Where is a better forum web site? CGTalk is dead.

#39

I could be wrong, but I’ve felt at times that it was a “Post No Bill” issue. Kind of like how you don’t want people posting ads on your lawn fence or gate.

But I feel such concerns (if any) should not apply here. Inevitably, the artists who are any good (or any more determined) below Professional level would be doing some form of self-publishing and I feel that’s a niche CGTalk could fill. You obviously have “residents” from Naughty Dog and Disney, but imagine if we encouraged sharing from the people making Steam Greenlight titles and cool shorts as well and allowed both these factions to mingle without boundaries.

One of my most cherished interactions over here, albeit on PM, was the chance to exchange feedback on REVERSION with someone who did work on a major film. We talked about eye shaders, and he shared some of his own rigging ideas, about audience expectations when seeing CG footage…I realized without this forum or community, I would have had a harder time finding him.

And that kind of interaction improves everything: Artistic Sensibility, Technique, Industry Awareness.

It’s golden. But they have to set people free.

#40

I’d like to agree with the feeling of there being “way too much everywhere.” The forums could feel so much simpler and cleaner, and therefore more inviting to new visitors. Imagine I’m a first time visitor… on the splash page, I see a lot of news and workshop stuff, but the link to the forum is very small. Now say I do manage to get to the forum. What do I see in the index?

Thrust CG Society’s Challenge Gallery
CG Award Gallery
Featured 3D
Featured 2D
Featured Videos
Latest Entries
News
General Discussion
The Chatter Box
Recruitment
Education
Best from the Web
Meet the Artists
Site of the Month
WIP Studio Professional Feedback
WIP/Critique: 3D
WIP/Critique: 2D
WIP/Critique: Animation
Collaborative Team Projects
Modeling Challenge
Rigging Challenge
Sketch Challenge
FXWARS Challenge
Animation Challenge
Lighting Challenges
Digital Matte Painting Challenge
… and about 30 more

Now, it’s not bad to have several sections, but it’s very overwhelming and should definitely be cut down and better organized, and why aren’t critique and discussion forums at the very top?

Let’s say I’m a first time visitor to Polycount. Okay, the link to the forum is in slightly bigger text, but since the feed is of recent posts on the forum, I can easily click one and get drawn into a thread and engage in the community. And if I click the forum link and see the index, what do I see? First off, minimal visual clutter at the top of the site. And as for the forums, the first one is 3D Art Showcase and Critique. Below that, there is much more consolidation as well as some descriptions to help visitors know where to go.

I think you can look at a site like Polycount and study its design and organization. There are users like myself whose interests align more with CGTalk but would like to see it become a more vibrant community.

#41

When cited under new management, a forum wide revamp was in the wind I thought great. As a long time lurker from the early days prior too full CGS membership, I’d reckoned was indeed much overdue let alone hoped for initiative. So when redesign choices practically in realtime throughout the initial stages became apparent last year, my first gut reaction was less than favourable to say the very least. Even going so far as to question the artistic bona fides of the people involved.

However was prepared to give the benefit of the doubt, and yeah no denying the fact improvements were made which to my mind pertinent back end wise, pretty much a mind bending undertaking at the best of times overhauling large and active web sites, so yes my compliments. But that being said client side, to be completely honest and by the way hurts writing this because I absolutely adore CGTalk, sadly not so much. As aforementioned, the giant text, alongside in my opinion superfluous sub-forums excluding Chatter Box of course, a long awaited resource that must stay.

At the moment, generally the forum has taken on a decidedly second hand vibe. Speaks volumes I think especially through the eyes of the random visitor with an expectation of a professional polished demeanour plus aesthetic, CGTalk has reputed to have attained over the years. Rather than an ‘ad hoc’ portrayal it presently depicts. I’ve harped on about it via a number of relevant threads in that, other communities seem to’ve resolved similar issues, for example Polycount amongst others.

