Taron's active forum involvement makes me . . .

#9

The latest communication from Taron sounds like what I wait for since 1999/2000. Rather honest (“Yes this is a problem”) and open for improvement (like with the graph editor zoom).

This community is great and instead of the old “We’ll let you know” or even worse “you don’t need that feature anyway” attitude that left the user out in the cold and resigned, this form actually could work in the long run, since the users can really HELP in making messiah better.
Before, pmG only claimed to be user driven but didn’t live up to that promise - pretty basic stuff wasn’t implemented for years although it was requested almost daily (weight maps, search and replace in expressions…).

pmG is too small to do it the “Adobe” way, where a finished update is presented to the customers for consummation - like it or not.
pmG needs to let the users become part of the development. Sure some selection has to be done, but many of the annoying things in messiah can be agreed upon I’m sure.

Finally digging those old problems out - as boring as they may be to tackle - will give old time users back the hope and make it much easier and less frustrating for new users to learn messiah.

It is really funny that new XSI users often rave about how “logical” it is. I happen to organize the usermeeting for XSI in Berlin (http://www.xsi-berlin.org/) and one of the standing topics is, that XSI is extremely well thought out, but still way too complicated for many artists.

If messiah becomes as logical and intuitive to use, develops it’s animation tools steadily and keeps a good communication open, I can’t see why it shouldn’t become far more widely used once more, since it IS so much easier to use.

But it will only work if this time it is a honest change to the better - to much glass is already broken and the trust will have to be rebuilt over a longer time.

I wish messiah all the best :thumbsup:

Cheers

#10

95% of the voters so far are more positive.

As Thomas noted, this will be good if this trend is maintained. The pmG guys may feel that PR distracts too much from development time and adds many new ideas onto a heap that’s just struggling to get done, but overall I personally think they can’t afford to go without a public voice like this.

How about pmG contracts Thomas to do their docs? It will lift that burden from them and add another PR person [Thomas is good with PR once he’s positive :wavey:]. I think I can safely say that Thomas’ recent PDF docs are very well done, clear and to the point, even if they don’t contain Fred’s humor. With Taron on development+PR and Thomas on docs+PR messiah’s star is sure to start shining even brighter.

But alas, I can’t talk for pmG nor Thomas, just hoping really . . .

#11

I am very optimistic for Messiah, if the team continues their latest way in listening AND talking… :thumbsup:

I second Paul_Newmans idea; with a combo like that, I too see an even better future for Messiah, than I think “just a good program” alone can achieve. (or maybe some similar team, since I don´t want to “force” Thomas into something… even though I have to say, Thomas really has a thing for getting the information to the point quickly in his way of explaining… I would be happy, if both parties would consider it :bounce:)

LX

#12

I think “PR” is a bit misleading. I’ve worked on PR and pmG (and Thomas) is far from it - even Taron’s latest communication offensive. PR is a different beast: securing and influencing editorial coverage, influencing forums…
What I’m positive about (psyched to use) are the number of minor issues that have been taken care of in a very short amount of time. That’s listening and implementing. Being part of a community. And also to see that topics aren’t being decided behind a closed door, but are subject of community discussion. Words alone hasn’t changed my perception. Seeing the tool grow has.

#13

60 votes and 93% positive.

That says something.

Now for pmG to follow through. No pressure. Just keep going guys. :thumbsup:

Personally I’m much more excited. I should add that some of my excitement has to do with Thomas back on the scene with new goods and excellents docs.

Some may recall that I tried selling my copy of messiah a while ago. Well, there was interest but deals fell through. Just as well, since my new career choice ends up needing . . . tada . . . messiah, for rendering mostly at the moment. Strange but true. So I’m back. :slight_smile: I hope to start a W.I.P. thread soon.

#14

I look at PR in the basic sense of the meaning: we (messiah users and forum visitors) are the public and they (pmG) build a relationship with us. I don’t care too much for sanitized and impersonal corporate PR.

So in that sense yes, it was misleading. :slight_smile:

Also in that sense Taron’s latest effort and Thomas’ recent contributions are good PR. Anyway, let’s not argue semantics.

