How to get started

[egproductions]

I hvae been wanted to do 3d modeling for quit soem ti now but the learning curve seems way to steep for me. When i began video eiditng I dindt need any books or anything the progam was self explanitory enough to get started. Whats the best way of learning maya or lightwave or 3d studio max?

[Beat Takeshi]

Well... I would say the absolute best way to "start" is to take a scupturing class and work with clay first. This will give your eye and hands the spacial relationship practice you are going to need for organic modeling in 3D.

[oneinfiniteloop]

Well... I would say the absolute best way to "start" is to take a scupturing class and work with clay first. This will give your eye and hands the spacial relationship practice you are going to need for organic modeling in 3D.

Good point. I took a class at my local community college. It helped me get a firm understanding of the basics and then I went from there.

[Greggl]

Set a goal and do it.

Storyboard a project or shoot a scene with the express purpose of using 3d
modeled CGI.

I know *hundreds* of aspiring 3d artists that have spent ages working on
their modeling skills... most of them have web sites and reels filled with uber
complex or hyper-realistic 'things' that they do renders on slightly reflective
surfaces. Its the equalivent of hanging artwork up on mom's fridge :)

If you have a goal to actually USE what you're modeling.. you'll only model
in the detail that will be visible at the scale its being used. You'll learn to light
and composite for realisic results, where to cut corners etc. In the end, you'll
have usable vfx skills that can be directly applied.

[Matt Grunau]

You may want to take some time and look at the process as a whole and find a particular niche/area you may be particularly good at and like to do. 3D ain't like Photoshop, there are many areas where you can bury yourself in wholly, without ever touching any of the others. 3D packages have so many applications that it is almost anti-prosperous to try and excel in them all. I'm not bashing your abilities, or anyone else's, but the plain truth is no one I can think of (and no effects houses worthy of being looked at) have only one person doing everything. Here are the major portions of any 3D app:

Modeling
Texturing
Character Animation
Scene Animation
Rigging
Lighting
Dynamics (Hard body and Soft body)
Particles
Rendering
Compositing

Each one is a career unto itself. Personally, I can't model with a crap, but I am not to bad at simple animation (cameras), particles, rendering, and compositing. (Lightwave) The pipeline for 3D is a massive one. No one is great at everything.

Most of my uses for 3D revolve around specific visuals dedicated for video enhancement.

Get some software and find what you are best at and then develop that. Then find others who use the same software and are good at different things. Three people great at three different portions of a 3D package are a hell of a lot more valuable than five people decent in more.

[Alex DePew]

You'll definitely want to check out the work on CGtalk. There are artists there in all the disciplines from beginner to professional. Just a warning though it is geared more towards the more skilled people and they can give the cold shoulder to a newbie. But I had good experiences on the board. I toyed with the idea of a career in animation. I was learning modeling in 3ds max to start and got to a certain point when I realized that it would be fun as a side project but that I would much rather make movies outside of animation.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/

A link to my WIP. I haven't touched it in a while. I hope to get some time to work on it one day.
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=265799

[surf]

you will have to read several books and tuts.
first you will have to choose the software you want to use later. and learn that one. for what do you want to use it?

[egproductions]

thanx for all your advice, i am going to try a little out from all the diffrent areas of animation but i would probably end up using it for video enhancments mostly maybe to be able to make technical animation of a product for promotional videos. What software would you recommend(PC)?

[jelloshotsrule]

personally i'd recommend the maya personal learning edition. maya is one of the standards in 3D work, but it's also pretty pricey. the PLE lets you learn maya without paying anything, and the only downside is that it watermarks your renders so you can't use them commercially. now, if you want to get something that is cheaper and you can use your results right away, lightwave or 3d studio max are also highly respected.

personally i've found lightwave to be confusing (coming in as a maya user) and have never used 3d studio max. so, i'm biased.

good luck! 3D is a lot of work but a ton of fun.

ps. you can get the maya PLE from alias's website... or just search for it on versiontracker or something and you'll get a link.

