Maya 2012? (Modelling not the apocalypse)

What would be the best overall modelling software wich is usualy mostly compatible? I honestly am not a fan of Blender because I can't understand anything at all in it. Are there some easy tutorials from where I can get started on how to model pretty fast?

Well any of the Big 3 (Maya, Studio Max and XSI) is a good start, chances are thought you'd be best off with Max, it tends to be the most used when it comes to gaming, would like to hear form Uber about their software thought.

Mike

Studio Max as in Autodesk?

Studio Max as in 3D Studio Max, I don't refer to them by who owns them, just gets confusing ;p

Mike

Yeah, considering Maya is now owned by Autodesk too...

On the plus side, a LOT of the 'learning' is platform agnostic - I mean, polygons are polygons are points in space with UV coordinates etc. Learning one platform does not lock you in to that platform permanently.

I prefer 3dsmax but that's just 'cause it's what I'm comfortable with.

3DS Max and Autodesk Maya are both industry standard. From what I've read (mind I've only used Maya), 3DS Max is more suited for environment modeling while Maya is better for characters.

Edit: These guys do good tutorials for pretty much any 3D relevant software. http://www.digitaltutors.com/11/index.php

Both work great and its mostly studio and personal preference. FBX and OBJ formats are great to go between any 3D program so it doesn't really matter. Depending on the task, I'll go between 3DSMAX (lowpoly and hard surface modeling), 3D Coat (retopo work), zBrush (scultping, detail work), xNormal (Normal map, AO extraction work) all using OBJ format.

Thanks Eka!

I forgot about Zbrush, been so long since I used it, I've focused more on the Hard Surface modeling. xD Never quite had the "Artistic Talent" for a program like Zbrush, or just drawing in general.

Mike

A lot of people say that Max is used most in gaming, but honestly it depends. Some game companies use Max, some use Maya. I think Maya's more flexible in what you can do and where it's used, but you have to remember that they're both very expensive pieces of commercial software. You can get them for free from autodesk if you're a student, but you can't use them to produce commercial work.

As far as sharing files - You can export objects and assest between software, but scene files and the like tend to be proprietary. Also, different versions of Maya usually don't play nice with each other. I made something in Maya 2013 and tried to open it in Maya 2012 and it would not read correctly. It was missing a bunch of geometry, gave me a bunch of errors, etc. Your best bet right now is Maya 2012, but maybe I'm being biased since that's what I'm using

Does this mean we should expect PA to import/use .obj models for modding? This would greatly simplify things, though I have personally found .obj format doesn't store normals in an easily smoothed way (something I found with a renderer I built for a school project).

Back in the TA days we used Rhino. Dunno what is the cheapest/most modding friendly one nowadays. Maybe Blender?

Can't get much cheaper than Blender. lol.

That's probably because you went from Maya 2013 to Maya 2012, instead of the other way around. No serial program does well when porting to previous versions, unless specified, like when Adobe products ask to what kind of file type you want to save.