3D Software?

joe40001 · Feb 23, 2004

Posted by Four Mad Men:
Same goes for me if you get Blender. The GUI is being re-worked and they have exposed much much more of the functionality in the menus (whereas before you just had to know the keyboard commands). Also the feature list is growing day by day. The daily builds also include Yafray (ray tracer) integration. Lots of good tutorials out there and as Axeman said, "practice, practice, practice!".

And as a side note, Blender has a dedicated CAD program in the works (first Alpha release a few weeds ago). I don't know if it will stand alone or not, but I'd be suprised if it didn't work with Blender in some fashion.

So, you're the blender guy?

If so, can you tell me how to cast shadows with something other than spotlights?

Thanks for your help.

Four Mad Men · Feb 23, 2004

Posted by joe40001:
So, you're the blender guy?

If so, can you tell me how to cast shadows with something other than spotlights?

Thanks for your help.

Yes, [BS-Ozzy] I Am Blender Man! [/BS-Ozzy]. In blender the only lamp type that will cast a shadow is the spotlight.

And for you or anyone else interested in a short talk about spotlights...

In order for a material to cast a shadow it's "Shadow" button must be set on (default)
Inorder for a material to recieve shadows it's "Shadeless" button must be off (default)
Spotlights cast light and shadow by default but can be set to cast only shadow by setting the "Only Shadow" button to on. That way you can have another lamp type provide the lighting but the spotlight provide the shadows.

joe40001 · Feb 24, 2004

Posted by Four Mad Men:

Posted by joe40001:
So, you're the blender guy?

If so, can you tell me how to cast shadows with something other than spotlights?

Thanks for your help.

Click to expand...

Yes, [BS-Ozzy] I Am Blender Man! [/BS-Ozzy]. In blender the only lamp type that will cast a shadow is the spotlight.

And for you or anyone else interested in a short talk about spotlights...

In order for a material to cast a shadow it's "Shadow" button must be set on (default)

Inorder for a material to recieve shadows it's "Shadeless" button must be off (default)

Spotlights cast light and shadow by default but can be set to cast only shadow by setting the "Only Shadow" button to on. That way you can have another lamp type provide the lighting but the spotlight provide the shadows.

Thanks, this program is growing on me fast. I might even make a C++ program utilizing it, but I think I'm getting ahead of myself. In any case, I'm going to start working on my concept trek ship now.

Can I see some of things you created? If the mods think it's too off topic to have you post a couple non-trek images, I understand. Mods, feel free to say "no", but otherwise I'd be really curious to see what kind of stuff you've produced.

Four Mad Men · Feb 24, 2004

Posted by joe40001:
Thanks, this program is growing on me fast. I might even make a C++ program utilizing it, but I think I'm getting ahead of myself. In any case, I'm going to start working on my concept trek ship now.

Can I see some of things you created? If the mods think it's too off topic to have you post a couple non-trek images, I understand. Mods, feel free to say "no", but otherwise I'd be really curious to see what kind of stuff you've produced.

Non-Trek stuff? Is there such a thing? But seriously, apart from some tutorials I don't think I've done anything non-Trek (even my Cruiseliner is civilian-Trek). I've also never really finished a project but my Phaser and Shuttle are darn close. I probably shouldn't just post links to my threads here so I'll just list a few thread titles: "Starfleet Shuttlecraft", "Federation Cruisliner", "NCC-1701 in a Blender" and "The Phasers of Star Fleet". There are others I'm sure but those are the main ones.

Four Mad Men · Apr 7, 2004

Formerlly only available in PRMan: Depth Map Based Ambient Occlusion Lighting

Now available in Blender (for the next release anyway, the following were made with pre-release code).

Faked GI (ala Vektor's tutorial)

Ambient Occlusion

The A.O. is definately darker but contains some additional detail. While I'm sure I could tweak the lighting rig I'm using for the F.G.I. to achieve similar results, now I don't have to.

