CompuServe Messages

Danny, There are three packages that I know off the top of my head that fit your price range: TrueSpace – Calagari Imagine – Impulse Animation: Master – Hash, Inc. There is also supposed to be a Windows version of Lightwave 3D available in a couple of months, the price I am seeing at the moment is about $950. Animation: Master is available for PC, Mac, Amiga, and SGI. I don't know about the others, but I'm sure that they hace PC, Mac, and Amiga versions. A lot of the choice depends upon what type of animation you want to do. Animation: Master is far and away the best application you can get for doing character animation. Go to the Hash library and download the file RODLOW. That is an example of what can be done with AM. It is a totally spline-based modeling system. If you need to use .DXF, it will import and export that format. If you want to see what you can do with things like spacecraft, there are a couple of images in the SF Fantasy Media forum in the Star Wars library that I did using AM. They are coming out with version 3.0, hopefully no later than the end of March. The new version will feature some new things like boolean cutters for spline modeling and a new module called POST for overlaying and/or combining one or more anims using Alpha, Transparency, and Shadow buffers, plus a completely re-designed interface. As an AM user, that is the first thing I would recommend to anyone who wanted to get into 3D animation. Ask Steve Sapppington in the Hash library to send you some product info. Hash is a small company, and doesn't have the marketing clout of Calagari and Impulse, but in this price range and even higher you can't get a better, more well-rounded package. Michael S. Flynn