Attached Link: http://www.glasko.com

Well I know I want to get the student version of LightWave as soon as I get some money. As for now I've been into the freeware modeling program "wings3d". Now I need somebody to explain to me basically what is good about different modeling programs? I'm still learning about greating textures... but as of now I've been modeling household items and creatures in wings3D to improve my skills. Such as, recently I completed a chessboard and the pieces from scratch in wings... it was tough, but a fun project. I'm heading to college next year to study Visual Effects and Motion Graphics at art school... but I really want to master the digital modeling aspect of art. Can anybody help me out here and name some good ways to model that will forshadow skills I will need in Maya/3Dstudio/Lightwave?

Attached Link: http://www.renderosity.com/messages.ez?Form.ShowMessage=999642

Have a look here, it's a start. I doubt any one person here can give you honest and detailed opinions of why every 3D proggie out is good or bad but there's a few testimonials in this link (just a few posts down) that should help you decide.

The modeling method is quite different in each of the programs you made, though pretty much every other program is similar to one or the other. Get the trial versions of MAX and LightWave first to see which one's more to your taste- there's a good number of people that can understand one just fine but find the other's interface incomprehensible (LightWave's Greek to me, for example. I more or less figured out the rendering prog, but I couldn't get the modeler to do much of anything. And there are just as many peopel who have the same issue with MAX). As far as LightWave goes, I can't help you, but get LightWave Applied- it and a few other books are quite good on the topic.

Teyons suggestion is mine as well

I found it necessary to get the demos and actually work with the programs. They all spec out as having the basic features. Some have better tools than others, but... the interface makes it or breaks it for me. I'm sold on the dvgarage toolkit and for 200 bucks from www.universe3d.com you get the amorphium pro thrown in. Comes with video training on the cd's. You can get demos of version 4 and the dvgarage version 2.9 is almost identical.

Attached Link: http://www.aliaswavefront.com/en/products/maya/ple/index.shtml

Don't forget that you can download Maya Personal Learning Edition. Fully functional, no restrictions except for watermarking, and you can't open commercial Maya files with it since it saves in a different format from commercial Maya, but, hey, what do you want for free.

Well I plan on going to an art school, that after a few years of general art classes, anatomy and basics... I can really get into visual effects and motion graphics with programs like LightWave and Maya. My goal is to work in motion pictures. I've been told that the difference between Lightwave, Maya and 3Ds is mostly personal preferance... And thanks to Quaestor for that link, I'll check out that learning edition for sure.

Attached Link: http://www.maxon.de

I'll throw a pitch in here for Maxon Cinema 4D R8. It is legendary for its stability, and the interface is, for me at least, very intuitive. R8 adds some pretty incredible stuff to an already great package. You can download the demo version the link provided.