Once you are familiar with the basics, you will be ready to try a bigger project. For complex modeling or animation, these pointers will save you a lot of time and frustration:
· Develop a story board or hand-sketch a view of where the objects belong-- their size and relationship to one another.
· Make a detailed list of objects and effects which will be in the model.
· Write a sample scene complete with lighting and camera angles if you are scripting an animation.
· Pre-script objects and their motion for the entire animation.
· Plan the sequence of steps to complete the project. Set up the models without textures to test the composition; lay down the textures; set up the lighting and special effects.
· For memory efficiency, use primitives and instances as much as possible. Many complex objects can be constructed with combinations of primitives or instances of shapes. An instance works much as an alias does - it references the original shape. In Strata 3D, primitives use less memory and render more quickly.
· Model with textures instead of geometry wherever possible. Using textures is easier, much faster to render, and takes less memory. Use geometry only when you can't use textures.
· Consider lower resolution and less detail for animations. The eye is very forgiving of objects in motion. Screen resolution may be sufficient because nothing stays in place long. You might not even need to anti-alias images.