TrueSpace7.6 is now FREE

[OOZZEE]

just register and download....


and the video courses are free as well...

http://www.caligari.com/

[safetyman]

I used TS years and years ago (version 3, I think). Caligari has been around since forever, as long or longer than anyone in the 3D business. I must say that I enjoyed using it -- it was my first introduction to 3D and it was surprisingly easy to use.

BTW -- wasn't Caligari bought by Microsoft?

[Qexit]

Are you sure it's free ? I just checked out the site at the link you gave and the only version for free was the trueSpace 7.5 trial version. If you want a full license it will set you back $595 with Version 6.6 'only' $395.

[akademus]

Cool. I started in 3D using Truespace some, um, well, a long time ago (mid nineties i think).

Still the best booleans i think.

[zardoz]

hmmm it's a link for caligari where you can TRY version 7.5

[colkai]

Yup, tis free, the link isn't accurate, If you go via:
http://cart1.caligari.com/web/Truespacemainreg.aspx

Then 'register' - you get a link to the full download.

See this:
http://forums1.caligari.com/truespace/showpost.php?p=71696&postcount=45

That's what happens when you have the finance of Microsoft behind you! ;)

[Qexit]

That's what happens when you have the finance of Microsoft behind you! ;)It also gives you a really cringeworthy address:

Caligari Corporation

1 Microsoft Way

Redmond

[bobakabob]

Hmmm, there's certainly confusion in the marketing, it's all over the place. All I can see is the free trial. A curious app, apparently it was the biggest selling globally though you need an MA in Semiotics to figure out the interface. Anyway, I know a talented designer who started out in Truespace, he's now slightly bonkers and hung up his mouse. Draw your own conclusions...

Looks like MS are gunning for Google and Sketchup - and Second Life...

[Qexit]

Looks like MS are gunning for Google and Sketchup - and Second Life......and not forgetting Blender :D

[starbase1]

It also gives you a really cringeworthy address:

Caligari Corporation

1 Microsoft Way

Redmond

Could be worse... If they continue to believe their own publicity they could end up at:

I love Vista House,
Balmer Way,
State: Denial

[cagey5]

Initail impressions are not good. Admitedly I haven't even scanned the manual yet but icon based software like that has nothing to recommend it as far as I'm concerned.

So does it do anything better than LW?

[Lightwolf]

So does it do anything better than LW?
Booleans, viewport display, collaborative environment (across networks).

Everything else is worse though ;)

Cheers,
Mike

[adamredwoods]

No MacOS. No go, Microsoft.

[Rayek]

Actually, I think this is quite interesting: a scene can be exported to X, collada, and played in DX9 in the trueplayer (even games). It supports real-time behaviours, scripting in several languages... The collaboration tool is, quite frankly, something I haven't seen before.

The animation tools sport a story motion mixer, full and easy bvh import, blending of keyframed and procedural/physics animation tracks, a facial animator tool and full body ik/fk (which, as far as I know only Maya and Motionbuilder have), bones with skin and muscle deformation, animation clips that are drop 'n drag, non-lineair animation clips... Rigging and posing seems very easy to do (I watched some of the video's).

I have not tried TS yet, but it does warrant a look or two, and I feel this will play nicely together with LW. Rather than looking down on this, I think this is a great give-away. (No, I am no fan of M$)

[OOZZEE]

the link is fine... just look at the blue banner near the top..... with the bird on it....

also all the tutorials are free too.... at this link....

http://www.caligari.com/products/trueSpace/ts5/Courses/WorkspaceOrganicModeling1.asp?Cate=Training&Subcate=Fundamental

[Qexit]

the link is fine... just look at the blue banner near the top..... with the bird on it....It was still showing 7.5 when I looked earlier today but as you say it has now been changed and provides a link to the free download. So another potentially useful tool is added to everyone's 3D toolkit :thumbsup:

[mattclary]

TS is the evil anti-LightWave with all those freaking icons. If someone could re-design that interface, I might try (again). I tried it before LightWave years ago and it made me suicidal. Thoroughly f-ed up interface.

[shrox]

...Thoroughly f-ed up interface.

The interface is why I fled 3DMax when it changed from 3DStudio. Autodesk lost customers to LW when they did that.

[Wickster]

This was the same tactics that Creature House did when MS bought them out. Creature House used to develop the vector/raster image apllication called Expression . MS bought them out and Creature House released the their latest buil, 3.3 I think to the general public for free.

MS started developing after that to compete with Adobe' Creative Suite, which is now MS Expression Web, Expression Studio, Expression Etc. which costs hundreds of dollars.

I suppose Calligari wants to do the same and releasing the last and final build of trueSpace before MS really takes over. This is a pretty good strategy too, since if a lot of people downloads it, there are a lot of potential for Ms to get people to purchase the upgrade once MS trueSpace comes out.

