Hi people. I'm new here, but some people may know me from PushPullBar. I posted this question over there as well, as there are some MoI fans on PPB as well.

I have a school project that i have to finish in two weeks and I would prefer to do it with the MOI 2.0 beta.
Right now it's bit of Rhino, a bit of MOI 1.0 trial version, a bit of sketchup, in fact it's a bit of a mess..
It's a project on a highway interchange, so it's exactly the sort of geometry MoI likes for dinner.
I'll probably need Rhino for some more complex operation though.

The Rhino to SU export is terrible, 3dm to 3ds to skp is not much better. Also tried the demo of Sycode's 3dm to Sketchup exporter, it's not any better actually.. It only takes meshes and it costs as much as a MoI license.
So I'm craving for the SU import and export and the layer and group options in MoI 2.0 beta...

Some questions - apologies if some have been answered here before, i'm a bit short of time for the moment..

Is the latest beta stable on larger projects? If it's not stable on large models I could still model in MoI and export and assemble in SU. Still, everything in MoI would be preferable.

How are the SU exports of more organic shapes? Do you have control over the poly count in SU?

And anyone ordered a student license? Do you get a license number right away? I can't wait until Monday, I need it running tonight or I'll have to find another workflow.. And the full license, well... It's almost the end of the month

The beta will be functional until the full release of 2.0 if I understood correctly. I presume the 2.0 will be there soon and I don't want to be in the situation where the beta is no longer functional just before the end of the project. With the only option of paying an upgrade.. Any news on that?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
I hope to be around here more often, I love what I've seen from MoI up to now!

I am a big fan of MoI ... though I have used Rhino for years.

The MoI 2.0 betas have been rock solid from the beginning ...

Michael Gibson is a prince ... he will not let beta user's in the lurch before 2.0 is completely ready!

Just go for it!

cheers,
eric

Thanks Eric, I'ld love to just go for it.. but it doesn't seem so easy.

From what I've read Michael doesn't seem like the kind of man to let his customers down, so I'm not too worried about the beta expiring like five days after the release of 2.0. Still, I'm faced with a decision to buy a program that I know will need an upgrade very soon. I'm interested in the 2.0 beta, not so much in the 1.0 - which is what I will end up with. The 1.0 is great, but I really need the SU import/export and the layers and groups.

The problem seems to be that studica needs proof that you're a student and doesn't 'ship' - I'll just get a download link I hope?? - before your student status is approved. Since it's Friday night I guess that means I won't get it up and running before Monday. And that's too late.

I've sent a mail to Studica, we'll see what happens.
Anyone who ordered there who can tell me how long it took to be up and running?

thanks,
pitrak

Hi pitrak, thanks for your interest in MoI!


re: Beta expiration after 2.0 release

I'd expect to have at least a one month overlap (if not more) between the release of 2.0 and when the 2.0 betas expire.


re: Studica order

Yeah to order from Studica takes a few steps like you have to send them in a scan of your student ID.

They have to manually check such things, so if they have a big stack of them to go through it can sometimes mean a delay of a day or something before your order is actually completed.

So since it is Friday now, yeah you probably would not get an educational license set up before Monday.


> I'll just get a download link I hope??

Yes, once your order is completed you'll get a download link in e-mail.


If you're mostly focused on wanting to get a better export, if you want to post your 3DM file here or e-mail it to me, I can do the conversion for you and send you back the SKP file if that would help. That would then give you a good demo of how the MoI 2.0 SketchUp exporter will work for your needs.

- Michael

Hi Michael, thanks for the quick reply!

Good to know about the expiration, it will at least allow me to finish the complete project without worrying about that.

The Studica order is a bit of a problem. I don't think I'll sleep much between now and Monday, too much work to be done for sleeping!
So I'll need to arrange a proper workflow right away if i want to be productive, can't wait much longer..

>If you're mostly focused on wanting to get a better export, if you want to post your 3DM file here or e-mail it to me, I can do the conversion for you and send you back the SKP file if that would help. That would then give you a good demo of how the MoI 2.0 SketchUp exporter will work for your needs.

That's too kind of you, maybe I'll send you one right away to see the difference with what I have now. But I'll need to do a lot of modelling in MoI and in Sketchup. I don't know if I'll end up assembling everything in MoI or Sketchup for final output, but there will be geometry from both programs. The organic parts from MoI, other parts from SU plugins. Can't expect you to do all those conversions for me of course!

I think I'll have to order a full license, it will be either that, modelling everything in sketchup or using 3ds export to SU..

Thanks,
p

Hi pitrak,

> That's too kind of you, maybe I'll send you one right away
> to see the difference with what I have now.

No problem - that would at least let you see if MoI v2 exporter would be helpful or not.

Although the MoI v2 beta is quite stable, please don't forget that it is still an unfinished beta release.

It is probably not a great idea to combine any beta release that you have not already been testing, with a really tight schedule like you are describing. That is just not a good combination in general principle.

- Michael