Best/Easiest 3D program for sculpting?

[Treyu]

Hey everyone,

So I'm new... painfully new, in fact, to any kind of 3D software, let alone making items for SL. 

Now, don't get me wrong, I do know a fair amount of knowledge about modding in SL itself and have built a few custom avatars from premade sculpts. Texturing is fairly easy as I've been working with Photoshop in its various forms since 7.0 was released (though as of right now I have CS3) and I've used my own custom textures a few times now... but I want to make more.

I've looked at this guide but I just don't understand any of it, especially not to make my own choices on what to start learning with.

Using 'Art of Illusion' as an example, I don't understand what any of the checklist means past 'Operating Systems'.

Every time I try to get into a program and follow a guide (I've tried a couple of times), I seem to just get lost. Is there any program (on that list or not) that is easy to use, but can make quality prims? Preferably one that has a lot of guides behind it at the very least? Which program do most builders use to create their prims and sculpts in SL? Naturally, I'd prefer the program to be as cheap as possible (preferably free- hah) but if there will be a significant difference in the quality and ease of creation with another, I will drop money for it. 

Also, feel free to 'talk down' to me. I don't know anything at all about this and attempting to educate myself on my own seems to not be working, no matter how hard I try.

[Drongle McMahon]

Blender is free and widely used. At the Machinimatrix site you can find all you need to install it and the extra tools you need for sculpties (see Jass). The site also has an excellent series of video tutorials both on Blender and on sculpties.

[Poenald Palen]

Talk down to you? How can that be working out? Uh.."HEY, wipe that smile off your face and think about what you DIDN'T say here! NO thank yous, you twerp!"

 

Ok, that is wrong, but uh....blender is a long term investment type of deal. You learn more and you gain skills that allow you to handle sculpts as well as regular mesh. You can gain skills baking textures or otherwise making textures. An example is making parts to paint onto larger parts, like detail parts. This saves modelling them all, so saves prims and adds details.

But, if you know how to build already...uh, sculpt studio gets a good name and I have seen it in action. It makes sense to many, some seem to have build  a whole business with it making parts packages to sell full perms! But, I think it is limited for end products. It makes great shapes that 'fit' with prim builds, if you wish to make hyrbids. I do this, but do NOT use this. I sort of regret it because i have seen it do tubes better then I have exported, which could be my technique. But, if it does it easier and I don't have to learn technique....well, I could use it for a roll cage this week! It is 5000L or so, which makes me think a bit. That is a bit of cash for me, I don't wish to get into my financial dealings but I also am looking at return on investment and time I lose learning it instead of learning new stuff with blender(that is maybe not even for SL! Blender can make stuff for other products and is a good CG tool set and makes animations as well as models for games and so on. 3dCG? Blender does it! I mean, just about will do anything.So....there is issues with those decisions that are more complex than needed to explain here, so I never bought it..yet. But I still think I will, I waited to long for mesh though and now laugh that mesh is arriving and NOW I need sculpt Studio lol. So, maybe I should wait...not sure.

 

Oh, zbrush is one I have seen in action and it does painting prims easily. But is sort of limited in a way, blender has extra tools...uh, but zbrush vids are out there. I think videos sort of show a new user a bit about the software they dont' read, so I like to watch those. Screenshots just show you tools you don't understand with 3D software. It is complex, by nature it is a bit harder than learning..uh, like MS paint! Paint is very simple and has limited use though. 3D stuff has more demensions and is a little different than many think. Sculpting in real life is sort of like zbrush or blenders sculpting settings (yeah, it does this to, just one of many tools it has) and if you have used playdoh, pastercine, clay or played with mud you might understand this. BUT, for mechanical objects you would go with extruding, mirroring and so on with Polygons. You have different workfows BUT...all of this is out the window wiht sculpts! They are usually manipulated from a primitive shape that has the right amount of vertices and rings ect. This is a technical issue with how they work, wich is why they are not just called "3D models" but "sculpties" and they are a bit...weird. You can paint on sculpties in blender to, but the workflow seems a little more tricky to me. You can paint from a photo or a rendered image...uh, 3d rendering in 3d CG is what you do when you have simulated materials and simulated light sources make an image with your object. You place a virtual camera, virtual lights and a slew of settings get set or maybe not...depends on what you want and what materials you have in your library!

Oh, that is another issue. Blender bakes textures, so does zbrush. You can find materials for both, paint stuff up and then paint it or put it in a layer and then layer up more stuff on that till you get what you want in blender. But I never have used zbrush, so I speak from what I have seen and know there are a few using it in SL. But, 3ds also does sculpties, and a few more.

