http://www.amazon.com/Blender-Dummies-Jason-van-Gumster/dp/0470400188/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1265224413&sr=8-1

The first two times that I tried to learn Blender, I gave up in frustration. The third time, I found the link listed above, and it made all of the difference. Blender is still weird, but I at least understand it now, and if you get to know it, it’s quite powerful.

Q: Can i have one team member using Unity Indie and the other using Unity Pro?
A: No. Within a single company, it’s all or nothing – the whole shop has to use either Indie or Pro licenses. (Jean-Guy – you had it right)

Q: Can i install Unity core engine on my home and work PCs, and Unity core with Unity iPhone on my Mac?
A: No – two machines is our tolerance. Those two machines could be a Mac and a PC, or two PCs, or two Macs. Three machines is a deal-breaker.

Q: If i install Unity on two PCs, and later i want to de-authorize one of the PCs and install on a Mac, can i do that?
A: Yes, but it has to be done through our support team. Eventually, de-authorization will be built into the app.

i don’t know if Flash is dying. i DO know, having used Flash for ten years, that by comparison the Unity team really seems to be lean and mean, and they’re putting together a really kick-ass product that does what you expect it to do. Flash development seems like a case of too many cooks – it’s been pulled this way and that, and features that devs have been clamouring for for YEARS are just showing up now, and it feels like they’re too little, too late.

3D is the obvious exmaple. Flash does 3D, sorta, just like Flash does OOP sorta, just like Flash does everything it does. It’s always a compromise, and nothing just works the way you’d like it to. There’s a workaround for absolutely everything. Other, less obvious features, that should have been in the program at version five are just showing up now six or seven years later in version ten, like the ability to swap out one symbol instance for another on the timeline and update the entire animation (instead of clicking on every individual keyframe and swapping the instance manually).

Now, i’ve only used Unity very briefly, and i haven’t completed a project with it yet, so i suspect i’m harbouring a lot of grass-is-greener thinking. i’ll be sure to tell you how my voyage into Unity development goes with up-to-the-minute reports.

As for you, Rob, i’d absolutely recommend learning Flash and making a game for your final project. You’ll be able to get it in front of far more eyeballs than with Unity, thanks to the Flash player’s ubiquity. You can still use your 3ds Max skillz to create pre-rendered 3D graphics. AND you can make fractions of pennies on it right out of the game by implementing MochiAds.

Go forth and code!

- Ryan

I’m a uni student whos been using 3dsmax for a while, but after reading about flash games and finding the pimp my game series I really want to build a flash game for my final year project. I suppose that’ll be alright as long as I scan the technology horizon with the rest of you chaps.

Love the site and blogs Ryan. Lead me to the indie developer promised land please!

- Ryan

Blender does enough that I just can’t justify 3D Studio Max. Max is better, as are Maya and Lightwave, but they aren’t $3,000+ dollars better.

At say $40 bucks an hour (or whatever your time is worth) 3DS Max equates to 87 hours of “value”. If you can learn Blender in less than 2 weeks of *full-time* study (which you can) then 3DS Max just isn’t worth it.

And my biggest pet peeve for 3D Studio Max still stands – in order to get it to “work” you end up buying $800 bucks in plug-ins to do stuff it should do out of the box.

- Ryan

Good thing i know a little C# from my adventures in XNA.

- Ryan

Also regarding the 2 machines/licence, each licence is intended for 1 developer. This licensing allows us to have a developer work on his own laptop from home and the one at work, or work from Mac and PC. It is not intended to give to two developers.

Sadly you will also probably want to budget $500/licence for the Asset Server. It is a life saver when working with more than one person. If you have two people working on the project then you will also need 2 Macs, one for each person. Once you start working in Unity IPhone you cannot go back to Unity proper.

Finally, learn C# the JavaScript is very limiting.

I personally know the author of “Blender for Dummies”. He’s a local where I live. I can put you in touch with him.

- Ryan

When i saw someone using Blender for a project during the last TOJam, i was agape. i had no idea how he had actually created a rigged character and a set. i didn’t think Blender could do that. i thought it was written explicitly to make my eyeballs bleed.

If there’s a Blender resource for borderline mentally retarded folks like me, i’d love to see it! A recurring problem i have with learning new technologies is finding the right starting point.

- Ryan

I’m assuming you already own a Mac? Because you can’t develop for the iPhone without a Mac, even with Unity!

Thanks, Jean-Guy … i know you’ve been a big proponent of the software, and it’s great to think that the grass is actually greener beyond the nonsense Flash makes developers endure. You’re correct that we don’t need 3D software immediately – Kahoots is entirely 2D. (You can build a 2D game in Unity, i understand, by mapping images to flat 3D planes.)

We’d like to have the 3D software to better learn the application. i suspect there will be a lot of demand for 3D in the browser (be it through Unity or HTML 5 [did i get that right?] or whatever), so it could be a very good investment for us.

As far as combining licenses goes, you’re right – i’ll have to check with the Unity team. i’ll post the answer here once i find out.

- Ryan

Great to see another Unity studio coming online.

Just a few things you and your readers may find of interest. I believe you Unity licenses allow you to legally install on 2 computers and that this applies for your iPhone license too. You can confirm this with Tom Higgins the Unity product evangelist. Tom is all round super nice guy and always willing to help out and point people in the right direction.

The Pro version of Unity and Unity iPhone is not necessary for a lot of developers getting started, so I’d recommend sticking with Indie until you land a contract or have the extra cash kicking around.

At Ethical Entertainment, we are all to aware of the cost of many of the 3D packages. Although we have been using Maya, we currently migrating towards a combination of Modo and Blender. These packages are much less expensive and in the case of Blender, free. You’d be surprised how much Blender has evolved over the last 2 years! We’re using Mode for a lot of our modeling and Luxology just released a new version which we have found to be really worthwhile.

Best wishes on your quest. Welcome to Unity.