Blender 3D: Noob to Pro

Authors & Contributors

This book has been brought to you thanks to the efforts of the fine folks listed on the Authors & Contributors page and a few people who just edit anonymously.

This book has not been reviewed so it must be bad?

Intro

This book is a series of tutorials arranged in a sequence to help the new user become a Blender expert. The tutorials become increasingly more difficult; as a result intermediate users may quickly advance to whatever tutorial is most suitable for their knowledge and can continue along the sequence. Although there are many different learning paths a user could take, we've made a concerted effort to accommodate everyone.

The tutorials should be followed in sequence. Blender beginners should not skip ahead in tutorials and expect to be able to accomplish anything, because the tutorials build on what was taught in the previous tutorials.

Sometimes it's good to set goals and write down what you want to achieve in Blender. If you tell yourself "I want to animate [what you want to animate]" then write it down, you are more likely to be able to animate.

All application versions can be found on blender.org.

This book is one of the Blender related Wikibooks, have a look at the complementary ones.

Contributing to this book

If you would like to contribute to this book, you are strongly encouraged (read "begged") to do so! There are a couple of things you may wish to do:

Editing a page

Simply click on the "edit this page" link at the top of whichever page you would like to edit! Your contribution will be immediately made live, but will also be quickly reviewed, so using these pages to link to a pornographic site is a waste of time and energy, as offending additions will be quickly removed. This also applies to spam and flaming. You can also ask questions and make comments about each page by clicking the "discussion" link at the top of the page.

Adding a page

If you would like to add a page to the book, such as a new tutorial page or a reference page, create a link to it under Contents section on this very page. Then with that link live, click it to be taken to the new page where you will be able to create content for the page. If you're putting up a tutorial and you don't know where it belongs, put it in the Miscellaneous section for now and we will tweak it and put it in the right spot. For instructions on how to name your pages appropriately, click here.

In order to maintain ease of navigation throughout the book, please be sure to create links to the pages before and after your new page, using the format that can be seen here. Also be sure to update the page before and after your new page with links to your new page. You can skip this step if you think the page you are putting in will likely be moved from where you put it, but in this case you should also ask for an opinion via the "discussion" tab..

Become a member of the team!

To work with the team, visit the Team Page.

Table of Contents

Wikibook Development Stages
Sparse text	Developing text	Maturing text	Developed text	Comprehensive text:

Beginner Tutorials

• Tutorial Syntax
• Non-standard equipment
• Operating System specific notes
• Become Familiar with the Blender Interface
  • Learn the Blender Windowing System
  • The User Preferences Window
  • The Buttons Window
  • The 3D Viewport Window
  • Other Windows

Learn to Model

• Learn to Model
  • Beginning Tips
  • Quickie Model
  • Quickie Render
  • Mesh Modeling
  • Modeling a Simple Person (Summary of shortcut keys too)
  • Detailing Your Simple Person I
  • Detailing Your Simple Person II
  • Creating a Simple Hat
  • Putting Hat on Person
  • Mountains Out Of Molehills
  • Making Landscapes with heightmaps
  • Landscape Modeling I: Basic Terrain
  • Landscape Modeling II: Texture Stenciling
  • Landscape Modeling III: Exporting as a Heightmap
  • Creating Models With Photo Assistance
  • Modeling a Gingerbread Man
  • Penguins from spheres
  • Die Another Way (dice modeling)
  • Die Easy revised for 2.44
  • Model a Silver Goblet
  • Model a Silver Goblet from a cylinder
  • Simple Vehicle
  • Simple Vehicle: Wheel
  • Simple Vehicle: Seat
  • Simple Vehicle: Rocket Launcher
  • Simple Vehicle: Body
  • Simple Vehicle: Some Assembly Required
  • Model a Low Poly Head
  • Building a House
  • Edit Mode HotKeys Review
  • Object Mode HotKeys Review
  • Curve and Path Modeling
  • Intro to Bezier Curves
  • Curves In 3d
  • Deforming Meshes using the Curve Modifier
  • Creating Weapons based on 2D Images
  • 2D Image (logo) to a 3D Model
  • 2D Image (logo) to a 3D Model Part 2
  • Modeling a picture
  • Using Bones
• Materials and Textures
  • Quickie Material
  • Quickie Texture
  • Procedural Textures
  • Creating Basic Seawater
  • Texturing Basic Seawater
  • Mountains Out Of Molehills 2
  • Making Landscapes with heightmaps
  • Light a Silver Goblet
  • Basic Carpet Texture
  • Procedural Eyeball
  • Image Textures
  • The Rusty Ball
  • Creating Pixar-looking eyes
  • UV Map Basics
  • Every Material Known to Man
  • Modeling Keyboard Shortcuts
  • Beginning Modeling Final Project

