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I've heard of the "uncanny valley" expression - thanks for explaining it so well.
Yes, Avatar is a perfect example. They didn't look like your average Joe and Joelene, so we never expected them to move like your average Joe and Joelene. They were large and fluent and their movements were large and fluent, so they looked right - suspended disbelief I think is the expression?
Absolutely fantastic movie!
Roy, your point is well taken, but there are tons of examples of, let's say, human-like creatures that we've all seen in feature films that are really excellently done. For example, the octopus-faced guy in Pirates is just one example...can't remember the dude's name. But there are many examples of characters that are not intended to be human, so creepy is okay...but they are human-like and just astonishing CG effects.
But yeah, a purely human, realistic human, that you want people to believe is really human, is exceedingly difficult. But an octopus-faced guy can be real creepy and it's okay, because people don't really know what an octopus-faced guy should look like, so they get a lot of leeway... :) :)
EDIT: Ahh, okay, the octopus guy was Bill Nighy playing Davy Jones. I believe they used Nighy's actual eyes and mouth, and the rest of the character was CG. Which tells you how very difficult it is to match a real human's eyes and mouth movements. ILM won an Academy Award for those visual effects. Good stuff.
I'm referring principally to the ready availability of aniMate clips. Sure, they do what they are intended to do, that is move limbs and they do it well. Realistic human movement involves a lot more than just moving limbs. Human and animal movement also involves muscle movement, little twitches and individuality, which these do not have.
My point is that when you are using realistic humans, the viewers expect to see realistic movement - including the clothing. Anything else simply looks stilted and disappoints. When you use cartoon characters, viewers expect different movement that is similar to but not exactly human or animal, so you can let the imagination run wild.
In no way is this an exclusive Carrara failing - even the big studios don't try to use realistic humans. The last CG feature-film I saw which used humans was Polar Express and even that didn't even try to pretend that they were real humans.
Carrara does have shortcomings which makes it even more difficult to do good character animation than applications such as Blender, but even Blender couldn't do realistic human animations - simply because real human movements are too complex to imitate in CG as it is at this point in time.
As far as mocap is concerned, I would be pleasantly surprised to hear that C8.5 has been improved to be able to correctly import BVH. Using the CMU BVH, the best method up to C8.1 is to animate in DS and export as pz2.
Remember we are discussing the future of Carrara and I am saying that the future of Carrara as a character animator would be better served by bringing out a line of correctly rigged cartoon characters, rather than continuing to rely on realistic humans. These make great stills, but not animations.
If anyone can point me to a really good realistic human animation, made in Carrara or any other application, even of say 3 minutes, I will be most pleasantly surprised and eat my words :)
Dart - hope you are not referring to my post as saying that more expensive apps do a better job of producing good images - that is not what I implied at all :)
I don't use DS at all. Never been a fan. I don't even use Carrara 8-whatever. I kick it 7.2 style haha
I use BVHs directly into Carrara all the time, though I prefer PZ2 and GFAs since Carrara operates best with quick cuts in the animation anyway.
Like with all mocaps, when using BVH, you're still going to need to get in there and tweak the final animation to really bring it to life. I don't really push too hard for life like animation. I figure that there's plenty of life to stare at in the real world. I think a more dynamic, cartoonish approach is best regardless of the animation medium. Even in very realistic video games you'll notice a lot of squash and stretch these days. A lot of over anticipation and excessive deflating in movements. I think it's more pleasing to the eye.
Anyway -- here's a how you quickly and simply put a BVH into Carrara. This is in old 7.2. Might even be easier in the newer versions.
cont.
So image 1: Figure in scene.
Image 2: Select HIP and IMPORT
Image 3: Select BVH mocap
Image 4: Match bones (do not create new bones)
Image 5:CAPS LOCK to align perspective center adjust animation as needed.
(everything is optional after this)
Image 6: Create masterclip for future use.
Image 7: Zero pose your figure. (Your clip is not stored on the sidebar there)
Image 8: Drag your clip into your scene, or drag it into your "Clips" folder for later use.
My take. When you boils it all down to its simplest elements, 3D is (a) objects that can be shaped (b) a surface that can hold a texture (procedural or map) (c) a method to move said objects around a 3 dimensional space (d) a method to illuminate the textures on the objects.
Software, skill and talent define the ease and speed at which the end results can be achieved but as long as a,b,c and d are present, the same end result can be achieve regardless of what software is being used.
I hate to disagree with most everything I've read so far in this thread, but here it goes...
First, lets start with complete honesty. Not that anyone is lying, but let's clear the slate a bit.
Guys and gals, there are no guarantees, regardless of talent, regardless of training and tools, regardless of budget and resources, it's all a crap shoot to a certain degree. Failure to keep that in mind at all stages of the discussion will lead to oversimplification.
