User-friendliness

Between maya, lightwave and 3dsmax which is the most userfirendliness? I recently downloaded the Maya PLE but was shocked at the complexity of the buttons. 3dsmax was the same but gmax-ish (well DUH, gmax came from 3dsmax but you get the meaning) and lightwave didn't have a trial so i got no reference there. Anyhow, what I'm asking is which software is the most userfriendly. I don't care which can do what because I believe that whatever one can do the other can acomplish with more work. So in your opinion, which can the user sink into and ajust to the easiest.

 

You may want to take a look at this topic for starters, that's where some of the opinions and questions for software are. Basiclly put, it all depends on your style and needs - but then again just about any high-end program you learn will take time to get used to. So I'd prepare for a learning curve regardless of whichever one you choose.

Hope that helps!

 

Thanks, it does. One last thing, though, is there a trial for lightwave?

Oh, and should I repaste the post in the topic?

 

I know there's a trial out there somewhere but I don't think it's for the latest version. As for the topic, you may want to talk about it in the other one as everyone will have a different opinion regarding their choice of software.

Good luck!

 

Going off topic a little, if you want user-friendliness, and are a beginer, you want carrara 4.1 pro! An excellent little program, and i got carrara 1 free in a PC mag and upgraded. It has a really cool landscape modeler, so you can get realy reallistic landscapesand a matter of minutes! It also has a half a selection of vertex, splines or metaball modelers. I highly recomend this for anyone who wants to get started in 3d work. O yer, it comes with a really good bunch of tutorials

 

In terms of a lightwave trial, I think there is one but like he said, it's for version 8 maybe? Not sure myself, but it's called the Discovery Edition. If you google that, you should come up with a good download for it.

Personally, I'm a lightwave user myself, but I started out in Max. If you're planning on using a lot of the models here on scifi3d, you might aswell go with max anyway, as that's the format most of these models are in. However, Lightwave in my opinion has a lot of really high quality models out there that are only a search engine away, .

 

User friendliness doesn't depend totally on the software but also how much you know 3D and how your brain wraps around using a particular software. And what your focus will be.

Some packages like Lightwave and Softimage did help a bit by having labeled buttons as opposed to icons (trying to distinguish between dozens of icons might slow some). Then again once you learn where everything is, shortcuts and the like it more or less becomes moot.

 

malducin posted on 9/15/05 2:39pm

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Some packages like Lightwave and Softimage did help a bit by having labeled buttons as opposed to icons (trying to distinguish between dozens of icons might slow some).[hr][/blockquote]
That's precisely why I like LW so much (aside from the fact that I started on that program). There's zero confusion about what button does what.. because they simply say "Move", "Rotate", "Load Object", etc.. I find the icon-based GUI of Max/Maya to be quite confusing after using LW for so long.

 

I'd say Max is th most user friendly, It took me awhile to get to grips with Maya, Never really tried Lightwave though.

 

i prefer maya ive had 3dsmax for wel over 2 years now and i still dont know how it works
all i got working was the 3d camera and being able to make basic geometries like sphere, box, ect.