Planet Blender v2 beta4 - 'Turning Pages'

Do-it-yourself 3D Scanning
BlenderNation - 2010-03-17 19:42:36

Sebastian Korczak built his own 3D scanner with Blender, a line laser and an old recordplayer. I love these kind of projects! Sebastian writes: I decided to execute my old idea of 3D scanner. I was surprised when I realized that digital camera, linear laser and Blender are enough for fast scanning of large objects with good [...]
Render gallery update
Sintel, the Durian Open Movie Project - 2010-03-17 18:13:27

Updating the blog has become somewhat a burden… doing a good post can take many hours, and “just dump stuff on the blog” is a bit scary! Nevertheless, here I do an attempt to just dump stuff from our “weekly” folders. Just WIP. No further comments… but I like it!

-Ton-
News: Progress Update for the BlenderNewbies 2.5 Training DVD
Blender Newbies 3D Video Tutorials (Learn to Create 3D Graphics with Blender!) - 2010-03-17 16:34:00

Just a quick update:

Development of the DVD is moving along at an increasing rate as Blender 2.5 continues to become more stable. Here's an abbreviated version of the mindmap depicting the current state of how the DVD is being organized.

Click to enlarge image.

A special Thank You to all of the pre-orders that are making this project possible!

UPDATE
Question: Can you post a little bit about what kind of videos you are thinking about for the "Technical Reference" section?
The Technical Reference section will contain many very short (less than 2 minutes) videos covering very specific technical subjects such as targeting a camera, snapping, local view, setting up a render layer, etc. Think of it as a video wiki for the DVD's contents.

I believe it will make learning more efficient because you won't have to waste time scrubbing through a video for that one part that shows, for example, setting up a render layer.

I'll create reference videos for things that aren't repeated too often in the project videos. For example, there won't be a reference video for "pressing the E-key to extrude".

Two things will determine how much content is in the Tech Ref section: time and disc space. To deal with the time issue I'll record these videos near the end of development to get a better feel for what may be helpful as a Tech Ref video. To help address the disc space issue, I'll record these videos at a smaller resolution with a lower framerate, and maybe framed to only show what's relevant.
Question: What about the Appendixes?
The Appendixes will contain quick references for things like:
- Using experimental versions of Blender
- Upgrading Blender
- Reporting a Bug
- etc.
Question: What will the Index be like?

The Index will be similar to the index of a printed book or the Lables listed on the right side of this site. I'll be "tagging" videos as I create them, and these tags will allow you to click a link on the Index page and get an appropriate listing of videos. Honestly, this is just something that I HOPE to be able to do. Currently, I'm not exactly sure how to set this up for the DVD's html interface, but I will at least have everything tagged so it will just be a matter of researching how to implement something like this. I'm sure it's not an original idea so the question has been asked and answered somewhere online.

technorati tags: Blender3D, 3D, graphics, Blender tutorials
Cycling to the studio
Tube - Epic Production Notes - 2010-03-17 16:32:01

Today was the first day of the season that we cycled into the studio. It’s magnificent taking the bike path during Spring and Summer, as the area is covered in forests and farmlands, and is a very inspiring way to start the day. Well energized, we’re back at boarding for myself and Pablo, while Bassam continues with the animatic and Fateh works on the script and schedule. We leave you with some photos of the cycling route during the Summer.
Digital Fantasy Painting with pixies using gimp
Starbright Illustrations (blog) - 2010-03-17 15:16:24

I’m working on another digital painting right now, as usual, with GIMP and my Wacom Bamboo graphics tablet. I have spent a couple of evenings on it, something like eight hours in all, and it looks about half done to me. I am still trying desperately to take my images in a cuter direction, and so I decided to paint an image with pixies in it. It is going to be called The Pixie Catcher when it is finally done.

For people who were not brought up in the UK being read Enid Blyton stories at bed time, a pixie is a fairy like creature, sometimes thought of as being blue. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about pixies.

All I have decided about the pixies in my illustration so far is that they are blue and have wings and a tail. I’ll be adding more detail to them as work on the illustration progresses.

I started work with the largest and most important character in this cute fantasy illustration, the pixie catcher himself. I simply opened GIMP and created a new image (I chose to make it an .xcf file to be able to use all GIMP’s features and save drafts). Then I immediately created a new layer within the image to sketch on, I prefer sketching on a transparent layer, rather than the white background because then I can colour in underneath the sketch more easily. I like to sketch freehand with no reference material, like photographs or thumbnails, because the image always seems more spontaneous and real to me when little or no planning has gone into it. It does mean that I sometimes have some problems to solve as I go on though, but that just adds to the fun.

