DasFrodo

On 2/21/2024 at 3:06 PM, Mash said:

Explore the import settings!, dont just take the defaults and expect nirvana. You can import materials from cad materials, from cad groups, from cad layers, it depends how the cad guy made the project in the first place. You can also define polygon density; some advice there, set angle to somewhere between 30 and 5 degrees, then play with sag, this controls how polys are added across larger curved areas and not just the corners. 20 degrees angle with 0.02 sag can give a good high quality finish without going mad in rounded corners. Increase sag for few polys on large curves, 0.03, 0.04 etc

This is why I love InstaLOD. It's not AS important for offline rendering but if you're going to create realtime ready models, like we do right now mostly, then it's your best friend.

If I have a product, let's say a motor with a bunch of screws  and hex nuts and whatnot, I will select the main body and set the max sag to the highest I can get it, and solely control the detailing by the max angle, which I set very low. Then for the smaller details like screws, I set the angle to something like 22 degrees and control mostly by lowering the max sag. This way I have precise control over which parts get how much detail. In my experience controlling with max degrees works better with cylindrical and "organic" shapes.

What working with max angle as "main constraint" also helps with is that cylinders that are inside each other will get subdivided evenly, instead of unevenly. What I mean by that is this:

Subdivision controlled by max angle, subdivision is even

Subdivision controlled by max sag, subdivision is uneven

• Controlling the subdivision with max angle is scale independent since a cylinder will always be 360° no matter if it has a radius of 500m or 5mm
• Controlling the subdivision with max sag is scale dependant since it looks at the distance between the CAD model and the generated geometry

So if you want perfect overlapping cylinders without the disgusting artifacting from above, use something that nicely divides 360° like 45, 22.5, 11.25, etc. for max angle and don't use max sag or turn it up so high that max angle is mostly the more aggressive setting that decides the geometry shape

The cool thing about InstaLOD is that you can do this for every single part in your assembly, and get instant feedback. C4D just imports the entire thing in one detail setting wether you like it or not. So you end up with either reimporting and mixing and matching (which can take A LONG time depending on the size of the STEP) or living with not so great subdivision.

It cannot be understated how much a tool like InstaLOD helps making great CAD conversions.

If you want REALLY good CAD conversion I can recommend InstaLOD. It allows you to have fine control over every single object in the STEP file, set detail settings for every single one, automate repairs, clean up the materials (so you don't end up with metal.01, metal.02, metal.03, metal.04, ...). etc.

There is a free version currently, but you have to request a license manually. https://instalod.com/fsl/

We're using the tool for over a year now for all our CAD data needs and you wouldn't believe how much time and nerves this thing saved us.

I don't think people understand how futile this backlash is. This stuff is going to happen, and there is absolutely nothing we can do about it. I'm not even trying to be cynical here. Imho that's just how it is.

34 minutes ago, BoganTW said:

 

You swore in your third sentence, telling us your feelings about the link to Chaosgroup. Plesse don't ask me to read it a third time, twice is more than enough. Not really language that would require a thread cop to haul you off for arrest, but a bit over the top given that your Google search for a place for Maxon feedback was declared a disaster because the link titled 'Bug reporting, fixing and feedback' at Maxon.net was just a few links down the page. If someone can learn 3D I'm assuming they can also manage browsing a page of Google results.

 

But I take your broader point that the current situation with Maxon and Cineversity could maybe be tidied up a bit. They should bring Dr Sassi and the Cineversity ask-your-questions forum over to the new Cineversity.maxon.net page and give it a slightly more modern look, and possibly also mention this in their Maxon Training Team recordings - "don't forget, you can ask questions here if you have any issues" - and that would probably sort things out.

Uh uhm, yeah.

Quote

be hard too, so no wonder you're swearing so much.

 I used goddamn once in a post. I am swearing so much. Please, think of the children!

Speaking of "thread cops". You do realize that I'd have to arrest myself, do you?

16 hours ago, BoganTW said:

Maybe just read what Maxon tells you when you subscribe rather than running to Google? They tell subscribers when they subscribe that Cineversity is there for them. If people forget what they're subscribing to then it's probably on them, unless Maxon are suppose to pass out dietary supplements to users to stop their memory from clouding.

 

The official Maxon support link is just two links under that Chaosgroup link you cited. If looking two links down is hard, then life itself if probably going to be hard too, so no wonder you're swearing so much.

 

 

I'm just going to pretend I did not see the last sentence, but I'm inviting you to reread what I wrote, and count how many times I "swore".

3 hours ago, BoganTW said:

 

If you're subscribing to C4D you have access to Cineversity, and Dr Sassi there has responded to all the various queries I've posted there usually within an hour or so of me posting them. So calm down a bit.

