Will you upgrade/buy when/if Lightwave 2021 comes out?

[prometheus]

I understand. There's a difference between mentioning another applications in an appropriate context and promoting it, but setting aside the need for some good judgement around that somewhat fuzzy line, whether you spell the application name out in full or not wouldn't be the determining factor.

What you as moderator or the forum rules says, is however one thing..how people find it appropiate to mention "B" in all it´s full glory in a lot of threads, that´s another thing a bit to the side of the rules and what you as a moderator has as guidelines.

Then we have to be consistent don´t we.
So we also have "H" "M" And "M" and "C" and a bunch more to make the communication easier to understand.

So let´s talk about something more constructive and interesting..
When will the next "L" version come out? anyone with insight should I save money or spend on something else?

 

[raymondtrace]

...how many people (NOT Corporations) "donate" to Bl*nd*r Foundation or subscribe to Bl*nd*r Cloud?

The B cloud displays its statistics. The last I looked, it was pulling in $40k per month. I'm sure as a non-profit, the foundation also publishes its income somewhere. There are plenty of other revenue streams (as demonstrated by the B cloud and from asset market/software development companies like Daz and Reallusion).

Can I just say I find it kind of funny when people write about "B", or "", or "Bl*nd*r", and similar variants? As far as I know, while the forum software does block some curse words and the like, this is not true for the word "Blender". I guess people are trying to be considerate guests, but it seems a little weird.

It has been my practice to only mention B because (while it is a tool in my box) there is no need for any promotion of it here...where I come to learn and discuss LW. However, in terms of SEO, I'm realizing the fault of this practice. If we were all spelling out the name, these LW forums could rank well in Google searches for B.

 

[prometheus]

Probably due to the LWO upgrade?



32bit - so yesterday.




Yeah I can see that.



2015 was pretty solid. I just can't go back.

Would we be having this thread if everybody had kept up to date with LW? Probably not, but LW also probably should have kept up with the times for sure. Subscription would have killed LW and perpetual licensing did kill LW. If Blender didn't exist LW would be in good shape. Blender has had 20 million downloads but lets be real, probably only 1 million or so actually "use" it. If LW had gotten 2% of that customer base we wouldn't be having this conversation.

Yes...I suspect the fbx not working or mdd not properly working has to do with the Lwo update, I mentioned that in the ..don´t be offended, the 1001 ways to use blender and Lightwave together thread.

Apart from that interchange issue, I have the volume light´s I would liked to have(sprite mode mostly), then some simbiont shaders...and all those textures available there.

32 bit, yesterday..all my troubles was far away, with 64 bit..you exclude modeling tasks you simply can not perform with 2019, there is a reason it says retrograder in my profile, a reminder of that somethings were done better in yesterday, if they aren´t improved to replace the days of yesterday with better things tomorrow..something like that..ehh

 

[prometheus]

The B cloud displays its statistics. The last I looked, it was pulling in $40k per month. I'm sure as a non-profit, the foundation also publishes its income somewhere. There are plenty of other revenue streams (as demonstrated by the B cloud and from asset market/software development companies like Daz and Reallusion).



It has been my practice to only mention B because (while it is a tool in my box) there is no need for any promotion of it here...where I come to learn and discuss LW. However, in terms of SEO, I'm realizing the fault of this practice. If we were all spelling out the name, these LW forums could rank well in Google searches for B.

Guess we have to define and classify what promotion of a software is..first of all to avoid any confusion and the "weird" situation when mentioning "B"..

• Just mentionining it by name?
• How frequent that is mentioned?
• New release is out?
• New features?
• How it is handling this or that in terms of capabilities etc?
• The amount of refering to what it is capable of or it´s name etc?

Intentionally or unintentionally, there is a risc that "B" get´s promoted..even if it´s not a direct promotion, there´s always hidden factors that could qualify as "promotion"
I myself in the 1001 ways of using blender and lightwave together, points out issues where I feel I can do something better in one software, and it´s not working nicely in the other..but this is purely isolated towards that very question/issue of technical matters, and isn´t intended to serve as promotion, more to put light on where something fails and where it could be done better..and that means you have to reference the better alternative, it will still be seen as such by users to a certain degree.

 

[prometheus]

"volumetric lights in sprite mode"

Yeah I can see that.

