Where, Oh Where Has The Innovation In 3D DCC Gone?

#1

I remember back in the late 90s, early 2000s, really cool new stuff appeared in 3D apps constantly. You could suddenly do Radiosity or GI renders, or create dynamic character cloth, or use softbody dynamics, or animate a crowd, or render realistic volume smoke, or do NPR renders, or got a really cool new modeling capability or texturing tool. Doing 3D CG was really exciting because of one new thing coming after another, even though far fewer people were doing 3D CG back then. Today you have maybe X 10 times more 3D CG users in many different industries, but the INNOVATION AND R&D SIDE OF THINGS IS AT A VIRTUAL STANDSTILL.

WTF happened to innovation 3D DCC, arguably the most exciting thing in visual computing?

Do the new business managers not give a s**t what goes into the software anymore?

Do these guys think “We spent enough on R&D in the 2000s. Lets glide through the 2010s sans innovation!” ???

The problem cannot be a lack of CG researchers - they publish new research and papers every day.

The problem seems to be with companies like Autodesk, Maxon, Luxology, Foundry and others who are simply not trying very hard anyone.

So where is all this going for 3D DCC? Will our tools pretty much like they do today in 2027 as well?

#2

You should take a closer look there is a lot goin on.

#3

Yeah, those were the days.

There were tons of shiny top end published books of CG tutorials and instructions you could order on amazon or get at a bookstore and then page through at the local super bookstore cafe, that always smelled like heaven and was the perfect temperature. You could pull out your laptop, work through assignments over a coffee and a slice of pumpkin spice bread after in the Fall if you wanted. You could enjoy a little slice of paradise while feeling infinitely inspired by the industry tech that was plowing forward like a raging Wildebeest in a heard pounding across a river and building a huge bright highway to your future.

Things are definitely far more bleak now by comparison.

The super bookstores collapsed because people got too poor to pay for overpriced coffee, even if they loved it. Video tutorials killed the book business. Multinational media corporations killed the burgeoning US VFX Studio market assisted by heavy outsourcing and then heavy in-sourcing. Software subscriptions stifled the independent and freelance community and finally Facebook killed the growing online forum communities that cared about all the hot CG news as it was released. Anyone remember DeathFall? For a good while they had the best news and always scooped everyone.

The best there is right now is CGchannel and here now. I think. If anyone knows any non-facebook news forums In fact I feel like Ziva VFX is like the most cutting edge tech right now, blender 2.8 is the hottest app and artstation is the hottest art site with no forums. Atleast CGhub had forums.

#4

This December I set up my own FACS rig using nothing but a home camera and some off the shelf software.

I 3D scanned a miniature on my local beach and put it together to make a photo realistic CG scene.

I have used facial capture systems with a home 3D depth sensor that I bought at a computer games shop.

Real time physics and cloth simulation is now available as odd the shelf additions to freely available computer game engines.

Automatic retopolisation and smart rigging. Real time surface texture painting. Smart PBR materials. Real time micro displacement in computer game engines. Home based DIY motion capture systems that rival those used on Hollywood productions a few years back.

3D game engines now are free for use. The same engines that used to cost HUNDREDS of thousands to just LICENSE are now completely free.
I am using a high end LAPTOP that has specs that would completely demolish SGI super computers.

Honestly if you don’t think there is innovation in CG you just aren’t looking.

#5

NONE of what you posted qualifies as ACTUAL INNOVATION or REINVENTION in 3D CG.

These are all old, well known 3D Computer Graphics techniques that somehow took a DECADE PLUS to actually be incorporated into off-the-shelf 3D software.

You also cannot make me accept ANY POLYGON-, VOXELS OR NURBS-BASED 3D WORKFLOW as INNOVATIVE.

That shit should have stayed in the 1990s where it belongs.

There are many different ways to describe and render 3D models and 3D surfaces with mathematics. And the industry gets us STUCK WITH 1970S VERTEX-EDGE-FACE TECHNIQUES in a shiny new package year after year.

Nvidia - somehow? - takes a full decade to stick what is essentially a basic realtime ray-tracing ASIC capable of 1 GI bounce into its GPUs, and calls it “RTX”. Wow. I feel so innovated!

As for the game engines that “used to cost hundreds of thousands of Dollars to license”.

