Likelihood to Recommend It's great if you don't want to mess around trying fixes or subpar software. Adobe Substance 3D is the default, and it just works when you need it. From textures to complex materials, it gets the job done with no worries. It's really good for new users, because the new UI features they implemented simplify the software a lot, and the learning curve is gentle. It is well suited for game development, renders, and top-notch material creation. One of the main features we use is the creation of dynamic materials that have different colors on the edges. This is useful because it adds a lot of realism, for example, in metals.
Read full review I've used many 3d programs I've not found any more capable or well suited for about anything you throw at it. I've had scenes with over 20million polys that I can work in just fine. It's well suited to produce absolute photorealistic renders especially when you pair it with plugins like V-Ray Render. One area where is may not be as suitable is if you have to model something in a coordinate space that is a long way from 0,0,0. Max is not double precision, so when a model is very tiny or very large or a long way from the origin, odd things occur. But, this is easily mitigated by modeling near the origin or reducing or enlarging the scene by some factor to make it not too small or too large. Then, after you are finished, you can scale it up or down by that factor again and export a perfectly scaled model for use in some other program
Read full review Pros Great performance Excellent Adobe support Fast and easy Read full review 3ds Max includes some of the inbuild modifiers which can be very good in the case of beginners. 3rd party Rendering support makes 3ds Max a powerful software for rendering out realistic images. Autodesk 3ds max in comparison to its rivals is lightweight and fast, also the animation case also. Read full review Cons Sometimes, it can take a lot to load heavy files It could be better at the time of exporting, it requires a pro user to make it right The interface can be messy if you're not familiar with it Read full review working in 2d is very frustrating and unreliable. It just lacks the precision How scaling affects units (or doesn't) There needs to be a way for modifiers to address a change of scale in the object. Booleans are not intuitive. Especially for architecture, creating an opening and putting a door or a window is an incredibly cumbersome process. Read full review Likelihood to Renew It satisfies 95% of my 3d visualization need. The left over 5% is handled by a few other programs. If Max just can't perform a specific task I can do that elsewhere and then bring it back to Max to finish up. But, it's rare that this occurs in my work
Read full review Usability This is not a 3ds Max fault, it's like any powerful software, "you have to spend time to learn it." It, like most all others as powerful, have a "learning curve" that can be steep depending on your knowledgebase. I'm glad it's not "so simple a caveman can use it" or I'd be out of business. Everyone in the world would have it and my skills would not be needed. Having said that, it's as intuitive and any other software. If you understand 3d principles, 3ds Max will not be difficult to wrap your head around. It uses normal and expected conventions
Read full review Support Rating I have contacted support many times and have had a good experience. They have always been helpful
Read full review Alternatives Considered For texturing, Adobe Substance 3D is much better than the other options. In other fields, it's another story. I find it excellent for game engines and realistic renders, but it only solves textures. We, then, move to
Blender because it has more compatibility with exports, and we can import them into our preferred render engine. We mostly use
Unreal Engine , but also Blender3D to do the final rendering.
Read full review In Autodesk 3ds Max you can do camera animation with ease, its complex in
Cinema 4D . Even I think same with light setup. Setting up light is quite easy in Autodesk 3ds Max as compare to
Cinema 4D . Overall Autodesk 3ds Max is less complex in compare to other 3D softwares.
Read full review Return on Investment We saved time when texturing models With better looking assets, it's more money in the bank Less time testing, more time doing Read full review Allows us to meet deadlines quickly - render times are minutes, not days. Digs into profits due to licensing fees - just a single seat can set us back thousands. Read full review ScreenShots