Has any tried LW 2020 on MacOS 11 (Big Sur)?

avkills said:
However, trying to use Cinema4D always makes me cringe in fear. I am just too accustomed to how LW Modeler and Layout works.
Click to expand...

Now that C4D has proper camera dollies and cranes, scene setup actually feels more like Layout now, IMO, maybe even a bit more "real". Also, for animation, having full-on, proper NLA is incredibly useful. Nicest of all, most stuff works even when used in non-expected manners, that's pretty valuable by itself, and something Layout appears to have lost.
 
Last edited:
Has anyone found a way to get the submenus back using LW 2019 on Bgi Sur? Without having to do a reinstall of Calalina?
 
macOS 11 and Lightwave2015

miked said:
Just wondering if there are any guinea pigs out there who have given this a try. Big Sur is about to come out of beta, and it seems like a significant overhaul to Mac OS, which means there's potential to break LightWave…
Click to expand...

Cant even get it to install so far.
 
jwiede said:
Now that C4D has proper camera dollies and cranes, scene setup actually feels more like Layout now, IMO, maybe even a bit more "real". Also, for animation, having full-on, proper NLA is incredibly useful. Nicest of all, most stuff works even when used in non-expected manners, that's pretty valuable by itself, and something Layout appears to have lost.
Click to expand...

Absolutely.

The argument that Layout feels like a stage, lets you act like a camera man; that may all be true. But due to Layouts lack of flexibility and progress for decades in that regard, other applications are far beyond that now. Spline control was added some releases back but was never improved again.

For example the ability to use tags on the camera object of any kind, having camera setups as you mentioned, the takes system, being able to just draw splines to animate the cam, various ways of running parametric and keyframe-less animation, native 2D and 3D motion tracking, various supported stereo / VR formats, even just the way to move in and out of the camera view or having a separate undo for camera changes is just so much more useful.

By the way John, if you don't know and have the Recall plugin for Cinema yet, I highly recommend it. Great for camera setups as well as to further improve the overall workflow. And the Signal plugin of course which is incredibly versatile but I guess you know these already.

P.s. sorry for being off topic here.
 
Last edited:
Haven't done much more than kick the tires since updating the OS, but 2020.0.2 is working fine for me on Big Sur on a 2019 16-inch MBP.
 
Marander said:
By the way John, if you don't know and have the Recall plugin for Cinema yet, I highly recommend it. Great for camera setups as well as to further improve the overall workflow. And the Signal plugin of course which is incredibly versatile but I guess you know these already.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tip on Recall, it looks extremely useful, and I'll grab it ASAP!

I've had Signal since it was released. :D
 
Thanks for letting us know. I'm still hesitant to update to Big Sur until I get most of my LW assets safely ported to Cinema 4D (which I'm slowly learning, but liking more and more).

But I'm also eager to update to Big Sur so I can try out Redshift and Octane.

Does anybody know of a forum with a lot of people transitioning from Lightwave to Cinema?

- - - Updated - - -

David_CGC said:
Haven't done much more than kick the tires since updating the OS, but 2020.0.2 is working fine for me on Big Sur on a 2019 16-inch MBP.
Click to expand...

Thanks for letting us know. I'm still hesitant to update to Big Sur until I get most of my LW assets safely ported to Cinema 4D (which I'm slowly learning, but liking more and more).

But I'm also eager to update to Big Sur so I can try out Redshift and Octane.

Does anybody know of a forum with a lot of people transitioning from Lightwave to Cinema?
 
Following up on this.
I spent some time exporting all of my major LW assets to FBX for import to Cinema 4D. Apparently Cinema lost the ability to import LW directly as of R20.
After upgrading to Big Sur it seems that LW 2020 no longer works. It crashed whenever I switched to Viper view or launched a render. Luckily 2019 seems to work just fine.

I was in a rush to upgrade to Big Sur because I wanted to use Redshift in Cinema 4D and the Mac/Metal version requires the drivers in Big Sur for the AMD GPUs. Also I wanted to get my hands on Redshift asap because I didn't want to get too deep into learning the native Cinema 4D materials, lighting and rendering systems only to have to learn my way around Redshift on top of it.

