Bugs found in Maxwell 1.0

[Fran]

MW is a great photorealistic renderer indeed however MW1.0 could crash anytime, it couldn't save a rendered image, and some raytrace, or reflect/refract applied in 3ds max could not be rendered properly with MW. NL should do better with the next version hopefully.

 

You have to use Maxwell materials and cameras. 3DS Max materials are not supported.

[Bongo51]

you also need to press the render button while wearing clown feet, singing the Mission Impossible theme WHILE making the universal sign for hope with the other hand in the air.

 

THEN maybe you will get somewhere.

[Bongo51]

I've finally uninstalled V1 for good. I spent 5 hours last night tweaking settings, test rendering... etc. I must say I am appreciating Lightwave's texturing system SOOOO much these days in comparison. Like, is it so hard to have a button that fits the texture to the object? or am I missing something.

 

In any case when I was doing my final render it crashed... stopped responding and crashed! I was livid. So I rebooted and opened up Lightwave. Somehow studio had deleted/corrupted numerous plugins so I couldn't load images, use imageworld, etc... and my textures were gone anyway, I would need to reimport them.

 

That was the last straw. I went to another workstation with beta installed and set it up in TEN MINUTES. I understand that the beta is nowhere near as 'deep' and 'powerful' but kiddies... you can DO STUFF with it... and, in under a millenium.

 

I'm back with the beta for the near future... until perhaps V1.1 is released...

 

sheesh... what a nightmare.

[Devin Johnston]

Well I've concluded that the current direction that Maxwell is heading is more for production designers than it is for architects. The material editor has been created to enable the creation of lots of different kinds of advanced materials that just don't show up in most architectural scenes. Mike and Mihai even admitted that the beta way of material creation worked great for us but wasn't so great for them, which is why we have what we have now. I still don't see why they can't get their wizard to duplicate the beta material setup, it seem like it could be done.

 

Bongo51 sorry to hear your having so much trouble with V1, I guess us 3d Studio guy's are luckier to have a more developed interface and don't have to use Studio.

[Bongo51]

I just read something interesting. I received yet another update from Newtek regarding the upcoming release of LW9. They have just finished the 12TH! Beta build to the beta testors, and the release candidate will be out shortly...

 

THAT is the way it's done. ACTUAL beta versions, before an ACTUAL RC is released... then ACTUAL finals. The are concerned about it ACTUALLY working before claiming it's FINISHED...

 

From my experience with Lightwave, though some bugs exist... when they claim it's a release candidate... IT IS.

 

Next Limit really could learn something from Newtek. As a company, they are not much different in size, but the product they produce puts Maxwell to shame. Of course, that's true of MANY software developers.

 

ian

[Ernest Burden III]

I just read something interesting. I received yet another update from Newtek regarding the upcoming release of LW9. They have just finished the 12TH! Beta build to the beta testors, and the release candidate will be out shortly...

 

In beta testing Datacad, we have had dozens of beta versions in a week, I've hav a dozen RCs. The point is you put something up, testers try it, report back, you put up another try...until it's as right as it can be. I've worked with RC's numbered into the low 20's. In the old days, bug reports were faxed in. It took months then to do what we can now do in a few days of testing. So after a year, NextLimit has published crap and called in a release version. What f*ing idiots.

 

Next Limit really could learn something from Newtek.

 

You assume too much.

[Hybaj]

Hi Max, Frances and all of you "thinking" people.

 

As Maxwell customers we just need to get over the fact that the beta will never return. They are giving us something that is more powerfull than the beta was, BUT the program is so "advanced" now that it's almost impossible to set it up right. Yeah the V1 probably can do it... but it's so goddamn hard since we don't know what setting should be tweaked to get to the same quality level. There are also some weakpoints of V1 which actually prohibits getting to the same quality (weird noise behavior and strange AA). But nothing is impossible for a good artist.

 

 

So to sum it up, maxwell v1 is perfect for product shots, exteriors and half-interior/exteriors. The interiors are just way too tricky now.

 

NL's marketing approach is dead wrong but they will never get it. They will feel touched that nobody wants to buy maxwell for 1000$ bucks because "It's so much powerfull now". They will blame it on the on customers that they are not ready to handle such a powerfull software. On the forum everybody is waiting for new "beautifull" images but they are nowhere to be seen. It's going to take a long time till we see especialy interiors in the same quality as they were before. Also alot of good artists are gone from the forum and we're only left with people that only do tests.

 

Don't get me wrong.. i love maxwell and i'm happy that i bought it. I created stuff with it that is impossible with other software. Thank god it only costed 500.. but still lol i was left with a 2,2 ghz amd, geforce 2 and 512 mb ram (hey it was a great computer some time ago).

 

Yeah as a student I have to start somewhere

[Fran]

There are also some weakpoints of V1 which actually prohibits getting to the same quality (weird noise behavior and strange AA). But nothing is impossible for a good artist.

 

Sometimes a good artist knows when to put down a bad tool.