Renders superfast, with fast iteration viewport feedback.. and it had a special look to it, you can´t have that fast light background with the new volumetric system,looks also hard to match.

workaround if you would want that background and lights, do it in 2015 and render out background, open the scene in 2019 and render objects, ships etc on top of that.

 

[prometheus]

And can´t use the simbiont shaders either in 2019, had some nifty shaders..this sample, the sun..( you can get there, takes a bit of more work though)

 

[jwiede]

Apart from that interchange issue, I have the volume light´s I would liked to have(sprite mode mostly), then some simbiont shaders...and all those textures available there.

Yeah, I find it extremely telling how few discuss or show VFX-style volumetric lighting tricks (engine flares, weapon flares, weapons discharges, etc.) in LW any longer -- there's a reason for that, and it highlights a pretty significant loss of functionality from moving to the new render engine.

LW volumetric lights each having their own discrete volumetric scattering medium was critical to many of those tricks. Having so many vlights proximal to each other affecting the same common scattering medium just turns into a big emissive mess. Previously, users could also use selecting between full-volumetric and sprite-based rendering to control perf-vs-quality on a use-by-use basis, as well. Now, volumetric rendering is painfully slow, and trying to use complex node networks to differentiate scattering between vlights just worsens an already poorly performant situation.

Considering how important those kinds of VFX-style shots and uses were in building LW's popularity in the first place, and where LW is now, feels like baby, bathwater, tub, soap, and a good portion of the house were all tossed out. Oh well, guess that functionality just wasn't "important" any longer.

 

[Tim Parsons]

Uhhhhhh, what other revenue stream could a commercial software product use?

That's kind of my point - either way, subscription or perpetual, LW was destined to die. Just not enough potential users to go around. The best business to be in is the toilet paper business - everybody needs and uses it.

 

[prometheus]

Yeah, I find it extremely telling how few discuss or show VFX-style volumetric lighting tricks (engine flares, weapon flares, weapons discharges, etc.) in LW any longer -- there's a reason for that, and it highlights a pretty significant loss of functionality from moving to the new render engine.

LW volumetric lights each having their own discrete volumetric scattering medium was critical to many of those tricks. Having so many vlights proximal to each other affecting the same common scattering medium just turns into a big emissive mess. Previously, users could also use selecting between full-volumetric and sprite-based rendering to control perf-vs-quality on a use-by-use basis, as well. Now, volumetric rendering is painfully slow, and trying to use complex node networks to differentiate scattering between vlights just worsens an already poorly performant situation.

Considering how important those kinds of VFX-style shots and uses were in building LW's popularity in the first place, and where LW is now, feels like baby, bathwater, tub, soap, and a good portion of the house were all tossed out. Oh well, guess that functionality just wasn't "important" any longer.

Yes, I agree with some of that.

Had to switch to 2015 a while today to fiddle around with it again, installed the newer dpont fractals with warping that contains, smoke, fluid, turbulence procedurals etc...I never tested that with sprite lights before..some really nice backgrounds effect at a fraction of the time it takes to work with 2019 volumetric lights and messing with textures in full volume mode there, perhaps 4.7 seconds vs, a couple of minutes for refining the viewport to final.
I don´t mind the fuller volumetric global stuff for some things though, but it´s too darn slow with many lights etc, and other volumetric items, but would have been nice to have the sprite lights being able to be engaged like the old legacy voxel sprite system as well.
May record it to showcase speed and the looks of that later.

 

[jimzombie]

Well the jump from LW11 to 2020 would have been a very nice upgrade for you.

Indeed, especially given I also took advantage of the LWCAD sale. So many new tools!

 

[Aggi]

I continue to use LW2018. And I didn't purchase LW2019 and LW2020. But I'm slowly warming up to LW2018. Should a version 2021 really come out, then I'll buy it.

 

[Bill Carey]

I continue to use LW2018. And I didn't purchase LW2019 and LW2020. But I'm slowly warming up to LW2018. Should a version 2021 really come out, then I'll buy it.

We're still hoping!

 

[prometheus]

I continue to use LW2018. And I didn't purchase LW2019 and LW2020. But I'm slowly warming up to LW2018. Should a version 2021 really come out, then I'll buy it.

