3D Modelling Software Comparison

Ok so I figured I'd do a post about something other than my Uni life.

So I will compair (in my opinion) a few 3D modelling applications that I have used, listing pros and cons.

Maya:

Made by Autodesk (who will soon own everything) this is the industry standard for movies.

Pros:

-Powerful

-Lots of capabilities

Cons:

-Learning curve is a cliff

-User Interface indecipherable

Cinema4D:

Made by Maxon, this program doesn't get the credit it deserves, it is both versatile and with every update gets more and more features.

Pros:

-Easy to understand Interface

-Pretty decent capabilities

Cons:

-Lacks higher end functions

-Due to obscurity, lacks file support in other applications.

3D Studio Max:

Also owned by Autodesk, this is the industry standard for games.

Pros:

-Good workflow

-User Friendly

Cons:

-Still very confusing User Interface

-Not available on Mac

Blender3D

Open Source from the Blender Foundation, free for all.

Pros:

-Free

-Lots of high end capabilities

Cons:

-User interface unlike any other 3d program in existence

-Another learning cliff

SketchUp

A Google Owned 3D program, also free for the basic version.

Pros:

-Easy as hell to use

-Comes with good starting tutorials

Cons:

-Completely Lacks high end features

-Irritating at times with limitation in creating shapes.

Well I hope someone found this interesting, maybe later I'll do some reviews of other types of 3D applications.

Peace out.

Why the diiiick

So I am total fail at thinking of an idea for my next animation assignment.

I want to do something in 1st person so I can be a bit different, but it needs something more animated in it and to be more than a floating camera.

I'm thinking of doing people getting ready to go scuba diving IE doing a buddy check, which has a lot of potential for lots of external animation, along with being something im familiar with, having scuba dived myself.

Then there is multimedia, i ned to make a website and upload a podcast and a video (other assignments, one of which i have done) and i have to write an essay on something about art and technology then finally a soundscape which will be the sound to my animation, so i dont have toooooooo much to do but i have a fair amount for 3 weeks.....shit

so the moral of this story is if you want to do animation at Uni, have lots of time to do work in, or

DO IT EARLIER YOU LAZY FUCK

FIIINALY

Massive Essay done....not massive actually...1500 words.....big for me though. give me a break im an art student gee

anywho also I submitted my 3 "photorealistic" renders in Maya for another assessment (tis the season)

why not have a looksy? Well you already did considering they're up there, but meh

so what does the internet think?

umm also if they seem thin and cut off, thats only because they are, open them in another tab to view them in full on glory.

More MPI in the new semester...

So now I have to make a 1 minute podcast about some new and up coming technology, so I'm gonna do the sixth Sense technology that was unveiled at TED in 2009, quite an awesome piece of technology. Here is the draft script for my podcast:

These days everyone wants the latest technological marvel. The newest smart phone or the best laptop, your portable electronic devices define you as much as does your clothes or choice of deodorant.

But, when you think about it, going beyond the fashion statement so obviously made by these pieces of plastic, what are we really paying lots….and lots, of money for? What do we get out of it? Connectivity, and information, and the ever more seamless access to the two. Devices are gearing towards more and more intuitive connection between user and device, trying to blur the line between them. A perfect device would be one we don’t even know we are using. Such a thing almost exists. At TED India in 2009, one of the Technology, Entertainment, Design conferences, Pranav Mistry revealed his brainchild known as Sixth Sense Technology. Imagine you’re on holiday in some distant country; you want to take a picture of something? Just make the classic framing gesture with your thumbs and forefingers and it’s done. Want to know what that sign says? The English translation appears beneath it and you’re on your way. You’re in a coffee shop with your travelling companions and want to decide what to do next, so a map of the local area with points of interest appears on the table, you flick through the weather reports, touch a landmark and more information appears before you.

All this and more is possible with Sixth Sense. All you have is a small projector and camera hanging from your neck or on your hat. The camera recognises your gestures and your surroundings, and the projector gives you the information you desire, from your “desktop”, now available anywhere, to anything you can imagine.

sadly i read this out at a fast pace and it went for 1:30 so I have to trim it.

