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Hello and welcome everybody to our very first CG related
podcast.
This is a brand new podcast called CGCast.
It's going to be all about CG.
Today is the 3rd of September 2005.
My name is Olivier Archer or ArcherX on various forums.
And today I have Mark Pinter, also known as George, on
different forums.
Hello people.
This is our very first episode, so this is a very special
moment for us.
I have big plans for this and hopefully with your help it's
going to be successful.
I plan on doing weekly updates of this podcast.
There will be news like what's happening in the industry,
what new tutorials are out,
if they're any good.
I'm going to try and do some interviews, have guests from
time to time.
I'll talk about shorts and demo reels around the net.
I'll also talk about CG contests on the net and anything
else that's of interest.
Another thing we'll talk about is artists that are doing
cool work.
I'm going to try and give them plugs and stuff like that to
help out the community and developing artists.
Right now, I'm working on the site for the podcast.
It should be cgcast.com, but it's not ready yet.
But hopefully, by the time you're listening to this, it
should be ready.
I'll try and get it up as soon as possible.
So anyway, today's show will be about the different 3U-
related websites on forums and forums around the net.
We couldn't do them all, so we did the well-known ones.
will explain what they have to offer and stuff like that.
The first site for today is evermotion.org.
It's a really nice site.
It has lots of information.
It's architectural focused.
It has tons of info.
But the only thing I don't like about it, it's a bit
graphics intensive.
So if you have a slow connection, you have to be careful.
As I said before, it has tons of information, news about
the industry, interviews, tutorials,
free stuff, game news, and its forums.
The tutorials they have on their site are pretty good.
They cover a lot of different subjects, animation, modeling
, texturing, rendering, compositing,
and different apps, Max, Maya, XSI, Lightwave, and etc.
But these tutorials are not targeted at newer users, but to
users that are a bit more advanced.
Yeah, I have to agree with you on the tutorials. They're
very nice.
But although they're advanced, even if you've used software
for a while, you can still get the hang of it.
What I like about most of their tutorials is there's
pictures there to help you along your way.
And so just a pure text tutorial.
And I found that most of the tutorials are focused more on
lighting.
And there's a lot more of like the interior architecture
ones, which is really nice.
I would actually really suggest that you check out these
tutorials because it can help anybody.
even if you're like a slight new to the 3D industry
or you're a veteran and been using your 3D program for many
, many years.
I also wanted to check out the forms to see what it was
like,
but they forced me to sign up before I can see the posts
that have been made,
and I think that's pretty uncool.
I like to see the forum atmosphere and see what it's like
before I waste my time to sign up.
Well, personally, I signed up because I just wanted to see
what it was like,
and I'll have to say you probably should sign up
because they have some pretty nice images and they're
finished threads
and some work in progress that are going on that looks
promising.
I was also looking at their gallery images and watched them
were really impressive
and I was just like, wow, I wish I could do this someday.
But maybe if I keep on doing their tutorials, maybe I can.
Fair enough. That's cool.
They also have a store, which is almost impossible to miss
since they have banners all over the site for their texture
CDs and architectural models.
That's what makes the site graphic intensive, all their
advertisements for their own stuff.
But some of their stuff looks kind of interesting.
They sell a bunch of texture CDs and architectural models,
which if you're in architecture would be perfect for you.
They sell software like V-Ray Renderer, which I love V-Ray.
And they have the new Maxwell Renderer for sale too,
which looks promising if they can improve their render
times.
they also sell some training cds like the mental ray ones
are kind of interesting for max because
there's not that much info about mental ray on max that
exists around so that would be cool
what do you think george i mean Mark yeah i i was just
quick looking at some other stuff and it
looks interesting i don't know i think they're going to
give 2d totals maybe saw a little run
for their money on their pictures and i like the mental ray
stuff there's like not no documentation
on it so that's the really good thing about their site that
i like yeah i agree all right next up we
have 3dtotal.com i really like the site it has a lot of
resources the tutorials they have are
really good they have all types of tutorials for various
application and it's home to the english
english version of the famous joan of arc tutorial now this
tutorial got me started with character
modeling and i look back on it from time to time when i'm
making heads in 3d max so if you're
If you're interested in character modeling, I suggest you
take a look at this tutorial.
