As a replacement for Carrara, how good is Strata CX8? I'm not an animator, so that's not an issue. Seems to have good lighting and rendering. The only thing is, everything on their web site looks shinny and commercial, never grunged up. I'm assuming that's because of their client base? How about Cheetah 3d? Houdini Indie looks interesting, but 200 a year seems a bit steep to me. Have heard Blender is hard to learn.

I can only comment on Blender and yes it previously had a big learning curve but since the introduction of 2.5 several years ago current version is 2.76b with 2.8 not far around the corner it has become much easier to learn, But you have to dedicate some time to it and you will not learn it over night but once you do get the hang of it you will fine it to be as strong a modeling tool as any of the big name one. Also we have a very active forum here for Blender with many members willing to jump in and help you along the way. Plus it is free so can't go wrong there either. I also own Carrara and will still keep it in my tool box of modeling tools but if you are looking to expand your knowledge base Blender would not be a bad place to start

Why do you need to replace carrara, has it stopped working or something?

I happily use it everyday. But I'm looking to get a new mac this summer, which will have the Yosemite OS. Will also be upgrading Photoshop and Painter at that point. My current Photoshop is CS4, which doesn't run on Yosemite.

An interesting post from Cheetah3D forums: Link.

As a first shot, I would say you shouldn't jump the gun on Carrara. Find out if it won't run on Yosemite first.

I deeply share your concern. The clock is ticking for us old C users up to the moment when our OS's shut us down.

I would also not rule out Vue. It has some of the most impressive rendering results out there and it isn't crazy expensive. I think blender is a great package and in some ways, it's ahead of C. In some ways it's not. I haven't been brought down to my knees far enough yet that I'm ready to devote a great amount of effort into a new program just yet.

I have given up on C ever having those wonderful outdoor superpowers that Vue and Terragen have so I'm going to invest in Terragen when it releases a new version this year.

As for modeling, there's wings and blender just as a start. I have also invested in Rhino as my backup plan when the clock runs out.

Based on cursory results and your art style, I would hazard that blender or cheetah3d would serve your interests. It's a pain to make the move but growing your skill set isn't a bad thing either.

Carrara isn't dead as long as we are still able to run it. Unfortunately, based on the limited information we have at our access, the odds of the end coming sooner than later are more likely than not.

Carrara 8.5.423 runs a-ok on Yosemite for me.

Vue is rich in features and abilities plus it has a nice community around it. Like Poser or Bryce, it's content manipulation program, not a content creation program - only primitive based modeling. (and of course, terrain sculpting) The shaders are awesome.

Vue's interface is easier to understand than Blenders in my opinion.

I don't know if you build your own models or use existing ones. If you don't need to model, Vue is more mature from an Enthusiast or Hobbyist level in terms of ease-of-use. Oh, and if you have Poser, it functions like a plug-in with view, letting you bring in Poser content and animations if you desire.

If I may suggest, houdini indie + engine: https://www.sidefx.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3189&Itemid=66

@Artformz2:

I think you will find this interesting: Link