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Old 12th December 2009, 12:47 AM   #1
Evan
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Default A few questions before purchasing

Hello all. I was hoping to get a few questions answered before I decide whether or not to purchase AC3D.

Here's my current situation: I'm working on a project by myself. I'd like to be able to create some basic art (3d models/textures) with which to fill my game. The quality of art I'd like to be able to produce is what you would call "programmers art" (so nothing fancy). I've been using Wings 3d for a bit, and have enjoyed the ease of use it offers. But now, I'm looking for something with a bit more power/features that won't break my 100$ budget and won't sacrifice to much ease of use (thus the reason I don't use blender, it isn't easy to use and I don't have time to learn it). I've tried out AC3D's demo, and it certainly has more features than Wings 3d. It was a bit harder for me to work with it, although this is probably due to I'm not used to the interface. Anyways, I would appreciate anyone's opinions on whether or not AC3D would be a worth while buy in the case of someone like myself. And my second question, how long is AC3D's learning curve?

Thanks
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Old 12th December 2009, 05:41 PM   #2
tbd
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Default Re: A few questions before purchasing

The learning curve are very very individual from person to person, so that is not possible to answer. That said, I think Ac3d are very easy to get a grip on. Its also surprisingly powerful. If you take a look at the gallery on this site you will see what can be done with Ac3d. So you can say I like it
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Old 13th December 2009, 06:41 PM   #3
Dennis
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Default Re: A few questions before purchasing

I've personally found AC3D one of the easiest 3D modelers to learn/use.

Also, if you're a programmer, you can easily create your own plugins and custom exporters/importers. The SDK allows you to do nearly anything the engine supports. You also might appreciate being able to add your own properties to AC3D objects (as text), which can be handy for custom game models.
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Old 14th December 2009, 05:14 PM   #4
lisa
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Default Re: A few questions before purchasing

Ditto on what Dennis said.

I originally bought AC3D for the same purpose as you--to create art for games. I've been enormously happy with it. It's a surprisingly capable modeler, and the plug-in architecture makes it quite extensible.

The TCP\IP slave\batch mode is perhaps the one feature that really puts it over the top for me, especially for creating arts for games as it lets me easily integrate automated art tasks--like collision geometry generation--into the nightly build. I'm not aware of too many, if any, other modelers in a similar price range that support this feature.
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Old 16th December 2009, 05:52 AM   #5
coldby
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Default Re: A few questions before purchasing

In addition to the above (which I share entirely), it should be mentioned that, unlike most 3D software, AC3D is extremely straightforward and you can understand (well, nearly) always what it does and why it did it like that.
Not a minor asset, take my word for it ;-)
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