I'm having a very tough time considering whether to upgrade to Carrara 2.0, or to go for one of the mid-priced 3D packages. In the running for me are Carrara 2, Lightwave 7 and Cinema 4D XL7. I have only a Power mac G4 at home which is why Studio Max is not on my short list.

While Carrara is far and above the most affordable contender (I qualify for the $199 upgrade from Meta's Carrara), I have some reservations about where to spend my money due to some very serious quality control issues I came across while attempting to use Carrara for professional project. I did a project for work entirely in Carrara on a Power Mac G4/450, and I encountered several very serious bugs that were real obstacles during production. The biggest problems I had were:

1. Animations failing to render at the end of the first frame, with an "unexpected error" dialog popping up. The workaround seem to be to set the rendering file format to quicktime, and them switch to sequenced pict when it came time to save.

2. View window failing to redraw after Eovia update to the software. I would click to go from single-camera view to 4-camera view, and window would just go blank. I ended up having to use the view menu to switch views instead of the view-switching "dot". I found no workaround or fix for this.

3. Failure and unpredictibility of anti-aliasing in a render. This was the deal-breaker for me. I tried during my project to render everything with high-quality anti-aliasing. Sometimes AA would work well, other times I'd get bad renders that were very poorly anti-aliased. I could render the same exact scene twice, with the same settings, at get wildly different results in terms of anti-aliasing quality. To this day, I have no idea what was going on. In the end, I had to render everything at 1600x1200 and use photoshop to shrink it down to 640x480, in effect faking antialiasing by downsampling. Argh!

Given what happened during this project, I'm very hesistant to continue doing production work with Carrara and I'm exploring the two other packages mentioned.

What really keeps me from using a new pacakge is not the price though, but the huge learning curve. I have the demos for C4D and Lightwave, and in checking out each one it was like I was looking at some kind of control panel for an alien spacecraft. The sheer unfamiliarity of these interfaces has me really scared to switch programs. I tried to make a simple scene in LW and C4D with a sphere and Cone, and I got really disheartened and frustrated. And I didn't get anywhere in the Maya demo!! Clearly, each of these softwares requires MANY hours of training and tutorials before I can even use them well enough to evaluate or compare them.

So right now, I'm really torn between just going along with what I know and love, which means getting Carrara 2.0 and hoping for the best in terms of big-fixes, or jumping headlong into one of the more expensive and more powerful programs. From playing around with them at work, I'd have to say that Cinema 4D looks like my other real option. I find its interface intimidating, but less so than Lightwave's.

Sorry for the long-winded post! I guess after all this, my really question is: is anyone else in the same boat? I'm really stuck deciding here, there are just too many pros and cons on this issue for me to commit to a software package! I am really truly hoping that Carrara 2.0 is stable and not riddled with bugs like 1.0.

Any input whatsoever on this topic could be indefinitely valuable to me. Thanks in advance Rostiy folks!

-Adam

P.S. I'm a Director Lingo programmer by trade. 90% of my 3D work is just for hobby, but I have actually done a fair amount of rendering stuff for work also. I also use Poser at home and freelance projects, so Poser-compatibility is an issue for me too.

Adam, I completely empathize with your dilemma as I was there, as well as probaly most people at one time. When I was looking into 3D packages I was considering tSp, Carrara, LW and C4D, and the bottom line is really....what do you want to do with the software. Whatever your choice, remember, it's a commitment! I had tSp for a while, and although it is a very good program, it wasn't for me. C2, also a good program, and has many things built in that others need plug-ins for. Not to mention, the price is not bad and you get Amapi. I tried the C4D demo and it is a really good one to. It has ther ability to do alot and if you want it to do more, you have some other programs for Maxon, like Dynamics, BodyPaint, etc... to really make awesome. So what did I choose, well I have C2, and like it, but LW is the one I'm concentrating on. Sure it can be very frustrating at times, but so can they all. Once you get into working through tutorials, etc... it makes alot of sense. And, I like the fact that the icons are in words and not pictures. I also like the fact that it can do most everything and anything you want. One of the deciding factors for me was the sheer mass of tapes, books, tutorials available to learn from. If you are that familar wioth Carrara and don't want to, or have enough time to learn another, than stick with C2. Antione Clappier (hope I spelled his name right) seems to really care and want to constantly improve his product so I look for some great things in the future. But....bottom line is...what are you going to do with it. I anticipate I will always use C2 for things but I really am looking forward to the LW journey. Just my opinion and thoughts, Chris

Carrara Studio 2.0 is now OSX and it supports dual CPU on the MAC. The AA has been improved along with many other issues, such as object selection and movements. Better UV mapping in the texture room etc. The eovia team is currently working on an update to 2.0 to clean-up issues that users are finding. Ringo Monfort

Hello Adam, I'm somewhat like you, i don't know if Carrara 2 is the good tool to make professionnal work . When i see all the lacks in productivity that remain i'm a bit dissapointed . I know every soft has its own problems on this side, and Carrara has one strong point with its cool UI that makes workflow more easy . A lot of potential then, and version 2 is getting further than V1 for sure . But it's still not a perfect software . If you're not in a hurry, i'd suggest to wait for Eovia to release a patch that will fix some of the problems Carrara has . Then, see if users on the forums are pleased with the changes . But i can assure you the program is already more stable than in version 1.1 (and it has a better A-A and Poser compatibility !) And by the way, if you got Metacreations' Carrara, i think you can upgrade for 149$ . I'm not sure, so check the pricing once again :) litst

