Mini survey of 3d softwares used

[Krisztian Gulyas]

I think most the people got used to Max, but in the past few years there are nice alternatives coming up and our studio wants to switch to Houdini, the only thing is that we use Corona for rendering, and there is no Corona for Houdini yet, but its on the waiting/voting list on the corona forum.

(almost hidden suggestion to help us get corona developed for Houdini intended ).

 

Beside from asking for a little help, Im intrested in what do you or your studio uses on a daily basis, and is there a plan (or a discussion/testing going on) to switch to something different?

Edited April 20, 2017 by krisztiangulyas

[James Vella]

3ds max, corona. I also consider myself a houdini enthusiast (noob), I love the software - I cant see us using it for architecture at this point - reason being it would take quite some time to build the tools within houdini requireed (railclone, forest, proxy management, import cad data - its great that houdini has the inbuilt ability to do all this without plugins... but it hasnt been built specifically for archviz yet).

 

We wont be switching until the ship has sunk, too many previous projects, libraries, scripts, purchased plugins which run our entire workflow. Take 1 of them out and it wreaks havoc for deliveries.

 

Out of interest I have looked at 4 alternatives lately - Houdini, Rhino + Grasshopper, C4D + Xpresso, Blender + Archimesh. These all seem to have parametric workflow which is great with limitations for each software. I cant get all the plugins I want for C4D and I hear it cant handle scenes as large as max, Houdini is overkill for what we need (pipeline would take too long to setup/licencing is expensive compared to max), Rhino is looking good (but I want to hear more about grasshopper ...being single threaded is a concern), Blender actually looks good (when u compare features between 3ds and blender now - its amazing how far its come). Im keeping my eye on them for interest. Always interesting to see what the community think about these workflows.

Edited April 20, 2017 by redvella

[Chris MacDonald]

To echo James, we probably won't switch until we have to. If we were to then I would definitely be leaning heavily towards Modo.

[philippelamoureux]

Learned zbrush recently. So powerful once you get used to the ui. It seems archaic but it's actually very well designed. Not really suited for archviz but one could use it to create archviz assets efficiently. You can link zbrush and max via goZ and you can xfer objects between both software with 1-click and it's instant. I block out in max (low poly), 1-click to send in zbrush, sculpt details, 1-click send back to max to render if you wish.

[foxrenderfarm1]

I am still using 3ds max + Vray, so it's good for me now.

[TomD_Arch]

I'd like to place a vote AGAINST Sketchup (I prefer to call it ****up). I've been stronger-armed into using it lately because the babies I work with can't seem to wrap their heads around modeling in Max. And, since the design principle likes to pretend he's actually being productive and insists on using Fu... I mean Sketchup all the lemmings follow suit. For serious modeling and visualization it is like using crayola crayons when you could be using prisma-color pencils and markers. It's functionality follows the worst sort of grouping embedded in components crap. It's like modeling with one arm tied behind your back. Another part of the issue is said design principles thinks EVERYTHING can be fixed in Photoshop, and it should only take you a few minutes, by the way. If I could, I'd take ****up out in the alley and beat the shit out of it.

[SkylineArch]

 

I think there are two different SketchUp users. Ones who have used it for a while and know it's limitations and how to work around it's weaknesses and see it as a great tool for it's speed and accuracy in Architecture, and those who are comfortable in their current software and absolutely hate it. Most people I work with fall into the second group, however, when asked most have never used SketchUp for more than a few minutes. Same deal with Max vs Maya, the Max haters have never really used Max for an extended period of time.

 

I feel the same way about Z-Brush as people do with SketchUp. I think it's convoluted and backwards, because I probably only have 20 hours into it here and there, yet, it's an amazing piece of software once you understand it.

[Chris MacDonald]

I'd like to place a vote AGAINST Sketchup (I prefer to call it ****up). I've been stronger-armed into using it lately because the babies I work with can't seem to wrap their heads around modeling in Max. And, since the design principle likes to pretend he's actually being productive and insists on using Fu... I mean Sketchup all the lemmings follow suit. For serious modeling and visualization it is like using crayola crayons when you could be using prisma-color pencils and markers. It's functionality follows the worst sort of grouping embedded in components crap. It's like modeling with one arm tied behind your back. Another part of the issue is said design principles thinks EVERYTHING can be fixed in Photoshop, and it should only take you a few minutes, by the way. If I could, I'd take ****up out in the alley and beat the shit out of it.

 

I totally get the rage when it comes to using other people's models, but I absolutely disagree with you when it comes to making your own models in SU. It is a superb piece of software, and the speed at which you can create content is unparalleled.

[Scott Schroeder]

SketchUp can create just as clean and just as detailed models as Max. The problem isn't SketchUp, the problem is the user. Many times, the user's don't fully understand the consequences of their poor modeling techniques. It is up to you, as the exert in the office, to help educate them the cost of dealing with poor models. If you don't, then you are 50% of the problem.

[Ernest Burden III]

Speed of SketchUp? I find it terribly slow when given anything even remotely complex. I only have it to convert models.

 

So for me it's the muscle of something like Max and the easier-to-use aspect of SketchUp -- Cinema4D. I usually render with vray, but the built-in engine can do very well, too. I've been considering Octane, but GPU abilities are coming to most apps, so a future native version could do that. While I type this I see an ad (helpfully inserted into Scott's post) for Iray, which now works with C4D.

 

Cinema4D shares one other feature with SketchUp--it's 100% Autodesk free.

[Devin Johnston]

I've been using Max for about 18 years, even though I have my issues with it's slow development and the bugs that never seem to go away I can't see switching as long as Autodesk keeps it alive. For Arch Viz it gets the job done but more importantly the library of thousands of objects & materials are what will keep me using it more than anything. Any switch will slow my workflow down for probably a year or two while I learn and rework materials and objects to work with the new software. That's a lot of work I really don't want to do, if one of these newer programs were able to convert Max & Vray materials to work perfectly in their system that would be a very big positive.

[Lewis Garrison]

I use Max+Vray. However, similar to whats already been said, in my office everyone else uses Sketchup. I don't hate sketchup and in some cases I can whip up a basic starting model in sketchup quite fast. It's usually what I have to do so that the model can be shared across the office. I had to download a crap ton of extentions, add-ons and plug-ins to get Sketchup to work anything close to what I want it to.

Then when its time to render I take it into max, replace as much geometry as I can, add details and materials. Obviously it's quicker to just start in Max.