No, this is on Maxon. If it is that hard to find where to give feedback or report bugs, then they failed.

Guess what pops up first when you Google for "c4d give feedback". This forum, this thread. With non personalized search engines like duckduckgo it's even worse.

If you search for "C4D bug report" once again you find nothing usable. The first thing you findi s a goddamn link to Chaosgroup and how to report bugs for their C4D plugins. It should not be this hard to give free feedback to a company for a software that people pay money for.

In a hypothetical scenario that some user wants to give feedback, what do you think, how long will they look for a page on Maxons site to give feedback? 95% will drop off immediately after they don't find it in the first 5 google results.

It is absolutely beyond me how Maxon moved the entire Redshift community to this forum and completely ignored the overall C4D community.

The situation is bad. Thing is, all Igor is doing is trying to keep this site alive. It's the only reason why we have the paywall.

58 minutes ago, Jeff H1 said:

Question is will they yield to pressure to make a lower-cost  version for Blender and honestly, why should they?   There's enough pandering going on.    It will be interesting to see the community as a whole cringe with they see a $300 (guessing) annual subscription for a particle plugin for their free software.  

I doubt they will do that, and if they do, it's not going to last long. Nobody in the Blender Ecosystem will pay this much for the tool. Well not nobody, but definitely not enough to make it worth the development cost.

Heh, seems like they're branching out. Smart decision I think. Them bringing their tools to Blender is huge, because it's still lacking a good particle system / tool.

Idk what's happening there, but it looks weird

Something weird is happening with the teeth there I think?

16 hours ago, Lonchaney said:

Filters>Distort>Perspective?

That's... interesting. Last time I searched for it I either didn't find anything or I found something with it that makes it useless for what I needed it. All I can remember from last time I tried is that the transform tools were not sufficient for me.

12 hours ago, Mike A said:

Let's hope that 'one big thing you've been waiting for' is the ability to easily and directly modify alpha channels just like any other channel... a request that has been around for years on the Affinity Photo forum - with absolutely no response from them.

A.Photo is a good application in many respects - but is tripped up by weakness in a few key areas. I have a copy, but Photoshop still reigns supreme for the stuff I do. I'll be interested to see what the Affinity crew deliver.

 

PS: I agree about the Ps / Adobe splash screens : )

I miss the transform tools from Photoshop. Especially Perspective and Freehand Transform. These are unfortunately dealbreakers for me in many cases.

https://parsec.app

Stupidly easy to set up.  works with a surprisingly shitty internet connection (~10mbit up on the sending end is already enough for decent quality). Almost no input lag. If you have a good connection you almost don't feel like you're using a remote PC. I've mixed up my local and remote PC by accident multiple times when I had Parsec open.

5 hours ago, Mike A said:

 

Welcome to the world of Houdini  -  inside joke ; )

- but I do agree with the overall sentiment ; )

lol I still remember when I tried out Houdini a while back.

Looking at a node, opening a dropdown, reading. 

"What the f*ck is a PolySoup?"

Houdini has a couple of these really weird special words for things

12 hours ago, Jeff H1 said:

Maxon will follow companies like Adobe, Autodesk and Foundry who have chosen not to yield to customer's frustrations on subscriptions, pricing, or the rise of other alternative software like Blender, Houdini, Fusion and so on.    I added Foundry because  they've overpriced Nuke, Mari, Katana and Hiero, driving the price up each year.   NukeX is now $10,268.  I bought it when it was around $6.5k about 5 years ago and recently stopped maintenance because the costs were going up by about $200 extra per year.   There has been no earth-shattering development in Nuke over the past 5 years to warrant a $3,768 increase over that period of time.    There's no reason why Maya sub should cost as much as it does, or even C4D for that matter, but it's what the market will bear.   Blender isn't taking over the industry despite what the pundits stated about 5 years ago, and each year and each release since then *yawn*.   If it DOES continue to eat up subscriptions for other software, it'll take at least another 3-4 years for numbers to potentially go negative and then maybe companies like Maxon and Autodesk will revisit.  However, Blender isn't the only one developing.  So are Maxon and Autodesk.  They'll continue to do just enough to keep their base and maybe a bit more.   The world said they were leaving Adobe when it announced CC and here we are years later and it hasn't happened.    CC was launched in 2012 with about 500K subscribers.   Prodesigntools did an analysis and determined there were 22mil subscribers in 2020 and around 26mil by the end of last year.  So much for the "angsty taking your ball and going home" like most said they would do with Adobe.  They've grown exponentially despite the few people that said they don't use CC anymore.   Apparently lots of others are.  

