Tools-Tutorials

Easy 3D TOOLS to get you making worlds with avatars and deploy them to the Web in no time!

In short: all about CREATE, ASSEMBLE and DEPLOY virtual worlds and games to the web, including MULTIPLAYER, that run on browsers without plugins, using Web 3D recent standards (HTML5 and WebGL).

1. CREATE 3D objects: to start creating 3D you need a good and free 3D modeler like Sketchup. This is an intuitive, easy to use and complete tool, able to create all sorts of 3D objects and components.
2. CREATE Avatars: with the intuitive and free MakeHuman all sorts of Humanoids can be easily created, .
3. ASSEMBLE the scenes and DEPLOY them to the Web: Unity 3D makes the magic happen, assembling the objects and avatars into 3D scenes, worlds or games, adding animations, advanced interaction and special effects. .When the creation process is complete, Unity deploys the 3D Worlds/games to run in dozens of platforms and formats, including PC desktop, consoles, mobile and the web via WebGL. This way 3D  runs directly in standard browsers, no plugins needed!. If you doubt please check our "out of the box" basic demo scene.
4. Add MULTIPLAYER to your Worlds/games and launch them globally with Photon - PUN 2 free

>> Our tutorials for beginners will lead you trough ... hassle free 

If you are curious about the overall picture of the coming Web 3D revolution read about it here.

To create and deploy Worlds and Games

 I. Unity 3D Personal (Free)

One of the best worlds and Games editor. It has a full featured free Personal edition and, surprisingly, is quite accessible for newbies. Uses assets/objects created in modelers (Sketchup, Blender, ...), assembles the scenes, makes animations/interactions/special effects and deploys the world/game to the Web in WebGL/HTML5 (among dozens of other formats/platforms, including desktop, consoles and mobile).
»Download from unity3d.com/download  and look at our Unity3D quick Tutorials

»Unity installation is a three application Setup:

1. Install Unity Hub (Mandatory! Used to create new projects, access your work and also manages multiple installations of the Unity Editor )
2. Then Install Unity3D Personal (this is the free edition). Choose the LTS, Long Term "Stable" releases (LTS versions here ) and not others, to avoid bugs and lots of trouble for newbies.
   >> During setup it's asked to select the needed components of Unity; check our Advice on Components to install.
3. In windows systems you may be asked to (auto) install MS Visual Studio (it's necessary to edit Unity C# scripts).

»Newbies should also install: Unity3D Standard Assets
This collection of assets, scripts, and example scenes can be used to kickstart your Unity learning or be used as the basis for your own projects:
»Download Standard Assets package from our Unity Assets folder

»Unity recommended companion 3D editors/modelers
Unity is a scene assembler and deployer but not a 3D modeler. It uses assets (3D objects and avatars) available anywhere, in 3D repositories, in the official Unity asset store or created by ourselves. To create other 3D content, our own creations, we need software to model 3D objects and create avatars.
Sketchup and MakeHuman, suggested below are recommended, among other possible choices, especially for newbies. The 3D content created with these programs can be exported* easily to Unity 3D using standard exchange formats .dae (collada) or fbx.
This has evolved and now sketchup files (.skc) are read directly by unity.

Tutorials & info

Unity Essentials (by Unity)
   Manual / Tutorials / Download / Assetstore & Tutorial projects / Unity Teams

Tutorials (more here)
   Tutorials (reddit.com)
   Making different game types - gamebridge unityversity
   Unity Tutorials (raywenderlich.com)
Sites (more here)
   Github Unity Projects 
   Source code Unity projects
   Sourceforge Unity3D projects
   unifycommunity (script repository, shaders, tutorials)
   y8.com (Unity3D multiuser/multiplayer games)
Assets (more here)
   Unity3D Standard Assets Pack (and fix)
   Terrain Tools Sample Asset Pack
Tools
     Bolt - Bolt brings complete visual scripting to Unity, empowering artists, designers and programmers to create gameplay mechanics and interactive systems without writing a single line of code. Bolt - Platformer Tutorial 

