Does anyone use Tree Druid (standalone version)? is it any good?

It's not needed since the Carrara plant editor came out.

I'm looking at the standalone version,it looks like there is more control on the overall tree then what Carrara offers (the way the trunk bends, roots ect). Has anyone used it? Whats the quality of the trees?

I used to work with tree druid, the plug-in version. (which now doesn't work with newer releases of Carrara) The stand along should be just fine. Neither option does roots - what look like roots are actually the branch shapes projecting on the ground grid. However, Carrara 5.1 DOES let you bend trunks, brances, change leaf shape, add custom leaves, add gravity etc. Basically everything that TD did. The one thing that Carrara does not let you do that the TD plug-in did is grow a tree over time/animation - that was great. I don't beleive the stand-alone version will do that either. Mark

Have you tried X-Frog?  It probably produces the most realistic 3rd party plants.

That goes w/o saying, but there is a learning curve and it isn't cheap by any means so you want to make sure you will use it enough. There is a demo, however. The demo runs indefinitely, but ability to export or save stops after 30days.

I have been looking at xfrog and the results look great, not sure if I want to go through the learning curve I have a lot on my plate with Carrara right now. I have been looking at Onyx Tree Pro 6 but I have read in other groups about a weird licence agreement.

Also does anyone know where the free version of Treemaker 2.0 is hiding I was at the gamegarage web site and there was mention that it is now free but the web site is gone.

I love Carrara's updated plant modeler! I am a bit of a tree fanatic, so I've tried most freeware and commercial standalone tree modelers. Most are either extremely complex, expensive and arcane, or extremely limited in what they can output. However, after a couple of hours of tinkering around in Carrara's plant modeler, I found that I could make highly detailed models of almost any tree I could think of, and some I might never have imagined! As a test I decided to see if I could make a Douglas fir type conifer. The trees in the "old growth" forests in the Pacific Northwest are incredibly tall and massive(150 to 300ft) and I've never been able to model a tree to replicate the look of these forest giants...until now! I'll let you be the judge, but I've been extremely satisfied with what Carrara's plant lab is capable of.

 

Oooops! Posted the wrong pic. I've since made the lower trunk a lot more massive.

Put up some pictures made wit the new tree builder in Carrara 5.1 please. The last tree above look too dark.

Will do. Sorry the pic is so dark, but I was thinking about fooling around with alpha maps and making some "billboard" trees. My PS in my Carrara/rendering comp just died, so I will post a new pic as soon as I can swap it out with a new one.

I was playing around with the tree maker in Carrara 5 and it seemed the trees were just varations on the pine tree. Thye weren't very realistic. It doesn't seem you can make a good narley twisted tree like a 100 year old Oak or a Cypress tree.

I ended up getting Tree Druid the results are good. The tree on the left is Tree Druid and the right one is Carrara. Not sure if you can get Carrara trees to look the same but both took me 3 min to make.

The tree on the left, Now that's a tree! Tree Druid makes some good trees. It has real roots. The trees are not just based on a pine tree. Trees look like they can be made using the 'y' shape. Are you using the stand alone version or the Carrara version?

notefinger - yea I like the tree on the left as well, I dont mind the Carrara trees but the all look to new and I wanted something with age. I am using the standalone version as the plugin wont work in C5 and I think there are more options in the standalone version.

How's this for "gnarly & twisted"?

That does look pretty good. How about showing one with leaves. What are the leaf options like? Can you use custom leaves?

danamo - cool tree where did you get that?

Attached Link: POVTree ver.1.4

Glad you liked it. this tree is the output of a freeware 3d treemaking program called POVTree. It's Java-based and only exports as a POV inc. file. I used PoseRay(freeware) as a POV to .obj convertor and imported into Carrara5. It makes some of the best "gnarly" trees of any treemaking app I've seen. They come at a price though; this tree mesh weighs in at a hefty 65mb file without textures. I will try to make one with leaves, and watch my computer melt down..

