What is your main 3d software for game art at work?

Eric Chadwick

What is the 3d software you use the most at work in your daily pipeline making game artwork? 

If you work as a game artist, please vote for the software you use for work, not at home.

I know at home many people use different packages than in the office. But for this poll I'm just interested in what your work requires.

You can only vote for one, so consider carefully. 

We've done similar polls in the past, I'll try to dig them up for comparison.

beefaroni

Maya

Interesting poll. I like that you can see who voted for what now  

Eric Chadwick

3ds Max

The same could be said for freelancers I suppose. It might end up being more informative to narrow it down to one vote per, just the one most-used app.

rayle1112

Maya

I use Maya the most for modeling, retopo, and UV at work but I dont really like it. Modo is the one that I want to learn. Too bad, its not industry standard at the moment.

lefix

Modo

Curious why you put 3dcoat in the poll, but not zbrush?

rayle1112

Maya

lefix said:

Curious why you put 3dcoat in the poll, but not zbrush?

I think he just wants to know about 3D modeling software, not sculpting.

Mathew O

Modo

At Massive we can use Maya, Max or Modo so there's a pretty even spread between Maya and Modo.

xvampire

3ds Max

oh cool , 3dsmax user still strong  , the rumors of max dying is far from true in this industry. 
guess my 3dsmax knowledge wont be a waste anytime soon.

*still want to learn blender too  

Burpee

Maya

Didn't expect Blender to fit in a piepline,

kohg

3ds Max

woops, remove my vote please,  i didn't read the op until i voted, i do not work on games professionally, yet.

RobeOmega

Blender

kohg said:

woops, remove my vote please,  i didn't read the op until i voted, i do not work on games professionally, yet.

Opps. Me too. Sorry...

Eric Chadwick

3ds Max

OP can't edit votes, nor can moderators. Which is probably a good thing.

Brygelsmack

Maya

Our tools are made for Maya. Once you get set up with hotkeys and shortcuts it's a pretty decent package. 

oglu

Maya

we moved from a hybrid max -- maya pipeline to maya only some years ago...

Kel-Shaded

Maya

Burpee said:

Didn't expect Blender to fit in a piepline,

My first job was in blender because it was open code, And we had a big art team it was cheaper to have the tools team turn blender into Max then it was to buy Max for the artists,
Worked really well, had an inhouse engine and file manager/version control and the blend max hybrid was built so well into it

Maya and Max are a lot cheaper now, but blender is still insanely customisable

Swaggletooth

3ds Max

3DS Max, and that's in a professional environment too. I'd be interested to know what the uptake of Modo is in actual studios (no doubt it's slow)

Justin Meisse

3ds Max

@xvampire Yeah, I was told I should abandon Max because it was going to be canceled back in 2003... it's the rumor that never dies.  I mean, Autodesk could cancel Max and Maya and not really blink an eye, manufacturing is where the money is at.

thomasp

Blender

i find it's not so much about if one gets canceled or not but rather that max isn't being updated or even pushed anymore in pipeline relevant functionality. combine that with the sheer number of experienced TD's and animators who are working in maya and all the schools pushing out maya-trained students and why would you base a new or revamped pipeline around max anymore these days?
which leaves max in the position of a really expensive modeller when it used to be one of the more affordable all-round 3d packages.

huffer

Maya

About 60% percent Maya and only 40% percent 3dsmax, unfortunately

Kwramm

Maya

60% Maya, 40% Max. Depends on our clients though. I used to be a Maya guy, then a Max guy, now I'm  mostly Maya again. I'm doing tech art work though, not art creation.

Mongrelman

Blender

All studios I've worked at have used Maya as the main program, but most of my work has been done in Blender and then taken into Maya towards the end of the process.

lukasvogl

Maya

Mathew O said:

At Massive we can use Maya, Max or Modo so there's a pretty even spread between Maya and Modo.

haha brilliant

fdfxd2

Blender

Don't work for the gaming industry(yet!)
but I use blender.

It has everything I need for a 3d modelling toolset.
I can't complain.

beefaroni

Maya

 But for this poll I'm just interested in what your work requires.