Expression 3.3 was a great program, it is comparable more to Adobe Illustrator but it did have a whole lot of other options and such. Now though, it is very hard to find the free 3.3 version out there on the web...and Expression 3.3 is both available for Mac and PC...did I say for free? :)

[meatycheesyboy]

In their comparison table they compare Truespace with Maya, Max, Cinema, and XSI but don't even bother to compare their software with LW. OUCH.

http://www.caligari.com/products/trueSpace/ts75/Brochure/Comparison_tables.asp?Cate=BProducts&SubCate=ComparisonTables

[adamredwoods]

MS started developing after that to compete with Adobe' Creative Suite, which is now MS Expression Web, Expression Studio, Expression Etc. which costs hundreds of dollars.

...

Expression 3.3 was a great program, it is comparable more to Adobe Illustrator but it did have a whole lot of other options and such. Now though, it is very hard to find the free 3.3 version out there on the web...and Expression 3.3 is both available for Mac and PC...did I say for free? :)

Yes, Expression was hot. Now it's too focused on their XAML and Silverlight-- and not enough development on the other features. Does not play too well with others.

This is too common with big companies buying out smaller ones. Adobe bought out Macromedia, and really screwed up the Flash interface. :screwy:

[Lightwolf]

Adobe bought out Macromedia, and really screwed up the Flash interface. :screwy:
You mean it's even worse now? :stumped:

Cheers,
Mike

[rakker16mm]

This is a program I wanted to explore some time ago just to see what their approach to CG is really all about. So even if I could only try out 7.5 it would suffice.

[Verlon]

it says fully customisable interface.....

I am guessing they didn't put Lightwave on the comparison becauseit would not look as good. Lightwave could check most of those boxes and cost is comparable.

[borkus]

this could prove interesting to have as part of the toolkit. looking at some of the included tutorial videos, it would be nice if you could rig and animate in ts and bring it into lightwave. i've still yet to grow the cojones to tackle rigging in lightwave. but ts seems to be what poser should have been, but never was. and do they support nurbs in the true sense of the word? haven't got very far into it yet as far as exploring the app. but that would be worth the price (free...lol) if that were the case. and comparing it to another "notorius" free 3d app; this one aggravates me a hell of a lot less. the real-time render is a bit exaggerated unless i missed something. opengl seemed just as worthy in lightwave. but, like i said, i've just been mucking about in it. good find and thanks for the heads up. any tool that's free is worth having. well, 'cept for blender. **** that thing.....

[jin choung]

well...

let this serve as a warning and grim ward for newtek....

"there but for the grace of God go lw..."

jin

p.s. in this day and age, icons are a non-issue for me... fast and ubiquitous tool tips have completely removed any inhibitions i've had about them in the past and working in apps like zb and blender may be different but not at all because of icons.

[Wolvy_UK]

The icons in the interface can be changed to drop down menus, but the icons tell you what they are when you hover the mouse over them anyway.

The animation stuff looks very interesting. I' ve watched some of the videos and the way you can make animation with clips in the story mode is very similar to Motion Builder and a program called Endorphin. You have a full body IK rig like IK booster which you use to keyframe , then you can use procedural animation (physics) to animate forces acting on your object.

So , you can have 2 characters having a fight and keyframe one kicking the other in the chest, and use procedural animation after the impact so truespace works out the animation for the character getting hit for you and you just go in and edit some of the keyframes you don' t like and then the animation is basically done.

One of the tutorials shows how to have someone fall onto a high bar, grab it, and fall with prodcedural animation as the bar breaks. And another shows swinging on a bar controlled by physics.

It' s obviously not as advanced as Endorphin, because their characters were trained to walk and have some sort of AI and will react in a more human way, but for a free program it's a good start.

Whether Truespace is useful to me depends on how well the Collada export works. There' s no FBX or MDD in the export list, so if I can' t get any animation out it' s only really good for playing around with.

[GandB]

and cost is comparable
Comparable to FREE?:thumbsup:

-Keith

[Verlon]

Comparable to FREE?:thumbsup:

-Keith

When they made the comparison chart, the cost was similar to Lightwave.

When you can say, yeah, our software does most of the same things as a $4995 XSI program, and a couple of things it DOESN'T for just over 1/10th the price, you might attract buyers.

Lightwave, being within a couple hundred dollars and having more screen credits to its name than Truespace, would be a tougher sell.

I'll be very interested in seeing where it goes from here. I actually came to Lightwave FROM Truespace around LW5.5 because I could finally afford it.

[Wolvy_UK]

Has 7.5 got less features than it had before ? I was searching for some tutorials and found this link http://www.animationartist.com/2000/Tutorials/trueSpaceBones/Bones.html and I can' t find any of the options in 7.5 to do muscles .

After checking out the procedural animation involving characters, I would say it' s more like the Half life 2 game (Havok) physics. If you' ve ever shot a guy down some steps in the game you' ll get an idea of what the physics in truespace is like. The character is in a big mess after the calculation, but you could add keyframes to get a more natural pose at the end.