Why?
Because it just then just happens to be released?
Perhaps they just release it with a new cover and nothing else, surely your standards and demands must be more than .."if it comes out"?
You look at the product and judge what it got, then purchase..then there are those who is die hard supporters that give away money for free just to support it I guess.

 

[raymondtrace]

...supporters that give away money for free just to support it I guess.

While my spending is far from being based on altruism, part of my decision for recent upgrades was to credit the devs. They deserved credit for keeping it alive (even as NT tried to kill it with a 5 year absence of marketing). Without those devs, there's one less reason to buy in.

 

[prometheus]

While my spending is far from being based on altruism, part of my decision for recent upgrades was to credit the devs. They deserved credit for keeping it alive (even as NT tried to kill it with a 5 year absence of marketing). Without those devs, there's one less reason to buy in.

Fair enough and understandable, if it´s "a part" of the decision.
Unfortunately, a few guys with such passion to do that isn´t enough I would guess, and for more people to have that passion,they need to believe, and to believe they need to have a communication with the company..that carries a philosophy on disclosing the very basics, as if they will continue to develop or not..and we are back to the eternal complaints about that..but there you go.

I will refuse to vote on the polls though, who would use that, or was it intended to show? the vizrt team to get all excited about the user poll and roll up their sleeves and get to work with hiring devs again? meh..don´t think so, and my vote would not encourage them anyway with the current status of not even giving the basics out to the customers around development.

Currently messing around with both blender and lightwave that helps me solve some workflow with fluid meshing from smoke, because all alone for the task, neither Lightwave or blender does what I need, but together it does.
So still using it, but the VDB implementation needs a major boost if I would invest, along with much more, one of the most important stuff they need to get their act together with, that is modeling tools in layout, none destructive workflow with curves etc.

 

[erikals]

LightWave still got mileage, it gets things "done" --- too often I feel like i'm wrestling Blender.

in LightWave i feel like John Wick, in Blender i feel like Chuck Norris.

 

[prometheus]

LightWave still got mileage, it gets things "done" --- too often I feel like i'm wrestling Blender.

View attachment 149633
in LightWave i feel like John Wick, in Blender i feel like Chuck Norris.

Blender is a structural mess, always has been..though they are working on it, fancy modeling tools and some other features you can do that simply isn´t possible with Lightwave.
Recent fiddlings with drawing curves, with geoemtery and remesh on top at that in realtime, each curve I draw can be drawn with a pen draw action, the curves are not a mesh by default but with remesher in edit mode they are, and with remesher in edit mode, each new curve I draw ...and the geometry shape, will fuse melt together with the other curves

And not only that..the depth can be projected to any surface so I can actually just draw tree root branches on cliffs or stars in one single go, fluently...this is not possible in lightwave, heck you can even have these drawn curves have yet another modifier, such as mesh to volume, which means I can draw curves with a mesh that fuses together on the other curves and have volumetrics active, drawing cloud tentacles, though depending on resolution on the mesh modifier and the volume modifier, it may become a little slow to draw.

Have to record that.

That said, blender is a structural mess with developers uncertain of where tools and panels should be, and it lacks a proper preset system for the materials and lacks a lot of fractals, and the native fluid system is ok, and to some degree better than the gas solver in some cases, but not more than that, it would need to step up on that area too.
If those things were fixed..then there´s are real contender.

 

[chunderburger]

Be nice if they just contracted out bug fixes

 

[WaveRider]

I only do either NPR or COP (crap on purpose) these days, so no reason for me to upgrade from 2015 any time soon. Maybe when the app split between Layout and Modeler gets dropped... around 2030, with the establishment of the first permanent settlement on Mars.

 

[wingzeta]

If you don't compete for market share, in a competitive market, then you too can kill a product with little effort. It takes money to make money. You have to market a product. You have to keep a product up to date with the competition.

So Yes, please sell the asset to another company that is willing to do these things, if such a company exists. If no such company exists, it means you have overvalued the asset, and need to lower the price. The argument that this is too complicated, or that so many legal entanglemnts exist, as to make the sale of an asset too difficult, pretends that companies don't buy and sell assets and IP's everyday. If you have given up on the product, sell it for the amount of money someone will give you for it. If you have honor, and wish to court good will, you might also not sell it to someone who intends to buy it in order to mothball a competitor (e.g. AD with XSI).