The Dogwaffler of the Moment newsletter issue #7



The Dogwaffler of the Moment newsletter #7- October 2006 http://www.thebest3d.com/dogwaffle/newsletter/7	more:newsletters go:home

* the big one: Announcing PD Pro Digital Painter 4 * PD Particles: the free 1.0a patch * PD Artist * Tutorials: PD Particles with Blender, PSP, Bryce and more * 3D news: Bryce 5 free, Poser 5 below $50, Carrara 4 under $60 * book #2: Silver Squirrel in Uneasy Pieces * Dogwafflers of the moment: Dalemation and criss * in other News
_______________________________________________________ Announcing PD Pro Digital Painter 4 - Beyond the Standard _______________________________________________________ PD Pro has received a major overhaul of the user interface and a new framework for adding multi-threading and getting even better performance on multi-core systems, dual-core now, quad and more in the near future. There is also a new pigment oriented color mixer, open a file directly to stored condition, and other tools and features. For a detailed description of why and what's new, visit http://www.thebest3d.com/pdpro If you are interested in upgrading your current copy of PD Pro 3 to PD Pro 4, please take note of these intro pricing specials: full version of PD Pro 4 is $119 - intro special $105 ($15 off) upgrade from PD Pro 3 is $35 - intro special $29 ($6 off) If you own a copy of PD Particles, use the discount coupon you received by email, it gives you $20 or better off, for 'sidegrades' from PD Particles to Project Dogwaffle v2.1, or to PD Pro 3.5, or of course also to PD Pro v4 The intro pricing is good through November 15. Your coupon may have a time limitation too, typically good through December 31 in most cases. Some coupons didn't have a time limit stated. They're good for a year. If you have any questions don't hesitate to ask us directly or openly on the forum at http://www.Yahoogroups.com/group/dogwaffle for the benefit of other fellow wafflers.
_______________________________________________________ PD Particles: the free 1.0a patch _______________________________________________________ Just a few months ago, in August 2006, we released a very light version of PD Pro, called PD Particles. Version 1.0 had a few minor glitches, and we have fixed them in a recent patch: 1.0a http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/help/patch1.0a.html PD Particles 1.0a is a free patch for users of PD Particles 1.0
_______________________________________________________ PD Artist _______________________________________________________ If you've been using the freeware version 1.2 of Project Dogwaffle and longing for something a little bit faster, with more or different features, you might find these new choices of interest: In addition to Project Dogwaffle 2.1 ($59), we now also have an entry level edition of PD Pro called PD Artist. It is based on a subset of the code roughly from version 3.2 to 3.5. It does have some minimal animation features, but is primarily positioned as an entry level paint system. What sets it aside from PD Particles is the custom brush support. http://www.thebest3d.com/pda With the holidays coming soon and the spirit of giving just around the corner, especially if you feel you want to help a needy student or starving artist with a copy of one of Project Dogwaffle's tools, there are now numerous ways to do so: - Project Dogwaffle 1.2............ the freeware edition - PD Particles 1 ...................... $19 - PD Artist 1 ......................... $39 - Project Dogwaffle 2.1 ........... $59 - PD Pro 3.5 .......................... $97 - PD Pro 4.0 .......................... $119 (intro priced at $104) If you do start with PD Particles, you can also upgrade to PD Artist. If you get PD ARtist, you can also upgrade to PD Pro. Technically, these are sidegrades, as you keep the original installations and merely get a discount coupon for the new full installer which you can install mon the same system in adifferent folder or even on a different system. For example, if your little brother got PD Particles to draw some Anime and toons, you can enjoy some great savings to sidegrade to PD Artist or PD Pro and show him some 'real' painting and animation as well as great secial FX that will make you feel like a Hollywood special fx artist!
_______________________________________________________ Tutorials: PD Particles with Blender, PSP, Bryce and more _______________________________________________________ Many new tutorials have been added for PD Particles ogver the last few weeks. Even if you don't use PD Particles, you will perhaps find some of it useful with PD Pro or even the freeware version. http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/tutorials There are tutorials that show some ways of using the resulting images with other imaging and animation tools, such as ArtWeaver, Paint Shop Pro and Photoshop Elements, to name a few. There are also some tutorials for users of 3D programs like Bryce, Poser, Cinema4D and Blender. If you make your own tutorials about PD Pro, PD Particles or other Project Dogwaffle and some other 2D or 3D animation and imaging tools, we'd like to hear from you.
