Arcadium 3D vs Terragen

Arcadium 3D is a browser-based tool for designing landscapes, houses, floor plans, and interiors. Its landscape tools cover property boundaries, terrain, patios, paths, retaining walls, fencing, planting, and outdoor features. The landscape planner includes hundreds of trees, shrubs, flowers, garden furniture, pergolas, fences, and outdoor structures. Users can create 3D designs, generate photorealistic landscape renders with AI, take first-person walkthroughs, and export printable 2D plans as PDFs. Projects can be shared by URL, and viewers can open shared designs in a browser without an account. The service runs without software installation and lists Mac, PC, iPad, and mobile device support, with web, iOS, and Android platforms. The free plan allows two projects, up to 30 objects per project, and one floor plan generation. Pro is $18 a month billed yearly; Power is $60 a month billed yearly. Paid plans raise limits and include custom model import, AI images, storage, and additional floor plan generations.

Terragen builds, renders, and animates natural environments for landscape visualization, visual effects, and artistic work. It creates procedural and heightfield terrain, can use real-world terrain data, and adds details such as cliffs and overhangs. Its spherical planetary atmosphere model includes volumetric clouds and fog, multiple scattering, and global illumination. The hybrid renderer combines micropolygon rendering and ray tracing, with support for anti-aliasing, motion blur, depth of field, and render elements. Nearly every project parameter can be animated, and image sequences can be rendered through the interface or command line. Terragen imports 3D objects and camera data, exports terrain as heightfields or geometry in formats including TER, EXR, LWO, OBJ, and FBX, and handles camera data in FBX, Nuke CHAN, and Maya MOV formats. It can also generate HDR environments for lighting in other renderers. Windows and macOS are supported, with Linux render-node support. The free edition is for non-commercial use or 30 days of commercial evaluation, with still renders limited to 1280 × 900. Professional subscriptions start at $10 a month.