 

Do these companies care?  Of course not.    World crisis?  They don't care.  They've already counted their subscribers for the next 1 1/2 to 2 years.   They probably stopped forecasting perpetual license purchases about a year ago, which is why the phased it out now.    Those sales were more sporadic and not worth it to them.  

 

Here's a fun article by WIBU Systems (used to have a Vray dongle made by them):  https://www.wibu.com/magazine/keynote-articles/article/detail/the-many-opportunities-and-few-risks-of-software-subscriptions0.html

People haven't switched away from CC due to the simple fact that there are no alternatives.  You can replace single softwares in that package but guess what, once you need more than just, for example, premiere (and you will need AE as well), you have to pay for the full package.

Adobe is just shamelessly abusing its place on the market and they have been for ages. That's why people hate it. Their releases are god awful every time. Their development pace is pathetic for a company that big.

And they gobble up good software. Substance / Allegorithmic used to be a great company. The software is still good, but the ecosystem and the forums went to absolute trash.

And now recently they bought Figma. Might not mean much to many, but it's another thing that undoubtebly will be ruined by Adobes greasy hands.

The difference between Adobe and Maxon is that Maxon does not have this luxury. They, unlike Adobe, do not own the market. I can decide to not pay their subscription prices and go to Autodesk, which is cheaper. Or I pay nothing and go to Blender. And in the Blender ecosystem I can get a hundred plugins for the price that would get me one big C4D plugin like X-Particles.

I was a C4D user for over 10 years and I ditched the software when I switched my job. I am pretty much a hobbyist 3D-Artist at this point and I had no issues whatsoever switching to Blender. I just cannot justify the price Maxon is asking for.

If they had an Indie pricing, which people have been asking for the second they announced the subscriptions, then maybe I would have come back. But I haven't been using C4D for so long now that I really don't care anymore. Anything I want to do I can do in Blender, and more. The only thing Blender sucks at, for my usecase,  is MoGraph. There is just no competition here compared to C4D.

It's sad but it is what it is. I'm not even surprised they got rid of perpetuals. They all do, once they go subscriptions. It was just a matter of time. At least it took them longer than Substance, which was less than two years until they completely scrapped the perpetuals.

I'm just glad I jumped ship when I did.

The biggest issue I have with geo nodes is that the average artist can't do much with it. It's just too complex and low-level. I'd argue even Houdini is easier because it has tons of Nodes that are just a collection of other low level nodes.

Blender needs something like this. It needs easier, ready to use nodes that do the basic stuff like arrays.

Yes, you can build them yourself (if you have the skill). And yes, there's already tons on the web. But you have to find them first, they are not updated automatically etc.

I'd look like this as well if someone jammed a spoon in my brain.

Poor guy, didn't have to end like this. But I guess that's what you get for being delicious.

Thanks for the reminder.

I want to take this opportunity to say f*ck Adobe.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk

11 hours ago, MJV said:

Certainly never in the context of 3d printing.

What are you talking about? Especially with 3D printing you can easily use Booleans for pretty much everything, since topology doesn't matter at all. There is no shading errors to worry about. All that matters is the raw geometry. Unless your topology is uberscrewed with some reality breaking polygons it will print just fine. I've done this stuff for years.

Love the first two. They look like Infected Mushroom Album Covers

9 hours ago, Igor said:

Ugh, I would have to dig through my Discord and that things is super fast in generating images!  

Nope, you can just login on the Midjourney site and get all the images you generated

9 hours ago, Igor said:

I tried this thing yesterday...it's scary and cool!

Pics or didn't happen.

10 hours ago, hyyde said:

Loads of images that comes out of it is based on real artist styles. Many people type their names in, to get  similar results. Which is cool and scary, cause how would it be possible  to create your own Beksinski style image otherwise. In the matter of minutes. So it kind of has it own style, but i would say it tries to match it to the real life art that someone already has created. Going for photoreal results is a different story. It getting better but still most of it looks like paintings. So maybe that is its style after all.

 

But all in all its a brilliant tool for concept art and quite often for some style ideas for 3d work. I`ve spent way too much time with it already

I love how it tries to get very photographicy, studio lighting on some of the 'photoreal' examples. Some of them below:

It tries to match real art because that's what it's been fed. Sometimes you'll even get hints of watermarks in your images. I do think though that the "style" in this case is less the choice of colors, or shapes but more "how it blends" elements together. Midjourney always has this smeary, no straight lines, rounded look. It has a general idea of what it needs to draw, but it "draws from memory". Like if somebody tried to draw a horse without reference. The core elements are there, and you can either clearly see what it's supposed to be or what it tries to draw (because you know the prompts), but it's neeeeeever quite there.

Your images are awesome btw. Love the crystal balls and the bug... things?