Full custom normals support will be in the next version.
.fbx support is also slowly getting better last I’ve seen (not a fast process due to being unable to use the SDK), and the near future should see work on a new viewport GLSL engine that should allow one to create a realtime PBR system.
Already in is an FPS mode for the camera and Cycles baking tools (highly usable for game assets). It goes to show that the BF has enough resources now to do a bit of both.
And you are not alone.
Autodesk has a known track record of killing products that might create inhouse competition.
Best example: Edit*
Back then the german distributor Yello was so successful that Edit* got implemented into many bigger german TV stations for newsroom editing. Big systems with 30+ machines on the very same storage pool were among this.
Autodesk decided that THIS would affect the market for the bigger Discreet products Flame, Smoke, Inferno. So - from one day to another - they killed Edit* (and almost its distributors AND users, due to killing support at the same time). We invested in Edit* systems very shortly before and I was quite close to the distributor team, so I know my bits.
Some stations released a rule that no longer any Autodesk products may be used in their stations afterwards.
Last year - with stopping Softimage - Autodesk did it again. I guess a whole bunch of ex- Softimage users is no longer happy with anything branded Autodesk. We still use Autodesk products, but for me its just a matter of time when a decision between Maya & 3DS MAX must be made. Autodesk had a long time to join the developments and - honestly - I haven’t really the impression this is happening, are you?
How Autodesk handles their business is surely their thing. With Softimage they gave at least some lead time and transition options. Or when they integrate one product into another its a nice move for some customers. So there are always pro’s and con’s.
Or think of Apple killing its compositing app. Rumors held about 3 years for the magic realtime enable follow-up tool. I think in the meantime even the hardest Apple-believers got shut up regarding this one.
I can just remind any company that there is a difference between having a loyal and respectful cooperation between your customer base and yourself, or by dictating the rules everybody need to follow.
Business-wise one must be able to justify development & support cost, that is why so many now move on to rental options, as its a pay-as-you-go thing. In the long run this brings more reliable money into the companies than hoping the next version is attracting many users to buy the update. Money isn’t as loose anymore as it has been a decade ago in this business.
With the rental licensing model there are two benefits:
A) You get your updates every now and then when a bug got fixed or a new feature enabled. No wait for the next big thing anymore (Agile software development)
and
B) The company earns money WHILE developing, no longer working and investing against a release data and then they might not be successful enough to compensate the cost.
In case of Adobe this creates apparently a very healthy business model.
Best
Axel
Umm, what? The UI hasn’t changed. The icons merely got replaced and the corners on windows are a bit sharper now. The interface is still the same, no inspiration being taken from other software.
Maya has had Spline IK capabilities for ages, it’s just simpler to utilize now.
This sounds to me like someone who has not spent much time learning Maya’s UV tools. They are very powerful and work well. The previous Unfold algorithm was already great, but as of 2015 they have Softimage’s Unfold3D algorithm, which works even better. I absolutely prefer it over Blender’s, hands down.
I have the student version of Maya 2016 and maybe some features can be cool, I’m interested in Allegorithmic Substances in Maya and PBS shader, for game design, but… I prefer Blender. The rendering is not in real time, crashes a lot on dummy things, support is not great… And i think I’ve read in Steams forums that LT cannot use certain stuff, as the Substance Designer plug-in.
The only thing I saw that Blender didn’t have was the node based opengl shaders. But ue4 and unity has that for free. Which is probably better to do in those anyways.
I feel that maya guys made this app for a quick buck. $800 bucks is actually not that much but you could buy game assets for that money instead.
Juat look into https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/ and see what you can get for $800. Sure you need to retexture and stuff to make it your own.
Edit: Just learned that it’s $30 a month. That’s actually better. Also they seem to have probably a perfect export of fbx file format. Also with no polygon restriction if UE4 is on the same system.
by golly! is that a docked outliner?!