Silo is back after many years. Version 2.5
michael-kristensen_e59faa8f72
Posts: 50
Hi there
I just want to point to that Silo is back after many years.
Mic
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Comments
Very nice! It's great to see it back. There aren't a lot of lower-price commercial 3D packs out there.
A couple of notes: It has a "Universal Manipulator" mode! Now, that may not seem like much, but Hexagon's Universal Manipulator is just plain awesome and when you don't find it in another 3D package, you'll realize just how much you miss how much speed that adds to your work!
And, it has sculpting tools!
Very nice. I still love Hexagon for its speed and ease of use, but I'll certainly take a look at this latest Silo.
Yeah, I have Silo myself went with it to get 64 bit goodness. It now sports more file formats and alembic support. It is a great modeler. I would recommend this to anyone struggling with Hexagon.
I have it. But prefer using Hexagon 1.21 still for all my modeling. Much faster getting work done for me.
Hi Shawn, long time no hear. Don't you wish Daz would update/upgrade Hexagon 2.5? I too miss using Hexagon for the speed factor. I just can't waste my time on very unstable, unreliable software. Good to see you back here however.
1.21 works great for me. No weird bugs. No crashes. But I'm on Windows. Macs probably can't run 1.21 at all anymore, unless they are running Windows.
I've been using Silo since it first came out and have had very little problems with it when it comes to crashing. It's a very stable platform and a clean and customizable UI.
I've had some crashing issues with this Silo, but I think that's because it the installer put it in the 32bit directory and is now, recently, a 64bit proggy. I've got to reinstall it in its own directory to be sure it's got everything it needs before calling this problem a "bug."
That's weird. I've never seen a 64-bit app get installed in a 32-bit programs folder. For Silo, I just hit next next next, etc during the install. No issue, other than that Silo can't open some OBJ models that my other apps have been using fine for years.
I bought it through "Steam" which has a default install-directory structure in the x86 directory. I didn't specify a 64 bit directory, so it defaulted there. I bought it through Steam because it was offered there for only $50 during the sale for the same product, since Steam gets the update, too.
Interesting about the import issue. I remember reading something about previous versions of Silo and "large" models, but that's not supposed to be a big deal, anymore. Are there any unusual properties for the objects you're trying to import? What sort of errors/issues hapeen? (Things I haven't explored are importing n-gons or .obj files with .mtl references. I also haven't really pushed it, yet, with large models. I have no idea how Silo deals with those issues.)
I think I paid $29 for Silo about 10 years ago. It prefers to export OBJs. Not import them. 3D-Coat is the best OBJ exporter/importer I'm ever used. It's one of the few modelers that can export what it imports without changing an OBJ in the process. If I import an OBJ file into Hexagon or Silo, the file is going to lose some information. Best to only export OBJ from those apps.
Lose information? What will it strip out of a wavefront object file on import? (I could understand if there were shading groups in it, since not a lot of apps use wavefront obj shading groups natively. But, is there anything of consequence that would be stripped out or lost?)
Hex will lose edge creases, colors, and textures when importing a perfectly good model from another app. If you're painting a model in another app, you do not want to send it back to Hexagon for any reason.
Hexagon is good for making new meshes, or morphing old ones. If you are using another app like Poser to do your rendering in. That's it.
I tried the Silo route for a cheap modeler but I it kept crashing randomly, so I just shelved it. That was about a year ago. I see they have been doing some updates so I was thinking of giving it a try again. But I would rather use Hexgaon because of how it's integrated with Daz, but dang! that program is 6 years old and still has the same old bugs it's had for years. I reinstalled and tried it again recently and within minutes it crashed on me (Sad Face)
I don't use Daz Studio. I keep Hexagon 1.21 as a separate modeler. No bridges or GoZ type nonsense that forever breaks whenever updates happen. If a new Hexagon does get released, and it doesn't crash, I'll still keep it separated. No bridges to other apps. Just import/export. Mostly export.