The fact being established that Carrara development is dead, that Daz is not willing to invest even a penny in an otherwise great piece of software that Carrara is (or was), it's very legitimate for us, ex-Carrara users, to look at alternatives. Fortunately there are very excellent choices, one of them is Cheetah3D, or C3D for short.

FIRST OF ALL, AND I'M PUTTING THIS IN ALL CAPS TO MAKE IT CRYSTAL CLEAR, C3D IS A MAC ONLY 3D APP. SO IF YOU ARE A PC USER, YOU ARE OUT OF LUCK, END OF THE STORY.

For those of us who do have a Mac though, C3D is a must-have. For $99.- you get a rather advanced 3D app, loaded with Cinema4D-like features. Here is a summary of these features. I will try and expand on these features in future posts, if I have time.

1. Modeler: C3D's modeler is actually quite powerful, very much on par with Hexagon, possibly even more powerful.

2. A node-based texturing system, which is the standard by which all modern 3D apps go.

3. In its upcoming version 7, currently in public beta, C3D has 2 built-in renderers. One ray-tracer, and one path-tracer which boasts advanced techniques like adaptive sampling, which stops rendering a pixel if its noise level falls below a given threshold. This feature greatly speeds-up the render in its final stages.

4. A camera which is a true camera, i.e. it has aperture, shutter speed, iso sensitivity, point of focus, and a host of other parameters that let you create renders that look like a photo taken with a professional camera.

5. A very well-thought configurable workspace, that you can adapt to your liking any way you want.

6. A particularly fast and responsive OpenGL preview.

7. A nearly flawless ability to import Daz/Poser contents through FBX or Collada export from Daz Studio. I have only tested static models though, not animated characters meshes. The image below is a render of the excellent model 'Baroque Grandeur' by Jack Tomalin, available at Daz3D. This is a raw render, i.e. I did not tweak any of the textures, except the diffuse intensity of the rug on the floor, because it was too bright.

There you have it. In my upcoming posts I will try and elaborate on all C3D's great features.

Carrara Pro has been and still is an great 3d program it shines in what it can do but then you all know this you have used it and will will not die an fast death but will be about for years to come

radioham posted at 4:47PM Fri, 05 May 2017 - #4304398

Carrara Pro has been and still is an great 3d program it shines in what it can do but then you all know this you have used it and will will not die an fast death but will be about for years to come

Agreed. I use it on a daily basis and it does everything I want to do for short animations, and fast. And on a fast Core i7 Windows machine.

radioham posted at 11:11AM Sat, 06 May 2017 - #4304398

Carrara Pro has been and still is an great 3d program it shines in what it can do but then you all know this you have used it and will will not die an fast death but will be about for years to come

Yeah, in Carrara I can use Poser and DS content natively and create all the environments/scenarios and simulations easily. For all the others things that I can't do in Carrara, I have Blender which is so powerful and FREE for Windows, Mac and Linux. Maybe I'll give it a try when a PC version is available.

Cheetah3D is truly a great program.

First of all, the program gets updated on the average every other month. Some of the updates actually are more than just point releases and minor bug fixes. They contain some significant improvements and enhancements.

Where Cheetah3D shines is that it comes with 2 renderers. One ray-tracer, and the other is a super-fast path tracer using adaptive sampling techniques, for the fastest results. This is pro-level feature in a $99.- package.

Cheetah3D is a Mac only product. If you are a PC user, this thread is not for you. Stay out.

Cheetah3D has numerous features quite similar to Cinema4D. In a sense it can be considered as Cinema4D's little brother.

The FBX import of Daz/Poser models into Cheetash3D works flawlessly. In 1 situation I had to break down the model in 2 parts for it to import correctly.

Cheetah3D actually handles Daz/Poser contents far better than Carrara does. You don't need to spend days to adjust textures to make them look good, as is the case with Carrara. From this perspective, the overall cost of a project is always a lot less with Cheetah3D than with Carrara.

Below are 2 sample works that I did with Cheetah3D. These are only wips, and by no means represent what Cheetah3D can do, in terms of lighting abilities and rendering quality.

More on Cheetah3D later.