LightwaveNewbie

[bwtr]

I have to brag--I am one of the lucky three to win LW9 in the recent 3D World exercise. First time in 75 years I have ever won anything!

Him, of all people, you may say! Sorry!

Anyway, while I wait for the package to arrive, I have downloaded a bundle of movies and a trial demo.

I really am staggered at how good LW9(.2) is. What a huge learning curve I am about to undertake!.

As a Carrara5Pro (and?Hexagon) junkie are there really anythings that I will miss if I concentrate 100% on LW9?

[Pete Exxtreme]

Welcome to the LW club

I can just share my rookie experience. Personnaly i've give up with modeling in LW and i will stay with HEx then Amapi, because my modeling skills have been formatted with those Eovia products, and LW modeling, while extremely powerfull is a pain in the neck IMHO. I will use LW for texturing/rendering and later animation.
I'm not saying that it's a bad tool (as 1,000s of beautiful models are done with it), but the workflow is less human-mind formatted to me.
The good thing with LW is that you have tons of tutorials, free or not.
This link tries to list then and is pretty good :
http://members.shaw.ca/lightwavetutorials/

There are good (not free) tutorials here at kurvstudios :http://www.kurvstudios.com/ I have 4 of their DVD and i quite happy with it.

Anyway as you won it (congrats !!!) and not payed it, don't forget it's a tool to create your art. So the learning curve is serious... and only you know if it's worth the time you'll spend learning it vs. your knowledge of Carrara/hex.

There is a thread (in french) about interesting LW ressources (all in english anyway) found on the net here :
http://forums.polyloop.net/lightwave...tutoriaux.html

[bwtr]

Thanks. The movies about the modelling, especially related to version 9 and 9.2, look very enticing.

I think Hexagon has become over complicated so perhaps my LW learning in that area may be short lived. Time will tell.

[Scratch]

Hi,

Welcome to the lw club.. Hope you enjoy it.

[juanmanuel]

remember www.flay.com Lots of goodies there

[Scratch]

and you can also take a look to the french section dedicated to lightwave in this forum.

[WillBellJr]

As any true Lightwaver will tell you, GRAB Inside Lightwave 9 by Dan Ablan off amazon, the Insider series has ALWAYS been the 1st book to grab when it's desired to learn all things Lightwave!

-Will

[Scratch]

You can also take the lightwave courseware from dan alban. It's a fantastic dvd. I thing it's better than a book.(inside lightwave is also very good,same autor).The begin includes the last news in lw9.2

[bwtr]

My first experiences with LW modelling have been very far from satisfactory. An understatement.

Can anyone with experience/competancy in modelling in both LW and, say, Hexagon, please honestly tell me if an old fart like me would really find worthwhile benefits in trying to learn the LW Modeller--would find it a step up from working with Hexagon?

[steama]

Lightwave is great in many ways but Hexagon is extraordinary in its design and approach to modeling. IMHO applications like Hexagon and Silo made modeling much easier to get going than many or most other more expensive 3D applications. I think the beauty of the niche that Hexagon and Silo fill was and is strong because modeling can be very difficult.

For me Hexagon has been possibly the very best modeling application (so far) and is very easy to learn. Silo is right there with it.

Originally Posted by Scratch

You can also take the lightwave courseware from dan alban. It's a fantastic dvd. I thing it's better than a book.(inside lightwave is also very good,same autor).The begin includes the last news in lw9.2

He is right. Dan Alban's Lightwave Courseware DVD may be the ultimate way to learn Lightwave. It makes what seems difficult much more easy. Dan Alban's Lightwave Courseware DVD is worth every dime it cost you. You would be hard pressed to find a better Lightwave learning resource.

[juanmanuel]

I wouldn't discard Modelling with modeler altogether. However, there ARE things that can be done easier in Hexagon (or Silo) as Steama rightly says. As there are things that are quite easy to do with modeler. A strong point for modeler is that there are lots of scripts and pugins that really can make difficult or tedious things in a jiffy.

[Pete Exxtreme]

Yes, LW modeler is more robust than Hexagon and will accept in example boolean operation that would made Hexagon explode
This said, the "layer way" to model of LW, plus the non-dynamic modeling is hard to appreciate if you like the Hexagon way. Anyhow you will have to use LW modeler for all the surfacing/UVmap etc...

[bwtr]

Thank you all.
It would seem that, in general, that you confirm ,for someone like me for whom modelling is a smallish part of my 3D activity, that trying to learn the "irregular"? (different) working methods of LW modelling may not be worthwhile.

Time will tell.

[WillBellJr]

LW's modeler is one of the best available, but as already mentioned, it's definitely NOT like some of the new, fast modelers on the block.

I'd say it's best to WATCH a few tutorials on LW's modeler - that will at least give you a taste on how stuff is done etc.

Modeling in LW is very old school, not that it's a bad thing but that's how it is for now. Plugins like LWCAD, VertiBevel et al., definitely make it a better experience but you'll pretty much already know how to use Modeler if you have those tools!

Again, I feel watching others use it is your best way to get a feel for using it..

-Will