Keeping software up to date

Snafu__

Hi everyone,

I was wondering something as I noticed that my substance designer/painter subscription ran out how people keep their software up to date for private use.

When I consider that 
Allegorithmic Pack  250€ per year
Photoshop CC  285€ per year
3ds max  2000€ per year
Vray 350€ per year
Zbrush 330€ per year (unless you pay 890 for a lifetime perpetual licence)

Total: 3215 € per year will amount to roughly 270€ per month

Situational:

Speedtree 240€ per year (20€ per month)
Marvelous Desnger 270€ per year ( 50€ per month)



I mean for some softwares you can  buy a perpetual licence but that still amounts to a huge sum. Plus after 3 years some licences will not receive updates or technical support anymore afaik.

Generally I was wondering how most of you do it since my eductional licences are about to expire and I still want to work on my skills privately at home.

Or if I have a chink in my way of thinking please let me know
:

lefix

I switched from autodesk to modo (1400$? perpetual) , and now to blender (free)since I am not doing much 3d anymore these days.
I use Affinity Designer (50$ perpetual) over Illustrator.
I also tried Affinity Photo, but I don't see it replacing Photoshop.
I use and prefer Hitfilm (free) over Premiere/AE.
I also own a perpetual license for 3Dcoat.
I use Figma (free)
I use Google Docs (free).

The only subscription i still have is the adobe photography plan for Photoshop, but I hope Affinity Photo or something else will prove to be a valid alternative in the future.

Eric Chadwick

I consider it a business expense, like rent, computer upgrades/replacements, etc. 

Of course that relies on you actually making money using the software. As a freelancer I just include software costs in my budget, like everything else.

If you're not thriving enough, there are plenty of free and low-cost options. Blender, etc.

You can also use these for freelance work, depends on the client's needs though.

I was doing a lot of work for those who needed 3ds Max files. So I bought a perpetual, and paid the $600 or so yearly to keep it up to date. 

As of last year, I'm not doing substantial freelance work anymore, employed fulltime instead. So I stopped the yearly.

Again though, it's just an expense to be budgeted. Part of running a business.
http://wiki.polycount.com/wiki/Freelance

m4dcow

Allegorithmic used to have sales, but after the Adobe acquisition I'm not sure if that will be the case anymore.

PixelMasher

if you are freelancing and cant afford 270 a month to cover your basic business costs, that could be a clear indication you are not charging enough. You should be able to cover that with a single days work at most professional rates for mid-senior level work, which is the level at which most successful freelancers I know are at. 

for personal skill development, max has a free educational liscence anyone can get, and the only software you really need after that for gamedev is the substance suite, and maybe photoshop. I do all my "rendering" in unreal engine which is free, so no need to get v-ray or anything like that. 

But yea, eric nailed it, if you are making money off freelance, you need to factor your software costs into your overall price, along with your overall cost of living. you need to develop an understanding of basic business which is hard and takes a lot of work, and even then most businesses fail after a couple years.

A lot of people are undercharging in a race to the bottom in an attempt get work, and can't remain profitable in the long term. My biggest advice to most people with freelancing is usually to up their rates by at least 50-100%. if you are freelancing for 10-15 bucks an hour that's extremely unsustainable in most cases and a great way to burn yourself out with financial stress.

long story short, if you were making 70k/year working at a studio, you probably need to be charging the equivalent of 90-100k a year for freelance work, otherwise the extra tax overhead, medical/benefits you have to pay yourself and equipment/software costs will kill you. 

Snafu__

Thanks everyone for your helpful insight. Im not freelancing at this time. I have a fulltime job as an architect. I was just wondering because I want to keep up my skill in game design and I noticed the prices and started wondering about it all

My next purchase will probably be zbrush.
I actually thought about enrolling in some relevant study to just be eligible for student prices or solutions Yaay to low enrollment fees in europe!
But I would kinda feel like a crook in the process

Biomag

No reason to feel as a crook. The lower prices for students is basically marketing for them - lower cost to learn software increase the number of people learning the software which is increasing how wide spread it is and thus chances to be used in the workplace. If people learning the programs can't afford them, they won't learn them and switch to a cheaper option

Neox

besides having and paying for the software updates (as the company)

i use

Max 2011
3dcoat 3.5
zbrush 4r7
an old knald version, maybe sometimes even crazybump

some of the tools i use daily are like 10 years old. you really do not have to be up to date on every software. Tho nowadays with subscriptions you are sorta locked into updating. But you could of course break that cycle by using blender

As of last year, I'm not doing substantial freelance work anymore, employed fulltime instead. So I stopped the yearly.

The yearly also sorta stopped with this year... or well they upped the prices by 20% so we sorta stopped all the maintenance plans and will keep using this software - if we need newer versions we will rent as needed. it definitely sucks

Andreicus

I have a full time job in a non related CG field and regarding CG i sell assets and do some freelancing works on the side.

I'm specialized in environments ( real time ) and my setup is currently this:

Maya LT 2019: subscription 317 € per year, has everything that you need if you are not a FX artist ( it doesn't have dynamics ) or non real time artist ( no Arnold ).
Combined with the Ninja Dojo plugin it becomes incredibily fast to model and retopo.

Zbrush Core 2018: 160 € perpetual, with the latest version they introduced a lot of features that were only available in Zbrush full like Decimation Master and 3D Print Hub but it's still limited. For me it's ok because i only use it for detailing props or doing some organic sculpting on rocks or similar.
I tried out 3D Coat but the viewport was lagging a lot while sculpting so i sticked with Zbrush.

Substance Painter & Designer: 150 € for both perpetual licenses

Marmoset Toolbag: 168 € perpetual

Unreal Engine: Free

TreeIt: Like SpeedTree but with less features and completely free and open source. I rarely use it because now we have scans for vegetations...

Gaea: Bought it during alpha stage for 160 € i think, perpetual license. It is similar to World Machine but it has some cool features although i rarely use it

Affinity Photo: 50 € perpetual. One of the best purchases that i did. it has almost all the features of Photoshop, same UI and some new cool features like live brushes and it's only 50 € one time payment.

Cloudydays

For a while I thought that buying perpetual licenses would be the best way to handle this - I bought perpetual licenses of Substance Designer and Painter (since those are the primary Substance software I use). But I really appreciate their constant updates so after a few months of lapsed maintenance, I usually go back to renew my maintenance.

This time around for renewing, I ended up doing a subscription since I am interested in more of their products and they update the products so often it's necessary to always update the software version. A few of these other software - such as zBrush and Speedtree - I would recommend subscribing to on the months that you need it. If you are doing a project that does not require foliage, then do not subscribe to Speedtree that month. Likewise, there's a whole suite of software you could use for hard surface or organic modeling but you don't need to use all of them as a part of the same pipeline.

I suppose a big of this is planning out your project and your needs - whether it's a personal or freelance project.

Zi0

I pay 120 euro a month for Photoshop CC, its cheaper when you get the photography package instead of a stand alone license. I'm not sure if they still have this deal tho.

Neox

you pay 120 euro per month?

Andreicus

Neox said:

you pay 120 euro per month?

He probably meant 12 € per month

Zi0

yeah my bad, I meant €12 euro per month 

Neox

phew! i was like "dang they are ripping you off man!
yeah photoshop on its own isnt that expensive anymore, but to be fair from my perspective it is becoming less and less relevant for game texturing.