Also keep in mind that every "rule"has its "exceptions." Don't be distracted and mislead by the exceptions. Know how to recognize an exception when you see one, and don't mistake it for the general rule. We've seen a million big budget movies do well earning lots of money, but we've also seen a few independent movies do really well against all odds. That doesn't mean that independent movies stand an equal chance against the big studios.
The issue is more probabilistic than anything. The probability of the project being successful increases proportionally with increased talent, tools, and other resources available to the big studios. That isn't to say that every once in a while a home-made single laptop animation might not blow it all away.
BC Rice isn't wrong, he's talking about the general "rule." which is that the major studios use Maya, or Maya derivatives for most everything they do. No one should really be disagreeing with this except to play devil's advocate. Again, this statement doesn't cover every possible exception nor does it need to. Resist the temptation to discredit the statement simply because it doesn't cover all possible exceptions. Accept it for the rule that it is.
Dartanbeck in my opinion is focused more on the exceptions, which he should be, because it is only with the exception that Carrara will compete head to head with Maya. Dartanbeck is wise enough to know that the exceptions do indeed exist, there are Carrara renders out there that look like Maya renders, so he is right to disagree with BC Rice's characterization of the rule because the rule isn't absolute.
What BC Rice should have stated was something like; "Carrara can rarely compete directly with Maya." This would be a fair and true statement, that Dartanbeck might still disagree with, just not as much.
Talent- I personally strongly dislike this word, no offense to Dartanbeck. It's like telling someone they are pretty to look at, its sort of empty. Ask anyone what the word "talent" even means and they will have a very difficult time describing it. Many people interpret talent to be some sort of cosmically ordained instruction for a person to explore some given exploit. It's almost like saying that this is what God wants that person to be doing so he's gone and made it easier for them. Like those with talent are more deserving of success than those without it. I've seen many times that children who are told they are talented in a certain subject become lazy in that subject because they now assume their talent makes everything easier for them so hard work isn't required. I try to avoid the word talent because it gives the impression that a certain degree of understanding is simply beyond the reach of those who were not born with such talents. Is talent a real thing...yes. Is it the deciding factor?...often but not always. Some people can sing and some cannot, at least not quite as well. But I've seen talent fail at times when artists depended on it most, making them momentarily envious of their non talented but harder working competitors who managed to pull off the impossible, even if that is the exceptional case.
Tools- Its not what you do, but how you do it that often matters most. Tools give us the "how" factor. Making this 3d looking image pixel by pixel in MS Paint is okay, but it isn't nearly as elegant as making it in Carrara, which might not be as elegant as making it in Maya. Life is short, why spend weeks to do what might be done in minutes in a more elegant software? Underestimation of tools is its own sort of blasphemy.
"Art" is a combination of inspiration and technical ability (resources) to follow through on said inspiration. Any useful discussion separates these two ideals and handles them uniquely. Often technical limitations will affect inspiration, forcing an artist to water down their initial artistic goals for more reasonably attainable goals. In reverse, there are also times when the technical tools of the software end up inspiring the artist to new levels of artistic expression. More on this in a moment.
Someone said earlier in the thread that in today's hiring market the concepts mean more than the software...okay, but then I argue, where then does one learn about these concepts? The only answer is that the concepts are learned from the software. Tell me a software that can give you a more complete basic understanding of the necessary CG concepts than an application like Maya? Sure, the house you end up working for might not be using Maya specifically, but the concepts that they are employing are probably found in Maya in some shape or form, so having experience with Maya will give you added insight into whatever the house is actually using. Learn Maya even if you don't end up using it, that's my advice.
Now HERE is an issue no one wants to talk about...and that is about....well...talent. If we can all agree that talent is that "indescribable something" that makes some people more proficient at certain tasks than the average person, then we need to face certain facts.
First is the assumption that all artists are created equal. Maybe this isn't true.
The average Maya user might just be more talented overall than the average Carrara user. It could also be stated that the average Maya user is likely more financially affluent than the average Carrara user. Let me explain. People who are more talented with the available funds tend to be drawn to applications like Maya, 3Ds Max, C4D, Houdini, because these applications can better keep pace with the talents of the artists using them, as well as helping them to meet deadlines for their clients. When you see a Maya gallery and compare it to a Carrara gallery, you often see vast differences in the work. This isn't simply a matter of lighting algorithms and shaders, it might also be real underlying talent and practical professional experience that is disproportional.
Maya users who've studied formally academically have had the world changing benefit of open discussion about their work allowing them to develop an eye that is far more critical than that of a hobbyist who's only feedback is coming from friends who want to say nice things. What we see in the final gallery comparisons might look like a difference in software alone, but if you look closely its not only software but talent combined with experience that is making the huge differences. Maya draws a greater number of "talented" (gifted individuals) than Carrara does. There, I said it.
