Animation Software Choice

[Maduro]

If you had to choose between any of the free and not-so-free animation software out there to learn on and to use professionally, what would they be? I hear that 3dsmax is pretty much the industry standard, and I think Maya is another. I've heard a lot about Blender, which is free, but I've also heard some negative things about it as well. What would you all recommend for someone just starting out in animation?

Edit: Drat, I should have started this as a poll.

[sahel]

To start out I would definately choose Blender. Good to start with and your experience in that program should help you getting to know 3dsmax or maya too. And ofcourse the difference in costs isn't so small . I don't use the programs myself (well, i've done some blender tutorials but im not a designer), but friends of mine who do work with animation are using Blender.

[Maduro]

Originally Posted by sahel

To start out I would definately choose Blender. Good to start with and your experience in that program should help you getting to know 3dsmax or maya too. And ofcourse the difference in costs isn't so small . I don't use the programs myself (well, i've done some blender tutorials but im not a designer), but friends of mine who do work with animation are using Blender.

Thanks for the info, Sahel. My only concern with Blender from what I've read is that the UI is not as intuitive as in 3dsmax or Maya. But then again, for the price (free), it may be worth taking the extra time to learn the interface.

[agalvayne]

I've got a copy of Blender and a PLE of Maya. I like them both, but find that the interface of Blender takes a lot more time to get used to than Maya. Not that you should expect either to be simple, due to their powerful nature and many features. Though it's not really designed for animation, the simplicity of something like Google sketchup is nice, and I'd love to see even a very basic animation software with similar draw, drag and drop functionality (for want of a better description )- the idea of just drawing a shape on the ground then pulling it up to your specified height and push/pull modification and deformations. means more people might get into computer animation

[Trux]

blender is nice, it's free. it's very powerful, and ppl who say its UI is wierd are propably already used to other UIs better.
the important thing, imo, if you begin with blender: get some good tutorials! thera are zillions of tuts, but try to find the good ones. also video-tuts helped me to speed up the learning curve significantly..

[thoreau]

http://mashable.com/2008/07/10/tools-for-3d-creation/

has a comprehensive list.

[Maduro]

Originally Posted by thoreau

http://mashable.com/2008/07/10/tools-for-3d-creation/

has a comprehensive list.

Nice, thanks Thoreau. I've seen some other lists that briefly describe the nearly hundreds of various animation software, but nothing with good screenshots like this. I am still curious about the inside working of these software packages from you guys that are using them for actual production, but let's not limit it to just the original three apps that we started the thread with.

So, what other animation software have you guys used and like?

[Ripper]

I've used Anim8or, 3ds Max & Blender.

Anim8or is a bit buggy but it's free and is still being updated and improved upon.

3ds Max is an industry standard, can't get much better if you can afford the price tag.

Blender,Is a great free product and can stand toe to toe with 3ds Max. The downside being it's got less documentation with it and is slightly less powerful.

here's a short film make in blender to help promote it http://www.bigbuckbunny.org