And finally a (very much in need of tweaking the power and postion) key light added.
Ambient Occlusion with key

And if your interested in the particulars of the method please read this write-up from Andrew Whitehurst (not related to me, blender, or the blender project)

Guest · May 2, 2004

Blender is great, back when I started out with it I was able to create a fairly realistic model of the Enterprise (refit) after 3 hours. For those of you about to give up: Learn the keyboard shortcuts and modeling will become much easier, but if you want to do anything regarding lighting, radiosity, or armatures I would recomend buying the 2.3 version manual. You could download parts of it at: documentation

This is my first post: be gentle
version 2.33 is out!

Intelligence · May 2, 2004

thanks for the tip tha 2.33 is out... maybe blender won't crash that often now...

Galactus · May 3, 2004

Ok I am going to try and learn blender and Animor8. Anyone have any suggestions as to where to get started. I have never used any programs like this so I am starting from scratch. I am hoping someone can direct me to any tutorials or somewhere where I can get some info on where to begin with the basics.

I got to increase my skills if I want to actually get a vote in the monthly art contest. :lol:

Four Mad Men · May 3, 2004

Posted by Intelligence:
thanks for the tip tha 2.33 is out... maybe blender won't crash that often now...

That's odd, I've had but a single crash of Blender and that's been ages ago. 2.33 is definately the best yet (but I guess that's the point of software updates huh?).

Posted by Galactus:
Ok I am going to try and learn blender and Animor8. Anyone have any suggestions as to where to get started. I have never used any programs like this so I am starting from scratch. I am hoping someone can direct me to any tutorials or somewhere where I can get some info on where to begin with the basics.

I got to increase my skills if I want to actually get a vote in the monthly art contest.

Here are some links that I've been meaning to post for awhile but just never seemed to get around to:

Blender Documentation, this link points to a page with lots of blender documentation links. Including the Official Blender User's Guide. It comes both as HTML and PDF (the PDF weighs in at 32 meg).

And here are some classroom based tutorials that a teacher created for his students. Comes in three parts but the section of "booleans" is definately worth missing (not because of the author but because that's one area Blender falls down in). It's partly made up for in some of the newest editing tools but I'll be glad when the new code goes in.

Guest · May 8, 2004

well i use maya 5..ayone need help with that.. well is a professional software so its a little tricky at the start but once you get a hang of it.. its possiblities are endless..
let me show you an image of a modified NX-01 that i am working on did this in 1/2 an hour..

Xenoclone · May 20, 2004

^I like it!

I use Lightwave, personally, and used to use trueSpace. The lighting isn't very realistic in tS and it crasehd a lot for me. LW has been nice, but I haven't learned it very well yet.

Guest · May 21, 2004

you forgot about Softimage Xsi by Avid.
One of the most powerfull aplications in the animation industri. Damn hard to learn though... i tryed and well it was abit to much for me.

Galactus · Jun 10, 2004

Ok does anyone here use Blender? I been reading on the manuals and still have no luck with it. Can anyone give me some pointers?

Four Mad Men · Jun 10, 2004

I do. And I would suggest reading this guide from the blender community website: http://www.blender.org/modules/documentation/htmlI/

Stephen Cronin · Jun 21, 2004

i use lightwave... its very good, thebroken.org has some good anims with it on episode 3

Chadduss · Jun 21, 2004

Hey Four Mad Men, do you know of a printable copy of that?

Thanks

Four Mad Men · Jun 21, 2004

Yes, if you go to the documentaion page http://www.blender.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=documentation&file=index there is a "download" link that takes you to a directory that contains a PDF version. Just download the newest version (I think it's dated May 2004).

grand_nagus_biglobes · Jun 21, 2004

Personally, I use lightwave- after getting used to the shortcuts, it's very quick and easy to use, I find.

Chadduss · Jun 21, 2004

Thanks!

zoom · Jul 26, 2004

Re:

Well i must say this is the most useful thread i have seen. Actually encouraged me to start learning something.

I have been tinkering with Maya 6 for the past few days and i find its user interface very simple at least from a beginners point of view.

This is my first model

http://ftgl.net/aayush/Daedalus%201.jpg

Please pass your comments on the same .

Also, i need some help - VERY newbie level - such as how to place the ship registry number and name on the hull in maya. Would be glad if anyone would help me out.
If so, please contact me by email at aayush.iyer@ftgl.net

Thanks

3D Software?

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