Thread by @delaneykingrox

I think it is time for Autodesk to develop a modern 3D application for the entertainment industries.

With the combined development base of 3DSMax, Maya and XSI, a clean unified start combining the best qualities of workflow and features would be a revolution.

Each of the products have strengths and weaknesses across the board, and are, frankly creaking under their long lifespan.

Personally, I would take the gestural nature of Maya's marking menus and build that over the bulletproof mesh and modifier stack system of 3DSMax-

And use XSI's node based scripting to create not only the individual tools but also the GUI, allowing artists to compile and share features, modifiers and tools.

The benefits of combined development is reducing the maintenance, focusing the teams and building something...

...that attracts users based on usability and power. Blender is making huge steps forward constantly, whereas the Autodesk suites shuffle forward.

We are all leaving because the extremely high cost, clunky old interfaces and instability.

Creating a new package...

would laser focus the development team, and merge marketing, support and licensing together.

Personally, I would call the new package Softimage. XDI has been dead long enough to not be confusing, but we all have strong associations with the history of CG.

Aaanyway...

...back to hoop jumping through a bunch of packages that are all not good enough to do it all smoothly.

And yunno... more and more Blender.