Blender 3D Tutorial

Blender 3D tutorial
From noob to pro
926 pages of information!

Noob to Pro
Contents
Blender 3D: Noob to Pro 1
Unit 1 - Knowing Before Making 11
Knowing Before Making 11
What Blender Can Do 13
Section 1A - 3D Concepts 16
3D Geometry 16
Coordinate Transformations 19
Orthographic Views 23
Perspective Views 25
Coordinate Spaces in Blender 27
Section 1B - User Interface (UI) 30
User Interface Overview 30
Keystroke, Button, and Menu Notation 31
Non-standard equipment 34
Operating System specific notes 36
Blender Interface 39
Blender Windowing System 40
User Preferences Windows 48
Buttons Windows 52
3D View Windows 54
Blender Interface (version 2.5) 66
Blender Windowing System (version 2.5) 68
User Preferences Window (version 2.5) 72
Properties Window (version 2.5) 76
3D View (version 2.5) 78
Blender Memory Management 79
Unit 2 - Basic Modeling and Shading 81
Section 2A - Your First Mesh Models 82
What is a Mesh? 82
Quickie Model 86
Quickie Render 92
Understanding the Camera 96
Improving Your House 99
Section 2B - Smooth Meshes 106
Modeling a Simple Person 106
Detailing Your Simple Person 1 112
Detailing Your Simple Person 2 117
Creating a Simple Hat 120
Putting Hat on Person 122
Section 2C - Materials and Textures 126
Materials and Textures 126
Quickie Material 128
Multiple Materials Per Object 131
Image Textures 134
Procedural Textures 139
Quickie Texture 141
Halo Materials 144
Section 2D - Beyond Basics 146
Aligned to view issue 146
Bones 147
Mountains Out Of Molehills 152
Modeling a volcano 158
Penguins from spheres 166
Die Easy 2 178
Die Another Way 192
Model a Goblet 204
Model a Silver Goblet 206
Model a Silver Goblet cylinder 212
Spin a goblet 215
Light a Silver Goblet 218
Simple Vehicle 223
Simple Vehicle: Wheel 224
Simple Vehicle: Seat 229
Simple Vehicle: Rocket Launcher 235
Simple Vehicle: Body 240
Simple Vehicle: Some Assembly Required 258
Modeling a 3D Parachute in Blender 262
Model a Low Poly Head 266
Building a House 279
Pipe joints 299
Section 2E - Using Reference Photos 303
Aligning Vertices with a Guide Image 303
Modeling a Fox from Guide Images 309
2D Image (logo) to a 3D Model 320
Section 2F - Curve and Path Modeling 340
Curve and Path Modeling 340
Intro to Bezier Curves 341
Curves In 3d 347
Deforming Meshes using the Curve Modifier 349
Making Your Creation Smoother 353
Section 2G - Using Materials and Textures 356
Using Textures 356
Using a texture to make a material partially transparent 363
Creating Basic Seawater 366
Mountains Out Of Molehills 2 369
Basic Carpet Texture 371
The Rusty Ball 376
Procedural Eyeball 377
Creating Pixar-looking eyes in Blender 383
Section 2H - UV Maps 388
UV Map Basics 388
Realistic Eyes In Blender 394
Unit 3 - Broadening Horizons 406
Section 3A - Lighting 407
Beginning Lighting 407
Understanding Real Lights 407
Adding Lamps 408
Faked Gi with Blender internal 414
Section 3B - Rendering 417
Render Settings 417
Output Format Options 421
OSA 423
Looking All Around - Panorama Settings 424
Other Important Render Options 427
Yafray Render Options 428
Stamping 430
2D, Toon, & CAD Rendering 433
Section 3C - Basic Animation 435
Basic Animation 435
ScreenLayout 436
Lattice 438
Bounce 446
Creating Basic Water animation 451
Flying Through A Canyon 454
Using the sequencer to compile frames into an animation 460
Section 3D - Particle Systems 463
Particle Systems 463
Making Fire 467
Furry 470
Fireworks 476
Particles forming Shapes 479
Billboard Animation 485
Section 3E - Soft Bodies 489
Soft Body Animation 489
Simple Cloth Animation 492
Soft Body with wind 495
Section 3F - Blender Game Engine 504
Your First Test 504
Platformer: Creation and Controls 506
An aMAZEing game engine tutorial 507
Platformer: Physics Fixes 517
Making exe 518
Build a skybox 521
Basic mouse pointer 529
