So, I started university this year and I will be focusing on

>>501334
A high end Nvidia GPU will be your primary need, as it accelerates images processing in Photoshop, video in Premiere/AE, and 3D in Maya, Blender, etc...

Arnold isn't GPU accelerated sadly, but there are plenty of other great GPU accelerated raytracers, like Iray (included in 3DS Max and Substance Designer, and integration coming for Maya and other software), LuxRender, VRayRT, Octane, Indigo, Arion, Thea, Redshift, moskitoRender... Arnold is one of the few that hasn't moved to GPU yet, and is kind of overrated.

And don't bother with the workstation cards unless you want to get into very complex CAD work, as that's all they really accelerate these days. Go with a Nvidia Titan X. As for a CPU, you could go with a dual socket 6 or 8 core Intel Xeon.

Then the rest is up to you with whatever money you have left. Preferably a 512GB SSD as well.

>>501337
To be honest, I have been focusing on Arnold lately because it's the easiest way to get photorealistic results with as little setup as possible. But I guess you're right.

Is 64gb of ram overkill, or is 32gb enough?

Also, Nvidia announced their new architecture for next year, where they claim that graphics cards will easily be able to have 12 gigs of vram, instead of the usual 2 or 4, at an affordable price. It's a good idea to wait and see about that, right?

>>501340
If you are willing to wait until around Feb-April, then yes I would absolutely recommend waiting for their Pascal architecture coming up, it's going to be a much larger performance boost than we usually see in new GPU generations. And you'll get more VRAM for your buck.
The Titan X does have 12GB of RAM though, so you wouldn't be terribly off.

As for your system RAM, 32GB is going to cover you for pretty much anything you throw at it unless you're rendering some huge Dreamworks level environment. You can always just get 32GB first, for 4 of your 8 RAM slots, then later pick up another 32GB for fill the other 4 if you feel you could use it.

>>501340
Also, Arnold is simple to use because it's an unbiased raytracer. So you place a light and an object and it will generally already look pretty real. Most of the ones I listed are unbiased as well, Iray and Octane are very simple to use, Redshift is biased, but the others should be pretty simple too.

>>501342
What about the motherboard? What is the best motherboard one could get with the best options for adding ram, two graphics cards and maybe even thunderbolt for RAID?

>Thunderbolt for RAID
What?
Why not just a RAID card?
Or a separate RAID box so you don't have your 1200W beast on all day?
Anyways, any Supermicro dualprocessor mobo is gonna run you >$200

>>501351
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007629%20600553802%20600288062%20600536751&IsNodeId=1&bop=And&Order=PRICE&PageSize=30

Any of those except for the first one. Just look at the specifications, they will tell you what CPU they support, what type of PCI slots it has (you want PCI-E 3.0 slots, which the second mobo on that list has two of), and what RAM is supports.

>>501353
Sorry, I don't know a lot about this shit yet.
Over the next few months I hope to expand my knowledge about rigs and this kind of stuff.

Respectfully to OP and not wishing to hijack the thread. I myself am looking into learning to create content. So far, am complete noob who jut downloaded SFM; may look into Blender toward the end of the month. I was hoping to utilize my simple, humble workstation computer (may post specs later) to do just some basic learning and simple animations. Anyways, in /3/'s opinion; what would be the most basic, minimum build one could use for content creation?

>>501459
Any mid-range computer these days is good enough for general modeling and even sculpting in ZBrush. 12GB RAM at least if you don't want to have to close every other thing you're running, preferably 24GB+, Any mid-range Nvidia GPU, though you can get buy with a lower-end one if it's a more recent series. And a decent Intel CPU from within the past 7 or so years. Preferably an Intel i7, but an i5 can cut it for while you're still learning.

>I started university
>I'm going to spend 3k on a computer
Don't be retarded, a $400-500 pc is all you need to produce quality material rendered overnight, a half decent modern GPU is pretty much the only relevant thing. Get a job before you start blowing money on things that will speed up your work but not increase its quality, you're like the guys who buy a tablet thinking it will magically make their shitty pencil drawings better.

>>501463
Yeah.... My workstation is a cheap AMD based system I threw together some years ago. Am looking into upgrading the CPU to a quad or six core and adding a video card. However that may be few months down the road; even then depend on my employment/financial situation.

>>501465
Nigga, I already worked on secondary VFX stuff in a small production house and I know what I need in terms of speed and flexibility.

Too bad I can't ask them, since they had money to blow on workstations

And being able to render pictures faster and test different iterations quickly actually does help you improver faster, learning what works and what doesn't.

I need to be able to do lookdev (especially shading and lighting) at least somewhat on-the-fly for my projects, to test how the results will look in my comps. And the school has no adequate computer for the kind of projects that I will be doing.

>going to school for vfx / compositing / filmmaking

you dun fucked up son

>>501503
Actually, no, the alumni have more than 95% employment rate. The name of the University is very big.
Advertisement and commercials can pay very well.

>>501504
>this worried about pay
>going to school...for art
>this is where you fade to black....this is where you gaussian blur

you messed. UP.

>>501504
Let me guess, either south wales, bradford or de monteford?
Either way its not the rig its how you use it

>>501540
So, is it free in 3DSMax and soon Maya?

>>501580
Is what free?

>>501582
Wrong bread, sry