Revision as of 17:52, 25 May 2012

There are many 3D modelling programs out there, both free and not free. Unless you're willing to spend lots of money, your best bet would be to get a free program such as Blender.

Free

Blender is the result of the work of the Blender Foundation, a group created from the remains of NaN (Not a Number), a European company. Blender is one of the best FOSS 3D modellers out there and can do quite a variety of tasks. With the right scripts, Blender can export most formats easily. Blender has an extremely large user community as well.

Wings3D is a static (non-animated) modelling program based on advanced subdivision modelling. It can export to obj and other formats and also has features such as UV unwrapping, texture painting, and is easy to use.

Misfit Model 3D is a simple 3D modeller with the goal of being easy to use. Misfit can export to obj, md2 and md3.

NPherno's md3 compiler is a compiler created by "NPherno", a member of the Quake Unity forums. The compiler can import md2, md3, ase and 3ds files and export them to md3. The compiler can rebuild normals and fix animations, among other things.

Noesis is like the md3 compiler, where it takes a variety of formats and converts them. Noesis has import and export support for a large variety of formats, including md2, md3, md5, obj, iqm, and many others that Sandbox does not use. Noesis can also preview models and some animations.

CharacterFX is a program for adding animations to files and can export to many formats.

GMax is a free, watered down version of 3D Studio Max, Autodesk's expensive (about $3,000) 3D program.

@@ Line 2: / Line 2: @@
 =Free=
 ==Blender==
-*Blender is the result of the work of the Blender Foundation, a group created from the remains of NaN (Not a Number), a European company. Blender is one of the best FOSS 3D modellers out there and can do quite a variety of tasks. With the right scripts, Blender can export most formats easily.
+*Blender is the result of the work of the Blender Foundation, a group created from the remains of NaN (Not a Number), a European company. Blender is one of the best FOSS 3D modellers out there and can do quite a variety of tasks. With the right scripts, Blender can export most formats easily. Blender has an extremely large user community as well.
 ==Wings3D==
 *Wings3D is a static (non-animated) modelling program based on advanced subdivision modelling. It can export to obj and other formats and also has features such as UV unwrapping, texture painting, and is easy to use.