The problem is actually deeper.
Companies are not downloading some free software like Blender, FreeCAD, Inkscape or GIMP to use it how it is. They are figuring out which approach is better for a wide range of workflows.
There are a lot of ways of tools interactions presented in different software.
And there is the only way to define which approach works better as solid solution - competition.
A single task, performed by multiple artist in different software. Thus was born the annual CG Battle, to compare which approach is actually better - like Maya, Max, C4D and Blender.
And the problem is that Blender 2.7x actually wins all those battles twice a year for a long time.
Companies analyze the reasons why it won and use them in production, to realize what approaches deserves to be used to, and what are not. Thatâs why companies use opensource to survive on a market, the ability to meet tight deadlines is much more important than software cost or beauty for them.
This is not how it happens.
It is more about âhey, there is another well known feature from 90x, that was beaten many times already, go implement it without any proper designâ.
And the problem is that we are even not against them - all we need is proper implementation instead of total immolation of professional approaches, that was reached during winning multiple real CG battles.
Do we have actual proofs that the main devs have some huge bias into developing more features for ââPixar likeââ stylized animation workflow? i also got that feeling but maybe itâs just a feeling everyone has as we are all mixed up sharing stuff together.
Do you mean something like comparison of speed development of sculpting, that is good for character modeling, and speed development of snaps, that is good for things besides character modeling?
Maybe so.
There are many influential things that form the picture.
well, itâs no really the institute, itâs because of the ultra competence of pablo per se
But for example i agree with you with the new hair type. ivâe been vocal until now about the instancing side of the system, that could be used and be extremely useful by everyone else, only a few options are needed, but it seem they only care about character artists on that one. Instancing features only referenced and talked over to a strict minimum which i found really sad.
Yes, we has got a lot of Pablos to force things like sculpting, and has got no Pablos for other workflows.
Thatâs the point - as a result, features and UI solutions are claimed as âreadyâ if they satisfies certain area of use, even if there are not much left to do, or even if they corrupt others at some point, including industry unique.
I agree to a certain externd. The basic workflow is the most important thing and I agree thant Blender schould lay most of the groundwork there. BUT there are the 10 big projects for 2020.
Many other areas are also finally got addressed or are being worked on. For example multi-value property editing grew from âshould be easy to implement as basic functionâ into "this needs a well thought implementation that is solid (yeah!). Outliner - finally got addressed and can be gradually improved in details. Topology shader view (not as a hacked setup per object) is being addressed correctly. The undo peformance is being addressed currently.
Blender needs improvement. Sure. But I fail to see the core complaint of this thread. âHeading in the wrong directionâ - no. Not at all.
Development needs more structure to organize what areas need tackling more than others and which ares are more nice to have first. This needs input from the community and itâs a good thing we do give it. Itâs also being tackled, though. Ton said that most of the Epic Megagrants goes into structure, organization and things like NDA comliant case reports from companies.
So this is being worked on as well.
This threads reads very unspecific to me. The general direction I see is very positive. It does need input and course corrections. Sure. But here we need to give specific input. Specific. Hyperbole wonât give anyone credibility. I had to learn this the hard way, as well.
I just feel that threads like these produce too much hyperble and result in being more counterproductive than helpful. The other thing is that workflows differ from person to person. Not everything that is completely right for one person is the right direction for another one.
And just for the record @1D_Inc - most the things I saw you give as input are, to me, very valid points. You do know what you you are talking about and I think your input is very much valued around here. Just in case: Please donât take this as trying to discrediting anyone, here. I really only want the important things to be heared by the right people in the right way.
It is openly admitted as a problem of working only with Open Movies
For example, the 10 big projects that told Spooky are all solutions for animation studios, that can be used in other projects. And the solutions for videogames are largely ignored since a lot of time when are little things to implement (for example, retopology viewmode)
I donât think thereâs much intention of fixing it for now. But if it is said in conversations with devs that using only Open Movies causes a bias in development. And it sounds to me like Iâve seen it on some video, but I canât tell you.
Letâs see, itâs obvious, the modeling/texturing is practically abandoned, the creation of textures the same, there havenât been new tools in years if we compare with any aspect of blender. Which is a pity, because it was the best modeling program at the tool level and now itâs just a little bit above average. And when you integrate new ideas, thereâs more resistance than there is desire to implement.
