Hi guys,

What is the best software to design models like these for a total beginner?

Example Models

To create something like that besides time and patience would be software like this

Out of the things that our good saint-michael has indicated, I have personally used Blender and Wings. They are Open Source and I could use them - the rest of the others (I am not sure of all) are commercial software and cost a load.

Between Blender and Wings - the choice comes down to extent of modelling and features required. Wings is good for object modelling purposes and have a very sleek user interface (UI). Blender on the other hand has a bit of complex UI that might take some time to learn and get around with - but after that it is a great tool. It contains most of the basic features and a little more that any other commercial softwares may have. And Blender is also great for a technique called 'Subdivision modelling'. I do not think though that Blender supports 'Patch modelling'.

Thanks for the replies guys. But what about for a pure beginner. What would you recommend.

Again, I dispense my knowldege that is limited only to opensource softwares.
Head to http://wings3d.com/ and download a copy of it for yourself. And then the following things:
1. Go through their manual. You can download it from: http://prdownloads.sourceforge.net/wings/w....1.pdf?download
2. Lurk a little bit at http://subdivisionmodeling.com/forums/ and get a hang of the concepts.
3. Work on some things and get yourself acquainted. Post it here at AstaHost and get some reviews. So you can hone your basic 3d visualization skills.
4. You may think of then shifting to the more advanced Blender 3d after that. It is a real good piece of software - incidentally, it was a proprietry software earlier that was owned by some studio. They realeased it to public some time back.
5. Instead of 4, if you have funds, you can as well buy 3D Max, Maya, ZBrush, or Silo or any of the other ones.

Ok I will check it out. I will probably start off with a open source version. However if I was to purchase one, which would people recommend?

Sorry about that tezza. Any suggestion I give on that issue would not be authoritative. So, I would better keep mum.

Thanks for the support anyways. Has anyone else got any views on this?

Try Blender 3D (free and opensource) or Maya Personal Learning edition if you want to learn on the industry standard application.

thanks for the advice. By the way off topic a bit but is Auto CAD as good as everyone says it is?