It's pretty famous and well-known.
And when newbies are making a character, you can spot that
they're using the Joan of Arc tutorial from the reference.
But if you use it with your own reference material, it's
pretty good.
The rest of the tutorials are pretty helpful.
They're aimed at all levels and scale.
And in fact, this is my favorite part of this site.
Yeah, I honestly agree.
This is probably the best part of their site that they have
the tutorials on.
They have all the range of what you can do in computer
graphics
from texturing, lighting, rigging, animation, modeling,
everything you would ever want.
There's a lot of basic tutorials that I really liked,
especially the modeling.
And then with what Archer said about the drone of arc,
that's where I first learned how to UVW unwrap,
which is a main part of getting your finished product.
And yeah, the drone of arc, everyone,
Like when somebody charges them all something,
that's the first tutorial everybody links to everybody to.
And now they have some good texturing tutorials also.
So if you're ever around this site,
I'd highly recommend that you go to the tutorials section.
Yeah, they have the texturing tutorials
to help with the CD sales,
and it's good advertisement for them.
I think Evermotion should advertise like that with
tutorials
and not have their site blasted with their ads.
Anyways, let's go into the forums.
Forums are okay.
They have a nice atmosphere.
They have 18,000 members strong.
The good thing about this forum is that you can get a lot
of help in their web subforums.
When I post stuff there, I always get some good comments
and criticism to help me improve my work.
For the forums, one of my favorite subforums of it is the
speed modeling challenges.
I've never really entered one, but this week I was
intrigued by some of their mugs that they were doing.
So I actually was working on my mug earlier before I
started this.
And yeah, it's just amazing what people can do in a certain
amount of time.
And it's always a blast just to see what people can do in
like 30 minutes of modeling something.
I should check that out. I've never really been interested
in speed modeling, but I think I'll check that out.
They also have a nice gallery, which is very hard to get in
.
I know I've tried a few times with no success.
I guess I have to work a bit harder in the future.
So that means you can only expect amazing images in their
gallery.
And that makes it pay out.
Their images are pretty sweet.
But right now I'm just going to talk about what I like
about
where they were when I first get to 3D Total is their
homepage.
If you scroll down a bit, you see all this stuff that,
like new tutorials that are coming in on the front page
and tutorials off-site, stuff that's happening in the
industry,
such as, like, movies, new movies coming out, new software,
like how Lightwave 64-bit came out and how they did a
little short animation.
I really like looking at that part and, like,
getting into depth with this computer graphic industry.
All right.
That's pretty, yeah, it's true.
They cover some good news there on 3D Total.
I always check it every day a few times a day.
3D Total sells a few things, such as their texture CDs,
which is very popular.
They're known for that.
I got three of those from doing a tutorial from them.
And I like how they reward their community for contributing
like that.
And I have to say that they're pretty good.
They have a lot of variety.
We have also started with a new training DVD for 3D Max
that teaches you how to make a monster.
Looks pretty interesting, but I haven't seen it yet.
But I won't mind checking it out in the future.
Another thing, looks like they're planning on releasing a
book called Digital Masters
to give Ballistic Publishing and Expose some competition.
But theirs looks rather interesting since each image is
going to have an overview on how it's made.
I hope they're successful with that because I'm really
interested in that book.
They also sell a DVD about shorts called The Shorts Drawer.
It's very interesting.
I want to buy a copy of this because you can see all the
quality shorts made on the internet all gathered on one
nice DVD.
Any comments, George?
Not really.
