[FocusMiah]

Hello all!

I have been learning Solidworks between school, and personally at home. However, I really want to start making some organic looking models for some home projects. Such as cobblestone roads for some miniature games I play.

I have access to just about anything at school. I just don't know what to use! Any suggestions would be great. I have been told Rhino by a few people. Something that maybe has the feel of Solidworks would be great.

Thank you ahead of time,

Jeremiah

[ger21]

I doubt you'll find an "organic" modeler that feels anywhere close to solidworks.

Here's a couple:
form•Z Jr, by AutoDesSys
Silo - 3D Modeling Zen | Nevercenter
Hexagon 2.5 - 3D Modeling Software

[FocusMiah]

Thank you. Have you used any of the three? How do they feel?

[ger21]

I've played a little with Silo, but I'd expect them all to be similar.
My preference is Lightwave, which I've used for about 15 years.

[FocusMiah]

Wow, Lightwave looks like an extremely nice package after just looking it up. It looks like they offer a student edition as well. How bad is the learning curve on it?

[ger21]

Well, it's not just a modeler, but a modeling, animation, and rendering package.

So the learning curve would depend on how much you want to learn.

For modeling, I'd say that if you wanted to learn on your own, it's very steep. However, a few days watching tutorial videos will shorten the curve a lot.

There's a demo you can try.

[ger21]

What's cool about lightwave (and other animation programs) is that you can alter your models with the animation tools.
You can also alter (or even create) your models with displacement maps.

You can also llok at Blender, which probably has similar tools, but it free. Steeper learning curve, though. (from what I've heard)

[awerby]

Take a look at Cubify Sculpt. It's inexpensive and quite easy to use, with a "virtual clay" interface. If you want even more intuitive control of your models, you can use the new Touch Motion 3D stylus with it, which gives you force-feedback so it feels like you're actually touching your model while you sculpt in real time. And there's a more capable (but costlier) software package that goes with it if you want more features: Geomagic Sculpt. I do a lot of organic-type modeling, and this is the best series of tools for this I've found. But it's nothing like Solidworks...

[hub]

I use ZBrush for organic modeling. It's like sculpting in 3D. Pretty simple to learn and very powerful.