🚀 go-pugleaf

Jon E. Schultz II wrote:
> 
> Hey, I'd like some advice.  I want to buy a 3D modeling program,
> and I would like to know which programs are good.  In looking through
> the catalog I will purchase from, I see:
> 
>         1.) Fractal Design Stuff
>         2.) Quark Stuff
>         3.) Ray Dream Designer 4
>         4.) Alias Sketch! 2.0
>         5.) Autodesk 3d Studio
>         6.) 4 Division Animator's pack (A $3,000 value for only $275!
>                                         Wow wee!...)
>         I hear Autodesk is good, but who knows.  Any suggestions on
> brands and individual programs?
> 
>         Thanks,
>                 Jon

1. Fractal Painter is an *amazing* program, and I highly recommend it, 
but it aint a 3D modeller. They do make Poser, which models 3D human 
forms only.

2. As far as I know, Quark has no 3D program available yet. Quark 
XPress is definitely not what you want (page layout program).

3. A pretty decent program for the price. You can make some 
professional-looking images if you take your time. However, way too 
slow for production work, and the interface can be kludgy. Phong 
renderer sucks, ray tracer nice but slow. Fractal Design just bought 
Ray Dream, so you may see some changes in this product soon (for the 
better IMO).

4. Sketch used to be a really nice little spline-patch modeller with a 
good renderer, but it's been phased out so don't waste your time.

5. 3D Studio: very good midrange modelling/animation package. No longer 
sold or supported, though. 3D Studio MAX looks great so far, but it's 
$3,500 plus you need a pretty hunky (read mucho $$$) system to run it 
on with obscene amounts of RAM. But if you want to get serious about 
3D, get used to it.

6. 4 Division ... sorry, I'm not familiar with this.

Bottom line: get 3DS MAX from Kinetix (Autodesk) if you can afford it.


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Ben Stahl | VISUAL ANTICS | San Rafael, CA
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