Thatâs why i think we need to give more power to the users.
a C++ building app, where users could build their own blender builds with C++ âaddonsâ that could be enabled/disabled non destructively could resolve the problem
Just so much ideas or project got forgotten because it didnât fit a certain ideal for someâŚ
It is a very long debate, luckily in recent times we have seen important developers openly in favor of a C++ API (beyond the problem of creating it that will not be easy). This would improve the situation a lot.
But yes, a week ago, I think, there was a quite important debate that tangentially touched this, about the development of blender UI. That the UI team basically goes to their own devices, ignores the users and just does what they want (all this said with good words, that itâs difficult to communicate and other euphemisms that they like to use). And it was left to improve communication with users, but with no a clear way to solve it.
Texturing as some little things coming thanks to Pablo, but I agree to consider it abandoned. But having Armor Paint I donât see that area moving that fast for now.
In modeling, compared to Max I only miss face constraints and edge constraints being togleable allowing for more complex but easier transformations and I believe only modo has some better tools with really nice gizmos.
What I find ridiculous is that better snaping, like move with base point isnât yet in master and wonât even make it to 2.83 LTS. The other area that would need some attention regards modeling it normal editing, there was a branch of 2.79 with a bautiful panel, the features made it into master but with the UI redesign the panel was scraped. I ported it, but is kind of broken sadly https://blenderartists.org/t/normals-panel-from-2-79-addon-port-to-2-8/1175147.
When we found Blender, we thought that it is the way that devs propose to interact with CG, that could probably beat any other DCC application on industry level. There were no ngons then, but the idea it proposed was truly impressive.
Users quickly figured out the solution they proposed, and started winning all those ISS DCC in direct battles and also replacing them in production, to perform much wider workflow range than we were able before.
But the problem is that all this time we thought that devs understand the reasons behind the tool they made, because they created and proposed them as solid product somehow.
Imagine our confusion when we realized that all this power was created just by accident)
Thatâs actually exact.
I remember time when Blender was not allowed to compete on CG battle after two wins in a row.
Maybe devs are confusing winners with whiners at some pointâŚ
hahaha, oddly enough, I myself have that example in mind in the discussion Iâm talking about. How the UI team decided, ignoring all the feedback that was there, to keep the panel simply because they didnât want to keep it, eliminating options like multiplying, adding,⌠simply because they didnât want to have the panel and they wanted a menu.
In regards to the Normal editor panel there is actually one major thing that Iâd think makes sense for everybody. Not just this one panel that could (or should) be a dedicated panel. Blender should actually have an easily accessible panel and pie/quickaccess/menue editor.
As @billrey mentioned in one of te threads: The basic functionality per se is there. What seems to be missing to everybody who has to work with normals a lot is a faster access. Access that used to be there in earlier Blender Versions but now has to be scripted in. Am I seeing this correct?
For example despite currently being a game artists first and foremost I never missed this particular panel in my workflow. I miss different panels that are very specific to my work but maybe not others.
So what I think could help on a much larger scale here is a very solid and flexible menue editor that does not necessarily require scripting to work.
A menue editor that is able to create floating panels like the quick access menue. It should be able to create more than one menue only and probably even several menue types. Dockables, floating, radial. A newly created panel should be able to hold script macros as buttons, as well as simple standard shortcuts like from the keymap editor.
Basically an actually user friendly âMake blender your own while you work with itâ toolbox.
The problem with tailored toolsets seems to be something Juan Linietsky (one of Godotâs main Programmers currently porting Vulkan to Godot 4.0 for those unfamiliar) mentioned when creating features for Godot: A feature should only be implemented into the core when the need for it arises. If production shows something is missing then it has to be implemented. If a specific workflow needs it then it should go into a plugin. If itâs just there because it was fun to tackle the problem then itâs probably not really needed.
So what I understand could be a very good addition to make more people happy and productive would be an easier way to customize Blender to very specific tasks, no?
Iâve already posted this here but we might need more and easier menue editor and customization than that: https://blender.community/c/rightclickselect/bpfbbc/
The problem is different than that, I think. The problem was that in blender 2.8 a unilateral decision was taken to destroy the T-shelf where the user had access to all the tools easily. And in the way of doing that, we tried to destroy the best thing that Blender had, the Tshelf. Something that was said to fail and that was a failure because in the end everything moved to the sidebar and the rest was hidden in some menus because of persecution mania.