The lack of a thirsty rendering engine has the advantage, however, of making 3DCrafter a good choice if you don’t have a high-end graphics machine. pov file and render it in POV-Ray, a freeware rendering engine. This can be a little frustrating if you are new to 3D and want to check your progress frequently.
One thing that 3DCrafter doesn’t include is a built-in rendering engine, at least in the free version. Unlike Blender, however, 3DCrafter doesn’t rely on keyboard shortcuts. Although 3DCrafter’s tool icons are well labeled if you hover over them, there are many tools, and it takes experience to remember what each does, especially if you are inexperienced with 3D design and not familiar with tools like Lathe, Equalize, or Crease.
You can drag and drop these into your workspace where you build, extrude, and mold your final model. Your starting basic shapes are a cube, cylinder, sphere, torus, or cone, and just like in Blender (also freeware). 3DCrafter either has missed the point of drag-and-drop simplicity, or has so many features it’s impossible to organize them all in a logical way.
I found 3DCrafter’s many non-intuitive buttons and lack of menus daunting and a little disappointing. With chopsticks.įloating built-in tutorials make 3D Crafter easy to start learning, but some artistic talent and a penchant for engineering are a must if you are to master the program’s many features. Using 3DCrafter 9.1.1 is a bit like building a Lego model without instructions. Don’t get fooled into thinking this is easy, though: You need both artistic talent and a knack for engineering. Amabilis Software’s 3DCrafter (freeware) is a modeling and animation tool that promises drag-and-drop control.