IntroductionWelcome | 00:04 | Hi! I'm George Maestri and welcome
to Blender 2.6 Essential Training.
| | 00:09 | Blender is a very powerful 3D modeling,
animation, and rendering application.
| | 00:15 | It can be used to create visuals for
animation, special effects, and gaming.
| | 00:22 | Probably one of the best things about
Blender is that it's free, it's an open
| | 00:25 | source application so you can download
it whenever you want and use it on OS X,
| | 00:30 | Windows, or Linux.
| | 00:34 | In this course we're going to go over
the basics of the Blender 2.6 interface,
| | 00:39 | then we're going to show you how to
model, we're going to go over polygonal
| | 00:42 | modeling, so that you can build
your own objects and characters.
| | 00:46 | After that we're going to take a look
at materials, we're going to look at how
| | 00:50 | to create glossy, reflective,
and transparent materials.
| | 00:54 | After that we'll take a look at
textures including how to apply bitmaps to
| | 00:58 | your objects and how to map them in
the UV Editor, we're going to take a look
| | 01:03 | at lighting and rendering, so that
you can create realistic scenes and
| | 01:07 | realistic environments.
| | 01:09 | And finally, we're going to take a look
at animation including character rigging
| | 01:13 | where we will build a simple character rig.
| | 01:17 | So let's go ahead and get started
with Blender 2.6 Essential Training.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the exercise files| 00:00 | If you've purchased the DVD or our
premium subscriber to lynda.com, you will
| | 00:05 | have access to the Exercise Files.
| | 00:08 | Now these will be located in
a file called Exercise Files.
| | 00:12 | If you download them place them on your
Desktop, and in there you will have 11
| | 00:18 | chapters worth of content, and if you
place it on your Desktop, you should be
| | 00:23 | able to get to it exactly the
same way that I do in the course.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Downloading Blender| 00:01 | For those of you who are new to
Blender, you can find the Blender download
| | 00:05 | at www.blender.org, and once you get to
that website there should be a download link.
| | 00:12 | Find the version for your
particular operating system and install it.
| | 00:17 | Now Blender will work for Windows both
32 and 64 bit, Linux 32 and 64, Mac OS X,
| | 00:23 | as well as FreeBSD.
| | 00:29 | So you have a wide range of
operating systems you can use with Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using Blender on a Mac| 00:00 | Blender on the Macintosh OS X Operating
System works pretty much the same as the
| | 00:07 | Windows Operating System.
| | 00:08 | They've made pains to keep the
interface consistent through our versions, but
| | 00:13 | the keyboard of the Macintosh is a
little bit different than the PC keyboard, in
| | 00:18 | that it doesn't have an Alt key.
| | 00:20 | So to substitute for the Alt key
we use the Option key on the Mac.
| | 00:26 | So for example Ctrl+Alt+Q on the PC
will be Ctrl+Option+Q and that will put you
| | 00:33 | into an out of quad view.
| | 00:36 | So just remember to substitute the
Option key on the Mac for the Alt key.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using Blender on a laptop| 00:00 | If you're using Blender on a laptop, you
may not have a keyboard with a Number Pad.
| | 00:06 | If that's the case then you won't
be able to do certain functions in
| | 00:10 | Blender such as switch views from
the Number Pad, but we can fix this by
| | 00:16 | setting a preference.
| | 00:17 | We can go into File>User Preferences
and under Input select Emulate Numpad, and
| | 00:26 | this will make the number keys along the
top of your keyboard emulate the Number
| | 00:30 | Pad along the side of the keyboard
allowing your laptop to be fully functional.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
1. The Blender InterfaceOverview of the Blender interface| 00:00 | Let's get started by taking a look
at the default Blender interface.
| | 00:04 | Now, this is the interface you
should see when you first open Blender.
| | 00:08 | Now, if you've opened an existing
Blender file, you may see a different layout
| | 00:14 | or a different interface, that's
because the layout is actually saved with the
| | 00:17 | file, but just know that you can always
get back to this default interface, and
| | 00:22 | I'll show you how to do that in a little bit.
| | 00:24 | Now, the interface is composed of
individual panels, and inside each panel is
| | 00:29 | what's called an Editor, and you can
tell what the Editors are because they have
| | 00:33 | an icon either on the top-left corner,
such as this, or at the bottom-left
| | 00:38 | corner, such as here.
| | 00:40 | Now, those little icons in the
corner tell you what type of Editor it is.
| | 00:45 | So let's go to the very top-left corner
here, and we see this little icon here
| | 00:49 | with the letter I in it.
| | 00:50 | In fact, if we left-click on this and
pull this down, you can see these are all
| | 00:53 | the different types of Editors we have,
and the one we're using here at the top
| | 00:57 | of the interface is called the
Information window or the Info window.
| | 01:01 | Now, this window is pretty
straightforward, it just has a File Menu, which
| | 01:07 | allows us to Open, Close,
Import, and Export files.
| | 01:11 | It also has what's called an Add Menu,
which allows us to add objects into
| | 01:16 | the scene, such as Meshes, Armatures,
Cameras, Lights, pretty much whatever you want.
| | 01:21 | We also have a Render Menu, and the Render
Menu allows us to render images or animation.
| | 01:28 | And we also have a Help Menu, which
brings up web-based help from Blender.
| | 01:33 | Now, next to this we have our Layout Menu.
| | 01:37 | Now, as you can see,
we're on the Default Layout.
| | 01:40 | If I go over here just to the left
of this, you'll see I have a pull-down
| | 01:43 | menu, and this actually allows us to choose
whatever type of Window Layout is appropriate.
| | 01:49 | Now, these are just some of the
presets that come with Blender, but you can
| | 01:53 | also make your own.
| | 01:55 | So for example, if I was using
Animation, I could just click on this and it
| | 02:00 | would reconfigure the Windows so
that it was easier for me to animate.
| | 02:04 | If I was working with UV Editing,
again, it would change the Window Layout.
| | 02:10 | Now, let's go ahead and go
back to our Default Layout.
| | 02:14 | If you can't find the Default Layout, we
can always reset Blender to get to this.
| | 02:20 | So all I have to do is find the File
Menu and just do Load Factory Settings.
| | 02:25 | Once we do that, it loads all default
preferences and it basically resets the package.
| | 02:31 | Be careful when you do this, because if
you have custom hotkeys set up, it will
| | 02:36 | revert them back to the original
settings, so just be aware of that.
| | 02:41 | Again, along the top of the Information
window, we have a Scene Menu here, this
| | 02:45 | is just a pull-down menu,
allows us to select different scenes.
| | 02:48 | We have a place where we can select
which Renderer we're using, and if you have
| | 02:52 | plug-in renderer, it would show up here.
| | 02:55 | And then we also have basically an
Information Panel here, which shows us the
| | 02:58 | Version of the Blender and information
about the object that we have selected.
| | 03:03 | Now, along the right side of
Blender we have two Editors.
| | 03:06 | The first one here on
top is called the Outliner.
| | 03:10 | The Outliner is basically a list of
everything in the scene and it allows us to
| | 03:14 | choose whatever objects we
want just by clicking on them.
| | 03:17 | Now, if you notice here, I'm having to
scroll up and down through the Outliner
| | 03:22 | window because it's kind
of sized a little small.
| | 03:25 | We can resize any one of these Editors
simply by clicking over the edge and dragging.
| | 03:31 | So if I put my cursor over the bottom
edge of the Outliner, left-click and drag,
| | 03:35 | you can see how I can expand it so
I can see everything in the scene.
| | 03:41 | We can also expand it horizontally, so
if I left-click and drag over this window
| | 03:45 | here, I can actually drag this open as well.
| | 03:48 | Now, this brings us to the Properties
Panel, which is the one below the Outliner.
| | 03:53 | And you'll notice how this window is contextual;
| | 03:56 | it changes a little bit depending
upon the object that we have selected.
| | 03:59 | So for example, if I select the Cube,
I get a number of different icons here.
| | 04:04 | In fact, let me bring this out a
little bit so we can see all of these.
| | 04:08 | So you'll see a number of different buttons
here, and each one of these buttons is a tab.
| | 04:13 | So this one here allows us
to see the Render properties;
| | 04:18 | this one here shows us Scene property,
if we want to see properties about the
| | 04:21 | object itself, and this will change
depending upon what we have selected.
| | 04:26 | So these are basically just properties
attached to whatever we're working with.
| | 04:32 | So in this case we have Materials,
because it's actually a physical object;
| | 04:36 | if we're working with a Camera, well,
Cameras really don't have Materials
| | 04:40 | applied to them, so this will change.
| | 04:44 | Now, along the bottom we have a Timeline,
this is where we can scrub animation,
| | 04:49 | we can also set keyframes and do playback.
| | 04:53 | Now, above here is this really big
window and this is called a 3D View.
| | 04:59 | And the reason it's a 3D View, well, it's
because this is where we see our 3D objects.
| | 05:03 | This is really the main part of Blender,
this is where we can do most of our work;
| | 05:09 | we can do modeling, animation, rendering,
a lot of that happens in this 3D View.
| | 05:16 | Now, if you haven't noticed, we can
actually take these icons that tell us
| | 05:20 | what type of window it is and actually
change the type of Editor that we're working with.
| | 05:25 | So as you can see here, we're working
with a 3D View, but if I want to, I can
| | 05:29 | change that into any other type of Editor.
| | 05:32 | So if I wanted to I could change this
to a really big Outliner or I can change
| | 05:37 | it into what's called a DopeSheet.
| | 05:39 | So I can change these into
pretty much anything that I want.
| | 05:44 | But I'm going to go ahead and
change this back to a 3D View.
| | 05:51 | So those are some of the
basics of the Blender interface.
| | 05:55 | As you can see, the interface can be
very configurable, but we can always get
| | 06:00 | back to our default settings, which is
what we're going to be using for most
| | 06:04 | of the course.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Understanding 3D view windows | 00:00 | Now let's take a look at the
basics of the 3D View window.
| | 00:04 | Now, this is the window that you're
going to be using the most in Blender.
| | 00:09 | Now, the 3D View window is
really this area of the screen.
| | 00:13 | You can see here at the bottom-right
corner we have this icon here, it says 3D
| | 00:16 | View, and then that goes all the
way diagonally up to this corner here.
| | 00:21 | 3D View window is our 3D Viewport, it's
where we can rotate, we can zoom, and so on.
| | 00:27 | But let's take a look at what surrounds
this before we get into actual navigation.
| | 00:33 | So if you notice here we've got a panel
that's on the left side of this window,
| | 00:39 | this is called the Object Tools Panel.
| | 00:41 | Now, this allows us to Translate,
Rotate, Scale objects, as well as do
| | 00:46 | some additional tools.
| | 00:48 | Now, this window will change a little bit
depending upon what object you have selected.
| | 00:53 | So if we go over here to the Outliner,
and I select the Chair, you'll see that
| | 00:58 | we have one set of tools;
| | 01:00 | if I select the Camera, you'll see
that these tools change just a little bit.
| | 01:05 | As with all panels, this
Object Tools Panel can be scaled.
| | 01:11 | So I can scale it to the right, or
if I push it all the way to the left I
| | 01:15 | can make it disappear.
| | 01:17 | Now, when I make it disappear, you'll
notice a little plus sign shows up
| | 01:21 | here, and if I click on that, it
allows me to get that Object Tools Panel.
| | 01:26 | Now, if we go over to the right side,
you'll see we have another plus sign
| | 01:29 | and under this is what's called the
Properties Panel, and this allows us to do
| | 01:34 | things such as Transforms and
change the Camera View, and so on.
| | 01:39 | And just as with the Object Tools
Panel, I can scale this and I can make it
| | 01:44 | disappear just by dragging it to the right.
| | 01:47 | Now, along the bottom we actually have
a menu and some additional buttons, and
| | 01:52 | we're going to go through a lot of
these buttons, but let's start with this one
| | 01:56 | here, and this is our Viewport
Shading button, and this tells us how we're
| | 02:01 | actually shading this particular 3D View.
| | 02:04 | So let's go from the bottom to the top,
if I select Bounding Box, it turns
| | 02:08 | everything into boxes, and this really
just shows you a very rough approximation
| | 02:13 | of where things are in the scene,
but it will render very fast.
| | 02:18 | So if you have a very complex scene, this
can actually help you scrub in real-time.
| | 02:22 | A little more detail, we go up to
Wireframe, and this gives us the Wireframe
| | 02:28 | version of the scene.
| | 02:29 | Then we have the Solid View of the scene,
which is basically just solid shading,
| | 02:35 | so we can actually see the
objects as they're shaded.
| | 02:38 | And then if we have textures on our
objects we'll see a Textured View, and this
| | 02:43 | will actually put the photographic
textures that we have applied into the scene.
| | 02:48 | I'm going to go ahead and put this back
on Solid, and let's take a look at some
| | 02:52 | of these other menus here.
| | 02:54 | Now, this one here we have a contact-
sensitive menu called the Object Menu, and
| | 02:58 | this can change to the Edit Menu or
other menus just depending upon what mode
| | 03:04 | we're in and we'll get to that in a little bit.
| | 03:07 | We have a Select Menu, which allows us
to select objects and, most importantly,
| | 03:11 | we have a View Menu.
| | 03:12 | Because this is a 3D View, this allows us all
sorts of control about how we view the scene.
| | 03:19 | So the first one I want to do is one here at
the top and it's called Toggle Full Screen.
| | 03:23 | Now, if you notice here to the right
of all of these we have a hotkey, and in
| | 03:29 | this case Toggle Full Screen
has the hotkey of Ctrl+Up Arrow.
| | 03:35 | So if I toggle it from here, you can see
my 3D View goes to Full Screen, all the
| | 03:43 | other panels disappear.
| | 03:45 | If I hit Ctrl+Up Arrow again, it comes
back, so this is really just a toggle;
| | 03:49 | so Ctrl+Up Arrow to make it big,
Ctrl+Up Arrow to shrink it back down again.
| | 03:55 | Now, another one that's another toggle
is called Toggle Quad View, and hotkey
| | 04:00 | for this is Ctrl+Alt+Q. So when I
Toggle Quad View, it actually brings up four
| | 04:06 | Viewports in this one 3D View.
| | 04:09 | So in the top-right we have a
Perspective View, then we have Orthographic or
| | 04:14 | Drafting View, so we have a
Top, Front, and Right View.
| | 04:18 | Now, this can be very helpful when
you're modeling and you need to get very
| | 04:22 | precise views of your scene.
| | 04:25 | Now, again, this is a true toggle, so if
I hit Ctrl+Alt+Q, it will bring it back.
| | 04:32 | Now, notice how it brought me back to
a different Viewport than I went in as.
| | 04:37 | So if I use Ctrl+Alt+Q to toggle back to my
Quad View, let me show you a little trick here.
| | 04:43 | When it toggles back to a Full View,
it's going to toggle back to wherever
| | 04:47 | the mouse is located.
| | 04:49 | So if my mouse is over the
Perspective window, it toggles to Perspective.