Lastly directed at Admin or whomever responsible:

Please! take a look at what they’re doing and get a handle on this. Because again I hesitate in voicing a possible outcome this thread’s title portends…

#42

I haven’t been around for ages. I may have missed a lot of wars and other mishaps around here, but I don’t think any of that is the problem. More popular modes of social networking, Facebook, Twitter, Linked In, Wechat, are faster and more convenient that forums, and they work on phones, meaning one can be always on so to speak. This hasn’t just hurt this forum, or forums in general, but the personal website as well.

I have heard from numerous, previously successful people that you can’t get by with your own site anymore. You must be on Twitter, Tumblr, Instagram, Facebook etc.

Sharing is everything now, and forums aren’t the idea venue for that. It has to be one click, show my friends!

I really wish I knew how to use twitter… :frowning:

#43

I agree with your comments. It’s a bit of time suck learning to navigate the social media effectively. You can’t just learn how to use it, you have know how to maximize its use as well as how to tie it in with the other channels in a way that brings you a nice ROI

#44

I check in on this thread regularly and like that people are interested in posting.

I don’t have time to address everything in here but wanted to chime in on a few things.

1st thing is we are here listening to the community, so if you have suggestions, we weigh out what we have time, and resources, to fix, or change. also please understand that for every voice the compliments or complains the majority stays silent until you actually change something, so while 5 people may say that chatter box is useless or doesn’t work, or there are too many forums when we delete or merge a forum we get 100’s of emails complaining that we did it. One of the biggest challenges is that when you have a site this busy a ton of your loyal traffic doesn’t post at all. I think the key for everyone is making the site more welcoming, engaging and useful.

Too many forums.

This is the issue it seems a lot of people debate. We do here almost daily.

One example:

Modeling Challenges
Modeling WiP 3d
Modeling
Zbrush

I think these all fit under the forum header of “Modeling” but the truth is each has a loyal group of users that if we make a change makes things much more confusing for them and quickly become chaotic.

Some Forums are legacy forums like “Meet the Artist” Great archival material for young users and students looking for advice or to get familiar with some of the people working in the industry. We could revitalize it but the need with so much social media is maybe not something our users are as interested in?

Some Forums like Science and Technical Art , are new forums we have added to expand and help provide access and highlights from some of the CG and 3d done in other areas, such as medical, and science fields… because of this forum we are working on a partnership with some interesting companies that will soon be contributing to the site like MIT but for now they are slow. Do we give them the time to finish the partnerships and mature or kill them off is a good question.

Other Forums like Best of The Web is an experiment to help highlight artist and events that you find around the web on your daily travels, Someone or Something you feel is worth highlighting… I run across someone everyday i feel is worth sharing, but don’t always have time to post so without users or a moderator is will die and we will decide if it’s a thread to be deleted. To me Moderators that have time or desire to take on forums like these are what makes a forum alive or dead. We have had 20,000 new users in the past 3 months and are ranked 8,700 in the US on alexa, numbers wise this site is very much Alive but without serving the community This site will die as would any. Moderation is on a volunteer basis people get busy and don’t have the time to community so one of the biggest task we have is finding those people that have an interest in helping take on new forums. If you are interested, being a volunteer can provide you perks like passes to events or subscriptions for software for reviews and simple things, but at the end of the day it needs to be someone who is passionate and for me Friendly and Helpful tops the list.

Until recently self promotion for kickstarter and gumroad has been forbidden I feel times have changed and that everything about what we do at CG Society should be to help serve the Artist and Community. I am interested in opening a forum dedicated to this so that it doesn’t clutter existing cg news or general discussion. We have been waiting on input from mods here on the site to see what their previous experience is and take that into consideration first. We need to increase our moderators to help run things effectively so we can take the time to highlight student short films, start ups, kickstarters while making sure things are in the right place and not distracting to help, news, galleries or specific areas.