All very true. This has been the same for me, although I get the feeling that many people still have a sense of talk, listen and discuss is good but now show me the product. Following 2.4 with 2.4b in such short time after Taron responded to issues was a good feeling. It has created a certain positive momentum which now desperately needs follow through by pmG (even if not in such short succession but then also not too long a period of nothing - remember the Neverending Story where the “nothing” comes to destroy all that is good including the morale of the characters?). Thomas’ recent comments captures that nicely . . .

#15

Well, im about to do a series of animations with messiah with 3 characters. So ill be putting the animation side to good use.

As far as rendering, i think whats holding me back is the fact that i have to get BNR to use the network and im already commited to render mule. :frowning:

#16

Yep, I think that render.exe should be fixed and put back in the package - it worked with the free spider network renderer, just (large) image handling was broken.

If it works with fxs as well as mpj and the image bug is repaired, it would become a rather versatile solution.

I have nothing against BNR, I just would prefer to be able to integrate messiah in my existing setup.

Cheers,

#17

Not a Messiah user, but Taron’s work is actually inspiring !
if you have the occasion of watching him modelling… its quite like a polygon modelling sorcerer. never seen anyone so far modelling so rapidly and with such a great contol over realistic shapes.
other than that i really like his approach to creativity in his personal images kinda surrealistic inspiration. : that’s why teh more he posts the happier i am when i visit these forums! :buttrock:

#18

well actually, i think that its not a matter of other render software supporting it, but a clever strategy on messiahs part to exploit the existing code for lightwaves render node controller software.

hear me out. Messiah, already tries to transfer alot of the LW settings into messiah native settings. So why not make a render executable that would interpret render settings designed for LW? so it would be a matter of setting up the render software as if youa re setting it up for LW but instead of the LWSN.exe being the file accepting the parameters, you would have messiah renderer do the interpretation.

this would instantly allow you to render over the network with messiah using any network renderer that is designed for LW. Does this sound feasible?

#19

Sorry Stooch, that’s way too twisted to be useful. :wink:
There are so many tools available for rendering that work with the kind of command line rendering that render.exe allowed (spider is free but there are tons of others), that every attempt to mimic some other software is just wasting time IMO.
And until the image and path problems are fixed for network rendering, your approach doesn’t help a bit since they are so basic and even happen in the main messiah application -> there are a lot of scenes that if you open them from the file tab and directly hit F9 will render black. You can fix it by just switching to the Render Tab, but this is the same problem as in the render.exe where - if you set each node to render 5 images in a row - the first one is often rendered black.
From the outside it looks like a (hopefully simple) initialization problem.
Getting .fxs to work shouldn’t be that hard either, since render.exe is just a frontend to the messiah program itself started without an interface. So I guess the .fxs problem is maybe related to the ages old imperfection in the working directory handling…???

Wrong thread for that anyway :wink:

Cheers and sorry for the OT

#20

I’m one of them…?
Taron is very cool and inspiring but, after all those years I just want the final-release more than I want inspiration!

/ Svante

#21

I’m new to Messiah and new to 3D CG too. I’m looking to find an app for character animation that I’m comfortable with and get good results. I find it really encouraging that Taron not only posts here, but shows his personal work (created on his other work: Messiah) here as well. This has got to be exceptional.

However, I must say that the Messiah learning curve is really very steep. In some ways I think it is too powerful for it’s own good. I thought I was intelligent but trying to get a decent result on Messiah has made me self doubt that. I’ve worked through all the web freebies I could find to very little effect. I have just ordered the entire collection of Joe Cosman DVDs so will persevere because all you guys out there can’t all be wrong. (Now I know why it’s called Messiah…you just gotta have faith!). All the major press re: Messiah is really positive which is what drew me here. But I think that I am on a well trodden path and wonder how many other potential disciples have given up and found a more convenient route to 3D salvation because of the lack of tutorials and ‘bridging’ guides. And I gotta add, Flash movies without commentary are really no fun to follow because all the important key presses happen between the frame rate.

Stickin’ with it.

#22

well many of you will know that I don’t hold back if I’m not happy about something…& for almost 1 year since buying Messiah:Studio workstation I was very unhappy. It was unstable, the docs were crap, OpenGL was temperamental & as for autorig…(sorry!)