The Big Bad Final Blog Entry...or is it?!

Over the course of my MPI104 subject, i have learnt many things; some new, some old, but all useful in one way or another.

To begin with, the basics:

Del.icio.us, Flickr, and Blogger. Three sites of similar purpose yet different content. Blogger is for uploading and sharing words, prose, and thoughts. Flicker is for exchanging and global viewing of each others images, videos and sights. Finally Delicious is for charing and showing where we have been and where we go on the internet, a world of its own, when seen in a certain light. You might say that Blogger, Flickr and Delicious are a portal for showing what we think, what we see, and what we are respectively.

Then Google, and its manny, many facets, from Gmail to iGoogle, Google docs and maps, books, music, videos, calendars, games, you name it. Another interesting medium which we didn't go into in class is GoogleWave, an interesting realtime message board style system free for all to use at the same time. It is new and will probably be changed in the future, but is none the less interesting in its execution, check it out.

Athene, and with it HTML, CSS, FTP to name a few of the (sometimes confusing IMHO) acronyms. This was not entirely new to me, but it was good to be refreshed with some HTML coding which I had long ago forgotten. CSS is clearly superior to HTML if you know how to use it, and finally learning about simple FTP processes was a blessing, as I have greatly enjoyed making my own website.

And this brings me to iWeb, which I greatly appreciate as one of the most easy to use, straight forward, simple HTML website building program, other than simply using Word.

With small touches on Tecnorati and other online systems, this subject has taught me much and I will no doubt put much of it to use in the future.

MOAR INTERTUBES!!

FTP

WSFPT

Basically it lets you upload files onto a remote internet server; transferring files from one spot to another, using magic.

This allows you to avoid the issues of different Operating systems or file names as both ends of the connection are under different controls and codes......again with magic.

It has a downside of the fact that if anyone is monitoring the transfer, they can read the information being sent, as it is unencrypted.

Sadly I am very tired today so I wont have a large tirade about it all, but I will say I am very excited about using it.

My pic is Encyclopedia Dramaticas' take on the internet....well part of it.

"Symbols are given their power by people. Why, with enough people, blowing up a building could change the world."

CSSSSSSSsssssss............

Yesssssss

CSS is an extremely useful form of web page formatting.

It is basically a way of telling a large amount of web pages how to look, so that when you enter information for a new page on your extensive website, you don't have to re-code the whole thing over again to make it look the same, you merely have to "call" back to your CSS sheet.

This has great advantage over the normal HTML formatting, as you can see.

For instance, this site, blogger, uses CSS so that when you make several blog posts, all their pages look the same, and when you want to edit what they look like, you only have to edit one pice of code to effect the whole lot. you can change fonts, colours and set up to suit your needs.

The short comings of this system is that you cant have one blog post looking different to another, for visual reasons or otherwise.

Accessibility is very important, as it allows the blind or sight impaired to have words read to them, or have fonts larger so that they may read them with greater ease.

Things i have done to my blog with CSS editing:

changed colours and font, also editing margins and the like, giving my page greater (though minimal) space.

Todays picture is what Encyclopedia Dramatica has to say about CSS

"Never compromise, even in the face of armageddon."

It's time for my....

DIRTY GREAT LARGE ASSED ASSESSMENT BLOG POST!!!!

That's right boys and girls, here it is:

Though out this subject, I have learnt to use and abuse certain parts of the great mish mash that is the internet, namely Blogger (this site and blog) Flicker (mine is here) Del.icio.us, (here for me) and minor forays into HTML coding and such, which isn't covered in this part of this subject.

Still with me?

Good.

My blogger account has a total of 9 blog posts, with my favourite (or more interesting) here, here and here, in no particular order. Aesthetically I've done little with my blog, being the minimalist that I am, though I have uploaded a picture with every post that I could. As for commenting on other peoples blogs, I have and did, but they have disappeared on one of the blogs when they changed their layout, and it won't let me comment any more. And the only other classmate I could find has only posted one blog update, so I've commented on that here. I know we're meant to comment on more than one, but I did and it disappeared, and I've tried to find others but I don't understand what the hell bloggers system is, I click on one of my followers and I won't let me view their blog -.- so yeah, one comment. The tags I have been using have been minimal, along the lines of MPI104, and maybe something to do with my post, gas, alone etc etc though I sometimes did forget since the tags (or labels as blogger calls them) is so easy to miss when you've been typing in this box for so long. Beyond all that I havent done much on blogger, I've placed a quote of interest at the end of every post though, so yay me.

