Arno Villard

This book , one of the few available tutorials book, is a good beginner’s introduction to the software .
Introduction to the environment and the best ways to organize it, the basics tools and concepts with nicely and useful commented quicktime files videos.
The following subjects are covered: custom menus, cV’s, projection,rail tool, skin, fillet, shader, bump map, basics rendering.

The approach to draw without scale (or units) is a little bit disappointing at the beginning, but the goal of these exercises is not to measure every curve you draw but to sketch nicely and make clean surfaces.

However, one important software tools isn’t covered: the blends curves (constrained direction curves) which is to my point of view a mistake, because the learner is inconscientiously looking for this tools to construct his model.

This book is coming with dvd that contains:
- instructor-led overviews to guide you through the project in the book: 4 well commented quick time videos (about 1 hour each)
- Scene file (.wire files) and material (bump images, textures,…)
- A 90-day trial of Alias StudioTools, and Alias ImageStudio (renderings)

Here’s an overview of the main chapters and lessons plus their contents to help you deciding if this is a right learning tools for you. Following shots: Copyrighted material

Up to me a very good tool for an introduction to run the software that allowed me, once all the exercises of this book were done, to do by myself (it’s not included in the book) the modeling and rendering of this Audi TT. I hadn’t any 3D skills before.