Automated 3D

[Michael J. Brown]

It happened sometime way before I was born with the advent of the printing press. It happened in the '80s with automated robots on the auto assembly lines. It happened in the '90s with desktop publishing, and is happening all over again today with cheap, but professional-looking website design templates. It's been happening for the past several years with digital photography. And it may be slowly creeping its way into the future of our own industry. Obsolescence.

 

Surely the digital revolution of CGI made hand-rendering a thing of the nostalgic past, but at least that transition was one that simply passed the baton from one artistic professional to the next. What I am afraid of (what all of us have thought about at one time or another) is what if packages such as Revit and Sketchup (ewwww...wash my mouth out with LavaBoy) get so darn "user friendly" that great quality renders can be cranked out by any typical construction document drawing, red-line correcting, shop drawing checking CAD operator?

 

This topic is not a new one. It's been discussed many times on this forum. Sometimes by design, other times by thread-hijacking sub-topic. But my intent here is to try and gage two things:

 

1) How far off in the future do you think it will be before somebody with significant enough market share develops and perfects a software package like this? Creating essentially an "easy" button for producing great (not average) architectural images.

 

2) What will you do when that day does arrive?

 

OR - Maybe you don't think this day will ever come... If not, please expound on why you don't see this happening.

 

 

I have long been opposed to any software that makes it too easy for exceptional results to be produced. I like it when our software (industry-wide) is exponentially difficult to learn, because it makes it that much harder for hacks to get in and undercut. Hence, we can't be phased out.

 

I have taught MAX collegiately for over 9 years (starting with VIZ), and must say that while it is gratifying when a student "gets it" and is finally able to create good images, there is a small part of me that thinks, "Well, dang! I used to have to tweak this, adjust that, alter this, and simulate that to get the same result. Now that the software has been simplified, even some of my students are creating works on par with half the stuff posted on the CGarchitect WIP.

 

Please don't interpret that to mean that I abhor progress. By all means, the software must continue to get better. Just not necessarily too much "easier". Otherwise we may end up going the way of the web designer - still employed, but with much less market share because most consumers are perfectly happy with what they can get from a $35 web template.

 

We all know how few truly discerning clients there are out there.

 

Feedback?

 

(sorry for the mini-novel)

[mattclinch]

won't happen.

 

people still use pens as well as printed books, people still make bespoke handmade cars as well as buy production line models, people still paint as well as take photographs, people still make custom websites even though there are thousands of templates available. we still make handmade renders even though we have 3D!

 

the medium will become more accessible, in the same way cars, photography and website design are now more accessible and not the reserve of the specialist, but there will always BE specialists, because a computer does not have a "make innovative and artistictly beautful" button, and once something becomes mass produced it is the quality that gets noticed. the ferraris, TVRs and konigseggs go on kids walls, not the volvos or hyundais..

[BrianKitts]

Great images are created by artists, not by software. Until we are in a word where computers can "think" "learn" "create" on their own, the design side of what we do is completely safe.

 

I think the closest you can get to automating what we do, is where the BIM platforms are today where half of what you do for modeling is getting automated. But that isn't anywhere what it takes to makes amazing imagery.

 

So I do not worry, although the software progress, I'll be long dead before my job is automated.

[axezine]

Hi all... Just wanted to chime in to a subject that I see crop up time and time again - what will happen when it's too easy? I've grown increasingly tired and frustrated by the argument that software should remain hard or "just not that easy" in order to protect the "artists". Come on! Artists are supposed to thrive on challenges! And what greater challenge than overcoming complacency and the status quo of your medium by coming up with something truly revolutionary and artistic? Whenever I hear someone complaining about this I imagine someone who's happy with what he's doing and loathes having to try harder in order to remain relevant... That's progress! It's always happened, in every line of business or trade or art, and guess what, it WILL always continue to happen. It's human nature - moving forward; not getting stuck. There's nothing you can do to prevent it. The only thing you can try and do is stay a step ahead by forcing yourself to try and be truly innovative.

 

If a piece of software comes out implementing some new "easier" way of doing something, instead of complaining about how "easy" it will now be for everyone to do "amazing" or "great" renders or whatever, study the new feature - I'll bet there's uses and applications for it that no one's even thought about! By definition the person just "doing" renderings because now it's so "easy" is not going to be the one trying hardest to do the best work - if he was, he would have probably been cranking out decent renders before. Sure, nowadays a five year old with some templates can put out a website, but when you visit it it can't, by definition of a template, be something original and innovative. You're bound to run into another website using the same template (just because there's probably not that many "great" templates out there...) and then the cat's out of the bag.

 

Allow me to summarize this by saying that I think an artist embraces his tools and is excited when he finds new and improved ones - they'll allow his own work to be that much better and do things he never dreamed of before! So whenever a new feature makes it's appearance I try to see how I can push it to new limits, not just how it can make my previous work "easier".

 

Just my two cents.

 

cheers,

 

Jorge

[lyca]

I agree with those who say that painters, photograpers, printers and web designer are still there even after their job has been demistify and became accessible for a large part of the non specialist people. It happens because their tools got easy to learn and very automated.

 

it's a question of time that our 3d Software change to become so simple that anyone could render a good image in a matter of hour after using a 3D package for the first time.

 

when this arrives it will not stop me to continue learning new 3D Technics and try to make renders that will amaze my clients, at least i can try to do so.

But the true is that it will change so much the cgi industry that i will have a lot of problems trying to explain my clients why he should continue to give me thousands of dollars for my work, when he could do almost the same himself or his eleven year girl.

 

As a open and technophile person i will probably be using right from the beginning this hypothetic new revolutionary software, this will be good for my amusement but for my money i will have to find a different business model.

 

so the only real questions are :

 

how can we in the cgi industry change to continue making money with our knowledge ?

 

on this i really have no idea for the moments, but there are some ideas like moving to 3d printers, augmented reality, stereoscopy and other emerging new technology.

 

And how many time do we have til we can't make any more business the way we do ?

 

i would say maybe an other 1,5 to 3 years maximum

Edited July 19, 2009 by lyca

[Michael J. Brown]

I feel you Jorge (axezine). But Monte (lyca) has got a very valid point. If it becomes THAT easy for someone who doesn't have the years of experience we do to crank out a moderately exceptional piece, what's to stop every architectural office from assigning the tasks that we currently charge thousands for to some intern or CAD operator? Hence, how do we make the money we're used to making? Hence, how long before we become the "China" of our own country - having to crank out $300 renders with break-neck turn-around speed to stay profitable and competitive with the in-house "talent".

 

That scenario is a stretch though. I've exaggerated a bit. I honestly don't think it'll ever come to that. For basic services - yes - it will. But for the discerning client, no. Our services will still be held in high regard and be able to command top dollar.

 

Bottom line is that there will always be that percentage of clientele who doesn't require or demand upper echelon CGI. For some clients (and some architectural office even) the quality you get from the typical intern or CAD operator is all they will ever need or even want (to pay for). This is the demographic that will be lost to the "automated renders". But truth be told, they're lost to us already - because they don't value high quality work. Just like the folk who choose website templates over custom designed websites always were a lost cause for the web designer - because they simply were never going to be willing to pay that type of money for a web presence.

[Noise]

I suppose the only analogy I can give is this;

 

If a man/woman (looking for love) goes to a nightclub dressed like the cheapest off the shelf person in the club then they have not a hope in hell of attracting any attention and therefore no result.

 

Buildings are the same. Clients want the best design and the best graphics for the best possible WOW factor to get peoples attention.

 

Basic stuff.

 

If the world did come crashing down around our ears and there was no power or food - who would survive ?

 

Those who adapted the best.

 

Its time to adapt, don't wait for software to dictate that to us - be ahead of the curve, thats why we are here doing 3D on computers instead of on a drawing board.

Edited July 22, 2009 by Noise

[Crazy Homeless Guy]

Surely the digital revolution of CGI made hand-rendering a thing of the nostalgic past, but at least that transition was one that simply passed the baton from one artistic professional to the next.

 

I wouldn't be so fast to dismiss hand renderings. They are often preferred over CG. This is why SketchUp is popular. We are actually walking a line where we might see a slight renaissance of hand renderings.

 

The truth is, with a good wire frame, a talented and efficient artist can create hand renderings at twice the speed of digital renderings of equal value. At least imo. In this economy, it is about efficiency, and talent.