I think most of these are animated gifs, but what was the base program that might create these? They seem to be churning this out quickly and cheaply so I don’t think they are using some expensive cgi moviemaking software - that would be overkill. I’m looking for a program that does this kind of 3d at about the level (price and functionality) of Adobe Photoshop.
Also in the following site, they have animations of people’s faces created from photos they sent in, how is that done, since a photo has only one 2d view of a face?
The program they use is almost definitely overkill judging by the animations they create. I majored in 3D animation and have used Maya and 3D Studio Max… both are capable of those types of animations and so, so, so much more. But then again, Adobe Photoshop is also capable of so, so, so much more than most people use it for. I’d compare functionality of 3D Studio Max to that of Photoshop, but it’s a completely different world. And the price difference is way outta control.
It’s been years since I’ve done any extensive 3D work, but I do use Google’s free Sketchup when I need to plot out one of my little side projects. It’s very basic 3D work, but it’ll get your feet wet and you can decide if you want to invest some cash into a “real” 3D program.
Regarding that other site, it looks like they just placed the image of the face on top of a relatively generic face shape. This is basic functionality of most any 3D application. Imagine printing an image of your face onto a large piece of rubber, then wrapping that piece of rubber around one of those styrofoam head shapes they use for holding wigs. Same concept.
So I take it there isn’t some simpler program than Blender to do this? I’m looking for something that lets you stick together components and draw (“sculpt”) in 3D somewhat like what Illustrator does for 2D.