 II. Sketchup Make (free)

One of the best and probably the easiest 3D modeler.  A free and highly intuitive 3D modeler that by its "easiness" has contributed to massify 3D creation. The free version Sketchup Make is not as powerful as the pro version but you won't (or rarely) notice the difference. A relevant aspect to mention is that Sketchup files (.skp) are read directly by unity 3D Editor.
»Download  Sketchup Make (2017) and look at our short Tutorials
»Download (alternative) More info here and alternative download here
More info on free sketchup: https://all3dp.com/1/sketchup-free-download-full-version/
  Install as trial and when it ends the program turns to a free version for non commercial use.

Alternative: Blender, free and one of the best 3D modelers but not an easy start for 3D beginners. 3D creator should invest learning it because Blender supports the entirety of the 3D pipeline-modeling, rigging, animation, simulation, rendering, compositing, video editing, and motion tracking.
For other alternative 3D modelers look below (section 3- Other modelers)

Tutorials & info

Tutorials (BabelX3D tutorials for beginners)
Sketchup.com
documents
Manual
Tutorials
Tutorials (the Sketchup essentials)
Tutorials (Designer Hacks)
Videos
Plugins/extensions
3D Warehouse (objects library)
blog.sketchup.com (to visit regularly)
https://sketchucation.com (tutorials and plugins)

To create avatars

 III. MakeHuman (free)

MakeHuman is a completely free, interactive modeling tool for creating realistic 3D human characters. These models can be exported to several computer graphics and animation platforms including Blender, Unity 3D, Unreal Engine, OpenSim and Second Life..

»Download from makehumancommunity.org (alternative site) and learn with our quick Tutorial

 Makehuman characters can be configured with a Game Rig, exported as FBX file format and then imported to Unity 3d and configured with animations. The process is explained in our quick tutorial: 2-Unity3D_5_Using_MakeHuman_Characters

Alternatives: 1- Fuse. Free and intuitive.  2- Daz Studio .Free and powerful although a bit less intuitive than Fuse or MakeHuman. To rig mesh humanoids use the online Mixamo Auto-rigger. Look at its free 3D models and other Freebies lists.

Tutorials & info

 MakeHuman Wiki (manual, videos, resources, ...)
 Tutorials (on MakeHuman community)
 Quick Character Creation in MakeHuman
 Clothes, Skin, Hair and Exporting in MakeHuman 
 Add more user contributed assets (clothes, parts, etc.,)

MakeHuman and Unity:
   Tutorials (our own BabelX3D tutorials for beginners)
   MakeHuman characters into Unity 3D
   MakeHuman Mecanim Animations in Unity 3D
   Other Makehuman Tutorials (on xenosmashgames.com)

... (more info) ...

Add multiplayer to your Worlds and Games with Photon Unity Network 2

 IV. Photon Unity Networking 2 - PUN2 (free)

"PUN 2 is all you need to easily add multiplayer to your games and launch them globally. Forget about hosting, connection issues and latency"

»Download from Unity Asset Store - Photon

FREE Plan: Photon Cloud is completely free for up to 20 concurrent users (CCU) per app, and you can have as many apps as you like. If you need to support more players, you can upgrade to a paid plan or downgrade to a free plan at any time (more info)

Alternatives: 1- Unity Multiplayer Networking, coming Unity Network technology that is available in beta. 2- Photon Fusion, a recent and promising version. Check info and sdk here.

Tutorials & info

 Photon (PUN2) Documentation (manual, videos, resources, ...)
 PUN2 Basics Tutorial

 ... (more info) ...

Autodesk FBX Converter

Free, provides accurate conversion of several 3D geometry formats to fbx, a file format used by many popular 3D programs.
»Download from autodesk.com

Alternatives: 1- Accutrans 3d. From micromouse.ca. Provides accurate translation of 3D geometry between the file formats used by many popular modeling programs. Although not exactly a free program, can be downloaded and used indefinitely..