TCarneiro

Modo

I'm going to be honest, I'm very surprised with the amount of modo users...

lefix

Modo

The actual number is probably lower. I think people who actively hang out on Polycount and other communities are more informed about software than your average artist. My coworkers didn't even know about Modo, 3D Coat, Quixel or Substance until I showed them. I think there are alot of artists who simply stick to the tools they learned years ago, unless a job requires them to learn something new.

artquest

Maya

lefix said:

The actual number is probably lower. I think people who actively hang out on Polycount and other communities are more informed about software than your average artist. My coworkers didn't even know about Modo, 3D Coat, Quixel or Substance until I showed them. I think there are alot of artists who simply stick to the tools they learned years ago, unless a job requires them to learn something new.

Very true! I ran into this more often then I expected.

Millenia

3ds Max

We all use Max at work at the moment.

Joopson

Maya

I use Maya for almost everything, here. As do my coworkers.

TCarneiro

Modo

artquest said:

lefix said:

The actual number is probably lower. I think people who actively hang out on Polycount and other communities are more informed about software than your average artist. My coworkers didn't even know about Modo, 3D Coat, Quixel or Substance until I showed them. I think there are alot of artists who simply stick to the tools they learned years ago, unless a job requires them to learn something new.

Very true! I ran into this more often then I expected.

I wish more people give Modo a try. Such an amazing modeler.. for an environment artist or prop artist this software is a dream come true.
Now the only thing left is the software to handle more polys on the viewport. As it stands right now, there's no way to compete with 3dsMax on that =/

Gaurav Mathur

Modo

I'd be curious to know how many artists go from MODO straight into their game engines.  I use MODO for modeling and UVing, then have to take my work into Max for export.

ysalex

Other (include in your reply)

I said other.

 95+ percent of my time in software is zbrush, and I can't figure out why it's not included (since it does modeling, retopo and texturing)

 The other 5% is silo, where I do most of the block out, subD hard surface, low poly tweaks, and all my unwrapping. 

<1% is maya. Maya is the last thing I do, import to set edge normals, export as fbx for baking, and delivering to clients.

Otherwise I spend no time in maya unless I need it for something special.

Eric Chadwick

3ds Max

Yeah my bad on that. My mindset is still kind of stuck on Zbrush as being kind of an adjunct 3d tool, like Mudbox, or Topogun, or whatever. But it's grown a lot over time. 

ahtiandr

Modo

I am using Modo as my main modelling app but I also use zbrush a lot. Probably 50/50.

yukonwanderer

TCarneiro said:

artquest said:

lefix said:

The actual number is probably lower. I think people who actively hang out on Polycount and other communities are more informed about software than your average artist. My coworkers didn't even know about Modo, 3D Coat, Quixel or Substance until I showed them. I think there are alot of artists who simply stick to the tools they learned years ago, unless a job requires them to learn something new.

Very true! I ran into this more often then I expected.

I wish more people give Modo a try. Such an amazing modeler.. for an environment artist or prop artist this software is a dream come true.
Now the only thing left is the software to handle more polys on the viewport. As it stands right now, there's no way to compete with 3dsMax on that =/

Why do you think Modo is better?

MiAlx

Maya

We use a combination of Maya and Motionbuilder for animations. I think some 3D artists use Max and others use Maya here. The reason many companies use Maya for example is that it is completely flexible and open-ended, you can write tools, plugins and scripts to really expand its capabilities. The trade-off is that it can become extremely slow with complex rigs, even with the new parallel rig evaluation feature. Motionbuilder is really fast and generally nigh-perfect for motion editing / mocap but a lot more rigid in it's architecture. 

I'm curious, is blender a viable option for AAA production though? How expandable is it? I haven't really checked it out myself. 

edit: just noticed that this thread has some great info regarding blender

MrHobo

Maya

I feel like the poll would be stronger if it allowed 2 options especially considering how heavy zbrush is in character art pipelines.
I normally spend probably 75% of time in zbrush sculpting and use maya (LT) for blockout/retop, hardsurface when needed, UV's and export for clients.

