Is Blender the only good, cheap 3d modeler for Mac and Daz?
tring01
Posts: 305
Took the plunge recently. Spent the whole weekend teaching myself Hexagon on my Windows 10 desktop. I've really got th bug to keep learning 3D modeling. Now I find out Hexagon is no longer supported and does not work on the current generation of Mac OS. I want to install it on my Mac so I can work with it while on the road and my laptop is a Mac.
This is a hobby for me, so cheap is paramount. I looked at SketchUp - but the free version doesn't support .obj files. Daz has a built in bridge to Hexagon, and ZBrush, but ZBrush is $800. No thank you.
That pretty much leaves Blender - unless anyone has a better suggestion?
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That's kept up to date? Yes. There are a few other few modelers but I think except for sketchup it's been over 10 years since they were updated, forget the name, MS bought it, shutit down, and made it free. There are probably some obscure open source ones too if you search.
So Blender it is.
MayaLT is $30 a month or $240 a year. Mudbox is $10 a month but someone gossiped it is buggy and will be merged into Maya. Maya and 3DS Max can both be subscribed to monthly too I think but before paying money on a sub I'd get started in Blender and see if you urge to 3D model remains.
Look into the Free Trial of Blacksmith3D Pro. The full version is currently about $84. I don't do much of my own modeling, though.
Carrara is often on sale esp if in PC+ and has a lot of Hexagon's tools
Personally I tend to use Blender most beacuse it's an all around package for modeling, texturing, painting, animation, rendering, fx, even compositing and game making !! .. But if you look for a cheap modeler that works fine with DS I guess Hexagon could be a good choice as well.
https://www.daz3d.com/hexagon-2-5-download-version
p.s. The name that nonesuch00 can't remember is Truespace .. a great modeler back then !!
p.p.s. Sorry I didn't read your post fully and didn't know Hexagon is limited to OSX 10.6 ..
Blender is really worthwhile if you can somewhat 'get' the UI and are willing to spend a lot of time learning it.
Depends on your amount of time vs. money, basically.
Personally, I find the Blender UI incredibly frustrating and unintuitive, so I make do with Hexagon, Carrara, and other stuff in the low end.
@william when it comes to 3D I find frustrating almost everything LOL .. at the end time is needed for everything so blender is not that much exception, but I fully understand what you mean I can remember the first time when I checked it up "what the hell .. rmb for selection !!??" LOL
Actually the RMB makes sense from a modelling perspective; stops doing something by accident.
You can change the setting too if you prefer.
There is also Wings3D.
Blender isn't just a program, it's a phenomenon. With half a million downloads a month, it's crazy popular with a massive worldwide userbase in the millions. It's free and open source architecture mean that numerous talented programmers write a bewildering array of free plugins, many of which become part of the program. The free (and usually excellent) training is bountiful, there's even a free tutorial version ( https://blendersensei.com/?doing_wp_cron=1421621126.6905400753021240234375 ). There's a team working on free characters ( http://www.manuelbastioni.com/manuellab.php ). This program is going places!
If you are not learned in any 3d app, I would also toss a vote in for blender. It's pretty good, especially for the price. Only reason I don't use it is because I already spent so much time learning different programs, and do not feel like relearning all the methods of doing things. Well that, and doing so would make me feel as if I wasted a lot of money on those other programs haha
As an alternative to buying the full version of Blacksmith 3D Pro if you just want to test it out, you can get a monthly subscription for $8.95/month along with $5.95 setup fee. I think I might do that myself sometime soon; it might finally be the answer to my longstanding quest to create obscure/vintage celebrity head morphs for V4!
For years I've used Inivis AC3D. It was never expensive and it has got reasonably schmick with time (although it still has some hairs). Not sure if it is on MAC - I'm a PC guy. Over the course of about 8 years I've tried to get into Blender maybe 10 times when something was not working elsewhere. Maybe I'm dumb, dumb, dumb; but I never even got to first base. Whereas AC3D I find very intuitive, and as I use it more, the more useful I find it. I've developed a pretty good workflow for moving between DAZ (Studio and Carrara, I use both); which is mostly working with the limitations of the AC3D .obj exporter which is (arguably) substandard. I have HideousHexagon and use it when I have to - mainly for simple morphs in Studio where the Hexagon Bridge functionality is useful (to the extent Hexagon is useful) but fragile. I've learned how to manage / recover from the bridge's fragility.
AC3D has lots of modelling functionality I've never mastered because I've never needed to - the point being it looks like it is quite powerful for a de-novo modelling task.