| | 04:55 | If I'm over the Top Orthographic window,
it will toggle to Top Orthographic.
| | 05:02 | So just be aware of that as you go
back and forth between these, your mouse
| | 05:06 | position is important.
| | 05:09 | So these are some of the
basics of the 3D View window.
| | 05:12 | Now, remember you can resize the
panels on either side of the screen and
| | 05:17 | also change the shading.
| | 05:18 | We're going to get into
navigation in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Navigating in 3D space| 00:00 | Now, let's take a look at
how to navigate in Blender.
| | 00:04 | Navigation is done using the middle
mouse button, so you really need a three
| | 00:08 | button mouse in order to
use Blender efficiently.
| | 00:12 | Pressing down the middle mouse
button and dragging will orbit the Camera.
| | 00:17 | So if I drag left and right,
it orbits left and right;
| | 00:20 | up and down orbits up and down.
| | 00:23 | If I go anywhere in between, it will
just orbit around kind of in circles.
| | 00:28 | Now, if you hold down the Ctrl key and
middle click, you zoom, so I'm zooming in
| | 00:34 | and out by moving my mouse up and down.
| | 00:37 | Now, a lot of mice have a middle scroll
wheel and you can also use that to zoom.
| | 00:43 | So if I scroll my wheel in
and out, again, it will zoom.
| | 00:48 | If I hold down the Shift
key and middle-click, I pan.
| | 00:52 | So I can pan up and down, left and right
just by holding down Shift and middle-click.
| | 00:58 | So let's go over that one more time.
| | 00:59 | Middle-click by itself orbits, Ctrl+middle-click
zooms, but you can also zoom
| | 01:07 | using the scroll wheel, Shift+middle-click pans.
| | 01:12 | So using these three tools we can
pretty much set our view to however we want.
| | 01:18 | So for example, if I wanted to zoom
in on this Chair a little bit, I can
| | 01:22 | just position that and pan over and
position my mouse so that I have that
| | 01:28 | Chair in the Viewport.
| | 01:31 | Now, as we work through the scene, we
may actually zoom into something, but need
| | 01:35 | to see the entire scene.
| | 01:37 | Blender has a number of automatic zooming
options here, and those are called Align View.
| | 01:43 | So if we wanted to zoom out to see
everything, all we have to do is go Center
| | 01:48 | Cursor and View All, and the
hotkey for that is Shift+C.
| | 01:53 | So when you do that, it basically zooms
out so you see everything that's in the
| | 01:58 | scene, and this could be really handy
if you're working and tied in one area,
| | 02:01 | you want to zoom out so you can go
over to another place in the scene.
| | 02:05 | So again, if I zoom in, change my View,
all I have to do is hit Shift and the
| | 02:10 | letter C and it will always zoom
out to the extent of the scene.
| | 02:15 | Now, on the other side, if I want to
zoom into a specific place, one of the
| | 02:20 | easiest things to do is to zoom in to an object.
| | 02:23 | So if I were to go into my Outliner
here and left-click on the Couch to
| | 02:29 | highlight that, I could go
View>Align View>View Selected.
| | 02:34 | Now, the hotkey for this is Numpad.
| | 02:37 | or Numpad period.
| | 02:39 | When I do that, it zooms into the Couch.
| | 02:43 | So if I were to move my View a little
bit, select, for example, the Chair here
| | 02:47 | and then click back in the Viewport to
make it active and hit the period, it
| | 02:51 | will zoom into that Chair.
| | 02:54 | And again, Shift+C zooms out to everything.
| | 02:57 | Now, there will also be times when I
will need kind of a standard Viewport here,
| | 03:02 | so let's say I wanted to view
the scene from the left side.
| | 03:06 | Well, I can kind of approximate it, but
I don't know if I'm exactly going right
| | 03:12 | along the axis that creates a Left View.
| | 03:14 | Well, we can do that here, again, in
the View Menu just by selecting any one of
| | 03:19 | these standard Views, so if wanted
the Left View, I could do a Left View;
| | 03:23 | if I wanted the Back View, I could
do a Back View, Top View, and so on.
| | 03:29 | Now, notice how these Views here are
not what we'd call Orthographic, they're
| | 03:35 | not square to the camera.
| | 03:38 | These are what are called Perspective Views.
| | 03:40 | So you can see here what type of View
we have, we have a Left Perspective View.
| | 03:46 | Now, this is nice for if we want to
actually view the scene, but if we want
| | 03:49 | to do something more technical, such as modeling,
we may need a straight on Orthographic View.
| | 03:55 | Well, we can toggle that, again,
in the View Menu by using View
| | 04:00 | Prospective/Orthographic, and the
keystroke for that is Numpad5.
| | 04:06 | So when I hit Numpad5, it toggles
between Perspective and Orthographic.
| | 04:11 | So if you notice the Orthographic View is the
square on View, which allows us to do modeling.
| | 04:18 | Now, if you notice a little bit of a
pattern here, a lot of these View commands
| | 04:23 | are on the number pad of the keyboard.
| | 04:26 | In fact, there is a whole list of
standard views on that number pad.
| | 04:31 | In fact, we can see them here, if we
go into View>Navigation, you can see we
| | 04:37 | have a bunch of different functions
here that are all based on the numpads, so
| | 04:42 | let's go through some of those.
| | 04:44 | If we hit the Number 7 key, in other
words, the top left of that, we get a Top
| | 04:50 | View, so again, Number 7 key is the Top View.
| | 04:54 | The Number 1 key is a Front View, and
the Number 3 key is a Right View, and
| | 05:03 | remember that 5 toggles
between Perspective and Orthographic.
| | 05:08 | So again, 7 is Top, 1 is Front, 3 is
Right, and I can toggle Orthographic
| | 05:15 | just by hitting that 5.
| | 05:16 | So I'm going to put this into
Perspective View, and there's also two additional
| | 05:23 | sets of keys that allow us
to rotate or orbit the scene.
| | 05:27 | If I hit the 4 and the 6 key on the
number pad, I can orbit Left and Right.
| | 05:35 | So again, if I'm hitting the 4 key I'm orbiting
this way, if I hit the 6 key, I orbit this way.
| | 05:41 | If I hit the 8 and the 2 key, I can
orbit Up and Down, so the 8 key orbits Up,
| | 05:48 | the 2 key orbits Down.
| | 05:50 | Now, if you want to zoom, the Plus and
Minus keys on the keypad allow us to zoom.
| | 05:57 | So if your mouse runs out of battery,
you can still orbit Blender by using that
| | 06:03 | number pads, so that can be really
handy if you're kind of working and closing,
| | 06:07 | you just need to nudge the view a
little bit, sometimes that number pad is a
| | 06:11 | little bit more efficient than
trying to get that view with the mouse.
| | 06:16 | So those are some of the
basics of navigating in Blender.
| | 06:21 | Go ahead and practice
navigating through the scene.
| | 06:24 | We're going to really need to get our
navigation skills up to speed as we dive
| | 06:29 | deeper into Blender.
| | 06:30 | So once you get the hang
of it, it is pretty simple.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Configuring user preferences| 00:00 | As you start using Blender, you may want
to change your User Preferences to make
| | 00:06 | it interact differently.
| | 00:07 | So let's take a look at how to do that.
| | 00:10 | User Preferences can be
found in one of two places.
| | 00:14 | The first, you can
actually make it into an Editor.
| | 00:16 | So if I click down here, you can see I've
got a User Preferences option which I can use.
| | 00:22 | That's probably not the best way to go about it.
| | 00:25 | If I want I can also get to it
through the File Menu, so do File>User
| | 00:29 | Preferences, and this brings up a floating
menu, which is probably a little bit better.
| | 00:34 | Now, in this we have a number of
different tabs for different types of
| | 00:39 | preferences, different
categories of preferences.
| | 00:41 | The first one is Interface, and
along here we have basically how big the
| | 00:47 | manipulator is here, we can change the size of
our Manipulators, change the size of our axes.
| | 00:54 | Probably one of the ones you want to
take a look at here is whether you not you
| | 00:57 | want to display Tooltips.
| | 00:59 | So if I hover over an option here,
you'll see this little black box comes up and
| | 01:04 | it tells me two types of Tooltips.
| | 01:07 | One is the top one in bold is just a
regular Tooltip, and then at the bottom is
| | 01:12 | the Python Programming Hints.
| | 01:15 | So if you're going to be programming
back-end for Blender, then that can be helpful.
| | 01:20 | Well, one thing is, I like to turn off
the Python Tooltips, because it makes
| | 01:24 | that Tooltip a little bit smaller,
and if I want I can also turn On and Off
| | 01:29 | Object Info, frames per second, and so on.
| | 01:33 | So if we go over to Editing, these
are basically preferences that we want
| | 01:37 | if we're going to do editing, such as our
Keyframing defaults and that sort of stuff.
| | 01:42 | The next one is Input, and that's
actually probably the one we're going to
| | 01:45 | spend most of our time, so let's actually come
back to this and go through the rest of these.
| | 01:50 | We have Addons, this is basically
for plug-ins to Blender, where you can
| | 01:53 | actually configure your plug-ins.
| | 01:55 | Themes, this is our default Colors, and if
you want to change the Colors of anything here;
| | 02:01 | we can change Colors of our 3D View,
Graph Editors, basically anything here.
| | 02:06 | So this is kind of a nice way to
change the look and feel of Blender.
| | 02:10 | File, System, if you have default
locations for your files you can put them in here.
| | 02:16 | System Preferences, now, these
are stuff like OpenGL Preferences.
| | 02:19 | What's the default light
Color, where is it coming from?
| | 02:23 | Are we going to be using Sound and how
are we going to be using Sounds, so what
| | 02:27 | type of Sound Driver I'm going
to be using, that sort of thing?
| | 02:31 | Let's go back to the Input
Panel and go through that.
| | 02:35 | Under Presets we have a couple of different
Presets for the Mouse and for the hotkeys.
| | 02:42 | Let's go through the Mouse first.
| | 02:44 | Under Presets, we have
Presets for Blender or Maya.
| | 02:47 | So if you're familiar with the Maya
mouse and the way the Maya mouse works, you
| | 02:52 | might want to use that.
| | 02:53 | So let's go ahead and just go to our
standard Blender Presets and just go through them.
| | 02:57 | Do we want the mouse to Emulate 3 Button Mouse?
| | 02:59 | Well, hopefully you have a 3 Button Mouse,
but if not, you can do that emulation.
| | 03:04 | Do you want Continuous Grab, and
that's really just how you move objects?
| | 03:08 | Do you want to Select With the
Left or the Right mouse button?
| | 03:12 | By default, Blender selects with the
Right mouse button, and that's sometimes a
| | 03:18 | little counterintuitive, because most
other 3D packages select with the Left.
| | 03:22 | So if you want you can change that;
| | 03:24 | I'm going to leave it at the default.
| | 03:26 | What Orbit Style do you want, do
you want Trackball or Turntable?
| | 03:30 | Let me show you the difference of these.
| | 03:32 | I'm going to leave this on Trackball,
and if you want you can see how when I
| | 03:36 | middle-click and drag, it's kind of
a different feel to the Trackball.
| | 03:43 | So let's go back into our User
Preferences here and change it to Turntable.
| | 03:48 | Now, this is probably more similar to
Maya, where when you middle-click, it's
| | 03:54 | kind of more Left, Right, Up,
and Down than continuous.
| | 03:56 | It's a little harder to get
that angled view in a trackball.
| | 03:59 | It defaults more to a square Up and Down
View, which I tend to like, but however
| | 04:05 | you want to set it up is fine.
| | 04:07 | And then, how do we want a Dolly?
| | 04:09 | And there are some additional ones here.
| | 04:13 | Also here is where we can set up our hotkeys.
| | 04:17 | By default we're going to be using the
Blender hotkeys for this lesson, but if
| | 04:22 | you're familiar with Maya, or if you
plan to use Maya in the future, you might
| | 04:27 | want to start getting used
to the Maya hotkeys here.
| | 04:30 | And so you can just change your
hotkeys to Maya, and if you want you can also
| | 04:34 | change your Mouse Presets to Maya, and now
Blender will operate a lot more like Maya.
| | 04:41 | So instead of middle-click and drag,
you have to hold down the Alt key,
| | 04:46 | left-click orbits, middle-click pans,
right-click zooms, so that's the standard for Maya.
| | 04:57 | And if you're familiar with Maya
navigation and Maya keystrokes, this might be
| | 05:01 | an easy way to get more familiar with
Blender without having to learn a whole
| | 05:05 | new method of navigation.
| | 05:08 | But for this course we are going to
be using the standard Blender hotkeys
| | 05:11 | and mouse operations.
| | 05:14 | So if we want, once we get our default
set, we can just use them in Blender.
| | 05:21 | So whatever I've changed I can use it here.
| | 05:24 | But if I want to continue using these
preferences, I need to Save as Default,
| | 05:30 | and what that does is it saves
whatever I've set up as my default.
| | 05:34 | So the next time I load Blender, my hotkeys,
my mouse operations, will all be there for me.
| | 05:41 | So before you go making a lot of changes,
it's always a good idea to just make
| | 05:46 | the changes, use Blender for a little
bit, and if you like them, then go back
| | 05:50 | into the User Preferences
window to go ahead and save them out.
| | 05:54 | Now, if you change some Preferences and you
kind of mess things up, very easy to get back;
| | 05:59 | all we have to do is, again, go to Load
Factory Settings and it brings it right
| | 06:04 | back to the standard default
views and the standard hotkeys.
| | 06:08 | So go ahead and set up your User
Preferences to the way you want.
| | 06:12 | If you're a Maya person, go ahead and use
the Maya keys, I'm going to use Blender.
| | 06:17 | If you're just starting with Blender,
you might want to stick with the Blender
| | 06:20 | hotkeys, just so you can follow
along with me a little bit more easily.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating custom layouts| 00:00 | There will be times when the standard
default Blender interface won't be working for you.
| | 00:06 | So what we can do is we can actually
create our own presets and create our own
| | 00:11 | custom layouts within a scene so that
you can work as efficiently as possible.
| | 00:16 | So we have this scene which is using
the default layout and let's go ahead
| | 00:21 | and start modifying it.
| | 00:22 | But before we start modifying it too much,
I actually want to create a new preset.
| | 00:28 | So let me show you why I want to do this.
| | 00:30 | So, let's say for example we kind of
mess around with the scene a little bit and
| | 00:34 | I kind of make this
bigger and open up this panel.
| | 00:38 | Now what happens is no matter what
changes you make to this layout, it actually
| | 00:43 | saves it in whichever preset you have available.
| | 00:47 | So right now I'd made these changes to
Default, and if I go into for example
| | 00:53 | Animation, you can see it completely
changes, but when I come back to Default,
| | 00:58 | those changes are still there.
| | 00:59 | So whatever changes we make, actually still
wind up in whatever precept we have up there.
| | 01:05 | So I'm going to do ahead and put this
back and resize these windows down and put
| | 01:08 | it back to pretty much the Default interface.
