What is Happening with LW?

[Rayek]

According to Linkedin he left LW development last August:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/antti-järvelä-4493913/

And Jon Tindall also left the same month:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-tindall-0674261/

If this is true, who is still developing LightWave? Or am I reading this wrong - it should say "[start date] - present" in Linkedin to indicate continuing employment, right?

[TheLexx]

If this is true, who is still developing LightWave?

Maybe no one...at present, but as long as the code is tidy and the notes aren't just written on the back of an envelope or cig packet all should be well.. During these odd times, I wasn't expecting a LW2021 in any hurry and I'm guessing work pro output has slowed, but I might be wrong of course.

[Nicolas Jordan]

It doesn't say either of them left on their Linkedin accounts at the moment. Maybe they just updated it. Antti just posted some videos on how to use the new 2020 GI a few months ago https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lKK3Vy_s1Fw&t=1567s

[prometheus]

According to Linkedin he left LW development last August:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/antti-järvelä-4493913/

And Jon Tindall also left the same month:

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jon-tindall-0674261/

If this is true, who is still developing LightWave? Or am I reading this wrong - it should say "[start date] - present" in Linkedin to indicate continuing employment, right?

Did I miss the part where they or someome in the feed from Linkedin is writing they have left? other than the assumtion from the date updates they have for their employment.
Personally I would from that just guess it´s and date update thingy in Linkedin, and not assume it has something to do with leaving Lightwave and newtek..at first glance, I could be wrong of course.
But knowing from my own experience with how Linkedin treats the employment date range, that is what I guess.

The odds of two employees leaving at the same time? and then you have the shift of the month not long ago, so I guess it´s just a date thingy in linkedin.

Poking at Anti..Right now, just to see if "It" bumps back

[Rayek]

I checked, and ordinarily LinkedIn uses the start date of employment and a "present" to indicate that a person is still in active employment.

In both Jon's and Antti's case: Nov 2007 – Aug 2020 Employment Duration12 yrs 10 mos

Matt Gorner, who is a UX/UI Designer at Newtek is listed as: Sep 2010 – Present Employment Duration 10 yrs 1 mo

Which would indicate that Antti and Jon no longer are active at the LW 3D group.

[gar26lw]

10 years for Matt? Wow, time flies

[prometheus]

I checked, and ordinarily LinkedIn uses the start date of employment and a "present" to indicate that a person is still in active employment.

In both Jon's and Antti's case: Nov 2007 – Aug 2020 Employment Duration12 yrs 10 mos

Matt Gorner, who is a UX/UI Designer at Newtek is listed as: Sep 2010 – Present Employment Duration 10 yrs 1 mo

Which would indicate that Antti and Jon no longer are active at the LW 3D group.

It´s of course possible that´s the case, but I have had issues with the updates not showing properly as to have ended ..despite that I changed it in my Linkedin profile, so I am not sure it is reliable really, then again..this is the case of the opposite, if it was a Linked update fault ending the employee date.

Another reason to add to the confusion, there are a lot of folks getting lay-off, during corona and the economic situations..so maybe they have implemented that for a while..but not for good, and meanwhile Antti is working for his self for a while, but not permanently leaving?
And the same for Tindall.

A shame if they by any reason have staff dropping out otherwise, or if their jobs are terminated.

[hrgiger]

Matt no longer works for the LightWave group. He hasnn't for 3 years. But he does work at Newtek. It does appear that both Antti and Jon have left NT.

[prometheus]

Not much in terms of ads for new jobs at Vizrt, if you look at the Lightwave3D page and check careers, you will end up on the Vizrt site anyway...

[jwiede]

Dave Vrba is also showing as working there until Aug 2020, whereas Bob Hood stlll shows as through "present".

Seems pretty likely staffing changes occurred.

Personally, I'd prefer clear messaging regarding whether LW2020 dev cycle is over now, some indication of future, etc. versus yet another corp-speak "staffing changes, it doesn't mean anything" exec dismissive, but expect we'll actually get more of the same nothing as usual.

[Nicolas Jordan]

I just noticed that on Jon Tindalls profile Deuce gave him a recommendation on Aug 29 2020 so yes I guess it would appear both Jon and Antti are likely no longer on the dev team. So render engine dev has been stopped I guess. There could have been more staff let go that are not on Linked In.

I hope the only reason for trimming back dev staff is because they have a very limited budget and plan on using those funds to contract new dev staff to work on other specialized areas of Lightwave. If they keep trimming staff without hiring any new staff then it's very limiting for Lightwaves future development.

[Nicolas Jordan]

I checked, and ordinarily LinkedIn uses the start date of employment and a "present" to indicate that a person is still in active employment.

In both Jon's and Antti's case: Nov 2007 – Aug 2020 Employment Duration12 yrs 10 mos

Matt Gorner, who is a UX/UI Designer at Newtek is listed as: Sep 2010 – Present Employment Duration 10 yrs 1 mo

Which would indicate that Antti and Jon no longer are active at the LW 3D group.

I don't think Matt works on Lightwave anymore either. Last I heard they had him working on other products.

[Rayek]

It would be nice for Newtek to let us know what's really going on because my gut feeling regarding this isn't a good one.

I agree. It feels very off. But perhaps we are only doom-thinking here. Yet I have a gut feeling that Newtek will announce something in relation to LightWave. What exactly, I am unsure. But I am probably wrong.

[jwiede]

I hope the only reason for trimming back dev staff is because they have a very limited budget and plan on using those funds to contract new dev staff to work on other specialized areas of Lightwave. If they keep trimming staff without hiring any new staff then it's very limiting for Lightwaves future development.

When you do that, you MUST hire the new staff before firing the old staff (to ensure there's some transfer of institutional/canonical knowledge).

Doing the reverse, you're basically ENSURING widespread catastrophic loss of same.

[erikals]

I don't think Matt works on LightWave anymore either. Last I heard they had him working on other products.

yup.