From: James Carruthers (jim@hydraulicdesign.net)
Date: Fri Mar 08 2002 - 02:49:48 EET
Hello List,
"3D" is a very broad topic so it's impossible for one product to hope to
cover everything, and people in different industries in general have
different needs.
But, there are several ways that 'specialization' can fail. The most obvious
trouble is the situation where it's used as a marketing scam, where
functionality that is commonplace in systems in some other field is dressed
up with jargon and charged a premium for, betting on the ignorance of their
customers.
The more sublte problem is how 'specialized' systems for one particular
industry can tend to be designed. Doing too much to try and 'tailor' the way
the system works and is used to the percieved needs and process and jargon
of a particular industry is very problematic, as these decisions are based
on assumptions about how groups of people work and think, when as we all
know when we try to categorize people in most any way, that the variations
among members of a group are greater than the differences between the
groups. And, one can fall into the trap of simply trying to 'automate' old
processes instead of inventing new ones. So what I'm saying is, in an ideal
world, software should be categorized by what it does, not who it is for--we
are intelligent enough to figure out what we want to do ourselves. A certain
specific task may be pretty much exclusive to a certain field, but the
optimum means of doing it usually isn't.
As an example, look at how most "illustration" programs, at least
traditionally for the most part, lacked tools for 'accurately' drawing
items. Object snaps, numeric input, that kind of thing. They're not not
there because the basic geometry is any less accurate than in a CAD program,
it was a concious choice based on the assumption that 'illustrators' don't
need or want that stuff, that only 'engineers' do. Who knows, maybe if it
wasn't for that mistake long ago, 3D CAD, as a specific product category,
wouldn't exist yet, we'd all be happily using 3D Studio or something.
Jim
----------------------------------------------------------------------
James Carruthers
Hydraulic Design
--3D Modeling and Design
--Rhinoceros 3D Sales and Training
http://www.hydraulicdesign.net
mailto:jim@hydraulicdesign.net
----------------------------------------------------------------------
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi [mailto:owner-rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi]On
> Behalf Of Robin Richards
> Sent: Thursday, March 07, 2002 6:17 PM
> To: rp-ml@rapid.lpt.fi
> Cc: brian.caulfield@nuigalway.ie
> Subject: Re: 3D Modelling
>
>
> Dear Brian,
>
> As an author of some 3D medical imaging/processing
> software, I guess I have to admit to being biased. Richard
> does, indeed, have the luxury of a wide range of software
> tools. This is an excellent position to be in but is, sadly,
> not available to us all.
>
> Software dedicated to a particular application can
> simplify the management of the inevitable complications and
> limitations of the data used. In the case of medical data there
> are many issues including: the incoming data formats, artefacts
> in the data and the clinical judgements that have to be made.
> A software tool that facilitates coping with these problems
> can significantly improve efficiency and the quality of the
> end result.
>
> Despite this, I still find that I sometimes have to
> resort to other bits of software to solve specific problems.
> The capabilities of many "animation tools" are significant
> in this respect but I would not want to rely on them alone.
>
>
> Robin
> ====================================================================
> Dr Robin Richards
> Dept of Medical Physics E-mail: robin@medphys.ucl.ac.uk
> University College London Telephone: +44 20 7679 6430
> 1st Floor,Shropshire House Fax: +44 20 7679 6269
> 11-20 Capper Street
> London WC1E 6JA www.medphys.ucl.ac.uk/mgi/workstat.htm
> United Kingdom www.medphys.ucl.ac.uk/mgi/models.htm
> www.medphys.ucl.ac.uk/mgi/cranio.htm
> ====================================================================
>
>
>
> For more information about the rp-ml, see http://rapid.lpt.fi/rp-ml/
>
For more information about the rp-ml, see http://rapid.lpt.fi/rp-ml/
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