Yeah, I have plenty to keep me busy in the mean time for sure. I know whenever it comes out I’ll be scrambling to make time to practice and create with the new tools.
Ya know, I’d get the whole “it’s free!” argument if we were getting a new version. But the fact that we’re just waiting around for a ported version of the software that’s been on the market for a year bugs me.
It is my own fault buying Zbrush 2 so late in it’s life cycle. I used it just enough to get addicted, but as soon as I started moving on to more complex stuff with which I needed support, I started finding that “the help” uses Zbrush 3.
Just Hurry up dude. Please.
To put it simply, Pixologic has failed the Mac community. It would calm the nerves of many a user to have heard anything by now… a year later. Unfortunately Pixologic has chosen to be extremely tight lipped, and thus, Mac users are left repeating themselves asking the same questions… but by the way Mac users have been treated this far definitive answers are not something we should expect. I pose a parallel scenario related to the 3D industry: imagine getting paid for a job in full and then telling the client that their game,tv show,film,commercial, etc. would be ready as soon as possible.
The client calls a month later and asks for a progress report. You tell them it will be ready soon. A couple weeks go by and they call again. You tell them it will be ready soon, again, but this time you tell them that you will let them know when there is something to look at. 3 months later they call again… this time you offer them a PAL version of similar work you are doing for another customer (suppose you live in North America which is NTSC) to tide them over. The client is now angry, but at least they know you are working… on something. Months go by and the client keeps calling and all you tell them is that it will be ready soon.
Sounds pretty ridiculous to me. Somewhere along the line the client would have, at the very least, fired you. Most likely it would be because you didn’t tell them anything or give them progress reports, not because you didn’t get the job done. If you were as evasive with a client as Pixologic has been with its Mac users, your client would assume the worst: you sitting on a sandy island beach, drinking a fruity colada watching the tide come in… on their dime.
However, we all took a risk when buying the license. Face it, there was no guarantee or set release date. It was a personal choice that we all made and a gamble at best.
Let’s also not forget that the mac version IS in beta testing and has been for a few months. They’re sorting out problems that have been discovered, otherwise it would be out. They have publicly stated expected release dates and missed them which is a sign of issues arising. I’m just saying, whatever the update may be, there are artists using it under a silence contract right now as I type.
So the thing is up and running somewhere, at least, and there’s no mention of a new Window’s version being beta tested. Therefore, I don’t predict Siggraph, I predict issues with Mac OS because they built the app around Windows. If they release it before, then announce a new update at Siggraph, I bet it will be free for the Mac users.
You have left out competition in the equation also. Zbrush has non at the present time. They are the only ones that make the hollow tip nuclear warhead. So firing them is a hard thing. Face it until Pixologic stops being Ma bell you are in the mist of waiting until the cow comes home. I’m a Pc guy but ya a feel for you really.
Okay. Perhaps, but by the mere fact that Pix is accepting money for their product created a valid expectation of a release date–SOON. This is a valid expectation regardless of whether or not Pix were to say anything about a release date!
A year behind is not “soon,” no matter how you cut it. Basically, Pix created the expectation that we would have the software we had paid for in full with minimal wait. To this day they have failed to deliver what we legitimately should have had a long, long time ago.
And the use of such excuses as Parallels or BootCamp as a “free” solution all the while (as though this fact should cut them any slack on their tardiness) is frankly an insult. And any first year econ student could tell you that “free” involves much more than how much money something costs.
Finally, I propose that the aforementioned “gamble” was not whether or not we would have Z3 in our hands by any particular date. It was whether or not Pix would behave as a software company who cares about its customers should (I’m talking about honesty and communication here). We put our money on Pix (in the most literal sense), and lost.
In short, if I place a bet that someone I trust will come through for me, and they don’t… sure, I have some blame, but it does not diminish the failure of the other person.
edit: wilf82 & jamesthiago, well said.
I also think the fact that it’s a free update allows the developers creative freedom and I like that. I guess the fact that money drives the world today kind of bugs me too. I admit, ZBrush is a hobbie for me but some day I wouldn’t mind working on tools like this.
If Pixo is the kind of company I imagine, they are ignoring these complaints in order to build a better product and spend the time they need/want to make it something they are proud of.
One of the biggest things I learned while working at a large studio was that you shouldn’t show off your work until YOU know that it’s finished and you like it too. If Pixo held themselves to a date, they wouldn’t be true to the creative process. Anyone that has worked under tight deadlines knows exactly what I’m saying. Besides, Americans are in the top of the list of overworked peoples.
For those of you that complain about not owning a PC and then buying the PC version, I am sorry you made that choice but I wouldn’t doubt they would refund your money if they had to.
Viva la freedom to create under no deadlines!!!
I guess what I don’t understand then is why
it was ok for PC z3 beta users to get their own
image gallery. Why is it different now?
If you told the client they already got a release and that they would have to live with a version that ran on another platform, would that change the situation at all?
If you sent them an email and told them that you were in beta and it would be soon, wouldn’t that count for something? Sure, you didn’t alert the press but that’s not what you do when you’re in beta, which is why they’re not alerting the press.