My view is if we can help expose your work, your efforts, your journey, then hopefully you will come back from your success to lift the next artist to their own success

Font issue… On our list of things to do, one of the biggest challenges we face is the historic coding of this site and database. for 15 years rather than migrate the site to new tech everything has been code hacked on top of code, anyone doing web development or experience site migration and a database like this can confirm what a nightmare it is. We have the tech and resources to build a site similar to some of our partners and others but to migrate the database for a site this large is not cheap. We are going through the code next month and spending a few days unifying all the font because its insane that its all over thee place;)

Some of our close friends work at Naughty Dog and AAA studios and some are at schools working hard to get a gig, while others just picked up a trial to me all of these people are part of the community and we are interested in featuring everyone so when they post we will highlight it. if you bust ass and create art whatever level. I look everyday for artist to feature and spend most of my time looking for great students working hard to help highlight them here on our site.I think one of the biggest testaments to the site is that the top row on the main page no longer features add for workshops that help fund the site, but now feature work of artist that post images and films to the community.

Last issue an the most relevant to me.

Our site isn’t pretty and has a lot of issues but it’s like a classic car that someone tells you isn’t worth the money to sink into it until it’s finished and you put the top down and go for a cruise along the coast with your friends! Today it’s much easier to build a new site or use social networks but this site has helped hundreds of artist move from what could make a fun hobby to a life as an artist. It is going to take a while to fix things, find the right organization and get the wrinkles ironed out but no one can argue that we are here to help, listening and working to add value to the experience looking forward to welcoming new users and foundation users that have been here for many years passing on their knowledge.

I will keep checking back to see what we can add or change to help people’s experience but wanted to chime in on a few of these issues I found relevant

#45

Yes, this is more or less the idea I had in mind. CG Society can be a COMPLEMENT to Social Media effects surrounding an artist’s efforts to exposure rather than compete for end user attention.

The main value of this place is supposed to be the “closed commune” in which people can discuss their ideas and WIP without the whole planet Earth taking a piss on the WIP or other ideas if such were immediately placed on Social Media.

Then you can help frontpage some things or feature them and others will naturally mobilize on Social Media accounts they already possess for the efforts they really love.

So it can be very organic. :slight_smile:

#46

i feel like this place could benefit by covering more of the indie game dev scene…there’s definitely a huge interest in it and it’s still at its early stages…lots of pros and hobbyist making and selling their own games online, and there aren’t that many sites covering their stories.

aside from the really popular ones…i find out about them when i see the game, do a google search, maybe randomly find a blog post about it and then nothing more. this site could make it the go to site for things of that sort. behind the scenes stuff, more exposure for the indie creators. at the moment, the site is too spread out trying to cover everything…i have to admit, this site isn’t as hot as it used to be. some major brain storming is needed. indie is a good start, lots of engines now going free to use and such. plus the VR stuff that’s starting up.

#47

Agreed on this. I also want to point out that there’s nothing wrong with the AAA folks being here. In fact, it’s what first attracted me to this place!

Obviously, if you’re choosing stuff to put in the gallery, the AAA guys would normally have it. But I’d really like to see a way where that interaction of the Established and the Indie guys (particularly artists and devs) can really happen here in a Community atmosphere (and not some public place in Social Media).

I think it can be a very special place if that evolution were to occur! :slight_smile:

How cool would it be if you were making a shooter and some guy from Idsoft talks about stuff they did to solve a few problems in DOOM?

This is the place where that can happen! :slight_smile:

#48

Hi Travis,

It is good to hear that you guys are listening and have plans to continue working on the site. On the point of old forums that serve more as archival material, why not consider transferring that material into subforums under an Archives forum so as to reduce visual clutter?

#49

I used to visit daily and often. Simply because I like to answer questions, toss ideas between fellow artists, or help out with examples.

People just stopped asking, I visit less often, much less often. Seems most all have moved over to asking on “faster” response outlets like facebook. Which to put it frank, sucks, as the archive of info gets lost easily there.