We're slacking off.
now we have 3dbuzz.com which is run by jason busby if you
're a newbie this is the place to go they
have a ton of free video tutorials about everything 3d
programming game development 2d
and even drawing tons of good stuff here i think this is a
site that started out with the video
tutorial stuff and everybody seemed to copy them with that
um but most of the stuff for 3d max is
not as advanced mostly beginner stuff but i hope they
update that section um the site has gone
through a major change from its original one that i saw now
it's a bit more forum based and they've
added their buzz net thing which is for for members that
pay and gives them a lot of stuff
but i heard that jason he quit his job to work on the site
full time and i heard that it has a lot
of cool features and i think that's pretty cool if you got
some cash and you want to learn a lot
one-on-one i hear they have webcam setup they teach you
about step-by-step stuff which sounds
extremely cool um one thing that they do really that they
do that i really like they they let you
taste um the member sponsor video tutorials like the the
modeling on the fly they let you
see the first two videos which is very cool and i think
that that's like they let you see the first
videos to get you hooked so you pay um the modeling on the
fly was pretty cool i learned a few things
from it um they also have their own radio show called buzz
radio which seems to be updated
monthly and hosted by buzz and zach they're both pretty
entertaining people another thing is that
His daughters have a radio show about Japanese culture,
anime, and all that good stuff.
And that seems pretty interesting if you're into that stuff
.
I highly recommend 3D Buzz if you're starting out in 3D and
you need to learn a lot.
And check out the modeling on the fly vids.
They're pretty cool.
Oh, yeah, that sounds pretty cool.
I'll have to check that out sometime, I guess.
All right.
Cool, you should.
All right.
Now we're going to talk about the3dstudio.com.
This site is pretty old.
And in fact, this is one of the first forums I joined up to
.
This is the first forum that I joined up to.
Yeah, very first I ever knew that there's a 3D forum.
That's where I met Mark.
That's where we met.
The forum used to be really cool.
It had a very family orientation.
Everybody was helping each other.
Everybody was really good friends.
But lately the site changed and everybody started leaving
the forums.
It became a resource-based site like TurboSquid.
And everything just fell apart.
But before it used to be really good.
I don't know if their mat is going to try and do anything
to fix it.
But it looks like everybody has moved on to their new forum
.
But now it's open ground.
if you're looking if anybody's looking for a new forum that
's practically empty with a few people
visiting from time to time that's a place to build up but
they have a free empty forum any comments
any comments Mark> yeah i'll just have to say uh the 3d
studio was like my lifeline kind of i posted
my first few works there i was proud of them got helpful cr
its there but not like somebody i get
from a professional current like person and they'd just be
like oh my god you should just stop now
they gave me uh advice and everything and another thing
that i really liked about it
is uh their contest they had really amazing entries and
when i first started 3d i just
looked at them and i was like wow and you just can relate
to all the people in the forums and uh
there's there's also a lot of people from my hometown that
came here like uh amazing artist
called Tyson and another one, Simon Dines.
He's not really into 3D anymore and another new person.
So being a small forum and having so many people from my
hometown,
it's kind of an interesting thing.
Yeah, it's too bad that the 3Dstudio.com went down and fell
apart.
I think it was because of lack of contest
and the forum reset is what totally killed it.
But everybody, they've moved on to their new forum.
Yeah, moving on to bigger, better things.
Back then, it was like a few years ago,
everybody was still a newbie at 3D,
but now most people are getting jobs in there, moving.
They don't have time for forums anymore.
Just moving on to bigger things, and that's about it.
Yeah, but if you're looking for a forum,
if your group is looking for a forum, just check it out.
Yep, I agree with that.
Next up is maxforums.org.
I don't really know much about it, so I have Mark to talk
about it for us.
All right.
Well, the way I found maxforums.org is I was looking at 3D
Studio,
and there was a link for it.
Well, honestly, I just had to click it, so I did.
And I slowly kept on going to it.
I really liked the atmosphere of it.
