suggestions for good books

suggestions for good books

Hi Guys

I'm looking to expand my knowledge on modeling, texturing and rigging; so i wonder what did you guys used to learn to model?

There is not too much around for c3d, and a lot of material is great, with vids and examples, but are hevily based on 3dsmax or maya, and i would like to learn independently from the software, so i can use c4d or any other software without any constrain, since i do not have [put a maya or max tool here].

My hope is to find something that start from a primitive or an image, and show how to proceed further and model a car, an airplane, a ship or whatever else; using low poly or high poly techniques, and that is independent from the software used (something like extrude here; create a poly here, cut there and so on; basically all tools that are available in any software that does 3d modeling).

IS there anything out there in a B&N or Borders or Amazon that i can buy? I've checked some books but they are all the same: teach the interface of the software but not the techniques to do something (and after all 3d is like painting or drawing....you can create something improvising, but when you learn the stroke techniques or how to make prospective and so on, everything gets easier, since is a "learn one adapt many times" kinda of process).

Thanks in advance for your suggestions....my next step in case this post will not give me some pointers, is to rent a tent and read all the books that i can from the closest Borders until i find something LOL

Hi Darshie!
not an easy request, since most of the stuff are software-related as you said. Personally i found really useful some videos on GuerillaCG and Nevercenter (these last are Silo related but are quite good to show you how to do the same thing in other software, since they use standard tools... just don't mind the kb shortcut and some tool's name )
for Cheetah3D there's the "for beginners" DVD but it needs to be updated for v5.0, some stuff from users like alvordr and the forum itself... look at the Tutorials section or try to do something and when you got a problem just ask!

cheers,
Alessandro

Thanks a lot SA

That site that you mentioned has the info that i was talking about; is really useful (the only negative side is that music that goes in and out all the times in every video lol).

I have the tutorial from the c3d site; and i was able to pick the software very easily with that series of vids; but sadly they keep it simple and many concepts are simply there to be used in c3d; while i was looking for something that gives me the tips about how to model this or that using different techniques; but in the end seems that extrusion is the most common technique (start from a primitive, extrude, rinse and repeat until done )

I am looking at some vids for blender now; trying to extrapolate the concepts and use them in c3d; but is still hard to figure out how to make a decent topography or how to correctly create a specific character to make a good rigging

I've found a couple of books online, but nothing at borders or B&N (on the other side, if you use maya, blender or 3dsmax you will rarely find yourself in need of looking for a specific book ); there was one that was interesting, but the generic part was 4 chapters, then the book was following the 3 major software packages with tips and tricks, so for 49 dollars i preferred to skip and wait for a better book.

Is anyone in the bay area that can suggest me a place where to find books on 3d? I know that there are a lot of art schools around SF, so i assume that they have suggestions about what kind of books to buy; but again, all of them are either based on max or on maya

I am surprised to see just one reply....is anyone so good that has no need of a generic book and simply love to loose time with trial-by-error?

Thanks anyway to the people that at least looked at it without replying

I guess what often helps are architecture and anatomy-books.