Any silo 2 users here?

richardanthony · Dec 2009

I have been thinking about purchasing silo 2 for modeling. yeah i know there are some bug issues and it hasn't been updated in a while but it really seems like a good zbrush/modo alternative. the ui is really simple and has a nice clean, uncluttered layout.

worth a buy? it's only $159 for the pro version:poly121: or would i be better off buying a older version of lightwave or cinema 4d for about $200?

CrazyMatt · Dec 2009

I own a copy of it myself.

It's a good piece of software. Though it depends on what you're main need of use is. Wether that'd be for characters, props, or environments.
Silo is relatively what I would say what "Maya's modeling toolset" should be today. Though the advantages it has are fine at it's cost. But I tend to use/used it for the purposes to bridge my work gap between packages.

In many cases, I did not want to follow anything about Maya's community anymore after 6 years of using the package. So after getting tired of trying to keep up2date with plugins, scripts, ect. Silo was the opportune advantage to bridge my quick gap in need of modeling faster. After owning the software for more than a year now. I have not tried it's UV tools, though I hear they are decent.

If all you want to do is model, it's a pretty good deal for the price you get.:)

LoTekK · Dec 2009

If you're aware of the bugs and lack of updates but are still considering it, I'd say go for it, especially if your main requirement is modelling. It's got a solid toolset and workflow, and it's generally quite fast (though to be fair, I tend to work with rather lowpoly stuff).

Rick Stirling · Dec 2009

+1

It has issues, but it's a lovely modeller.

richardanthony · Dec 2009

thanks for all the good advice. yeah i'm aware of the bugs. i downloaded the demo version and it is very easy to jump in and start modeling. i fell in love with the gui. i get it. i can use silo to model and blender to render/animate.

i was thinking about hexagon but silo seems like a deeper modeler. one that can hang with the big dogs(zbrush, modo, maya etc) besides i think it's a great learning tool. it has the built in human figure mesh which may be cheating but it's faster than importing a reference blueprint image. LOL

I think i'll go with silo.

Ged · Dec 2009

Ive got it but stopped using it when it wasnt updated and when I realised I was getting rusty at max(which employers seem to recommend being rather good at)

Slave_zero · Dec 2009

I used silo at work and I will buy me a personal license soon. The programm is pretty nice. Although there are some bugs and no further upgrades (as said above) it has some really nice features.

Nice customizable GUI, fast selection methods and a nice subdiv handling which is supperior to maya(<=8.0).

As I was used to work with maya before, Silo offerd some really nice approaches to basic modelling.

Texturing tools are quite nice. although you don't have as much control (projections etc.) like in maya.

Negatives Points of the software are imo:

- No alpha on materials
- the newest version doesnt support scripting. (I heard there is some old version arround which can do python scripting, but its not distributed any more. But it's traded on ebay.

Conclusion:

YOu get a nice modelling tool which lacks some advanced features but provides great handling and fast interaction. And it's cheap as dirt compared to other packages and the features you get with it.

CheeseOnToast · Dec 2009

I use it for organic base meshes mainly. For this it's brilliant. Very quick, lots of context sensitive stuff. It also preserves vertex order reliably, something I've had problems with going between Maya/Mudbox/Zbrush before.

Its main shortcoming for me is that there are no deformers or true splines, which means I have to jump into Maya for some things. It can be a bit crashy, but you start to learn the kind of operations that make it crash and avoid them.

Wheel · Dec 2009

I love it. Great for organic low to mid poly work. What it lacks in frills it makes up for in speed and simplicity. Get the demo check it out on your system as it can be a little crashy, but as Cheese says you soon learn what operations to avoid (or save before) performing.

Entity · Dec 2009

I love it, it's so quick for modeling

Unleashed · Dec 2009

what GED said! I hate how the devs how basically said we cant be buggered to continue the program(I loved silo and did buy a copy but no longer use it)

Mark Dygert · Dec 2009

I've used it. I Loved it. It has a great toolset and a quick and light way of working. I would say at the very least try it out. I ended up re customizing after I had used silo for a while.

I've read some real horror stories about it being buggy and crashing, which it never really did to me all that often, at least no more than Maya or Max. But they seem to kind of abandoned it. As is its pretty good, just don't bank on future updates.

ScoobyDoofus · Dec 2009

I'll just jump in here and say that while I do love Silo for modeling sometimes I've become disenchanted due to the massive quantity of bugs. The number of times I've lost work due to crashes or frequent file corruptions is too numerous to count. It crashes hard multiple times daily/hourly(?). The fact that the guys who made it basically told their user base to go fuck themselves and stop asking for support doesn't endear me to the app.

I bought it and now regret it.

Any silo 2 users here?

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