The average person who can afford to buy Maya probably also enjoys a lifestyle where they have the time to learn it and use it for personal exploits or for commissioned services. The average Carrara user on the other hand was someone who looked at Maya, decided it was too expensive and would take too much time to learn while holding down two jobs and raising two kids, so they got the things that was most affordable, its not that they would have turned down Maya if they could have afforded it.
All this to say that Maya exists for a reason. It takes nothing away from Carrara to acknowledge that it isn't Maya, nor could it ever be, so direct comparisons will always lead to subjective loops. Carrara is a wonderful application, but it isn't Maya and in the hands of the average person, doesn't turn out the same level of output as does Maya. Maya however, isn't some fool proof paradigm either. A really gifted Carrara user can indeed compete with Maya users, but that is not going to be the average Carrara user. And a complete novice in Maya will be destroyed by a gifted Carrara artist, true. You never really know until you see the final render.
Again, there are no guarantees so we really shouldn't put too much stock in any of it.
Same could be said for a Bryce vs Carrara. I LOVE Bryce, even though I readily admit it is lacking in many departments. There are those who would argue that Bryce can do anything Carrara can do in the right hands. Well, the right hands is much easier said than done. So in most comparisons, Carrara wins regardless of the user, but there are a few occassions where the user will make all the difference. Just because the user can serve as an equalizer doesn't mean Bryce is actually competitive with Carrara because it isn't, Carrara is LIGHT YEARS more powerful. Are there some things Bryce does a million times better than Carrara? Yes, indeed there are. Still, it takes nothing away from Bryce to admit that in the hands of the average user it cannot turn out the same level as Carrara does in the hands of the average Carrara user.
It;s okay to truly love something and still acknowledge the limits of its value.
Very interesting - what is the source of the BVH's you use directly in Carrara? Excuse my ignorance, but what are GFA's?
I ask because I have the full CMU hip corrected BVH library, as well as quite a few randomly downloaded freebies and none work correctly directly in Carrara. The ones that do sort of work need a lot of correction, normally foot slide and neck rotation.
Did more testing last night and found to my surprise that the CMU BVH work fine in DS on Genesis - strange, because the bone structure is different to the M4/V4 range that the corrections were made for.
Rashad Carter, very well written with many good points!
I want to elaborate on the above quote and disagree a little with the last part. I speak for myself of course but I would imagine this to be true for quite a number of Carrara users. Forget about software. I personally as a 3D artist have limitations. Even though I dable, I am not a modeler so that is a personal limitation. I am not a texture artist or a rigger so those are others. And as you pointed out time is a big factor. There are many other limitations that I have as a one man 3D studio compared to a team working full time. I feel that my limitations are far more limiting than any of Carraras and in fact using Carrara helps to minimize quite a lot of them.
I want to be productive and creative and get my project done. And for me, this is where Carrara saves the day; simply because I can focus on less and do more. I would not choose Maya over Carrara right now because my limitations would doom any project I attempted to pull of using Maya.
Had my goal getting into 3D been to work at a major studio then I would have made choices that suited that direction. But I think most of us Carrara users are out to make 3D art in the most achievable way possible.
Rashad,
Wow, there's a lot there...much I don't agree with, but I certainly agree when you say that getting a job at a major or minor studio "is a crap shoot". Of course it is. For many reasons.
In the real world, it depends on a lot of things....who, if anyone, is hiring? And unfortunately, who do you know in the business? Yes, that matters quite a bit. And what make you stick out from the crowd? And believe me, the crowd is HUGE.
Why? Because CG and visual effects are cool, and every kid who watches a cool movie with VFX says "WOW !!! I want to do that for a living !!!". Kind of like every kid wants to be a web designer... :) :)
And the only qualification to learn CG software is that you have a computer and can download it, and much of it is free. Cool.
And that leads to the #1 most common and most prevalent misconception of most "hobbyists" doing 3D...and I don't mean that term to be disrespectful or derogatory, only to describe people who haven't been exposed to the business end nor been exposed to talented peers who can teach them some basics. That misconception is this: "As long as I master the software, I'll become a master 3D guy and I can get hired at a major studio".
That's wrong, in very many ways, some of which I've already described. You do NOT learn animation/CG/VFX by learning animation/CG/VFX software. And that's where I think I disagree with you, and others, the most. You learn animation by studying people. You learn about how they move, how they react, you learn weight and balance and squash and stretch and dynamics and how to show what their emotions...and a ton of other things. And that's just a start. You learn how different types of people move differently. You learn about characters, and characterizations. When the cute little girl in Despicable Me asks Gru "read us a bedtime story", you know that people associate cute little characters with wide eyes, and the tiny nose, and that cute innocent look, and standing on her toes to hand him the book about kittens, and a ton of other very minor characteristics that all go into people falling in love with that cute little computer generated character. And if you don't learn that, AND if you don't have a natural ability to sense those things and show them in your animations, people won't enjoy your work. Call it talent, call it whatever you want, but some people have it and some people REALLY have it and some people don't. You can spend a lifetime just studying people. And that's just for animation. What about lighting, and texturing, and modelling and on and on....how many CG artists really study the world around them to understand it so they can tell stories about it in their work? Do people study textures in the real world? Or light and shadow, so they can understand how it affects us emotionally? Very very few.
