GMAX

EVIL

good afternoon,

I'm in a bit of a pickle at work.
I'm a concept artist, but for some quick scenes I would like to sketch up a basic model for perspective help. (saves a but-load of time, plus the model could be passed up to the 3d artist for basic proportion references)

now our company is to cheap to give me a incense of 3dsmax, and I started looking for alternatives.

I tried a few but non work like 3dsmax. but then I remembered gmax, a free version of 3dsmax for game modders.

now when looking around for it, I saw that the program is no longer supported by autodesk.

I have found a download link on turbosquid, but now the question pops up.

Is it still legal to use gmax?
since I don't want to jeopardize the office by installing illigal software.

CheeseOnToast

How about using the free version of Google Sketchup if it's just for perspective reference?

EVIL

I can't for the life of me work with sketch-up. I have gave it 4 or 5 attempts in the course of its development, but its not for me.

Tom Ellis

+1 For SketchUp.

I don't really see how you can't get on with SketchUp... if you can draw shapes in Photoshop, you can make VERY quick 3D in SketchUp. Even though I've been using Max for about 7 years, I'll still use SketchUp at work (Architecture, not games) to concept out quick geometric ideas, or for proof-of-concept stuff.

It's so quick and easy it's stupid.

EVIL

I think its mainly the camera controls, also you cant set up a camera as far as I can see. so creating some interesting angles for an interior thing is difficult.

Tom Ellis

I agree the camera controls are somewhat primitive, and limited to say the least.

Try holding the Shift key whilst using the zoom tool, IIRC that alters the FOV which should give the option for creating wider viewing angles.

JR

Why not to use Blender? It's simple to use, very well documented, has tons of tutorials on YouTube and it's free.

Mark Dygert

Is it legal, yea Autodesk passed the Gmax Torch to TurboSquid, I'm pretty sure it's all mentioned in a Autodesk Press release, or on the TubroSquid Gmax Page, if not it should be on the wikipeida page for Gmax. Autodesk dropped support for it but they never killed it and tried to wipe it off the face of the earth.

It's 3dsmax 4 without rendering so I don't know how much will be familiar to you or useful. There is no hardware viewport rendering and getting files out is a bit of a pain because they restricted the file formats it outputs. But there are a few gateway formats and plug-ins that eventually lead you to an .obj you can import into other apps.

I second sketchup, I hope and pray they improve the navigation and camera controls, C22 brings up a good tip thanks for that! And if you use it enough, you do get used to it.

oglu

maybe give the softimage mod tool a try...
http://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet/pc/item?id=13571257&siteID=123112

r_fletch_r

I wouldnt really recommend blender the lack of ngon support can make architectural modelling messier than it should be. you could use sketchup to model and drop it into blender to get camera control.

pior

I'd say Silo!

Snowfly

fletch - if it's just perspective reference you shouldn't have to bother with ngons. intersecting primitives is all you need. Sketchup and Silo don't really cut it for me in the blockout department, because of the lack of cameras. +1 for Blender 2.5 if you'd also like to render out shadows and AO in addition to the perspective blockout.

daphz

I agree with Blender3d! once you get used to the interface it's pretty intuitive

r_fletch_r

Snowfly wrote: »

fletch - if it's just perspective reference you shouldn't have to bother with ngons. intersecting primitives is all you need. Sketchup and Silo don't really cut it for me in the blockout department, because of the lack of cameras. +1 for Blender 2.5 if you'd also like to render out shadows and AO in addition to the perspective blockout.

Noted, i had it in my head that the modeling would be more complex.

EVIL

hmm, one more downside to sketchup, to export to 3ds format, you need to have the pro version wich is 500 dollars

Snowfly

When you save a Google Earth .kmz from the free version, you can rename the extension to .zip and extract your model. I think it's a collada .dae. That's an old trick though, hopefully it still works.

renderhjs

just interesting to know:
sketchup is opening more and more for scripting:

• Google I/O 2008 - Advanced Ruby Scripting for Sketchup
  [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FALvwBN5-hc[/ame]
  even a scripted 3d game within skechup
  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FALvwBN5-hc&feature=player_detailpage#t=1300s
• Ruby Scripts for Sketchup official site
  http://sketchup.google.com/intl/en/download/rubyscripts.html
• Scriptspot section with already written scripts
  http://www.scriptspot.com/sketchup/scripts

I think thats extremely sexy, I already tossed the idea of using sketchup at my workplace as it might bring designers and developers closer.


edit more official resources for the scripting:
API site: http://code.google.com/apis/sketchup/
API blog: http://sketchupapi.blogspot.com/
Ruby user group: http://groups.google.com/group/sketchup-Pro-Groups