Just say’n.
its pretty obvious guys we are gonna get zb4 !
it makes no scense for this secrecy and extreme long delays , no beta images if it wasn’t a " big" surpise !
a little bird told me 
Kosher: Unfortunately the circumstances surrounding the Mac/Zbrush 3 release have not played out in a way that would suggest that what Pixologic has said both officially or unofficially holds any merit. “Soon” has been a word that has been tossed around very loosely over the past year. In relative terms, soon would suggest a more reasonable time frame than a year.
As for telling the client that the release was unavailable for a certain platform, I would agree with you. If Pixologic would have said that Zbrush 3 wasn’t going to be available for Mac none of us would be forced to speculate or be asking the same questions repeatedly. The only problem is that they announced a Mac release would become available soon when the PC version came out. Mac users have been strung along for a year with no substantiated news to speak of other than the call for Beta testers 5 months ago.
As for Zbrush 4… it would seem that with the time frame we are working with it would be a logical assumption. But again with out an official announcement we are back to speculating.
One of the biggest things I learned while working at a large studio was that you shouldn’t show off your work until YOU know that it’s finished and you like it too.
In this case though. We know exactly what we paid for looks like. Windows users have been using it for a year. We are, as far as I know, simply awaiting a port of an existing product. Which is why, I have a problem with the super secrecy surrounding the whole thing. As Super Glitcher previously pointed out. There’s been a beta gallery before, why not now?
If you’re going to keep your customers waiting. At the very least, surely, courtesy dictates, that you keep them informed.
I would pass out of the MAC users got ZB4.
skullbeast: Hello Wall, is that you?
Wall: …
Not a chance, if ZB4 is just around the corner I’ll give away my ZB license and become a professional pig wrestler!
I think Microsoft “ask” Pixologic to “grasp” ZB3 for MAC… And You know why…
Uhm… software development is not a creative process. More than anything, I’d say it’s a technical process. It’s not as though we’re asking them to paint a mural on the ceiling of our church or something…
I have worked on tight deadlines, and I know what you’re taking about–that’s why I never have deadlines on personal creative endeavors. BUT–if I have a client, that means business, which means money, which means I MUST have a deadline.
The trick is to set a deadline that you have a reasonable chance of meeting. And the very moment that it becomes clear that you cannot meet that deadline, you communicate that to the client, and do everything in your power to rectify the problem.
I would have no problems if six months ago Pix came out and said, “look, we’re probably not going to have this for a long time,” and they communicated with us consistently and without excuses or use of the word “soon.” I’m not asking for a date. I’m asking for some honesty and openness.
It’s really not much to ask.
And this isn’t a matter of “being true to the creative process.” It’s a matter of making good on your word (whether that word be a promise or an “unofficial statement”).
I also wouldn’t accept payment for said unfinished work, nor would I talk about how I’ll have it done “soon” when I’m really nowhere close, nor would I make excuses about how they can still look at and admire my past work thats sitting in my portfolio.
Uhm… actually, as it was presented to me, I would have Z3 in my hands VERY SHORTLY after my purchase.
And don’t try to write off the preference to use OSX as some mistake we’ve all made. Don’t forget that we are paying customers, and Pix DOES profess to have a system native to our platform. If Pix didn’t have an OSX version, I’d be running Modo right now. Refund our money? I would doubt it, actually…
Uhm… if I give you money for something, you had darn well better have a deadline. So enough of this cushy, flowery, idealistic rubbish… this is business, plain and simple. And anywhere you go in business, there are deadlines.
Loki, fair enough. You have your opinion. I don’t fully agree obviously
Well… I speculated the following scenario:
In a coding lab galaxy not so far away…
They released the PC version of ZB3, whoefully thinking in a 6 month developing of the Mac version since is created from the ground up, because of new operating system and intel processor (a really major change)…
Then, the Mac programmers realized this timeline is not going to be enough, while the PC crew was going planning on new features for ZB4…
In these days, Aurick saw our impatience, and managed somehow to get authorized an unofficial thread, a gently and good will move he maybe later regretted due to the animosity between some of us, so he locked the post.
Back in the labs, the deadline time shift become sooo evidently extended, they realized the Mac ZB3 and dual platform ZB4 releases will be so close to each other than is better to have a unified release date to everybody, PC’s and Mac’s, this way we can happily post our works together with no envy (apart from skills and creativity).
So almost a year later, Pixologic incorporated to the Mac ZB3 schedule all the features of the ZB4, and worked so well than now the PC coders are trying to catch up all the new stuff… they get a very few, experienced and prominent industry leaders and 3D creators to work on the Mac beta, with a NDA very tight because they know they’ll be blown away and will try to tell their friends…
So basically, we Macusers, are waiting for the PC coders to reach the developing status of the Mac version so Pixologic can invite everyone to the big buffet ZB4 will be…
Is that, or…
…We’re forgotten.
I like to think always optimistically, there are many things besides ZB to worry about, some of them we can’t control and have to deal with them, even if we don’t like it. Let’s put our energy in what we CAN do, or learn.
BTW: all the ZB info, is not “insider stuff”, is imagination 
Well maybe, just maybe, the Beta testing isn’t that advanced at all…
Just a thought…