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Isn't the reason why 3DSMax is so popular(or at least was haven't followed this in decades) because of the abundance of plugins? I never used any of these enou

Isn't the reason why 3DSMax is so popular(or at least was haven't followed this in decades) because of the abundance of plugins? I never used any of these enough to understand what the advanced differences were, but 3DSMax definitely seems easier to use than Softimage and Maya. I'd assume one of the reasons why softimage died was precisely for that reason.

wlesieutre 5y ago
The thing I miss from 3ds Max is that you could have a non-destructive workflow for basic primitives because the geometry of simple objects like a cylinder just lived at the bottom of the modifier stack and you could change them later. Once you need to edit the mesh you have to “apply” that geometry and lock it in, but it’s handy to be able to go back and say “When I merge these objects the topology flows better with 24 faces around the cylinder instead of 16.” Haven’t used it too recently, but in blender I think that still means deleting the object and making a new one to replace it.
- jtxt 5y ago
  Blender also has modifiers and can do many things non destructively. (Been a while since I've used Max heavily though.)
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    Yes, but the geometry is not a modifier. The “how many rings/segments” configuration shows up during primitive creation, the geometry is generated, and that’s your geometry unless you want to delete it and make a new one. You can see what I’m talking about in 3ds here: https://youtu.be/Dp9Ozs3HjzY?t=120 https://youtu.be/Dp9Ozs3HjzY?t=120
    - jtxt 5y ago
      Yes, I know what you mean now. (Perhaps they could add primitives to the modifiers for a similar workflow.) You can setup parametric primitives other ways though, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaHL7jRo6mM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaHL7jRo6mM Or putting a screw modifier on a curve... ( torus, sphere, any lathed object...) Or there's likely a number of different ways using geometry nodes. Granted it's not currently simple and intuitive though.
      - wlesieutre 5y ago
        I need to try out blender's node systems. I've done a bit of texturing with Substance Designer and really liked the approach, just not been doing this kind of 3D work lately. Flipping through some image search results, geometry nodes look pretty cool!
    - blooalien 5y ago
      The shiny new geometry nodes feature in Blender is a modifier and can be used to perform some pretty nifty non-destructive trickery on basic primitives too. Not exactly like what that video shows, but still some really neat stuff can be done with it. Well worth playin' around with a bit. :)
      - wlesieutre 5y ago
        2.93 has a Mesh Primitive node! Seems like what I wanted from 3ds should be directly doable with this, if not quite as simply! https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/modeling/geometry_nodes/mesh_primitives/index.html https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/modeling/geometry_...
        blooalien 5y ago
        ^^^ And this right here is one reason I love sites like this one. Seems like I always get to learn somethin' new from folks. ;) Thank you for finding that! I have played with the geometry nodes some, but somehow I'd missed that particular detail. I suppose I should peek at the docs a little more often. :)

wlesieutre 5y ago

The thing I miss from 3ds Max is that you could have a non-destructive workflow for basic primitives because the geometry of simple objects like a cylinder just lived at the bottom of the modifier stack and you could change them later. Once you need to edit the mesh you have to “apply” that geometry and lock it in, but it’s handy to be able to go back and say “When I merge these objects the topology flows better with 24 faces around the cylinder instead of 16.” Haven’t used it too recently, but in blender I think that still means deleting the object and making a new one to replace it.

jtxt 5y ago
Blender also has modifiers and can do many things non destructively. (Been a while since I've used Max heavily though.)
- wlesieutre 5y ago
  Yes, but the geometry is not a modifier. The “how many rings/segments” configuration shows up during primitive creation, the geometry is generated, and that’s your geometry unless you want to delete it and make a new one. You can see what I’m talking about in 3ds here: https://youtu.be/Dp9Ozs3HjzY?t=120 https://youtu.be/Dp9Ozs3HjzY?t=120
  - jtxt 5y ago
    Yes, I know what you mean now. (Perhaps they could add primitives to the modifiers for a similar workflow.) You can setup parametric primitives other ways though, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaHL7jRo6mM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vaHL7jRo6mM Or putting a screw modifier on a curve... ( torus, sphere, any lathed object...) Or there's likely a number of different ways using geometry nodes. Granted it's not currently simple and intuitive though.
    - wlesieutre 5y ago
      I need to try out blender's node systems. I've done a bit of texturing with Substance Designer and really liked the approach, just not been doing this kind of 3D work lately. Flipping through some image search results, geometry nodes look pretty cool!
  - blooalien 5y ago
    The shiny new geometry nodes feature in Blender is a modifier and can be used to perform some pretty nifty non-destructive trickery on basic primitives too. Not exactly like what that video shows, but still some really neat stuff can be done with it. Well worth playin' around with a bit. :)
    - wlesieutre 5y ago
      2.93 has a Mesh Primitive node! Seems like what I wanted from 3ds should be directly doable with this, if not quite as simply! https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/modeling/geometry_nodes/mesh_primitives/index.html https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/modeling/geometry_...
      - blooalien 5y ago
        ^^^ And this right here is one reason I love sites like this one. Seems like I always get to learn somethin' new from folks. ;) Thank you for finding that! I have played with the geometry nodes some, but somehow I'd missed that particular detail. I suppose I should peek at the docs a little more often. :)