You can learn Maya or Carrara or any other animation software tools like a master, but unless and until you have the talent and knowledge and sense of how to animate to depict and portray and tell stories and emotions thru your animation, people won't like your stuff.
Unfortunately, many who haven't been exposed to what the art is in all of this can't comprehend that it's about more than just learning software. But it's not. It's telling stories, its showing emotions, it's connecting with an audience, it's knowing how to tug at their heartstrings and make them laugh and cry. Some people do that well, others don't. That's life. Some comedians are great, others aren't funny. Some artists produce beautiful art, some don't. And with most people, you can learn for years and years, but if you don't have that special something, you'll probably never be extraordinary. And others are naturally extraordinary.
Rashad,
If I'm reading you correctly, this is a perfect example, IMO, of the "software priority" misconception I've been talking about. You cannot learn the necessary CG concepts in ANY software.
Let me give a simple example:
Not long ago I saw a walk cycle someone posted. A pretty standard one that he/she had done manually I believe. And it was fine, with one exception. The right arm moved forward with the right leg in one step, then the left arm moved forward with the left leg in the next step.
Now, that person could have been a master in the software tools involved in making the animation....Sequencer, keyframes, whatever. But he/she was totally ignorant on the most basic characteristic of how everyone walks...opposing motion. Left arm swings forward with right leg, and vice versa.
In order to do CG/VFX/Animation/whatever, you need to be a student of life. You need to study people, and light, and texture, and motion, and color, and emotion....and you can't learn any of that in a software training course.
And BTW, one other thought I had....
If your goal is to generate a realistic human character and animate it in 3D, IMO the most important question you should ask yourself is this:
Why?
When you think about it, getting out a camera and videotaping a real person doing what you want the 3D character to do is a whole lot easier and quicker and more photo-realistic....and probably a lot cheaper if you're a professional.
Which is another reason why you see so few features with fully CG humans. It's freaking expensive to get a team of modellers and riggers and animators and Mocap guys, compared to some guys with a camera and lights and a sound recorder and ask him to do something in front of a green screen and shout ACTION !!!
Which begs the question....why even bother trying to go thru all the hoops to come up with a realistically modeled and rigged and animated and rendered human, when you can just call up a friend or a college acting group or professional actor and pay them a few bucks and do whatever you want, and then composite him into your CG scene?
Yeah, if you're doing it for the enjoyment, then no question, go right ahead. But for efficiency and realism, nothing can match the real thing.
Lot to agree with in both Rashad and J2Ks posts.
Just to reiterate, most of the posts are in the realm of advice to young people just entering the industry. My posts are in the realm of advice to mid level managers regarding the emphasis that is placed when hiring entry level people.
The industry as a whole cannot only hire people who are fully prepared to work at mid-career level of knowledge and training on day one. It doesn't add up in any industry. A couple of exceptional firms can cherry pick, but the industry as a whole can't. Training has to occur some where, somehow. So, we get a combination of specialty school programs, internship programs, de facto in house apprenticeship programs, etc. What should the hiring strategy be? And I say strategy because I am not talking about one exceptional hire. Like everything else, hiring is a crapshoot. Some employees who appeared to be perfect fail, and some long shots excel. But as Rashad says, playing the probabilities.
As J2K points out, there is a distinction between the task being carried by the software, and the software itself. I used the phrase subject matter expertise. I am saying a wise hiring strategy is to look for subject matter expertise and some sort of computer literacy over a strategy of looking for experience in the particular software we are using today. No, the industry as a whole cannot expect entry level employees to be fully functional in every way on day one. It doesn't add up.
So, is your long term strategy to hire a pool of experts in your subject matter (which is not the same thing as your software) and then train them in your particular software (which you should expect to change over the medium term)? Or, is your strategy to hire people who have mastered the software even if you have less evidence of subject matter expertise? Again, don't tell me you want both. I know that, but not all firms can fill their staff that way. It doesn't add up.
Sometimes, management is foolish. It could very well be that to get a job in a studio you have to know a particular software package (in this case Maya). I am not saying that is or is not the prevailing hiring practice, although a couple of Google searches suggests it is not. I am saying that that strategy is short sighted, foolish, and ends badly. Furthermore, I assert with very little support that this foolish strategy comes and goes in cycles.
Imagine if I said to you that Germany had never invaded France. You'd call me ignorant and you would be correct. Imagine if I said to you that Germany has never invaded France since the Department of Homeland Security has been keeping records. Well, that is kind of a true statement because the department has only been around for a decade. Imagine if you hire someone who is an expert in the department database but has no knowledge of history or foreign relations. As J2K and others have pointed out, the software isn't the subject matter.
