Modelling/Wings3D
General
Wings3d is a free, OpenSource modelling program. Wings3d can be picked up very quickly compared to some modelling programs, and the user interface makes it quick to use. It can also be a powerful tool for modelling once mastered; having a diverse set of mesh manipulation tools.
Wings3d also supports UV mapping and texture files.
Wings3d can be downloaded from the Wings3d website or the Sourceforge project page.
Export MD2 from Wings3d
Wings3d does not actually support any kind of exporting in the format .MD2 and I've found no plug-ins which allow it to do this. This means that currently the best method is to use another program that does support the exporting like 3DSMax, Blender or any of the other ones that you have to hand.
This means that after the mesh is created its best to export into the new program and follow that program's specific .MD2 exporting instructions from there.
- There is a md3 exporter and importer plugin for Wings3D: see their SVN.
- There is also a md2 plugin feature request on the fr tracker at: sourceforge.net
Transferring your Wings file
You can't always say which format will be best to export from wings which can then be imported into your chosen modelling program. For example Blender supports .wings import which can be very useful.
But, I would say that as a general rule exporting your wings file as a .obj file will probably be the best course of action. The .obj format is a very clean and easy to edit modelling file format and so should be widely supported and import/export from most programs without too many problems.
Scale
Getting a md2 file into Wings could become as much trouble as exporting your wings file so I would suggest that the scaling of your model is done best in the program you are going to use directly before export as md2. The fewer times you import/export a model, the better.
If you have a set of meshes that are all of a related scale and need to be exported its probably best to play with the import scale settings of your chosen program to use before export. If the import settings don't support this then the export settings from wings should support it.
Create Animations
Wings3d currently doesn't support any form of rigging or animation. This is best done in another program.