You hold in your hands the best-selling guide to NewTek’s LightWave 3D animation software, completely updated for LightWave v9 by award-winning animator and trainer Dan Ablan. Rather than rehash the documentation like other books, this down-to-earth, easy-to-follow guide offers an invaluable set of project tutorials that teach you the ins and outs of LightWave and show you the techniques you need to master this powerful 3D software. Inside LightWave v9’s accompanying DVD features hours of high- quality video training tutorials that will help you take the projects in the book to new heights. No other book has taught more LightWave 3D users than Inside LightWave.

Featured tutorials cover:

• Insights into the new LightWave v9 workflow
• Powerful new surfacing with the Node Editor
• Character modeling
• Bones and rigging for character animation
• Particle animation
• Hard body and soft body dynamics
• Rendering concepts with the new Global Render options
• Advanced camera tools

Accompanying DVD-ROM offers hours of unique training videos created just for this book, exclusively from 3DGarage.com (requires QuickTime); a demo of LightWave v9 for Mac OS and Windows; all of the projects from the book; royalty-free textures and reference images; and full-color screenshots from the book!

Dan Ablan, award-winning animator and LightWave author, offers Inside LightWave 9 to get readers up-to-speed and enhance their productivity with NewTek’s LightWave 3D software. No other LightWave book is as comprehensive, or packed with more clear step-by-step tutorials and helpful tips. Coverage includes understanding 3D, layout, keyframing, textures, 3D camera actions, logo modeling, character modeling, node based texturing, bones and rigging, cloth dynamics, particle animation and more. NewTek’s LightWave 3D is a winner of the Primetime Emmy Enineering Award and the new version includes enhanced character animation tools, new modeling tools, a new suite of bone editing tools and production-proven photo-real rendering. The Software retails for $1695 standard and $595 for an upgrade.

Missing just one thing...

I actually really enjoyed this book and thought it was quite helpful. Some reviewers seemed to dislike the fact that the author would continue the lessons with video files on the accompanying DVD, but I actually really enjoyed that way of learning. There were a few places where I wish he would have written more and done video less, but in general reading, watching, and then doing proved to be a very effective way to learn for me. Of course the best way to learn is very much based on personal preference, but this system worked well for me.

My biggest complaint is simply that Ablan omitted a topic that I thought should have been discussed in the book: UV mapping and unwrapping. Basically the art of unwrapping the polygons of a complex model into a flat template so that you can go into an image editor and paint textures on to the model. I know a little bit about this process, but it is one of my biggest problems with any 3d package that I have tried, and Ablan seemed almost completely avoid talking about the process, which was kind of a let down for me, and will probably result in me buying the competing book "essential lightwave 9".

Other than the omitting of that one topic, I thought everything else was covered very thoroughly, and made me a better lightwave user. Lightwave 9.3 has been out for a while now, so anything that the older reviews said about the book having material pertaining to a unreleased or finalized product is no longer valid. Like I said, I just wish he covered UV mapping and unwrapping, other than that, great book, great accompanying DVD, and great way of learning.

Get LW v9.2 Beta first.

I actually wrote a review for this book but now I look back and it isn’t here. Hmmmm. That’s minus one star.

The good news:

Overall, I like the way the author writes. I like the layout of chapters and the step by step method they are written in, however I wish he would explain the goals of certain actions before jumping into the steps. I find myself reading through the chapter to figure out WHY I’m doing things and then attempting them using the steps as guides. (Minus one half star.) Besides that, the book is clear and well written and I haven’t come across many errors in 10 of 16 chapters.

The videos are great, even if they didn’t get all of them on to the DVD. Downloading them is simple enough once you find the link in the author’s website.

The bad news: Most of the exercises in this book can be done with out the book files, but I like to look at the samples and see what the author has done. Unfortunately, LW v9.2 begin its beta during the creation of this book and at that point, the file format changed. You can’t load the v9.2 files with v9. Since there is not a backward conversion utility, you can’t use the files in the last half of the book unless you get into the v9.2 beta. I couldn’t, so no files for the last half of the book for me. Beware. Minus one star.

Just to be nice, because besides the obvious rushed-to-print problems of the book, it is well written, I’m rounding up. So 3 stars. Once LW v9.2 leaves beta, Netwek puts a free update on their site, or the book comes with a title change (to Inside Lightwave v9.2), I’ll up my review.

Note that I am very new to modeling but I have an extensive 3D graphics background from the programming side. I found the book easy to comprehend, but if you have less experience, don’t take my word on it.