…but now we have 2.4b. I got a fair bit of flack for questioning what this release actually does but I think that it was worth asking, after all what use are new tools if the app is still unstable or the interface glitches whenever you move something? Well, I’m pleased to say that I actually trust it enough now to use it. I still get the occasional crash but it’s generally due to myself not setting something right before rendering (such as displacements) & I find it really frustrating to use but it finally does what it says on the box. The bones are a dream to work with (why would you need autorig?) & I’ve hardly done any character work before & I’ve finally got Lightwave, ZBrush & Messiah working in harmony…woohoo!:bounce:

My only gripe is with the shading system. I can see how powerful it can be but I find it incredably difficult to get the simplest of surfaces to look right. Actually another thing that bugs me is that I can’t have multiple viewports for setting up a scene so that I don’t have to constantly switch between top, front, side, perspective & camera views…or can you?

…so, am I positive or negative?..um, 80% positive. I’m fairly pleased that I couldn’t sell it but wonder whether my money could have been better spent on another app that suits me better.

#23

Are you talking about a quad view? If so it’s there and has been for a long, long time.
(wonders what else you’ve missed…):shrug:

#24

For multiple Viewports: press W for two windows and Q for four.
The interaction is a bit annoying in multiview but it’s there.

As for the shading: You may know them already, but a lot of people found my docs for AoN and TLHPro helpful. Especially in the AoN:Studio docs I go into great detail about the internal flow of values. (see the two links in my signature for the downloads).
In the end, “nodebased thinking” boils down to something very simple: almost everything is values between 0.0 and 1.0… Try to build a basic understanding of RGB, HSV, Alpha etc. and go from there. (Well, that may be a stupid advice, sorry. I don’t try to be a smartass here, but with nodes, you have to know a bit about the internals to have fun…)

And maybe it is time to go once more through the docs. They are lacking in some areas but with your gained knowledge, you may find some things easier to grab then when you first read them.

The 2.4 release didn’t push me out of my socks too, too many “old friends” were still present (or still missing). And one of the last things I need messiah for is particles. But the latest development in squashing bugs/problems and the improved communication has made that almost vanished spark a bit brighter again.

Good luck! :thumbsup:

#25

Actually another thing that bugs me is that I can’t have multiple viewports for setting up a scene so that I don’t have to constantly switch between top, front, side, perspective & camera views…or can you?

You hit “Q”. Quick keys chart at bottom of docs.

I on the otherhand feel the docs are well done. (I picked up the full Cosman Show set myself…and am very pleased with the 2 dvds that have already arrived :thumbsup: .)
I will admit the rendering make take awhile to learn. But its still a less task set to learn then the rigging process in other larger packages. HintHint can’t wait for Taron to get out those render tutorials… :smiley:

#26

ah, it does have quadview:bounce:

now that’s made me think a bit more…there’s actually a few other things that bug me at times. I could blame the docs or the layout or a hundred other things…

I think that the one major problem that I have with messiah is that it’s not Lightwave & that’s what I’m used to. I can see that Messiah is a brilliant tool but unfortunately many of it’s users will know of it from it’s early days as a Lightwave plugin. That’s how I heard of it…& Lightwave users, I think, are spoilt with a pretty easy to understand interface & quite a simple, logical way of doing things…Messiah on the other hand has some fairly bizarre concepts that’s going to take a while to get used to. I was sure that I’d searched for quadview in the docs but obviously not…I would have thought though that it would make more sense to have a button for it next to the other views?..also, if something is important, why should you need to press F3 to see it?..very odd but this is not the place.

As I said before I’m using it more now & I’m learning all the time but I often wonder what I could have created if I’d saved a bit more & got Softimage, Modo or even some Lightwave training material.

#27

honestly. i dont know what to tell you other then to stick to lightwave.

have fun animating.

#28

Bilousfrog: I’ve seen quite some people who just weren’t compatible with certain software. Some hate a tool that others love.
I was in love with Lightwave for a long time - now after a year with XSI as my main tool I recently had to use LW again and found it very “ancient” and annoying, especially the modeler.
You are right with some of the problems in messiah and the bizarre and non-obvious bit, but on the other hand, if you don’t like a tool you will always find something odd about it, but if you like it, you will just make it work for you.

In the end it is a decision to either dig into it or leave it and use something else.

Cheers,