Back in the saddle #2

Boom! After a brief hiatus, I'm back from paternity leave and raring (or as close approximation as I can achieve on a few hours sleep a night) to go.

Practice makes perfect

I used my first week back to practice and hone various techniques I knew I would need for the up-coming projects.

I spent quite a bit of that time tracking, and at one point got quite excited by the tracking workflow in Blender ...

(via @Blender_Cloud): https://t.co/BE2cRMak9m - is it just me, or does the motion tracking in Blender look better than MatchMover?

— Owen Rees-Hayward (@owenreesh) September 22, 2014

Modo

I managed to get hold of an extended trial of Modo as part of the CG Society time travel challenge. It is a great app. But I'm not entirely sure I buy all the hype around it. Maybe it's because I've spent a lot of time in Maya, but it just doesn't seem to be that much easier to use. The usability is definitely better than Maya, but then that's a known weakness with Maya (don't get me started on the Modelling Toolkit!).

I really wanted to love Modo, but I didn't. The renderer is fantastic. But I felt slower modeling in Modo; it might be that with more time I'd find the workflow more intuitive, . (It is a real shame The Foundry don't do free student licenses like Autodesk. From the outside, I wonder whether that's a mistake commercially, especially when there's a strong encumbent competitor like Maya).

That said, if Maya crashes on me anymore I might just revisit Modo!

Tally of the days #maya2015 crashes. Only one hour into the day : ( #maya3d pic.twitter.com/INZQywhGZk

— Owen Rees-Hayward (@owenreesh) September 2, 2014

Projects

This week I have started working on some projects. This is where the rubber really hits the road. It's not an ideal time, just having a new baby with it's associated sleep deprivation, but that can't be helped.

It was a great week though, and I'm learning a lot about modelling workflows as I reflect on non-optimal decisions (aka mistakes) I make along the way! It is true what they say, you definitely do learn most by doing. My confidence is increasing all the time, which is great. I should have some renders to show soon!