Hello. What is the best way to create meshes? Which application should I use? Is there anything I should know before attempting to create a mesh?
Thanks a lot in advance.

What kind of mesh? You create meshes differently depending on what you want to make. Some you can make through bezier curves (trees for example), others through a cube etc.

Personally i really like Blender. (2.49b), which is free. I would suggest following a few beginner tutorials on youtube.

What I would mostly want, is creating statics.
Ahh, yes, Thanks! ^_^

Blender is free, and is quite popular amongst morrowind modders i have noticed

Yep Blender+Nifscope all the way, it got all necessary functions for creating models and animations, and from my point of view its more user freindly (or its just me ;p)

Prefer Max myself, the camera doesnt rotate in bizarre ways, and the UI is a million times better, the program utilizes your hardware better too (good if you have a decent machine)

Obviously, this is just my opinion, i can't stand blender

The most awesome 3D modellers here use BLENDER, do I have to say anything else!!! :rock:


TheDaywalker :rock:

You would say that fool!

Wanna challenge me, punk?!!!


TheDaywalker :rock:

about Max- SGmonkey which version do you use?

In case you do not like Blender you can try gMax, a crippled Max4 (it is free and supported by NifTools plugin). For simple meshes this is more than enough.
http://www.fileplanet.com/69843/60000/fileinfo/gmax-v1.2

Dear Blender/Max fans, let’s be tolerant, we are serious mature people, aren’t we?

No worries my friend, SGMonkey and me are on same modding team, we're just making fun!!!


TheDaywalker :rock:

Yes, thanks for suggestions (and off-topic :mellow:). I'm trying out blender now, though it seems to take much time to learn.

That's one of the biggest complaints with Blender. Even some die-hard fans will admit the learning curve is rough. GMax, as A1x2e3l linked to, is much easier to start with. Actual difficulty, though, is about equal when you start making complicated things. Max does have official exporters for Morrowind, which I've always found easier to use than the unofficial Blender exporters. I think they may be almost equal in features now, though. Max is easier to make particle effects in, and some other things (like animated textures) tend to be easier in Max. Blender can do a lot, but IMO this is a you-get-what-you-pay-for situation.
Of course, you can use ZBrush too. I've even heard of people using such ridiculous things as Milkshape. If you really wanna go hard-core, EMACS is the only possible option. Write your models by hand.

Ugh, for me drawing with hand would create bad things. So I guess I should better try Gmax out.

Seriously, Blender isn't more difficult to learn than any other application. I tried Blender, Max and zBrush and you can learn the basics of all three in about not more than a week. For anyone who has worked for some time in a certain program it apears complicated to get used to a different UI, that's all. I started at a time where almost no good tutorials for Blender were available and only a hand full of modders were working with Blender at all. Plus only very few wanted to share their knowledge. And I still got it done myself with help of some basic tutorials on youtube.

Now we have plenty of tutorials and many modders that can help with the program. Most people who say Blender is difficult just don't show the necessary patience to get used to the workflow. You can't expect to learn such a complex program in only one session. And to become a good modeler it takes month and years of daily exercise, doesn't matter what software you're using.

If you plan to go into a professional direction one day, I'd advice you to get familiar with max, but for modding and 3D modeling as a hobby Blender has much more to offer than you can make use of. Btw, Blender's UI currently gets overhauled completely, so it will look more like max and friends. I don't like it at all, but that's a different story!!!


TheDaywalker :rock:

I didn't think Blender was that hard, at least once I got past the strange user interface. After I figured out the keys, it all started to flow fairly nicely. However, I mastered nifskope first - to the point where I was creating new meshes in it.

Moving to blender was liberating.

However, I haven't use any other tool, so I may be talking out of my backside.

Oh no, I didn't mean drawing. EMACS is a text editor, I meant writing your models by hand. Real modelers can make a body mesh by hitting http://xkcd.com/378/. If your keyboard doesn't have a buttefly key, though, you may be out of luck.


Something we'll never agree on , but it is true you can pick up the basics of all of them fairly quickly. After that, it's just a matter of which style/tool is best for your style of work. Even the folks using Blender have made some damn fine models, so it can't be all bad.
I've heard it's also possible to use Maya and export to Max (or Blender), and I know for per-poly stuff, Cinema 4D has the absolute best tools there of any app. None of the listed (except ZBrush, I think) work well for texturing, but you can just use DeepPaint or Photoshop Extended (both are capable of importing and painting on the model) for that.

If you complain about Blender's interface i think it's because you havent realized you don't need to deal with it much at all. Keyboard shortcuts IS the interface, it's as efficient as it gets. It's how i think these programs should be created, its more similar to learning how play the guitar than to work in a boring menu enviroment (which feels neither fun, creative or effcient).

I tried Max ages ago and i really, really hated it, lots of really deep menus which was a big :thumbsdown: lost all my creativity just by looking at it.

Maybe you can work with keyboard shortcuts just as much as in Blender though, i never got that far before i decided 3D modelling wasnt for me heh