I liked the way the sketch was going and added more and more detail to the character, adding pointy ears to make him look more like a fantasy creature.

Next I turned my attention to imagining the sort of fantasy world where this image might be set. I have been imagining a fantasy world which might end up being called Spiral Land. There would of course be a lot of spirals and, as you can see here, even the branches of the trees might be more spiraly than usual. I have turned the layer with the main character off, by clicking on the eye icon, so that I can concentrate on the background.

As you can see in this screen shot of the GIMP interface that in the layers window only the forest sketch and the background are enabled with the eye icon.

I then switched the layer with the main character back on and created a new layer below it to add some colour to him.

I then added a couple of pixies flying away from the main character as fast as their wings can carry them. To make the image cuter I had the idea that the trees would be helping the fairies to escape, so I altered the image to have one of the branches curling around the main character’s hat to try to stop him. It’s quite a subtle change, and I might have to add more branches helping the pixies to make this idea more obvious.

Here I have started to add some shadows to the image, you can see the change best on the character’s face. Shadows are really easy to add in GIMP, and they really bring the image to life. Simply create a new layer above the thing you want to add shadows to. Paint the shadows roughly in a dark colour, but turn down the opacity of the layer, using the slider at the top of the layer window. The lines and areas you paint will transform from solid colour to the merest hint of a shadow at low opacity, or quite heavy shadows at high opacity. You can make the edges of the shadows less sharp with the smudge tool, and when you are happy with the effect just right click on the shadow layer and chose the merge down option to add the shadows to your object.

Apart from a few edits like changing the shape of the hat, adding spirals to the main character’s collar and resizing the image to zoom in more on the scene the only difference between this image and the one before is layer after layer of shadows and a lot of time. Although I have also switched off and deleted the layers with the original sketches on because I don’t really need them any more. Now I’m more painting than drawing, but still using the same GIMP tools and my graphics tablet, the best 60 euros I ever spent.

I’m starting to like this image and I’ll be doing more work on it soon. I’ll post the final image here on the blog as soon as it’s done.
IK leg setup with three pivots
Virgilio Vasconcelos - Animation - 2010-03-17 09:50:00

Yesterday was the second class of Character Animation at the Post-graduation program on Digital Games at PUC Minas. I'm teaching rigging and animation theory along with exercises to be applied by the students. They're very interested in learning, which makes everything easier. :)
[read the full article]
iPhone Photography
mike's digital anthology - 2010-03-17 06:09:32

I recently got an iPhone 3GS, the camera that’s built into the phone is a pretty big disappointment for someone who shoots dSLR for the past year. Super-noisy at base ISO 100, no manual control, shutter lag… it’s a mess. Granted, big lenses and big cameras are super cool, and they take amazing pictures. But this post is about living with, and taking advantage of the tiny camera on a camera phone.

Lesson 1: Know the limit of your camera, and try to work around it.

Small cameras are known for their low dynamic range, so to get the most out of this sunset, I took two images at different exposure and merged them together with Pro HDR, right on the phone. This increased the dynamic range dramatically, making it equal to that of a dSLR. Then a bit of contrast and saturation boost completed the look.

Lesson 2: Post Processing

This picture came out very bland at first, but a few tweaks in Lightroom 3made it marginally passable. There are enough apps in the Apple Appstore to edit your photo into oblivion and back. Some of my favorite apps are Pro HDR, TiltShiftGen and Best Camera. Of course, for the most control, you’d have to use a desktop-based tool like Lightroom or Aperture.

Lesson 3: Color

What the tiny camera lacks in light-gathering ability, it makes up by upping the vibrancy and contrast. iPhone photos are usually a lot more vibrant and contrasty than what you get out of a high-end dSLR. Use this to your advantage to capture some eye popping pictures.

Lesson 4: Bokeh

You CAN throw the background out of focus even on a tiny sensor like the iPhone camera, but only if you are shooting in macro. Just be patient with the focus, it can take a while to get the razor sharp image that you wanted.

That’s all for now, I am still discovering the capability of the iPhone camera. Let me know if you have any tips regarding digital photography.
Creating Hair
Blender Cookie - 2010-03-17 03:27:56

In this Blender 2.5 Video tutorial, I go over techniques for creating hair, and giving them textures and materials. The first is Mesh hair using Bezier Curves, and the second is Particle Hair. Support the site – Download includes: High resolution .mov Video .blend file at the state of the tutorial

http://blendercookie.com