Over the years Modo has grown from a modeling package to a full blown 3D model and animation suite with all the blows and whistles anyone could ask for. Modo, on the other hand, has a very nice interface for modeling, a very good and fast basic renderer and the price, well, it's way below that of C4D.

And I find the basic renderer a bit slow. I must say I was very surprised/impressed by C4D, and mainly because it has a lot in common from 3DSMax, but it is expensive. I'm in the same situation as you are, starting up my own business.įor 3D work I used to use 3DSMax (release 4 if I do remember well) in the time I worked with Windows only.īut a couple of years ago I completely switched over to the Mac and never regretted that decision.Īt this point I'm also looking at some 3D packages, and currently I'm investigating Cinema 4D, Modo 601 and (yes) Blender 2.6. However, if you purchase an unbiased renderer like Indigo Renderer RT or Octane Render, you can still render your scenes with photorealistic quality when necessary, and at price point that's less than the Broadcast, Visualize or Studio versions of C4D.

If you only get the Prime version, then you don't get the Physical renderer, which renders light and shadow very realistically. Without the excellent interchange between AE and C4D (in both directions), I would have had to twist myself into a pretzel to get the job done. I just finished a project for a client where I tracked some footage in AE with The Foundry's CameraTracker, set up some nulls and solids to which I could attach 3D objects, sent everything over to C4D where I added the 3D objects and set up the lighting, then sent the lot back to AE for final compositing, including masking. For me, its greatest asset is that I can move projects almost effortlessly between AE and C4D, which has made my 3D life a whole lot easier. There's a ton of how-to guides and tutorials available, as well as plug-ins.

I worked with Carrara for a long time, and despite its intuitive interface and a great tutorial set by Mark Bremmer, I never felt comfortable in the app.Ĭ4D has been a joy to work with so far. It was a struggle to get even the simplest things done in Blender the learning curve is steep but it does have everything you'll ever need (short of becoming a CG House for Hollywood) for great 3D, both simple and complex.

Blender or c4d