Sculpted Prims: 3d Software Guide

Offline Previewer Tools

Basic tools that can be used to preview what a sculpt texture will look like when uploaded into Second Life and rendered as a prim. All of these are made by other Residents and should generaly be considered beta or works in progress.

XNA Sculptpreview

• Creator: Eddy Stryker
• Link to get it: XNA Sculptpreview
• Requires: Windows XP SP2 or Windows Vista, along with the Microsoft XNA framework (see above link for details)

A Hacky Sculpt Previewer

• Creator: Yumi Murakami
• Link to get it: Executeable File, Source Code (Java SDK required to run from the source).
• Requires: Java Runtime Engine 1.6 or higher, Java 3d API and any OS that will run them (Win, Mac and Linux are well covered). If installing or upgrading the JRE, be sure to do it before installing Java3d.

Professional 3d Suites

It has to be said: most professional 3d software is incredibly expensive, anywhere from hundreds to thousands of dollars for a single copy; they're marketed at big professional studios with thousands or millions of dollars to budget for this stuff. There are ways to reduce this expense so that it's witin the reach of an average person: some legal, some not.

• Don't post links to downloads of pirated software or directions/tools to crack trial software. They'll be deleted.
• Don't ask in a public forum where you can download pirated software.
• Don't be fooled by online retailers selling "OEM" copies of software online for cheep. None of these programs come in OEM (original equipment manufactuer, or anyone who makes computer hardware and bundles software with them) versions. Many companies such as Autodesk go so far as to only sell their software through authorized retailers. These too good to be true offers are just that: crooks trying to get you to pay them money for pirated software. (ed.: Trust me: I've fallen for it before and now know better).
• Do be aware that downloading pirated software is a good way to end up with malware on your system such as trojans and keyloggers.

That said, here are some of the legal options you can look for:

• Educational Licences: If you're a student, you can usualy get a signifigant discount on most of these programs. The downside is that many educational licences say you're not supposed to use the program for commercial purposes.
• Subscriptions: You pay anualy for a subsription to use the program. While this business model sucks for things like Anti-Virus programs, it can really save you money over time for 3d software and is a lot easier than a huge initial investment for the full licence. You also get the full benefits (and sometimes extra) of buying the program outright. I've seen (legit) subscription prices for 3ds Max run as little as $100 or $200 a year.
• Trials: Most 3d software has a demo or a "learning edition" that you can download from the software maker and try on your system. They will be either time or feature limited but this is a good way to get your feet wet.

So with that out of the way, the list...

Other 3d Programs

These programs may be free or cheap, but won't have nearly as expansive feature sets as those above.

3d File Formats

If you're using software that doesn't have a sculpt exporter avalible for it yet, there's always the option of exporting it in another program or giving the file to someone who can. To do that you'll need to export the model into a format the other program can handle. Here's a brief rundown.