Blender 3.5

https://www.blender.org/download/releases/3-5/

by emadabdulrahim • 3 years ago

231 117 3 years ago

blender.org

koch• 3 years ago

What's blender

jeron• 3 years ago

3D computer graphics software

mandmandam• 3 years ago

It's the best example of how open source software can reach industry standard - and possibly above, in some ways.

It's 3d software used for movies, engineering, and even game creation.

You might find this link helpful - https://www.blender.org/about/

jcelerier• 3 years ago

It's the best example of how open source software can reach industry standard - and possibly above, in some ways.

it started as closed source industry software though, that's different than a lot of OSS out there

detuur2• 3 years ago

blender my balls

dang• 3 years ago

Not here, please.

ftxbro3• 3 years ago

me: wondering if it has gpt integration

blender: HAIR

CyberDildonics2• 3 years ago

You thought an open source 3D animation program would have sophisticated text generation as a feature?

KineticLensman• 3 years ago

I know what you mean, but prompt driven object construction could be useful

ftxbro3• 3 years ago

obviously ridiculous to think blender would have gpt integration https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35320571

sebzim45002• 3 years ago

I've seen videos of GPT integration into blender that make it look quite useful, so it's not a crazy idea.

joering2• 3 years ago

no, but if you watched presentation you mostly fiddling with numerical values for how the hair would be constructed. not a hard stretch to imagine GPT learning how to fiddle with that and create its own characters by - yes - generating text values / numerical values that Blender understand.

rhtgrg• 3 years ago

Looks like GPT is the new 'blockchain', except it's the unwashed masses calling for it rather than VCs (I suppose the latter have learned some hard lessons recently).

Who am I kidding, VCs will be VCs.

nickstinemates• 3 years ago

VC twitter and linkedin are awash with GPT.

sebzim45002• 3 years ago

I don't know about that. I think it is fully plausible that products like Blender will get LLM integration over the next few years. Already this looks quite useful and it's made by one guy in a week.

https://github.com/gd3kr/BlenderGPT

ftxbro3• 3 years ago

Hi, it looks like you are commenting on my username: ftxbro. Thanks for noticing!

After lurking I made this account only to post a joking-not-joking explanation of why Alameda had the weirdly specific credit limit $65,355,999,994 with FTX and why I thought it could be a funny off-by-almost-1000x bug/typo/mishap https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34473811 but I think almost no one read my comment because I posted it so late after the thread had scrolled off the front page :(

EDIT: wait did you call me an unwashed mass? usually the unwashed masses call me an elitist!

master-lincoln2• 3 years ago

Why would an open source 3d software integrate a commercial third party API that is not free, especially when the API is about text generation?

wahnfrieden2• 3 years ago

Text includes parameter and API automation

smcnally2• 3 years ago

There are a few GPT and Stable Diffusion add ons

https://github.com/tin2tin/chatGPT_for_Blender_Screenwriter https://github.com/TREE-Ind/Blender-GPT

preommr• 3 years ago

The vector displacement maps for sculpting look amazing.

Kind of surprised they didn't lead with that instead of focusing so much on the hair.

thomascgalvin• 3 years ago

I only follow this stuff casually, but IIRC hair is notoriously difficult to render realistically without massive computing power. It doesn't surprise me that this would be called out as a leading feature.

ccity88• 3 years ago

Blender is what I point to when people tell me open source is doomed for failure. There isn't anything that comes remotely close in terms of features and ubiquitous support, and its free. Honestly the best example of open source done right.

CreepGin• 3 years ago

Also a reminder of how tenacious you gotta be in order to have "open source done right". Remember Blender is almost 30 years old.

capableweb2• 3 years ago

And on the brink of not existing at a couple of times in its history, reinforcing how tenacious you have to be :) Huge Kudos to Ton who've been through hell and back for Blender to end up what it is today.

mixmastamyk5• 3 years ago

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2001/07/21/good-software-take...

good-software-takes-ten-years-get-used-to-it

Linux, Firefox, Chrome disproved "open source failures" twenty (and over) years ago. Nice to have another app in the mix.

thomastjeffery• 3 years ago

Every Blender release is exciting to read about.

How many other software projects can you say that for?

pier25• 3 years ago

Not even commercial ones!