[Rich Lee]

if you can...take a class...i took a 10 week class and it helped a great deal!

if not do some research and grab some tuts on the net...there are tons of dvd training courses you can buy.

start modeling simple things around your house...a glass...a table...a chair...working your way up to harder things like a stove or shoe...

one of the first things i ever did after my class was model things on my desktop...things i could measure and examine...

http://www.rich-lee.com/Personal/telephone_large.jpg

then i started modeling other things in my house...starting with chairs and bottles and jars...working my way up to my bike and a cool old fan....then measuring my apartment and building it...

it was a great exercise...and you will learn allot cause you start to think about how to build each shape and each one wil have its own little challenge...

http://www.rich-lee.com/Personal/kitchen_large.jpg

this was like 5 years ago...i could do way better now...but you have to start somewhere...after i did this and a few other images it wasnt long before i got a job...

you have to work hard though...like anything else...and if its something you really want to do then you have to make it a priority...its nothing like learning an editing program, these programs are 50x's deeper then any editing app...they are more complex then operating systems...

take a short intro class...just to learn the basics...

i started

[ChrisForbes]

did anyone else just say "Holy Crap" ?

[Matt Grunau]

I sure did.


i just KNEW there was a reason a secretly hated that dude. :Drogar-BigGrin(DBG)




Great work Rich

[im.thatoneguy]

One of the things that really cought me off guard moving from the learning phase to the professional phase was timelines. You quickly realize that everything you'd learned in the years past was useless if you couldn't do it three times as fast as you did it before.

I would recommend this incredibly boring but probably effective regiment.

1) Find something incredibly complex and seemingly impossible
2) Do it perfectly, take a month, two months, whatever.
3) Do it again from scratch. Now in 2 weeks.
4) Do it again from scratch. Now in 1 week.

Rinse and Repeat.

If you want to really really learn something, do it several times, each time you'll find out where you wasted time, what you didn't need to do, what doesn't get noticed, and next time your first pass will be faster.

Finally you'll get to a point where cutting corners is just second nature, and you know which corners can and should be cut, and which you need to spend the time and detail on.

It doesn't matter how awsome your scene is if it's going to take a month to render and your deliverable is in 1 week. A lot of times when people are learning 3d they'll make these amazing single frames. When you start working they're going to ask for 1000 of them... your render took 23 hours... now what? Try to learn to optimize as soon as possible. Treat your TDs with kindness, they have to deal with all the shit you throw their way. :) I was joking to one of my old teachers that they should have forced the students to render a 300 frames of every project they turned in. That would'a taught 'em pretty quick.

Learn to Draw. If you can't draw it, you can't model it, or at the very least you can't model it quickly. Learn to sculpt.

Specialize pretty early on, if you don't want to animate, don't waste time learning to animate. If you don't want to model, don't waste time learning to model. If you don't want to create textures, don't waste time reproducing baroque paintings.


On a side note... sorry I don't mean to hijack the thread.

Rich I'm looking into making a transition to Pre-Viz work. What do you guys look for in demoreels. Pre-viz quality with an emphasis on speed, Photoreal or Live-action cinematography? Or something in the middle. I'm not quite sure which direction to focus my portfolio and resume.

- Thanks

[jelloshotsrule]

Learn to Draw. If you can't draw it, you can't model it, or at the very least you can't model it quickly. Learn to sculpt.


i disagree. well, i should say, i agree that one should learn to draw, for sure. and that it will be a big help. i disagree that if you can't draw it, you can't model it though... i do think that you need a visual representation of what you want to model first, however. whether that is something you drew, something someone else drew, a picture, or the actual object, to me is not too important. ideally you have a few images you can import and work with as image planes.


the rest of your post is great advice for sure! and i actually think i should take up your tip of modeling something once really good, and then redoing it, etc. a good project for sure. thanks for the insight.

[im.thatoneguy]

If you're modelling cars and screw drivers, reference photos will be more than enough.

As soon as you get into the really tricky stuff like organics, you can to a large extent just throw your photos out the window. There are far too many subtle, critical form changes that are a million times easier to practice with a pencil, than to "figure out" in 3d.

Drawing is just so mind bogglingly simple. Everbody does it, everybody knows how to use a pencil. I would much rather teach someone how to model on an 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper than on a 23" apple cinema display.

[Greggl]

I can't draw well. I wouldn't consider it a pre-req either.

[surf]

me too. but I hate modelling organic