3D Modeling & CAD Tools

Create Outstanding Animations - Easliy!
Choosing the right 3D animation software to match your needs is not a trivial matter anymore. Nowadays even the simplest 3D softwares are capable of producing stunning & outstanding animations. We have listed below several 3D animation softwares to choose from. Please note that most of these are demo versions so first try them out before shelling out your hard-earned cash!

Google SketchUp
Google SketchUp is a free, easy-to-learn 3D-modeling program with a few simple tools to let you create 3D models of houses, sheds, decks, home additions, woodworking projects, and even space ships. You can add details, textures, and glass to your models, and design with dimensional accuracy. You can place your finished models in Google Earth, share them with others by posting them to the 3D Warehouse, or print hard copies. Google SketchUp is a great way to discover if 3D modeling is right for you. Google SketchUp is free for personal use. No registration is required.

Ulead Cool 3D
Ulead Cool 3D is a 3D-text-creation tool that delivers high-impact still and animated graphics for use in presentations and on the Web. You can input text directly into the application utilizing TrueType fonts, or import EMF files. Preset styles, textures, colors, backgrounds, and lights allow you to optimize your output and to give it that special flair. Cool 3D even includes special effects such as Fire, Explode, and Twist, in addition to customizable special effects that can be saved for future use. Control over placement, distance from camera, and rotation can be applied to entire words or each to individual letters. Animation can be designed quickly and easily via preset templates, then saved as animated GIF or AVI movies. Still images can be exported in GIF, JPEG, TGA, or BMP formats.

Free DWG Viewer
Free DWG Viewer supports AutoCAD DWG, DXF and DWF. It has simple view tools and measurement tools with accurate snap-to-geometry functionality. Save views to JPEG. It runs as a desktop application, and an ActiveX control in IE. Printing is available in our $29 Brava Desktop product. Version 6.0.0.4 includes AutoCAD 2008 support, an updated interface, and improved measurement tools.

Bryce 3D
Create breathtaking realistic 3D landscapes and animations with DAZ 3D Bryce. The easy user interface simplifies the design process for a novice or the seasoned professional. Start out building or importing a landscape as impressive as the Grand Canyon. Populate it with buildings, people or any other object you create or from the extensive DAZ 3D library. The Light Lab provides you robust control over your sunsets, moonlight nights or high-noon ambiance. Tree Lab allows you to plant your landscape like the gardens of Versailles. You'll have to register your copy of Bryce on the publishers web-site to gain access to your free Bryce serial number.

iClone
iClone 2 transforms any desktop into a complete virtual movie studio. Create 3D characters, scenes, and special effects for films inside a total 3D real-time environment. Designed for users of any skill level, iClone is equipped to break the barriers of storytelling offering simplified 3D character creation using any photos, custom face and body shapes, easy design of 3D wardrobe and real-time foliage ecosystem. Filming movies inside iClone casts users as the role of director with Timeline editing control over scene animation and exporting options to gear your movie for Mobile, HD, Web, or PC premiere.

3D Canvas
3D Canvas is a real-time, 3D modeling, and animation tool that incorporates a drag-and-drop approach. Complex models can be constructed from simple 3D primitives or created using 3D Canvas's object-building tools. Creating an animated scene is as simple as positioning the objects within your scene for each point in time in your animation. 3D Canvas will ensure the resulting animation runs smoothly.

AutoCAD
Design, visualize, and document your ideas clearly and efficiently with AutoCAD software from Autodesk. From conceptual design through drafting and detailing, AutoCAD enables you to explore ideas like never before. Create, edit, and develop design alternatives using realistic solids and surfaces in an updated design environment. Communicate your ideas with powerful sketch, shadow, and rendering tools, including intuitive walk-through animations. Then turn your concepts into a set of documents with the new section and flatten functionality.

Alibre Design Xpress
Ready to get started with a real parametric solid modeler, but don't want to spend money to try it? Alibre Design Xpress delivers the features you need to get started with 3D design and tackle projects for your business or workshop. It's a rich and capable design application for creating parts, assemblies, and 2D drawings. Those that are new to 3D will find the tutorials, help, and user interface helpful in learning how to build 3D designs. Xpress is used in manufacturing, woodworking, mechanical design, and much more. Professional designers can use it at home and export for work. Once you have mastered Xpress, you can upgrade to more robust versions of Alibre Design.

CadStd Lite
CadStd Lite is a general purpose, easy to learn CAD/drafting program for creating professional quality mechanical designs, house plans, blueprints, schematics, and charts. Export your drawings in DXF or use 'copy clipboard' to paste images into Office and other applications. Import simple (Rev 12, Non-block) DXF files.

Punch Super Home Suite
Punch Software Super Home Suite makes it easy to design interior and exterior home improvement projects or entire homes in Photorealistic 3D with vivid colors and textures. Created by professionals, Punch Super Home Suite lets you draft and frame while calculating and modeling cost and square footage targets to avoid mistakes before you build. Design and landscape your yard, then take a Photorealistic 3D stroll through what you've created. Punch Super Home Suite is a great way to plan, design, remodel, or build your dream home. With this download comes bonus deck design software to make the deck of your dreams.

Truespace
This is the full working version--nothing removed or crippled, no time limits or watermarks. Features include: Powerful point editing, smoothing, sweeping, and deformation tools; amazing metaballs and plastiform tools to create organic shapes; multiple spot, local, and infinite lights; full physics simulation engine; bones, skinning, and inverse kinematics for character animation. A large number of file import and export formats add to the flexibility and compatibility with other programs. Output formats include rendered stills, animation, or VRML. A very active community provides support and interaction. Large selections of 3rd party plug-ins provide extra capabilities.

DAZ Studio
DAZ Studio is a feature rich 3D figure posing and animation tool that enables users of any skill level to easily create stunning digital imagery. Whether youre a 3D newbie or an avid 3D artist, you'll find DAZ Studio is the perfect tool for designing unique digital art and animation with virtual people, animals, props, vehicles, backgrounds and more. Experience total creative freedom with DAZ Studio and express yourself in 3D like never before.

CyberMotion 3D-Designer
CyberMotion 3D-Designer is an integrated 3D-graphics program for modeling, animating and rendering photorealistic 3D-scenes, terrains and characters. It features a multi-window graphical user interface, a vast number of 3D modeling tools, a landscape designer including complex atmospheres, TrueType-3D-fonts, subdivision surfaces and boolean operations, multiple material selections, hierarchical animation, inverse kinematics, skeletal deformation (skin and bones), global illumination rendering and a host of special effects, such as lens flares, caustics, volumetric fire, object halo, motion blur, depth-sharpeness, animated atmospheres with clouds, fog, rain and snow, starfields, and particle systems.

Visio Shapes Sampler
Visio Shapes Sampler is a free Microsoft Visio stencil containing 30 assorted symbols from Visimation's ShapeSuite for Manufacturing and Industry. ShapeSuites are collections of Visio stencil sets that have been crafted and structured to help you create superior drawings for a variety of business and technical uses. The entire ShapeSuite for Manufacturing and Industry includes 54 Visio stencils with approximately 3000 Visio shapes to support production and operational diagramming. The stencils are available as a complete set or in 10 individually priced categories: Building Automation, Laboratory, Manufacturing and Assembly, Power Systems, Process Control, Pulp and Paper, Waste and Wastewater, Controls and Miscellaneous, ASHRAE Schematic, ISA Process Schematic. ShapeSuite collections relieve the burden of creating graphics and symbols for your Visio templates and diagrams, freeing you to focus on more critical tasks. With ShapeSuites, there's no need to start from scratch

Blender
Blender is the open-source software for 3D modeling, animation, rendering, post-production, interactive creation and playback. It is available for all major operating systems under the GNU General Public License.Mostly a bug-fixing release, but it also adds a few new features like subsurface scattering (SSS) support and two new composite nodes. Version 2.45 includes unspecified updates.

Nendo
Nendo is a 3D modeling and painting package that is simple enough for the novice and powerful enough for the professional. You can create 3D objects for use in model libraries, games, print material, Web sites, visual simulations, and architectural applications. Nendo allows you to model objects in a 'digital clay' environment, with an interface based on traditional sculpting. It offers a variety of modeling functions--such as extrude, scale, rotate, connect, bevel, inset, mirror, and smooth--to create organic as well as hard-edged objects. Its 3D painting module allows you to paint in an interactive 3D environment using familiar painting tools with brush options such as size, opacity, and softness, as well as color and texture selection. Nendo also allows you to export your creations in a variety of file formats (.obj, .x, .3ds, and .wrl) for use in other 3D applications.

Poser
Harness the power of 3D figures with Poser. Design, pose, and animate your dream figure in 3D. Poser's interface unlocks the secrets of working with the human form. Poser contains all the tools you need to dress figures, style hair, and add accessories. Create anything from photorealistic content to cartoon images, learning illustrations to modern art. Make figures walk, dance, or run to create animations for Flash content or movies.