is anyone here familiar with both of these products? if so, could you please post some of their respective pros/cons. ive heard good things about both programs, and seeing as theyre both available at the same price now (900 US)im having a hard time deciding. ive read the info on their sites, but what i need is the viewpoint of someone whos used the product -- not propaganda from the distributor.

Well, I can't say I know much at all about Lightwave. But I have been using 3DSMax for almost a year and a half now. I like the interface of 3.1...everything's where I expect it to be. Very customizable. Plus, there a million and a half plugins for it. But, this can be said for Lightwave too. So I guess the best thing would be to take each one for a demo testdrive or something. See which one trips your trigger and go from there.

thanks, but the problem is lightwave 6.5 is only on sale for a little while and then the price goes back up to $2500 US. i can get max with a student discount but i cant find one for lightwave. these two programs seem to be in the niche that im interested in -- ones like raydream are too entry level and ones like maya and softimage are way too expensive. by the time my max demo cd arrives lightwave will probably be back to full price so ill be forced to buy max anyway.

I can tell you a little about Lightwave. Lightwave is a pretty awsome program, if it's for special effects such as explosions, laser fire, fire it's self, or if it's for modeling objects such as spaceships (which I've seen mostly done in lightwave) weapons, stuff like house hold item and everything. I guess 3DSMax can pretty much do the same, but I don't know about the effects part. I can tell you this though, lightwave can take some time to learn, and come be very time consuming. Although I agree with tempest, try the demos. I can't speak for 3dSMax, I've never used it before. Yet anyways... The picture I'm showing (if it appears) is an example of an explosion I did. Very easy to make, however the textering part was a pain. It took me about 1-2 hours to texture. (Which sucked a lot when I screwed up and had to start over)Sorry for the small size, I'll try and render a bigger picture. This was made by a tutorial I followed. Greeg72

I was undecided about the 2 programs myself. I took a class in Lightwave (it was the only 3D class I could find at the time). My instructor (and I've heard this other places also) said the modeling tools in Lightwave are better than MAX but MAX's animation tools are probably a little better than Lightwave. I want to do modelling and texturing and don't care about animation. I bought Lightwave and am very happy.

it is the eternal question, anything you buy, you are happy with it. Max is cheaper. Perhaps, max has more plugins in the market than lightwave, and with that plugins, max is powerfull. I like max interface more, but the truth is i only see lightwave two times. dont forget other 3d aplicatons, max and lightwave isnt everything, you must look at the prices and the thing you think make with it.

I just purchased Lightwave through that deal you are talking about. I'm not enrolled at any school and I certainly don't meet the strict requirements for the student pricing on Max right now, so the sale price on LW was a big factor in my decision. Remember that you have to own one of the qualifying products that they list to get that price on LW.

As I understand it 3DS Max is the program of choice for game producers and Lightwave is is the program of choice for Television animators. LW is also being used in more and more film projects lately.

At the same time you would be hard pressed to find any feature that one has that the other doesn't have...or doesn't have available to it in the form of a plug-in.

I don't think you can make a wrong decision here...both are very powerful tools. You might want to check the 3DS Max and Lightwave forums here to see what people have been doing with them to get some hints as to which program you might prefer.

Call Newtek...I think they're going to have specials next month also.

thanks for the info guys. JKeller, a good friend of mine owns a video toaster so i'd buy lightwave through him so i could get the discount. 1500 dollars off is a LOT of money saved.... movida, im more interested in modelling, not animation, so id definitely factor that in as well. as for other programs, ive tried a lot. ive tried rhino, truespace, raydream, carrara, bryce3d, etc. ive narrowed it down to either lightwave or max. just thought id see what you guys would recommend. im looking for something thats versatile and powerful and doesnt cost so much that i have to mortgage my house to buy it -- like maya. maya courses in my area also cost around 13-17k. heh. i think ill pass on that one.

Lightwave has better modelling tools, a better rendering engine, more built in effects, and actually is I believe cheaper than Max. There are also a million free plugins that will do everything under the sun for Lightwave. Interface is a question of the user. I find Lightwave's interface very clean and functional and easy to use, whereas Max's candy coated icons and drop down menus confuse me. Either way there is going to be a learning curve.