OoooooooO• 3 years ago

Dolphin comes to mind.

lostgame• 3 years ago

Actually immediately thought of Dolphin with this comment. The Dolphin team's dedication to having fantastic write-up that match every release is commendable as hell. Phenomenal software, as well. :)

mordae• 3 years ago

Godot.

Also PostgreSQL and KiCad major versions.

whateveracct• 3 years ago

Glasgow Haskell Compiler!

asutekku2• 3 years ago

Unreal Engine

senectus1• 3 years ago

Krita

dividuum• 3 years ago

I hope this doesn't sound negative, but I'm curious about the converging feature set of modeling software like blender and game engines like Unreal. From my total amateur point of view it seems game engines slowly get all those nice modeling features and visual fidelity, while also being able render all it in real time. How can modeling software compete with that? Vastly better tools for modelling?

fassssst• 3 years ago

Blender also renders in real time. It’s useful outside games, I like just drawing in it. It’s like a way more powerful Illustrator.

capableweb2• 3 years ago

The workflow difference starts to matter more than actual features, where for me the workflow for modelling in Blender is miles ahead than what you get in something like Unreal Engine.

Secondary and more technical, not everything has to or can be real-time rendered, and for that Blender is probably still king of the two, where Unreal Engine is optimized for real-time.

There are things you can only do in Blender, and vice-versa, so what the right tool is will as always depend on the job.

MayeulC• 3 years ago

Yes, blender is mainly a modeling tool. You can plug it into many different renderers (technically, including an Unreal engine game where you exported your models). Epic subsidising it should hint at it not being a competitor :)

There are other niche tools in a creative pipeline, like Substance Painter for texturing and applying surface shaders. Blender has image and material edition capabilities, but they are more entry-level than competitors to Substance and GIMP/Photoshop.I think there's a niche for a lot more tools, including "AI" stable diffusion-like tools.

Also, blender used to have its own "Blender Game" engine.

asutekku2• 3 years ago

Unreal's modeling tools are fine for blocking out stuff but you still want to do proper modeling in an actual modeling software because of the modifiers & tools that make the process so much simpler and less cumbersome

itishappy• 3 years ago

Game engines like Unreal are incredible, but Blender still has capabilities they lack: unbiased rendering. Real-time engines work via a series of clever tricks and hacks. We've spent decades of effort on hiding the seams, but they are there if you know where to look.

As an example, take refraction. I can look up Newton's telescope dimensions, model the lenses in Blender, slap a glass material on there, and look down it to see an accurate view. (Minus diffraction and dispersion, and dispersion can be added manually.)

Real-time raytracing is an answer to this, but it's not quite there in it's current state. It still takes an order of magnitude or two longer to raytrace a frame than to rasterize it, so it's currently only used sparingly to touch up details.

Personally this is one of the areas I'd love to see Blender continue to develop. A spectral rendering option in Cycles would be invaluable when you want to render the Dark Side of the Moon logo.

Reitet003• 3 years ago

Blender looks better and better!

I was wondering... Is there a good book teaching Blender fundamentals covering more recent versions?

rwl4• 3 years ago

The fastest way to get started is to watch Blender Guru's excellent beginner donut series.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjEaoINr3zgFX8ZsChQVQ...

Reitet003• 3 years ago

I've been half way through this tutorial once and it indeed is fantastic. I'm not sure if it applies to recent versions of Blender though.

creativenolo2• 3 years ago

I commented elsewhere so I sound like I am trying to push it. This book does it. I speak passionately about this because video tutorials just don’t do it for me. And you asked for a book but the other comment is a video. When you google Blender books it’s mostly people asking and people answering with videos references : https://www.blendersecrets.org/book

Reitet003• 3 years ago

Greatly appreciate it! I don't know why but book format is the one I like best, maybe it's a mix of learning at my own speed and at the same time something tangible that I can mark in various ways.

Thanks!

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

It's become a ritual for me: Get excited by the Blender release notes on HN, try to find good beginner resources, play around with it for an hour, give up.

This is not a negative comment about Blender. I'm not their target audience I guess. I just _want_ to learn it but I can't really find good resources that start at 0.

There are some Youtube channels out there but videos have never been a good way of learning for me. It's tough keeping material up to date with a fast moving project.

I enjoy these threads every time!

ehvatum• 3 years ago

I recommend starting right out of the gate with a modest project goal in mind, such as something neat to 3d print, or a simulation of interesting gears turning.

The period where you feel like you’re progressing the least and struggling the most is actually when you’re learning fastest.

