Help please - 3d 101?

[Alex.Zelenski]

I have been interested in 3d and 2d (2d is what i do primarily because im better at it) for the past year or two. Im on the fence between which career/major/program or whatever I should chose between (illustration or game art). Problem is I have no clue where to start with 3d even though I really want to do it or at least know how. The programs are crazy complex and I have no clue what im doing in them. Mind helping me out? I have blender and 3ds max 2010 - Are those good starting programs? How should I go about learning the programs? And tutorial sets that seem to cover all the important stuff? How do you generate ideas and all that? Just general help

[dpaint]

Max and Maya are industry standard for Video Games so learning them is the way to go. Blender is used in schools and by amateurs cause its free. The interface is different enough to be useless for learning Maya and Max. Learning 3d is useful for illustration too because you can build your own ref and light it. If you own Max just follow the tutorials that come with it. If you are using a pirated copy then you are on your own.

Edit: Also you can get banned from this site discussing pirated software.

[Alex.Zelenski]

Max and Maya are industry standard for Video Games so learning them is the way to go. Blender is used in schools and by amateurs cause its free. The interface is different enough to be useless for learning Maya and Max. Learning 3d is useful for illustration too because you can build your own ref and light it. If you own Max just follow the tutorials that come with it. If you are using a pirated copy then you are on your own.

Edit: Also you can get banned from this site discussing pirated software.

nothing is pirated . I used the student version - on the education community. So get rid of blender and just learn 3ds max? And maybe get maya?

[Kya Hill]

It's better to know more than one program, but if you only have max right now, start learning that.

[bodied]

Max and Maya, for sure. Honestly, just try watching the tutorial videos on Autodesk's website and get a feel for how 3D 'works', learn basic terminology and 3D concepts. I got a few books to look at as well, such as Mastering Maya/3Ds, which helped me to get a foundation in modeling.

[Rengin]

What bodied says. You can learn any program in a few weeks as long as you know the principles of what you're dealing with. Learn about vertices, edges, faces, what are common pitfalls for modelers starting out (lamina faces, ngons, wrongly distributed edgeloops), learn about the industry standards (triangles used to be the way to go with modeling, but nowadays you should try and go for quads), practice UVing and texturing (that might actually be a nice combination of 2D and 3D for you), and learn about rendering terms like Global Illumination, Ambient Occlusion, photons and irradiance particles.

It'll take time, but start with the basics and ask a lot of questions, and you'll get there =)

[JeffX99]

Yeah, just stick with Max. Autodesk has come a long way in traingin and developng good tutorials. I like Kelly Murdock's 3ds Max Bible series as pretty comprehensive texts to go along with the program.

3D "modeling" is actually made up of four different disciplines:
1) The actual modeling of the object, usually referred to as "mesh modeling"
2) Texturing/mapping - for this you will need basic Photoshop skills and a decent digital camera
3) Lighting
4) Animation (if it is something that animates or moves of course)

Blender does some basic mesh modeling things quite well and is fairly easy...but it really comes up short beyond modeling. Sketchup might be an interesting place to start as well. Unity would be good to know as well, it has emerged as the industry standard game authoring system.

Good luck!

[Flake]

There's no quick and easy way to get into 3d, the "big" programs are just that, big.
Easy things tend not to have a 3000 page instruction manual.

get a feel for how 3D 'works', learn basic terminology and 3D concepts.

Do this, the concepts largely apply universally across most apps.
Once you know that you need to say, subdivide / split an edge, it becomes a matter of scanning the various sub menus for the relevant button or icon.

I'd say stay away from things like ZBrush or Mudbox for now, basics first, fancy plugins later.

btw, much as I like CA, you'll get better answers to any questions you may have (having gone through the help files first obviously..) on a more specifically 3d forum.

I haven't been on them for ages but..
CGtalk (CG Society now I think?) used to be good.
Don't post any "which app should I use" threads though, they kinda hate that.

Polycount was more geared towards games, so if that's your main interest it might be a better fit.

Anyway, good luck with it.

[Alex.Zelenski]

There's no quick and easy way to get into 3d, the "big" programs are just that, big.
Easy things tend not to have a 3000 page instruction manual.


Do this, the concepts largely apply universally across most apps.
Once you know that you need to say, subdivide / split an edge, it becomes a matter of scanning the various sub menus for the relevant button or icon.

I'd say stay away from things like ZBrush or Mudbox for now, basics first, fancy plugins later.

btw, much as I like CA, you'll get better answers to any questions you may have (having gone through the help files first obviously..) on a more specifically 3d forum.

I haven't been on them for ages but..
CGtalk (CG Society now I think?) used to be good.
Don't post any "which app should I use" threads though, they kinda hate that.

Polycount was more geared towards games, so if that's your main interest it might be a better fit.

Anyway, good luck with it.

thanks so much for youre help. Im actually beginning to become active on polycount and cghub, CA seems to slow for my liking - and honestly a popularity contest - the guys that are constantly posting and have been here for ages get more views and comments than new starting artists and honestly its a bit of a motivation kill. lol - but you learn to just keep pushing