I have both Max and Lightwave. Lightwave is the better all around program and is used where the real money is made- Hollywood. Many of the gamers are starting to use Lightwave over Max now too because of the UV Mapping LW 6.5 now has. JKeller, Lightwave isn't just being used more and more in movies- It's been around in movies FX for quite a while now :o) I only use Max anymore to convert Max files to Lightwave.

Well, just to round things out a bit, since the answers here have been mostly pro-lightwave, I also had to choose between the two and decided on Max. There are hundreds of plugins for Max as well, both commercial and freeware, that extend its functionality to rival even that of Maya, especially if you look into Character Studio, Reactor, and Combustion (which I bought as well). I'm an industry professional who uses Maya and Soft (as well as others) at work, but Max is my weapon of choice at home for modeling and animation. I find it extremely flexible and powerful. It costs more to get the "total" package, but I enjoy it a great deal. I have seen Lightwave used in the TV industry, and it's certainly a decent package, too; My advice is to try both and go with your strengths. If you're job hunting, it's likely that experience with either one will apply fairly well towards using the other as needed. Many principles are similar, and employers know that. --

i decided on lw a few months ago it seems the whole industry is starting to really look at lw gamers have started turning to them and some of the best games sellers have used them alreads citzen kubuto used it also if you buy messiah and sasquatch the total cost is about 2500 with the discount and messiah is amazing as is sasquatch plus lw is about to relase another free update making it the second major upgrade for free when the industry is still talking about how great lw is with the realese of 6.5 you may want to check out foundation they did work on starship troopers and about 6 other big movies

I was using both of the LightWave 6.5 and Max 3.1... Max is a little easier for animations and Special FX are not bad but LW is more complete. There is more Plugs for MAX but LW need less. Personaly I love LW... He is not hard to learn, he have very good special FX (particle system is the best with HyperVoxel 3.0). Useful plugs are not really expensive (not all). Modeling tools are really good. And he is used for MOVIES, MAX not (yet). LW was used to make RED PLANET, PITCH BLACK... LW is my favorite but MAX is not bad and a little less cost. NOW I'M USING LIGHTWAVE ONLY

Hmm. This has been an interesting discussion. I was thinking about buying Lightwave myself. Right now I'm using Carrara, but plan on upgrading some day. I've played with Max some, but I think Lightwave is more attainable budget- wise (I just missed winning a bid on eBay for sealed-in-the-box 6.5; I think it went for $720 or so, argh). My main interest is cartooning/comics, and I wondered if any of you have used Lightwave for that sort of thing.

twills theres a good ex ample a artist uses it for a cartooon chaos is the name he uses lw and aura but you dont need aura there are some free cell shader pluggins and lw comes with a cell dhafer aslo making cool cartoon effects

there are a few free cell shaders for LW as well.

Cell shaders are fun to play with. I bought the Toon shader for Carrara, and used it to make Tarot Cards. Anyway, lately I've been seeing version 5.5 Lightwaves pop up on ebay (some still sealed in the box) for an affordable, so I imagine that's the direction I'll go in. I haven't seen the same sort of deal for 3DMax (aside from -spit- warez), but then, it's more expensive to start with. Buying software on eBay can be risky, but I have had good luck by limiting purchases to things that are still shrink-wrapped. It sounds like Lightwave has nice modeling tools, and that's what I need the most help with. --Terri

I'm still pro-Max all the way. :) Admittedly, I've never tried LW, but I wouldn't object to it. I just have never had the chance to play with it. I've used Max for several animations since I started. Very simple, very quick. "Click animate, do your thing, unclick Animate". Bingo. Plus, I'm figuring out Open GL and low-res polygon models. It works for me. :)

twillis, newtek has a promotion now that if you currently own a product on a pretty long list of software by different companies, then you can get lightwave 6.5 for 995 US, which is over 1500 US off their regular price. i suggest you do get it from the manufacturer that way youre registered and you will get their full range of support, as well as a much newer product. ebay is full of scammers.

Attached Link: http://www.wacom.com/overstock/serial.cfm

Unfortunately, I don't qualify for the promotion. I do like to buy from the manufacturer when I can. In fact, I just bought a 6x8 refurbished Intuos serial tablet from Wacom for about $140 (I put the link above in case anyone is interested). You are absolutely correct that one has to be careful buying stuff from eBay. There _are_ lots of scammers there, and I report every one I find. So far I have had very good luck by limiting purchases to stuff still sealed in the box. I bought Carrara and Photoshop that way, and was able to register both. Thanks for the info, everybody.