(Relatively) Quick and Easy 3D Graphics
Corel‘s new 3D animation/motion graphic program, MotionStudio 3D, is unabashedly aimed at consumers. But I’m writing about it for you, readers of a website with “Pro” in the title, because I’m impressed by how easy it is to create results quickly with MotionStudio. Since “3D” and “quick” aren’t a common combination, I thought you might want to know about this new app.
Two interface elements are standouts: The fittingly named EasyPalette, and the Attributes Panel. While the EasyPalette has a word or two you may not know, most of the effect terms are comfortingly familiar, and those effects are organized into a logical tree structure. You can drag and drop any of the many effects onto 3D objects that appear on the right side of the EasyPalette, or you can import objects (even 2D images) from other programs.
The terminology in the Attribute Panel is as comprehensible as EasyPalette’s, and sliders let you quickly adjust parameters such as texture, color, and (as in the screenshot below) how bright the lights are in your scene.
You can import the following types of files into MotionStudio 3D: 3DS, 3GP, AIFF, AU, AVI, AVCHD, BMP, CDA, EMF, JPG, M4A, MOV, MP3, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, WAV, WMF, WMA, WMV, X Model, and Adobe Illustrator version 8 or earlier. You can export your projects as 3DS, 3GP, AVI, AVCHD, BMP, GIF (still or animated), JPG, MOV, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, SWF, TGA, WMV, and X Model.
To get a feel for what the app can do, watch the 10 videos on MotionStudio’s Vimeo channel: https://vimeo.com/groups/ms3den/videos. Here’s just one of them:
