Hey, I'm a 3D Artist trained in animation in various programs including Modo, Maya, Cinema 4D, Mari, Mudbox, Zbrush, and others. If anyone has any questions, I'm willing to provide resources for people interested in this area.
Hello @A_aronical and thanks for posting on the Microcenter Community Forum. Thanks for being open to sharing resources and tools with the community for those interested in 3D animation. I would be interested to know. For a beginning 3D animator who is just starting out, what free 3D animation software and tutorial sites would you recommend to download and install to learn 3D Animation?
As far as free things go. Blender is the biggest free animation software, and it's pretty competitive with the big-name software. Even when I was learning Maya, it had features that weren't in that version of Maya as a default, despite Maya being the industry standard in many companies.
As for resources; you can't beat the main website:
There are great tutorials by Blender Guru, Grant Abbit, Blender Guru, and Yansculpts on youtube.
Also, if you're ever interested in preparing for the industry-standard in sculpting tools aka Pixologic's Zbrush; they have software known as Zbrush Core Mini (Previously Sculptris), but for most people, Blender's sculpting tools are just as good in the right hands.
And if you cannot afford some form of Photoshop (especially with its shift to a monthly subscription) then Gimp is a long-time alternative that complements Blenders texture tools.
Blender has some editing tools as well, but the free version of Davinci Resolve is a good start for many.
I would love to, but my posts don't seem to be going through. Perhaps I am mentioning some software or links that the system doesn't like, and it's auto-deleting my posts?
Sorry about that, something got caught by our spam filter, got that fixed.
Thanks for the fix. So I'm going to avoid links just in case, but the best free stuff that a lot of people use includes:
3D Modeling, Sculpting, Animation, Texturing, and Editing:
Blender - So good it competes with professional costly software and even had features missing from Maya for a long while.
Sculpting Software:
Zbrush Minicore (formerly Sculptris) - A basic version of an industry-standard program (and my favorite sculpting program).
Photoshop alternatives include:
GIMP
Editing Software:
Davinci Resolve
My favorite free Blender tutorial buddies include:
blender.org
Grant Abbit on Youtube
Blender Guru on Youtube
CG Cookie on Youtube
Yansculpts on Youtube
@A_aronical thanks for sharing the information on blender.
Great information here! Thank you for sharing!
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