Howdy, I''ve seem Blender mentioned a few time on this board and I was wondering what everyone thinks of it. Is it powerfull enough to be used as a professional 3D package? How does it compare to other popular 3D packages (other than it''s free...). Thanks for any advice.

It doesn''t really have any useful export options, which is a problem...

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Direct3D vs. OpenGL
The sad thing about artificial intelligence is that it lacks artifice and therefore intelligence.
Democracy is where you say what you want and do what you''re told.

quote: Original post by Promit
It doesn''t really have any useful export options, which is a problem...

That is often solved through Blender''s scripting support.

Could you maybe point me to a blender exporter script(s)?

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Direct3D vs. OpenGL
The sad thing about artificial intelligence is that it lacks artifice and therefore intelligence.
Democracy is where you say what you want and do what you''re told.

quote: Original post by Promit
Could you maybe point me to a blender exporter script(s)?

The only one I personally use is for WaveFront OBJ files (both export and import). I mirrored it here a while back. I just found a number of them by searching for "blender python export script" on Google.

Ok, Obj is fine, but I don''t have the full python installation and I have no intention of d/ling it. Do I absolutely have to in order to script with python and Blender? Doesn''t blender support anything else?

-----------------------------
Direct3D vs. OpenGL
The sad thing about artificial intelligence is that it lacks artifice and therefore intelligence.
Democracy is where you say what you want and do what you''re told.

I''ve got Blender3D. But, you know, it sux rox. Its not even nearly good as 3DSM or even Milkshape or TrueSpace. Personally, I''d love some tutorials for TrueSpace, but they''re hard to come by.

TheMoriaHobbit

Drink the Dwarven Ale!

Blender has a steep learning curve, but once over that it''s very powerful, and being free helps too

The python programmers on the Blender forums are working on another script to make it import/export 3ds files, but no word yet on when it''ll be out.

Obj is easily converted to whatever you want, so really it''s no big deal.

I''ve also heard from a few people who have tried both Blender and Max, and they all said that Blender can do anything that Max can. I can''t attest to that because I''ve not used Max.
Hell, since Max is so expensive, and I''ve gotten very comfortable with Blender, I''ll just stick with Blender.
It also comes with good post production editing tools.