| | 01:11 | And before we start really drastically
reconfiguring this interface, I'm going
| | 01:15 | to create a new preset and so that way
I can keep my default pretty pristine.
| | 01:22 | In that way can always come
back to that default setting.
| | 01:25 | So all I'm going to do is hit the
plus sign here and what that does is
| | 01:30 | it just takes whichever view you were in,
makes a copy of it and makes another preset.
| | 01:35 | So if I do the scroll down here, I
now have Default and Default.001.
| | 01:39 | Now any changes I make to Default.001
will stick there and then when I go back
| | 01:45 | to Default, it will go
back to that original one.
| | 01:48 | So let's go to Default.001
and start doing some changes.
| | 01:53 | The first thing I'm going to do is I'm
going to take this Object Tools panel and
| | 01:56 | scale it down, so I have a
full user perspective window.
| | 02:00 | Now, there are a lot of times you're
going to want to have more than one
| | 02:04 | view into the scene.
| | 02:05 | Now we can do this by doing the Quad
view, but there are also ways of creating
| | 02:10 | your own custom layouts, and
let's show you how to do that.
| | 02:13 | If you notice, each one of these
windows has a little kind of a crosshatch in
| | 02:19 | the top right corner.
| | 02:21 | So we have little kind of
diagonal crosshatch here and here.
| | 02:25 | We can use this to actually split our windows.
| | 02:29 | So if I left-click and drag, I can split window.
| | 02:32 | So in this case, I'm going to
split this window vertically.
| | 02:34 | So I'm going to left click here and drag
to the last and you see as I do that it
| | 02:41 | creates a second window.
| | 02:43 | Now, each one of windows is unique.
| | 02:46 | So, if I pan in this user perspective
window, this one doesn't get affected.
| | 02:52 | I can also change each
window to whatever view I want.
| | 02:55 | So for example, if I want to change
it to orthographic, I can do that.
| | 02:59 | If I want to I can also change it to a top view
just by hitting the number 7 on the number pad.
| | 03:06 | Now I also can split them horizontally.
| | 03:09 | So if I left-click and drag
down, I split the window again.
| | 03:15 | So now I have three views here.
| | 03:17 | So let's go ahead and change
this Top view here to a Right view.
| | 03:23 | You can also create floating windows.
| | 03:26 | So, if I position my cursor above this
icon here, hold down the Shift key and
| | 03:32 | drag, you'll see that it actually
creates a floating window that I can also use.
| | 03:38 | Now, this might not be as useful for
viewports, but it's very useful for things
| | 03:44 | like the Properties panel.
| | 03:46 | So if I take the Properties panel, Shift
and drag you can see I've detached this
| | 03:52 | Properties panel here.
| | 03:54 | Now, this is great if you're using
multiple monitor setups and you want to have
| | 03:58 | floating palettes on one
monitor and your viewport on another.
| | 04:02 | So basically, you can just Shift+Drag
and take your Outliner and your Properties
| | 04:07 | panel and just put them into another monitor.
| | 04:10 | So this can be very handy for that.
| | 04:12 | I'm going to go ahead and close this.
| | 04:15 | Now, once we have our layout the
way that we want, we can rename it.
| | 04:20 | Right now, we've been working with
this as Default.001, but if we want we can
| | 04:26 | give it a more descriptive name.
| | 04:27 | So, all I have to do is left-click
in there and type in the name.
| | 04:30 | So I'm going to call this TriView
because it's three windows here.
| | 04:35 | And now I've changed the name of that
preset, so if I click here you can see now
| | 04:39 | I have TriView and I can go back to my
Default and I can go back to TriView.
| | 04:46 | Now, we can also collapse windows.
| | 04:49 | I know we've actually added a bunch of
new panels here, but we can actually get
| | 04:53 | rid of those basically using the
same method we used to create them.
| | 04:58 | So, all I have to do is again,
left-click on this icon here and if I drag up
| | 05:03 | instead of down, it basically creates
this arrow that you can see, and when I
| | 05:09 | let go, it collapses one window into another.
| | 05:13 | So, if I want to collapse this view
here, I have to start here and left-click
| | 05:18 | and drag to the right instead of the
left and you can see how it basically
| | 05:22 | expands that window.
| | 05:24 | Any change that I've made to this
will show up in this TriView preset.
| | 05:29 | So if I go to my default here, I still
have that, but if I go to my TriView,
| | 05:34 | then that basically stays.
| | 05:37 | So again, try to name them descriptively,
and then if you're going to do a drastic
| | 05:41 | change, create a new preset.
| | 05:44 | All of these presets
actually save with the scene.
| | 05:49 | If you want you can save preferences and
it will save all of your defaults as well.
| | 05:56 | So this will give you a lot more
flexibility in how you arrange and organize
| | 06:01 | your workflow in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
2. Selecting and Translating ObjectsSelecting objects| 00:00 | So let's take a look at
selecting objects in Blender.
| | 00:04 | We already learned a little bit about
selecting objects by clicking on them in the outliner.
| | 00:08 | So if I have to click on an object
here you can see how I can select them.
| | 00:12 | But we can also select objects in the
viewport and we do that by right-clicking.
| | 00:18 | So if I were to position my mouse
over this cube and right-click on it, you
| | 00:23 | would see that it highlights
and that tells me it's selected.
| | 00:28 | If I look in the outliner, you will
also see a little circle here that tells me
| | 00:32 | it's selected as well.
| | 00:33 | If I were to right-click over another
object, say the Cylinder, it would highlight.
| | 00:38 | And I can do this for any object.
| | 00:41 | So if I wanted to select one object
at a time, right-click is all I need.
| | 00:44 | Now if I want to select multiple
objects, then I have to hold down the Shift
| | 00:49 | key and right-click.
| | 00:51 | So if I have this Cube selected and I
hold down the Shift key and select the
| | 00:56 | Cylinder, you will notice
how the Cylinder highlights.
| | 01:00 | So now I have two objects selected.
| | 01:02 | But also notice how the
highlight around the Cube turned dark.
| | 01:06 | And this is just a little bit of
information that tells me that the Cylinder is
| | 01:10 | the last object that I have selected.
| | 01:13 | So if I were to hold down the Shift key
and select the Cone, and the Torus, you
| | 01:20 | can see how that highlight follows you around.
| | 01:23 | So this way you know the last
object that you've selected.
| | 01:26 | And this can be important for certain
operations such as booleans that require
| | 01:30 | you to select objects in a certain order.
| | 01:33 | Now if I want to deselect objects, I
can again hold down the Shift key and just
| | 01:38 | click on the object.
| | 01:39 | Now if the object is highlighted with a
dark color, you have to click twice so
| | 01:44 | if I hold down the Shift key and
click here, notice how the first click
| | 01:48 | transit light, then the second click completely
deselects and we can do that for all of these.
| | 01:56 | Another way to select objects is to
simply select everything in the scene.
| | 02:00 | And we can do this using the letter A
. So if I hit the A key, it selects
| | 02:06 | everything in the scene,
including cameras and lights.
| | 02:10 | But what's really cool is if I hit the A
key again it deselects everything in the key.
| | 02:15 | So this is a really nice toggle to
select everything or to deselect everything.
| | 02:20 | And this even works if I
have just a few items selected.
| | 02:24 | So I were just to select three items
I can deselect them just by hitting A.
| | 02:29 | Now there are a couple of other
ways to select objects within Blender.
| | 02:33 | And a lot of these are in the Select menu.
| | 02:37 | And the two most important
are Border and Circle Select.
| | 02:41 | Now what's really cool is that these
are labeled A for select all, B for Border
| | 02:45 | Select and C for Circle Select.
| | 02:48 | So you can just remember it by A, B, C. So
we've already covered A which is Select All.
| | 02:54 | Let's go ahead and look at
B which is Border Select.
| | 02:57 | If I hit the B key, notice
how these crosshairs come up.
| | 03:01 | All I have to do is left-click and drag,
and you can see I can draw a selection box.
| | 03:07 | If I let go, anything
within that box is selected.
| | 03:12 | Now if I were to do this again, hit the
B key and select for example the Cone,
| | 03:19 | it would just add to the existing selection.
| | 03:21 | So I don't deselect the old objects
I just add to my existing selection.
| | 03:27 | I have to hit the A key to deselect.
| | 03:30 | Now also with Border Select is that
anything within that border gets selected.
| | 03:36 | So if I were to Border Select this
sphere and just the top corner of this
| | 03:42 | Cube, the Cube would still be
selected, even though it wasn't completely
| | 03:46 | within that border.
| | 03:49 | Now another tool that we can
use is the Circle Select Tool.
| | 03:52 | And that is the hotkey of C. Remember A,
B, C. So if I hit C, notice how this
| | 03:59 | little circle comes up and I can just
start clicking on individual objects and
| | 04:04 | just selecting multiple objects.
| | 04:07 | To cancel this mode, either hit the
Escape key or just right-click out of it.
| | 04:13 | Now one of the nice things about
this Circle Select Tool is that you can
| | 04:16 | increase or decrease the size of the circle.
| | 04:19 | So I am going to hit the C key again and
if you have a mouse with a middle mouse
| | 04:24 | button, you can just roll
that mouse button to size it.
| | 04:28 | If you don't have a middle mouse
button the Plus and Minus keys on your
| | 04:33 | keypad will also size it.
| | 04:35 | So if I were to size this fairly big,
then get a couple of objects within it,
| | 04:39 | I can select multiple objects just by
making sure that they fall within that circle.
| | 04:47 | And again, right-clicking
gets you out of this mode.
| | 04:50 | Now in addition to these tools, there
is a couple of rather really handy tools.
| | 04:54 | Couple of them here are Random which
just selects a random number of objects, so
| | 05:00 | if I were to hit Random again it will
just select a random number of things in
| | 05:05 | the scene which can be handy.
| | 05:07 | But another one is Inverse.
| | 05:09 | So if I hit Ctrl+I or hit the Inverse
menu option, it'll select everything
| | 05:15 | that wasn't selected.
| | 05:16 | Now one more that I want to
show you is called Select Pattern.
| | 05:21 | But before I do that, remember
every object in Blender has a name.
| | 05:26 | And in this case we have names such as
Cone, Cube and Cylinder, very simple names.
| | 05:30 | But we can use those as
criteria for a selection.
| | 05:35 | So if were to go Select Pattern and type-in
for the Pattern cube, we'd select the cube.
| | 05:44 | If I were to Select Pattern and just
type C with the asterisk, it would
| | 05:50 | select anything starting with the
letter C. And in this case that would be the
| | 05:55 | camera, the cone, the cube and the cylinder.
| | 06:00 | So those are some of the basic tools
for selecting objects within Blender.
| | 06:04 | So go ahead and practice with selection.
| | 06:07 | It's really fairly straightforward
and you should get the hang of it
| | 06:10 | fairly quickly.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Moving objects| 00:00 | There are many times when you'll need
to move your objects around in 3D space.
| | 00:05 | And we do that by using the Transform Tools.
| | 00:09 | Before we actually start transforming
objects around, we need to know where
| | 00:13 | we're going to be transforming them.
| | 00:14 | We need to do a little bit
about how 3D space works in Blender.
| | 00:19 | So if I start orbiting my scene, you
will notice I have a little icon in the
| | 00:23 | bottom corner of this screen and I also
have some green and red axes, and these
| | 00:29 | just tell me where my X, Y and Z axes are.
| | 00:34 | Now my Z axis is my vertical axis
which isn't showing up on my grid, but just
| | 00:39 | know that Z is up and down and X and Y
move you left, right and forward back.
| | 00:46 | So if I want to move an object,
probably the easiest way to do that is to hit
| | 00:51 | the Translate key here
in the Object Tools Panel.
| | 00:56 | I can also get to that by using the G hotkey.
| | 00:59 | Now G stands for Grab.
| | 01:01 | So if I were to right-click on an
object say the table and hit G, notice how it
| | 01:07 | turns white and now I can translate that object.
| | 01:12 | Now I really don't know
exactly where I'm translating.
| | 01:16 | You see in the bottom of the screen,
it kind of has these numbers here of Dx,
| | 01:20 | Dy, and Dz, which kind of
tell me where it's moving.
| | 01:24 | But because I've got a 2D screen and a
3D space, I can't tell exactly whether I
| | 01:30 | am removing it left or right or
up and down or back and forth.
| | 01:33 | Probably the easier way to do this is
to constrain the motion of the objects.
| | 01:39 | So if I were to hit the Translate key
again, and this time hit the X key, you
| | 01:44 | notice how I can actually
move it along the X axis.
| | 01:49 | If I were to hit the Y key, notice how I
can move it along Y and the same for Z,
| | 01:55 | you can move it along the Z axis.
| | 01:57 | Now this is great because it allows you
to constrain the way that the object moves.
| | 02:04 | Now another way to get more constraint
over the way an object moves is to use an
| | 02:10 | orthographic viewport.
| | 02:12 | So if I were to hit the number 7 key
on my numpad, go to my top viewport and
| | 02:17 | then hit 5 to go to orthographic, then
when I grab this object and move it, I
| | 02:24 | am basically only moving it in the X, Y
plane, because I'm looking straight down at it.
| | 02:29 | I'm just rearranging it along the floor.
| | 02:33 | So I am going to go ahead and bring
this back into Perspective Mode, by just
| | 02:37 | orbiting my camera and hitting the number 5.
| | 02:39 | Now another way to move the object is
to actually move it by discrete numbers.
| | 02:46 | We can do this in a number of places.
| | 02:50 | If I go over to my Properties Panel
here and I hit Object, you will see that I
| | 02:54 | have numbers here for translation.
| | 02:58 | So I can move my X position here, my
Y position here or my Z position here.
| | 03:06 | So for example, if I wanted it exactly at 0
and Z, I could just type 0 and it would go to 0.
| | 03:12 | Now I can also get to these tools by
bringing out the Properties Panel here.
| | 03:19 | So if I want to I have my object that's
selected, again I can go X, Y, and Z. So
| | 03:29 | those are two additional
ways to transform objects.
| | 03:33 | And that way you can also
type-in very precise numbers.
| | 03:38 | I am going to go ahead
and get rid of those here.
| | 03:40 | One additional way to translate
objects is to use the transform gizmo.
| | 03:46 | And you can do this by going down to the
bottom of your 3D viewport and clicking here.
| | 03:52 | But what you would be able see here
is this Arrow, the Curve, and this
| | 03:58 | little Scale Tool here.
| | 03:59 | But I want to make sure it's on the Arrow.
| | 04:00 | And when it's on the Arrow, this little
gizmo comes up and it allows me to just
| | 04:05 | grab either the X, the Y,
or the Z axis and move it.
| | 04:10 | So if I hit the red cliff I'm moving in X;
| | 04:14 | green, I am moving in Y;
| | 04:16 | and blue I am moving in Z. Now I
also can move multiple objects.
| | 04:22 | All I have to do is just Shift+Select
them and I can move many objects at once.