Tutorials & info

Help/tutorials page: autodesk.com - FBX converter

MeshLab 

A free program. MeshLab is a powerful open-source system to convert 3D formats and for manipulation of 3D meshes. It supports most known 3D formats, and has several types of filters and operators for remeshing, reducing, cleaning, and modifying 3D structures.
»Download from meshlab.sourceforge.net

Tutorials & info

Blog that reports about easy tutorials, hints, practical examples and stuff done with MeshLab: meshlabstuff.blogspot.com

Meshroom

A free, open source, program that lets you easily get 3D models from photos you take of virtually any object. Visit AliceVision and see Demos.
»Download from https://github.com/alicevision/meshroom/releases/

Alternatives: 1-  Regard3d (http://www.regard3d.org/) free, open source. 2 - Autodesk ReCap (Link). Commercial, but free for students and educators on this link.
Other: - MeshMixer, a free app that lets you edit easily the 3D mesh of captured objects and correct some gaps, modify or reduce/resize the model.
»Download from www.meshmixer.com/ 
(general 3D editors can do corrections too)

Tutorials & info

 - Meshroom Manual (online)
 - Photogrammetry 2 – 3D Scanning simpler, better than ever! 
 - Meshroom for Beginners 
 - Creating 3D Models From Photos Using Meshroom  - ( Includes a Photoset kit )
 - Meshroom: Free photogrammetry

Examples made with Meshroom

Examples made with Recap. See also: Fab@rts

 - Reduce/simplify a digitized object with MeshMixer

Old info for 123D Catch (discontinued) & MeshMixer
 . Check this tutorial that uses both programs

GIMP and other useful image tools

A free program. Gimp is a well known powerful image editor.
»Download from www.gimp.org

Alternative: For beginners, another nice image editor. easy to use but powerful enough,  is Paint.Net
»Download from www.getpaint.net/

Complimentary: IrfanView a viewer and batch image converter

Tutorials & Info

GIMP user manual

How To Use GIMP Photo Editor (crash course by Maximum Pc)

Use Google Photos to store your forum images. More info here.

Audacity

Is a free, open source, cross-platform powerful software for recording and editing sound.
»Download from audacity.sourceforge.net

Alternative: absolute beginners can try the interesting online simple editor and mixer available at http://naturesoundsfor.me/
 

Tutorials & info

Manual, help & wiki

- Introdution to Unity sound 

Ezvid

A free screen capture and video editor to share your worlds or video tutorials in YouTube.
»Download from Ezvid

Alternatives:

• Movie Maker »Download from Microsoft
• OBS Studio »Download from OBSProject

Tutorials & info

Video tutorials

Easy way to deploy Web sites and Virtual Worlds
 

Expression Web 4

It´s free. A full-featured professional tool for designing, developing, and publishing compelling, feature-rich websites that conform to web standards.
»Download from Microsoft

Tutorials & info

Free Expression Web 4 Tutorials EBook

Free Web hosting for your sites and Worlds

Free Web Hosting

Those who don't already have a web server can use free Web hosting. Free hosting is not as stable as paid, but ... works. Check a list of the best free hosting services here:
 - https://www.techradar.com/best/best-free-web-hosting
 - http://www.hostingadvice.com/how-to/free-web-hosting/

Beware: a standard Web server is needed to make virtual worlds (or websites) available online. A server that allows you to upload a group of files from the PC directory to a similar directory structure in your space on the Web server.
File server systems like Google Drive or OneDrive will not work.  Similarly simplified Web systems like Wix or Google Pages with upload constraints are not suited. Finally ... some standard Web Servers may have security policies that prevent some file types to be 'served' online so ... test for yourself several services and opt for the one that suits you.

Tutorials & info

  - Free web hosting for your 3D site. Look at free-webhosts
 - In portuguese: conselhos sobre o Alojamento Web (páginas, sites, upload, ...)