ShadowBanThis012• 3 years ago

Agree. You really need a personal goal in order to learn. Plodding through tutorials with no particular goal in mind is... not a fool's errand, but certainly a fast path to boredom and no retention.

Claude_Shannon2• 3 years ago

Check this, his vids were the best for me (and then his stuff on ArtStation, but paid :| )

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2U0MiZSV9A

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

Thank you! I'm happy to pay for good content. I'll take a look.

In fact, If I could make a targeted donation towards Blender that only goes towards funding documentation I'd be up for that as well.

evanwalsh• 3 years ago

For anyone just getting started, no video tutorials really clicked for me until I found Grant Abbitt's: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLn3ukorJv4vuU3ILv3g3x...

Obviously no guarantees of instant savantism, but never say never!!

CobrastanJorji2• 3 years ago

Grant Abbitt's the best. His Udemy course "Complete Blender Creator: Learn 3D Modelling for Beginners" is really great for a complete novice. It's a really well thought out style of "repeat after me, now let's do it again and I'll give you a bit less guidance, now here's the thing again and you try it on your own, okay now I'll walk through it." Very intentional, very well done, broad introduction to many tools.

He also has some short free videos of the same style: "here's a simple shape, produce it on your own, now I'll show you how I would've done it."

Of course, it's on Udemy, so the price rapidly vacillates between $10 and $190 according to no system knowable to man, but when it's on the cheap end it's a great deal.

krisoft• 3 years ago

What kinda thing would you want to make?

Blender can do so many things. I personally use it to draw pretty things to be 3d printed, and then cast out of metal. But there are people who use it to composite things into live action footage, people who make game assets, and a lot more.

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

I'm mostly interested in a 3D printing suite as well.

I've been using SolidEdge for a few years and Fusion and also tried FreeCad but the latter also never really clicked for me.

I'm trying to find an open source solution - I understand that SolidEdge etc. are parametric and Blender is not. But I at least wanted to get good enough in Blender to make simple things (mostly functional, not pretty as in your case).

yurymik• 3 years ago

Did you try https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIoXOplUvAw ?

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

I did, yeah. Didn't work for me: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35360962

weaksauce• 3 years ago

the blender doughnut project video series is a pretty good intro to them and your complexity can go up quite a bit

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

I did the first five or so videos and that didn't work for me. I know, that others have different opinions here but it was too much "do this, then do that, then this" for me and too little explanation why.

punyearthling• 3 years ago

Polygon Runway has a good intro tutorial. But like you, I'm in a similar boat. Play around with it for a couple hours and can't get back into it even when I really want to. I think it's a matter of building a good habit.

JKCalhoun2• 3 years ago

I kind of did the same. The hours may have added up though — I finally started grokking it a bit.

Actually, what finally worked was to have a very specific (small) project in mind. For me it was to figure out how to model a plastic storage bin. I struggled for days on that one — making all the rookie mistakes.

Having now done several follow-on projects in Blender I think I could go back and create that plastic storage bin in less than an hour.

It's going to just take time. But having a small, achievable goal/project in mind will give you the excuse to get there.

agumonkey• 3 years ago

not every piece of software sticks, blender post 2.8 is an amazing achievement, but he'll never get me the way Maya does

mrguyorama• 3 years ago

Do you want to render photorealistic images or make models for a video game engine or....

It's really helpful to have a goal or project in mind, something extremely small. The classic for photoreal is the donut, just a donut on a plate.

For game models, I made some low poly missiles and a small cityscape that looks like trash but now I know how to use blender.

gabereiser2• 3 years ago

To reiterate what others have said, one doesn’t just “learn blender”, it’s way too complicated a software with too many parts for different roles/jobs. Instead focus on a goal. Have a project in mind and pursue the learnings to complete the project. Start small like “I want to model and render a small room” to get the feel for sculpting and modeling, materials and lighting.

Forgeties79• 3 years ago

Exact same way I “learned” audacity.

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

You are correct. I did elaborate on that in another thread.

I did come in with a concrete project when I first started looking at this years ago. I'm interested in creating models for 3D Printing.

Unfortunately, even with this limited scope I found it hard to get started. But again: I'm not blaming anyone. I know that I'm using a professional tool as an amateur who does not even have enough time to skill himself up for something that is possible in this tool but not its primary use-case.