If it helps, I've attached a .duf of a model of the interior of the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall - forget the figures in it - they are not AC3D sourced (although the wing was originally built in AC3D. This model was originally built in Vue (an utter dog of a program) and extracted with difficulty into .obj format then extensively re-worked in AC3D to fix the many modelling and texturing problems. It was then manually ported into Studio (ie Studio-element-by-Studio-element .obj imports - part of the AC3D .obj export inadequacy - but livable with) and final texturing done in Studio. As easy to use in AC3D as it is to observe in Studio, if you choose to open the .duf. To illustrate the ease of workflow, there are maybe 50 major and minor tweaks I did to this model after first loading it into Studio. Either in the studio viewports (for gross problems) or in test renders (for less obvious problems), I could identify the problem, jump into the AC3D master model, update, save the selected element .obj, re-import, re-"surface" and check in a matter of minutes (excluding the model fix times). A very easy workflow for me.
FWIW, the AC3D model is in 2 files, the roof and the base. This was mainly for ease of visibility.
Hope my comments help. Cheers, Lx
And for reference, note the comment from "timmins.william" above. My experience with blender, times 5. Again FWIW, in my career I did lots of IT and coding and clever-user stuff. If a program is "unintuitive", then something is wrong.
It's been commonly observed that CGI UI falls really loosely into two camps: CAD-based design (with lots of hotkeys and modes), and graphic artist (with more visual bells and whistles).
Going back, it's like EMACS vs. Word.
And people tend to either find CAD stuff works great for them, or find it like typing with kittens.
Everything I've heard about Blender strikes me as being in that CAD school of UI, and, well, meow meow smoosh meow smoosh rAAAR
Blender's UI is nothing like CAD, started with CAD programs and hated their rigid work structure. Tried Hexagon and hated that because it felt like a CAD program and crashed alot.
I've started my transition from Hexagon to Blender, though I will probably use both going forward. I like the Daz Bridge in Hexagon. Makes it real convenient to pop a model over and make some quick mods to it. UV mapping is kicking my butt currently. Just can't get the hang of it.
Blender users! So glad to meet you!
Can I ask a question related to texturing? In the videos I've found which mention moving models from Blender to DAZ Studio, people say you need to unwrap and create UVs--but they'll be ignored by DS and you'll have to retexture on import, so the texture images don't matter. So far I have created things in Blender that can be retextured simply by adding shaders in DS. But is it really true there is no way to make texture maps in Blender and use them in DS? If there is a way, please enlighten me; and if not, then what do you use to create useful texture maps for objects to be rendered in DS? The program doesn't really come with a wide variety of Iray shaders, and I'm tired of everything I create having to be made out of polished concrete or mahogany floorboards.
No it is not true. Blender has a 3D paint mode that can generate texture maps but is not as well developed as the rest of the program. If you use the right export options from Blender and the right import option in Studio UV mapping and textures do apply. Studio has quite a few useful Iray shaders, did you download all the Default and Essential packages that should have been in DIM?
@inkubo This is depending on what you mean for "textures". As jestmart says image mapped textures export just fine. You can use obj import/export between apps. May be collada works as well but I did't much testing at this time.
If you mean cycles materials that's another story. They will not convert to iray materials. There's nothing you can do. Then yes in general you will have to "retexture" your models. Though something can be exported in image maps by baking them.
Also I know that the lux engine is available both for Blender and DS. So I guess if you use lux materials in Blender they will be the same in DS. But again I don't know much of lux (yet).
Hi hi!
Before going with something really expensive and DRM-heavy I would try Blender, and then Blender plus Zbrush, and then when you have more of a budget, maybe Modo. At no point would I suggest or recommend Autodesk products to someone new to 3d. You're going to have to learn a lot of hotkeys to optimally use both. The good news is that if you can learn Blender and Zbrush, no other software will ever be really hard for you to pick up in terms of your learning process, lol.
You can import images to use as brushes and then use them to paint on meshes in Blender, then export the resultant textures to jpg/png/tiff for import to Daz Studio. It is irritating and counterintuitive the way it works compared to most other programs with 3d painting capacity (I still use 3d Coat for diffuse work and Zbrush for normal maps on most projects) but it is certainly possible.
The other big thing Blender has to offer is its sims. Its cloth and water do not equal MD and Realflow, but they are fully as good as what I've seen out of the Autodesk suites. And its particles are extremely good and, since you can set anything as a particle, they're versatile (great way to spray/scatter things around a scene).
Even after all this time and all the other software I've bought, Blender is still my go-to for a lot of base models, for morphs, UV mapping, for materials and group assignments, and for particle and some other physics sims.
Yes,, Blender is really amazing tool, even for real hobby user like me. One thing I often regret is,, why I do not keep learning blender, when I first found it almost 20 years before,,,,, .
then If you hope to 3d paint and bake ore generate textures for iray, I think 3d coat is very reasonable price than z brush. 3d coat is not only for painting, acutally I really enjoy make simple props with 3d coat and auto generated low poly mesh,, it work well about simple props.
3d coat PBR shader can easy bake and produce many textuers. (of course you can use blender to make retopo mesh, then sculpt more in 3d coat,, there is app link, I often use both for same product, to arrange and clean retopo mesh in blender is more easy,, but bake and paint things is more flexible in 3d coat,,)
then about shader,, though daz offer iray mixer,, but once you learn cycles nodes, it is real flexible. and easy use it. though blender is not offer mat preset, as default,.
then prodcut PBR textures which can apply easy for iray (though I need adjustment often,, but it is more easy than to set texture generate for cycles, and adjust it for iray shaders,, because there is already metalness and roughness work flow in 3d coat)
Howdy!
I've progressed to making my first models in Hexagon. Just physical objects - not characters. I find the UV mapping in Hexagon really confusing and hard to use. Not to mention that it just randomly seems to do something to my models that prevents them from taking ANY texture when I send them back to Daz. Probably me, but really frustrating. The big surprise to me was that modeling in 3d is the easy part. I watched some vids of people unwrapping and UV mapping their models. Seems to take 3 to 4 times as long as creating the model. Unbelievably tedious process. Or so it seems to me. All I'm trying to do is put a UV map on the model that will accept tiled textures. I've bought so many great ones.
I still like Hexagon for one thing. I can quickly send a model over from Daz and trim off some unwanted geometry. Maybe even create some new material zones. That's really all I can see using it for.
I'm truthfully hitting the wall trying to get a grip on UV mapping. Without being able to put a good map on models I create - well, there's no reason to create them.
Blender is really a very good modeling program. As with any new program you need to give it time. Most people that learn on one system find other UIs "difficult" because it is different than what you're used to. I had to learn Blender. I really had no choice for the work I was doing at the time. Now I did find going from the old 2.49 interface to 2.5 (we're up to 2.7) much easier and has been much better. All programs take time. The good thing about Blender is the amount of documentation or training you'll find for it which can't always be said of all programs.
You'll find good information here: https://www.daz3d.com/forums/discussion/8736/who-said-blender-was-hard/p1
I'll add to the positive comments on Blender. It's an amazingly powerful system, once you get the 'feel' of it. For learning Blender, I highly recommend Neal Hirsig's Blender 3D Design Course. It's a free video version of hisTufts University course. He begins by assuming you know nothing about Blender and works you up through modeling, texturing, rigging, animation, particle systems, and simulations. If you work at it 2-4 hours a day, expect to spend at least a couple of weeks getting through Hirsig's course. But once you have, you'll be comfortable working in Blender. You'll still find surprises, but there are lots of Blender forums and tutorials to fill the gaps.
For texturing, I highly recommend Allegorithmic's Substance Painter. It's pricey but worth the investment, especially if you buy the package that includes Substance Designer. Substance Painter's real genius is how it helps you automate wear and tear, dirt and rust, etc., and it will export DAZ-ready PBR maps for Iray rendering. You just plug the maps into the appropriate DAZ Iray channels. Substance Designer lets you create new materials that you can apply to models in Painter. Allegorithmic have an excellent suite of free tutorial videos for both programs, and the time you spend learning them will not be wasted.
I modeled this rope in Blender, textured it in Substance Painter with a material I created in Substance Designer, and rigged it in DAZ:
Enjoy learning Blender. It will be worth your time. :-)
FWIW, The Foundry shipped Modo 11.0 yesterday and rolled out a brand-new subscription package. I want to say $59/month but I may be off on that.
or $399 per year for maintenance, which leaves you with a permanent license for your current version if you stop paying. Not that it is really relevant to this thread, but just for completeness.
another plug for Carrara
for what it is worth if you rig something in Carrara with Carrara native rigging it exports rigged as DAZ collada, not general .dae, to DAZ studio often with animation)
(not import an already rigged third party FBX into it which does work in Carrara but suffers the same mess it would if imported as FBX into D|S)
Not too many programs other than Poser have any sort of rigging recognised by D|S, ( well Makehuman and a few other things can import rigged also as .dae but need fixing)
This is interesting. I know someone that does all their animations in Carrara. Hmmm...
Are you suggesting it is better/easier to create the texture in the modeling application and then export it to Daz? I hadn't thought of that work flow...
Thanks for all the info, everyone! If you are interested in the course described above, get to that site and start downloading: the site is closing on May 1.
Eeeeek, someone needs to make a mirror site, quick. oO