A painter might feel like a paintbrush is an extension of themselves, developing muscle memory and skill to create beauty. But what happens when that tool is owned by someone else, and they charge rent? What if they've decided to take it away from you? What if they've decided your art isn't yours?
As a 3D artist, I was professionally trained in using Autodesk Maya, a 3D modelling and animation application. I became really good with it, and grew to love it! I used it at work and at home for my own projects. It became muscle memory, an extension of myself, an organ for expression.
The full version of Maya is ludicrously expensive at CA$2,500 a year! So I had to settle for a cheaper version called Maya LT. It was missing some features, but I wasn't using them at the time so it worked out. I paid CA$360 a year for 3 years.
COVID struck, and I lost my job. I had to use savings to continue paying my license for an additional 2 years, yet in that time they provided no updates. I was just paying for access.
In 2022, Autodesk announced that Maya LT was being discontinued, replaced by a new version called Maya Creative. Instead of a subscription, you'd buy "tokens", spending one token for 24 hours of use. You could only buy tokens in bulk, the cheapest being 100 tokens for CA$405, and they expire after one year.
I've never seen such a predatory, disgusting pricing model for a piece of software. It's like an arcade machine! I thought subscriptions were bad enough! I refused to participate.
Despite spending nearly two grand, the tool I love is going to deactivate itself soon, and I don't have any say in it. It's bytes will still be on my computer, but it'll refuse to launch. Maya LT had a proprietary file format, so all of my projects will be unusable.
It feels like I'm losing a part of myself.
I feel like a fool for even letting this happen in the first place. I let myself become attached to a tool I didn't even own, run by a faceless corporation! My own art is being held hostage! How unfair! Should it even be called a tool, or a service?
I've been avoiding 3D art lately, focusing on programming and game development. My friends and I started working on a game in the Unity Game Engine. A couple months in, Unity's owners were saying and doing some unsavoury things, so we swapped to the Godot Engine. I feel incredibly lucky that we did because of the Unity drama that followed.
Unity wanted to start charging a fee for every user that installed your game. They wanted this to apply to every Unity game retroactively. This is obviously a stupid idea, and they walked it back, but it begs the question: Do you even own the game you developed? It seems like you don't.
I don't want to let myself fall into this trap again. I feel like we as artists form a personal relationship with our tools, and it shouldn't have to be an abusive one! I want to own my art and tools! That shouldn't be difficult as a digital artist! I've been recommended some proprietary subscription based "tools" by friends recently, and I refuse to use them. I won't let this happen to me again.
I'm going to use as much open source software as I can. Open source software is the only software you can truly "own". You have access to the code, and you can do with it as you please! It's often democratically run by the community! You can distribute it to your friends, and it's not piracy! There's a ton of excellent open source art software out there, and I encourage you to check it out!
Autodesk broke my heart. When I get back into 3D art, I'm going to be learning Blender.
I feel more closely connected to others when speaking in gesture compared to words.
There is less abstract sense in gesture.
My arms move in the way of eating, my mouth moves in the way of chewing, my finger slides down my cheek in the way of sadness.
I comprehend sadness in others by the look on their face; by the way their face gestures.
Words fail to represent my sadness. Words fail to enmasse the gravity of the spectrum of my turmoil and my joy.
When I dance my joy is palpable. My stress spills out of me and dissipates into the air and lays bare an open canvas, itself a gestural invitation for the dances of others.
When I cry my lips quiver, my face crunches to grimace, my back hunches and my arms droop. The gesture of my sadness invites others to offer care without a word.
I feel I have so much experience to share, and I seek to write it, to speak it, but I reluctantly abstain. my words never seem to match my intention.
I recognize loss in representation. I become frustrated with my inability to speak the depth of my experience with the limits of my words.
I've been told I'm well spoken, yet so often when I seek to speak my heart I fall into the traps of "whatever". I blah blah, yadda yadda, etc. etc. my way through the struggle of representing my experience.
In seeking to speak I smooth the textural surface of that which I wish to be understood into a package of slippery abstraction that can only barely be grasped.
We don't understand one another through repetition of each others words. Words are not what we understand. Words are a medium through which we grasp for care in our infinitesimal misunderstanding.
I know what I know through experience, I relate my experience with words and relay these words to you.
I do not wish to be understood. I believe we can not understand one another. I seek to care and be cared for.
I speak words as a representation of my intention to care. I listen to your words to wrap my arms around your care, to quietly trace the texture with my fingertips, and to embrace it and take it on with you.
My world is my care, as yours is yours.
I hope one day I will dance with you
We will not dance "without a care in the world"
We will dance with ALL the care of our worlds
All together
And they will be unable to resist dancing with us
and so they will
and all together we will need no words.
Together we will become care without the need to understand
[Video description: A compilation of clips from Star Trek: The Next Generation showing the instances in which Picard pulled his shirt. It is edited so that every time he pulls his shirt, his badge flies off of his uniform with a 'pop' sound. End description]
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