3D Software and Future Licensing Policies
Oct 15, 2014 by CGP Staff
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Introduction
Autodesk’s recent announcement that they’ll be phasing out permanent licenses as an option for purchasing their software has caused strong reactions. The shift from permanent licenses to a rental model is a significant one and some have suggested that this is a trend that will spread to other software developers. But is this really the case? Will artists find themselves with no choice but to rent their paintbrushes? Will other major 3D developers change their licensing policies, too?In order to help fellow artists and bring some certainty to the matter, we have asked major 3D software developers (based on the most frequent ones mentioned by comments on this site) if they plan to keep permanent licenses as a purchase option in the foreseeable future, or if they expect to move to a rental/subscription-only model.
Developers’ replies
Side Effects, developers of Houdini“There are currently no plans to stop selling permanent licenses to our customers. Houdini and Houdini FX are our commercial versions and we offer a choice between permanent and rental (subscription) licensing. Our products under $1000 such as Houdini Indie and Houdini Engine are subscription only.”
The Foundry, developers of Modo
“Actually, The Foundry already offers rentals/subscription on some products, since way back, and we’ll continue doing so. But we also plan to keep permanent licenses as a purchase option too.”
Maxon Computer, developers of Cinema 4D
“There are currently no plans to stop offering permanent licenses. If in the future MAXON decides to make a subscription model available on a monthly basis or something similar, we will offer this as an additional option, not as a replacement.”
The Blender Foundation, developers of Blender
“Blender’s GNU GPL license firmly establishes it as a Free Software project, which guarantees that Blender will remain free forever – free as in freedom for users and developers.
That doesn’t mean we do things for free – there’s currently already 10 people working on Blender who get paid and supported by the Blender Development Fund and Blender Institute’s store and cloud services. I welcome everyone to reconsider their software budgets for 2015, and take a look at how Blender could fit in your pipeline after all. We’re open!
I would also like to add that artists should seek for software providers that share their passion for the medium. Choose to work with relaxed and accessible companies or projects who love to work with you on making awesome stuff. There’s still a healthy market with smaller parties like Maxon, the Foundry, Sidefx, Newtek, SolidAngle, and similar organizations – they deserve to be flourishing and be successful.”
Thanks for taking the time and asking the software developers the question. I’m sure this will hit Autodesk harder as we have declarations now that the competition won’t force it as a only option.
Thanks CGPress staff.
thank you very, very much for this article. it is only bit of concrete info on the subject, and there is plenty of speculation.
as expected – all of the companies seem to view rental as an optional extra at most, not a way to strong-arm their customers or as some sort of inevitable future. (that is actually very relieving to know)
i am specifically looking to jump to either houdini or c4d and its nice to have the future policies laid out.
playing around with houdini for some months and its a struggle but i love it.
all the discussion aside – there is no way i will be renting software, especially not something i already paid full price for. no way in hell. simple as that.
it will be fun to see how autodesk plans to incentivize the crossover.
I have already been transitioning to C4D and Modo. Happy to see they value customer support and options.
Can anyone tell me what plugin developers will do? I see that Thinking Particles 6 is released today. I will not be upgrading from TP5. I assume that Autodesk must be aware of how this will impact developers.
I hope to see more replies soon for zbrush, 3d coat, sketchup, lightwave 3d, all the daz3d apps and the smith micro apps too..also 3rd party plugins and renderers
good news on these companies not looking to go rental only
pixologic has been massively generous with the updates, and i have great trust in their model.
i look forward to pay them for the r7 and support the great work they are doing.
I hope these companies stick to their word. However, when I personally reached out to inquire of Autodesk as to whether they would be maintaining purchased perpetual licenses, I was told that there were no plans to phase out perpetual licenses. It is a PR statement. The truth will only be realized over the course of time.
I can’t properly parse the response from AD’s community manager…to me it SOUNDS like those of us who have loyally remained on subscription may be allowed to continue? BUT…it sure looks to me like they are tripling the annual fee for subscription…in which case I will use my 2015 license as I transition off their stuff.
Tell me…what feature or improvement has been made to Max in the last 4-5 years that would justify even a doubling of the price?
We currently use AD Motion Builder. When/if they go rental-only, the version we have will be the last one we EVER “buy” from AD. We will NOT rent ever. We will not allow our work to be held hostage by any company. That’s why we’ve migrated from Adobe software and will do so with ANY company that wants to hurt the customer by removing CHOICE. If/when our 3D app goes the way of rental-only, we will migrate to Blender and continue to support them.
Having the option to own OR rent is paramount and is beneficial for the customer. Having rental-only is ONLY good for the software company. Hopefully people will not buy into this scheme to show AD that they need to keep perpetual licenses as an option.
Don’t be fooled, so these companies currently have ‘No plans’ to switch to rental licencing. Isn’t that what autodesk originaly said?
Plans can change overnight, there are no guarantees here.
Disagree. Not all companies behave the same way.
And we can judge them based on their past behavior. How many of them have removed the option to upgrade from older versions? How many of them sell their soft at double the price in different countries? That should give you a hint of what they’ll do in the future.
There is ONE guarantee… if you accept the AD rental plan as only option, the business strategists at the company won’t stop there.
so…just come off an autodesk/motion media webinar about subs and rental 🙂
maya and 3dsmax will go rental ONLY in early 2017 by the looks of it.
Autodesk Smoke has already gone rental only.
People on subs for smoke…have had their subs converted from subs to rental..same cost as subs were…so far. so that’s about 1/2 price of outright rental cost.
They (motion media) who were the hosts of the webinar say they think the same will apply to 3ds max and maya once they go rental only.
People on 3ds max 2015 have 365 days to jump back aboard subscription from when their subscription ended.
There is a migration/cross grade option to move from 3ds max over to maya if you feel ads max has failed to deliver anything worth while. USA price was $1840 to transfer over.
I planned to apply for EU funding to pick up few ADSK licenses(max or maya) for startup business (taking biz courses). How am i supposed to present this “black-hole” from risk assessment point of view? Once a golden chance for MANY startup companies to eliminate license fees, now instead we find out that adsk wants to leech on you and tank your business before it even gets a chance to take off? Sorry, not in a million years – i have family to feed, not a monopoly.
I grabbed Houdini Indie as soon as it became available and never looked back. Not a day goes by that I do not feel gratitude and awe towards that software. SideFX has made it truly a dream to work in this field (opposed to adsk nightmare).
I have also replicated my 3ds max modeling productivity in blender with simple python scripts and bindings (+it has modifiers). Organics are reserved for ZB. I am also very impressed by C4D in most aspects (especially iteration/productivity and animation).
Timing has never been better as each of them has become more accessible, mature, feature rich making them not just “an alternative” but more often a far better choice. These are the companies/products that I am happy to support and build my pipeline around.
This info could not have come at a better time. Thank you CGP (for both articles)
To replace 3ds max, you need Houdini, c4D and Blender.
You better not make too much money.
As soon as your before tax/cost earning pass $100,000, You will need to pay $4,495 + $2,495 EVERYYEAR!
That is IF YOU WANT, if you don’t pay for it, you can keep working… that’s the main difference…
Cheers!
It’s kind of amusing reading the same people complain and whine about max in each thread. Especially when they’re still on several versions back.
Are you on the beta? They’ve fixed many things and are implementing and laying down the ground work for many features. If you can’t appreciate these things then you must really like complaining.