Del.icio.us is a new concept for me; a site for bookmarking sites...didn't think much of it at first, but I have now learnt how it can come in handy for people, though I myself haven't had cause to use it, I generally memorise the web pages I frequent. Anyway, I have bookmarked 8 sites on my Del.icio.us account, all of which interest me for different reasons; I use them, they have my content in them, they are funny or informative etc etc. My 3 favourite links would have to be this, for its humour and irreverence, this because it contains almost all my note worthy artwork in this world, and this because it is so much better than the normal forums supplied by CSU, making the animation degree that much easier.

And finally Flickr, the site for the uploading and sharing of pictures. Much like deviantArt which I use often, Flickr is less artistically themed, making it more of a plain old "you see what I see" site, which is not a bad thing, just not perhaps very inspired. I have a grand total of 14 images uploaded and one video, none of which are photos as I don't have a camera of any description. My favourite images would be this, this and this. Ill let you figure out why.

And I believe that wraps up this monstrous blog post, I hope it pleases and satisfies.

"What the eye sees is a reflection of what the mind comprehends."

TUMBLE WEEDS

I GET BACK TO UNI AND ALL I SEE IS TUMBLE WEEDS LIKE BIG CONFORMIST SNOWFLAKES IN DRIFTS UPTO OVER 2 METRES DEEP!!!

What the hell? Seriously.

Todays pic, some advise about plants and sex.

"The only stupid question is the one not asked."

iPad

I know what you're thinking!

But really, I've been thinking of how useful one would be in my personal Uni life, as I don't need a laptop but could use something to keep my notes, timetables, tasks, projects, not to mention playing fun ass games during vis101 lectures if they got too boring. I thought the iPad would fill this niche nicely.

But aside from the usual Apple bashing a Mac user (such as myself) comes across on a daily basis, there were many qualms about the iPad which carried weight for me;

Lack of flash support, a sad truth, but undoubtedly someone out there will make an app fixing this, if apple itself doesn't release an update with flash support.

Lack of a headphone jack. A comeplete lie, it has one.

Lack of USB support, only half true. Although the iPad itself does not have a USB port, the dock with which it connects to other computers connects to the ipads built in 30-pin socket, which in turn connects to the host computers USB port. And if that isn't to your taste, then the good old 30-pin socket to USB port adapter should do just fine.

Those were my major problems with it, with minor ones been the lack of a built in camera, or iSight, etc etc.

So after making an in depth investigation into the iPad on the apple site, looking over its many features, I am now even more sure that it is a piece of technology that I not only want, but actually could make great use of.



Sorry for the lack of a picture this time, I'm posting off of my girlfriends laptop, so no great lol folder :(



"Hate not the weak or stupid, they are products of their history, not of choice."

4 Days Alone

Well it's been interesting, I'll say that.

I've spoken little, save on the phone to various peoples, which is rare, and even rarer to my neighbours.

I've sadly got little work done; a little here and there on my HTML site, not much though. Lots of required reading for VIS101, and a minor rotoscoping test for VFX101.

Eating, drinking (liver is getting a good rest too btw) and watching MASH all day everyday, burning some movies to watch, but otherwise very quiet. I like it. Solitude has been very enjoyable, and still no sign of anyone else returning, probably be back tomorrow though.

I should note I'm not entirely alone, I have the fish I'm caring for of course.

But I shall be brief with this post.

This posts pic is my own creation, after watching "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" I was inspired to make this for use on the net...you might know where.

"I'd rather live one day as a lion than one -thousand years as a lamb."

GAS!

I have to talk to my RA, as my room, which resides above the hot water system....the gas hot water system, and if I leave the window open all day, which I do like doing, what with the limited amount of fresh air in New Res and all, my room ends up smelling of nothing but gas, which I am not privy to falling asleep in. Hopefully it's just a superficial leak that can be fixed, instead of normal running, meaning it won't change.

