Autodesk today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Alias

Quote:a privately held developer of 3D graphics technology, for $182 million in cash. This acquisition will grow Autodesk’s expertise and offerings in the film and video, interactive games, media, Web, consumer products, industrial design, automotive, architecture and visualization markets. Autodesk anticipates that the transaction will close within the next four to six months.

This is big, big news! There's going to be some huge changes with the beloved 3D Studio Max package, and some heavy impact on the gaming/film industry. I'm really anxious to see how Maya and 3DS compete with each other now. [Edited by - Salsa on October 5, 2005 11:24:47 PM]

I finally noticed the aquisition today when I visited Alias' website today. I personally really dig Maya's interface. I wonder which name is going to stick around, Maya or 3d Studio Max? I can't really imagine they'll keep both softwares going. Autodesk has alot of mechanical/architectural design type software packages, so I'd imagine that Max might be dropped and instead we'll be using 3D Studio Maya or some crap like that.

Maya 7 was just released not too long ago. Hopefully Autodesk will want to be faithful to the maya community and not turn it into the doormat to 3ds and make it less inferior or worse yet tear it all to pieces. I was getting used to a new Maya upgrade every 6 months or so at work and now i just dont know.

They(Alias) sold for 182 million cash. That is a great sale on behalf of the owners. You have to remember that Alias is really run by the stockholders and the stockholders could care less what the users think. They want to turn a profit on their investment. Thats really too bad..perhaps they should think twice about their greedy selves. Why dont we just be blunt..thats what it all boils down to isnt it? Greed? The power of the almighty dollar.

Also the problem with merging companies like this, especially specialized companies that we are talking about, innovation and product quality can become an afterthought..sort of just frozen. This is why a lot of people are against it. So autodesk is 3ds right? the main competitor is..err.. was Maya. Now lets say(and dont be nieve and think this isnt possible) they upgrade 3ds and make some nice enhancements and then Maya becomes an afterthought...yeah they will add a new feature here and there but it will become the doormat to 3ds. Then the maya community will complain and ask for more.. like we are used to getting every 6 months. There is nothing to stop Autodesk from telling you to shove it. what have they got to lose? Now they have little or no competition.

This is why competition is good for the base community/users and overall good for everyone..it keeps all the company on their toes to be innovative so that they can keep up with competition. If there is none however, there is no motivation or not as much as you would get otherwise.

what do you think?

Maya is not getting dropped and it's not going to be shoved under 3ds max. Autodesk isn't stupid.

Trashing Maya would be equivalent to giving every modelling program except 3ds max a huge wave of new users; a dream come true for NewTek and SoftImage, to be sure. Maya and Max will both continue on as before in order to retain the full user base of both programs.

Innovation also is not going to suffer. Max and Maya are not the only programs out there and what is out there is gaining ground very quickly. What we're going to see from Autodesk is likely the exact same thing we're seeing now: both programs implementing the same features with different UI's.

Quote:Original post by LockePick
Maya is not getting dropped and it's not going to be shoved under 3ds max. Autodesk isn't stupid.

Trashing Maya would be equivalent to giving every modelling program except 3ds max a huge wave of new users; a dream come true for NewTek and SoftImage, to be sure. Maya and Max will both continue on as before in order to retain the full user base of both programs.

Innovation also is not going to suffer. Max and Maya are not the only programs out there and what is out there is gaining ground very quickly. What we're going to see from Autodesk is likely the exact same thing we're seeing now: both programs implementing the same features with different UI's.

Agree I do.
But when that happens they will probably make it into one program with a cute liddle radio button for which UI you want.

Quote:Original post by Wolfmanyoda
I don't think both programs will have the same features with different UI's.
My guess is that they will tailor each program to a specific industry: Max for the gaming world and Maya for film.

They already have the same features with different UI's. Change the name, put the button in a new place, make the display window a little different... How long do you think a high-end program would last if it stopped copying everyone else? It might take a year or so, but all features that are useful enough will be put into all the competition. If they aren't, that program starts to lose ground.

Example: Autodesk has been pushing Pelt Mapping as a major improvement in 3ds max 8. Think Max is the first program to have pelt mapping? Someone at autodesk used another program, realized pelt mapping totally rocks, and decided they were going to copy it.

It's not a bad thing, it's just the reality of the situation.

I doubt there will be any major changes in the actual programs. Perhaps they will market Maya and Max more aggressively to film and game development, respectively.