Mostly, my comment was meant as a fun/light story about how much I like thos release notes and how they get me to spend a whole evening on Blender every time they pop up.

mixmastamyk5• 3 years ago

I'd recommend a highly-rated book if you are starting from 0.

lars_francke10• 3 years ago

Do you happen to have a recommendation? Books have the unfair disadvantage that they are out-of-date the moment they hit the printer.

jolexxa• 3 years ago

hey me too!! The video that finally helped me get going was this one from Imphenzia on YT: https://youtu.be/1jHUY3qoBu8

all his other stuff is great, like building and rigging a low-poly character. Instead of having to follow tutorials and make stuff I didn’t want to, he shows you how to use the tools to make what’s in your imagination!

douglee6503• 3 years ago

The UI "dead-ends" a lot, where you get into a state where, "why is the wireframe not showing?", or, "why aren't the transform gizmos displaying and why is my screen now one single screen with no UI?" Especially Macbook Pro, where you don't have a numpad.

One way to get through this is to save a startup file, and just keep going back to it. I wish there was a "reset UI to default startup file state while preserving current file"

TOMDM• 3 years ago

What you're asking for was added as an option when loading files, though I can't remember when.

Steps are:

Step 1: Save your blender project

Step 2: File --> New --> General

Step 3: File --> Open (find your messed up blender project)

Step 4: Go to the cog (settings) in the top right

Step 5: Uncheck 'Load UI'

Step 6: Load your blender project

It will then have default UI

I only remembered this was possible, not how to do it. The steps above are copied from this persons lovely succinct video tutorial on how to do it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKJLOIy7OFE

mejutoco• 3 years ago

I can recommend this paid course on skillshare. I know the author and he is super professional. A really dedicated person doing a short film and sharing everything in a course.

https://www.skillshare.com/en/classes/Filmmaking-with-Blende...

creativenolo2• 3 years ago

I like books and lots of little nougats of information you can piece together: like how you can learn code or an SDK. So for me, this book has been great: https://www.blendersecrets.org/book

smcnally2• 3 years ago

Grant Abbitt — cited as another good resource in this discussion — also likes this book. The ToC gives a detailed look into what the book covers.

hollander• 3 years ago

I'm with you. For me it's also about motivation, and getting past that point where you can do basic things, and then learn by doing. I'm on a Mac, but I do have a big monitor with a wide keyboard, so I could give that a try.

Udemy has some good courses for which you never should pay more than $20 and they always have offers. It's not about time, but it's about getting yourself motivated to do that course day after day.

ulnarkressty• 3 years ago

Yep, same here. I remember years ago playing around with the student version of 3DS Max, was able to create and animate quite complex scenes for my school presentations in minutes, everything was very intuitive and stable. Trying to use Blender feels like I'm wrestling with the interface most of the time, while not being entirely sure what's going on the rest of the time.

Got to admit overall it looks better and better. Wish they took some time to redesign the interface properly, not just 'improve' it. The current one is still mostly looks and feels like 2.x

ShadowBanThis012• 3 years ago

I hate most open-source UIs (see GIMP and Audacity), but Blender's is a breath of fresh air so far. I was pleasantly surprised.

I took a class in Maya and found its UI to be a shitshow of redundancy and unintuitiveness. Didn't explore 3DS Max though.

If you have specific objections to the Blender UI, by all means share.

smcleod• 3 years ago

You're not alone. I think it's a problem with all 3D modelling and CAD software as well - it's all amazing - but it's all really quite horrible to use.

Just think how easy it is to do simple things like cutting and pasting selections in 2D (even with any number of layers) with tools like Photoshop, Pixelmator Pro and GIMP - now you try doing that in Blender or Fusion 360 and you'll quickly find that not only is not at all intuitive - it's a bloody nightmare.

Doxin• 3 years ago

In my experience you'll want to start with the sculpting mode. The vertex twiddling can come later. Rough "tutorial" for anyone interested:

1) start blender 2) switch to sculpt mode from the dropdown in the top left, by default it's set to "object mode" 3) Open the "remesh" dropdown in the top right and click "Remesh" in the panel that shows. 4) mess around with the brushes along the left side. Click and drag to use the brush. Click and drag middle mouse button to rotate around the sculpt. Scroll to zoom. Shift and drag middle mouse button to "offset" your view. 5) notice your sculpt starts getting kind of glitchy or low resolution, Go back to step 3 and repeat. You can lower the "voxel size" to increase sculpt resolution.