Even though it's a large forum for 3D, it has about 11,000
members,
it still almost has a family base to it although i've been
uh creeping if you might say that around
for like about a year i i recently actually uh became a
member and started posting there
and um like you can see all the older members they all know
each other by their first name
they say happy birthday to everybody that they know it's
like really friendly but at the same
time there will be this like the new person that would come
in there and ask people to do stuff
for free and then just tell them to go away and then there
's also the people like their critiques
that they do on your artwork are probably the best that I
have seen on any forum because they can
tell like how long you've been using 3d and they'll give
you the best example like the best way to do
it and um even the more experienced artists that are doing
it for the jobs they'll have all these
other critiques from other people and it just makes all
artwork better and you can just see
over like a very short amount of time that people evolve
really quickly on these forms because
they're helpful critiques and they're very honest also so
they're not just gonna be like wow that's
amazing they'll like play to say oh you should change this
it might be a better idea to do
something like this or like that and it's one of the best
forums i've seen oh that sounds pretty
interesting maybe i should check it out you know i've never
i've heard about it but i've never
really checked it out yeah seriously you should go there it
's it's pretty intensive all right i
think our viewers should go there too since it's so good
now we have 3d palace.com that's 3d
dash palace.com um this website is very good it's pretty
new one to one that i know it's pretty new
and they have a lot of cool video tutorials it's not like 3
d buzz where they have the beginner
stuff they have more advanced stuff they've been making me
cha things for a long time like the apus
from the matrix and it's amazing what they have even some
of their not so advanced tutorials are
are pretty good like i was looking at a basic one and i
learned some stuff that i didn't even know
after so many years of using Max.
But I think it's worth checking out.
They have a forum.
I don't really check it much
because I don't like to go in for forum, forum, forum.
You forget people, but I stick to like two, three forums.
But I really recommend checking out their video tutorials.
They have for Macs, ZBrush, all different applications,
Photoshop and stuff.
Yeah, I can't really say much about this
because I had only been introduced to this recently.
Another forum, there was this newbie.
Well, I can't say that because he's been using it for 3D
Studio for about two weeks.
And he showed this picture of this mechanical vehicle.
And I was just amazed at what he could do in two weeks.
I remember all I could do in two weeks was make a few cubes
and some text and stuff.
and I was really amazed like this is something that would
take like quite a few months to do
and so I'm like oh I have to check out these tutorials so I
was skimming through them and I
I saw one that I really liked and I will be checking out
really shortly and it's uh normal
mapping for games for 3d studio and I'm just I'm like I
really want to do this because recently I
have taken an interest into uh gaming and I've recently
been modeling stuff for uh Half-Life 2
in Counter-Strike Source.
So I think normal mapping can take my game art
to a new level,
although my game art is at no level right now,
but maybe it'll make it a bit better.
So that's all I can say about this one
because I have no experience with it.
But from what I can see from the front of it
is that everyone should check out the video tutorials at
least.
Yeah, they're amazing.
I've downloaded quite a few gigabytes worth of video
tutorials
from them filling up my hard drive but the amount of stuff
you learn from it is priceless and the
best thing is that most of these video tutorials are free
they have a few sponsored ones but you
can you have gigabytes worth of free video tutorials that i
highly recommend if you're
if you want to learn something today just visit 3dpalace.
com now last but not least
is cgtalk.com.
I'm pretty sure most of you know about this site
because it's like one of the biggest sites on the net about
CG.
This is where newbies and professionals hang out.
I mean, this forum is huge, man.
It has a couple hundred thousand members,
and I love it.
These forums are very heavily moderated
to keep all the crap out,
and I want to say good job to all the moderators out there.
They have a ton of sub-forums,
one for each app and even for different niche software that
's there they have a
very helpful WIP forms it's not very newbie friendly
because the only a lot of
people with really good stuff post there so newbie stuff
not only goes on to the
abyss pretty quick but once you get good you can post your
stuff there you can
get amazing crates I'm not saying that newbie shouldn't
post but if if you're
starting out you can really get some good help there if you
're persistent with your forums and
with your posts um another thing is that a lot of artists
dream of being plugged there like recently
um i've been working on the two minute film club and they
used um part of my short the flower fight
for for the voting plug at the at the top and i've that
that makes me feel really good what do you
say it, George?
I really have to say that
it will probably make anybody's day for being
plugged in one of the best CG
websites that there is today.
What I do when I first get there
is I look at all the new plugs
and I click them
and I just get amazed by
just the art and the CG
depending on if it's 3D
or in 2D. It's just amazing.