| | 04:29 | So those are some of the basics of how
to translate objects, within Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Rotating objects| 00:00 | Rotating objects is another
important thing to learn in Blender.
| | 00:04 | So let's take a look at how to do that.
| | 00:06 | Now we can rotate just similar to
transform by hitting the Rotate Tool and the
| | 00:12 | shortcut for that is R. So if I
right-click over this chair to select it, hit
| | 00:17 | the R key, you can see how I can
rotate it around this viewport.
| | 00:24 | This might not be how you really want
to rotate it, but again, just like with
| | 00:30 | the Move Tool we can
constrain it to specific axes.
| | 00:35 | So if I hit the X key, I can rotate
around the X axis, if I hit Y, I can rotate
| | 00:41 | around Y. Now remember we are rotating
around that axis, so think of the Y axis
| | 00:48 | is more or like the X wheel.
| | 00:50 | If I were to go for the Z axis, we
would rotate around that vertical axis.
| | 00:55 | Then I am going to right-click
off of this to cancel.
| | 00:59 | So if I hit the R key and hit it as second
time, you get a different type of rotation.
| | 01:06 | You can actually rotate this
object almost like it's on a trackball.
| | 01:10 | So if you move it up and down, you're
kind of moving along the Y direction, if
| | 01:15 | you move it left and right, you're
moving it along the Z direction and so on.
| | 01:22 | So you can kind of play with that as well.
| | 01:24 | And again, right-clicking cancels the operation.
| | 01:27 | Now just like with transform, if I want to
type-in specific numbers, I can also do that.
| | 01:34 | I can go over to the Properties Panel
for the chair here or I can expand the
| | 01:42 | Properties Panel here and I
have my Rotation options here.
| | 01:46 | So If I wanted to rotate it around Z
say 90 degrees, I can just type that in or
| | 01:53 | if I can left-click and drag on
these sliders, I can again spin the chair
| | 01:58 | however I want, and I am going
to hit Ctrl+Z here to undo that.
| | 02:02 | And I am going to go ahead and close
this, and now again, just like with the
| | 02:07 | Move Tool, we also have a gizmo that
we can interact with to rotate objects.
| | 02:14 | So if I go down here to my viewport
and click on this Rotate Manipulator,
| | 02:20 | you'll see this Manipulator comes up
and it has three colors, red, green, and
| | 02:25 | blue for the three axes.
| | 02:28 | So I have just by clicking on that I can -- you
can see how it changes to my X, Y, and Z axes.
| | 02:38 | So those are some of the
basics of how to rotate objects.
| | 02:42 | So go ahead and practice with that and
get used to the different rotation modes
| | 02:46 | that Blender offers.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Scaling objects| 00:00 | If you want to make objects bigger or
smaller, you can do that using the Scale Tool.
| | 00:06 | This is very similar to translate and rotate.
| | 00:09 | We have a Scale button here in the
Object Tools Panel and the shortcut for that
| | 00:15 | is S. So if I right-click on my chair,
hit the letter S for Scale, I can scale
| | 00:22 | the chair up and down.
| | 00:25 | By default it scales uniformly, so
it scales in all three axes evenly.
| | 00:31 | If I hit the X key, I can scale in X,
if I hit the Y key, I can scale in Y, and
| | 00:39 | if I hit Z I can scale
up and down in the Z axis.
| | 00:44 | And again right-clicking
cancels the scale operation.
| | 00:49 | If I have numeric values that I want to
scale by, I can just type those in, in
| | 00:55 | the Properties Panel either here or if I
expand that in the viewport I can type it here.
| | 01:01 | So for example, if I wanted the chair to
be really deep, I can type 2 into Scale
| | 01:06 | and then it will double the depth of the
chair, you want to make it wider, I can
| | 01:11 | make it wider in Y by typing
2 into that number as well.
| | 01:15 | Or I can just spin these just like I
can with all the other options to make
| | 01:21 | those, whatever I want.
| | 01:22 | I am going to go ahead and type 1
in to both of these just to reset it.
| | 01:27 | And then I am going to go ahead
and hide this Properties Panel.
| | 01:30 | If I want to, I can also use a
Manipulator to scale and this is just like the
| | 01:36 | Translate and the Rotate Manipulator.
| | 01:38 | It's at the bottom of every 3D view.
| | 01:40 | All I have to do is click on this and a
three pronged icon comes up, a Manipulator.
| | 01:47 | If I grab the red one, I scale in X, if
I grab the green one I scale in Y, and
| | 01:55 | if I grab the blue one, I scale in Z.
If I want to flip an object, if I want to
| | 02:01 | mirror it, I can just scale
it in the opposite direction.
| | 02:05 | So I can just go past the
origin and scale it negative.
| | 02:10 | So those are some the basics of
how to scale objects in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Understanding transform orientation| 00:00 | When you start moving objects around in
Blender, there are times when you need
| | 00:04 | to move them at angles.
| | 00:06 | So in other words, we need to
them at different orientations.
| | 00:10 | So we have a feature in Blender called
Transform Orientation that can help us with this.
| | 00:16 | So I have a simple table and chair here.
| | 00:19 | So if you want to take a look at this
kind of from the top, I've got these two
| | 00:23 | chairs and I want to go ahead and put
this one chair underneath the table.
| | 00:28 | So I am going to right-click on it and
rotate it so that it's kind of in the
| | 00:32 | same direction as the table, so it's
fairly square to the table, and then I am
| | 00:37 | going to select my Translate Manipulator.
| | 00:40 | And if you'll notice here, I've got
this manipulator actually is along the
| | 00:45 | global X and Y axis.
| | 00:46 | So in other words, I can't
slide it directly in to the table.
| | 00:52 | I can move it this way or this way, and
so if I wanted to, I can kind of edge my
| | 00:56 | way into it, but I can't
do it in one smooth motion.
| | 01:01 | I can change that by using
the transform orientation.
| | 01:04 | And that's this little box here
next to our Move and Rotate and
| | 01:09 | Scale manipulators.
| | 01:11 | So right now it's set to Global and
that's the default, and so this Manipulator
| | 01:17 | will match the X, Y, and Z axis
of the scene, the Global axis.
| | 01:24 | But if I want, I can change this to
match the axis of each individual object.
| | 01:29 | But if I want to, I can change this.
| | 01:31 | Each individual object has its own
set of coordinates and we can use those.
| | 01:36 | So I go from Global to
Local, notice how that flips.
| | 01:43 | And now I can just slide that chair
straight in, well, it's a little bit off
| | 01:46 | there, but yeah, I can pretty much
slide that chair straight in, rather than
| | 01:51 | having to do it this way, where I have
to kind of work it in one axis at a time.
| | 01:57 | So typically, when you build an object, you
should build it square to the X, Y, and Z axis.
| | 02:04 | And when you do that, by nature, your
local axis will keep with the object.
| | 02:12 | We have a number of additional axis here.
| | 02:14 | The ones you're going to
use most are Global and Local.
| | 02:17 | We have another one called Gimbal,
and that's for, when you're working with
| | 02:21 | bones and that sort of thing.
| | 02:23 | We have Normal and this actually aligns
it to the normal direction of the surface.
| | 02:28 | So this is something you would use
when you're actually doing Mesh Modeling.
| | 02:33 | And then also the other one is aligned to
view, and this can also be very important.
| | 02:38 | So what it does is gives you an
X and Y that are actually always
| | 02:41 | perpendicular to the cameras.
| | 02:43 | So no matter how I move the camera, I
can always move it square to that camera.
| | 02:50 | So if I move it this way, then I can still
continue to move it square to the camera.
| | 02:55 | Now this can be very important if
you're doing things where you need to move
| | 02:58 | things directly horizontally to where
ever the camera is and this will go ahead
| | 03:04 | and calculate that properly.
| | 03:06 | Also don't forget that these
methods also work for the other tools.
| | 03:12 | So for example, if I wanted to scale
this chair, I would go into a Local mode
| | 03:17 | in order to scale it.
| | 03:18 | So if I wanted to scale it left and
right or back and forth, going on the
| | 03:24 | Local axis gives me that.
| | 03:27 | If I did the Global axis, then my
scaling wouldn't be aligned with my object.
| | 03:32 | And the same goes for rotation.
| | 03:34 | I can rotate around the Global axis
or around the Local axis and I can also
| | 03:40 | rotate around the view.
| | 03:44 | So by using Transform Orientation, we
can Rotate, Move and Scale objects using
| | 03:50 | different sets of axis.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Changing an object's origin| 00:00 | Whenever we move, rotate or scale
objects in Blender, Blender needs to keep
| | 00:06 | track of where all of these objects are.
| | 00:09 | So every object in Blender is
assigned some numbers that tell Blender where
| | 00:13 | that object is in space.
| | 00:16 | Now we can take a look at
these on the Properties Panel.
| | 00:18 | I am just going to open that up.
| | 00:19 | This particular wheel, if I right-click
on it, you can see that its Location is
| | 00:24 | at 0 0 0, in fact, Rotation is at 0
and Scale is at 0, so this is perfectly
| | 00:30 | positioned at the origin of the scene.
| | 00:34 | But if you notice it, well, it's not
perfectly positioned because actually the
| | 00:39 | wheel itself is much bigger
than just the origin of the scene.
| | 00:44 | It actually comprises of
volume that contains many points.
| | 00:48 | But Blender has to have one point
to say this is where that object is.
| | 00:53 | And that point is called the origin of
the object or other people call it that
| | 00:57 | pivot point of the object.
| | 00:59 | So I am going to go ahead and scale this
down here so we can take a look at this.
| | 01:03 | When you select an object, you will
notice that the pivot point is highlighted
| | 01:08 | by a little orange dot.
| | 01:10 | So you can see this orange dot here,
and when I right-click on this tire, you
| | 01:14 | can see that my manipulator
surrounds that orange dot.
| | 01:19 | So if I were to rotate this object, it
rotates around the origin of the scene.
| | 01:27 | This is fine if the tire is rocking
back and forth on the ground or something
| | 01:31 | like that, but if we were to attach
this tire to a vehicle and we wanted it
| | 01:37 | to roll down the street, we might want to
have this tire rotate around its center point.
| | 01:43 | And what that means is that we have to
move this point to the center of our object.
| | 01:50 | A Blender is very handy in that it
does have a number of tools that we can
| | 01:55 | use to move this origin or this pivot point to
anywhere we want in the scene or in the object.
| | 02:03 | So you can find these tools under Object>
Transform and we have three of them here.
| | 02:09 | We have Geometry to Origin, Origin
to Geometry and Origin to 3D Cursor.
| | 02:15 | Now the middle one Origin to
Geometry just centers the pivot.
| | 02:19 | So when I select that, it
centers it to that object.
| | 02:23 | It calculates how big the object is.
| | 02:25 | It finds the exact center of it and
then it puts the pivot point there.
| | 02:31 | And when I do that on this tire, now I
have it centered so I can rotate my tire.
| | 02:37 | Now there are times when you might
need the pivot point in a different place.
| | 02:41 | And we can change that place by
using something called the 3D Cursor.
| | 02:47 | And this is the 3D Cursor here.
| | 02:49 | Now if I left-click anywhere in the
window, notice how this little circle with
| | 02:54 | some crosshairs follows me around.
| | 02:57 | And this is what's called the 3D Cursor.
| | 02:59 | And in Blender, this 3D Cursor can be
used as a placeholder for things to happen.
| | 03:05 | So if you create a new object, it
will create it at the 3D Cursor.
| | 03:10 | We can also snap our pivot point to that cursor.
| | 03:14 | But the problem with this 3D Cursor is
that, well, we are moving a 3D object
| | 03:20 | into the space, so we don't have a
very precise idea as to where this is.
| | 03:24 | Is this behind or in front of the Y
axis, we really can't tell for sure.
| | 03:29 | So in this case in order to position
it, we have to use orthographic views.
| | 03:34 | So I am going to go ahead and Toggle
Quad View, in fact I am going to zoom out
| | 03:38 | here and I'm going to just go
ahead and center my tire here.
| | 03:47 | So if I want to move my 3D Cursor
to a specific place, I can use these
| | 03:52 | orthographic views to get
it exactly where I want.
| | 03:55 | So let's say I wanted to be up here
where the tire for example might be hanging
| | 04:00 | on a wall or something like that, all
I have to do is just click here in my
| | 04:06 | right view and click here in
my front few, to get it aligned.
| | 04:10 | And then when I Toggle my Quads View
back off, I can see that, that 3D Cursor is
| | 04:16 | kind of right there at the back of the tire.
| | 04:18 | So now that I have that, I can just do
Object>Transform>Origin to 3D Cursor.
| | 04:25 | When I do that, it snaps
the origin to that cursor.
| | 04:29 | And now, it's like the tire is
hanging on a peg on the wall.
| | 04:35 | So this can be very handy
when you're doing animation.
| | 04:39 | Anytime you need to rotate an object,
the position of that origin or pivot point
| | 04:44 | is very, very critical.
| | 04:47 | Now we also have one more tool in our
toolkit and it's basically the opposite of
| | 04:52 | the first one that we did.
| | 04:54 | We did Origin to Geometry, which
means we snapped this pivot point to the
| | 04:59 | tire, but we also have Geometry to Origin,
which means we can snap the tire to the pivot point.
| | 05:05 | And again, that will center it,
so that way the tire will rotate.
| | 05:10 | So we have three options to change
where our pivot points or our origins are.
| | 05:16 | We can snap Geometry to the Origin, the
Origin to the Geometry or we can set a
| | 05:22 | 3D Cursor at a very specific
location and place the origin there.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Selecting pivot points| 00:00 | When you start manipulating, rotating,
scaling multiple objects, you add some
| | 00:05 | additional variables to your equation.
| | 00:09 | In other words, do you want to rotate
all of your objects as a group, do you
| | 00:12 | want to rotate them individually, and
when you do rotate multiple objects,
| | 00:17 | around which axis do we rotate them?
| | 00:20 | Within individual objects, it just
rotates around that centre origin point, but
| | 00:26 | in terms of multiple objects, we have
multiple origins, so we need to determine
| | 00:31 | how do we manipulate all of these objects.
| | 00:34 | So let's take a look at this a
little living room scene here.
| | 00:37 | I'm going to right-click and Shift+Select
everything in the scene.
| | 00:42 | If I select my Rotate Manipulator, you
can see that at this point it's centered
| | 00:47 | on the couch, which was the
last object that I have selected.
| | 00:51 | So when I rotate the scene,
I'm rotating around the couch.
| | 00:54 | I'm going to go ahead and undo that by
doing Ctrl+Z and let's go through and see
| | 01:00 | what the options we have for
rotating all these objects.
| | 01:04 | We find the options here under this
little icon and its labeled Pivot Point and
| | 01:09 | this is where we
determine how these objects pivot.
| | 01:13 | So let's go from the bottom up.
| | 01:14 | Now, the bottom one is called
Bounding Box Center and what this does is it
| | 01:19 | draws a box around all of your objects, finds
a center of the box and that's where we rotate.
| | 01:24 | So this will basically just rotate
around the average middle of our objects.
