what's a good 3D program? open source?

[murraymile]

I've been looking around and I hear a lot of good things about Cinema 4D. Is there any other great 3D Appz. that are open source?

Thanks,

Murray

[Mattykins]

Why would you ever say "appz"?

But childish verbiage aside, look into Maya, Lightwave, C4D, 3D Studio Max -- they are all great programs. As for open source - I wouldn't know. I only operate Maya on my computer.

[murraymile]

Why would you ever say "appz"?

But childish verbiage aside


First of all, who cares what I said. I wrote in a hurry. For you to even have time to nit-pick someone's message is lame!

Thanks for your time and suggestions.

"Childish Verbiage"...
***Shaking my head with disappointment as I wonder why someone has time to care about what's irrelevant from this discussion***

[Raptor365]

There's only one open source 3D app that I know of and that's blender.

Assuming your interested in coding then.

Open source, okay, well that does not mean anything to me anymore because all of the major apps (http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?t=48853&page=3)
offer either wrinting scripts or c++ interfaces. So, at that point, what does open source mean? It's redundant.

Again, these 'which apps are best' pop up every now and then and the above link and many threads before should give you ample info.

As far as I know, no program is open source, but c++ wise, C4D does give you an API and support, in theory, not in practice.

Anyways, I find if you're a programmer you can export as .obj which is a text file, and write your own c++ parsers to import it into c++. Do what you want, then export it back in the same format.

Any questions on that send me a PM or here.

[Mattykins]

Wow, really?

I answered your question to the best of my ability. I could have told you to use the search bar at the top. These topics come up everyday.

And I think more people should care what is said. I write in a hurry as well. Applications takes about one second longer to type out. Apps might have been okay. But to say Appz is juvenile.

I guess I am lame. I got off my show today and read these boards. Noticed someone asking for help without even the courtesy to complete a word.

The film industry is about professionalism. And most certainly you will get a better response if you at least take the time out of your life to ask a question and spell check it. "Appz" doesn't make you sound cool. No one really cares. The people here do judge based on posts.

It's a suggestion. Lame or not, taking time to show that you care enough when asking for people to respond to you - is not at all a bad thing.

Matt

First of all, who cares what I said. I wrote in a hurry. For you to even have time to nit-pick someone's message is lame!

Thanks for your time and suggestions.

"Childish Verbiage"...
***Shaking my head with disappointment as I wonder why someone has time to care about what's irrelevant from this discussion***

[Edweirdo]

meeeow!

blender is open source free 3d animation

http://www.blender.org/

[j1clark@ucsd.edu]

meeeow!

blender is open source free 3d animation

http://www.blender.org/


Yes, but is Blender a 3-D program, or just a method for people to engage in self-abuse...


I don't work with 3-D apps much, so I can't justify a 500-5000 $US package... so Blender sounded 'good'... after about 3 or 4 years of trying various versions, trying to understand the interface, how to get even simple objects to 'move', working through some set of the tutorials, etc., I broke down and got Carrara when the DAZ site had a cheap special in May...

As for wanting to support Open Source versions... I've been using GNU/Unix/Linux for about 20 years... so I definitely know the benefit of having a wide group of developers supporting software.

Just a few days ago, the 'antics-3d' site up a notice that they were discontinuing public operations, having been bought out by some content developer for 'children's programing' (or something like that...), and so now those with antics, especially those who paided for Antics will see dwindling support, and have to find alternatives (not much in the same price range...).

Had Antics been an 'open source' project, Antics could have done whatever was best for Antic's investors, but the rest of the users, could continue with the open sources available to bug fix, and even improve the software.

[Anhar Miah]

And I think more people should care what is said. I write in a hurry as well. Applications takes about one second longer to type out. Apps might have been okay. But to say Appz is juvenile.

I have to agree with Matt on this one.

Words have meaning, if one does not care about words, then it devalues the worth of those words, this not only impacts others but mostly for yourself.

If you place little value upon your own statements why then would you expect others to place any higher value to which you yourself do not ascribe too?

Sorry for comming down hard on you, but bear in mind this is a public forum and as such social rules that apply in the real world end up being reflected in the virtual world. The old bad days of Web 1.0 etiquette is but a distent memory.

Anway to answer your original question:

Blender or Wings3d if you wish to go open source, (however I too have found the UI perplexing; but it is a very capable 3d application and highly recommended).

For full blown commerical applications, any of the top Maya/Max/C4D/XSI/Modo (not in any Order) are higly recommended; most of them Have learning editions.

Also for VFX slant Houdini's particle & physics/fluids node/scipt based system is usurpassed IMHO.

Anhar.

[El Director]

I'm all about Blender. True, it's interface is different, but I'm used to being different as I'm a Vegas user as well. I've used it (blender) extensively in my films, both shorts and features. Once you learn your way around (takes a month or two of playing with it) you can produce work extremely quick, and you didn't have to pay a dime.

[GottaBeTheJuice]

I'm all about Blender. True, it's interface is different, but I'm used to being different as I'm a Vegas user as well. I've used it (blender) extensively in my films, both shorts and features. Once you learn your way around (takes a month or two of playing with it) you can produce work extremely quick, and you didn't have to pay a dime.


I'm interested in seeing any of your short films with 3d Blender integrated models/animations.

Can you provide a link?
:)
I'm probably gonna delve deeper into the wonder that is Blender and Maya down the road hopefully.

[El Director]

Sure. This first link is from a film that's a few years old. The Blender bit is the part where the knife is thrown into the lens about halfway through.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM_gyCEXCNg&feature=channel_page

This next one was for the MTV movie spoof contest in 2008. My partner and I didn't find out about the contest until literally 48 hours before the deadline, hence Optimus is pretty raw, (more of an animatic), but he was comp'd in via alpha channel, as opposed to greenscreen, like the knife was.
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=33973330


And finally an example from my first feature two years ago in the form of stills. The before shows how I'm using Blender to comp in the eyeball. You can even see tracking marks on the guy's face that were generated in Voodoo (motion tracking freeware). The after shows the final composite.
Before (http://starspictures.ning.com/photo/2094877:Photo:111?context=latest)
After. (http://viewmorepics.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewImage&friendID=377440237&albumID=1096349&imageID=15353173)

Also, the logos for both the shorts were done in Blender. For The Cube, I simply opened the original .blend file and added the greek building with a camera move.

If you have any other questions, just ask! =)

[GottaBeTheJuice]

Sure. This first link is from a film that's a few years old. The Blender bit is the part where the knife is thrown into the lens about halfway through.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sM_gyCEXCNg&feature=channel_page

This next one was for the MTV movie spoof contest in 2008. My partner and I didn't find out about the contest until literally 48 hours before the deadline, hence Optimus is pretty raw, (more of an animatic), but he was comp'd in via alpha channel, as opposed to greenscreen, like the knife was.
http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&VideoID=33973330


And finally an example from my first feature two years ago in the form of stills. The before shows how I'm using Blender to comp in the eyeball. You can even see tracking marks on the guy's face that were generated in Voodoo (motion tracking freeware). The after shows the final composite.
Before (http://starspictures.ning.com/photo/2094877:Photo:111?context=latest)
After. (http://viewmorepics.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=viewImage&friendID=377440237&albumID=1096349&imageID=15353173)

Also, the logos for both the shorts were done in Blender. For The Cube, I simply opened the original .blend file and added the greek building with a camera move.

If you have any other questions, just ask! =)
Ah, great work. I personally like the eyeball one!
Thanks for taking the time.

[El Director]

You're welcome. Glad you liked it!