YOu mention art of illusion, that doesn't do sculpties directly. I don't think you can bake with it, which is making the materials you made solid in an image to use as a texture...that is a quick no thinking explanation fromme...so sorry if it sounding vauge lol. But, basically you will see what I mean when you look at in world items that have shiny on to them and might look like a photo was wrapped around them. In fact, some do use photo's! Others bake OR use render source. Of course, you can use regular textures and then use SL's shine. But, it depends on what you are making. Baking and rendersource painting open up new methods and can be used in combo with SL shine, you can load up a texture to place onto a object (like in SL..sort of) and then change the materials in blender or zbrush and bake this out. This image tries to recreate what you have if you rendered the item in the 3D program. Hard to explain, but easy to see...which is why videos are worth 10X these words and take like 2 mins lol.

[Jacki Silverfall]

Go for the freebies first then see how you like it. Google Blender tutorials and see which ones you like. Blender is not that easy to learn although the 2.58 is much beter than the previous 2.49.

Do you want to make sculpts or mesh? Blender does both.

Be patient with yourself. This isn't easy. Hugs!

[Josh Susanto]

Sculptypaint is not the most precise or the most versatile, but it is the easiest.

[Rolig Loon]

I put off learning to make sculpties for the longest time despite the fact that I, like you, had been building and texturing for SL for a few years.  I did my research and decided that Blender or Maya were the best tools to use, because both are extremely versatile.  It's fine to make sculpties today, but the day will come (fairly soon) when you'll want to make mesh objects too, and it would be a shame to have to learn yet another tool.   Deciding between the two choices was a no-brainer.  Maya costs megabucks and Blender is free.  What put me off was the learning curve.  Blender is not easy to master, even with a ton of good tutorials on line and with the JASS-2 add-ons for SL.  I finally just took a deep breath and spent a month doing tutorials and making practice objects.  It was time well spent.  I recommend it.

[Poenald Palen]

It is mentioned that blender is not easy. I have a wierd feeling it is not so hard BUT there I still get all the UV stuff mixed up when projection painting, though I have done this a few times already! Each time I get something wrong or forget to check something! I wish it was easy as naming my image files and then naming the view screens for when I "... from view" the UV whatever stuff...see, I am not thinking well today BUT I still foget this either way! It is sad, but really blender 2.4x series was tough to learn. Right now I read about workflow stuff and a new render engine, all changes happening to the 2.5x series that might turn into the 2.6x series! So, learnign 2.5 is only part of it, there are maybe changes coming along with 2.6 that mean relearning. I know it sounds crazy, but I think blender might just help peoples memories by excersiing them! But, I really feel like skipping 2.5x series altogether and cut my losses since I never got into learning it and jus use 2.49 until 2.6x series starts.

BTW, I use the word series due to the talk of changes and is not like official reference words or dev language lol. I can't think of a way to describe it because their are UI differences and this means there is not a perceptiable single 2.5 and then bug fixes, there are changes and this is seems like a way of refering to all the variants that where talked about as 2.5, when some of the tutorials where in releases that where beta! They would all say it might change, and it did. But yeah, they are so similar BUT there was enough difference to make me use the word "series" because hey are different enough. Uh, and yeah...don't rip the matress tags off or lift your hand off that hand grip while in motion....watch you head to, and so on.

[Treyu]

Thanks to everyone for your responses!

@Drongle, Thanks, I think I will be trying that one out.

@Poenald, Haha, I guess I may have misspoken. By 'talk down' I mostly meant talk to me like I was a small child or something like that. But thank you! Yes, I really greatly prefer video tutorials because I can follow along. I'm very much a visual learner. I think it looks like most people are telling me to go with Blender, so I think I'll be trying that one out. I'm not sure what 'baking' a texture means, but hopefully I'll find out soon! I feel so embarrassed to be so very uneducated on this topic.

@Jacki , Haha, I don't even know the difference between Sculpts and Mesh. Do you mean solid and flexi prims? Sorry, I'm literally about as n00by as you can get at this!

@Josh, I will look into that one as well. Perhaps it will help to teach me a few of the basics.

@Rolig, I joined SL specifically because I wanted to build and create. I've been putting it off so long now with any effort being sofruitless that I finally asked for help on the forums... and while that may be easy for some, it's very hard for me to ask for help.

 

Thanks again, everyone. I'm off to download Blender and watch a loooot of tutorials. Wish me luck. ;D

[Jacki Silverfall]

??HUH??

[Pamela Galli]

I think all the 3D programs are hard; they make me feel more retarded than I usually do, and that's saying a lot.

The only easy one I know of is Rokuro (free version, which is the only one available for Mac). Takes 5 min to learn -- but is limited as to what you can make. The creator has several other programs but I have not used them because they are not for Mac.

Next easiest is the inworld tool Sculpt Studio, which is not that easy but there are inworld classes. Also Ac3d, which is not free, and is evidently easy for most but not for me.

I do use Blender but it is mind-bendingly hard -- but there is good inworld group support, and lots of SL-Blender tutorials.

 

 

 

[Poenald Palen]

use simpler words or define more! Hey, you are not doing the wrong thing, you are doing the best for you! I am not going to say blender is better, but will point out that many say this because at some point you find blender has a feature that others don't and then you end up learning blender anyway lol.