| | 01:29 | We will go ahead and undo that and let's
go to the next one, which is 3D Cursor.
| | 01:35 | This again uses that 3D Cursor we saw
in the last lesson and this 3D Cursor can
| | 01:41 | be used as a pivot point to rotate objects.
| | 01:44 | Now, it might not be the perfect pivot
point for this scene, but you can imagine
| | 01:49 | there will be a number of situations
where the 3D Cursor can come in very handy.
| | 01:53 | Let's say you have a bunch of objects
and you want to rotate them around a
| | 01:56 | circle or something like that, where
you can place the 3D Cursor in the center
| | 02:01 | of that circle and then when you
rotate all those objects, they'll rotate
| | 02:05 | around that center point.
| | 02:08 | The next option that we
have is Individual Origins.
| | 02:11 | So what this does is it basically just
rotates each object around its individual
| | 02:17 | center point or origin point.
| | 02:21 | The next one is Median Point and this
pretty much works the same as Bounding Box.
| | 02:27 | It's just the average position of
everything, but it takes into consideration
| | 02:32 | the relative volumes of objects.
| | 02:33 | So it's not just a bounding box, it's
a little more sophisticated than that.
| | 02:38 | And then the last one is Active Element,
which again, was where we started and
| | 02:42 | that's basically rotate around the
last object that you've selected.
| | 02:46 | So if I were to deselect everything,
select the couch, both chairs and select
| | 02:51 | the table last, then we
would rotate around the table.
| | 02:55 | So again, order of selection can be
important depending upon what you do in Blender.
| | 03:00 | So anyways, those are some of the ways
to rotate and manipulate multiple objects.
| | 03:06 | This also works for scale as well.
| | 03:09 | So if you're scaling objects, do you
want to scale them around their individual
| | 03:12 | origins or do you want to
scale everything globally.
| | 03:16 | So this works for a number of
different things in addition to rotation.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using Snap to move objects precisely| 00:00 | When you want to move objects precisely
in Blender, you'll need to use some of
| | 00:05 | the snap options that are available.
| | 00:08 | Now, probably the easiest way to snap
objects is just to snap to the grid, and
| | 00:14 | we can do that by using the
Snap option in the viewport.
| | 00:18 | So we have this little magnet icon here
and when this is active the objects will
| | 00:24 | snap when you move them.
| | 00:26 | So if I right-click on this cube and I
select my Move Manipulator, then you can
| | 00:32 | see as I move this object, it
snaps to the size of that grid.
| | 00:38 | Now, what it's snapping is this
origin or center point of the object.
| | 00:44 | If I select multiple objects, it
will also snap those to the grid.
| | 00:50 | So again, if I select everything
it will snap as I move everything.
| | 00:55 | I'm going to go ahead and right-click
on the Torus and we have some additional
| | 01:00 | options here for snapping.
| | 01:02 | I'm going to go ahead and right-click
on this cube and now the grid that we're
| | 01:08 | using is just our standard grid.
| | 01:11 | If we want we can change that grid as well.
| | 01:13 | The easiest way to do that is to go
into the Properties panel by expanding it,
| | 01:18 | and if we go down here under Display,
we can actually change the display for
| | 01:23 | this viewport and we can change the
scale of that Grid and that will change
| | 01:28 | the snapping options.
| | 01:30 | Now, another thing we can do is we can
actually snap one object to the other.
| | 01:36 | So I'm going to go ahead and right-
click on the Torus and under here we have
| | 01:41 | Increment, which is basically snapped
to grid, but we also can snap to parts of
| | 01:45 | other objects, such as
the Vertex, Face and Edges.
| | 01:49 | Now, these are mostly designed for mesh
modeling, but they will work with object surface.
| | 01:54 | Select Vertex here, and when I move,
you can see how it's snapping to the
| | 01:58 | vertices of that cube.
| | 02:01 | In addition to these interactive snap
options, we also have a few menu options
| | 02:06 | that allow us to snap.
| | 02:07 | I'm going to go ahead and turn off
Snap in the viewport here, and then under
| | 02:11 | Object we have a Snap menu.
| | 02:15 | So we can Snap to Grid, and again,
that's just the same, that will just snap to
| | 02:21 | the closest grid object.
| | 02:22 | So if we go Snap>Selection to Grid, it
will just snap it to the closest grid point.
| | 02:28 | So if I move this off again, let me
try this one more time, Snap to Grid.
| | 02:33 | You can see how that moves.
| | 02:34 | Another thing we can do
is we can Snap to Cursor.
| | 02:38 | So, in other words, it's going to snap
to our 3D Cursor, this is another place
| | 02:43 | where we can use that cursor.
| | 02:45 | So when I snap to there, it snaps all
the way over here to this 3D Cursor.
| | 02:50 | Now, if I want to move that cursor and do
that again, Selection to Cursor, it moves there.
| | 02:55 | Now, you can also use
snap to move the 3D Cursor.
| | 03:00 | So, if I go into here, Object>Snap, you see I
have a number of options to move my 3D Cursor.
| | 03:06 | So, if I want I can snap my
cursor to whatever I have selected.
| | 03:12 | I can snap my cursor to the center of
the scene, in other words, just bring
| | 03:17 | it back to the origin.
| | 03:19 | I can Snap>Cursor to Grid.
| | 03:21 | So if my cursor is somewhere here in
the middle, I can snap it to the closest
| | 03:26 | grid point, and cursor to whatever is active.
| | 03:32 | And again, if you have one
object selected, that would be active.
| | 03:36 | So snapping the 3D Cursor can allow you
to not only use it as a snap point for
| | 03:42 | moving objects, but to
position pivots or create new objects.
| | 03:47 | So, we have a number of options with snap,
and as you start modeling and working
| | 03:52 | with Blender, you'll start to get used to these.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
3. Modeling Creating mesh primitives| 00:00 | Now let's go ahead and get
started with modeling in Blender.
| | 00:03 | We're first going to take a look at
some of the basic primitives that we have
| | 00:06 | that we can use as
springboards to create our own models.
| | 00:11 | Now, we've already dealt with the first
of these primitives and that's the cube
| | 00:14 | and that's actually part
of our Default interface.
| | 00:17 | When you start Blender by
default, you get this little cube.
| | 00:22 | Now let's go ahead and just
show you how to add in primitives.
| | 00:25 | So, I'm going to go ahead and
right-click on this and hit the Delete key
| | 00:28 | and then I'm just going to say OK to Delete,
and I'm going to have a clean stage here.
| | 00:34 | Now, if we want to add in a primitive,
we can do it by using the Add menu here
| | 00:39 | in the info editor and we have a
number of Mesh objects that we can add in.
| | 00:45 | We can get this exact same menu by
hitting Shift+A on the screen, and again,
| | 00:52 | this gives us all of these
things that we can add in.
| | 00:55 | In this case, I'm just going
to add in a Cube one more time.
| | 00:59 | Now, when we do that, you'll see how this
little box here comes up and it says Add Cube.
| | 01:06 | In fact, if I scroll this up you can see
that I have a couple of different options.
| | 01:10 | One is, where do I want it on
the screen, and also what Rotation?
| | 01:16 | I also have a switch here to align it to view.
| | 01:19 | In other words, it will align
one face of that cube to your view.
| | 01:23 | Now, once I have brought that into the
scene, I can just click off of it, and
| | 01:28 | then when I click back on, notice how
that little creation menu goes away.
| | 01:32 | So that really only happens
when I first create that object.
| | 01:36 | So again, I'm going to right-click
on this and hit Delete.
| | 01:40 | Now, another thing you need to be aware
of is that when you create any sort of
| | 01:44 | primitive, it comes in at the 3D Cursor,
which in our case was right here at the
| | 01:50 | center, but if I move it someplace else
and then add in that cube again, you'll
| | 01:57 | see how it comes in at that 3D Cursor.
| | 02:01 | So this can be both a benefit and a curse.
| | 02:03 | On the plus side, you can place objects
wherever you want, just as long as you
| | 02:07 | remember to place the 3D
Cursor in that location.
| | 02:11 | On the other side, a lot of times we
forget about the 3D Cursor and we'll bring
| | 02:15 | in an object and we won't know where it is.
| | 02:18 | So you have to kind of look for that
3D Cursor to find the new object that
| | 02:22 | you've put into the scene.
| | 02:23 | So I'm going to go ahead and delete
this one again, and let's go ahead and
| | 02:28 | center that 3D Cursor.
| | 02:30 | We can do that by hitting Shift+C on the
keyboard and that centers the 3D Cursor
| | 02:35 | and frames everything.
| | 02:37 | Now, I'm going to go ahead and
zoom-in just a little bit here.
| | 02:40 | So we can see where we're working,
and I'm going to go ahead and add in
| | 02:44 | another type of Mesh.
| | 02:46 | In this case, I'm going to add
in what's called a UV Sphere.
| | 02:50 | Now when I do that notice how the
sphere comes in and I have a box here that
| | 02:55 | has all of my options.
| | 02:56 | In fact, if I scroll this up you can see
that I've got a number of different options.
| | 03:00 | And we may want to actually turn this into
Wireframe, just so we can see what happens.
| | 03:06 | The first option is how
many Segments do we have?
| | 03:09 | Now we can type in the number or we can
left-click and scroll to add more or less segments.
| | 03:17 | So if I wanted this to be 16 segments,
I could click in here, type 16 and hit
| | 03:21 | Return and you can see
how this has fewer segments.
| | 03:24 | If we wanted the number of Rings, these
are the vertical options that go up and down.
| | 03:29 | Let's say we wanted 8, and you can see
how I can add or subtract detail from
| | 03:35 | this sphere, and if you look at in
Solid mode, you can also see the facets.
| | 03:40 | Then we also have Size, so how big is this.
| | 03:44 | And then just like with the Cube, we
have Align to View, as well as Location
| | 03:51 | and Rotation as well.
| | 03:53 | So we can rotate it over any one of
these axes, and when you're done, just
| | 03:57 | deselect it, and now we
have this object in our scene.
| | 04:02 | So let's quickly go through some of the
other types of primitives, just so that
| | 04:08 | we can become familiar with our options.
| | 04:10 | So again, I'm just going to hit Delete
after all of these just so that we can
| | 04:13 | look at them individually.
| | 04:15 | So again, I'm going to hit Shift+A, we
added in a Cube, a UV Sphere, which has
| | 04:21 | basically latitude and longitude lines,
we also have what's called an Icosphere,
| | 04:26 | and what that is, is a
geodesic dome type topology.
| | 04:31 | So number of Subdivisions just
gives it a higher or lower order.
| | 04:35 | Now, this can actually be a better
sphere, because it doesn't have the regular
| | 04:40 | geometry, sometimes it
renders a little bit better.
| | 04:43 | So you just have to kind of pick and
choose which one you want to use, and
| | 04:48 | again, I'm going to go ahead and Delete this.
| | 04:49 | And let's do another Shift+A, and
let's take a look at the Cylinder.
| | 04:54 | So, the Cylinder again is basically
just a can, and we have number vertices
| | 04:59 | surrounding it, so this is number of
Vertices that define the circle on the top,
| | 05:05 | the Radius, as well as the Depth,
which is basically the height.
| | 05:11 | So, we're going to go ahead and
Delete this and let's go ahead and take a
| | 05:15 | look at another one.
| | 05:16 | We also have a Cone, which again is
very similar to the Cylinder in that it has
| | 05:21 | number of vertices, as
well as a radius and a height.
| | 05:24 | Let's go and get rid of this, Delete.
| | 05:28 | Some other ones here,
these all seen fairly familiar.
| | 05:31 | The Torus again, it's very similar.
| | 05:34 | We have our Major Radius,
which is how big is the Torus;
| | 05:38 | we have our Minor Radius, which is
how thick it is, as well as Segments
| | 05:44 | for Major and Minor.
| | 05:47 | And then the last one is kind of just
a fun one here, and that's the Monkey.
| | 05:52 | There are really no options for this,
other than we actually have a monkey
| | 05:58 | head that we can use in our scene, if
we, for some reason just desperately
| | 06:02 | need a monkey head.
| | 06:04 | And this is kind of the mascot of
Blender, and it actually can be very handy
| | 06:09 | when testing out things like materials
and rendering and that sort of thing,
| | 06:13 | because it has a more complex shape.
| | 06:16 | You can actually just toss it
into a scene to see how lighting and
| | 06:19 | rendering will work.
| | 06:20 | It's much better than a
sphere or a cube in that respect.
| | 06:24 | So those are some of the basic mesh
primitives that we have in Blender.
| | 06:28 | They are the fundamental building blocks of
anything you're going to create in Blender.
| | 06:33 | So become familiar with them.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Selecting vertices, edges, and faces| 00:00 | When you start modeling in Blender,
probably the best way to do it is to just
| | 00:04 | start with a primitive and then
reshape it, add detail and turn it into the
| | 00:09 | model that you want.
| | 00:11 | Now, you don't have to start with a primitive,
but a lot of times it's the best way to start.
| | 00:15 | Now in order to edit any object,
including primitives, we need to go into
| | 00:21 | Edit mode in Blender.
| | 00:23 | So, right now we're in what's called
Object mode, where we can select the actual
| | 00:28 | objects in the scene.
| | 00:30 | So I'm going to right-click on the sphere
and then I'm going to go into Edit mode.
| | 00:34 | So we can get to it here, we have
Object Mode, and then we have a number of
| | 00:38 | other modes, but the one we want to
go to right now is called Edit Mode.
| | 00:42 | And notice, when I do this, the
actual look of the object changes.
| | 00:47 | We get this wireframe on shaded look,
and this exposes the underlying structure
| | 00:54 | of my object, and so now
I can start reshaping it.
| | 00:59 | Now in order to do this, I need
to select vertices, edges or faces.
| | 01:04 | So let me show you the
difference between each of these.
| | 01:08 | Now, we have some buttons here along
the bottom, and they basically switch us
| | 01:13 | between the different modes.
| | 01:14 | So, I'm going to go ahead and click on the
leftmost one, and this is the Vertex button.
| | 01:20 | So when I right click to select any
one of these, I can select the vertices,
| | 01:27 | which are basically the points.
| | 01:29 | If I go over here to Edges, I can
right-click on any one of these to select the
| | 01:36 | edges, which are basically lines.
| | 01:37 | If I go here, then I can select faces,
which are basically plains that define
| | 01:46 | the surface of the object.
| | 01:48 | Now, another way to get to these and
this is probably going to be a little bit
| | 01:52 | faster, is to hold down the
Ctrl key and touch the Tab button.
| | 01:56 | When you do that, we have a little
menu that pops up and allows us to switch
| | 02:01 | between Vertex, Edge and Face.
| | 02:07 | So, any one of these can be
used to reshape an object.
| | 02:11 | So, if I'm in Vertex mode here, I
can move that vertex however I want.
| | 02:19 | If I'm in Edge mode, and again, right-clicking
on the edge, I can move the edge.
| | 02:25 | Hit Ctrl tab again and select Face, then I
can select that Face and move that as well.
| | 02:32 | Now, before we actually get into actual
editing of moving objects around, let's
| | 02:36 | take a look at some more
selection options that we have.
| | 02:39 | I'm going to go ahead and hit Ctrl+Tab
and go into Vertex mode and then I'm
| | 02:44 | going to hit A to deselect everything.
| | 02:47 | In fact, the A key in Edit Mode works
very much the same as the A key in Object
| | 02:53 | Mode except it only works on that
particular mesh that you have active.
| | 02:57 | So, if I hit A that selects
everything in my mesh, but it doesn't select
| | 03:02 | everything in the scene,
only that stuff in the mesh.
| | 03:06 | Hit A again, and it deselects.
| | 03:09 | So I'm going to go ahead and deselect
everything and let's take a look at some
| | 03:12 | more selection tools.
| | 03:14 | Well, obviously we know about A, but
remember in Blender we also have B and C.
| | 03:20 | So if I select B it brings up my
crosshairs just like it does in Object Mode,
| | 03:26 | and I can left-click and
select some additional vertices.
| | 03:30 | If I hit B again, I can select
some more, and again, A, deselects.
| | 03:38 | Now, C is again my Circle Tool, so if I
want I can hit my plus or minus
| | 03:44 | keys on my num pad or just roll my
mouse wheel to make this bigger or smaller,
| | 03:49 | and then I can select however,
many of these that I want.
| | 03:53 | In fact, if I want, I can click and
drag and actually just paint my selection,
| | 03:58 | which is kind of nice, and
right-click ends that mode.
| | 04:03 | And again, I'm going to
hit A to get rid of that.
| | 04:07 | Now, another really handy tool, which
you don't have in Object Mode is the lasso
| | 04:11 | select, and you can do this with
your left-click and your Ctrl button.
| | 04:16 | So, I hit Ctrl+Left-Click and I
can lasso select whatever I want.
| | 04:23 | So that can be very handy, particularly if
you're trying to select in very tight areas.
| | 04:29 | This could be a very good way to
select very specific types of vertices.
| | 04:34 | So those are some ways of selecting
Edges, Faces and Vertices in Blender.
| | 04:41 | So, go ahead and practice with these
tools, and then let's go ahead and get into
| | 04:45 | actually modeling, in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Editing mesh objects| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at how to
actually reshape and edit objects in Blender.
| | 00:06 | Now I have a simple sphere here and
let's go ahead and put it into Edit Mode.
| | 00:10 | So I'm going to right-click on it to
select and hit Tab to go into Edit Mode.
| | 00:15 | Now probably the easiest thing to do
is just to select the single vertex
| | 00:18 | and move it around.
| | 00:20 | So if we want to make sure that we're
in Vertex Mode, we can either check our
| | 00:23 | little icons here and click on Vertex
Mode, or we can hit Ctrl+Tab and select
| | 00:29 | our Mesh Select Mode here, so
I'm going to go into Vertex Mode.
| | 00:33 | Now if I right-click on a vertex, you
will see that a manipulator comes up and
| | 00:39 | if I want, I can move this manipulator.
| | 00:42 | But sometimes when you move vertices,
you don't really want to move them
| | 00:46 | relative to the world, you need to
move them relative to the object.
| | 00:51 | So right now my manipulators are set to
Global, which means it follows the X, Y,
| | 00:56 | Z coordinates of the world.
| | 00:59 | We can certainly change that to Local.
| | 01:01 | That's not really going to do much
because my object is also aligned to the world.
| | 01:05 | But if we go to Normal, what
happens is this aligns to the object.
| | 01:13 | It actually aligns to the Normal of that vertex.
| | 01:17 | And what that means is that it actually
is moving so that the Z axis moves it in
| | 01:23 | and out and the X and Y axis move it
basically along the left and right and up
| | 01:28 | and down axis of that sphere.
| | 01:31 | I can also select multiple, so if I
Shift and right-click and select say couple
| | 01:35 | more of these vertices, you can see
how now if I have four of them selected,
| | 01:40 | they still move along the normals.
| | 01:43 | Now this may change depending upon
how many vertices we have selected.
| | 01:47 | So notice when I have three selected,
it's a little bit different than when I
| | 01:51 | have one, two, or four selected.
| | 01:54 | And this is because what it's
doing is it's averaging the normals.
| | 01:59 | But again, this can be very handy when
you need to move things relative to the
| | 02:03 | object rather than the world.
| | 02:05 | So I'm going to hit the A key to deselect.
| | 02:08 | Now if we want, we can
also select multiple vertices.
| | 02:13 | One way to do it is to use the B Tool, so
we can actually just hit B and box-select.
| | 02:20 | I'm going to hit A again to deselect that.
| | 02:21 | Another way to do it is to use the
Lasso Tool, so I'm just going to hold down
| | 02:26 | the Ctrl key and left-click
and lasso these vertices.
| | 02:31 | Now here's a little thing that is
going to probably get you, is that if we'd
| | 02:35 | scroll around here, we did not
select the back-facing vertices.
| | 02:41 | Now the reason is because we
can't see those back-facing vertices.
| | 02:46 | So basically you're only going to be able to
select those things that you can actually see.
| | 02:51 | One way around this is to either put
the object into Wireframe Mode and we can
| | 02:56 | do that by either selecting it here
or hitting the Z key and that toggles
| | 03:01 | between shaded and wireframe.
| | 03:03 | Another really handy method is
used what's called X-ray Mode.
| | 03:07 | So if I click this little button, what
it does is it gives me a shaded view but
| | 03:11 | I can still see through
it to see the wireframes.
| | 03:14 | And so if I can see these
vertices, then I can select them.
| | 03:18 | Again, all I have to do is hold
down the Ctrl key and I've got them.
| | 03:23 | Okay, so now I have an entire row of vertices.
| | 03:27 | Now I can do this again for the top,
so if I want to, I can hit Ctrl and
| | 03:32 | select more if I want.
| | 03:34 | Now another way to select is to
basically just select the simple thing and grow
| | 03:39 | and shrink my selection.
| | 03:41 | I'm going to go ahead and turn off X-ray
Mode so we can see this a little bit better.
| | 03:44 | So I'm going to go ahead and
select that one vertex at the top.
| | 03:49 | And under the Select menu we have a
couple of options and one of the ones that
| | 03:53 | we want is More and Less.
| | 03:56 | Notice how the hotkey is Ctrl+Numpad Plus
and Minus.
| | 04:00 | So I'm going to do it here at the menu and
hit More, but I can also do it as the hotkey.
| | 04:06 | So Ctrl+Plus on the Numpad
selects More, Minus selects Less.
| | 04:12 | So once I have that, I can
actually start editing this.
| | 04:15 | So if I wanted to, I could scale that up.
| | 04:19 | If I wanted to scale that, make that a
little bit bigger, I could do that very simply.
| | 04:23 | So I'm going to hit A to deselect this.
| | 04:28 | Now we also can work with edges and
faces, so I'm going to hit Ctrl+Tab and
| | 04:33 | let's go into Edge Mode.
| | 04:36 | Now edges are actually kind of a nice
way to work because what you can get
| | 04:40 | is you can actually get these rings of
edges and these are actually called edge loops.
| | 04:45 | And if I hit the Alt key and right-click,
I actually select a whole ring of edges.
| | 04:50 | It's a very quick way of
selecting multiple edges.
| | 04:54 | So if I, for example, were to select
this edge, hit Alt+Right-Click, I can
| | 05:00 | select that, Alt+Right-Click, I can select that.
| | 05:03 | If I hold down the Shift key and Alt+Right-Click,
I can select multiple edges,
| | 05:09 | so if we wanted to scale those down or whatever.
| | 05:12 | So if I were to select this one
here, I could again just scale it.
| | 05:17 | So if I wanted to scale it up, I
could and if I wanted to move it, I could.
| | 05:31 | So now we're getting this shape
and we can do that again here.
| | 05:34 | So if I again, Alt+Select this, I
could again scale it, shrink it down, and
| | 05:41 | maybe move it up like this.
| | 05:43 | Okay, maybe we're getting
kind of this mushroom shape here.
| | 05:46 | Now this is a very easy way to select
and manipulate parts of your object.
| | 05:53 | Now we can also edit faces.
| | 05:54 | So if I were to hit Ctrl+Tab and go from
Edge to Face Mode, notice how the mode changes.
| | 06:01 | And again, I can just select individual
faces and move them if I want, or if I
| | 06:06 | wanted to select multiple
faces, I could do that as well.
| | 06:10 | I'm going to go back into X-ray Mode
here and I'm going to hit the Ctrl key and
| | 06:16 | Lasso+Select all of these.
| | 06:19 | So now that we have all of these, we
could actually move them if we wanted to,
| | 06:23 | but there are some additional
operations that we can do with these.
| | 06:28 | Now if you notice here over in the
Mesh Tools, we have Translate, Rotate, and
| | 06:32 | Scale, and we've been
working with those already.
| | 06:35 | But we also have two additional ones and
these are actually nice to use on faces.
| | 06:39 | One is called Shrink/Fatten,
the other is Push/Pull.
| | 06:41 | Let me show you the difference between these.
| | 06:44 | Shrink/Fatten is as soon as you click
it, you can move the mouse up and down.
| | 06:50 | And when you move it up, it shrinks and
this is kind of more like a squash and stretch.
| | 06:54 | So it's basically stretching, and if you
move it down, it's basically squashing.
| | 06:59 | So you have kind of this nice way of
manipulating multiple faces and kind of
| | 07:05 | getting a proportional type of edit.
| | 07:06 | Now if I left-click off of that, it goes away.
| | 07:10 | Let's do the same thing for Push/Pull.
| | 07:12 | Now this is a little bit different.
| | 07:14 | Now what this does is it moves
each face in and out over its normals.
| | 07:20 | And again, as I move my mouse up and
down you can see how as I move it up, it
| | 07:24 | moves those faces in along their normals.
| | 07:27 | As I move down, it moves
them out along their normals.
| | 07:32 | So those are some of the basic ways of
selecting and editing meshes in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Proportional editing| 00:00 | When you start working with organic
objects in Blender, you probably want to
| | 00:04 | learn about Proportional Editing and
this allows us to edit a little bit more
| | 00:08 | softly than just selecting individual vertices.
| | 00:11 | Let me show you what I mean.
| | 00:13 | I have this character's head.
| | 00:14 | I'm going to right-click on it to
select, hit Tab to go into Edit Mode.
| | 00:19 | Now let's go ahead and just select
one vertex at the tip of his nose,
| | 00:24 | let's reshape his nose.
| | 00:26 | Now if I start moving this, you'll see
that I get this really sharp edge here.
| | 00:31 | I don't have any sort of falloff.
| | 00:34 | And even if I were to select
multiple vertices, if I hit Ctrl+Plus to do a
| | 00:39 | select more, you'll see that I'm still
getting sharp edges wherever I move those vertices.
| | 00:45 | And this is really an inefficient
way to edit these sorts of objects.
| | 00:48 | I mean I could conceivably edit them by
selecting alternating rows and vertices,
| | 00:53 | but proportional editing
will make this a lot easier.
| | 00:57 | Now we can get to this in
several different places.
| | 01:00 | If we go into the Mesh menu, you'll
see we have a Proportional Editing menu
| | 01:04 | option and we can go
Disable, Enable, or Connected.
| | 01:08 | And Connected is for if you have
multiple discrete objects in the scene.
| | 01:13 | And then Falloff is how
does proportional editing work.
| | 01:17 | Now this is probably the least
desirable place to get to because we actually
| | 01:20 | have a button that enables it right
here at the bottom of the viewport.
| | 01:25 | All we have to do is just click on this
and hit Enable and notice how a second
| | 01:30 | button comes up to set our falloff.
| | 01:34 | Now the hotkey for this is the letter O.
So if I hit the letter O, you can see
| | 01:38 | how that toggles it On and Off.
| | 01:41 | Now if I leave it On, you can see how
-- when I start moving those vertices,
| | 01:46 | I already get this kind of nice
proportional falloff, so I'm not getting
| | 01:50 | those hard edges anymore.
| | 01:52 | Now this maybe enough to edit however
you want, but we can actually further
| | 01:57 | modify it by changing the actual falloff.
| | 02:01 | And we do this by hitting the G key,
which is basically the Grab key.
| | 02:06 | And when I hit G, what happens
is this little circle comes up.
| | 02:10 | Now I can scroll my middle mouse wheel
to size this up and down, or I can hit
| | 02:18 | Page Up and Page Down on the
keyboard to do the same thing.
| | 02:23 | And once I have this, all I have to do
is move the mouse, I don't have to click.
| | 02:29 | So by moving the mouse and scaling
that up, you can see how I can actually
| | 02:33 | affect a much wider or narrower area.
| | 02:38 | Now if I right-click on this, it cancels.
| | 02:42 | If I hit G again, move it,
and left-click, it solidifies.
| | 02:46 | So let's try this again one more
time at the top of the character's head.
| | 02:52 | In fact, this works for not just
vertices but for faces and edges as well.
| | 02:57 | So let's go ahead and select some faces.
| | 02:58 | I'm going to go into Face Edit
Mode here and just right-click and
| | 03:03 | Shift+Right-Click a few of these
vertices towards the top of his head.
| | 03:07 | And now if I start moving those, you
can see how I already have Proportional
| | 03:10 | Editing on, it doesn't go
off when I change modes.
| | 03:14 | And if I hit the G key, I can scale that up
and really start to affect how his head works.
| | 03:22 | Now if I want to, I can also hit scale
and scale that up or down as well and
| | 03:29 | I can also rotate it.
| | 03:31 | So it really works with any sort of operation.
| | 03:34 | If I hit Tab to get out of it, you can see how
I've actually modified that just a little bit.
| | 03:40 | Go ahead and start playing with these
tools, play with the different falloffs,
| | 03:43 | you'll get the hang of it fairly quickly.
| | 03:45 | And this can be very instrumental
in making nice smooth organic models.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Sculpt mode| 00:00 | Another way to do organic modeling
is to use Blender's Sculpt Tools.
| | 00:04 | Now these are highly interactive, but they
also require a little more density to the mesh.
| | 00:10 | So I took this particular character,
added a little density, and let's take a
| | 00:14 | look at how to use the Sculpt Tool.
| | 00:16 | Now the Sculpt Tool is actually its own mode.
| | 00:20 | So if I right-click on this object to
select it, you'll see that I have Edit
| | 00:24 | Mode but we also have Sculpt Mode.
| | 00:28 | And this allows us to
actually sculpt the object.
| | 00:31 | Now as soon as this comes up, notice
how my cursor changes to the circle which
| | 00:36 | is basically a brush.
| | 00:38 | All I have to do is left-click and
drag on the object and you can see how I
| | 00:42 | can sculpt the object.
| | 00:44 | I'm going to hit Ctrl+Z to undo that and
let's get a little more control over this.
| | 00:50 | All of our options for sculpting are
here in the Tools Panel or the Brush Panel.
