How to Get Started With Blender 3D

Blender 3D is a free 3D design and animation tool capable of some very powerful results. While it may seem overwhelming at first, if you commit the time to learning the program step by step you will be rewarded with an intuitive mastery of the commands.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

1. Visit the official Blender website to download the latest version of the Blender 3D software.

2. Install Blender 3D on your system and open it.

3. Familiarize yourself with the windowing interface. The top window is the "3D Viewport" window. This window is where you view and manipulate 3D objects and move around your 3D scene. The bottom section is the "Buttons" window. Here you have access to various commands and ways of manipulating the objects you see in the "3D Viewport" window.

4. Play around with the windows by resizing and splitting them. This will get you comfortable with adjusting the interface to suit your preferences.

5. Open the "User Preferences" window by resizing the bar at the top of your screen. Now you will access to wide variety of preferences that can be set according to your wishes. Turn on "Auto Save" while you're at it, as Blender 3D can be a bit of an unstable program. When you're done with "User Preferences," simply resize it back to a bar at the top of your screen.

6. Start by creating a few basic geometrical shapes in the "3D Viewport." Try out a few cubes and pyramids. Next, you can build spheres using the "Subdivision Surfaces" tool.

7. Light up your scene with the lighting tools. You do this by adding lamps. Go to the "SPACE > Add > Lamp" menu and choose one of the many options available.

8. Move on to other, more complex aspects of 3D design: rendering, animation and particles. You'll find a variety of detailed online tutorials to help you in your quest to be a 3D designer.

Resources

• Wikibooks tutorial site
• Download Blender 3D

[Bimaville]

on 2/20/2009 I luv this program but i just can't use it