They NEVER - EVEN THEN - WERE WORTH NEARLY THAT MUCH. It was an INDUSTRY-WIDE DECISION TO MAKE THE GAME ENGINES SO ATROCIOUSLY EXPENSIVE TO LICENSE THAT ONLY 15 - 20 BIG STUDIOS COULD ACTUALLY AFFORD THEM.

They didn’t want Indy developers to be able to create the next DOOM, Call Of Duty or BIOSHOCK on a shoe-string budget.

PBR and Micropolygon displacement in game engines? Seriously old 3D techniques trickling down to GPU use. That again doesn’t qualify as innovation.

Mocap with depth-cameras or 2D video cameras? Old hat. That stuff was done in research labs in the 1990s. You’re just being given access to it today.

Innovation is what happens when you do something IN A COMPLETELY NEW, NEVER-DONE-BEFORE WAY.

New Math. New Logic. New Techniques. New Workflows. New mind-blowing efficiency and possibilities.

Implementing 1990s Computers Graphics papers 20 years later is NOT innovation.

It borders on fraudulent to call what we see in 3D software today “INNOVATION” in any sense of the word.

Both the 3D software and hardware companies can do a lot better than what they give us.

But if you play the Its-Good-Enough-Monkey each time they sell you 20 year old tech, then you won’t see innovation in this industry at all.

And neither will anyone else, including people who would greatly benefit from the time-cost-effort savings created.

#6

At this point, I’m getting angry at however invented bold and CAPS.

#7

3D was and is in permanent motion. Just look what happened with PBR and VR in the last years.

You won’t see big changes in the traditional areas anymore though. Polygon modeling is poylgon modeling, and sculpting is sculpting. What you will see there is small improvements. And there are lots of them. And also this is innovation.

#8

While I get your meaning I personally don’t ONLY equate innovation to new code/new toys.

Streamlining, debugging, and lightspeed hardware advances fundamentally change the industry and push it forward, through innovation, in ways that fresh new buggy code/sexy new features never could.

A lot of the features released in their earliest forms would be considered borderline unusable by today’s standards and for the requirements of 2019 and beyond.

#9

LOL. Iamhereintheworld, I got to give it to you, your trolling is getting better and better.

#10

Hollywood is obviously holding back all the innovative revolutions, together with the water-powered car, holodecks, completely flawless AI that is creative and the cure for any known and unknown illness… o_O

@BobbyBob3D What innovations are you shouting for? What exactly do you want? Don’t just say ‘I want something new’. Give examples :slight_smile:

#11

The main expenses are not the engine, but the salaries.

#12

What innovations are you shouting for? What exactly do you want? Don’t just say ‘I want something new’. Give examples :slight_smile:

Yeah, every time these threads pop up, the poster who starts them sounds like the equivalent of the clients from the “old days” who would come to us and say “What - it’s easy right? I thought you just like - hit a button and it makes everything for you.” :rofl:

That aside, I think what @BobbyBob3D is really looking for isn’t so much “innovation” (as mentioned, there’s plenty of that already), but rather a complete paradigm shift. It’s not so easy to do that over night so I have to echo the question of what they would like to see?

#13

Lol’s, well spotted.

…and photogrammetry for a VR games oriented innovative workflow example, is in my opinion extremely useful realizing an envisioned experience, especially on a budget:

Development log - Building a complete car from scans - VR Game dev

#14

First I agree with others that alot of innovation is happening in 3DCC.

Particularly in the area of Character animation & VFX.

The fact that something is theoretically possible does
not mean it is economicly viable for mass distribution and usage.

Also there is a certain economy of scale to consider.

By that I mean how large is your target demographic of users
and will it be large enough to make your innovation profitable
for you and worth the change for that demographic

Look at the history of the smart phone.
It is hard to imagine that in the 12 years since the introduction of the
Apple Iphone, in 2007, that smart phone users are an ever growing
numerical majority( in the U.S. at least)

This can be attributed to obvious fact that a personal handheld
internet computing device that makes phone calls and records broadcast

quality HD/SHD video etc etc. has broad appeal to even the most
average consumer population, and even then ,smart phone technology
was in development for many years before 2007.

Now what percentage of the general population even knows what a
polygon is much less is demanding some innovative replacement for

it??.

Major change in small demographic industries, like ours, will always
be “slower” due the the economics of it.

#15

It’s not me you idiots :smile:

#16

Haha, you have to at least admit the resemblance :stuck_out_tongue: