3D Software Vendor Bloodbath with AutoDesk Acquisition of Alias
AutoDesk is acquiring Alias Rearch. AutoDesk acquiring Alias is to 3D what Adobe acquiring Macromedia is for 2D graphics and design. The combination of bloodbath and consolidation continues.
If you our outside of the 3D and video industries, you may not know that AutoDesk, while being the formost provider of CAD software (with the industry shaking AutoCAD), also owns the Discreet line of products, including 3D Studio MAX (now more strongly branded as AutoDesk 3D MAX). 3D MAX is probably the best known 3D modeling and rendering tool for the game industry. And in that corner, Alias Maya is the tool of choice for 3D in film. In the last few iterations of both products, both products have attempted to poach more into the others territory, with game specific features showing up in Maya, and MAX cleaning up its act towards film.
The 3D industry has been in bloodbath mode since both Alias and NewTek (owners of LightWave) started dropping prices. NewTek’s LightWave started on the Amiga and became famous for producing the (then) eye-popping 3D effects on the TV Sci-Fi show Babylon 5. It was really the first tv show that made use of technologies previously associated only with science fiction feature films. Lightwave held the line for quite some time as the best value for a 3D production artist’s buck, with Maya and MAX both holding much higher price points, making much less affordable to small, independent production houses.
If you want to learn LightWave, you can still get it at a huge savings compared to the others, and it has some amazing tools. But I doubt NewTek’s LightWave will bounce back from that year 2002 price drop. They also face products like Maxon’s Cinema 4D , SoftFX Software’s Houdini, and not to leave out Avid’s SoftImage. It is the second wave of 3D vendors who will feel the bite of AutoDesk Maya.