bundleguide,
I'll see what I can do to help you out...I've used Max, Maya and Softimage 3D in a production environment and am now on XSI.
Ok....these are my personal observations and if anyone on here disagrees well...too bad...
Seriously though don't want to start another software war...
In my experiences both Maya and XSI work great depending on what you are doing, your deadline time and budget.
Rendering
We've had problems with Maya taking soo damn long to do a simple render. Then again Mental Ray can take forever to do a GI scene. I personally would put my money on XSI-->Mental Ray than Maya-->Mental Ray. Softimage has had an excellent relationship with mental from the beginning and it shows.
Modeling
I don't like to spend a couple of thousands more for sub d's in Maya....in XSI it's included. I also don't like the texturing of Sub d's in Maya but I can work them in XSI.
Animation
Softimage 3D or XSI ALL THE FREAKIN WAY! No comparison if you ask me. Some mayans will disagree.
Video Cards
Currently we are using a Geforce 3 overclocked and it works like a charm in XSI. In maya we have problems with this card with paint fx, artisian and some particle scenes.
Particles & Dynamics
Maya takes the prize on this one. I think Maya's particles and dynamics system are more robust. It doesn't mean you can't pull off the same effect in XSI but I think you have more options in MAYA for this feature set. Keep in mind XSI is still young and come a long way since ver 1. In the coming releases it should make some good competition in this area.
Time is Money
Bottom line...If you're a big house with lots of money to spend on programmers and stuff go ahead and buy a trillion copies of Maya Unlimited...you'll need these programmers.
If you're a house where time is money then I would say XSI is the way to go... You could always buy both?
We have both Maya and Now XSI.
Maya is used strictly for our effects shots and XSI for the rest.
Since switching over to XSI our production time has been cut down 60%. XSI lets our artists do what they do best....ART! In maya our artist were spending too much time fidling with the Mel Command reference...
I hope I didn't offend anyone, these are just my experiences with both packages. No need to get all mushy and personal about software.
As Dennis Murin (spell check) said @ Siggraph last year
"Give an artist a piece of sh*t software and he'll make it happen, not the software but the artist"
-Out-
