Re: Animation for Television

Hi Michael,

I entirely agree that artists using a tool they're familiar with is
significantly more productive - though I'd assumed for this that if
cost saving is of a primary concern the artists would also be on the
inexpensive side - meaning they'll be inexperienced and less tied to a
particular package. In which case productivity is less likely to be
affected by package so much as good training, pipeline and technical
direction.

Sri, if you do go for a commercial package I'd have a hard time
recommending which to go with. If you will have a fair amount of
particle effects I'd have to say pass on XSI - though it's my
preferred application generally. Issues you'll have using XSI will be
particles (until the next version) and finding good, experienced
artists (TDs and I mean real TDs not guys who can write a few lines of
VBs are gold dust in the XSI community - even more so XSI TDs who know
linux - There aren't many of us around). Maya you'll have an easier
time finding artists and TDs though I can't speak much to it in
production as I was a mental ray specialist when working with it in
production and didn't really use it for much beyond coding shaders and
rendering.

Cheers,

Alan.

On 4/3/07, Michael Duffy <mduffor-/[email protected]> wrote:
> If you are doing a Television production, you need to develop a very fast
> workflow.  Just being ABLE to do it isn't good enough... you have to be able
> to do it QUICKLY.  So you need to find some good Technical Directors and
> Programmers who understand the production pipeline, and have them build you
> a pipeline that will work for your production.
>
> Personally, I'd use a mixed Linux and Windows environment.  Use Linux on the
> renderfarm, on your servers, and on whichever workstation you can.  Your
> modelers and texture artists are likely going to need to use Windows,
> because some of the tools they use aren't available on Linux.  For these
> users, setting up a dual-boot workstation is the way to go.  All other
> departments work well under Linux.
>
> There are a lot of great tools on Linux to help set up the pipeline, but
> when it comes to the main graphics application I'd still suggest sticking
> with the main commercial applications (Maya or XSI).  Only use something
> like Blender if you are trying to prove a point (like the guys who made
> Elephant Dreams), or if Blender is the primary package of your existing
> artists.  You won't find many mainstream professionals that are trained up
> in Blender, or possibly even willing to work in Blender.  Salaries tend to
> be much more expensive than software anyways, so if your software keeps your
> artists productive, then it more than makes up for the expenditure to buy
> the commercial package.
>
> I don't mean to put Blender down, or any other FLOSS software (I use as much
> of it as I can), but having worked on the pipeline of a successful TV
> production ("The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron", for Nickelodeon) sometimes
> the practical has to outweigh the phillisophical.
>
> Cheers,
> Michael Duffy
>
>
> Alan Jones <[email protected]> wrote:
>  Hi Sri,
>
> I've got no doubt that it can be cheaper on linux. At a minimum I'd
> suggest you use linux for your servers and workstations. I've also
> written renderfarm management software that may interest you
> http://sf.net/projects/splish (no official release yet as I need to
> make a few things easier for general users - unfortunately setup is
> one of those - which is annoying as it's a on off task).
>
> The main challenge you'll have using OS software for the actual
> artistic work will be getting good artists who are familiar with open
> source packages such as blender. However if you can get someone in who
> can trainyour artists and a good pipeline TD prepared to learn the
> packages and get it all integrated then I've got no doubt you can
> successfully run a full scale children's television production on
> FLOSS software.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Alan.
>
> On 3/12/07, srinivasa rao gantenapalli wrote:
> > Hi Group,
> >
> > I am planning to produce an animation/comic show for television (mainly
> > targeting the children). I am wondering if it can be cheaper on linux
> > platform. Can someone help me regardig where to start / if open source has
> > proven software for this.
> >
> > Thanks in advance.
> > ---Sri
> >
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