Contributor BeatKitano Posted February 17, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 17, 2013 Carlosa, this relativism is getting on my nerves. I know there's no such thing as bug free software, I know that 3dcoat is young (I stated it before a few times on those very boards), I was there for the 0.98 beta of zbrush (when it was just a toy with pixols and absolutely no sculpting purpose)... I know what a long development time is, in this kind of software (especialy these days mind you). BUT, I'm not asking new features, I'm not asking 3dcoat to have all the features of competitor products. I want WHAT WE CURRENTLY HAVE WORKING. I will repeat, but the major features which are kinda the selling points of 3dcoat to the general public (mainly freeform sculpting, retopo/autoretopo and painting) are generaly rough/broken tools. Ask anyone REALLY using the software even on specific parts of the software, they'll give you a dozen points (at the very least) which don't work/are poorly implemented. If you're selling a software on specific points but those point don't work, don't get disappointed if you fall in the pit of "software that could've been awesome". Silo is dead, HeLiX is born. Could've been IS. I hope Pilgway is really taking note here, they've got gold in their hands but are pleased with the dust layer on it... OUCH ! BTW v4 is Beta and i dont use it for my daily work... Well you're one of the lucky ones not getting the bugs still in the latest 3.x build. Because if you were you would agree with me that if the polish was there it wouldn't be such a big deal. But if you're unlucky you'll encounter bugs that weren't fixed and you're now forced to use v4 beta builds because "it's fixed in the latest beta" (the only fix since 3.x builds are not maintained anymore). You know what I mean you redirected a few new users yourself :/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Creator Posted February 17, 2013 Member Report Share Posted February 17, 2013 I propose to add GUI to AngleScript (or whatever it will be) so people can modify it. Then we can choose best option from all propositions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 17, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 17, 2013 Carlosa, this relativism is getting on my nerves. I know there's no such thing as bug free software, I know that 3dcoat is young (I stated it before a few times on those very boards), I was there for the 0.98 beta of zbrush (when it was just a toy with pixols and absolutely no sculpting purpose)... I know what a long development time is, in this kind of software (especialy these days mind you). BUT, I'm not asking new features, I'm not asking 3dcoat to have all the features of competitor products. I want WHAT WE CURRENTLY HAVE WORKING. I will repeat, but the major features which are kinda the selling points of 3dcoat to the general public (mainly freeform sculpting, retopo/autoretopo and painting) are generaly rough/broken tools. Ask anyone REALLY using the software even on specific parts of the software, they'll give you a dozen points (at the very least) which don't work/are poorly implemented. If you're selling a software on specific points but those point don't work, don't get disappointed if you fall in the pit of "software that could've been awesome". Silo is dead, HeLiX is born. Could've been IS. I hope Pilgway is really taking note here, they've got gold in their hands but are pleased with the dust layer on it... OUCH ! BTW v4 is Beta and i dont use it for my daily work... Well you're one of the lucky ones not getting the bugs still in the latest 3.x build. Because if you were you would agree with me that if the polish was there it wouldn't be such a big deal. But if you're unlucky you'll encounter bugs that weren't fixed and you're now forced to use v4 beta builds because "it's fixed in the latest beta" (the only fix since 3.x builds are not maintained anymore). You know what I mean you redirected a few new users yourself :/ I ran into a series of annoying bugs recently and felt overall stress levels rising again. I saved the presets, and nuked the entire MyDocs/3D Coat V4 directory, except for the folders and the lincense file. Sure enough many of those bugs (most were UI related), disappeared. Something is getting corrupted routinely in those xml files. Andrew really needs to find out just exactly what is causing the corruption, because if he can do that, I'd say 1/3 to 1/2 of the bugs reported would disappear also.One other thing that absolutely, positively, without a doubt....needs to get nailed down...is baking. I've had decent success at times baking normal maps, but there are times where 3D Coat is determined to fight me tooth and nail to get across the finish line. I have blown hours (troubleshooting) trying to get a decent result, and I can't afford to spend 8-10hrs doing what should only take 30 seconds to 1 minute. It's got to be easier to get a clean bake and Andrew has got to spell it out clearly. I understand the principles of using a projection cage, and have tried dozens of different Baking parameters, and sometimes NOTHING works....no matter what I try. Baking/Merging to MicroVertex is even worse. It's why I practically never use it. THIS MUST CHANGE. This application is too dependent on baking, and it breaks the whole workflow having to send both the Voxel mesh and Retopo mesh outside the app just to handle the baking. 3D Coat should have a reputation as a rock solid texture baking app. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlosan Posted February 18, 2013 Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 holes and mesh explode in my test not always, BUT sometimes... only happened over meshes that was painted directly in surface mode -no retopo, no baking- from voxel rooom -in surface mode- to paint room and... this is weird... only when i use brushes with radius > 1.00% if i work at radios <0.99% is ok... changed to >1.10% = holes and explode Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advanced Member Zeddicus Posted February 18, 2013 Advanced Member Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 I understand what you are saying, but there is redundancy in most ANY application. At least in most other apps, like 3ds Max where you have more than one way of doing something, the end result is usually the same between them. Not so with 3D Coat. The past couple of weeks have been pretty frustrating for me, trying to get fully functional 16-bit displacement maps exported from the retopo room for a low poly mesh which has more than one UV set. I've given up on trying to do it in what seems like the logical way and am now focusing on trying every possible permutation across two rooms just to see what my end results are. My hope is that I'll eventually stumble across the correct path, allowing me to finally move on. It's been emotionally draining and I've felt like giving up a few times, but this riddle needs to be solved sooner rather than later if 3D Coat is to be of any use to me in future projects. Does Andrew even have a road map for 3D Coat? That is what most of the others do, and not just the software developers. Even if people are posting a lot of requests for new features, Mantis has sorting capabilities so at least he can focus on just the bugs alone if he wants to which is good, provided people are reporting them accurately and not making dupes. Bugs first, tweaks second, and adding new features last is the order he should be looking at right now, as well as prioritizing those bugs from least to most important. Without a solid plan, you just go in circles. Adrift on a vast sea, alone in a row boat with only one oar, what else can you do? Buy more oars and the manpower needed to use them effectively (hint hint). Just out of curiosity, is Andrew an artist? What I mean is, does he spend any time making much art with his own application, or does he spend all of his time programming? Using ones own software is part of what aids in the development of ZBrush a lot I think, hence why I'm curious. While I know ZBrush isn't perfect either, I do feel the steam train / roller coaster comparison made by BeatKitano was an apt one. Not that roller coasters aren't fun of course, to a point anyways. Note that they are actually made to go in circles though, not just up and down, so truly not something one should aim at emulating. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 18, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 Beat and a few others suggested they actually do so, a few months ago, and when they did, they stumbled upon some of the bugs people had complained about for some time. That seemed pretty productive, as not only did it help make LiveClay a lot more usable and stable, but they got to see where some of the limitations were. Raul re-worked the architecture of LiveClay a good deal before he had to leave abruptly back to Cuba....which currently has very scant internet resources for the average person. Hopefully, Andrew will do this once a month, so he can catch encounter more and more of these issues, himself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor digman Posted February 18, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 Andrew's Wip and I would assume he has a development road map, never met a developer that did not have one... http://3d-coat.com/f...showtopic=10640 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taros Posted February 18, 2013 Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 ... Same goes with the 2D Texture Editor. I told Andrew ... What?! Do I use a different tool? What kind of "2D texture editor" do you mean? I've never heard about such a menu point. Enlight me, please! By the way: I agree with all points mentioned by you and BeatKitano in the last posts. Best wishes Chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 18, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 What?! Do I use a different tool? What kind of "2D texture editor" do you mean? I've never heard about such a menu point. Enlight me, please! By the way: I agree with all points mentioned by you and BeatKitano in the last posts. Best wishes Chris I'm referring to the UV Texture Editor from the TEXTURES menu. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor BeatKitano Posted February 18, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 holes and mesh explode in my test not always, BUT sometimes... only happened over meshes that was painted directly in surface mode -no retopo, no baking- from voxel rooom -in surface mode- to paint room and... this is weird... only when i use brushes with radius > 1.00% if i work at radios <0.99% is ok... changed to >1.10% = holes and explode Now you know why I get angry. Bugs are ok, but not that kind of bug, take zbrush and mudbox, you don't have your mesh getting corrupted just by sculpting it. Your mesh doesn't get hole or disconnected parts just by brushing on it. This is unnaceptable, I know it's hard to fix because there are special conditions when this happen (I can't really be mad at Andrew because I don't even know WHY I get them which could help fix it so) but this is the kind of thing that simply nullify any chance for 3dcoat to get into a sculpting pipeline. 