[GandB]

I actually came to Lightwave FROM Truespace
Same here. I had heard that Softimage is no longer offering Foundation as an option? That kind of sucks.

I'm hoping that TS 7.6 being free now, will attract more plugin devs (especially of the Indy Game Dev type :thumbsup:). As mentioned before, the new TS will be a great alternative for those who don't want to try to navigate the atrocious (my opinion) interface of Blender.

-Keith

[starbase1]

but the icons tell you what they are when you hover the mouse over them anyway.


Not much good, Vue does the same and that doesn't work either.

If a button is labelled 'merge points' or whatever I can LOOK at the screen abnd decide what to do. Trying to guess which tiny graphioc represents this, or pausing the mouse over each one in turn is not a productive way to work...

Down with blobs on Knobs!

[colkai]

WOLFY said you could turn them into drop down menus, or is that still drop down icon menus? :p
Even so, s'gonna get stuck on this PC, even if half the content / examples looks like it used to back in the TS3 days. Not seen anything, apart from an engine, that looks comparable to LW, that said, my stuff wouldn't exactly tell a shining story of LW so who am I to judge? ;) :D

[prospector]

Well after downloading almost 3 gigs of stuff, and looking at it for....3 min...it's gone..kaput...fini.

Besides the silly icons (1 icon can stand for anything man can think of and that's the alphabet), it doesn't even know which way is Y.
Y is UP AND DOWN....not sideways.
Thought I might get a good way to get Vue into LW and just do a replace object.....you have to do sooooo many things to get INTO vue from Truspace (according to vid), it wasn't worth it.
Even free wasn't worth it.

[nub]

TS is the evil anti-LightWave with all those freaking icons. If someone could re-design that interface, I might try (again). I tried it before LightWave years ago and it made me suicidal. Thoroughly f-ed up interface.

Actually on the layout side you can change the icons to text by clicking on the little triangle and selecting 1D (I think. I don't have it in front of me right now).

[Lito]

I downloaded it installed it and all I can say is *yuck*. Maybe it's just because I don't know the interface at all, but it just looks so cluttered and useless. Model view is always perspective mode or every window is in texture shaded mode. My complaints are pretty newbie-ish I guess and I am sure they are addressed somewhere in the manual but I can't see myself wanting to keep the program around long enough to figure it out. I thought Blender was bad, but IMO TS is worse than blender.

[GandB]

Yes, in the workspace (which will be all that's left in future versions when the modeler is merged into it....much like some wish that Lightwave would do in future versions) you can turn all the icons into text tabs (which, when hovered over, will conversely show you the accompanying icon). In other words, you can have icons or text tabs.

To verify another question; there is no time limit on TrueSpace 7.6 being free.

Just to clarify. ;)

I don't see TS as being worse than Blender (having tried out both) at all. As far as the views go, you can change both the perspective (side, top, etc.) as well as the shading of each window (which can be put into quad as well)...just like any other program of its type.

-Keith

[mattclary]

Yes, in the workspace (which will be all that's left in future versions when the modeler is merged into it....much like some wish that Lightwave would do in future versions) you can turn all the icons into text tabs (which, when hovered over, will conversely show you the accompanying icon). In other words, you can have icons or text tabs.


I'll have to look at that. If you can make it text, maybe worth playing with.

[meatycheesyboy]

ok, I just installed it and first thing that jumped out at me was the installer. It's archaic and doesn't even suggest installing into the Program Files directory? Hasn't the program files dir been standard in Windows since the Win 98 (maybe even 95) days?

First impression using the program is that it's slow... I might try to learn it in my spare time but if I don't see a benefit quickly, I'll probably give it up quickly. As they say, time is money.

[Paul_Boland]

Well, having only recently (past few months) closed the door on TrueSpace and am in the process of becoming a full Lightwave user, I am stunned by this move by Caligari. TrueSpace 7.6 is their flagship 3D software. The last version to get a free release was TrueSpace 4 when it appeared on magazine cover discs a few months back so to suddenly released the newly released 7.6 for free really knocked me.

The release of TrueSpace 7 saw a complete redesign of the TrueSpace environment with the introduction of the Workspace side. This ended up splitting the program in two, model side and workspace side. While new comers may have picked up Workspace easily, after a decade of working in model side since TrueSpace 1, I just couldn't make the move over easily. I also didn't like the split program structure and I didn't like the new Workspace side, the way TrueSpace's future is set to go. Then when Microsoft bought Caligari, the community fell into a terrible state of affairs and things looked bleek indeed. It was two months later I decided (not easily) to move from TrueSpace after a decade of use under my belt.

To be fair to those who don't like the icon interface, once you get to know it, you can whiz around it. If you stop by the 3D page on my website, you'll see my progression of years of work with TrueSpace. It's was a great program in its day.