So it's been a few days since I last posted and what has changed?

Well I've done work towards my other subjects, read a lot of BS on art, made a slideshow about said BS. I've done a lot of cleaning downstairs in my dorm, specifically sweeping. I made (and ate) banana bread out of the bananas someone left behind, they were about to spoil. Good eating. And I'm almost completely better from whatever chest/throat infection has ailed me for the duration of the holidays so far.

So my easter alone, without chocolate, but not unhappy, restful and fulfilling, though I do miss certain someones.

Anyway, M.A.S.H is on all day everyday, so there is never nothing to watch. Great old show that one.

Verily this verbiage veers most verbose, could be the gas o.O

So I will sign off once again, after telling you about this blogs picture: It's awesome.

"Artists use lies to tell the truth. Politicians use them to cover it up."

About time for another....

YES!

Thought it was about time to make another blog entry, seeing as how much we're meant to do for this subject is a bi on the heavy side (at least for blogging, I mean come on, I personally hate blogs)

Anyway, first term just finished, and almost everyone has gone home, there is only me and 2 other people in my dorm built for 20, and I think one of them is going home today o.O

So I get almost complete use of the kitchen, which anyone in New Res will know, is awesome! But I am also sick, I can barely talk, my throat is all sore and blocked, so I'm quite quiet. But that's ok, means I get lots of work done.

And what work?

Well.

Tutorial Paper for VIS101

Do some essay practise for VIS101

Work out how to rotoscope and such for VFX101, maybe draw up a kind of story board for it too.

Try to finish a Zelda game or 2

Continue blogging, deliciousing and flickring.

Get better.

Feed myself

Go to that Wedding

Go to visit girlfriend (long distance relationships are hard.)

That about sums it up I guess.

I'm sorry to say that for the most part I think I will be uploading funny photos everywhere, because I have over 400 of them on my computer here :D

So this blogs one, is a bit of a brain teaser, try it out.

"Life's a bitch? Bend it over a table!"

Another Week....

MOAR INTERNETS!!

Wow, so much to do. Good thing I already did it when I was bored one day.......
anyway my del.icio.us acount:
http://delicious.com/arcanis.lupus
and my Flickr:
http://www.flickr.com/people/arcanislupus/

Del.icio.us:
An interesting site, which at first glance appears to me as useless and pointless, but have read into it more I can see how it would be useful, what with being able to have all your links with you where ever you go. Usually I would remember all the URL's that I use on a regular basis, but I'm sure that is not fail safe.

Flickr:
A site for the uploading and sharing of images and video. Not one of a kind, but as with everything brings it's own flare to the scene, in this case NOT LETTING ME UPLOAD ANYTHING FOR SOME REASON!!!! Anyway it could be because I'm on a MAC or something....anyway I'll sort it out im Sure.


"If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them. "

For shits and giggles....

Go here and learn them:

http://rulesoftheinternet.com/index.php5?title=Main_Page

"It doesn't have to work, it just has to look like its works."

Blogs, and why they will destroy the world.

Don't Do It!

Blogs have lead, slowly, from telling people about what you're doing over seas, something legitimately interesting, to a large exchange of anonymous opinions (a bad move, see picture) to allowing anyone to write anything, the worst of which is fan-fictions, or fan-fics. The worst of which is described here:

My Immortal - Encyclopedia Dramatica

Seriously, read the damn thing, or try to, see how far you get before your brain melts and you die a little inside.

But I digest.

Bloggers have to accept that they are not important, and the world can keep on turning.

"It wouldn't hurt to think like a serial killer every now and then."

First in, too much time.

Well, this is what I get for wasting my time surfing the net....though I guess going on the subject outline wasn't really a waste, since I now know I need one of these blog things.

Truth be told, I've always disliked bloggers.

But I must do what I must do, so I'm off to make a del.icio.us account, and maybe if I have time a flikr one too.

Lets just hope that I don't have to start over due to a technicality.

"If you have a reputation for subtlety, it pays to be obvious."