The DVD is critical

My biggest complaint: you can’t always tell what’s "selected" from the images in the book. It’s difficult to tell the difference between selected and unselected edges in the wireframe views. Also, some of the pages aren’t fully inked, and the images on those pages aren’t at all helpful. However, the DVD contains hi-rez, full-color versions. Either I never knew that or I forgot by the time I got to chapter ten, because I couldn’t follow the penguin tutorial with the book images. Having discovered the DVD images, I’ll re-read that chapter.

Also of value on the DVD, the videos extend the tutorials in the book. They aren’t just a recap of the book tutorials; they’re additional content, and they’re quite good. There’s so much video content, in fact, he couldn’t fit it all on the DVD. There’s additional free material on the author’s website.

For many of the chapters I felt the book tutorials didn’t go far enough, like they had ended too soon. The videos are necessary to continue the tutorial. While I gave credit for this additional material above, this is also a drawback to this book. I bought a book because I like that format. The videos are nice, but I prefer printed tutorials. As the book is already a hefty 700 pages, I’ll just have to conclude that LightWave tutorials of this depth just don’t fit in one book.

Also of note, this is very much a learn-by-example book. It is comprised almost entirely of tutorials. Remember that you have LightWave’s manual as a reference, and Mr. Ablan reminds you of that throughout this book.

LightWave is a very deep program and this book doesn’t cover every option available. It does cover a great deal of material, though. You’ll get more than just a taste of what the program can do. The tutorials are easy to follow, and perhaps credit to the LightWave program itself, when Mr. Ablan tells you to do something you’ve done before, without explaining it again, you’ll usually not cry out, "I don’t remember how to do that!" Things that need to be explained are explained.

The Node Editor is a huge new addition to LightWave. Mr. Ablan does a fine job explaining how to use it, but in just one book he can only scratch the surface in explaining how to achieve specific effects. I hope the lighting and texturing books I’ve ordered cover this in more detail. If Mr. Ablan wrote a whole book about the Node Editor I’d surely get a copy.

Easy to Understand - A Little Bit of Everything

This is a solid book. Coming in at 722 pages and including a lot of good content on the DVD, Dan Ablan’s book covers most everything you need to use Lightwave 9. If you are a beginner, this is a great book. It may or may not be worthwhile if you consider yourself an intermediate, which is what I would consider myself. That said, Dan’s workflow is solid. His tutorials are great and I found myself finding many better methods I should use rather than my own. One of the lengthiest and most detailed sections is wrapped around network rendering and setting up Screamernet. If network rendering is something you need and its a new concept to you, this is well worth the price of the book here.

I would say this is a must own if you are a beginner and a not-a-bad buy as an intermediate. Skip it if you consider yourself well versed in Lightwave’s ins and outs.

A must for Lightwave users

Any user of Lightwave v9 will find this in-depth reference has been completely updated for this latest version, comes from an award-winning animator and trainer, and offers a set of project tutorials which teach the program by example and project rather than the usual tutorial which focuses on concepts and ideas of applications. From character modeling and particle animation to hard and soft body dynamics and advanced camera tools, INSIDE LIGHTWAVE v9 offers up all the keys to success using tutorials based on real-world experiences, and will prove a must for Lightwave users and any comprehensive, in-depth computer program reference library.

Diane C. Donovan
California Bookwatch

Dan does it again!

I have been using Lightwave since the very first release. It can be difficult to keep up with Lightwave’s features but this book will help keep you up to date. Dan has a way of explaining things that makes it easy to understand. I have been a fan of his books since the old Amiga computer days.

Pretty much everything you need to learn Lightwave is in this book. Also Lightwave pros will still be able to use it for reference. I refer to it a few times a week and I consider myself fairly knowledgeable about Lightwave.

In conclusion, if you use Lightwave you need this book. Enough said!

Lightwave v9

The book Lightwave v9 is not only illistrated in a most professional way
it offers a high level of education in animation. Offering follow up Web
Resourses and a great list of learning resourses. The Author Dan Ablan
has made it easy to follow his tutorials for quick learning.

It’s good, but can’t be completely utilized right now...

I assume that the other reviewers thus far have either not made it past Chapter 5 or have received an advance copy of version 9.2 of the software. So I am just writing this review as a heads-up to anyone working in version 9.0 who is thinking of purchasing this book.