I feel like blender isn't especially hard to use these days, it just does a lot of things and has a lot of buttons which makes it hard for beginners. Ignore all the buttons you're not using and it's a lot more doable.

oumua_don17• 3 years ago

This is the course you are looking for.

https://cgmasters.com/blender-for-complete-and-total-beginne...

blindstitch• 3 years ago

You must endlessly google for the first week(s) to learn how to use it. Luckily I have only encountered a few issues where stack did not have an existing answer.

The youtube tutorials out there are sometimes OK but typically mediocre and annoying, so I learned most by having a problem to solve and figuring it out step by step.

Pompidou• 3 years ago

I started playing with the game editor in the pre 2.79 versions. It's Amazing how easy you Can Do cool little games. I find it much pleasant to use than unity, because blender is a all in one solution. The game player embed a python interpreter. It would be fun to use it to create a data visualiser. Unfortunally, theses pre-2.79 are not compatible with new Intel drivers for 520 and 630 chipset : selecting an object in a second layer make the software crashing. I found an old 520 driver, and it is working fine, but at this day I didn't find any driver version compatible with blender < 2.79 for Intel 630 graphics.

wahnfrieden2• 3 years ago

I hope grease pencil gains full exportability to use assets in games / RealityKit on iOS

lovehashbrowns• 3 years ago

One of my favorite projects ever. I’m having a ton of fun learning blender and I can’t wait to get to the point where I can start learning hair modeling.

antoineMoPa• 3 years ago

With great power comes great complex-ability, so Blender now includes hair assets to make your life easier.

That's a good lesson is software/product design. As things get featureful/complicated, it's nice to provide carefully chosen defaults and samples to help people get started.

douglee6503• 3 years ago

Ok, native Metal 3d viewport is ++++. Tested on a Macbook Pro M1 32 core 62gb ram Ventura.

- In Properties > Render Properties > Cycles => set device to "GPU Compute"

- In Preferences > System set Render Devices to Apple M1*, GPU Backend to "Metal"

- If you have a scene open it will black out for a few, mine was about 20 sec

Very much faster and better

mixmastamyk5• 3 years ago

This is an impressive project, but I was hoping the UX standardization would continue. Seems to have slowed? I've started using it this month due to hearing things had been improved, but what did I find?

- Window always opens maximized, which I never want. Couldn't find a way to change it. (A common arrogance of media apps.)

- F11 key doesn't toggle fullscreen. To its credit I was able to change this. Defaults are important however.

- When in full screen the top left menu doesn't extend to the edge of the screen. So you can't easily hit it without slowing down. I first learned about Fitt's Law in the 90s, not exactly new:

https://www.asktog.com/columns/022DesignedToGiveFitts.html

Is this a lack of interest? Or special-snowflake syndrome?

Another quibble with media apps is that they want to use their own special hotkeys for zooming, panning etc, but I never want them to be different from my browser and/or web maps, which are used every single day. Option doesn't seem to exist to change them in a group to standards. Probably could do individually, but don't yet have time, and risk conflicts.

To be a good desktop citizen these things still need to be addressed. Looks like they have profiles now so non-standardisms could be moved to the classic profile.

bitbang• 3 years ago

You keep using that word "standard". I do not think it means what you think it means.

mixmastamyk5• 3 years ago

What do you think it means? Hotkeys/UI definitely have standards. Maybe not ISO. Conventions? HIG? CUA? https://duckduckgo.com/?q=human+interface+guide+HIG

Semantic discussion is not very interesting.

jzer0cool• 3 years ago

Anyone know the performance on M1 Mac, 16GB ram for use creating only simple model s? I do not plan on creating thousands of objects for a scene and wondering if it is suitable machine for learning and where it might start to lag.

mkaic• 3 years ago

That machine will run blender absolutely fine for simple tasks! Heck, I learned blender on a 2013 Core i7 MacBook Pro years ago, and even then it ran pretty darn smooth all things considered.

programmer_dude• 3 years ago

Does it still crash a lot?

geenat• 3 years ago

Always excellent to see Video Sequencer updates so we can eventually replace After Effects / Premiere

dan_hawkins• 3 years ago

If anyone is interested in following works of this release splash screen artist, here she is: https://twitter.com/nicky_blender

Blender 3.5

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