You want a pool of new hires who know what you are trying to deliver and see the software as an imperfect way to deliver it. You want them to be frustrated with the software because they see things that they want to take into account but that this software doesn't do well yet. You want them to be complaining about how you (the manager) are too cheap to get them software that will enable them to (whatever) even if that means contracting with programmers to develop a plugin. And yes you are too cheap and no they won't stop complaining. People with subject matter expertise make those kinds of complaints. They are a pain in the ass, but they are the future of the firm. You adapt to change with those folks. So I agree with a lot of what J2K says when he complains, even if I don't think this is the venue for it.
Someone with software expertise may or may not have subject matter expertise. If you emphasize software expertise, eventually the "may not" part will bite you in the ass. And every so often, there is a whole lot of ass biting at the same time.
A lot of these posts are advice to young people. Mine is more in the realm of advice to mid management.
Interesting comments by everyone, and anyone who has done perspective drawing would understand that you can get many views of the same object.
Each view being right from the direction it was taken from.
Software - I have over 15 years experience using AutoCAD and various Earthworks programs (road-building/civil construction)
In all that time I probably only used one-tenth of what those programs were capable of doing at any one point of time.
I could have used far cheaper software but the programs were considered to be industry standards, so that was what was used.
For me personally I like Carrara as I can use it with DAZ3D while at the same time importing other models if I choose to use them.
Yes Carrara has some issues, but it has been through a number of developers each of whom had their own ideas.
If there is a part you don't like then use something else that does the job for you.
Me, I use DAZ3D, Bryce, Corel PSP, Ultimate UnWrap3D Pro, am learning Silo 2 & Blacksmith 3D.
In the past I have dabbled with Hexagon, Sculptris, Curvy 3D, Blender, GMAX, FSDS, & Paint.NET.
Currently have TurboCAD Deluxe 20 & Draftsight installed for my CAD work, and I use both.
I would think that most of the users out there would have a similar tale as regards software.
It gets down to :-
What do you want to do
What can you afford to do
What you can actually do with your skills/aptitude with the resources that you have.
If you want to be a part of the big end of town, expect lots of stress, a very mercenary workforce, as well as bosses who are very ruthless. Then don't get sick, don't fall-over, don't have families, don't have friends, don't have a life, and you might last until that heart attack hits you.
Rashad -- I agree with some of what you're saying, but man, I'll take that bet any day of the week. Give a kid one week with ZBrush vs one week with Carrara and tell them to each model a monster face by hand? Give someone MSPaint and another one Photoshop and tell them each to paint a picture of Spiderman.? The software makes an enormous difference.
It feels so awkward defending ZBrush or Maya against Carrara or Photoshop against MSPaint. I mean, show me ANYWHERE where someone has done in Maya something with the elaborate characterization and story that has Vining's Star Trek: Aurora. Show me the most popular and successful web comic on the planet -- Homestuck, and it's made with friggin MS Paint.
That's my point in all this. Maya is better. ZBrush is better. C4D is better. Blender is better. But absolutely *not* for the independent creator looking to create long form narrative works. There are some artists like Max Gilardi who use Maya in conjunction with Flash for short narrative work, so the argument could be made for that style of indie artist Maya or Blender might be serviceable. And certainly ROSA used ready-made model elements in conjunction with C4D in order to produce a really amazing narrative short.
But for long form narrative work, Carrara is an incredibly important tool. Even if, like with ROSA, you were to combine elements with other softwares, the core importance of Carrara is there for the indie artist.
But because Carrara cannot do EVERYTHING that Maya can do, Carrara is 100% irrelevant to the larger studios.
Maya or Blender for the indie artist = Bad. Carrara for the indie artist = Good. Maya or Blender for the artist wanting to be hired at a studio = Good. Carrara for the artist wanting to be hired at a studio = Bad.
I listed a laundry list of current job openings at all the major studios, and most all required a knowledge of Maya. It's a basic software knowledge required by studios who have a GLUT of talent to choose from their personal networks.
So to be the absolute best you can be you need the absolute best tools that exist. You cannot get on the NASCAR track with a Ford Escort and expect to win the race, no matter how good of a driver you are.
So if you're an indie (or freelancer), studio jobs are irrelevant. If you want a job at a studio, the very bare bones basic requirement is knowing Maya, if only for its Maya-specific language that all the studios use.
Rashad,
If I'm reading you correctly, this is a perfect example, IMO, of the "software priority" misconception I've been talking about. You cannot learn the necessary CG concepts in ANY software.
Let me give a simple example:
Not long ago I saw a walk cycle someone posted. A pretty standard one that he/she had done manually I believe. And it was fine, with one exception. The right arm moved forward with the right leg in one step, then the left arm moved forward with the left leg in the next step.