Blender has good UV unwrap features. The mesh is made up of points, the texture is mapped to these points at points withing the texture. Now, texture is a tricky word here...I mean, you have layers in most 3D programs and they all work with what are called "materials" to make what you see from the model (or even a 'particle', but those are not transferable to SL) and basically...wow, the pictures wrapped around need to be mapped. They need anchor points and then they might stretch, or possibly there are different sections. So you can make these different sections onto a flat 2d texture and then paint, draw or use photo source onto those bits. This making of sections on the one image that is eventually wrapped on a set of points in your model can be arranged in different ways. Blender seems to be good at this, so it is used alongside other software! it is common to see a pro artist veteran in 3D use multiple softwares in his workflow! Maybe one for making bump maps (crazy bump anyone!), another for sculpting (mud box, zbrush ect.), and maybe even more than one modelling app! Heck, Groboto is neat because you do lots of boolene type joining. What is boolene? Logic based stuff (the math behind it) that means you can join, cut out, make holes, or otherwise use 2 (or more) shapes to do this stuff to/with each other. So, you might not use 3Ds (which, I should mention, has a lot of tools that can be easier, if you learn they exist..plus plug-ins, one for sculpts and also another for prim building in that prog exist! it is a bit costly,but not for student usage...uh, I think they ahve a free demo to) SO, no 3ds for boolene stuff because Groboto is what style you want. This is a trouble with 3D. you hear of only 3Ds, C4D (oh, anther one that I have heard was easier than 3Ds, and also have plug -ins and exports files you can use in blender or other 3D progs) and the BIG names. But, there are programs like Groboto that is not as well known and might be easy or save you time. I don't know, I have not tried many of them BUT they do offer demo's! I went with blender due to support in SL of sculpts, plus it was free. Since I liked it enough, I stuck with it!

Blender has a list of teachers that are actually certified by the foundation.

But, seriously...you might really dig another program! Some really love Cinima4D, and it has a sculptie plug-in for it! I can't afford it, but it does cars so well I have seen it used for those...wow, some wonderful images from that program! Not sure of collada though...I think it does. There is always .obj then import into blender lol. Groboto is neat to, it is sort of new and not so well known. Good for concept art and who knows what else. It has a generative type feature, so you can make varients...so, once gain sort of good for concept and speeds up production of things that you need varients of!

[hibit Spad]

There is some good advice given here by others.  If you decide to try the blender route  please IM me in world and I will pass along a notecard to you that list a bunch of differetn sources for tutorials and other help.   The group Blender Academy recently distributed this notecard as a group announcement. 

 

There are at least 6 groups in SL that will give blender help in english and I have no idea how many other blender groups oriented towards other languages.

 

There are various inworld Scultp creating tools (some of them free to try)  and I would really recomment you try or get a dome of them before you choose to buy one.  Some of the inworld tools are very popular but for some people make no sense to them.  I am not goign to name any particular tool here but I know of one that lots of peo-pel in SL love but I absolutley detest.  It has been my experience with this particualr too that peopel either love it, hate it,  or never use it after trying a few time.  There seems to be no middle ground with that particular tool.   So try before you buy  on any inworld tool.

[Josh Susanto]

Re: ??HUH??

Sculptypaint is what I use. 

Does it look to you like I'm struggling with it?

[Rolig Loon]

---

Josh Susanto wrote:

Re: ??HUH??

Sculptypaint is what I use. 

Does it look to you like I'm struggling with it?

---

If I had to guess (and I really do have to guess), I imagine that Jacki's comment was not about Sculptypaint but about what you meant by your short post; "Sculptypaint is not the most precise or the most versatile, but it is the easiest."  I puzzled about that myself.  It sounds like you're saying "Sculptypaint can't do very many things and it doesn't make very sharp 3D models, but it is easy to use."  That doesn't sound like much of a recommendation to me, but I've never used Sculptypaint.  Maybe that is the best you can say about it, though.  Was it what you meant?

[Josh Susanto]

It is not great for texturing sculpts.

It is great for sculpting textures.

But practically no one sculpts textures.

[Vladi Hazelnut]

Sculpt studio and Jass2 would be my suggestions. Jass2 is just blender with all the scripts and plug ins for sl. you can get a free version of it. Sculpt Studio costs like 5000L and you use it in world.

There is also prim oven, but its very limitig as to what you can do with it.

Blender looks hard, but has TONS of documentaion and tutorials. Sculpt studio has a learning curve too but not a lot of documentation for it. They do have classes though.

Both have there good sides and limitations. SS is great for modeling stuff in world, and has some awesome tools that come with it. Undo NOT being one of them, god it wish it had undo lol. And you can't bake textures with it.

Blender you can do a LOT with once you learn it, but its diffecult to model around stuff that is inworld or know exactly how it will look until you bring it inworld. But you can texture with it. You can even import things you make with SS into blender and texture them.

I use both daily.