Style3D Atelier vs Marvelous Designer

My one week experience of using Style3D Atelier. (Don't confuse with Style3D Studio)

PROS:

1. Affordability.

Free version available for non-commercial use. I believe you cannot export high quality 3D model with the free version. Currently discounted at 18$ per month so a lot cheaper than MD $39. Their Unreal Engine simulator plugin is also discounted at $18 but I have no need for it. But beware! any one company can raise/lower at any time. Style3D may even terminate their free tier in the future.

2. Easy transition from MD.

They obviously design the software to snatch users from MD. If you already use MD, there’s no learning curve at all. If your take some time reassigning the shortcut, using it will be a breeze.

3. Has many great Clo features that is not available in MD.

This includes colorway, directional seam (felled seam), baseline, sublayer, puckering and "distribute internal line". One feature that I’m excited is the “create filling pattern” feature that is similar to Clo fill tool to make puffer jacket. *Update: MD now has puckering tool too. I guess If you wait long enough, they will eventually grant us these Clo-only tools.

4. Faster simulation.

I initially though that the simulation is slower because not much movement is happening. But it is actually so fast that the simulation is basically finish already. They use GPU simulation by default, so the simulation speed depends on how powerful your GPU is. I use it on my desktop RTX4070 and my laptop RTX4060. I don’t know how good MD/Clo GPU simulation is now, but back then their GPU simulation was so bad at layering I only use CPU simulation since.

5. Raytracing viewport rendering

Style3D Atelier does not has internal render and so does MD. However, the raytracing viewport render in Style3D Atelier is so much better than MD “quality” viewport render. If I fill the background with white image while using raytracing, it is basically the same as Clo “interactive render”

6. A bit less clutter

Some tools are combined/simplified. For example, in MD to draw a rectangle internal line, you need to use the “internal rectangle tool” instead of the “rectangle tool” (a mistake I often make). In Style3D both are the same tool. There is also no “edit button tool”, instead you just use the button/buttonhole tool to select or move button/buttonhole.

7. Others

Another small quirk that I like as a pattern drafter is the ability to specify angle when drawing line. I also like their default avatar more especially the female avatar (EU female). One problem with default MD female avatar is the bust is too small (80 cm) in relation to her hip. If you are following instruction from a book, adjustment is always needed because most pattern-making book use the standard 90 cm bust.

CONS:

1. Less user base.

Less tutorial and support because less people are using it compared to more established MD/Clo. I myself cannot completely switch to from MD/Clo simply because my clients want the zprj file.

2. Need more polishing.

At the time of this writing there’s yet a user manual available. One feature in MD I miss is the ability to easily create perpendicular line from a point along a line or curve. Another noticeable difference is the lack of snapping/aligning when drawing. It has ruler unlike MD but I cannot drag out guidelines from it like in most CAD program. It has baseline features, but you cannot edit the baseline. The program also hates Bezier curve. Most importantly, I have trouble exporting glb/gltf but the fbx exporter is better than MD in my opinion.

3. No strain/stress map?

They have their own tool to check fabric strain called “clothing section” but it is less intuitive.

*Update: The latest version is updated with the fitting map that you usually see in MD/Clo. Stye3D Studio already has this feature before, so I guess they just unlocked it for Style3D Atelier.

4. Higher system requirement.

Arguably, because they prioritize GPU simulation you need powerful GPU. Many laptops don’t even have a GPU so this will be a barrier of entry for some.

5. Software longevity.

Let say one day this company went under, or their server broke, or they got sanctioned by the US (coz they are Chinese), how can I open my file then? At least with MD, there are dubious offline copies floating around if you sail the high seas.

6. Others

I only have been using it for a week now, so this is by no mean a complete review. I have not yet tested their claim that their GPU simulation is superior in layering. I also have no idea on their capability on other aspect like rigging or animation.

CONCLUSION = highly recommended to try it.

If you are on monthly subscription of MD/Clo and have no urgent need, why not skip a month to try Style3D for free? I’m not paid to promote either company (I wish I am), but I will record some of my process using Style3D from time to time.

Style3D Atelier easily beats Marvelous Designer but not Clo because it does not support real life garment production at all (no notches, no seam allowance, cannot export pattern, no internal render etc). Their true Clo competitor is Style3D Studio which also has free version for non-commercial use. It is currently $40 per month.

However, all these may change in the future. They can change their prices and add/subtract features at any time.

Regrettably, Style3D is still a subscription like MD/Clo. Hopefully, more competition will bring the subscription price down. There are of course other softwares like Browzwear/Vstitcher, Tukatech etc but their target users are very different.

People in 3D industry don’t really need these specialized softwares. But they are important to me as a hobbyist who just want to drape the patterns that I drafted. You will never see me do much texturing or any animation. I long for the day when Blender finally overhauls their cloth simulation and add sewing function.