Attached Link: Arbaro tree & plant maker

Another freeware standalone POV tree-maker is Arbaro. It can output some excellent trees(the willow is very nice) in POV, ,obj, and .DXF. It is worth checking out.

Attached Link: POVtree ver.1.5

Here's an updated ver. of POVtree.

danamo - cool thanks for the info, I thought I missed the make real tree slider in Carrara

**danamo - povtree has some nice options to it here is another sample of two trees one with leaves and one with out both from povtree. **

Attached Link: Bantam3d, Twig, Grass, and Scatter

Nice trees Dennis, and you're welcome. I like being able to add roots to the trees in POVTree. With a little work, both POVTree and Arbaro can output "Hero" trees; trees that look really good close-up. The only downside, besides the massive file size, is not being able to add wind animation to an imported tree(AFAIK).

 I hope Carrara6 will add more functionality into the plant modeler. The "ramified" or "hybrid" settings in the expert tab are pretty much useless in their present state as far as I can determine, though someone may show me some examples to prove me wrong.

BTW, have you ever used Twig? Twig was a commercial plant-modeling app from the artist known as Geese, the designer of Bantam3d Grass. Geese seems to have abandoned his commercial website, but he made Twig into freeware. Twig makes great flowers, wind-blown looking grass, bamboo, simple bare trees, lamps, etc. and comes with an easy to understand GUI and a lot of helpfiles and preset examples. It is available at a file locker for free download, so if you like free plant modelers, I recommend it. Cheers, Dan

danamo - I dont mind not being able to add wind to my trees if I need them to move a couple of bone will do the trick.

Do you know if there is any place to download treemaker v2.0 its now freeware but the web site is gone - I have wanted to try out this app for awhile it lets you add fruit and berrys to trees.

I tried Twig but there is no serial number included in the zip and wont let me export anything with out it.

Isn't there a program that can be used to trim download the poly count?

There is a few of them Action3D is one of the cheaper apps but not sure how well it works.

@Dennis445- I have searched the web and "Googled" for Treemaker 2.0, so far in vain. If I run across a new address for it I will be sure to let you know. I'd be very interested to hear about or see any results you have in "boning" non-Carrara tree models for animation. Sounds like a very cool idea.

 As far as Twig is concerned; did you dbl click on the little icon that is labeled Twig.exe? I didn't "install" Twig, even though there is an install exe included in the unpacked folder. I just clicked on the Twig.exe icon(the one with the stylized flowers) and the app opened(much like UV Mapper Classic) and it did not ask for a serial number. I did a test and transfered the unpacked file to my other computer(my Carrara/render box) and without installing the "setup bootstrap" exe I was able to dbl click on the Twig.exe and open the app there too. Then I just copied and pasted some of the preset plant settings in the "Create" tab section and was able to export an .obj model file. You will have to name your file with a .obj on the end of it. Twig will not add this suffix, so you can do it manually. From there you should have no problem. The only glitch I encountered was when I pasted the settings for the blowngrass file, and the program generated some very nice roses!:laugh:

danamo - I tried just running the exe but the same thing happens when I try to export it asks for a serial number.

Do you know if bones can be affected by physics (flow force)?  this is what I would like to do, add bones to a grass blade and pass a directional force over them to simulate breeze or a gust of wind.

Dennis- I have to confess that I haven't gotten around to testing Carrara's physics functions yet, which is strange considering my interest in animation. I've been so busy trying to learn the shader tree functions and familiarizing myself with the various modelers(I got Hexagon2 also) that I haven't done much more than some wind/tree animations and some experimenting with animated displacement maps. Carrara5 is so "deep" that I am sure that it will take me a quite a while to gain some mastery. So, while I don't know the answer, I encourage you to try it. After all, Carrara is a pretty robust app and I don't think you can break it by trying!:laugh:

I need to carry around the manual on my usb key