Learning Blender: A Hands-On Guide to Creating 3D Animated Characters, Rough Cuts

Description

This is the Rough Cut version of the printed book.

Learning Blender walks you through every step of creating an outstanding animated character with the free, open source, 3D software Blender, and then compositing it in a real video using a professional workflow. This is the only Blender tutorial to take you from preproduction to final result, and it’s perfect for both 3D novices and those who’ve used other 3D Software.

Focusing on Blender 2.71 and above, 3D-professional Oliver Villar explains all the basics, including Blender’s interface, controls, and how to manipulate objects. Once you’ve mastered the fundamentals, you’ll follow a realistic 3D workflow through a complete project.

You’ll find chapters on every aspect of the character creation: design, modeling, unwrapping, texturing, shading, rigging, and animation. Once your character is ready and animated, you’ll learn how to integrate it into a real video using camera tracking techniques, lighting, and compositing. Each skillset is taught hands on, and available online video tutorials (more than 5 hours) will guide you through Blender’s trickier tasks.

By the time you’re done, you’ll understand how the whole process fits together, and how to use Blender to create outstanding characters for all media. You’ll also build strong Blender skills you can apply in any 3D project, whether it involves characters or not.

Learn How To

• Master Blender’s innovative user interface, navigation, and selection techniques
• Create your first scene with Blender and get comfortable with its core tools
• Prepare for projects so they’ll go as smoothly as possible
• Use modeling tools to create a 3D character
• Bring your character to life with color, textures, and materials
• Create your character’s skeleton and make it walk
• Make the most of Blender’s Camera Tracking tools
• Add lights to your 3D scene
• Render with Blender Internal or the powerful new Cycles render engine
• Composite your 3D character into a real video
• Switch to Blender from 3ds Max, Maya, or XSI

Register your book at informit.com/register to access all of this book’s production files, plus bonus video tutorials, and a useful Blender keyboard shortcut reference.

Sample Content

Table of Contents

Preface         xxiii

What Is Blender?   3

Commercial Software versus Open-Source Software   4

The History of Blender   5

The Blender Foundation and the Blender Institute   7

The Blender Community   9

Summary   9

Exercises   10

Chapter 2: Blender Basics: The User Interface         11

Downloading and Installing Blender   11

Blender User Interface   12

Understanding the 3D View   13

Navigating the 3D View   17

Managing Areas 19

Editor Types   20

Selecting Objects   23

Using the 3D Cursor   24

Blender User Preferences   26

Summary   28

Exercises   28

Chapter 3: Your First Scene in Blender         29

Creating Objects   29

Moving, Rotating, and Scaling   30

Naming Objects and Datablocks   33

Interaction Modes   36

Applying Flat or Smooth Surfaces   37

Modifiers   38

Blender Render and Cycles   41

Materials   42

Turning on the Lights   44

Moving the Camera in Your Scene  45

Rendering   46

Summary   48

Exercises   48

The Three Stages of a Project   51

Defining the Stages   53

A Character-Creation Plan   55

Summary   56

Exercises   56

Chapter 5: Character Design         57

Character Description   57

Designing the Character   60

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