NONE of the scene files for Chapters 6 - 13 will open. Trying to open any of them results in an error message stating: "This scene requires a newer version of Lightwave". I have the latest version, 9.0 (Newtek has not yet posted the 9.2 update on their website as of the time of this review). So, check the Newtek site or make sure your software has been updated to 9.2 before ordering this book if you want to be able to load the scene files and follow along.

Of course, the positive side of this is that Dan has written a training guide for the absolutely newest version of the software (so new it’s not even out yet, over a month AFTER the book has been out!). Rarely do you see training guides that are that punctual. So thanks to Dan for that. But it’s a little frustrating that I can only use a third of the book right now.

Having said that, the content in the book is great, and clearly explained. It really enables you to get your bearings in Lightwave very quickly. On the included disc, there are also some video tutorials (including a Quickstart series that you can watch before starting the book to jump right in, and video supplements for each Chapter). There are a fair amount of typos, but no one’s perfect, and most of them are not too confusing, so it’s not a big deal.

Again, if you’ve already upgraded to 9.2, then disregard the above part about Chapters 6 -13, and consider this a five-star review, because the book is very helpful. But if you’re in 9.0, you’ll find that you’ve got a 700+ page temporary paperweight. I hope this helps anyone who’s considering purchasing this book.

A true teacher

This is my third Inside LightWave 3D book by Dan that I have purchased (started with Inside LW 7). He continues to re-invent his teaching style which makes these books invaluable for any LW user. This lengthy book (over 700 pages) also contains almost 6 hours of instructional videos on the DVD to continue where the tutorials in the book left off. A brilliant move that keeps this book thinner than previous editions but yet provides more "meat". I also purchased Dan’s LightWave v9 Signature courseware (over 17 hours) which greatly enhances the LW learning experience. Thank god for people like Dan who can teach 3D in a very unintimidating and friendly fashion. He makes you feel like you can create anything you want with LW.

Another Winner From Dan the Man

What can I say? I can say that this book, although 700 pages versus the usual 900, is just as good and perhaps better than Dan’s previous endeavours. The text is comprehensive and informative. LightWave is a complex program and Dan understands that which is evident in his writing style and approach to this book. The projects are great for a beginner like me, even though I’ve used LightWave for 5 years now. What I like is that Dan puts a lot of hours of extra videos on the books disc to help you learn more. This is a great concept that I wish all publishers would do. All in all, for $40 you won’t find a more valuable text on LightWave 9 (and now 9.2)!

Most comprehensive book written for LightWave 3D

The Inside LightWave books have constantly been the most comprehensive books written on LightWave 3D by NewTek, Inc. This reincarnation of Inside LightWave covers the new release of version 9 and the author Dan Ablan has done a great job again. As with previous editions, each chapter is more or less self-contained allowing the reader to study a chapter out of order as needed. In this latest edition, he does more than just dedicate one chapter to discussing the new tools and enhancements for version 9. Throughout the book, he offers several tutorials that incorporate these new features, thus giving the reader hands-on practice. The Getting Started chapter found in previous editions has been transformed into a video tutorial on the book’s DVD which saves space in the book.

My favorite part of working in 3D graphics is modeling 3D objects and Ablan has always covered this area thoroughly. In this edition, he does the same with some new modeling tutorials. However, he takes a more artistic approach and emphasizes using LightWave as an artistic tool. He begins modeling still life objects. First you use box modeling to create a banana and then he introduces the Multishift and Magnet tools while modeling an orange. The Clone and Magic Bevel tools come into play with a bunch of grapes. Finally, you use the Spline Draw and Lathe tools to create the fruit bowl. The intermediate modeling tutorials emphasize modeling intricate details. As you would expect, advanced modeling techniques are covered in character modeling as you model a cute penguin character to which you will eventually add weight maps and rigging for animation.

Next, Ablan discusses the new Node-based texturing and improved particle animation techniques. LightWave comes with some new cameras and a new rendering engine and the author covers these new options for setting up your scenes. He also covers single and multi-computer rendering and the new ScreamerNet network rendering engine.

One of the most difficult tasks when working in 3D is blending a 3D object into an existing project. Ablan discusses how to add a 3D object to a still background image. But a still background is only half the challenge. He also covers how to track the LightWave cameras to match prerecorded footage.

The DVD contains project files, full color graphics of the figures from the book, free textures and several tutorials from the author’s 3D Garage.com website. Dan Ablan has been a pioneer in 3D animation since 1989 and has his own business, AGA Digital Studios. He has authored many books and magazine articles.