great thread. I've been pondering to give blender a try and this thread confirmed that I should actually do it

The problem with blender is that it has no foothold in the industry. Almost all studios have existing tools and pipelines. Artists which are familiar often up to expert level with an app. No time to lose for learning, especially when it concerns an entire studio. Hiring people with blender as main app is a problem. Convincing IT that relative newcomer a free tool beats a commercial app. I'd say it's more difficult than switching an entire gfx company to Linux on the desktop level.

Nevertheless, I think it's great that there's an open source 3D app and I'd love to see more like this in production.

Thanks to everyone who provided tutorial links, they are all super helpful to those of us looking to give this thing a bash.

I would also like the point out that while it's a pain to get materials set up and working with the 3d painting tools, that Blender's projection paint tools are pretty shnazzy.

Also using matcaps and masking and baking the results out can be great for laying down a foundation for your diffuse maps.

Once you get used to it I find Blender to be a really great tool, I enjoy the subdiv tool it has and being able to adjust a crease with a slider, it's not a 100% of the time method for subdiv modeling but it works in quite a few instances.

And using the shrinkwrap modifier works well for making clothing and armor base meshes for sculpting and for retopo work.

In fact, overally I really enjoy the modifier stack in Blender, it sort of works well for me as a halfway point between how I worked in Max and Maya.

^Yeah materials are awkard at first, but there's that layer addon which works with painting and everyone should get it .Don't forget to enable your Glsl shading or you won't get more than one texture at a time if you have layers .

yeah... ive been thinking of giving it another go soon... last time i tried i got as far as creating some cubes and struggling with the UI...time to give it another go it seams...

I've been using Blender for the most of the time while in school.
I used to hate it when it was still in the "old" 2.49 UI version. Now it's my main tool.

Im learning max now because it helps knowing it for getting into game industry.
Im not saying max ain't good, but it feels like a slow behemoth for me now when coming from Blender.
But once i get the hold of the shortcuts it will probably get better.

I don't see anything wrong about Blenders material system. Although i don't use it that much either. I just do unwrapping in Blender, textures in Photoshop and then rendering in UDK, Unity or Marmoset.

Good things:

+ Free / Free plugins / Great Community
+ When you get hold of the shortcuts, its fast. No tweaking with gizmos..
+ UV tools
+ Spacebar Search (why on earth other packages dont have that?)
+ Modifiers (no need to collapse modifiers like in max)
+ It's getting better fast. (I remember being exited when i heard Lightwave getting an realtime viewport rendering. Time passed by.. few years actually before it was released on LW11. Blender announced Cycles. Few months later we already had it on our hands..)
+ You can customize the UI layout the way you want. Super easy, no need to go to settings or anything
+ perfect for freelance work, indie teams, works like a charm with Unity.

Bad Things:

- Not used really in larger game studios
- Game Engine feels unnecessary, i only know one serious game using it for real.
- Beveling. I havent looked into it, maybe it's possible (i know theres a modifier for it, but its not the same) .. i just do it "manually"..

Originally Posted by walreu

- Beveling. I havent looked into it, maybe it's possible (i know theres a modifier for it, but its not the same) .. i just do it "manually"..

2.63 has bevel (should be in the specials menu - w). It's comically buggy though. Probably should have been cut for release, but a lot of people really wanted it I guess.

They're porting over a bevel plugin from Sketchup. Right now it's an add-on called Bevel Round. You can find it on this page. It's still testing but works better than the trunk bevel, and eventually will replace it.

Originally Posted by monster

Things I disliked:

• Right click to Select on by default.
• Confirm Transformations on by default.
• No Max navigation style, only Maya and Blender.
• The Rotate gizmo icon is an arrow with a slight curve. Took a while to find it.
• I would prefer an Open file dialog instead of a fullscreen file browser.
• I wish you could select keys in the Timeline.

Blender encourages a gizmo-less manipulation. Its much much much faster to press the move hotkey and move your mouse, than to click and drag on handles. This is something Modo users have known a long time, but Max and Maya users "dont know what they dont know"

You can set up a max navigation style easily. The hotkey config setup is great, and its really easy to set up new hotkeys. The first thing I did was make the navigation like Max, and set the 1-2-3 keys to Vert, Edge, Face select in edit mode.