Text in BGE 529
Python Platformer: Creation 530
Unit 4 - Taking Off With Advanced Tutorials 532
Section 4A - Python Scripting 533
Python Scripting 533
Introduction 534
Introduction (version 2.5) 536
Addon Anatomy (version 2.5) 538
Addon User Interface (version 2.5) 542
Addon Custom Property (version 2.5) 545
Separately Installable Addon (version 2.5) 548
Object, Action, Settings (version 2.5) 550
Procedural object creation 556
External scripts 559
Creating a GUI for your script 561
Export scripts 564
Import scripts 571
Scripts for modifying meshes 573
Section 4B - Advanced Modeling 574
Advanced Modeling Introduction 574
Advanced Modeling 574
HDRi 575
Creating a Light Probe 578
Making Landscapes with heightmaps 579
How to Do Procedural Landscape Modeling 584
Landscape Modeling I: Basic Terrain 587
Landscape Modeling II: Texture Stenciling 594
Landscape Modeling III: Exporting as a Heightmap 600
Realistic Water using Fluid Sim and Yafray 605
Section 4C - Advanced Materials and Textures 610
Bump Mapping 610
Normal Mapping 613
Texture Normal Mapping 613
Color Map Normal Mapping 617
Nodes 620
Texture Nodes 620
Material Nodes 623
Compositing 626
Section 4D - Advanced Animation 629
Introduction 629
Armature Object 631
Object View 631
Edit View 635
Pose View 642
Mesh Object 644
Armature and Mesh 644
Envelope 645
Vertex Groups and Weight Paint 648
Shape Key 653
Lip-Sync 656
Constraints 662
Copy Location 664
Copy Rotation 665
Track-To 666
Floor 667
Stretch-To 668
IK Solver 669
NLA Window 673
Intro to the NLA Editor 675
The Stride Feature 678
Relative Vertex Keys 679
Piston, Rod and Flywheel 680
Cutting Through Steel 684
Section 4E - Advanced Game Engine 693
Advanced Game Engine 693
Game Creating Techniques Part One: The GUI 694
Creating Pop-Up Menus 694
Creating Moving Menus 699
The "5-Layer" Button 702
Creating Object Outlines 702
Game Creating Techniques Part Two: Python 702
Really Advanced: The Game Engine Source 703
Appendices 705
Reference Material 706
Glossary 706
FAQ 713
Tutorial Links List 714
Hotkeys 721
Output Formats 722
Image Portfolio 723
Blender Glossary 724
Every Material Known to Man 727
Sources of free 3D models 730
Blueprint Links List 732
Materials, Textures, Photos 733
Advice 734
Asking for Help 734
Know What You're Doing 734
Modeling Realistically 735
Modeling tips 738
Cheat the 3D 738
Performance vs. Quality 739
Miscellaneous Tutorials 740
Modeling a Gingerbread Man 740
Modeling a simple space-ship 754
Creating Weapons based on 2D Images 755
Match Moving 757
Motion Tracking with Icarus 757
Create a Clayman 759
Organic Modeling 762
Understanding the Fluid Simulator 764
Creating a jewel in Blender 766
Modeling a picture 771
Modeling with the Spin Tool 772
Spin Tool Introduction 773
Illustrative Example: Model a Wine Glass 786
Creating Ogg-Theora movies using Blender 788
Creating animated GIFs using Blender and Gimp 789
3D Tiling Backgrounds For The Web 790
Cool Things 797
Troubleshooting 809
Creating Blender Libraries 810
Add some depth with stereo 812
Fluffy Material 818
Human Body 822
Using Blender Libraries 824
Beginning Modeling Final Project 825
Using Inkscape to make advanced Bezier curves 826
Platonic Solids 828
Polygonal Modeling 830
Box Modeling 831
Illustrative example: Model a Chair (Swan Chair) 833
Model a Chair-Preparations 834
Model a Chair-The Seat 835
Model a Chair-The Feet 846
Illustrative Example: Modeling a Simple Human Character 857
Modeling a Human Character - Preparations 857
Modeling a Human Character - Modeling 858
Polygon by Polygon modeling 862
Animation Notes and FAQ 866
Customization 874
Mist - Make Objects Opaque 874
References
Article Sources and Contributors 878
Image Sources, Licenses and Contributors 885
Article Licenses
License 917
Blender 3D: Noob to Pro 1
Blender 3D: Noob to Pro