BackStage and the Content Store
Since so much of iClone is preset driven, you’ll obviously need to get more content at some point, and Reallusion will be happy to provide you more for pretty reasonable prices. There are two ways to buy extra content from Reallusion: BackStage and their Content Store.
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BackStage runs directly in iClone and gives you access to a lot of individual assets—from props and characters, to animations and a little of everything else. What’s really cool about BackStage is that you can take any content for a trial run to see if it’s what you’re looking for. There are a few limitations: your window will have a watermark and you can’t save or export a scene with trial assets in it, nor are you able to edit trial version content. Additionally, you are also limited to ten trial downloads per day.
This is an awesome system because you can make sure a piece of content not only does what you want it to do, but you can also make sure the quality of the asset is high and won’t cause any trouble—a much better system then many of the other 3D content stores out there. If you choose to purchase a piece of content you can quickly buy it and it will automatically download the full asset. In addition, it will maintain any of the animation you’ve already done to the trial version. Another perk to the content store is that you can re-download things you’ve bought at anytime.
The downside to BackStage is that it uses a points-based currency similar to Microsoft’s Xbox & Zune stores. I understand why this kind of system is attractive for a developer since they have less credit card processing fees to deal with and users spend larger amounts of money at one time to buy point bundles, but it’s not ideal for the user. iTunes nails the kind of experience I want to see from a micro-transactions based store. To give you some idea of the pricing, the average character dials in at 1,000 points—the equivalent of $10.00.
The Content Store works a little bit differently. First of all, it uses real money (hurray!) and its focus is on much larger purchases. The content store is all about packs of content that you want to buy together and save on a bundle price. For instance, instead of buying a character, you might by a full pack with 1 character, tons of accessories, props and clothing and even some cool particle effects, or you might end up with a bundle for a high resolution character with a bunch of different morphs and textures built in. Most prices range from $10 to upwards of $60 (though a few go much higher) depending on what you’re getting. You can check out the content store online here.
iClone’s niche
Initially, you might be tempted to compare iClone with other consumer-level 3D applications that focus on ease of use and pre-built assets like Smith Micro Software’s Poser or DAZ Studio, but this isn’t actually the case. When I spoke with John Martin, Reallusion Vice President of Product Marketing, he explained that rather than competing with these other applications, Reallusion is a partner with DAZ 3D in terms of sharing community assets. This is due to DAZ Studio focusing primarily in providing high quality—usually single image—renderings while iClone is made for making real-time animations; they are two different and complementary parts of the market.
Pricing
There are three versions of iClone to choose from—iClone4 EX: free, iClone4 Standard: $79.95, and iClone4 Pro: $199.95 (pricing for the download versions). There’s a detailed version matrix on Reallusion’s site but it basically breaks down like this: iClone4 EX is an extended trial and learning version. It starts with most of the full features but a lot of the animation and timeline options expire after fifteen days and only 60% of the preset content is included. You are also limited to 30 seconds of output with a maximum video resolution of 320×240 and there’s a watermark. iClone4 Standard doesn’t include bone-level facial deformation, advanced facial puppeteering, and a bunch of the animation and timeline controls, but you do get the full export options without a watermark. Neither EX nor Standard include the BVH converter for motion capture files, so if you plan to be using iClone with a lot of BVH files, you’ll need the full version.
There’s a pretty serious catch though—if you actually want to bring in models from another modeling program like SketchUp or from a library like the Google 3D Warehouse, you will also need to buy iClone 3DXchange for another $69.95 (3DXchange is included in the boxed versions of iClone for a slightly more reasonable price). Let’s be frank: I can’t believe this isn’t included in the Standard and Pro versions. At $80, you’ve invested enough in the product that you should be able to bring your own content in. At $200, even more so.
Conclusion
John Martin told me that the ultimate goal with iClone is to enable anyone to be a “citizen director”—a visual storyteller; iClone 4 delivers on that goal admirably. For anyone currently doing a lot of machinima, iClone will open a whole new world of options to create even richer stories—in more unique settings—with real facial controls and expressions. For someone currently working with Poser or DAZ Studio, iClone is a great tool to branch out further into making animations much more quickly and often more easily.
While I feel that professional 3D artists and filmmakers may not feel as comfortable without more complex and powerful tools for final renderings, iClone is still a compelling choice for doing very rapid pre-visualization work before wasting time and budgets on detailing a shot that may not work very well for the final project.
If you’ve never touched 3D animation and you’re curious about it or you have a story you want to tell then iClone is a fantastic place to start. Despite what I feel is unfair pricing for 3DXchange, I’m still happy to award iClone the Icrontic Stamp of Approval.
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