What kind of CG-goodies would you want for free?
polycounter lvl 18
Hello,
My wife just found out that she won´t be getting any scholarship for 2007,
and since I´m a friendly husband (unfortunately not a rich one), I´m going to try to help her in any way I can.
I figured a good way would be to combine helping her with giving back to the community I´ve been helped by so many times in the past.
An idea was born that I could create a CG resource site, with loads of goodies, for free.
I would then perhaps get a few cents from AdSense (nothing obtrusive, I hate ads as much as you) along with the occasional donation (perhaps stretching it a bit, but you never know).
Anyways, I´ve been brainstorming a bit during the day, trying to figure out what kind of goodies I could provide, that would be appreciated.
My list so far is the following:
* Tutorials (this would be a rather scarce section, as I´d be writing all the content for now)
* Photoshop brushes and possibly actions
* Textures (Seamless or just plain photos?)
* Grunge-maps
* Stencils / Alphas for mudbox/Zbrush
* High-res HDRI´s (most likely rendered until I can afford a decent camera/tripod)
Is this something that sounds viable? I´m very interested in ideas for content I haven´t thought of yet.
Best regards and all that,
Richard Wikström aka Sevenfingers
My wife just found out that she won´t be getting any scholarship for 2007,
and since I´m a friendly husband (unfortunately not a rich one), I´m going to try to help her in any way I can.
I figured a good way would be to combine helping her with giving back to the community I´ve been helped by so many times in the past.
An idea was born that I could create a CG resource site, with loads of goodies, for free.
I would then perhaps get a few cents from AdSense (nothing obtrusive, I hate ads as much as you) along with the occasional donation (perhaps stretching it a bit, but you never know).
Anyways, I´ve been brainstorming a bit during the day, trying to figure out what kind of goodies I could provide, that would be appreciated.
My list so far is the following:
* Tutorials (this would be a rather scarce section, as I´d be writing all the content for now)
* Photoshop brushes and possibly actions
* Textures (Seamless or just plain photos?)
* Grunge-maps
* Stencils / Alphas for mudbox/Zbrush
* High-res HDRI´s (most likely rendered until I can afford a decent camera/tripod)
Is this something that sounds viable? I´m very interested in ideas for content I haven´t thought of yet.
Best regards and all that,
Richard Wikström aka Sevenfingers
Replies
and honestly all that you listed would be handy, and i tend to donate to stuff i find handy.
Thanks dudes, keep ém coming.
a script for 3ds max to make an object scatter without deforming with distance control and number of copies and that could also make the object conform to face near it , wold give you a donation from me for sure
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Sorry to by-pass the main point of discussion. but I think Johnny is looking for the Advanced Painter Script for 3Ds Max.
http://www.scriptspot.com/start.asp?p=download&ID=1955
I love this little script and whore it out every chance I get.
It lets you paint scatter objects along another object. I use randomizer the most, for scattering foliage, rocks, debris, papers. The spline painting tools are nice also for painting things like ivy, vines, roots, cords and wires.
Now I return you to your regularly scheduled thread... BEEP!
So why should we go to yours? That's not me being nasty, that's the question I think you need to answer so that you provide something. I'd say try to find a niche.
The textures? Nah, there are lots of those out there. The Photoshop brushes and actions however is a much better idea. Tutorials? Meh, but the HDRIs? That's a good one.
For the ads, adsense is a great place to start. It's tracking mechanisms mean that you place ads in different areas and you can find out which ones people use. Check out problogger for more information on making some cash, but I warn you - you are unlikely to make more than your hosting costs in the first 3 months.
I have a ton of links to freebie sites for various things (brushes, actions, textures, seamlesses, hdrs, etc. etc.) but knowing which ones have good content vs crap is a real moving target. If you have a good sense of what kind of online freebies are actually worthwhile, then your portal could be valuable.
I also have to check the license restrictions on freebies, free rarely means truly free. So info about restrictions is essential for me when I grade a site's offerings.
Talking about adsense, do they pay for clicks or displays?
I think a good, easy-to-read sensible website which puts everything in one spot is a good idea. It could definately have succes if you manage to hold everything you put on there to the same standards. I can't think of one single website where i can find decent brushes, textures and actions, for instance. Maybe if you'd link it to a blog (in the vein of createdigitalmusic.com or createdigitalmotion.com) which reports on various related news-articles, you'd have something that people would check daily. A blog is also an easy way for tutorials posted on forums to reach a wider audience, and therefore a way for people from different forums to have one central spot to check.
Scripts may be a good idea, but you don't want to give people the feeling that your website is centered (how the fuck do you write this? firefox is failing me) on any one 3d-package.
Cheapalert: If I can arrange it (I have some buddies who are studying and have access to motion capture studios afaik) I will, not promising anything there though
Rick: Fair points, I´d say the reason to go to my site would be quality along with fair licensing (still looking in to this, I´d like it to be free for personal and commercial use, is creative commons something for this?).
Also, not expecting much cash from this at all, then I´d sell on turbosquid or something.
Eric: The idea from the start was original content so I could control the licensing (having it free for both personal and commercial use) But a link-section with commented/sorted links might be a good idea.
MightyPea: Yup, I´m cheering in a silly way every time I find a good brush-set. They´re rare.
I think there´s both pay per click and pay per thousand impressions (I guess that means for every 1000th visitor you get a set amount of $). I haven´t really looked in to it much yet; I figured I´d start with the content first.
Designing the site so it´s easy to overview and stuff would be a major point as well.
I´m considering ways to actually implement it, wordpress seems like a semi-viable solution. I´ll have to investigate further though.
Thanks again, I really appreciate the input!
http://creativemac.digitalmedianet.com/articles/listarticle.jsp?type=downloads