One thing is for sure, I'm definitely waiting for the Carrara 2.0 demo before I consider buying it. $199 is inexpensive, but only if the product is usable. If I find C2 buggy, I'm just going to plunk down the cash for C4D and not look back. I have the C4D demo, and it looks like a lot of work to learn, but it's not crashing or misbehaving so far. I'll be trying it out all week and doing the online tutorials. -Adam

Adam - I believe you are dead right. I have been up at 2am on the verge of chucking my computer through the window b/c of that @#$@# render failed issue...and Eovia's free tech support?? I should sue them for saying that have tech support at all...they are pretty much worthless...I have left them voice mail and email, never to recieve a response. The thing is tho...I can't leave carrara all together. I just bought my dream 3d software Mirai and it kicks @ss!!! but what 3d program has such awesome text generation as carrara?....no extruding/extra modeling...its just there... How about how easy it is to make awesome scenery??? In terms of making Scenes quickly for simple projects none of the other 3d apps in any price range can compete (imho of course) For simple work I will continue to use carrara, but how I can I trust Carrara as my main software when the company who makes it does not find it benificaial to give it a professional modeler when they can sell it extra?? I sort of feel like Eovia is about 4 years behind the curve....You cant even export the boned caracters out of carrara into a usable format by game engines unless someone ever manages to write a carrara --> .x exporter.....C2 is out and the designers still don't have the SDK...why didnt Eovia release that first???? ALSO...why use amapi at all? You take the time to make beautiful edgeloops and quads and then it just triangulizes it when you save it for Carrara. Anyway Carrara is awesome, but in terms of professional animation you can't use it for a primary tool. Its to unrealiable, and there isn't a great support system to fall back onto interms of customer support. I have 3 or 4 stories of Carrara leaving me in the cold this last year b/c of that render error, then when the deadlines got tight there wasn't even a render farm I could send my stuff to.... I will upgrade later this year, and I will contiue to use it, but only sparingly..... -brent - former carrara fan, now a carrara user only.

I know where you're at. Don't get me wrong...I like Carrara. I've been using Ray Dream since version 5. For the money, It's got a heck of a lot of features. Just the same though, I am going to wait to upgrade. I am tired of having to fight my way through bugs. This isn't just a Carrara issue. In general, I am at the point where I would like to feel that I am not spending upgrade money on software that wont really work until the "XYZ" patch is released a month and a half later. It frankly seems that this is an issue I have with ALL of the new software I deal with. I prefer at this point to make informed decisions on my investments, rather than purchasing based on faith, open ended nonspecific promises of stability, and glowing new features that may or may not work as advertised. Eventually, I believe that I will upgrade to C2. At this time, however, I would simply prefer to make my decisions based on a larger pool of reliable information.

Hi, I can understand your frustration with this. This is a monumental decision when you are doing 3d work as 90% hobby. This makes it tuff to plunk down large amounts of money for an app that is not going to be used to make you money right away. There is a plus side to your dilemna. Carrara 2 is the perfect choice for a hobyist. I know, because I pretty much fall into that category mostly. You own a Mac and, as you may have read already from me, IMHO C2 is a must upgrade for Mac users, especially OS X users. Is Carrara perfect? NO WAY! But that is also a plus, because Eovia is evolving the product. They are always listening to users and V2 is proof. Bones was the biggest requested feature. OpenGL, Selection, performance, were requested often too. Well If you stick with Carrara, I don't think you will regret it, especially since you are an admitted hobbyist! -Paul

Once I took the time to learn Cinema 4D, I haven't look back, after having used Ray Dream and Carrara for years. My biggest issue with Eovia is Mac stability. I love the modeling process in Amapi, but even version 6, with latest patch, crashes CONSTANTLY. That said, I want to support Eovia and plan to pick up C2.0 once a few reviewers put it through it's paces, mainly because I can do certain modeling quicker than in Cinema4D.

I'm curious. Is everyone here using macs? Are wintel users having the same amount of problems? I'm just a hobbiest, so I'm not that serious but, I'm less than impressed with Carrara's ease of use or stability compared to RDS. I liked RDS's UI much better that all those "work windows". Switching back and forth is not producive for me. I resisted Carrara till Eovia it took over. I'm going to wait and see for Carrara 2.

I think it boils down to this: It is best to get in on the ground floor with a 3D app, like Carrara, because in the hands of a good developer the app will evolve into a more robust yet complicated monster. If you stay committed and you feel the the developer is too, then you will have the best of both worlds, a great app and the knowledge to use it from experiance. All the other 3D apps out there are fantastic, but, they did not start that way. I am willing to stick with CS and its drawbacks because I feel that Eovia and TGS won't let me down. Both of them want to have the killer app too. Kryoclasm

Kryoclasm, Looooooong time ago... That's what people were saying about Ray Dream Studio and 'Megagreedations'.