Great Indie/Open Source Creative Software (Patreon)

There are a lot of apps out there for creating digital art, in particular for managing all types of 3D/CG workflows. This isn't an easy field to write software for: the sheer amount of stuff you have to support, and its inherent complexity, is mind-boggling. After many years of dealing with different apps I'd like to showcase some that I think are very useful and which have brilliant devs who are dedicated to providing a great experience for users.

I also think it's important to support free, open-source software, or software that provides an affordable perpetual license. There are a lot of choices these days and it's surprising how indie software can often provide a better workflow than corporate commercial behemoths. In the end, productivity is the most important thing. What tools help you reach your creative goals as quickly as possible? My criteria for this list is software that:

1. Is free, open source, or offers an affordable perpetual license.2. Is top of its class in terms of functionality: powerful, flexible, and easy to use.3. Is supported by devs who care deeply about providing a great product.

Without further ado, let's roll!

Gaffer

gafferhq.org

Cost: FreeModel: Open source

It's no secret to Patreon members that I'm a big fan of Gaffer. It's incredibly robust and powerful software for rendering complex scenes and it offers a ton of automation options for maximum efficiency. Plus, the devs are among the best in the business. They're responsive to user feedback and are always adding great new features. I've even contributed some (small) improvements to the main source code myself!

RizomUV

rizom-lab.com

Cost: Commercial rent-to-own and perpetualModel: Closed source

Good UVs are critical for trouble-free texturing and rendering, but making them can be slow and frustrating. With RizomUV the process is as pain-free as possible thanks to its great interface and large, robust toolset for managing every possible aspect of UV creation. Rizom-Lab also provides great customer support. They offer a consumer-friendly rent-to-own option that lets you pay off a perpetual license over 12 months and then it's yours to keep forever.

DaVinci Resolve/Fusion

blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve

Cost: Free limited version or commercial perpetualModel: Closed source

In recent years Resolve and Fusion have become mainstream video editing and compositing powerhouses. The software is stable, battle tested, and feature rich. Resolve is in many ways preferable to Adobe Premiere, especially in the areas of color correction and audio editing. Fusion is a node-based compositor, similar to Nuke and with a comparable feature set. True pro users will still need Nuke's complete toolset (such as support for deep EXRs), but for everyone else Fusion is a great solution. The free version of Resolve is licensed for commercial use and just missing a few features compared to the paid version. For $299 you get Resolve and Fusion perpetually, including free upgrades... forever. It's an amazing deal.

PureRef

pureref.com

Cost: Free non-commercial and commercial perpetualModel: Closed source

PureRef is a lovely, small app for collecting, organizing and viewing reference images. It's laser-focused on this task and provides everything you ever might need to manage references and refer to them while working. Development was on hold for quite a long time, but they recently returned and released a version 2.0. PureRef is free for personal use and $49 for a perpetual license.

Affinity Suite

affinity.serif.com

Cost: Commercial perpetualModel: Closed source

Affinity is an impressive suite of creative tools, including apps for image editing, vector drawing and desktop publishing. They're all powerful and very easy to use, plus the price can't be beat. Each app might be missing a feature or two compared to their Adobe counterparts, but I've been using Affinity for everything for a few months and I don't miss Adobe at all. Plus, Affinity Photo natively supports OpenColorIO, which makes it more advanced than Photoshop!

OpenRV and OpenImageIO

github.com/AcademySoftwareFoundation/OpenRVgithub.com/AcademySoftwareFoundation/OpenImageIO

Cost: FreeModel: Open source

OpenRV is a fantastic open source professional image viewer with tons of features. I added some UI customizations to make it even better and it's been my daily viewer for a long time now. OpenImageIO handles image processing under the hood of a lot of larger apps. It's great for command line conversion of images between various formats.

I put these two projects together since their main downside is they require building from source. OpenRV will be releasing builds at some point and OIIO is included with a lot of other apps, like Arnold and Houdini. That being said, they're not too hard to compile and once you've figured it out you're all set deal with any future releases. I made a script for building OIIO on Windows that should take most of the pain out of the process: github.com/BrianHanke/oiio_win_batch

Honorable Mentions

The following are great apps that might not meet all my criteria, but are still a valuable additions to your toolbox. For example, Houdini Indie is rental only, but it's so powerful and well-priced that it's easy to recommend.

RenderMan

renderman.pixar.com/store

Cost: Free non-commercial and commercial perpetualModel: Closed source

RenderMan is a spectacular renderer. A few years ago it wasn't very good for indie users because of the slow render times, but RenderMan XPU is pretty much ready for prime time now and is exceptionally fast. The perpetual license is pricey at $845, but if you pro-rate it compared to renting other renderers it's a good deal, especially in light of the fact that you'll own it forever. Plus, it has excellent Blender integration and offers a non-commercial version for free.

Houdini

sidefx.com/buy/

Cost: Free non-commercial and commercial rentalModel: Closed source

I'll break my rule about offering an affordable perpetual option in this case. Houdini does offer perpetual licenses, but they're very expensive, aimed at larger companies only. That being said, a Houdini Indie rental at $269 per year is a great deal that gives you access to one of the most powerful creative apps in the world. Plus, SideFX is a wonderful, innovative company that is well worth supporting.

Blender

blender.org

Cost: FreeModel: Open source

I'm not a Blender superfan, but it does do a lot of things right and development proceeds at a good pace. I find it to be a nice platform for modelling and sculpting and there's a large ecosystem of add-ons if a feature you want is missing. Separately, the Cycles renderer is in really good shape these days and I use it in Gaffer all the time.

Conclusion

If you have Blender, Gaffer, Affinity, Resolve and Houdini you'll be able to create anything your heart desires. Throw in RizomUV for truly painless UVs and RenderMan for a more costly option that will set you up for life with one of the best renderers in the world.

Any other apps you love that are perfect for indie artists? Leave a comment below!