Now, that person could have been a master in the software tools involved in making the animation....Sequencer, keyframes, whatever. But he/she was totally ignorant on the most basic characteristic of how everyone walks...opposing motion. Left arm swings forward with right leg, and vice versa.
In order to do CG/VFX/Animation/whatever, you need to be a student of life. You need to study people, and light, and texture, and motion, and color, and emotion....and you can't learn any of that in a software training course.
Joe -- Why argue against that the studios want new hires to know Maya when it's literally been proven in all of their job postings? And the one place where Maya wasn't specifically listed (Pixar), it turns out that their Marionette proprietary software is based on Maya. They speak Maya at Pixar too.
It's common knowledge that studios want new hires to have already learned and mastered Maya *as a starting point*. It's walking in the door knowing Japanese for a Japanese-speaking company instead of walking in knowing Chinese.
The exceptions are irrelevant when we're talking about real world application. It'll be network, reel, software knowledge base, et al.
Saying, "Oh, you need to know how to be a good animator" goes without saying in exactly the same fashion that "Oh, you need to have mastered Maya" goes without saying. I don't know why you're mentioning animation skills when talking about what software someone needs to have learned for a studio job. They have nothing whatever to do with one another.
Question one is: Do you need to have a solid grasp on animation principles? Yes.
Question two is: Which software is best to learn if I want a job at a studio? Maya.
The answer to question two is not "It's irrelevant". Because it is relevant. If it wasn't relevant then it wouldn't be in literally every single job posting for every major studio (and/or it wouldn't be the program that all major studio propitiatory software is built to mimic).
Well and the "big end of town" has pretty much picked up and moved to Canada now. So...also being a Canadian resident perhaps a prerequisite. haha
Like most Carrara users, I'm an outlier. I have no interest in anything studio related. I had my chance to do the whole Hollywood thing, even had the appropriate connections, but I decided on Chicago and independence. You're best off just living the life you most want to live. Whatever life that is -- just follow the breadcrumbs or chop down the trees, ya know?
I did want to speak on this little bit as well about affordability. I don't think that many serious artists are letting economics stand in the way of getting their hands on a given software if they need that software to produce whatever they want to produce. There's a reason that Adobe went to a subscription model -- because you could literally for free get a full pirated download of the software anywhere on the internet. The same holds true for Maya.
I chose Carrara over Maya or C4D or Blender (Blender is just as powerful as Maya and is also free) because Carrara better suits my objectives as an artist. So while I agree that rich people will almost assuredly have easier access to better schools which lead to better networking, I don't think that it plays much of a role in the software game.
Affordability as it pertains to time...I also don't know if that's true. People who get Maya get Maya because their objective includes Maya. People choose Carrara over Maya when their objective is in line with what Carrara is capable of. I have no kids or second jobs or whatever else. I could most certainly be using Maya or Blender, but I choose to use Carrara because of what I need out of a 3D program, which is easily morphed models, ready-made backdrops and content, a helpful and encouraging forum presence (which you'd be hard pressed to find ANYWHERE on the internet these days), and a simple plug-and-play interface.
There may be some people using Carrara because they couldn't afford (either in time or financially) something like Maya or C4D, but I honestly don't think that is the main motivation. The motivation is "How does this software suit my needs?" There are some animators who strive to make the perfect frame-by-frame animation (that's what drives them), and they make very little in the way of completed animations (though they're awesome to look at); then you have other people who are happy with cut out South Park style animation, and that artist can put out a lot of content.
It's all about the end goal. If the end goal is to work for Dreamworks, then you'll want to learn Maya. If your end goal is to produce content quickly and (largely) effectively, then Carrara works well enough.
C is far from dead I am sure...I'm not even using the most recent version! (8.1)
If I ever got a job at a "real" studio some of the things I learned along the way would have been important.
A timeline is a timeline
Sequencer is Sequencer (Pro Tools or Daz or Carrara - same thing)
Pretty excited by the new MS VR kit; may look into getting a real job doing that. I am certain that my skills in 3d would be applicable.
I never took the class that said making animations using realistic looking humans was impossible so I just go ahead and try anyway.
When I started doing this (v 7.2) Carrara was a modeller, mostly, nobody was doing animations, really so not sure what the fuss is about.
I would use Maya and similar software to create "original" characters - that's why the studios don't use Daz, they don't own the "character", they have to make their own.
Are we going in circles it seems that most of this has been said much earlier in the thread.
Datan,
I have been following these posts on the validity of Carrara..I hope you don’t mind if I add my own, view as a recent user and advocate of Carrara.
Maya, C4d, etc are catering to the Hollywood productions, their sub-contractors and big network advertising houses demands. These 3D programs have legions of users because they are used by these large organizations - and that is where the majority of the animation jobs are found. Maya must have numerous programmers working to keep their software in synch with this “show Biz” industry. And the schools are using this software because this is the pipeline leading to jobs in 3D. It is a symbiotic relationship. At present there is no way that Carrara can compete with this type of structure - or should it. To drag up an over-used phrase, “we are marching to a different drummer.”