Another tip: Go to the user preferences, then addons, and enable "Dynamic Spacebar Menu". No clue why its not default. It has the search + everything else in the app:



As for the timeline issue, check this video:

http://blendtuts.com/animation_basics

At the end, he shows how to replace the timeline with a modified Dope Sheet which works the way you'd expect. Another reason I like blender - customization!

In fact, if anyone wants my key setup, here it is:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2586457/jm_blender_keys.py

Also, here's my startup.blend
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2586457/startup.blend

Just save the file and in the User Preferences (Ctrl-Alt-U), Import Key Configuration).

A few changes:

Max style navigation which means:

middle click: pan
alt-middle: rotate
ctrl-alt-middle: zoom

Also, in edit mode: 1-2-3 keys = Vertex, Edge, Face. Also works in UV edit mode as long as selection sync is on.

Right click is now lasso select instead of tweak/grab. Everyone in the world should quit using Box select in every app 80% of the time and use lasso. There are only a few times ever where Box is more efficient than lasso. Another thing most people dont realize :P

Ctrl-Mousewheel: Select more/select Less (Grow/shrink selection in Max)

Alt-W: Merge menu. M is too far on the keyboard for something you'll use that often.

Ctrl-X: Loop cut/slide. Usually defaults to Ctrl-R, but I find that too cumbersome for something I use a lot. Personal preference, YMMV

Also, if you hate the right as select, just go to the User Preferences and in the input, change the select button to left instead of right.

Ah I got it, cheers for the presets it instantly feels less alien.

Originally Posted by Slum

Ctrl-E: Loop cut/slide. Usually defaults to Alt-R, but I find that too cumbersome for something I use a lot.

How do you access the edge tools when you've taken its hotkey? Also, loop cut is CTRL-R. Alt-R is spin.

Originally Posted by Overlord

How do you access the edge tools when you've taken its hotkey? Also, loop cut is CTRL-R. Alt-R is spin.

Whoops! I meant Ctrl-X. You are correct sir!

Another funny thing about blender is the x key being the default for delete. At first I was annoyed by this, but I realized it's much nicer than delete/backspace because you don't have to move your hand off the mouse or across the keyboard.

The best advice I can give for someone looking to learn a new app and getting frustrated: question everything you do. Try to justify the reason why you expect something to work the way you think it should. I'd wager half the time the only reason you feel like it 'should' be that way is because of habit, not because it's better or more efficient. Always think about what you're doing and how you can improve your workflow/processes. This actually applies even if you're not switching apps. Don't get caught in a habit for the sake of it - justify what you're doing and try to get faster and more efficient.

Originally Posted by Slum

Another tip: Go to the user preferences, then addons, and enable "Dynamic Spacebar Menu". No clue why its not default. It has the search + everything else in the app:

Yes, everyone do this. It's much better.

Lots of great links in this thread!

Even though I've been using Blender for many years, I've still not gotten used to the stupid cursor and the ways it's used though. Sad face.

Originally Posted by walreu

+ Modifiers (no need to collapse modifiers like in max)

By the looks of your post, you have some wrong information. This is one of them. The beauty of Max's modifier system is that you DON'T have to collapse the stack... therefore retaining the option to change things. Very handy modelling process.

By the looks of your post, you have some wrong information. This is one of them. The beauty of Max's modifier system is that you DON'T have to collapse the stack... therefore retaining the option to change things. Very handy modelling process.

What other wrong information?

Well i have to admit, i haven't used that much max's modifiers but it sucks that i have to add a Unwrap UVW modifier to my model just so i can unwrap it (or do i?) ,and when im done, i cant go back to editing polys unless i collapse it. Am i wrong?

edit: whoops my bad, it wasn't collapsing, it was just that annoying pop-up.

Even though I've been using Blender for many years, I've still not gotten used to the stupid cursor and the ways it's used though. Sad face.

You can use it to move objects/vertices etc to exact points, set origins..