This move to release 7.6 for free, apart from flooring me, has left me wondering just what this means for the future of the product line? Yes, I am moving away from it, just finishing off some projects that were well udner way in TrueSpace, but I do still keep a tabs on it. I am wondering now will there be a TrueSpace 8 or is this the end of the product line? And if there is a TrueSpace 8, what direction will it take? And if not, what will come from Caligari in its place? I read with interest the posts above about how this happened in the past with other software.

[mattclary]

Ok, I had to uninstall it. You can get multiple view windows open, but only one view can be set to "model" mode, the rest are "Workspace". If I had to, i could probably get used to it, but LightWave's interface just kicks the sh1t out of this thing. That's what made me fall in love with Lightwave, the interface is very intuitive. :lwicon:

[GandB]

Did you try doing the same thing in the Modeler, instead of the Workspace? How long did it take everyone to get ahold of Lightwave's interface? I know it took me a good bit of time; even with help from Dan Ablan. Can't expect to turn something new on and start using it properly within a few hours.

I will say that I like LW's modeler quite a bit; especially with all the different tools and plugins for it.

-Keith

[shrox]

Please, please, please NewTek don't ever change to icons!

[xmanflash]

I just moved to Lightwave from Truespace 7.5 as I had so many issues with its half finished state that I gave up.

7.6 is what a lot of people were asking for in terms of completed much of the port to the workspace engine, but to me it always seemed to be a tool built by engineers for animators, without taking the animators into account. The workflow was horrible to learn, I never fully did, but I am getting much further in Lightwave much easier - which leads me to suspect that I am just more in tune with the LW interface (I started off using Max a looong time ago when it was 3D Studio.. so might be biased..)

I also get the impression TS was supposed to be all things to all people, and therefore many of the extra features bolted on were not robust or useable enough for a good workflow, but looked good in the brochure, something that I do think Lightwave seems better at - its being used in real production environments and therefore has greater expectations on it, and probably a better volume, and quality of feedback.

There are some great things in Truespace though - You can purchase the add on Vray renderer - albeit not the latest and with not all the features, but its still a great tool and fast, and works within the Truespace interface, something that I believe Lightwave lacks (chaos group were supposedly building stand alone vRay engine for LW but it appears to have vamooshed) and there is also a very early but functioning Renderman interface for Truespace called Dribble, that has a lot of promise.

The TS realtime DX9 workspace interface is cool, although to me seemed more suited to demos than lots of hard work.

I hope LW adds volumetrics and all the other missing bits to the SDK so it can interface properly with other render engines, but so far its working well for me and my small needs..

[rakker16mm]

Please, please, please NewTek don't ever change to icons!

:agree: Yes I also prefer text over icons, and considering I am dyslexic, I think that really shows how much easier text is.

[bjornkn]

And I prefer to choose icons or text (I'd definitely choose icons/tooltips).
I've been using tS since v1 (-91?), and was a beta tester from tS2 to v6.6. and really loved it, most of the time. The reason I left was because it was always quite unstable, and many of the more annoying bugs were never fixed. And the render enigine was not good, and GI was useless. For a while then I was using C4D XL7, but was fed up by the company attitude, and then started using LW instead. But the main reason for leaving tS was that SketchUp appeared on the scene :) Combined with the LW render engine (and FPrime and hd_Instance) it works great.
But I still very much prefer the tS GUI rather than LW, which I have never liked. Text takes far too much screen space, and it can be much less confusing. Who would think that a tool like Julienne is actually for slicing objects? There's a lot of non-intuitively named tools in LW. Another thing that I miss is the Widgets, for manipulating objects/selections in different coordinate systems.
I guess I'll just have to try the new tS version, after all the nice words... ;)

[Lightwolf]

Who would think that a tool like Julienne is actually for slicing objects?
You don't cook, do you? ;)

Cheers,
Mike

[bjornkn]

Yes, I do cook, but in Norwegian ;)
I just looked it up in wikipedia though, where it says that Julienning is a technique of shredding vegetables, which i had never heard before, like for pommes frites/french fries. And then you eventually finally end up with brunoise if you slice it again (where is that in LW?) (BTW, I looked up valkyrie as well ;)
IMO it just shows the advantage of icons vs text? ;)

[RTSchramm]

I downloaded Truespace, but is it me, or is the IU really sluggest? I'm using Windows Xp 64 Pro with two dual core zeons and 8 GB of memoy and a Geforce 8800GTX Video card.

Rich

[mattclary]

Did you try doing the same thing in the Modeler, instead of the Workspace? How long did it take everyone to get ahold of Lightwave's interface? I know it took me a good bit of time; even with help from Dan Ablan. Can't expect to turn something new on and start using it properly within a few hours.

I will say that I like LW's modeler quite a bit; especially with all the different tools and plugins for it.


Yes. From what I can tell, workspace is for animating and other non-modeling functions. I almost immediately grasped LightWaves interface, maybe because I had a background in AutoCAD for DOS. LW is VERY straightforward. You have tabs with different types of commands and they all are readily recognizable if you speak English.

