UBB.Developers Forums Community Development Design, Style and Graphics 3d rendering software?

Does anyone know of any free or cheap 3d rendering software? I don't have nearly enough money to buy Bryce or 3DSMax right now, and I only need a program for a quick and simple (in theory) job. So, anyone know where I can score a decent renderer that isn't gonna require my firstborn in payment? It doesn't have to have every feature under the sun, but decent looking output would be nice...

---Skorpion

lightwave? I hear it is fair...

Cool 3D

Well, I'm not sure if theres a such thing as a free one. But there is a program called Poser that I've heard of, it's an alternative for those expensive 3D programs. Poser I think is $250 about, and I think that is as cheap as they get. Unless you were to get a 3rd party program like Swift 3D, which renders 3D stuff you make into small flash files, but your options are limited with that.

You may also want to try to pick up a demo or trial version of 3D Studio Max(if there is one) or Maya (I know there is one but I'm unsure where).

There are quite some free ones available, just check the www.download.com for the graphical applications category.

Alright, I found a couple that are pretty decent and free (right after I posted that above, ironically ).

OpenFX - www.openfx.org - is an opensource 3d renderer. I haven't been able to try it cuz my hard drive had weird failure problems with zip files becoming corrupted. But it's been rated pretty highly by the site I found it from.

And Blender Creator - www.blender.nl - is something that i have been playing around with. I have no experience with other 3d progs so I wouldn't know, but apparently this has a weird non-standard gui style. But it works for me. Nifty little program, seems to have lots of options. And free. I think it's partially an engine for game graphics too, if you're into that.

---Skorpion

[ 11-04-2001: Message edited by: Skorpion ]

Skorp, i have been using a combination of Bryce & a neat program called TrueSpace from Caligari[.com]

I use TrueSpace for modeling, at which it is a much more efficiant tool than anything else i have tried (including maya, max, lightwave, 4D.)
TrueSpace is pretty cheap, however you really need to get stuck into it for a little while to produce anything spectacular [it is pretty easy to learn however, but the difference between average design & good is a year of learning.. reminds me of photoshop...]

Well, im off to post another fat block of buttons [hehe, im not the convenient type 'o guy ]

-Gwala