Lighting

• Beginning Lighting
  • Adding Lamps
  • Shadows

Rendering

• Render Settings
  • Output Format Options
    • OSA
  • Looking All Around - Panorama Settings
  • Other Important Render Options
  • Yafray Render Options

Animation

• Basic Animation
  • Basic_Animation/ScreenLayout
  • Lattice Deformer
  • Bouncing Ball with Lattice
  • Creating Basic Water animation
  • Flying Through A Canyon

Particles

• Particle Systems
  • Making Fire
  • Furry
  • Rug
  • Fireworks

Soft Body

• Soft Body Animation
  • Simple Cloth Animation
• Soft Body with wind

Blender Game Engine(BGE)

• Game Engine Basics
  • Platformer: Controls and Movement
  • Maze: Force and Multiple Levels
  • Platformer: Improving the Physics
  • How to make an .exe
  • Build a skybox
  • A simple mouse pointer

Other

• Match Moving
• Realistic Water using Fluid Sim and Yafray
• High Dynamic Range imaging (HDRi)
  • Creating a Light Probe
• Create a Clayman
• Organic Modeling

Blender FAQ

• Free Blender Samples
• Understanding the Fluid Simulator

Advanced Tutorials

Python Scripting

• Introduction
• Export scripts
• Import scripts
• Procedural object creation
• Scripts for modifying meshes
• Creating a GUI for your script

Advanced Animation

• Introduction
• Guided tour:
  • Armature Object
    • Armature Object in Object Mode
    • Armature Object in Edit Mode
    • Armature Object in Pose mode
  • Mesh Object
    • Connection between Armature and Mesh
    • Envelope
    • Vertex Groups & Weight Paint
    • Shape Keys
      • Lip-Sync with Shape Keys
  • Constraints
    • Copy Location
    • Copy Rotation
    • Track-To
    • Floor
    • Locked Track
    • Follow Path
    • Stretch-To
    • IK Solver
  • Timeline Window
  • IPO Window
    • Data Type
  • NLA Window
    • Introduction To NLA Editor
    • The Stride feature
• Working example: Bob
• Working example: Piston, Rod and Crank

Miscellaneous Tutorials

• 3D Tiling Backgrounds For The Web
• All Blender Tutorial Links – tutorials from all over the Web
• All Blueprints Links – blueprints from all over the Web
• Cool things that aren't that obvious in Blender
• Ways to create a "fluffy" effect [materials and lights) (under construction)
• Troubleshooting Common technical issues and what to do about them
• General Advice on Modeling Realistically
• Using Blender Libraries
• Creating Blender Libraries
• Displacement Mapping (under construction)
• Human Body
• Rendering Informations
• Add some depth with stereo (under construction)
• Creating animated GIFs using Blender and Gimp
• Creating Ogg-Theora movies using Blender
• Making a cute little fuzzball: http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?t=99165&highlight=fur+hamster&page=2
• How to use Blender to create products for the IMVU catalog [1]
• Mac controls for blender
• Creating a jewel in Blender

Miscellaneous Video Tutorials

• Blender 3d Basics(Part 1)
• Blender 3d Basics(Part 2)
• Blender 3d Basics(Part 3)
• Using Subsurf to Smooth Objects
• Using Blender's Edit Mode
• The Blender Toolbar and Tools
• Blender 3d Material Basics
• The Basics of Animation
• Constructing a Scene
• Using Particles
• Texture your Objects with UV Mapping
• Adding Objects From Other Files With Append
• How to make a glass texture/material
• How to make waves with the wave modifier
• Using Blender 3d's Built in Game Engine to Make a Game
• Using Softbodies
• Using Fluids
• Making Grass with Static Particles