[Lightwolf]

IMO it just shows the advantage of icons vs text? ;)
To the contrary... try looking up icons on Wikipedia ;)

Cheers,
Mike

P.S. Juliennes, like many french cooking terms, is pretty international. I agree it makes little sense in a CG app... then again, it does show a little sense of humour (which seems to have gotten lost in the past few years in the industry).

[rakker16mm]

Some icons like the paintbrush or bucket tool in Adobe Photoshop make plenty of sense because they are analog of common everyday items, but when you get to the shape tool it all starts to fall apart. A text button that says "Shape Tool" says shape tool much better than a blob. Then there are all the tools that look like pen nibs. You might might get the idea they are for drawing. Thank goodness for tool tips.

We could have an icon for the Seashell tool and it would be just as clear as the text button but with other tools the meaning of the icon is not always as clear. What icon can can clearly tell you "Edit Skelegons" as clearly as the text?

The only real advantage of Icons is that they take of less space on the computer monitor, but if that is the only reason to use them there are better solutions. We could have a user definable option that makes the text buttons appear when you mouse over to the edge of the screen. I seem to recall we already have a way to not show the text buttons, so it shouldn't be too hard to add that behavior.

[bjornkn]

I rarely look closely at the images/icons, but regard them as placeholders, which use much less space than text buttons. Tooltips is very important when using icons, as well as being able to see the shortcut for the tool. In tS 6 you could have all the tools on screen at the same time, and it would still use a lot less space than only one of the text bars/menus in LW. Using LW without lots and lots of shortcuts would be a nightmare, having to switch between the main "menus" all the time, trying to remember where a tool is located.
BTW I use lots of shortcuts in all programs that I use a lot, like SU, LW and previously also tS, but it is very convenient to have all the tools available as small icons that doesn't use a lot of valuable screen space, especially when you need a tool that you don't use very often..
When I moved from the Atari ST and Cyber Studio/Sculpt to PC I actually didn't even consider choosing LW because of its (already) old-fashioned look with text buttons and huge panels. The choices were tS, Real 3D, Imagine and 3D Studio., and for me it was an easy choice, even though 3D Studio was the "child" of Cyber Studio. It was also too expensive...

Regarding Julienne, the term isn't really descriptive of the tool, as Julienning is slicing vegetables into long narrow strips, like french fries etc. The LW tool chops/slices rather than Julienne it?. If it was intended to be humourous I think they missed their target a bit? ;)
Among all the tools in LW I guess I have used less than 1/3 of them, because they have names that sounds like I don't need them, and if I try one of them I often need to look into the manuals to try to find out how they are supposed to work. Many of them are very unintuitive IMHO.

[Paul_Boland]

From what I can tell, workspace is for animating and other non-modeling functions.

Model side and workspace side are both one and the same. TrueSpace 1 to 6 was developed as you see model side, that's what the software looked like. With TrueSpace 7, Caligari decided to totally redesign the software and implement a new work environment. That was workspace. I didn't like it at all though. Imagine it, ten years working with a package whose layout is second nature to you, and suddenly it's completely redesigned and shows no resemblence to the tool you've been using. The reason for the two environments being part of TrueSpace 7 is that not all the tools were implemented in workspace side so you had to jump between the two (I think that's fixed now in 7.6), and, of course, for users who were so use to the mdoel side.

I didn't like the new direction, it wasn't TrueSpace any more, it was a different 3D software package. But yes, you can model, animation and render in both model and workspace side.

[prospector]

The LW tool chops/slices rather than Julienne it?.
Maby it should be renamed to......Bass-O-matic?

oops you young'uns wouldn't know what that is tho :D

[prospector]

but regard them as placeholders, which use much less space than text buttons. Tooltips is very important when using icons,
But that just makes bloatware

first you got icons...
then you have to hover...
then a description comes up

which means all that has to be programmed into it.

bloat...bloat...bloat

[shrox]

But that just makes bloatware

first you got icons...
then you have to hover...
then a description comes up

which means all that has to be programmed into it.

bloat...bloat...bloat

Plus waiting for the tip to appear. Then it doesn't appear...until you move off of it and then back on to it again. Just give me the word already!

[prospector]

Then it doesn't appear...until you move off of it and then back on to it again. Just give me the word already!
Exactly

I know 2 icons in Photoshop and been using since ver 5 came out
the square box cutter and the spray brush.
And that's it.
I just don't have time to learn and relearn everytime a new ver comes out.

[bjornkn]

Well, if you only know and use 2 tools in PS I can tell you that there's no need for you to upgrade to new versions every time a new version comes out ;) You could even save a few $s by using some free pixel editor instead ;)

Regarding icons I don't really understand why you think they are bloatware. What is bloated? The program code? In LW the screen space is taken up by lots of bloated text buttons and panels/dialogs, and instead of adding more functionality to a tool they add a new tool/plugin instead, to clutter up the GUI. That's what I'd call bloatware.
An icon can be much smaller, and when you occationally need to use a new tool you can always get a descriptive text, which can be much longer than the text on any text button. That's what I'd call "information at your fingertips, when you need it", rather than having to clutter your screen with lots of big text buttons that you don't use anyway ;)

[pumeco]

Well, I downloaded it.

