Results from Siggraph 2009

[Ted Gocek]

..... and it's not good. Well not totally. The problem was that Mark,
of Animux, had MUCH trouble talking about what we are doing since he
really has no idea how the technology works so it's really not his
fault. Yeah there were over 200 people in that room and then when he
got to our stuff he got stuck and the presentation fell apart, people
were leaving "in droves" as he put it. That sucks. It is my fault too
since I had no time to prepare good stuff for this nor have the chance
to really talk to Mark beforehand. I pushed this and it backfired,
harsh but it's true. Maybe I should have waited as I originally
planned and gone for Siggraph 2010.

Now the plan is - I am for sure going next year. This production of
Project Widow will be completed by then. We will hopefully be working
with or at least testing the next version of Mosaic for Blender 2.50.
That will be what I show at Siggraph 2010.

One question I do have is - did anyone from here go to Siggraph? Any
feedback?

Another series of questions that I think stems from paranoia and that
this years Siggraph took a down turn : are we shunned by the Blender
community? Are we making a difference? Do people REALLY want to see
this get bigger? Or am I just taking it a bit too hard for my own
good?

I do not know, however I do know that we all have to make this year
count, we NEED to show that what we are doing is for the better, not
just a simple little project with no clear idea what we want. The past
few years have been building up, I think we are so close to the light
at the end of the tunnel that we can touch it. Whatever that means...
anyways despite the bad news I am really not discouraged. I think we
will always be the "rebels" of the Blender community. I think what we
are doing IS worth doing. I think that with the simple goals laid out
for the next 12 months we CAN accomplish them (after all it's only two
of them).

Thoughts? Ideas? Words of encouragement? Slaps in the face? lol

[Anthony Rosbottom]

Hi Ted,
It's a shame it didn't go ideally.Speaking in public is harder than it looks on TV and I know from fraught experience that you need to be ultra-prepared to pull it off successfully.

No, being based in the UK I've never been to a Siggraph. I would love to one day but I've never worked for an employer that deems it important enough =/ But I'd say don't worry too much about this years performance. It's done now and at least you know that next years showing will be a definite improvement.

as for being shunned. I think that might largely be paranoia. To me it seems a lot of the vocal majority of Blender users are people without significant experience in production. They don't know what problems renderman is solving. They think 'why go through the hassle of learning and setting up this strangle renderman stuff, when I can press a button in Blender and it'll give me back the same thing - with hair!'

At any rate, just keep carrying on steadily and the progress will happen.

Cheers,
Anthony

[>WHiTeRaBBiT<]

Sorry about the Siggraph mishap, unfortunately these things can happen
in public presentations :( As you've already mentioned I think only
someone extremely well versed in RenderMan and our pipeline should
attempt to present such a complex thing (and then only with a lot of
preparation and testing). I also agree that collectively all projects
involved just need a little more time before were more publicly
viable.

I also agree with Anthony on all counts, I don't think were being
shunned as much as misunderstood. For most people talking about
RenderMan is like talking about religion: no one really understands,
everyone acts like they do and usually ends up just getting upset
about it. The best way to correct a misunderstanding is by educating
with undeniable proof not with conceptual arguments, the hard truth is
even though lofty things have been said about OSRenderMan were still a
long ways from fulfilling them. I know, and you know, that RenderMan
IS what the 3D OpenSource community needs (including for my own
projects) so lets keep working hard until its a reality! If we all
keep doing our individual parts we'll get there as a community. Also I
wouldn't worry about public opinion or head counts, if somethings
worth doing then just do it... and I think this is worth doing ;)

Also I just have to say that support for RenderMan in Blender has been
overwhelmingly positive both in the hobbyist and professional
communities. I think everyone understands that RenderMan for Blender
is important even if they don't always understand why. I've had
nothing but encouragement from the good people at BlenderArtists even
though there's a few ignorant loudmouths there, but the truth is any
large group has a few idiots and we all have been drooling maniacs
from time to time (except for me or course hehe)! We have to be
careful not to isolate ourselves from the Blender community, but also
not to act like any part of Blender is inferior to RenderMan (these
are all just different tools for different things). Just like us they
are violently protective of their dreams. Like it or not these are our
potential user base and our response to them (even the annoying ones)
does effect our ability to reach the others.

Anyway as the old saying goes "so when your backs up against the
wall.... yada yada, you know the rest" :)
Eric

On Aug 7, 7:23 pm, Anthony Rosbottom <anthony.rosbot...@gmail.com>
wrote:

> Hi Ted,
> It's a shame it didn't go ideally.Speaking in public is harder than it looks
> on TV and I know from fraught experience that you need to be ultra-prepared
> to pull it off successfully.
>
> No, being based in the UK I've never been to a Siggraph. I would love to one
> day but I've never worked for an employer that deems it important enough =/
> But I'd say don't worry too much about this years performance. It's done now
> and at least you know that next years showing will be a definite
> improvement.
>
> as for being shunned. I think that might largely be paranoia. To me it seems

> a lot of the vocal majority of Blender users are people *without *significant

[T G]

Yes I suppose that much is true. I tend to let the 2 or 3 fanboys get
to me a bit too much, most of them are actually quite helpful and hell
if it wasn't for Blenderartists forum - Dan would not be with us
working on this. So it's not all bad. Another thought I had was maybe
we should get one of the devs that is in charge of the RenderAPI to at
least join the group, this way we can have an actual Blender Dev that
understands the needs we are demanding (hehe)? A thought. We have done
well so far but maybe one of them with more direct communication would
not be a bad idea.

Given that this has been building up for a couple years it still has a
way to go. Compared to some software, we are still in the infancy
stage. Maybe this years SIGGRAPH was just too early? I really think
now that may be the case, after all Mark has no experience with our
tools, he is a Linux admin, not a Renderman artist so I can't be upset
because he does not know. Well now we know what we need to do.

Project Widow
Mosaic for new Blender.

In that order. I know for certain that any development for the next
version of Mosaic will not be as in depth as the current one, you have
been working on it for two years Eric. Though if it has enough
functionality to prove a point, it just might be enough for next year
as a "what to expect" sort of thing.

Ok I have to stop thinking about this, it is done, it is the past.
Good effort but not enough at this time, we know what needs to get
done.

We have work to do : )