Daz3D, Bryce, Hexagon over Carrara?

mipe212

Hi,

This question may be placed in the wrong corner of the forum. Anyway I wounder, if I want to be able to create 3D objects as well as landscapes/scenery. Would a combo Daz3D, Bryce and Hexagon do the trick or would Carrara be of a better choise in any aspects?

/BR
SJ

SixDs

A tough question to answer, actually.

From the standpoint of cost, the DAZ Studio\Bryce\Hexagon option is significantly cheaper. DAZ Studio is free, and Bryce and Hexagon are currently on sale for $5.99 each. Carrara is on sale for a substantial savings as well, but still costs $44.99 for the standard version, or $85.00 for the Pro version.

Insofar as which option is better, that is entirely a matter of opinion. There are dyed-in-the-wool Carrara users who will extol its virtues, but it is important to recognize that there is a tendency for those who have become very familiar and comfortable with a program to feel it is "better". The same can be said of both Bryce and Hexagon. A certain amount of bias is almost inevitable. Some will find one user interface intuitive, while others will not. It is entirely subjective. Only you can say which you prefer.

If you are unfamiliar with the programs, there is certainly something to be said for learning only one (Carrara) which can handle your modelling, landscape creation and rendering needs, as opposed to having to learn three programs and how to imort and export stuff between them (although some people do that).

One thing to remember if you wish to use Genesis 3 models - Carrara does not currently support them, but DAZ Studio does.

Other than that, I can't honestly tell you which way to go, since that depends on what works for you. And I know nothing about that. I'm sure that others will chime in if you wait a bit.

Edit: As Sean mentions below, both Bryce and Hexagon are 32-bit only, which can impose some limitations, while Carrara is available in a 64-bit version, but only if you buy Pro (the standard version is only 32-bit)

sriesch

I've not used Carrara much so I can't really review how well it works compared to the Studio/Bryce/Hexagon combination.  However, I do use the Bryce/Studio combination regularly, and while it works for what I need there are limitations as the two applications are not completely compatible.  A single application that can do everything, if it can do everything, would certainly be preferred.  For example you can't pose in Bryce, so you have to pose in Studio then transfer to Bryce, and if you need to make any pose changes later but you have already made material changes in Bryce, you would have to delete the figure and start all over, which could be a lot of work so you have to be careful what you change.  Materials don't (always) transfer between the two applications. (procedural materials are completely incompatible.  image-based materials mostly work, although there are some issues.  There's an option to bake a material onto an object in Bryce to send back to DS, which sometimes works ok, sometimes not so well.)  Some Bryce objects such as trees and booleans, haz/fog, etc. cannot be transfer back into Studio, or not in a useful manner, and those that do (terrains for example) you have to know how to do it correctly.  Some objects that work in one application will be slightly different in the other.  I find DS is pretty much a posing utility to set up figures to send to Bryce to Render, or Bryce is a terrain generator or a sky generator to create a skydome (with the addition of another product) to bring into Studio.  Bryce is also a 32-bit application, which limits what you can do with it and requires learning a few minor tricks to get the most effective use out of it.

That said, I intend to keep using the Studio/Bryce combination, but it does have it's limitations and learning curve.