I realize a lot of Renderosity members know of the Freebies section but not everyone is aware of just how many quality 2D and 3D assets are available, particularly if they haven’t visited the section in a while.

I had posted a link to my earlier article about Repurposing Renderosity Content on social media and the question came up of how easy was it to really convert Rendo content to applications like iClone and Unreal Engine. I suggested they go over to the freebie section and check out different types of assets so they could go through the process themselves and pretty much left it at that.

That brought some surprisingly positive feedback on the quality of the freebies available in the archive. And perhaps I shouldn’t call it an archive because it’s not just history, there are still items being added on a regular basis. Most of my social media friends are fellow 3D artists and not easily impressed. Like some of us, they create their own content too. When some of them notice, that gets my attention.

Being a bit guilty of not having taken a really deep dive into the freebie section in quite a while, I jumped over to it to see what lay beneath the first page. The only problem is, the content I saw on the first page made me want to immediately download it!

I’m not a mega downloader either but when you see a fun model, one that gives you instant story or composition ideas by just looking at it, it’s hard to move on. So, I did what just about any digital artist in my situation would do… I downloaded and converted it. This led to another model that caught my eye and it too was downloaded and converted.

The models in question were both from kalebdaark, the Transavia PL-12 AirTruk, and a Jetpack Poser prop. I used the OBJ versions, dug through the texture folders until I found what I needed, and directly loaded them onto the model in iClone.

I bypassed the usual FBX export since the OBJ was provided. The import process was simple enough. I knew I wanted to animate the prop on the AirTruk so I let iClone break it down into individual pieces. This allowed me to recenter the pivots by individual pieces making for an easy rotation solution. The AirTruk was just one of those freebies that I could not pass up. 

I created a simple animation that involved moving the clouds in the background as much as moving the plane forward. It also used the iClone Cartoon shader for the final render. Throw in a few cartoon ducks and a rock and roll chimp because… well… why not? You now have an instant cartoon. Not only is it quick but it’s fun too.

Cost per minute per animation? Zero. 

Well… unless you count the misery you may bring upon yourself by using too much of your free time to create a cartoon instead of spending it with your significant other. Better yet, teach your significant other how to create cartoons and they can find cool free Rendo assets for you to play with!

kalebdaark’s Jetpack is another example of a very easy-to-convert Renderosity freebie that can be adjusted to fit an animated iClone character. Since this is an accessory and not a cloth that makes it easier to convert. You will have to play around with the scale on various axis to avoid mesh penetration, but it becomes a very useful accessory that, like the AirTruk, looks cool and invokes a story just by looking at it. 

So much for my deep dive. Hopefully, I’ll get time to try again and maybe I can get past the first page without having to download and play with something. And I readily admit it was like playing with new toys. Those kinds of toys you never knew you needed until you saw them.

So, the next time you are bored with your significant oth… err I mean the TV… hop on over to the freebie section here at Renderosity for some inspiration and the immediate gratification of an on-demand download.