#50

Why always good things die in the end? I remember CGTalk and DigitalTutors for a years, never had a chance to talk with pro artists. Also, when I registred on DT it was pretty dead. Now while i have a chance to learn something (still not in better position because im my self teacher, just following some tuts all around), to hang out and talk with other artists, my favorite forums are dead. And now when i need some attention ppl are gone, so i cant ask for help anywhere. All known Maya IRC channels are also dead. So when my time has come to become an artist there is no support for me.

I have finished one spaceship tutorial from DT and it went well but now I following tutorial Modeling a Female Character for Animation in Maya and it pissed me at start. This tuti should be for beginners but nope its not, but in the second lesson he skipped few steps and added new objects, like foots and similar so i cant follow him anymore. Tried to model foots by myself but it doesnt look like in video and i dont have a clue how to get same foot as his. Since childhood I was dreaming about day when I’ll became greatest 3D artist in the world…but because of all these so called “beginner” tutorials im so pissed that i almost smashed 2000$ worth pc.

And because all of that, dead forums, no support from pro artists, professional tutis for “beginners” etc I cant live like that, cant learn something, cant move from one place, cant make my dream comes true, cant make my own masterwork. Its painful, every time I see good animation or 2D/3D art I crying like a baby.

I have tried 3D modeling a few years ago and i was good, done few basic projects for “noob” but when i was on something more complex i didnt had professional hand to guide me.
This video inspired me to start it again, sadly i got problems just like few years ago, but I’ll try not to give up this time.

//youtu.be/KgQCgqUe3LE

#51

I used to enjot visiting this location but it certainly has lost whatever luster it used to have for me.
Not very fond of the new layout here but that’s just me.

Years back when this used to be a wild west of sorts, yes I recall the Lightwave forum where things did get wild and rude, it was entertaining and not the pc snore fest that this place has become thanks to its need to become vanilla flavored because of it going commercial etc.

The moderators are somewhat responsible for their way too cautious and largely patronizing and condescending tone. And I am NOT referring to Leigh who has always been entertaining even when I didn’t quite agree with her, but she certainly has a lot more cajones than the majority of the rather smug attitudes from mods who have snuffed out any contrary view of theirs.

Add to that the same old chorus of predictable, bully legacy forum posters and you end up with where you are now.

I’d say you screwed the proverbial pooch here.

#52

ohh come on ppl, its already 3 days how i wrote my post and its still not validated…what kind of forum is this???

#53

It’s been a while since I’ve checked these forums (months!). Been quite busy with work in general. Hoping it continues strong. I’ve learned a lot from the community over the years.

#54

Speaking on the self-promotion, Kickstarter etc.
I remember when Kickstarter began getting hot, there were multiple posts daily about such and such random crowdsourcing project that seemed interesting. I, for one, posted a couple in GD such as the 3Doodler. My impression on the “NO CROWDSOURCING THREADS” post was in regards to that. As in stop cluttering up GD with random crap.

I never got the idea that promoting your own work was frowned upon but that may due to me seeing the entire conversation. Looking at that post today I see it threatens with banning so perhaps it does need to be revisited. :smiley:

#55

Polycount is kind of cool, but damn the artwork there is a bit erm… intimidating
These people know what they are doing and clearly have been in the games industry for a while
Their forum software is among the best I’ve used.

Luxology forums, I hear are nice

Blender artists (even if you don’t use blender) is also nice, just don’t mention the game engine.

#56

It looks like we will start a forum for kickstarter and personal projects I will test it out for a month or two to see if it adds value and helps… if not pull it. I think it is a useful tool to help artist that come and contribute.

#57

But as has been said before, the (growing) number of sub-forums is part of the problem. Don’t add another one. Simply allow announcing kickstarters on News and discussing own projects on GD and see if it spirals out of control or not. If it does, revert the rules. If not, you’ve created more content and traffic for GD and News without further complicating the structure of CGTalk.

#58

Instead of a “CGTalk is dead” thread it might be helpful to start a “sticky” “suggestions for improvements” thread… :wink: