Blender 3D By Example: A project-based guide to learning the latest Blender 3D, EEVEE rendering engine, and Grease Pencil, Edition 2

Oscar Baechler · Xury Greer

May 2020 · Packt Publishing Ltd

About this ebook

Get up and running with Blender 3D through a series of practical projects that will help you learn core concepts of 3D design like modeling, sculpting, materials, textures, lighting, and rigging using the latest features of Blender 2.83

Key Features

• Learn the basics of 3D design and navigate your way around the Blender interface

• Understand how 3D components work and how to create 3D content for your games

• Familiarize yourself with 3D Modeling, Texturing, Lighting, Rendering and Sculpting with Blender

Book Description

Blender is a powerful 3D creation package that supports every aspect of the 3D pipeline. With this book, you'll learn about modeling, rigging, animation, rendering, and much more with the help of some interesting projects.

This practical guide, based on the Blender 2.83 LTS version, starts by helping you brush up on your basic Blender skills and getting you acquainted with the software toolset. You’ll use basic modeling tools to understand the simplest 3D workflow by customizing a Viking themed scene. You'll get a chance to see the 3D modeling process from start to finish by building a time machine based on provided concept art. You will design your first 2D character while exploring the capabilities of the new Grease Pencil tools. The book then guides you in creating a sleek modern kitchen scene using EEVEE, Blender’s new state-of-the-art rendering engine. As you advance, you'll explore a variety of 3D design techniques, such as sculpting, retopologizing, unwrapping, baking, painting, rigging, and animating to bring a baby dragon to life.

By the end of this book, you'll have learned how to work with Blender to create impressive computer graphics, art, design, and architecture, and you'll be able to use robust Blender tools for your design projects and video games.

What you will learn

• Explore core 3D modeling tools in Blender such as extrude, bevel, and loop cut

• Understand Blender's Outliner hierarchy, collections, and modifiers

• Find solutions to common problems in modeling 3D characters and designs

• Implement lighting and probes to liven up an architectural scene using EEVEE

• Produce a final rendered image complete with lighting and post-processing effects

• Learn character concept art workflows and how to use the basics of Grease Pencil

• Learn how to use Blender's built-in texture painting tools

Who this book is for

Whether you're completely new to Blender, or an animation veteran enticed by Blender's newest features, this book will have something for you.

Table of Contents

• Introduction to 3D and the Blender User Interface

• Editing a Viking Scene with a Basic 3D Workflow

• Modeling a Time Machine - Part 1

• Modeling a Time Machine - Part 2

• Modern Kitchen - Part 1: Kitbashing

• Modern Kitchen - Part 2: Materials and Textures

• Modern Kitchen - Part 3: Lighting and Rendering

• Illustrating an Alien Hero with Grease Pencil

• Animating an Exquisite Corpse in Grease Pencil

• Animating a Stylish Short with Grease Pencil

• Creating a Baby Dragon - Part 1: Sculpting

• Creating a Baby Dragon - Part 2: Retopology

• Creating a Baby Dragon - Part 3: UV Unwrapping

• Creating a Baby Dragon - Part 4: Baking and Painting Textures

• Creating a Baby Dragon - Part 5: Rigging and Animation

• The Wide World of Blender

Ratings and reviews

Better than nothing, has not aged well. Free Youtube lesson playlists will equip you better for the current 3D work market. Most of my frustration with it has to do with features no longer compatible or bundled with Blender. There are more efficient ways to achieve the outcomes of the exercises, but I suppose the book is here to demonstrate the tools, not to stick to the best possible choice for a given task.

the topics are a really good starting point. around chapter 5, there are A LOT of unexplained things. it feels like being told what to do without exactly knowing what is happening. id suggest taking the main topics from each chapter and looking online for something more in depth.

About the author

Oscar Baechler is a CG generalist, professor, painter, photographer, open source advocate, and community organizer who teaches at Lake Washington Institute of Technology. He's published a number of mobile games with a Blender pipeline and created animation for clients both big and small. Oscar runs the Seattle Blender User Group and Ballard Life Drawing Co-op and has presented on CGI at SIGGRAPH, LinuxFest Northwest, the Blender Conference, OSCON, Usenix LISA, SeaGL, SIX, WACC, and others.

Xury Greer has been involved in digital media production for over 15 years. He got his start as an indy film director, participating in 48-hour film competitions, and creating training videos for businesses in the Greater Seattle Area. Xury earned his bachelor's degree in game design at Lake Washington Institute of Technology and graduated with the highest honors. Xury specializes in 3D characters and technical art, and he loves to share his knowledge. He has taught courses for Mount Si High School, Washington Network for Innovative Careers, DigiPen, and LWTech.