And then from there, I like to
browse the forums of the 3D
finished art stills and just some of the stuff there even
if it's not punk it's still simply
amazing and it really gives inspiration to everyone that
will like approach 3d or even 2d
and it's just a great learning experience too they also
give awards to people that have done
really good work and you can see that the um some members
carry them around badges
and wow i dream of getting one of those um cg talk awards
one day because it's so cool
and it's like really prestigious man it would look really
good on your resume um another thing
is that the sub forums they have a lot of activities going
on like they in the um they
have the daily sketch which is really cool where people do
quick sketches and they have votes for
the two minute film club which roberto just started and i
think that's really cool i've
been participating in the first two it's only two now so
far but it's really cool
i think you should check that out there are a lot of good
entries this time um in the art
discussion forum there's linda has been writing a lot of
cool tutorials um another guy forgot his
name he's been writing a tutorial about his new technique
in photoshop it's really cool um
They also have another thing on if you pay to help CG talk,
which I think is cool.
If I had the cash, I would be a member of the CG society to
help the forum out.
Since they have a ton of traffic every day, I'm pretty sure
they get a million hits a month at least.
So traffic must be expensive.
What else do they hire?
Well, I have to say one of the things that I always look
forward to is the contest.
I'm not experiencing stuff to actually enter them,
but I just like to see the progress,
how the artists come about getting their final product.
And you just look at some of them,
and you're just like, you're completely stunned
of how much work they put into it.
And it's not just some little dolly contest
on some other forums where you get a few things.
This is like full-out pledged.
You get like, you know, computers sometimes, software.
And even like, you get so much stuff.
It's just amazing what people like to sponsor.
But being one of the biggest CG forum sites ever,
of course people are going to advertise with products for
these contests
because there are so many entries and you just are.
It's just amazing sometimes.
Yeah, I agree, man.
If I could win those prizes, it would be so cool.
But the competition is fierce for that
because it brings out the best of the best for those cont
ests.
So if you actually win one of those contests,
you must be extremely good.
Another thing on CG Talk,
ballistic publishing came from CG Talk, I think,
and they've had the Exposé books.
And wow, those books are amazing.
I have the Exposé 1, which is really cool.
I wish I could get the others,
but right now I'm starting school and I don't have any cash
.
But once I get all my expenses out of the way,
I'm going to try and start paying.
Then I'll start buying the books.
The rest of the books, they're pretty cool.
And every artist dreams to get published into...
Didn't you get published in it though, Olivier?
Yeah, I got published in the first one.
It was when I was doing the3Dstudio.com days
with all the help from those guys.
I got help from Terry, from Cameron.
I didn't know Tyson back then, but everybody else helped me
.
What else is there?
I don't know.
That's about it.
I think this has been a pretty good podcast.
There will be many more to come.
I want to try and record one every week.
But don't forget to check the site, www.cgcast.com.
Hopefully, will be up by the time you're hearing this.
I registered the domain.
I have the hosting, everything.
I really want this to be successful.
I'm going to have a contact there, so you can send me your
suggestions, comments.
If you don't like the site, send me an email.
Tell me that it sucks.
Just don't tell me it sucks.
Tell me how I can improve it.
Tell us how we can make this podcast better.
Suggestions for shows, whatever.
Any ideas, comments, criticism, we're open.
And we just want to try and make this the best CG podcast
available.
If you want to be part of the show, send me a message.
If you have something you want to talk about, something
interesting that's related to CG,
we'll have you on the show.
That'd be pretty cool.
So any final words, George?
Just that I'm very pleased to be your first guest host on
this.
And I really give you my best for hoping that this will
become a successful podcast.
And it probably will be because it's one of the more
original things
that will come into the CG thing instead of just forums and
stuff.
So it's just a good way to interact with the CG community a
bit more.
Yeah, thanks.
I hope I can have you in the future because you're a pretty
good co-host.
All right, thanks.
I think that wraps it up for now.
Well, thank you for listening.
and good night.
Goodbye from Switzerland.
Bye-bye.
And Canada.
