Moho Forum

Hi everybody

I've read a lot of topics on the forum But I need to have more precisions about anime studio pro.

First of all, I don't understand who has made this software ? It seems to be Lost Marble but now ? is it Smith Micro ?

Do you think ASP will be upgrade in the future ? I don't see a lot of "official" topic in there

A 7th version ?

thx in adance, and I 'm sorry for my poor english

AS started off as MOHO made by Mike Clifton, aka Lost Marble I guess.

Then Smith-Micro bought it and now its Anime Studio (mmble grmmble).

Anyway that's how I understand it.

I like the software.

It will probably get upgraded sometime in the future. At the moment it works pretty well. Seems like a couple of people are kind of chasing the dragon with version upgrades.

Crystal Noir wrote:Hi everybody

I've read a lot of topics on the forum But I need to have more precisions about anime studio pro.

First of all, I don't understand who has made this software ? It seems to be Lost Marble but now ? is it Smith Micro ?

Do you think ASP will be upgrade in the future ? I don't see a lot of "official" topic in there

A 7th version ?

thx in adance, and I 'm sorry for my poor english

Smith Micro are the marketing guys, Mike and Lost Marble are the programing team from the very beginning. There are updates but its rare for any dates for when the next one is due out.

The Version 7 discussion I started to look at the long term development of the product to include features which would make co-productions better. No date has ever been set for ASP7 and it might be years away. Version 6 is the current maintained version and will continue to be bug fixed and upgraded for the foreseeable future.

Rhoel

Mikdog wrote:Then Smith-Micro bought it and now its Anime Studio (mmble grmmble).

Anyway that's how I understand it.

That was how I understood it too but something is weird here. I have both versions of Anime Studio 6. I bought and installed Debut 6 and it installed under the Smith Micro folder. I recently bought and installed Pro 6 and it installed under the e-Frontier folder. So who is the true owner of this software? I am beginning to think that Smith Micro is the distributor and e-Frontier is the actual owner.

I recently bought and installed Pro 6 and it installed under the e-Frontier folder

Can you open the License and verify who released the pro version you have purchased?

Also the About dialog would tell you the current vendor.

The story is this:
Mike Clifton, a stand alone programmer did Moho. He founded LostMarble company to hold the copyrights of Moho. The popularity of Moho and the wiling of Mike to get more time for personal stuff and dedicate only to programming and leave selling and customer dealing to others, made him to sell the program rights to e-Frontier. e-Frontier also sold Poser, Manga Studio, etc. They modified the name from Moho to Anime Studio. Also they released a new version AS 5.6 from e-Frontier.

Later e-Frontier sold or was bought by SM and the reseller of AS is now SM. LostMarble is still holding copyrights of the code but it is shared somehow with SM now. Mike still working on AS and (mainly) he coded the 6.0 and now the updated 6.1 version.

-G

wow, only one guy to develop AS ?

Good work, but, severals owner (lost marble first, e-frontier, now smith micro....) so what will be happen ?

Don't you be affraid about the future ? (this is just a question).

There isn't many official post here.

AS seems to be a good product, but I prefer ask some questions before. In fact we don't know where AS goes.

Well - so what?
A software you buy today will not expire tomorrow. I was quite happy with version 5.6, now I'm being even happier with 6.1. Whatever miracles Mike will work again on a version 7 will be an add-on, but there's nothing which prevents me to create films with AS right now.

If you are the "I just need feature XY before I can even start a film" kind of guy, re-think your mindset. Or choose another software.

I've already have this kind of problem : a soft bought one day and has expired two weeks later

So,

I'm not this kind of guy "need to have xy features etc..." I just want to do some animations and/or movies as a hobbyist.

I don't want to live this once again. The background of this product seems to be perilous.

That's all I don't want to hurt anyone, just some questions about.

Bizarrely Mike 'sold' it to allow him to get a regular income from programming just AS, whereas before he was only able to work part time on it from what I understand. So it's actually in a better place than it was...

Crystal Noir wrote:I'm not this kind of guy "need to have xy features etc..." I just want to do some animations and/or movies as a hobbyist.

Then you should purchase AS. Since it was Moho, years ago, it has been a fantastic software to make animations, easier, faster and more powerful than any other software. I started as a hobbyist and now (because of this software) animating is my real work.
With the pass of the years many tiny fantastic features have been added, but the core still being the same of the old Moho. I mean, you could use the old Moho and get fantastic results even now on 2009. And I'm pretty sure you could use the current AS for many years from now, more if you are a hobbyist.
I invite you to take a look to share your work and tips & techniques sections. There are many posts which will show you what I'm talking about.
You can visit the old Moho gallery too
http://www.lostmarble.com/moho/gallery

I've already have this kind of problem : a soft bought one day and has expired two weeks later Wink

So,

I'm not this kind of guy "need to have xy features etc..." I just want to do some animations and/or movies as a hobbyist.

I don't want to live this once again. The background of this product seems to be perilous.

That's all Smile I don't want to hurt anyone, just some questions about.

Poser, Flash and many other programs have went through multiple owners and sellers and name changes. Who knows, tomorrow Smith Micro could sell out to Amazon and with the next upgrade some poor minimum wage person will send you a DVD with animation on it.

Dale

Thx for your answers

Yes AS is cheap, that's why I'm interesting in

But when I've read forum, saw the official site, there isn't a lot of dev communication that's why some precisions was needed.

I'm going to test a few more AS and continue watching some tips & tricks.

Genete wrote:Can you open the License and verify who released the pro version you have purchased?

Also the About dialog would tell you the current vendor.

Not sure where to look for the license info but the About dialog has SM in the splash screen. Still the question is why would SM put the new top of the line version under a e-Frontier folder instead of their own like they did with Debut, unless e-Frontier still has the rights? BTW, e-Frontier is still alive and well as well as their flagship 3D software Shade.

selgin wrote:Since it was Moho, years ago, it has been a fantastic software to make animations, easier, faster and more powerful than any other software.

I am so happy to read this.

Yeah, I think SM has done a pretty decent job keeping the program updated and progressing forward.