Opinion's on modelling programs.

[Veleran]

You must read the Gmax help and do tests for months,you must not hurry.
After some time you can become good.
The more you read the help,and tutorials,the sooner you will become skilled in gmax.
I will send you links for tutorials later.

After some time it will be easy for you to work.

If you learn another modeler more quickly,when your skills become much better,you will be asking for things milkshape cant do and switch then back to gmax,so why not reading the help from now the begining?

[RageDeux]

Very true !

I promise not to give up if you can get me some good tutorials...
(As most of the tut's i found are dead links or advanced)

Nah seriously man appreciate the help , info. (is it me or is this a two man topic?)

Again on the N-sided site i see there's allso another program for modells of humans
is this the program you are reffering ? (This all seem's expensive for a hobbyist)

Any way thanks again !
.....................................

[Veleran]

Both Milkshape and argile can import/export .obj models.Do whatever you want.

[RageDeux]

Well im going to take you'r advice and go Gmax only because i have been looking into a moddeling / Animation Deploma.

(WHAT !! WAIT ) I here you say a deploma ! (what a nut)

Nope im serious i have allways been into Arty things just not on a computer.

And i figure that while i arrange payment plans and save for the deposit i might aswell get used to a complex work space
i have had a look at a site for jobs (no im not dreaming) seem's like it's either 3ds max / maya / zbrush / mud box
that are standard at the moment.

It's a british based learning company they supply 3ds max for training with. Its a 12 month intensive course begginer to advanced costing £503
and with that deploma i could go on further learning etc...

Or try and get a apprentaship with a company hell some of the jobs just requier you know these programs well and like game's. So i figure if im about to go down this route a deploma cant harm.
some do prefer college but meh ! would prefer to get my deploma 1st and wiz through a college course

So i guess for now i had better find some good tutorials on Gmax !
.............................................................................................................
I have not gone mad just enthusiastic !
And if it all goes wrong i can blame you
.............................................................................................................

Thanks again man !

[Veleran]

I do modelling for 11 years and i say ,and dont spend too much time in 3d stuff-
specially if you re not going to get any money in the future from it.
If you work for hours,take breaks every 5-10 minutes the most.

There s no reason to put much money in.
Argile costs only 70 euro,and i assume someday you ll upgrade your computer to play newer games-not specifically for making 3d graphics.

If you want to know,i now regret that i spend more hours on the computer with modelling than i should.
Many times i should be out,doing other things that i miss now.


You model do UVW Unwrap,make skeleton and physique in gmax,in Argile you texture with the 3D Paint tools
and trade the model between the two programs as .obj.

(quidam- and quidam2 is another modeler -more expensive -the common spot is that argile can import export in quidam QDM format) .
You dont need quidam of course because as i said you animate in max.

If you dont hurry,you ll succeed.You dont need the college and all these tens thousands of euros for fees-
you can learn more things by yourself and later have a specialty in something as the time passes (character modeler,environment modeler,animator).

With rf you can do fun practice and to keep in touch with minor game development things,test your models,animations etc inside level previews,without being committed anyone.
You will need two years practicing -the minimum,so dont bother trying hard so early.

About the cg companies,many projects get cancelled,and they anyway drink your blood with the sponge.
Freelancers can earn more,and are free to work whenever they want.

Take a look at this:This article is monumental and even better,save it to disk.
Learn about Paul tosca,massimo righi and others.
There you ll find some of the most famous freelancers

http://area.autodesk.com/index.php/stories_bts/print/

Gmax Tutorials
Watch these and save to disk whatever can be saved
(Leave each video play again and again from the begining
until you have learned something).

Note,you may see various mapping types.You,use planar mapping to faces according their normals direction.
Normal maps need this planar mapping -or box mapping the most-
the other mapping types (spherical,cylindrical ,etc) are of no use to normal bump mapping.

Gmax Fundamentals- Part 2: Functions, Operations and Techniques

http://www.the3dresource.com/index.php? ... techniques

some more there

http://www.the3dresource.com/index.php?/gmax-tutorials

Gmax UV Mapping Video Tutorial

http://files.filefront.com/Gmax+UV+Mapp ... einfo.html

http://www.windyweather.net/WW/max/gmax/

http://www.fsdeveloper.com/wiki/index.p ... deo_(GMax)

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fusea ... id=1669335

http://www.freewebs.com/gmax-tutorial/a ... npart1.htm

http://www.freewebs.com/gmax-tutorial/candleholder.htm

http://airspace.uhk.cz/mlk/msfs/tutoria ... ng_01.html

[GMer]

Thanks for posting links to these Gmax utorials, Veleran.
I personally prefer Gmax because (a) it is free and (b) I've used it for a few years (first started with it for creating Trainz, content, but failed miserably, couldn't get an exporter, but anyway...). I don't think I could work with anything simpler than Gmax.
There is a program called anim8or, but I don't think that would be good for organic models, but would be good for a battlemech.

[Veleran]

The 3d paint of Argile is usefull because you can make the textures tile no matter how many pieces the uvw is,
using projection stamps.
You load a bitmap to the background,and when you paint on the object,the bitmap is projected on the model.
This way,you paint in the middle of one side,change view,paint from another angle,and so on untill you paint over all the seams.
It is more difficult to paint the textures without leaving seams,and you are more restricted to welded uvw -bigger pieces,which causes texture distortion-patterns show clearly any distorion.

[GMer]

And how much is Argyle?

[RageDeux]

Ye cheers veleren for all those tutorials

just what i needed !
.....................................

[bernie]

And how much is Argyle?

€59
See here:
http://www.n-sided.com/store/

[GMer]

$79 US dollars. Not really for those whose budget is $0...

EDIT:Double post deleted by bernie

[Allanon]

For a free solution you could use Blender to paint the textures.

http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Manual/Texture_Paint

[GMer]

Thanks Bernie for deleting that double post.
I've heard of blender... lots of exporting, just gotta learn how to use that weird layout.
"PloppSecondLife" is a cool program, But it only exports models to a picture format, which I have no clue what it does...

[Veleran]

I thought Blender from the begining,and it has sculpture tools too somewhere i think,multires mesh levels and numerous goodies but i would nt recommend it to ragedeux.
The interface is hard to learn and generally it is a difficult program.You can propably do many things with scripts if you know python.
If you insist to only free programs you can take a look to the Blender manual:

http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Manual

It has good support,and its own forum at CGTalk.
Blender forum is updating but you could take a look at its CG forum.

http://forums.cgsociety.org/forumdisplay.php?f=91

[Voltare]

Milkshape can export to dang near any format you need.