Blender is a Sophisticated 3d modeling tool with built in, modeling, animation, particle and rendering tools. It has a built in python interpreter for incorporation of python language, Which is noted for its clarity and used by NASA.

Blender has a internal rendering engine of it own, complete with Panorama, Radiosity and Ray mirror. It also has a external rendering engine ( Yafray external ), which is capable of more photo realistic renderings and easy to use.

Python conversions programs I would recommend are world forge or ZBrush ( for creating 3d worlds) and the Python elevation script for NASA SRTM or Gtopo files.

Reading over the tutorial on installing python in to your system, will insure proper operation. Blender requires python 2.3 for the scripts to work in the text buffer area. Stable Platforms are avalable to the general public at http://python.org. Remember in order to run Python in conjunction with Blender you will have to set a path for blender and python, without a proper path Python will not respond while running Blender. This information is found in the Blender documentation Tutorials under Python.

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