3D Model Haven is an upcoming source of free high quality 3D assets for everyone, following in the footsteps of HDRI Haven and Texture Haven. Our goal is to create a constantly growing community funded resource of open content, licensed as CC0 for complete freedom and usability by professionals and hobbyists alike.
No, at least not initially. All the content will be our own original work, or acquired from artists who can prove the same. Opening the site up to public contributions is a bit of a legal can of worms, since everything on the site will be licensed as CC0.
It is something we want to do in the long run, but we'll need to be extremely careful to ensure no one is publishing copyrighted content, so we'll leave this to a later stage and concentrate on producing the content ourselves for now. It's also extremely important to us to maintain a standard of quality, so any future system of public contributions will be strictly curated.
We want 3D Model Haven to be useful to the largest number of people and to generally avoid niche content. This means the content we create will be primarily focused towards background assets for environmental design, architectural visualization and game development.
Sometimes yes, but remember this is just one of the many tools available. Our goal is to create quality assets, and we'll use whatever methods are best for each model.
All models will be fully textured with standard PBR materials. The included textures will also be licensed as CC0.
At first each model will be available as a .blend file and FBX file. In future we will expand to support other 3D software formats (Max/C4D/Maya...) depending on demand.
Please do! We're always keen to hear your ideas, just keep in mind we're mainly interested in models that are useful to many people and not just your own project. The best way to get in contact with us right now is on the various social media linked above.
We have accepted a $10k grant from Epic Games that will cover most of the initial content and building the site. After launch, it will be funded solely by Patreon donations just like HDRI Haven and Texture Haven. The more donations we get, the more models we can publish each month, and the more formats and features we can offer on the site.
As already proven by HDRI Haven and Texture Haven, community-funded open content can indeed be high quality. We're fully aware that the creation of 3D assets takes a lot of time and experience, which has financial value. Rather than selling the content the traditional way, we believe we can benefit the industry more by giving away everything for free without any restrictions, and rely on community support to fund our work.
Epic doesn't get anything directly out of this. Quoting from their own FAQ: "Simply put, we succeed when you succeed. We’re incredibly proud of the UE4 community and want to do what we can to grow that community. Epic wants to help you focus more on creation and worry less about keeping the lights on."
My interpretation of this is that, apart from breeding good will for their company, it's a form of long-term investment in the industry; they may have a lot of spare cash right now and want to ensure the industry grows. By helping 3D Model Haven, they are indirectly helping students enter or flourish in the industry who may one day make popular games that eventually return a profit to Epic.
Cameron Casey will be running the show for 3D Model Haven, while Greg Zaal will handle all the web development and help keep it in line with the other Havens. Assets will also be acquired privately from a number of other 3D artists to improve the variety of content available.
Sometime in late 2019 or early 2020. Early supporters on Patreon will have the opportunity to try the site out before then.