Carrara in my view is a quality independent system that is aimed at the low budget entrepreneur. It has the unique asset of having almost seamless and effortless integration with a library of 3D characters. No other 3D program has this felicitous advantage that I can see. In the right hands this program, as it is today, is capable of turning out some truly impressive material. So what should Carrara’s mission be. Certainly not following in the footsteps of Maya, etc. with their emphasis on 4K, Hollywood and large render farm necessities. I think Carrara should be aimed at turning out high quality images for fashion/ advertising and especially video for the internet. That is in my opinion, a niche in which it can occupy and prosper. Of course that is what it is doing already. Even now, many of the people who post on this forum are putting up their images on U-tube, Facebook or their websites. As time goes on this traffic can only increase. But there is another aspect to Carrara’s advantage and that is the small screen “movies”. I think as a story telling media this is just in its childhood. For even the largest budget hollywood production, in all its 4k and beyond glory, is no bigger or better than what you can produce when seen on an iPad. In other words, it is possible for an underfunded, independent to turn out a terrific movie using just Carrara or some of the scenes in Carrara, if the motivation and talent is there. It is up to us..the tool is capable -are we.
Starboardtack
Again Carrara's market is marching to this other drummer. It is in my opinion, ideally suite for the independent entrepreneur who will never need to turn out images up in the digital crunching 4k range. To illustrate how Carrara may be positioned for a future market, consider this.
Amazon by offering a cheap, financially remunerative and secure means of publications to writers who who would otherwise never have a chance at publication by the big publication houses has caused a revolution. It has turned the publication business on its head. If there is a means, and I believe it is coming, where the small screen movie maker has access to something like Amazon is offering for writers, then watch out. The financial carrot will be there for the small entrepreneur to turn out some innovative and entertaining media. Of course there will be a deluge of mediocrity, there is on Amazon now, but in amongst that are gems that shine through and prosper.
Starboardtack
There's a lot of research / user feedback material for DAZ here and I suspect they've been snooping around taking notes. Just credit everyone with gift cards and free upgrades when the time comes because you've got some really cool users on this forum who love your products to pieces even if you don't talk to us much.
We already have the Amazon equivalent for the indie visual artist -- Youtube. Amazon isn't writing books, it's just giving people a place to easily sell them to the masses. The reason there's a glut of indie books is because text on a page is simple to produce. A lot of visual artists look at DAZ and Carrara as the equivalent to how comic book artists see BitStrips. I doubt that is going to change anytime soon.
But despite the perception, who cares? Disney style animators similarly look down on South Park style animation.
Personally I think it's irrelevant. I've never had any interest in making things for other artists to approve of, all I care about is if the average Joe or Jane can enjoy what I make. If they can, then who cares what my peers think? That's their issue to deal with, not mine. :D
I use 7.2 and have rarely ever done any modeling in Carrara. I use it exclusively for animation.
We already have the Amazon equivalent for the indie visual artist—Youtube. Amazon isn’t writing books, it’s just giving people a place to easily sell them to the masses. The reason there’s a glut of indie books is because text on a page is simple to produce. A lot of visual artists look at DAZ and Carrara as the equivalent to how comic book artists see BitStrips. I doubt that is going to change anytime soon.
But despite the perception, who cares? Disney style animators similarly look down on South Park style animation.
Personally I think it’s irrelevant. I’ve never had any interest in making things for other artists to approve of, all I care about is if the average Joe or Jane can enjoy what I make. If they can, then who cares what my peers think? That’s their issue to deal with, not mine. :D
Nothing against UTube..but it is for free. It is a wonderful asset for airing your work - for free. However, there is another huge market that is yet to be tapped and that is small screen entertainment that allows the entrepreneurial video artist to receive compensation for his work. The compensation may not be much per viewing, but pennies, nickels dimes and a few dollars add up... With incentive will come efforts to create entertainment to fit this small screen...As I mentioned earlier, on a small screen you are on equal footing with the largest studio..They do not get anymore pixels then you do. The big problem to solve is maintaing the copyright "rights" of the artist against theft, etc. This problem has been growing steadily online. If we lived our everyday lives the way the web works at present, you could not park your car..it would be stolen, you could not leave your house it would be robbed. How they solve this will be interesting to see, perhaps an online Patent and Copyright office, where if you register a work, it can only be displayed by you on the web for a limited, specified time - say 3 years. Any other use will be automatically dropped by a search engine. After copyright limit has expired the work can be putt on U-tube -for free.
Anyway - something to think about.
Starboardtack
I love the fact amazon has thrown wide the gates for indie authors to self publish. I've discovered more gems and new-favorite authors over the last 2 years on amazon than in all my prior years of browsing at the bookstore. Sure there's a lot of not-good or plain-bad stuff, but discovering talented new authors is fantastic, and there are some really really good stuff out there that I would never have known about otherwise (I'm a voracious reader).
