Alternatives to Maya and 3D Max

[CornetPlayer]

As I understand it, all animation image development must be done in Maya or 3D Max. The I3D images are then brought into the GDN Editor.

For those of us who cannot afford the $3600+ price tag (and are not students, to receive the discount) for Maya or 3D MAX, are there less expensive alternatives?

[Cucumber]

May be free Blender?

[Farmer GM]

Yea, I keep seeing, Blender, as being an option for people.

[tom42728]

some even use google sketch up don't know much about it though

and yeah 3ds max and maya are very pricey which really i could see in commercial usage but for a home user they should offer a discount

and also on 3ds max i have 3ds max 2013 still need the plugin for it any idea when that will be

[CornetPlayer]

Thank you for the replies. I downloaded/installed Blender. What a great tool! And free??? Amazing. Since it's been around awhile, I'm assured that it's stable as well.

[Mantose]

The latest version of blender doesnt work with the latest exporter from giants. I think you have to get an older version of blender. Version 2.62 I think works.

I would suggest starting off making very simple things to learn the whole process of exporting and getting them into the game. No sense wasting days or weeks on a model if it doesnt get into the game properly.