Which should I pick up?

Blender is obviously the most appealing being open source. But I absolutely hate its interface and find it counter intuitive at times, but that's just me.

I have some experience with 3DS Max and I like its interface. I won't say that I'm skilled at all since I've only dabbed into it. Big plus is the interface, but the price tag even with educational discounts is killer.

I also heard Cinema4D is good, and it comes with Body Paint 3D. Never tried this one though I could always get the trial. Plus it's cheaper for C4D Studio as a student from Studica.

Now I guess my question is whether or not Blender and Cinema4D can size up to 3DS Max or if 3DS Max is really worth the money? How many people use Blender as their main modeling tool or do any professional dev studios use it? I feel like I won't adjust to the interface of either 2.49 or 2.56a but I've only used it a few times. And does it offer as many modeling tools as the other two professional programs?

Like picking an instrument - whichever 'fits' you best*. Never, ever, chose a tool because "everyone else is using it!" or "that's how pros do it" - sure, sometimes the job will require you to use Maya. Sometimes Max.
...and sometimes it will be some obscure tool you never heard off. Point being don't worry about which tool makes sense to others - worry about which tool makes sense to you.
*with the added proviso that sometimes the instrument you chose has a hefty price tag you just can't buy into. At such times it's best to pick whichever feels closest to that - and pray that everything else doesn't also carry a hefty price tag

Which should I pick up?

Blender is obviously the most appealing being open source. But I absolutely hate its interface and find it counter intuitive at times, but that's just me.

I have some experience with 3DS Max and I like its interface. I won't say that I'm skilled at all since I've only dabbed into it. Big plus is the interface, but the price tag even with educational discounts is killer.

I also heard Cinema4D is good, and it comes with Body Paint 3D. Never tried this one though I could always get the trial. Plus it's cheaper for C4D Studio as a student from Studica.

Now I guess my question is whether or not Blender and Cinema4D can size up to 3DS Max or if 3DS Max is really worth the money? How many people use Blender as their main modeling tool or do any professional dev studios use it? I feel like I won't adjust to the interface of either 2.49 or 2.56a but I've only used it a few times. And does it offer as many modeling tools as the other two professional programs?

Blender used to be the in-house 3d tool for the dutch animation studio NeoGeo, it was later commercialized through the company NaN, when it closed down in 2002 the Blender Foundation bought all rights to the blender code and re-released it under the GPL. it is most definitly a very capable tool, the unconventional UI however takes some time getting used to, It was used in the production of the 2004 movie Spiderman 2 (only for animatics though) and it has been used for quite many TV productions.

3dsmax is in my opinion not worth its cost for the average indie developer, it does offer some productivity advantages but for game models there really isn't anything you can do with 3dsmax that you can't do with Blender and its unlikely that you'll spend so much time working on your models that the productivity gains you'd get from a more expensive tool would be worth the cost. (If you are going to make pre-rendered movies for cutscenes etc the more advanced rendering and postprocessing system 3dsmax offers may have an impact on the end result though)

If you dislike the Blender UI you could also look at other tools such as truespace, Milkshape3D, etc , there are plenty of cheap 3D modelling tools out there that have a more traditional user interface. (Most of them are less capable than Blender but depending on your needs they might still be more suitable for you)

Blender is obviously the most appealing being open source. But I absolutely hate its interface and find it counter intuitive at times, but that's just me.

'Open Source' isn't a useful program feature. It's what a program uses to describe itself when it has no interesting features to speak of.

Now I guess my question is whether or not Blender and Cinema4D can size up to 3DS Max or if 3DS Max is really worth the money?[/quote]3D modeling is the same regardless of the package. The tools or modifiers may have different names, but the same skill set is applied regardless.

Blender 2.5x works fine for most things. I'm not sure what's tripping you up in that interface? There is a button for every command on the screen now, and the G,S,R,E key modeling is smooth and easy.

Watch some B25 tutorial videos on www.BlenderCookie.com and you'll come to understand how it works.


If all you want to do is basic modeling and rendering, Blender will get you far. 3DS Max is great if you want to get a job with a company that uses it, but other than that, for personal projects, it can also be overkill.

I personally use blender because it's free, open source, and highly diverse. However, I really don't like the hotkey based interface since I always forget the hot keys and end up spending up to an hour searching the web to find them. Personally I really liked the interface in Silo. However, it is limited to mostly just modeling and does not have some advanced features that blender has.

I personally use blender because it's free, open source, and highly diverse. However, I really don't like the hotkey based interface since I always forget the hot keys and end up spending up to an hour searching the web to find them.

The theory behind the hotkey based UI is that after learning the keys, which of course requires intensive use, an expert user can work much more efficiently than with a mouse-based interface that doesn't offer anything to learn.
While still learning, it is advisable to write down and keep at hand lists and cheatsheets of hotkeys, which is much more cost-effective than discovering a command and forgetting it again without progress.

The theory behind the hotkey based UI is that after learning the keys, which of course requires intensive use, an expert user can work much more efficiently than with a mouse-based interface that doesn't offer anything to learn.
While still learning, it is advisable to write down and keep at hand lists and cheatsheets of hotkeys, which is much more cost-effective than discovering a command and forgetting it again without progress.

Everything in Blender 2.5+ has a clickable button. G,S,R,E are the only hotkeys you need to remember and use on a regular basis. You can use the gizmos instead of GSR, but it's a lot easier just to use the hotkeys. The hotkeys for other commands are labelled on all the pop ups menus, and you can always press space and type any command you are looking for, which will bring up the command name and the associated hotkey, if there is one.

Hotkeys in Blender 2.5 are like in every other computer program. They are there if you want to use them to speed up your workflow, but not required.

http://www.blendercookie.com/getting-started-with-blender/

Well at this point I'm probably going to use Blender :x Free ftw

I guess I just have to get used to the interface and hotkeys

Wait actually, I have how another question. Blender can also be used to rig and animate models right? I plan to work with UDK a little bit so I want to know if it's viable to use only blender.

It takes a little bit getting used to it, and the texturing tools are definitely lacking, but Deled is a fun one to poke around with for low-poly stuff.

I have always used 3DS Max, I'm just more used to it. I think the 2008 version is $139.99. It's a really complete tool with ok stuff for texturing. But then again, blender is free. I have seen people do ok thing for most garage games with blender.