Interesting to think if there might not be a similar market for self-made animators too, I had never thought of that before.
Interesting thread. I actually agree with nearly everyone who has posted, even if on the surface you seem to be disagreeing with each other, because many good and valid points have been raised.
One thing: Carrara is not equivalent to a broken old keyboard with missing keys and out of tune notes. It's equivalent to finding a $10,000 Grand Piano in a pawn shop for 20 bucks. Sure it needs some dusting, and a tuning fork, and there are tears in the padding of the bench, but at it's core it's still an extremely capable instrument capable of making extraordinary 'music'.
100 Carrara masters vs 100 masters of (insert $1000+ software app here)? Interesting thought.
But first you'd need 100 masters of Carrara. Is there even 1 ultra-master of Carrara who knows every feature and function and can use it effortlessly to best effect? Seems like every week the frontier of what Carrara can do is pushed further as someone else here in the forums figures out some new method/tip/trick/feature and unlocks it's usability in ways never thought about before.
I'm no expert, and no artist either, never even claimed to be or even aspired to be an artist. Carrara may be a great tool for artists, but please consider many of us use it for different purposes.
On talent: Sure, some are born with it, others are not, that's the way life has always been. Ever heard the 10,000 hours theory, though? Goes like this: spend 10,000+ hours of honest effort working in any field, and you will become a master of it, regardless of your natural aptitude when you started. I tend to find that's true in other fields that I've observed. Honest work ethic and determination and willingness to refine your approach can trump simple 'I was born with it, but I don't have to work for it, so I won't work on it' talent. Interesting to think what kind of skills and mastery someone who has invested 10,000 hours of working on/in Carrara could achieve. Maybe someday long from now I'll have put in that kind of effort and time :) Hmm, I might be at about the 500+ hour mark now, and I can certainly look back and see a lot of progress from where I started...
Is Carrara the best app? Depends on the user, and what purpose he's trying to achieve. For me the answer is a solid 'Yes!' for others it might not be. I do think it would be ridiculous to try to argue that Carrara doesn't have great value as an addition to someone's toolkit though, particularly since at $65 on sale, it's not like it's priced beyond anyone's budget :)
Interesting, I was making the point that Carrara dynamic hair is an incredibly good hair sim that supersedes any of the other hobbyist-priced dynamic hair solutions like Blender and Poser.
I never even thought to go searching in youtube to see/compare Carrara against the high priced apps; I guess I just assumed that the $1000+ pro software would automatically have great and realistic dynamic hair solutions, and so I didn't even bother to look, so after seeing Dart's comment I had some fun searching through youtube... Carrara stands up very, very well! I would say Carrara is about as good as the best hair sims I could find posted for C4D and was superior to the best sims I could find for Lightwave. I had trouble finding any examples at all of human dynamic hair for 3Ds, by the way. Apparently it exists, but finding an example of it posted on youtube is difficult. Ditto for Modo.
Whereas in Carrara I'll just point out that up til about a week and a half ago I was limited in my knowledge of the hair room to some basic brushing of already existing hairstyles and knew nothing at all of animating it. Since then, for comparison I created this hairstyle in less than 5 minutes, and render time was about the same:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsz65nEkq5U
Maybe a better example of Carrara hair is from a more expert user Philw:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1AfC6s5ocH8
For comparison, just youtube 'Maya hair animation', 'C4d hair animation', 'lightwave hair animation', '3ds hair animation' etc. Maybe you'll find better examples than I was able to find, but I'm honestly shocked by how well Carrara hair stands up to the comparison. Here's some that I found, to give an idea:
Example of Maya hair animation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiCD696577U
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fr35uGL8ouk
Example of C4D hairs:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVPHOk_v7Fg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qOAg2ZrRu5g
Example of Lightwave hair animation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbkJEDqFaDI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrmRNN5LHdk
Esample of 3DS hair animation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4lHkelUzG8
Hmm, Carrara stands up pretty well, at least in my opinion :)
Youtube pays you, unless you specifically ask them not to. You're usually paid between $1-$5 per 1,000 views.
And the thing you're looking for, separate from Youtube, I believe, is Patreon. Plenty of visual artists are getting paid thousands or even tens of thousands per month by their fans for the creation of their work. I support several creators over there. You should check them out if you haven't already.
http://patreon.com
Rational people adapt to the environment - irrational people expect the environment to adapt to them.
Therefore, rational people are boring and maintain the status quo and irrational people are exciting and bring about change and innovation.
Listen to irrational people - they are the true artists.
What has this got to do with this discussion - about as much as the latest posts have to do with the topic - The Future of Carrara!
Come guys - is this a discussion of the Future of Carrara, or Career Counselling Week?