3dcoat is used, for the other rooms, but I've yet to see a production using it exclusively for sculpting, afaik it never happened (as zbrush or mud was involved at a later stage). Freeform sculpting (I talk a lot about it because this is my main use and the part I'm the most familiar with) should be the holy grail that makes 3dcoat go up, look at how much sculptris got praised with a low performance engine ! And yet we're stuck with something that works, so-so (stroke quality is my main grief with surface, especialy noticeable with overlapping strokes: bumps !) and simply fail at times without any explaination. Not ok. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlosan Posted February 18, 2013 Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 what can i say... like beta tester... my only experience was in games Andrew told about some holes issues fixed in BETA12 im just waiting to test it ------------------------- note: Roadmap link http://3d-coat.com/mantis/roadmap_page.php Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 18, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 Now you know why I get angry. Bugs are ok, but not that kind of bug, take zbrush and mudbox, you don't have your mesh getting corrupted just by sculpting it. Your mesh doesn't get hole or disconnected parts just by brushing on it. This is unnaceptable, I know it's hard to fix because there are special conditions when this happen (I can't really be mad at Andrew because I don't even know WHY I get them which could help fix it so) but this is the kind of thing that simply nullify any chance for 3dcoat to get into a sculpting pipeline. 3dcoat is used, for the other rooms, but I've yet to see a production using it exclusively for sculpting, afaik it never happened (as zbrush or mud was involved at a later stage). Freeform sculpting (I talk a lot about it because this is my main use and the part I'm the most familiar with) should be the holy grail that makes 3dcoat go up, look at how much sculptris got praised with a low performance engine ! And yet we're stuck with something that works, so-so (stroke quality is my main grief with surface, especialy noticeable with overlapping strokes: bumps !) and simply fail at times without any explaination. Not ok. I am not saying this is definitely the source, but as I mentioned previously, after nuking all the files in MyDocs/3D Coat except the folders and license file, a bunch of bugs or annoying glitches stopped happening. Something is getting corrupted in those files and it causes bug-like behavior. It would take me a few hours to stop, record and report all of them. I hope Andrew can get to the bottom of this. This corruption of the xml files needs to get solved, otherwise both his and users alike will waste time trying to sort out whether it's a real bug or just these xml files getting corrupted. I wonder if the constant overwriting (with so many new builds) may have something to do with it?I was doing some work in LiveClay recently, and I was amazed at how long I could go and how far I could push it and never have any glitches/issues...so, I have to wonder if the xml files corruption may be a source of your problems. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor BeatKitano Posted February 18, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 At some point I'll remove everything and try again. But this program has so many random "moments" (that's the best I can describe a load of bugs happening after a relaunch of the program) this is hard to tell if something is corrupted and if it's indeed participating a lot then something is really wrong with the settings handling. For the time being I don't want to go for another ride of "ok, cool it's wo.... scratch that". I think the worst in all of this is the insane amount of changelog stating "voxel artefacts/surface holes explosions fixed". Everytime I get super excited, and... nope. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member calilifestyle Posted February 18, 2013 Member Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 i discovered something weird. When i install 3d-coat i just noticed that the program is not inside the windows uninstall or change program system. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor Tony Nemo Posted February 18, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 Bizarre! An app that uses an OS without the OS being aware of it! The mind boggles. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor artman Posted February 18, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 I was doing some work in LiveClay recently, and I was amazed at how long I could go and how far I could push it and never have any glitches/issues...so, I have to wonder if the xml files corruption may be a source of your problems. Me too,I dont get any holes ,explosions or whatever using LC if I dont use reduce tool (which is supposed to have been improved to avoid that in beta12). I am talking multiple hours of smooth, artifact-free sculpting... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor digman Posted February 18, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 18, 2013 Me too,I dont get any holes ,explosions or whatever using LC if I dont use reduce tool (which is supposed to have been improved to avoid that in beta12). I am talking multiple hours of smooth, artifact-free sculpting... Same... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Advanced Member Zeddicus Posted February 19, 2013 Advanced Member Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 Andrew's Wip and I would assume he has a development road map, never met a developer that did not have one... http://3d-coat.com/f...showtopic=10640 Creating a bug while testing for bugs. Deep. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor ajz3d Posted February 19, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 I on the other hand do get LC spikes here and there from time to time, but I blame constant BETA switching for that. I like to believe that if I were to stick to one version through the whole process, those spikeys wouldn't occur at all. Also, luckily for me I found those spikes to be usually fairly easy to be gotten rid of with a Reconstruct tool, if I can pinpoint the place they grow from. However, the Reconstruct tool seems to sometimes hit some kind of a memory leak. It eats all of my available RAM with a Godzilla-like hunger and successfully crashes the whole system (if I'm not fast enough to kill the 3D Coat process). I really have to report this to Mantis, but I always forget to do so. Any news about the ETA of BETA12? I'm so eager to try it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlosan Posted February 19, 2013 Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 what i found too... some bugs are project related if i found a bug at B5 -like example- opening the same old bugged project using an new upgraded Beta reply the bug... BUT if i make a new project and try to reproduce it... the bug is gone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor ajz3d Posted February 19, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 Not only project related, but I think they're also time/mood/whatever related, because my 3D Coat recently healed itself from the delay bug. It works like a charm now - superman fast in everything. I suspect it has something to do with corrupted user config files (something that AbnRanger suggested?). But who knows? Andrew said he probably found the cause, but he was very mysterious about it and didn't said what this cause was. At this moment I have only one bug to report (apart of the memory leak) and one future-feature to implement, that would make 3D Coat super powerful in texturing I think. The bug is in the "Place an image along the spine" tool that leaves a seam (blank, unpainted pixels) when using a closed curve mode and weirdly stretches textures in places where spline control points are. And this tool, if you ask me, is VERY POWERFUL. The feature, I mentioned, is an upgrade of said tool. A variation, let's call it. NURBS texturing. Now this would be something absolutely marvellous. Place CVs around the geometry to create a virtual surface from which the texture would be projected onto your mesh, pick ye textures. input no. of repeats, project and BLAM! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor digman Posted February 19, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 I spent quite a bit of time lately roaming around the interface and using the tools and brushes. Of course I have found bugs, some minor and some major. The problem with open beta testing and it has always been a problem with 3DCoat is that as a group we are scattered so to speak. We do not have a D-Day for one bug where we all test for it and then can report to Andrew, Ok, this a true major bug or minor. We get the same result using the same testing bed. Then Andrew takes that information and uses it to track down and squash the bug. Our efforts are diluted through not having a direct action plan. The curse of open beta without much direction from Andrew. We just come across bugs as users and then report them to Mantis. Open Beta is good but still needs at least a somewhat of a directed plan that users can voluntarily join if they so desire. There are enough users here who would not mind testing for a certain bug under Andrew's direction so it gets squashed. My 2 cents worth... 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Contributor ajz3d Posted February 19, 2013 Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 @digman, don't forget that open beta is one of the best solutions to testing the software. We might be an uncontrollable and unguided crowd, but we're still: a CROWD. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor digman Posted February 19, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 @ajz3d, Yes, Open beta sure is the best, only a little direction needed at times... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 19, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 Creating a bug while testing for bugs. Deep. Indeed. I guess his next sculpting project will have to be a Boot....you know...to better squash the bug(s) with. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Taros Posted February 19, 2013 Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 I'm referring to the UV Texture Editor from the TEXTURES menu. Ah ok. Now I got it. Yes it's a strong tool, if you know what it can do. A lot of people were very surprised when I shown it to them. I have some ideas to make it better, but it's not the right place. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member stry Posted February 19, 2013 Member Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 The Texture Editor is amazing for greebles, would be more so with a few fixes. Way better, to me, than nDo. One of the things I've often wondered about is why does the rectangle and closed spline tools work differently in the Paint room, and the Voxel Room? Currently, when I want to make a freeze selection for a surface that respects the brush alpha on its border, I have to hop to Paint Room to make it work. I took me a long while to discover this feature, and I don't think most new users have a clue that you can quickly create intricate, custom borders for the 'closed shape' type e-panel tools with 'Create using curves' brush feature. But only in the Paint room. When I first discovered this I thought it was a bug. 'My border is wonky', I thought, and it wasn't until much later I noticed that the border was dependent on the currently selected brush! Some tools in the Voxel room have a 'Plane border', and BorderFormParam (wouldn't the e-panel 'Border width' be enough?) settings , but no setting for brush alpha for the border. Seemingly same actions by the user, produce wildly different results! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Reputable Contributor AbnRanger Posted February 19, 2013 Reputable Contributor Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 The Texture Editor is amazing for greebles, would be more so with a few fixes. Way better, to me, than nDo. One of the things I've often wondered about is why does the rectangle and closed spline tools work differently in the Paint room, and the Voxel Room? Currently, when I want to make a freeze selection for a surface that respects the brush alpha on its border, I have to hop to Paint Room to make it work. I took me a long while to discover this feature, and I don't think most new users have a clue that you can quickly create intricate, custom borders for the 'closed shape' type e-panel tools with 'Create using curves' brush feature. But only in the Paint room. When I first discovered this I thought it was a bug. 'My border is wonky', I thought, and it wasn't until much later I noticed that the border was dependent on the currently selected brush! Some tools in the Voxel room have a 'Plane border', and BorderFormParam (wouldn't the e-panel 'Border width' be enough?) settings , but no setting for brush alpha for the border. Seemingly same actions by the user, produce wildly different results! Yeah, I have some issues with not being able to use the ERASE tool in the 2D Texture Editor, using splines, shapes, etc. Why? Why not let the user drag select an area to delete...for example, if you wanted to delete all the specularity from a layer, you'd immediately think to use a freeforma lasso or rectangle select + ERASE tool. WTH...over? Only brushes work. Same thing with the Stamp tool. Haven't been able to use that in the Texture Editor for some time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlosan Posted February 19, 2013 Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 @ajz3d, Yes, Open beta sure is the best, only a little direction needed at times... yeah you right... we need a roadmap The big deal with Mantis is... who admin the Severity ? Let the users to use their own criteria to do it is a BIG NO NO We need a filter in between (Admin) Report Issue -> Admin discriminate the Severity -> Andrew kill the bug -> Admin report to the BTesters the changes -> BTesters try it and report -> Admin confirm to Andrew if is resolved or not. and so on and so on... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andrew Shpagin Posted February 19, 2013 Author Report Share Posted February 19, 2013 BETA12 - Main intension of the build is bugfixing, big amount of mantis reported problems fixed. A lot of critical problems solved. Often mentioned lags problem fixed too. - camera position will be stored in save file, it is convenient to open file and occur in last saved camera state. - Important change in masks painting - there is volume preserving mode that is now default. In this mode instead of just modulating effects by mask surface may be displaced in both sides - back and forward so that in average volume will be approximately preserved. It is very important if you use mask for detailing. This mode allows to avoid constant surface growing when painting. - Models palette is now available in Retopo room to be merged directly in retopo room. Retopo layers may be dragged to that palette. - E-mode circle/lasso/rectangle/spline etc will work closer to PS style - SPACE + LMB will move whole shape. - Render room got improvement - prossibility to render blended states between several saved scenes. In so way short animated illustrations may be easily rendered. It was done mainly for my son's personal project, I think it will be helpful for community too. I expect to be criticized for this little animation support, but it was my personal needs, not just new feature, so I will be really sad in case of critics. - a lot of small but important changes that I forgot to mention because stopped to tweet last couple of weeks. Seems should start it again. Also, if someone has panful problem or set of problems, don't be angry on me or on 3D-Coat but post it to Mantis or drop me mail. It will help to solve problem quickly. BeatKitano, I seen that you feel that everything is bad in 3D-Coat and our "club". Then please post it to Mantis or describe me personally by mail. Please be constructive. Also some things can't be easily chaged or fixed (some of them mentioned in your thread). But I am doing what I may and even more, it is far not always fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts