Intersted in another Free version of TrueSpace 3D?

[KenWood 5]

While I was browsing for some unrelated 3D stuff, I happened across a message on a forum announcing that Caligari was releasing trueSpace 7.6 for free. Not sure what all in a "catch" there is, but if interested, here is a link I was directed to to get it:http://cart1.caligari.com/web/Truespacemainreg.aspxI doubt any of our utility scripts will work with it, but hey - always worth checking out, yes? I got the main file (about 130mb), the PDF manual (30 or so MB) and video tutorials (132MB). To show how far behind on things I've gotten - I didn't even know M$ bought out Caligari!!!Oh, well... :-rollKen Wood :-sun1Gateway 700X; Intel P4 2.4GHz; 512MB RAM; NVIDIA Ti4200 4X AGP 128MB; SB Audigy; Thrustmaster TopGun Fox 2 Pro Shock

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day Ken,I received the email from Caligari advertising the free download of version 7.6 of Truespace but 130 MB download on 56K dial up turned me off.I'm currently using version 4.3 and the 3ds to s3d converter by Chris Wallace works fine. I have a pretty good feeling that it may also work with V7.6. Would you be interested in testing out the converter if I send you a *.scn file of an aircraft?I was also unaware of the buy-out of Caligari by MicroSoft!! I wonder what the logic of giving it away for free is. It's their latest versioon isn't it?? All the bells and whistles of V7.6 is not needed however for aircraft modeling.Cheers,Roger

[flyfisher 0]

Hi Guys,Seems amazing.I still have trueSpace 3 installed.When it became available for free I thought that was very generous of Caligari quite unlike MS who insist on one having to pay for new versions of programs (with the exception of Int Explorer, big deal) even if changes aren't quantum leaps eg Office.Perhaps it has something to do with competition with Google and SketchUp.

[KenWood 5]

G'Day Roger,LOL - If I can find some space on my main HDD to put 7.6 on it, I'll be happy to try and see if the converter works or not. Of course, I'm such a newbie with these 3D programs - no matter how much I read / how many tutorial videos I watch, the usage seems to elude me. In as I really want to upgrade Seawind's panel to a full 3D cockpit style, so as recolouring isn't as much a problem - but alas... Guess I need to stick to my weather charts!! LOLMany Cheers!Ken Wood :-sun1Gateway 700X; Intel P4 2.4GHz; 512MB RAM; NVIDIA Ti4200 4X AGP 128MB; SB Audigy; Thrustmaster TopGun Fox 2 Pro Shock (Old guys like me LOVE their old Computers! :-lol )

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day Ken,I've bitten the bullet and am downloading ts76 as I write. Up to 120 MB and have resumed the download 3 times. Thank heavens for GETRIGHT I say. It's painfully slow (56K dial-up) and my ISP keeps kicking me offline but I'm very nearly there and will have a good look at TS7.6 to see if it can be used for Fly!II. I'm certain that many of the more complex functions will not be handled by Chris' converter but if one keeps to just the basic functions then there's a chance it might just work. I don't follow your point about 3D panels being easy to recolour?? You would have to maintain the 3d files and all the textures if you wish to do any modification work on the panel, especially if the rework involves moving parts like levers/switches etc. That's a problem I ran into with the beaver. I couldn't rework the control levers because I didn't have the 3d object files. Any way I'll post on my results later.Cheers,Roger

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day Ken,I knew it had to be too good to be true!after hours of downloading I finally installed and had a quick look at it. It's not bad, rather more complex than earlier versions but that's to be expected.Then the bad news;As soon as I tried to render an object a message box appears "offline rendering engine not installed; contact Caligari.com @www.caligari.com" I went to the website and for US$299 you can purchase "V-Ray" which is a rendering engine for TrueSpace 7.6So the free download program is basically useless as you can't render a model. They don't tell you that in the info blurb before you download. The error message perhaps hints that you may be able to render online using a Caligari website based engine but even if that's possible the rendering time factor would be prohibitively slow using 56K dial-up.Reading the manual it is not likely that Chris's converter would work with it either so it's back to TrueSpace 3.2 or 4.3 for me as both of those have rendering engines included and will work with chris' converter.Thank you Microsoft but no thanks.Cheers,Roger

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day all,I was a wee bit harsh in my last post. But why Caligari didn't include their native render package ( as with earlier versions ) one can only speculate. Maybe it wasn't up to the job? After delving into the manual I have found out that there is a Freeware render package "Virtual Global Illuminator" included BUT you have to download a "plug in" to enable it to work with Truespace.The plug in is payware and costs US$25 So if anyone wants to get started into 3D modeling I guess one can't complain. $25 is really only a couple of coffee's on my morning ride.Unfortunately it will be of no use for making models for Fly! II.BTW the manual is excellent and would be well worth downloading. It's exceptionally well written and explains a lot. It would be great for people who are using earlier versions of TrueSpace.Cheers,Roger

[KenWood 5]

Thanks very much for the posts, Roger. Since M$ bought them out, I should have known the "free" offer was too good to be true. I think the first post was accurate enough - considering what was sent out led one to believe one was getting a full working package...Ah well, live and learn, I suppose! I'll work on TS32 and see what I can accomplish.Cheers, Mate!Ken Wood :-sun1Gateway 700X; Intel P4 2.4GHz; 512MB RAM; NVIDIA Ti4200 4X AGP 128MB; SB Audigy; Thrustmaster TopGun Fox 2 Pro Shock

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day Ken,If you are serious about using TS 3.2 then do a google search as there are some good (almost essential) freeware "plug ins" that will help no end. You will need a UV wrapper/unwrapper to aid texturing models and a hierachy sorter to help organise all the bits into one model. If you can't find any plug ins get back to me and I'll email them to you.Ts 3.2 does everything you need to produce an aircraft for Fly! II and we have Chris Wallace's converter that will make the output compatible with Fly! II editor.I bought Ts 4.3 about 2 years ago on 2 CD's when Caligari had the special deal offer for US$20. Very little difference to Ts 3.2, just a few extra features and some bug fixes.Don't be too harsh on Caligari. They don't get the $25 An independent developer wrote the plug-in to enable the "virtual global illuminator" to be used with Truespace 7.6 You are directed to his website to buy it. I guess he likes to eat :-)Cheers,Roger

[Guest DSandberg]

I know I'm really late with this information, but to my knowledge nothing was actually removed from trueSpace 7.6, including free rendering abilities. It's just that the old renderers have only been available in the older "Model View" mode of the application (the mode that should be more familiar if you have been using earlier versions of trueSpace); they have never been in the "Workspace View" that is new with trueSpace v7. You can switch back and forth between the two modes more or less freely (I think), but the tools (including the render buttons) are mode-specific.Caligari Forums FAQ post on render button errorI hope this is not too late to be helpful. From what I've seen, trueSpace 7.6 is really quite a nice freebie.

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

G'day David,Mate information is never too late! Thanks for the explanation and the link; it explains why the renderer works only in model view and subsequent links tell us that model view is only included for backwards compatibilty and that future versions of Truespace will only have workspace view.As you say TS 7.6 is an excellent freebie ( I've downloaded it and put it onto a CD ) but I would urge anyone interested in modeling for Fly! II to hunt around for one of the older versions of Truespace ( Chris Wallace's converter is compatible with or we may have to cajole Chris into updating the converter :-) ). 90% of the features of TS 7.6 are simply not required to model an aircraft. Thanks for the infoCheers,Roger

[Lord_Rixk 0]

I recently acquired a brand new pc with vista running (a 1mb nvidia card and 4 giga of ddr2 ram) and one of my first thoughts was to try Fly! 2 on it.... brilliant! (it works smoothly), so I felt it was time to go back to designing...and then encountered a bit of a dissapointment when i could not longer download truespace 3.2 from the caligari website, so i downloaded their new free offer instead. it looks good but as roger said, its complex, and it will need a few good sessions before it is of any practical use.later on i found a link on converting the buildings from Google earth's format (kmz) to caligari's (cob) ny using another free program called "render". but the system should only work if using truespace 7.6(google earth models): http://sketchup.google.com/3dwarehouse(How to convert them):http://johanneskebeck.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!42E1F70205EC8A96!6520.entry(Blender): http://www.blender.org/I am yet to convert succesfully any model, i have tried a few and failed (mainly because 7.6 keeps crashing)anyway... luckily i found a copy of 3.2 on cd and it works fine on vista.I have not discarded the google models yet, because their skins could be of some use (copying part of them could save hours of work), though i fear i will not be spending too much time on 7.6... its complexity requires the knowledge of a more seasoned designer... my best advice is, if you dont really work with 3d models on a daily basis, 3.2 is the tool for you

[Guest DSandberg]

Mate information is never too late! Thanks for the explanation and the link; it explains why the renderer works only in model view and subsequent links tell us that model view is only included for backwards compatibilty and that future versions of Truespace will only have workspace view.

Anything is possible now that Redmond is involved and tS is free, of course, but personally I would anticipate that Caligari would move at least one internal renderer into the workspace view before phasing out the model view. There are quite a few other tools that also are only in the model view right now, and trueSpace users would howl if many of those tools were simply dropped at some point along with the model view. (That's why the model view is still there, after all ... because Caligari was unable to fully re-architect everything to work in the workspace view before they had to decide to pull together what they already had into a package they could begin selling as trueSpace 7.x)On that note, even though Caligari may indicate the model view will be going away in the future, anyone who has followed trueSpace over the years probably knows to expect their plans to take about four times as long to actually implement as what they are saying (that is, if the plans ever come to fruition at all). So I'm betting the model view will be around for a little while yet. :)Anyway, have fun using whatever version of tS you prefer! (Or any other 3D app, for that matter ... recently I'd started playing around with Blender a bit.)

[Roger Mazengarb 0]

>Anyway, have fun using whatever version of tS you prefer! (Or any other 3D app, for that matter ... recently I'd started playing around with Blender a bit.).I have downloaded Blender and had a bit of a play with it. Initially found it a bit cumbersome but the program certainly looks very professional with a miriad of bells and whistles (very similar to 3D Max in appearance but minus the prohibitive expense.).Unfortunately there is not currently a 3ds to s3d converter to enable Blender models to be used with the Fly! II editor. Now there's a project for a keen programmer. :-)Cheers,Roger