What is the best 3D software?

You need some clarifications because your question makes no sense...
First of all, the quality of what you produce will depend on your abilities and skills, not the software.

If you want to quickly match the job offers that exist in France, focus on 3DS Max, ZBrush for sculpting, and you might also need Photoshop.
3DS Max is well documented, in French (!), has a good community, and plenty of good tutorials to learn from. ZBrush is similar. An alternative to ZBrush is Mudbox. Less known but still very good.

Maya:
If you're up for it, 3 years and 4000 euros to spare => http://store.autodesk.fr/store/adsk/fr_FR/pd/productID.297240200

I recommend Maya. I find it excellent overall and ergonomically more pleasant to work with than 3DS Max with its small buttons.
I warn you, at the beginning it's easy to extrude a few cubes. But when you go further into the software, into the nodal systems, and there are very few tutorials to "really" learn Maya (aside from in English), you will struggle.
The official documentation is not in French either for learning. Technically, it won't be easy if you're not a pro. Lastly, the software is starting to suffer from Autodesk's policies. The last version I used had a seriously buggy Viewport 2.0 when I moved my UVs (everything reset, and so on). Such a shame.
One last thing: many tutorials on this software are paid, so prepare your wallet!

Blender:

A future Ferrari still underestimated. I've started using it and I'm so happy that I can't even imagine switching. According to Ton himself, the software is still quite incomplete, but it remains impressive.

Compositing, Camera Tracking, Video sequence editor, good physics management, very good UV mapping, instant rendering in Cycles, performs well in animation, very well-developed 3D sculpting tools, good texture painting module...
Even 3DS Max and Maya can't boast about having so much built-in. And it's free!
Free, with plenty of good tutorials to learn, and a growing community.

Cinema 4D: I don't know it, give it a try.
Softimage: used less and less.

E-on Vue: I can recommend it for nature, it’s really great, but relatively unknown here and requires a powerful machine.

For post-production effects, Adobe After Effects, or better, Nuke from The Foundry.

In short, if 3D is going to be your job, 3DS Max is essential, along with V-Ray for rendering. If it's a passion, Blender and Cycles will suffice, noting that they are rising rapidly. The young people training on them today might be tomorrow's pros.

For the other paid software, I’ll let you calculate all that. At a minimum of 15,000 euros for the whole package, I’d lock my studio in a bunker, but it's also true that I don't have this fear of being robbed with Blender ^^!

And instead of spending on licenses, I invest in graphics cards, CPUs, RAM, and computing power.

Food for thought.

Honestly, I have no reason to worry about the budget; it's not my wallet that's at stake. But you seem to want the Rolls Royce of 3D... and that doesn't exist... when it comes to that, you only have either heavy junk or Ferraris. The real good results are undoubtedly achieved through a good knowledge of the software and talent, rigor, and patience... if you have a huge budget and no knowledge in the field, you should rather pay for training, definitely with the Autodesk software group, or if you want everything right away, start a production company and hire modelers, animators, and a whole team of diverse skills... because each aspect of either of those softwares is a job in itself... it's very hard to do everything by oneself...

In that case, I suggest C4D
However, for the export, I don't know; I wouldn't want to tell you anything wrong... but I think it's not possible, I've never tried :/

Hello

just a little surprised that a "professional 3D artist" asks this kind of questions

CINEMA 4D Studio represents what MAXON can offer best to professional 3D artists.

http://www.maxon.net/fr/products/cinema-4d-studio/who-should-use-it.html

http://www.maxon.net/fr/products/general-information/general-information/system-requirements.html

Blender is free, C4D Studio costs several thousand euros I believe, so you need to know where you can afford it or not to avoid integration problems...
Always outside of the guidelines because never on time

Hello,

After Effects,
Cinema 4D,
Blender (which I use),....
You have plenty on Mac

Best regards,

zak

It depends on the usefulness you'll have; personally, I recommend Cinema 4D for intros and Blender for 3D in general.
Good luck :)

It would be more about animation with the rigs. Basically, a quick and small modeling, and then I play with the timeline.

Is it possible to export my creations from C4D to Blender and vice versa??

But Maya 2012 is useless??

Oh dear...!!! After Effect...???!!!
After is not a modeling software; it creates animations but in motion design. It's a very good software for post-production and adding special effects to relatively short videos (you can do it for long videos, but in that case, I would recommend you lean towards Nuke, which remains the top in this field, and since the budget is not an issue... because there, you know it’s several thousand euros...!!)

Cinelma4D is the one I use the most often (on my Mac) because it is very easy to understand!

But you are crazy, I swear...

You only talk about C4D or Blender while the famous 3DS Max and Maya are the two most used in the professional field...

So I recommend these two...

3d studio ...

as for the price, I doubt you have the budget.

--
When we open our eyes, we discover the world but, sometimes, we must keep them closed.

Maya, 3D Studio Max, and ZBrush.

I'm 16 years old, I use Blender and I can create some cool stuff. It's clear that it's the best of the best among free software. Plus, it seems that Cinema 4D doesn't have anything more than Blender, even though it costs a lot. I highly recommend Blender.
You can see my creations on the Facebook page D3 tsitra.n/n.artist 3D.

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