Joopson

Maya

Tidal Blast said:
Greater camera navigation and zoom (in/out) work better. Overall better UI. Greater customization (UI, hotkeys, custom scripts, multiple windows/cams, etc.) Better UVing tools and the tools... they just work. Faster subd modeling tools. Advanced Viewport. Community Content (Materials, Custom Scripts, Kits, etc.)

Your list has some good stuff and also some biased stuff. These things from the list are either opinions, biases, or just misinformation.

"Better UI" and "greater camera navigation" are mostly subjective.

"Greater customization" is misinformation, at least compared with Maya (I can't say, for Max). They seem pretty on par with one another, which is good.

"Better UVing tools" is partially up to taste. Downloaded Nightshade UV for Maya, which gives it a great layout and adds a couple of scripts, and I can't imagine needing anything else.

"Faster subd modelling tools" - Again, somewhat subjective. I will agree that Modo has some very innovative tools though.

"Advanced viewport" - Maya's viewport is pretty great these days. AO, PBR DirectX shader, etc.

"Community Content" - I don't think you can argue this for modo, over Max or Maya, which have been around for so long. I agree that the modo one is growing very fast though, so in the future, it wouldn't surprise me.

The best thing about Modo is how innovative they are. And that's nothing to scoff at. And I do agree it is the most promising program being developed right now.

leleuxart

3ds Max

I voted for Max because that's what my project uses, however I don't do much modeling as a Lighting Artist and the other projects do use Maya. 

lefix

Modo

Joopson said:

"Greater customization" is misinformation, at least compared with Maya (I can't say, for Max). They seem pretty on par with one another, which is good.

I think he wasn't talking about how customizable it is, but more about how easy to customize it is. Assigning a Hotkey is a matter of rightclicking an action in your history whereas in Max it was a tedious process where you had to to navigate through a messy list and assign it multiple times for Edit Poly & Editable poly

FourtyNights

Blender

Even though Maya is the main 3D software where I work, but I can do the modeling in Blender pretty much without restrictions. But with characters, the rigging pipeline is in Maya, so as long as I can get my model set up in Maya for the rigger, I'm good to go.

kanga

3ds Max

and ZBrush

zbrushtraining
3dsmaxtraining
and those two for commercial projects

ahtiandr

Modo

Tidal Blast said:

• Workplane

I am sorry to ruin you list as I am using modo myself but there is a workplane plugin for max
http://miauumaxscript.blogspot.fi/p/commercial-scripts.html

What I personally like in modo is that it feels very smooth while max feels more stiff. For instance I can model and unwrap at the same time. I can use my uv window to help me select faster and easier some parts. In max I always have to jump between the modifiers.

Geezus

Other (include in your reply)

Out of the ones listed, I'd have to say 3DS, but I'm in Zbrush and Painter/Designer far more. Also... XSI? lol

Gaurav Mathur

Modo

MODO's modeling and UV tools can almost get me into a flow state, where I'm just modeling and not thinking much about the interface.  The community-written scripts and plugins go a long way to keep the user experience smooth.

Other parts of the toolset seem too technical or are cumbersome, by comparison.  I wish the sculpting UI would get an overhaul.  The potential is there, but it's clunky.  And I still haven't quite wrapped my head around the Shader Tree.  

Gaurav Mathur

Modo

I find Warren Marshall's short YouTube videos wonderful both for smoothing out some of MODO's rough edges, and for discovering nifty workflows that are useful for game development:  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5dRrOarPI6ufGWsabG28FQ

dand3d

Maya

Dustin beat me to it. We use Maya as the Primary 3D program, but the studio wants the best work you can do as fast as possible.

SnowInChina

Blender

i do my modeling in blender
but still need maya for converting & export

Swizzle

Modo

I do all of my modeling, retopo, and UVs in Modo, so I chose that option. That said, all of Insomniac's tools run through Maya, so I also use it regularly to set things up for export into our engine. A few other people at work also use Modo, and several others use Max, though the vast majority use Maya for everything.

lotet

Modo

sziada

3ds Max

My one and only favourite is 3DS Max, gets me through the good times and the bad times. There is a lot of awesome modeling tools in the box. Really awesome tool if you any of you guys are also doing freelance.