| | 00:56 | So I'm going to go ahead and open
this up so we can take a look at it.
| | 00:59 | Now we have a couple of options.
| | 01:01 | One is the Radius of the brush.
| | 01:03 | I can make it smaller or bigger
just by moving this option here.
| | 01:10 | If I hit F, we can also change the Feather
of the brush as well which is kind of nice.
| | 01:19 | Then we also have an Autosmooth
amount, we have Add and Subtract.
| | 01:24 | So in this case, this will pull
vertices out, add them, in this case it will
| | 01:30 | subtract them, push them back in,
and again, I'm going to undo that.
| | 01:34 | Now we also have what's called Symmetry.
| | 01:38 | Now this can be very important
particularly in things like character modeling.
| | 01:42 | So I'm going to drop down here to the
Symmetry Panel, roll that out, and open it up.
| | 01:47 | And you can see, if we want we can
actually have symmetry over any axis.
| | 01:53 | And in this case, he is kind of sitting
along the X axis, so I want my symmetry there.
| | 01:59 | And when I do that, you can see how
now when I start sculpting, it actually
| | 02:04 | sculpts on both sides.
| | 02:06 | So if I change this to Add and maybe
bring my brush size up just a little bit by
| | 02:11 | hitting F, I can start to
puff out this character's cheeks.
| | 02:16 | And you can see how it's very
easy to do that with the brush.
| | 02:21 | Now we also have a number of different tools
that we can use and let's go to that rollout.
| | 02:26 | And we have the Draw Tool which is
the default and this just allows us to
| | 02:31 | basically draw on the character.
| | 02:33 | But we also have a number of other ones,
one is called Blob, Clay, Crease, Draw,
| | 02:39 | which is what we're using.
| | 02:41 | One of the nicer ones is called
Smooth, so let's take a look at that.
| | 02:45 | And if you start modeling, you might get
little bit of blobiness here but we can
| | 02:49 | actually use the Smooth
Brush to kind of put things back.
| | 02:52 | Now another way to use that
Smooth Brush is to get rid of Creases.
| | 02:57 | So I'm going to hit F to go down a little bit.
| | 03:00 | And if we want, we can paint over this
hairline here and smooth out that crease
| | 03:07 | and turn him from a guy with
hair to a guy with no hair.
| | 03:11 | So if I want, I can increase my brush size and
maybe smooth that out just a little bit more.
| | 03:17 | And again, because I have Symmetry
turned On, it's very easy to sculpt this
| | 03:22 | character so that he comes out just fine.
| | 03:25 | Now we have additional tools.
| | 03:27 | Inflate is a great one that just pulls
things out, it's very similar to Draw,
| | 03:31 | but it's a little bit different.
| | 03:33 | So if I go to the top of this
character's head, you can see how I can basically
| | 03:37 | inflate his head, give him a big giant
brain or really whatever I want, turn him
| | 03:42 | into a brainy alien or something like that.
| | 03:45 | Or if I want, I can turn this big mass now
into hair and I can put that crease back.
| | 03:52 | So I have a Crease Tool here, so if I
hit the F key and shrink down my brush a
| | 03:59 | little bit, I can start to put a crease in.
| | 04:02 | But I've got the crease going the wrong way
because I have Add On instead of Subtract.
| | 04:06 | So I'm going to undo that, Ctrl+Z and
hit my Subtract Tool and then just kind of
| | 04:12 | paint in another crease.
| | 04:17 | And again, I can just paint in kind
of a nice crease for where his hair is.
| | 04:22 | So as you can see, this can be very, very handy.
| | 04:26 | It's a really nice way to sculpt
creatures, organic objects, really a lot
| | 04:31 | of different things.
| | 04:33 | So go ahead and start playing with all
these tools, there is a lot of options here.
| | 04:37 | I just wanted to kind of show you some
of the basics of this to get you started,
| | 04:41 | but you can go pretty
deep into this if you want.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with edges and edge loops| 00:00 | When you start working with mesh
modeling in Blender, you need to pay
| | 00:04 | attention to edge loops.
| | 00:06 | Now edge loops are basically just
loops of edges that define areas of a
| | 00:10 | character or an object.
| | 00:12 | Now I have a little creature here and
let's take a look at how his edge loops work.
| | 00:17 | I'm just going to go ahead and right-click
to select them and hit Tab to go in Edit Mode.
| | 00:21 | Now I'm in Face Mode here, so
I'm going to go into Edge Mode.
| | 00:25 | Now if you notice here we've got
all sorts of edges but a lot of these
| | 00:29 | edges tend to go in loop.
| | 00:31 | So if I hit Alt and one of these edges,
you can see I have a loop around his
| | 00:36 | legs, the top of his arm, it kind of has a
loop, and we also have one around his waist.
| | 00:42 | Now if I want, I can use these to
actually manipulate and edit my character.
| | 00:49 | So if I wanted to, I could make him a
little bit skinnier, I could hit S to
| | 00:54 | scale down his waist and
I could scale that down.
| | 00:57 | One thing you want to notice is how
this is kind of going asymmetrically.
| | 01:01 | Now that's because I selected this edge
and we're scaling around the center of that.
| | 01:09 | And that's because we have our
3D Cursor set to Active Element.
| | 01:14 | So I'm going to go ahead and undo that
and let's set this to Bounding Box Center
| | 01:20 | which basically just sends it
to the center of all the edges.
| | 01:23 | And again, I'm going to hit S to scale
and now when we scale down, you can see
| | 01:28 | how that goes symmetrically.
| | 01:30 | But the edge loops here are
actually what define that whole waist.
| | 01:35 | And so by working with them as a loop,
we have a little bit more control over
| | 01:40 | how to manipulate our character.
| | 01:43 | So I can move those again and I can rotate
them and I can actually reshape him fairly nicely.
| | 01:51 | Now if I wanted to add more
detail, I could also do that.
| | 01:55 | Now there is a very nice tool that Blender
provides and that's called Loop Cut and Slide.
| | 02:00 | It's over here in the Mesh Tools Panel.
| | 02:02 | So if I hit Loop Cut and Slide, what
happens is wherever I place my mouse, it
| | 02:10 | will find the edge loop in between those.
| | 02:12 | So if I put it here, you see
I've got an additional edge loop.
| | 02:16 | All I have to do is left-click and then
once I left-click, I can slide that loop
| | 02:21 | wherever I want and then left-click
again and it's selected.
| | 02:27 | So if I wanted to, I could hit scale
again and scale that down to give him a
| | 02:31 | little bit more of a waist.
| | 02:34 | Now if I want, I can also
select additional edge loops here.
| | 02:39 | Now if I select the one up here,
notice how the selection stops right here.
| | 02:45 | Now edge loops are basically just ones
that go over these two-way junctions.
| | 02:50 | When I get to this three-way
junction, then it's going to stop.
| | 02:54 | So what I have to do is hit Shift+Alt,
right-click again to get that area,
| | 03:00 | right-click again to get this, and
right-click one more time to get that third area.
| | 03:06 | Now once we have all of these, then I
can do things such as scale and rotate to
| | 03:12 | change this profile.
| | 03:14 | Now this works also with
things such as his arms.
| | 03:18 | Let's say we wanted more detail in
his arms, we can again hit Loop Cut and
| | 03:22 | Slide, and again, just position the
cursor over that area, and again, I can
| | 03:28 | add additional detail.
| | 03:30 | So as you can see, edge loops really
are a very powerful way to add symmetrical
| | 03:35 | detail to an object or a character.
| | 03:37 | There are also ways to
manipulate that detail efficiently.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Extrusions| 00:00 | Probably one of the most important
tools in any mesh modeling program is the
| | 00:05 | Extrude Tool, and Blender is no
different, the Extrude Tool is used a lot.
| | 00:10 | So let's take a look at how to use it.
| | 00:12 | I have two objects here, I'm going
to go ahead and select the cylinder by
| | 00:16 | right-clicking on it and
let's go ahead and tab into that.
| | 00:20 | Let's go ahead and take a look
at how to extrude on faces first.
| | 00:24 | So I'm going to hit Ctrl+Tab and go
into Face Mode, and let's just go ahead and
| | 00:30 | select just one face here and
let's just see how this tool works.
| | 00:34 | Now if we go to our Mesh Tools
palette, we have two options here.
| | 00:39 | One is Extrude Region,
one is Extrude Individual.
| | 00:42 | For a single face, these two work identically.
| | 00:46 | So I'm just going to go ahead and
hit Extrude Region, and then move my
| | 00:50 | mouse right and left.
| | 00:52 | And you can see that when I move it to
the left, it makes a little hole and it
| | 00:57 | makes an extrusion when I move it to the right.
| | 00:59 | Left-click cancels it.
| | 01:02 | So there I have some additional geometry.
| | 01:05 | So you can see how this can be used to
make branches or arms on a character,
| | 01:09 | legs, those sorts of things.
| | 01:11 | You can really use this to
make a lot of different objects.
| | 01:15 | Now the difference between this Extrude
Region and Extrude Individual shows up
| | 01:20 | when you start extruding multiple faces.
| | 01:23 | So I'm going to hit A to deselect
that face and then Shift+Right-Click
| | 01:28 | three faces right here.
| | 01:31 | So let's take a look at Extrude Region first.
| | 01:34 | When I do that, pretty much operates the
same way that it did for the single face.
| | 01:40 | I can actually just extrude in to make a
hole or extrude out to make an extension.
| | 01:46 | Now these three faces move together as a
block because we're extruding them as a region.
| | 01:53 | If we extrude them individually,
something completely different happens.
| | 01:59 | So let's take a look at this, we're
going to go ahead and do Extrude Individual.
| | 02:04 | And when I do that, you can see how I
actually get separation between these.
| | 02:10 | So if I go in to create a hole, you
can see how I get a border between those.
| | 02:16 | And if I extrude them out, we
actually have separate faces.
| | 02:22 | So just understanding those two
differences can really show you how they work.
| | 02:27 | And in fact, this Extrude
Individual can be used to do a lot of really
| | 02:31 | cool little effects.
| | 02:32 | I'm actually going to zoom out here
and move over to this sphere and I'm just
| | 02:36 | going to show you something very quickly.
| | 02:38 | I'm going to go ahead back into Object
Mode, right-click on the sphere, and hit
| | 02:44 | Tab to go back into Edit Mode.
| | 02:47 | Now when you do that,
everything should be selected.
| | 02:49 | If not, hit A once or twice to select
everything and we should still be in Face Mode.
| | 02:56 | If we hit Extrude Individual for
all of these, watch what happens.
| | 03:00 | If we move them out, we actually get
a sea urchin type of thing, we have a
| | 03:05 | lot of different faces.
| | 03:07 | And if I set my Pivot Point to
Individual Origins and hit S for scale, you can
| | 03:15 | see how I can bring those down to points.
| | 03:19 | So I can make some very
interesting objects very, very quickly.
| | 03:23 | So I'm going to go ahead and deselect
that, let's go back into Object Mode,
| | 03:27 | right-click and select our cylinder.
| | 03:30 | Now Extrude doesn't work just on faces,
it also works on edges and vertices.
| | 03:37 | So let's take a look at how some of that works.
| | 03:39 | Again, I'm going to go back into Edit
Mode on my cylinder and let's go into
| | 03:44 | Vertex Mode and go ahead and just
select a single vertex and let's go ahead and
| | 03:50 | do an Extrude Region.
| | 03:51 | Now this actually isn't very
interesting because when you extrude a vertex, all
| | 03:56 | it does is create an edge
that connects it to that object.
| | 04:01 | So this really isn't usable geometry
that we can work with, so if I'm going to
| | 04:05 | go ahead and delete those
vertices just by hitting the Delete key.
| | 04:09 | But probably more
interesting is extruding edges.
| | 04:13 | I'm going to hit Ctrl+Tab again and
go into Edge Mode and just right-click
| | 04:18 | on one of these edges.
| | 04:20 | And in this case, when I Extrude Region,
you can see how it actually extrudes a plane.
| | 04:25 | So when I do that, I actually
get a nice additional surface.
| | 04:30 | Now for a single edge, that might not
be useful, I'm going to go ahead and hit
| | 04:33 | Ctrl+Z to undo this.
| | 04:35 | But for edge loops this can be very useful.
| | 04:38 | So I'm going to hit Alt and right-click
on those edges so I select that very top
| | 04:44 | edge loop, and again, just do Extrude Region.
| | 04:47 | And what happens is I'm extruding this
very nice surface and then if I want to,
| | 04:52 | I can scale that up or down to create
some additional geometry that actually
| | 04:58 | might look good depending
upon what you're modeling.
| | 05:01 | So these are some of the options for Extrude.
| | 05:04 | Now Extrude adds geometry.
| | 05:06 | We can extrude in a region, in other
words as a block, or we can extrude
| | 05:10 | individually which
basically breaks apart the faces.
| | 05:14 | We also can extrude edges and vertices.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Smooth shading objects| 00:00 | There are times in Blender when your
models will look like they have facets, in
| | 00:05 | other words, they don't look smooth.
| | 00:08 | You can see them here on
this sphere that we have.
| | 00:11 | Each individual face is kind of
rendered flat almost as a plane, so that as it
| | 00:17 | moves through the light, you can see
how that sphere looks less smooth and more
| | 00:22 | like just a series of planes,
which actually is what it is.
| | 00:25 | But we can get around
this by using smooth shading.
| | 00:29 | So all I have to do is right-click on my
sphere and in the Object Tools palette,
| | 00:35 | you'll see I've got an option here for Shading.
| | 00:38 | Flat shading gives you this;
| | 00:41 | Smooth shading smoothes that out
so that you can actually have a
| | 00:46 | smoother looking object.
| | 00:49 | You can apply this on a per face basis.
| | 00:53 | So let's go ahead and switch this back
over to Flat and then hit the Tab key
| | 00:59 | so that way I can go into Edit Mode and I
am going to hit Ctrl+Tab and select faces.
| | 01:07 | So I am going to deselect all the faces
by hitting A and then I'm just going to
| | 01:11 | go ahead and select about six or seven faces.
| | 01:15 | So I am just going to
select a bunch of faces here.
| | 01:18 | Let's actually go ahead and select
eight faces here, let's select all of these.
| | 01:23 | All I have to do now is scroll down and find
that Shading option again and I can hit Smooth.
| | 01:28 | Now what this does when I deselect these
is, it actually smoothes out only those
| | 01:36 | faces, so you can see how inside
of this area, it's not faceted.
| | 01:42 | Let's go ahead and do this for
the whole top of this object.
| | 01:44 | So I am going to go into X-ray Mode so
I can select all of these faces and I am
| | 01:48 | just going to do Ctrl+Select here.
| | 01:51 | So now that I have every face selected, the
whole top half of this sphere is selected;
| | 01:56 | I am going to shade those as Smooth
and then when I deselect here, you can go
| | 02:02 | out, you can see how the bottom is quite
faceted, but the top is totally smooth.