I've wanted many times to like trueSpace, but that interface is just too messy and cryptic, and for me, this latest version is just as bad as it's always been. It's a seriously powerful program though make no mistake. I'm not 100% sure where Microsoft is going with this trueSpace lark, but I can only hope that whether it remains free or not, their priority will be giving it a clean and logical interface.

I think trueSpace (like Blender) is a perfect example of programming teams assuming they're good at design implementation as well as programming. Clearly that's not the case, and the result you get is an interface like that of trueSpace and Blender!

[dennis1234]

I never found the interface that bad, but TS was one of the first apps I used.

I upgraded to LW from TS 7 (Paid) because it was not a finnished product however with that said it is a functional app and will stay in my tool box.

I am happy that it is free now.

[IMI]

Well, I downloaded it.

I've wanted many times to like trueSpace, but that interface is just too messy and cryptic, and for me, this latest version is just as bad as it's always been.

It's still like that, huh? Well, I guess that makes sense - I can't think of any apps offhand which have changed their interface drastically over the years.
I, too, tried to like Truespace, but it was a no-go. I can't even remember what version it was I last tried - version 4, maybe, and haven't even kept up with it since.
For that matter, before I settled on LW, I tried anything and everything which had a demo. I remember Amapi and TS immediately went on my NO f'in WAY! list, because I couldn't do jack with them. Rhino made sense to me, 3ds max was OK, but wasn't as easy as Rhino. LW was really the first 3D interface that I actually liked and understood pretty much right away.

OTOH, I know there have been alot of people who have used TS for great things, and I know I've read it's a very capable modeler and renderer. Weren't they one of the first with radiosity?
Well, it's a matter of preference, I suppose. :)

[pumeco]

Yup, it's a powerful program alright.
If they gave it a clean/logical interface and kept it free then the 3D markets foundatons will surely shake - big time!

[aidanodr]

Hi Guys,

People here talking about Icons v Text Menus in Truespace. Some also mentioned how to change from Icons to text but I found the explanation unclear. Try the following:

1. open TS
2. look at the Icon bar bottom left of the Workspace window - look at the right hand side TIP. You can see an 'x' to close, Under this is a little down arrow.
3. click this arrow and select 1D - now you have a text menu.

I am sure you could change the text in the menu's to your liking, havent got that far yet. If any one does - please post here too! If this is possible then one could set the menu item names to LW spec.

cheers
Aidan

[aidanodr]

Also

4. Under the Down arrow is another icon - 3 little dots. Click this to make the menu Horizontal OR Vertical
5. Double clicking the Icon Bar at the top while vertical OR the left hand side while horizontal will collapse/explode the toolbar

Aidan

[SP00]

The limited time that I tried to use TS 7.6 I found it to have some pretty darn powerful features. The problem is that the help files does not go over the basic stuff like how to navigate. I hope is it not limited to dragging the icon only. Also, how does the hot key work? I guess once you learn this problem, it is pretty good.

[adrian]

My first 3D app was TS2.0 and I used trueSpace up to version 4.3 at which point I moved over to LW6.5. Whilst it took me a good month to get used to the interface once I did it became second nature. I think that's why I have adapted to Zbrush quite quickly.

I was tempted to download 7.6 until I read the interface had completely changed... I remember TS with great fondness and don't want anything to spoil that. As much as I love TS there's nothing it can do that LW can't do better.

I am assuming TS has SUB-ds built in these days... I remember everyone raving about a third-party plugin called ThermoClay on the TS forums!

[GandB]

SP00,

Have you downloaded all the free (used to cost) tutorials, including one or two that go over the interface (the old one is for 6.6, but the UI hasn't changed that much)?

Adrian,

Check out this user-created interface set-up:

http://forums1.caligari.com/truespace/showthread.php?t=5941

-Keith

[DiscreetFX]

Typical MS move to prop up the Windows Empire. Hopefully it does not hurt other developers of 3D software. MS tried this in the 90's when they bought SoftImage but they gave up and sold it off. This time it's a freebie but you must have Windows. No thanks we will stick with LightWave 3D. Free software with an agenda is of no interest to us. Watch the next version of TrueSpace be DirectX 10 & Windows Vista only. We remember when this first came out on the Amiga ages ago and it was $3000. Wow, how times change.

[AmigaNewTek]

Great!!! I don't understand this Microsoft move, tho...
@BillPana
Bill, i'm happy to see you even here.
I should reinstall the Google talk for a conversation with you.
Ciao (AB)

[DiscreetFX]

@AmigaNewTek

Glad to talk with you anytime.