I've been using Lightwave since version 4 or 5 (so like, 20 some years). I've been interested in Cinema 4D for quite a few years but never really liked the native renderer and besides, it still doesn't export Cryptomatte. When I heard about Redshift starting to support (some) AMD GPUs on Mac I realized it was time to move on and so far, so good.
 
Hi there. Stuck like some of you with the lack of LW updates as Mac OS carries on evolving.

Got one machine (Mac mini 2019) where Lightwave 2018 works with Catalina so I won't be updating OS here for as long as I can.

Got another one, (Mac Book pro 2014) with Catalina where Lightwave 2018 stopped working, no way to make layout and model work together. So I updated to Big Sur anyway. Every other piece of software I have works (or updates are available) except LW 2018. I've been toying with the idea to buy LW 2020 just to keep me going for a while as I only do Architectural Stills using LW renderer. Also with the idea of setting up my scenes as normal and start learning something like Octane. However, it seems that for some people (as I can see above) LW2020 is not working with Big Sur. Is this a general fact? or some people can run 2020 on big sur well?. I can't work without seeing the sub menus.

On the other hand, thinking about transiotioning

-Not really wanting to go to the B app.

-I've started using TwinMotion which is good for some things but I still need a modelling-high-end-rendering app.

-Then Is C4D, which I never really wanted to get into, but seems to be the only choice. Having to relearn a whole new app is annoying but it's time to.

-- I saw also the OctaneX stand alone app being offered free on the App Store. I downloaded it but I can't make it recognise my envidia card although it is supposed to be supported.

As I don't know anything about Octane yet, I was wondering if you could tell me whether I can set up scenes (in the stand alone app) in a similar way I can do in layout: Import geometry, move it around, set up cameras and lights etc. This way I could perhaps model in modular for a while more and just import the geometry into Octane standalone for setting up my scenes. This way avoiding using layout at all.
 
jwiede said:
Now that C4D has proper camera dollies and cranes, scene setup actually feels more like Layout now, IMO, maybe even a bit more "real". Also, for animation, having full-on, proper NLA is incredibly useful. Nicest of all, most stuff works even when used in non-expected manners, that's pretty valuable by itself, and something Layout appears to have lost.
Click to expand...
Well I might have to give it another look then.
 
Switching to another software like a subscription based C4D has additional hurdles besides the learning curve.
- How do you transfer your assets to the new package and if you don't want to transfer them, how can you open your old projects in two years with the then current Apple OS?
- How to access your models and scenes once you stop the Maxon subscription, if you decide C4D is no longer your tool of choice?
- What would you do if a client requires a change on an older project? (If this applies to you)
I run the 14 days trial of c4d currently and try to convert my models back and forth between both packages.
I have not tried Polytrans, yet. But I don't think C4D Loft objects or subdivision modifiers translate well to LW. This would be a frozen mesh, I guess.

So, test it out. Try to find a workflow to find the show stoppers before you commit to a yearly subscription.

To be clear here, I currently don't want to switch, but I want to see how both packages could work together. But if I decide to skip c4d after 2 years, I need a way to transfer editable objects back to LW.
 
Last edited:
Subscription is a big no-no, as you point out problems with assets if you stop subscription.
These companies basically have you over a barrel.
But then I am only a hobbyist.
 
briancoates said:
Well, found some time to try a fresh install and the blank sub menu issue is still there in LW 2018… looks like it’s time to upgrade or switch to another 3D program, if the talk about LW’s impending demise is to be believed.
Click to expand...
did you ever get updated OS to work Either Big Sur or Monterrey? Did you end up upgrading to LW 2020?
 
I have been running 2019 on Big Sur for a while; but I am no where near pushing the envelope on all the features. Only noticed a few things that are wonky but not unusable.
 
avkills said:
I have been running 2019 on Big Sur for a while; but I am no where near pushing the envelope on all the features. Only noticed a few things that are wonky but not unusable.
Click to expand...
Does that include submenus failing to render their text? Pretty far from usable at that pt.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top