_______________________________________________________ 3D news: Bryce 5 free, Poser 5 below $50, Carrara 4 under $60 _______________________________________________________ There have been lots of new product announcements in recent weeks and months, and it's been great for starving artists to finally get their hands on software that used to cost a fortune and see them turn into freeware. Bryce 5 (http://www.daz3d.com) was promoted as a free download for several weeks in preparation of the long awaited Bryce 6 launch. Version 6 was previewed at Siggraph in Boston. Did you see it? Here's a set of tutorials for starting with Bryce: http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/tutorials/bryce101 - discovering Bryce! http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/tutorials/bryce With any luck, you might still find the free version of Bryce 5 at http://www.download.com - do a search there, or at daz3d's website Poser 5 was also free as a download for a while (http://www.e-frontier.com) and I hope you got your copy, if you're interested in art with human figures. Version 5 can also still be found in boxed form while supplies last, then it's going to be 6 and version 7 has just been pre-announced. We're offering Poser 5 in boxed form for $49.95 with free shipping available in the US, shipping from California. If you're in a different state, chances are you won't have to pay sales taxes and therefore you pay exactly $49.95 for the boxed edition on CD with the printed manual! See details for Mac or PC Versions here: http://www.thebest3d.com/poser One of our favorite all-round 3D solutions is Carrara, and it was acquired a few months ago by the owner of Bryce, i.e. DAZ. While Carrara 5.1 is currently the latest and greatest, there is still some inventory of prior version 4 (Standard and Pro) in boxed form available at Purplus. This is a great opportunity to acquire Carrara for $59.95 - free shipping available in the US - this is the boxed version. http://www.thebest3d.com/carrara A little-known 3D tool is also pretty amazing, especially for users of fast 3D systems, and it's particularly great if you like to just sketch and make that sketch turn into 3D. It is called Archipelis Designer, check it out here: http://www.thebest3d.com/archipelis Going further into modeling and clothing and posing of human figures, you mkight be attracted to Quidam, by N-sided. That one goes into a little bit more of the professional side of the market, but it's not a bad price at all especially if you don't need the low-poly exporter. see http://www.thebest3d.com/nsided Try the demo, it's fun and very fast to play with. You can also load your existing 3D model in Wavefront OBJ format and further morph and reshape it. There are other tools we've discovered and found very nice, such as 7-zip, or LeoCad, and we invite you to check some of our recommendations listed at www.thebest3d.com - we're also open to your feedback for other suggestions of tools and services that make an artist's dream easier and more fun to reach. what we seek: Freeware - Shareware - Affordableware
_______________________________________________________ book #2: Silver Squirrel in Uneasy Pieces _______________________________________________________ They say a 3D artist never sleeps.... they instead dream in 3D to keep the adrenaline going. That must be the case with Dan. Dan Ritchie is not only a prolific programmer and visual artist: he also has (or finds) time to write novels: the chronicles of Silver Squirrel. His second novel was just released this same week as PD Pro 4: http://www.thebest3d.com/silversquirrel If you like to read, and you like mother nature, this might just be perfect.
_______________________________________________________ Dogwafflers of the moment: Dalemation and criss _______________________________________________________ He's not really a new user, he's been around for a while, and in fact you may have seen his 'contractor' animation in the past 2 years whenever you came in for a visit to the patches section and updated to the latest free patch. Dale Hemenway, aka Dalemation, does animation. He uses Project Dogwaffle and other tools. This is just such a cute little animation, we want to show it again. http://www.thebest3d.com/dogwaffle/dotm/dalemation New Dogwaffle: 'criss' from Romania Cristian 'criss' Mihaescu has been using Blender for a while, for 3D. He recently created great artwork and a tutorial with PD Particles, here's one: http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/tutorials/blender/criss Criss also sent us a great tutorial using Terragen: http://www.thebest3d.com/pdp/tutorials/terragen/index.html
_______________________________________________________ In Other News _______________________________________________________ --- PD Pro the retail edition: what's in your boxlet? If you're in the UK or parts of Europe that receives satellite TV coverage of the Shopping Channel, chances are that you may have seen or bought the boxed edition of Project Dogwaffle Professional, based on version 3.5 of PD Pro and published by Fasttrak in the UK. Recently, Fasttrak has merged with Avanquest: http://www.fasttrak.co.uk/ http://www.avanquest.co.uk/ PD Pro 3.5 is not the only great product they carry. If you're in the market for other tools, particularly audio related tools, some Game Creation tools and more, be sure to visit them. If you still have the original Project Dogwaffle Professional 3.5 installed, be sure to at least get the free update atch to 3.7 http://www.thebest3d.com/dogwaffle/patches By-the-way, we do have a limited supply of boxed editions too, and they are available on special order for shipments in the US and Canada with the exception of California (we want to keep sales tax reporting simple). In the meantime, they're included as a free backup copy and tutorial collection with school orders of downloaded site licenses of 20 and more seats. --- Pablo, where's your Surplus? ...at Purplus of course And while we're at it, another excellent source for software, and not always the latest version but great stuff nonetheless, is a software and hardware surplus outlet called Purplus: http://www.purplus.com This is in fact through whom we found some great deals like Poser 5 and Carrara 4. You can find prior-generation versions there at a fraction of what it used to cost when it was new. Even Photoshop Elements v4 for about half the usual cost based on MSRP. We go there also to renew our McAfee anti-virus subscriptions, for around $15 if memory serves us right. --- looking for a tablet? When it comes to tablets, you might enjoy a reseller who carries the Wacom or other brands, and is out of your State, so you may avoid sales taxes in some cases. Furthermore, if they already discount their tablets by a few bucks, it will cover shipping charges. In the end you may have a great tablet, new, for less than if you drove to the nearby shopping mall's electronic super store. And with gasoline pricesw where they have been, we should also remember how much the trip to the mall adds in overall cost. Shopping the internet is looking better than ever. Try Tigerdirect, but also other suppliers. We have a discussion thread on tablets in the dogwaffle forum at Yahoogroups Happy Halloween, and Happy waffling everyone! -Team Dogwaffle www.thebest3d.com and www.squirreldome.com