[jburford]

Typical MS move to prop up the Windows Empire. Hopefully it does not hurt other developers of 3D software. MS tried this in the 90's when they bought SoftImage but they gave up and sold it off. This time it's a freebie but you must have Windows. No thanks we will stick with LightWave 3D. Free software with an agenda is of no interest to us. Watch the next version of TrueSpace be DirectX 10 & Windows Vista only. We remember when this first came out on the Amiga ages ago and it was $3000. Wow, how times change.



MS did not buy SoftImage back then to really try to do anything with it other than force them to port to NT and prove that NT can handle such apps and get the power out of the hands of SG Irix and the lot!!!

It fullfilled it's purpose, and they got rid of it then.

[jburford]

Am downloading now, can not wait to get it up and running if only to toy with it a bit.

[DiscreetFX]

@jburford

100% correct about NT & SoftImage. Maybe this time they are trying to peddle Vista & DirectX 10.

[jburford]

And doesn't everyone have an agenda of sorts? Be it Adobe, or Apple or Dell or McD's or . . . . .

[jburford]

@billpana

how's the weather in Chicago?

[DiscreetFX]

Nice today.

[Verlon]

All software companies have an agenda.

I am not going to scoff at their agenda if it happens to line up with mine. Free is a price point I can deal with if I want to look at something.

Free software with an agenda? Who cares as long as it does what you want.

You're seriously not going to use the FREE software because of your speculation of what the NEXT version will have in the way of system requirements? It is already Windows/DX only, do its not like they would be dropping support of Apple or OGL.

Hating the interface, not stable enough, not powerful enough, too slow, doesn't work in your pipeline, wanting to focus on other software...these I understand - even if I disagree.

Not using it because of speculation on a future version that isn't out, isn't announced, and probably not much more than brainstorming on a dry-erase board is just silly.

[DiscreetFX]

All the things you mentioned and more is why we won't use it. Also MS recently tied us up in a small room and beat us senseless to make us use it. That did not help matters.

:thumbsup:

[zapper1998]

Please, please, please NewTek don't ever change to icons!



Totally Agree

[DiscreetFX]

Your free to use it neverko, if we choose not to use it that's up to us. LightWave 3D is the right tool for the job here. Your 3D art gallery is really nice.

http://www.aether.dk/athena/index.html

[DiscreetFX]

Your welcome to think that if that's how you feel. Why so serious?

:thumbsup:

[mrbones]

Be sure to check out the free Motion Capture in BVH format that is included with TrueSPace 7.6 Free, Courtesy of TrueBones.Com

Cheers

_[]_
OjO
(M)r. Bones

http://www.truebones.com

[prometheus]

Totally Agree

I don´t agree on that, well not totally.
Icons can be implemented in a good way, I believe modo and houdini has done it much better than Truespace, but truespace icons are really horrible.

I believe there is a couple of things to be aware of when designing icons such as..it needs description or name, either a name directly under them or when hovering over the icon.(a name migh be neccessary in the beginning until the image are imprinted in our memory, Í don´t believe text works the same way.)


They need to be carefully designed so they really match what the tool are suppose to do, and it is here it becomes problematic to do for every item and thus its´not suitable to have icons for everything, it is way easier to have an icon for a box and a ball than for a load mocap tool.
So why icons?

well imagine having these model tools lined up horisontally in modeler..
box,ball,disc,cone,torus,gemstone,gear,pyramid...v ersus having it in icons.

I believe that when attempting to choose the tool it would be faster to use icons ..I believe that the image memory works faster but only if the icons are representative to that tool...of cours if we have text and have it sorted neatly where we want them it would probably work almost as fast. but if theres lots of modeling tools it will take time to choose compared to icons I believe and especially if you are a newbie and havent used lightwave for a long time.

I have seen some tutorial pros showing there tutorials and when trying to find
the simple box or ball tool..they are not finding the tool they want directly..lets say ball..but they go with the marker to the box tool first..and that is most certainly because they subconciously need to read it first as opposed to how fast we would pick it as an icon from image memory.

Personally I would like to still have most of the tools as text but maybe in the future a shelfe tab can be introduced with icons, and it should be fully customised so it´s easy to swap between primitives,curves, modyfiers etc.
and even easy to drag your tool of choise to that shelfe tab.

Michael

[prometheus]

well there is some icons..in lightwave such as the viewports zoom button, and rotate..
and how hard is it to understand the designed undo redo button in most apps.

Michael

[mattclary]

There is a reason we developed the written word and abandoned pictographs.

I sometimes walk into a room and "pick up" a word. I saw the word somewhere, but I have no idea where. I search the room and finally find it. That's how unconscious reading is (at least to me). Even after the learning curve, you will never recognize an icon for "box" quicker than the word "box". The best you can hope for is an equal speed.

The only halfway reasonable argument that can be made for icons is they save space. And I am happy with the space available in LightWave.

[prometheus]

There is a reason we developed the written word and abandoned pictographs.

I sometimes walk into a room and "pick up" a word. I saw the word somewhere, but I have no idea where. I search the room and finally find it. That's how unconscious reading is (at least to me). Even after the learning curve, you will never recognize an icon for "box" quicker than the word "box". The best you can hope for is an equal speed.

The only halfway reasonable argument that can be made for icons is they save space. And I am happy with the space available in LightWave.

He..he, and I was thinking of buying an chinese keyboard.
recognize the word box faster than the image of a box?
I disagree with you on that one.
It´s not only those tool that is supposed to be recognized, the difference speed of choosing them might be unrecognizable when the text is short and if
its just a matter of choosing between a few tools. but when the tools are stacked upon eachother in a long item list, Im pretty convinced you will recognize the box tool from the ball tool when choosing from icons.

Well Im not sure if either you or I can give an absolute fact to that of what is faster for the brain to act upon, text or images, ..well finding a tool called subdivisionbox, right beneath subdivisonball would in my opinion be way faster to choose from an icon that picking them from an text item list among other tools.
But maybe this is something for the brainprofessors to give actual proof of.
except for recognition speed (in my opinion) and saving space, I would say that in some cases an icon could explain a tool better than text, but in most cases it´s the opposites perhaps.

well I know that I can pick an icon faster than a tool from an text list, maybe Im dyslectic or just stupid:)

Anyway I don´t see any problem by intergrating icons in such way that you can choose if you want them or not by simply opening an icon favorite shelfe tab.

Michael

[Titus]

There is a reason we developed the written word and abandoned pictographs.

I sometimes walk into a room and "pick up" a word. I saw the word somewhere, but I have no idea where. I search the room and finally find it. That's how unconscious reading is (at least to me). Even after the learning curve, you will never recognize an icon for "box" quicker than the word "box". The best you can hope for is an equal speed.

The only halfway reasonable argument that can be made for icons is they save space. And I am happy with the space available in LightWave.

I think you have the idea backwards because images are easier to remember, that's how some memory techniques work. I don't have any problem using icons or words.

[mattclary]

I think you have the idea backwards because images are easier to remember,

For "box" the image is easy, but still no easier than the word "box", but clone? Array? Subdivide? Render?

You guys are out to lunch. Why don't we write books with icons instead of words? If images are so great at conveying meaning, we should switch back to pictographs or hieroglyphics.

[prometheus]

For "box" the image is easy, but still no easier than the word "box", but clone? Array? Subdivide? Render?

You guys are out to lunch. Why don't we write books with icons instead of words? If images are so great at conveying meaning, we should switch back to pictographs or hieroglyphics.

You are missing the point I believe. conveying a meaning has nothing to do with it..it´s about the minds objectspeed perception or tool description.

I´m not stating that everything should be icons, like writing a book with icons.

a lot of the interface in lightwave and buttons are fine and most of them should probably be the same.
and yeah its no big deal with box and ball...but really tell a newbie what subdivide is opposed to show an image of what it does..it might be clearer than just the text subdivide.

and lets step back to childhood..how the heck can a couple of months or a one year old select the word box,ball, pyramid etc...you know I believe that
we in early childhood did some puzzling and selecting the correct shape to fit in a certain puzzle..reading and writing is a description of a certain shape that comes much later on in life..it´s pretty simple..we start by seeing the shape..and can easy relate to that when it´s an icon since that´s the most correct shape.

try and lay out the 10 textstrings of the word box, and 10 of the word ball,and 10 of the word pyramid, mix them together and try then and sort them into labels named equally...
now do the same with symbols representing the box,ball and pyramid.and sort that into labels with corresponding symbols.Ill bet you will sort
the symbol out way faster than all that word mess.
I belive thats just the way how our minds work.

But as you pointed out..it might now work well if the symbol isn´t well known
..and therefore icons must be restricted to just that for the most part..or for those symbols less known..an explainatory text is needed under it. but even so if theres a text under it..why icons? simply because it will be easier to recognize amongst other tools..compared to that scrambled word mess.

so let´s think the other way around...why so much icons and symbols in the world?
And how do we percept a word ..letter by letter or in the word string..the eye has to sort the word shape somehow and i belive scientist are heading
towards that the brain reads and percept symbols faster than words.

for some people it might not have such huge impact on how they work or not so big deal as long as everything is where they are used to find it.

Michael

[Stooch]

lol its my "gateway program".

i remember the days of making sky highways, box buildings and various primitives floating around. Its still quite capable of doing this job it seems.

[Titus]

You guys are out to lunch. Why don't we write books with icons instead of words? If images are so great at conveying meaning, we should switch back to pictographs or hieroglyphics.

Or ideograms, like those in your avatar. Only a quarter of the population use them :D.

[prometheus]

hey..why not use voice recognizion..just say the word box, or ball ..and lightwaves starts creating it for you..better yet..just connect the brain to the computer and think of an image of a ball or box...and..oh..crap..back to square one.

Michael