I stopped using CC4 sometime ago (as I had other things to do), but recently I've come back to it and noticed that there is now version5.

I must say that your website is unbelievably confusing.  Trying to work out what is included with anything is a nightmare.  You think you might be buying something that will do what you want, but you'll find you need to spend loads more to achieve it.
I currently have CC4, with  Face Mocap and Motion Live 2D.  It seems that when you upgrade to V5, there is an upgrade to these that adds to the cost hugely, but there is no indication of what additional features are in these two updates. Presumably the version used with CC4 works with version 5?
It's interesting (and fun) software, but aspects are really poorly implemented.
For example - in the timeline, it should be possible to adjust values FROM WITHIN the timeline, but there are now values to modify manually. There should be a graphical display of each element.;
There don't seem to be any shortcuts to control micro changes in motion either - it all has to be done with the mouse, which is problematic when you are trying to make subtle changes in position.

With V5, from the video demo, it implies that you can control the motion graphically, but on deeper probing, you discover that to have access to that feature you have to pay loads more.  That should be part of the CC5 upgrade.

Why is it cheaper to by version 5 as a new customer than as the upgrade price?

What is there that justifies such a high price for version 5?

I use CC4 almost exclusively for animating pictures - which is very poorly explained in any media you provide - YouTube or User manual - so it has taken me hours to try to understand what to do, and as there is no fine control of bones (other than by mouse), it's a nightmare.
Facial movements are much easier with the use of a webcam of course, and if you want to use standard animations, that works well, but there doesn't appear to be any easy way to control detailed subtle manual movements.

The software is very clever, but achieving things is made far too difficult because of the way the software has been written.

For example, why can't you change the layer structure of the contents by simply moving the layers into a different order in the scene manager?

I'd love to upgrade to something that works easily, but as things stand I can't see any value to come from spending 100 dollars.

I'm not a professional user - I create things for friends to produce facebook (or other social media) videos with a different slant from the usual (at no charge).

Sorry for the rant, but this has bugged me for such a long time !

Hi...

Just to clarify, you refer to the software as CC4 which is generally what we call Character Creator 4 (our 3D software). I assume you actually mean Cartoon Animator which is known as CTA4 or CTA5. I'll answer based on the latter.



Not really sure what you mean by this. Cartoon Animator is a self contained product that doesn't need you to purchase anything else to get going. In terms of software, you can purchase mocap profiles but these are not required to use the software and are completely optional.



It's not. With the release of version 5.3 (A FREE upgrade for v5 users) we currently have a limited time offer that makes the new and upgrade price the same, but as already mentioned this is for a limited time and not a common situation.



At $99 I'm surprised you consider the cost of CTA5 a high price. Competing products like Moho Studio costs $399 and a subscription to get Adobe Character Animator will cost over $500 (and that's just for one year). Considering the numerous Pro features included, $99 is really a bargain



                                                                

Peter
Forum Administrator

www.reallusion.com