Btw, i've had dynamic space bar menu working as default everytime i have installed Blender..

Originally Posted by walreu

Well i have to admit, i haven't used that much max's modifiers but it sucks that i have to add a Unwrap UVW modifier to my model just so i can unwrap it (or do i?) ,and when im done, i cant go back to editing polys unless i collapse it. Am i wrong?

I wouldn't necessarily collapse it, but you might have to re-UV that particular shell; that would all depend on the model. Yeah, if you are moving up and down a modifier stack you will frequently get warnings. They can be annoying.

Well, in Blender, if you pin your UV's and leave the seams in place on your mesh, you can just unwrap it again and stitch the new UV's into place. I don't think you can do that in Max.

about hte modifer stack, yes very useful, the problem is in max there are lots of things that shouldn't be in the stack, editing normals should just be part of the editable poly's as well as UV's should be in the editable poly, and get there own window or viewport like blender or maya.

Originally Posted by walreu

Bad Things:
- Game Engine feels unnecessary, i only know one serious game using it for real.

But that doesn't mean it is not necessary just because you don't need it. This depends much on your own point of view.
BGE is clearly not a engine for the masses like Unity. But there are a lot people who use it anyways. And there are more games made with BGE than you are aware of.
Personally I would prefer BGE over Unity since it has way more raw power and comes with the source code. It is also evolving very fast these days like Blender's modeling and sculpting tools.
Unity on the other hand goes down the hill with it's approach to reach a mass consumer sector, where every average Joe can create a game thrown together with pre-made assets. Not to mention all the instability and critical issues Unity faces with each new release.

^That makes me think that i never used it but i wonder if you could be able to display your portfolio pieces with the BGE if it has some nice lighting and supports shaders with normal maps and all that.I reckon i'll have to look into that.

Originally Posted by Kwramm

great thread. I've been pondering to give blender a try and this thread confirmed that I should actually do it

^ this!

Really liking the modifier stack in Blender (been using it for years, mainly for UV mapping but recently doing most of my modeling in it too).

For my current project I've been retopologising my model and have a first pass rig with a short deformation test animation. Using the modifier stack:

Mirror the new mesh
Subdivide the new mesh
Shrink wrap the new mesh onto the source mesh
Skin new mesh to the rig

Doing this means only working on one side (obviously), and having it in this order means when it is subdivided the new geometry is then shrinkwrapped to the source, so you can see what it will look like when you reproject, and then the whole thing is on the rig so you can see how the final result will deform (been very impressed with Blender's autoskinning).

And by toggling on the visibility/editing options of the modifiers you can actually scrub the timeline to move the rig into a pose, then edit the mesh in that pose and it will propogate the changes from the default pose and shrinkwrap onto the deformed one. So you can for example raise the character's arm and twist it, then push verts and see in real time the projection updating.

Hopefully that made some sense. I found it cool anyway.

about hte modifer stack, yes very useful, the problem is in max there are lots of things that shouldn't be in the stack, editing normals should just be part of the editable poly's as well as UV's should be in the editable poly, and get there own window or viewport like blender or maya.

This is exactly how i feel too. Mirroring is there too..

..But that doesn't mean it is not necessary just because you don't need it. This depends much on your own point of view. And there are more games made with BGE than you are aware of

Youre right, i wrote that mainly from my point of view..
But still, i check out Blender's front page news everyday and i can't remember seeing commercial quality game stuff made with the game engine in there. If you know these kind of projects, i would love to see them.

Unity on the other hand goes down the hill with it's approach to reach a mass consumer sector, where every average Joe can create a game thrown together with pre-made assets.

??
I don't get this. Should game making be hard?
I think Unity is doing good job making things that shouldn't be rocket science ,easier.

I'm going to follow this thread, paired with thorough tutorial reading, coupled with absurd amounts of caffeine and background musics. I really need to sink my stupid, lazy teeth into 3D art, and Blender is free, so hey.

I've personally been trying to make Blender like Silo, but with a lot of other cool stuff tacked on. With Bmesh now it's pretty close.

Maybe we could have a blender thread or something, that would be sweet.