I tried Max a few years back and it was so complicated. Seems like the total opposite of where MoI is headed

I can see how in certain situations this kind of functionality is to be desired, but it always comes at the price of complexity. The beauty of MoI is that it is easy, both simple and powerful without complexity.

On the other hand I can see how being able to change fillets, etc later on would be great. After all I can change the size of a cube, why not other things?

I'm sure that Michael will come up with an elegant way to handle this in a MoI way :-)

Please don't get me wrong, I am not a Max user, at least not a good one.... I find it difficult and I don't need it's capabilities more than 3%.
I just like some of the methods very much....

I try to imagine MoI's future as a user.... I would like to be able to do many things even if I don't need them every day.... For example, we have an array command... What if we could make this array attached to a surface? I mean what if we make a 10X10 objects and then make them follow the surface of an object, something like trees on a mountain..... or the very nice array on a curve that we already have in MoI.

Another example.... What if we created this array and now we want to replace the initial object we used (and every other object of the array) with a better object we imported.... Would be nice to have such a tool.... Or, scale one object and then everyone follows... That's instances.

Another great feature of Max is the modifiers stack.... Make a box, make a fillet, open a hole.... No, it has to be a bigger box.... Go back and change box's one dimension, 2.3cm.... and now the fillet can be a bit bigger, change that too....
You get the picture I think....

I am not a programmer, I judge every product from the result I get.... MoI is great but there is a lot of work to do so my only purpose is to help Michael and not make a clone of Max which I don't like very much.

I wish I had some experience with better apps like Maya or Rhino but since I am not a CG artist and I work with buildings, I never had the need.

Michael !
Its not the library aspect of the componants that
I love its the way you can tell that component to snap
into place that is so cool !!!!!!!
Like you can build a window and move it into a building
you then save as a component how that should snap onto the surface
next time .
It works with arrays too !
You build a model up fast that way too .
A building is set up in a matter of minutes where you need a few hours in others !
Peter

Hi JTB,

> I would like to be able to do many things even if
> I don't need them every day....

Sure, I can understand that, and I will be trying to make that happen.

It is just that the #1 priority for me are the simple things that you do need to use more every day. That's why having a full set of "updating" kind of tools was not the highest priority for version 1.0 .

Like for example right now the priority has been on making tools that make it as easy as possible to do the initial drawing, rather than focusing primarily on later updating.

These other programs that are focused on updates have the reverse priority - they make you go through more steps in the initial drawing which becomes less convenient but then later updating is easier.


I want to keep the general focus on doing the initial drawing easily, but I do have some ideas that should make later updating work better than it does now.

- Michael

Hi Peter,

> Its not the library aspect of the componants that
> I love its the way you can tell that component to snap
> into place that is so cool !!!!!!!

That part is definitely cool!

But please keep in mind that it is something very focused on architectural modeling.

SketchUp is a tool that is dedicated for use in architectural modeling.

MoI is a more general purpose tool not so specialized for one particular area so much like SketchUp. This has weaknesses but also different strengths as well, like for instance it is easier to do curved forms in MoI.


That's not to say that it would not be cool to have that type of component snapping in place in MoI as well, it is just probably going to be a while before that happens. In the meantime, if you need to do buildings with a bunch of windows in them, that is really easier to do in an architecture-specific type program, it is just a better tool for that kind of a job than MoI. In a certain sense, that actually makes it a kind of lower priority for me to add that stuff into MoI, after all if there is another tool out there that is better for a particular job I just really expect that you should use that tool instead of MoI.

- Michael

Michael !
In general I´m with you with what you say .... but this time I´m not !!!!
Its not something that is worthwhile only for architectural porposes !
If you make a mechanical object and make a rivet a component you could easily place those on
a surface using this feature !
I see it as part of an updated array tool too !
I understand that its not No 1 priority but its not ONLy usefull for architecture !
It would be a "COOL" feature for the future even for mechanicals !
Peter

Hi Peter, yeah you're right and in fact I guess that mechanical solid modelers like SolidWorks and Pro/E often have a pretty similar kind of "feature library" type thing as well.

But again if you have the need to create such repeated fasteners quite a lot, then again I would suggest using one of those modelers that is focused very much on mechanical part design like SolidWorks, they will do a better job of that type thing in a similar sense to what I was describing for an architecture-oriented modeler being easier to use for architecture.

- Michael

I'm sure that what you have in mind will work OK, I just wanted to share my small experience...!