I'm trying to create models for my strategy RPG and I was thinking simple models would suffice.

I was hoping to make minecraft like models (but have the models have knees and elbows) and carrying their weapons.

Is there an easy to use program for a non-digital artist to use to make the body, animate the frames, and paint skins?

I've tried blender but I could never get the bones to work right.

Thanks!

Honestly, if you want free, I recommend you keep at figuring Blender out. It doesn't get better for free, and later, when you want more complex models, you will be grateful to have learned what you did.

I honestly don't know of anything better than Blender for free. There are some easier programs, but they tend to be lacking, some in important areas. Some are missing things you want, like any method of animation, and going by what you specified you want, Blender is the only one that does all of it. It can make the models, animate them, and even "paint skins." There is nothing else that does all of this for free, though you can find a paid program(or two) that does it.

If you have trouble with Blender, you can always try again, and post on forums, either here, but probably better on dedicated Blender forums, to help overcome the problems. I'm no expert, but if you want to PM me, I may be able to help as well.

Honestly, if you want free, I recommend you keep at figuring Blender out. It doesn't get better for free, and later, when you want more complex models, you will be grateful to have learned what you did.

I honestly don't know of anything better than Blender for free. There are some easier programs, but they tend to be lacking, some in important areas. Some are missing things you want, like any method of animation, and going by what you specified you want, Blender is the only one that does all of it. It can make the models, animate them, and even "paint skins." There is nothing else that does all of this for free, though you can find a paid program(or two) that does it.

If you have trouble with Blender, you can always try again, and post on forums, either here, but probably better on dedicated Blender forums, to help overcome the problems. I'm no expert, but if you want to PM me, I may be able to help as well.

Well I discovered MagicaVoxel and while voxel art is not for everyone it helps me create models and it's something I have the patience to use.

Now I can export the .VOX file as an .OBJ to animate it and I can do that with Blender or perhaps I can find an application for that purpose as well.

Another question I have is there a way to export .VOX files into a .PNG? I would like to create isometric tiles using MV but than taking screenshots I don't see how that would be possible. Is there an app that takes a .VOX in and outputs an image format?

Thanks.

EDIT or is there a library that can add .VOX support to Game Maker or other C/C++ apps?

Is there an easy to use program for a non-digital artist to use to make the body, animate the frames, and paint skins?

No there isn't. Most of the software that can make quick and easy to use assets either produce such noisy and bad results, that you spend days cleaning it up to use, or they use already made models and animations, only combining them in different order and is nothing more than a game character creator.

Another question I have is there a way to export .VOX files into a .PNG? I would like to create isometric tiles using MV but than taking screenshots I don't see how that would be possible. Is there an app that takes a .VOX in and outputs an image format?

Yes, however it is redundant.

First is the most common way of doing it: you store the xy position in the image xy and the color in the rgb channels the Z axis is stored in different images.

This is a 16*16*4 voxel map.

The problem is that soon you have hundreds of textures just to represent a small size world, for a normal size chunk you would need 64 images of 64*64, your world will be thousands of these chunks. This is hard to edit and large in size as images can be large.

The most efficient way of storing voxels in image us to use the rgb channels to store xyz axis and the alpha as a code for the texture or color.

So a pixel in a image with R5 G2 B1 and A 16 is a voxel at point X5 Y2 Z1 and with color or texture 16.

The problem with this is it's hard to edit and that the position of each voxel will have to be relative to a chunk because as standard you will only be allowed to enter a value of 0-255.

And again images can be large on a disk.

The best way to store voxels is in a text: Voxel(Position(X,Y,Z) Color(X,Y,Z))

Images have 3 color channels, a alpha channel and a XY axis, the limit of the channels is determent by the image bit size, you can use these any way you want to store data.

There are 3D images made by people using voxels however they can't be opened in a 2D image editor and need special software to use them; they are mostly text files anyway so just make your own.