| | 02:08 | So this actually can be used
to your advantage in modeling;
| | 02:12 | if you want something to have a
crease or a sharp edge, smooth it as flat.
| | 02:17 | If you want it to be more smooth
then you can always use smooth shading.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Subdividing meshes| 00:00 | Probably one of the most common ways to add
detail to a Mesh model is to subdivide it.
| | 00:07 | Now there are two ways to
subdivide models in Blender.
| | 00:10 | The first is to just
subdivide them by themselves;
| | 00:13 | the second is to do what's
called subdivision surfaces.
| | 00:17 | We are going to get into
that in the next chapter;
| | 00:19 | we're just going to look at
subdividing by itself right here.
| | 00:23 | Probably the easiest way to look at
subdivision is to just take a simple
| | 00:27 | cube, which I have here.
| | 00:29 | So let's go ahead and zoom in on the cube,
and right click to select it and then
| | 00:35 | in order to subdivide, we
do need to be in Edit Mode.
| | 00:39 | So I am going to hit Tab and then I am
going to hit the A key to make sure we
| | 00:43 | have everything selected.
| | 00:45 | Now if you scroll down here in the
Mesh Tools Panel, we've got an option
| | 00:50 | here called Subdivide.
| | 00:52 | So once I click on this, you'll see an
option comes up here in the bottom and
| | 00:57 | also notice how the Mesh has already subdivided.
| | 01:01 | Remember, we only had one face along
each side of this cube, now we have four,
| | 01:07 | and basically that's what subdivision is.
| | 01:09 | It takes one face and it
cuts it into many pieces.
| | 01:14 | So the number of cuts we have is a
variable that we can use right here.
| | 01:19 | So if I bring this up, you can see we
have two, three, four cuts so we can
| | 01:23 | actually add more-and-more detail.
| | 01:25 | Now one of the things you'll notice is
that the detail that I'm adding here is
| | 01:30 | still keeping the shape of that cube.
| | 01:33 | I'm just adding additional faces.
| | 01:36 | If I want, I can also work with this
Smoothness parameter to smooth out those edges.
| | 01:43 | So as I bring my Smoothness up,
notice how this kind of actually starts to
| | 01:48 | go towards a sphere.
| | 01:50 | In fact, if I bring up the number of cuts
even more, it's going to get even more spherical.
| | 01:56 | So this is actually really great way
to turn a square-shaped polygonal object
| | 02:01 | into something more organic.
| | 02:03 | Now we have a couple of other options here.
| | 02:06 | One is called Fractal and that we
probably are not going to use that a lot
| | 02:09 | because what it does is just
randomizes those vertices, and generally, we
| | 02:13 | probably don't want to do that.
| | 02:15 | And then we also have the Corner Cut
Pattern and we can do it either as a
| | 02:19 | Fan, Inner Vertex, or Path, almost all the
times we're going to keep it on Inner Vertex.
| | 02:23 | Now another thing with this tool
is that we don't have to subdivide
| | 02:27 | everything at once.
| | 02:29 | So I am going to go ahead and click
off of this and then hit Ctrl+Z to undo.
| | 02:35 | So I am going to bring this
back to the way that it was.
| | 02:38 | Now I am going to go ahead and hit A
to deselect and right-click on this top
| | 02:44 | face and let's go ahead and
just subdivide that top face.
| | 02:48 | So I am going to go here into Subdivide
and you can see how already the geometry
| | 02:54 | is changing a little bit because
I am only subdividing part of it.
| | 02:57 | So as I add more cuts, you can see how
it's trying to make sure that I can just
| | 03:03 | cut this face and still keep
it connected to the others.
| | 03:07 | And if I add smoothness, you can see how.
| | 03:09 | Again, I can just subdivide part of
the object and not just the whole thing.
| | 03:14 | So I am going to go ahead and deselect
this and Hit tab to go back into Object Mode.
| | 03:20 | Now probably the most common use of
subdivision surfaces is in organic modeling.
| | 03:26 | So I've got this head that we've kind
of been working with and this is a very
| | 03:30 | low res version of this head.
| | 03:33 | This is kind of just a very
low polygon version of this.
| | 03:36 | This is basically how you'd
probably model something like this.
| | 03:39 | So I am going to go ahead and hit Tab
to go in Edit Mode and make sure that all
| | 03:44 | of my faces are selected, and
let's go ahead and subdivide this.
| | 03:50 | Now again, if we subdivide this with
smoothness, notice how it starts to get
| | 03:55 | a lot more organic.
| | 03:57 | So if I have one cut, two cuts, notice
how we are actually getting a lot more
| | 04:01 | detail in that model.
| | 04:04 | Now one of the things you need to be
aware of is that each one of these cuts
| | 04:09 | quadruples the number of vertices.
| | 04:12 | So one cut will make one vertices into
four, two cuts will make four into 16,
| | 04:18 | three cuts will add 64.
| | 04:19 | So you're geometrically multiplying the
number of faces that you have in your model.
| | 04:26 | So be very careful.
| | 04:27 | If you get much above three or four cuts,
you are going to start getting so many
| | 04:31 | polygons that you may run out of memory in your
system and that sort of thing. So be careful;
| | 04:36 | don't go too high on those number of cuts.
| | 04:39 | Also, another thing to be aware of is
that the more detail you have in your
| | 04:43 | model, the harder it's going to be to animate.
| | 04:46 | So typically, when we actually subdivide,
we subdivide as little as possible and
| | 04:52 | then when we get into using subdivision
surfaces, that's where we can kind of go
| | 04:57 | crazy with the subdivisions to
get things really super smooth.
| | 05:01 | But at this point when you're modeling, you
don't want to go too deep into subdivisions;
| | 05:06 | just enough to give you the room you
need to create the shapes that you want.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
4. Advanced ModelingWorking with modifiers| 00:00 | Now let's go little bit deeper into
modeling and take a look at Modifiers.
| | 00:05 | Now up until this point, we've been
working mostly with editing tools on the
| | 00:10 | Object Tools Palette, and those
are pretty much one time operation.
| | 00:14 | So if you were to extrude a face for
example, once you have extruded it, it's
| | 00:19 | done and you move on to the next operation.
| | 00:21 | Modifiers are a lot more interactive
and that you can come back to them and
| | 00:26 | change parameters later.
| | 00:28 | So this can be really
handy for more complex objects.
| | 00:33 | So let's take a look at these.
| | 00:34 | I am going to go ahead and right-click
on my box and expand my Properties Panel,
| | 00:41 | so that way I can see all of my tabs here.
| | 00:43 | And I am going to look for the little
wrench here and that's my Object Modifiers tab.
| | 00:48 | Now once I open that up you will
see, well I don't have much in here.
| | 00:53 | But I do have an Add Modifier button.
| | 00:56 | So let's click on that and when we do,
you'll see that we have a whole lot of
| | 01:02 | different modifiers that
we can add to our object.
| | 01:06 | And if you have installed plug-ins into
Blender, you may see even more than this.
| | 01:09 | But right now, we just want to understand
the concept of modifier and how it works.
| | 01:15 | So let's just pick one simple
modifier and use it just to understand how
| | 01:19 | modifiers apply to objects and then we
can move on to the more complex ones later.
| | 01:24 | So let's go head under Deform and
find the one that says Simple Deform.
| | 01:29 | And let's just go ahead and left-click
on that and as soon as we do, you will
| | 01:33 | notice how the box kind of twists a
little bit and that's because that's what
| | 01:37 | the modifier is doing, in fact, if you
can see here, the Simple Deform is in
| | 01:41 | Twist Mode and we can see that.
| | 01:43 | But before we get to this part, let's
go through the actual Modifier Panel and
| | 01:48 | see what sort of options we have.
| | 01:50 | Now the first option here is
basically just the name of the Modifier and
| | 01:56 | then here we have this little camera and that
basically turns it on and off in the Renderer.
| | 02:02 | So if we don't want this to render,
turn that off, typically we keep it on.
| | 02:06 | Now this second one, the little Eyeball here,
that turns it on and off in the Viewport.
| | 02:13 | So if you want to kind of toggle it on
and off to see what effect it's having,
| | 02:17 | this can be a very handy button.
| | 02:19 | This third button just shows the
Modifier when you're in Mesh Edit Mode.
| | 02:23 | Right now we are in Object Mode but if
we were to hit Tab you can see how we can
| | 02:27 | actually get into Mesh Edit mode.
| | 02:30 | And now this Mesh Edit Mode here we
are seeing the solid version is actually
| | 02:35 | what happens with the Twist but we're
also seeing the cage of the mesh as well.
| | 02:41 | So we are kind of seeing two objects.
| | 02:43 | If we want those two to sync up we are
going to hit this little triangle box and
| | 02:47 | that will go ahead and sync them up.
| | 02:49 | Now I really want to stay in Object
Mode so I am going to go ahead and hit Tab
| | 02:53 | and go back into that.
| | 02:54 | Now to the right of this, we also
have tabs that move up and down, and what
| | 02:59 | those do is basically just
rearrange modifiers in the stack.
| | 03:03 | Right now we only have one modifier
applied but we actually can apply as many as
| | 03:07 | we want and rearrange them if we need to.
| | 03:09 | Now along the bottom here we have
a couple of options, and the most
| | 03:13 | important one here is Apply.
| | 03:15 | Now what Apply does is basically apply
whatever we've created with this modifier
| | 03:20 | and just apply to the mesh
and get rid of the modifier.
| | 03:24 | So if I were to hit this, basically
the modifier goes away, and my options to
| | 03:29 | change anything goes away and it
kind of freezes my mesh at that point.
| | 03:35 | But actually I want to get this back so
I am going to hit Ctrl+Z to bring back
| | 03:39 | my modifier and hit an undo.
| | 03:41 | And now let's go through the actual modifier
itself, and this is again is a Simple Deform.
| | 03:47 | So right now we're in Twist Mode and if
you notice we have a bunch of different
| | 03:51 | modes, we will go through these in a second.
| | 03:53 | But we also have a couple of options here.
| | 03:56 | This particular modifier has a
Deform factor which is how much are we
| | 04:00 | twisting this object.
| | 04:01 | And we also have Limits as where does
this twist start and where does it end.
| | 04:06 | Now we can also add additional ones.
| | 04:09 | We can turn this into a Bend.
| | 04:11 | So we can actually Bend the
object as much as you want.
| | 04:14 | We can Taper the object, we
can also do Squash and Stretch.
| | 04:18 | So if I wanted to stretch this object I could.
| | 04:20 | So, each one of these is in
this Simple Deform Modifier.
| | 04:24 | Now let's say I wanted to
add a Stretch and a Twist.
| | 04:28 | Well that's actually pretty easy.
| | 04:29 | All we have to do is add a second modifier.
| | 04:33 | So again, we just go up to the Add
Modifier pull-down, and again select Simple
| | 04:38 | Deform and now we have Stretch and if
we scroll down, we also have that second
| | 04:46 | one, which is called Twist.
| | 04:48 | And if I want I can expand or collapse
these just by hitting this button here,
| | 04:52 | so I am going to collapse that first modifier.
| | 04:55 | Now let's take a look at this Twist
Modifier and let's go ahead and twist.
| | 04:59 | So now what we're doing is we are
actually using two modifiers, we are
| | 05:03 | stretching it in the first one
and the second one is twisting it.
| | 05:08 | So now we have basically two
modifiers affecting this object.
| | 05:13 | And so if I wanted to I could still go
back up to the first one which is the
| | 05:16 | Stretch, and stretch it some more, add
some Limits to it, really do whatever I
| | 05:22 | want and everything will interact just fine.
| | 05:26 | Now if I want I can also switch
these around by reorganizing them.
| | 05:30 | So if I wanted to put the Twist on
top of the Stretch, I could do that.
| | 05:35 | And now if I look here my Twist
comes first and then we stretch.
| | 05:41 | So those are some of the basics of
Modifiers, and if you understand this
| | 05:45 | workflow and as we use more
complex modifiers, you'll also be able to
| | 05:50 | understand them.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with subdivision surfaces| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at Subdivision Surfaces.
| | 00:03 | This is basically a modifier that
does pretty much the same thing as the
| | 00:07 | Subdivide command in the Object Tools Panel.
| | 00:10 | But this is more interactive, it's
basically live so we can actually modify an
| | 00:14 | object and have it subdivide at the same time.
| | 00:17 | It's really great for character
animation and anything where you need organic
| | 00:21 | shapes that animate.
| | 00:22 | So I am going to go ahead and select
this box and expand out my Properties Panel
| | 00:29 | just a little bit so I can get into
my Modifiers and then I am going to add
| | 00:34 | Subdivision Surface.
| | 00:35 | Now notice what happens, as soon
as I add this, it starts subdividing
| | 00:40 | this particular surface.
| | 00:42 | So if I want I can add more
subdivisions in my View and also more in my Render.
| | 00:50 | Now with this you got to be a little
careful not to add too many because you
| | 00:53 | can very easily get millions of polygons if
you bring this up much above three or four.
| | 00:59 | So you have to be very careful with this.
| | 01:01 | But we can actually dial in Resolution
and we can have a different resolution
| | 01:07 | for the Viewport and for the Render,
which can be really, really nice.
| | 01:11 | Now what really is cool about Subdivision
Surfaces is when you start editing the original mesh.
| | 01:17 | So right now I am in Object Mode, if I
hit Tab I am going to go into Edit Mode.
| | 01:22 | Now what shows up here is the original box.
| | 01:25 | So if I were to delete this,
okay with no Modifier that's my box.
| | 01:31 | But when I put the modifier back on
you'll sea that it actually subdivides that.
| | 01:37 | And so as I add more detail in terms of
subdivisions I have a smoother object.
| | 01:43 | Now what's really cool is that I can
actually modify the original mesh, in
| | 01:48 | other words that original box that I
have and it will actually, the underlying
| | 01:53 | surface will follow along.
| | 01:56 | So if I were to select for example some
of these vertices here, I can actually
| | 02:01 | start making a very curved
surface, and that's pretty cool.
| | 02:06 | And if I wanted to go into Face Edit
Mode and Shift+Select a couple of faces I
| | 02:11 | could actually go through and use some
of these Object Tools such as Extrude
| | 02:15 | Region and I can make an extrusion, and
let's go ahead and do another one here.
| | 02:20 | And now notice how as I do this we
get additional detail, but also that
| | 02:27 | detail is smoothed.
| | 02:29 | Now one of the things you probably
should be aware of is that that smoothing
| | 02:33 | really depends on how close
together the edge loops are.
| | 02:37 | So, if I were to go into Edge Mode
here and Alt+Select this edge, you can
| | 02:43 | see how when I slide it this way the more
distance I have here, the more curve I have.
| | 02:50 | If I push it closer you'll
see that this curve is tighter.
| | 02:54 | So this can actually control how much
curvature we have in our model and this
| | 03:00 | is another reason why Edge Loops can be
important particularly for this sort of modeling.
| | 03:05 | So if I drag this Edge Loop in here
you'll see it's tighter or it's looser.
| | 03:11 | So as you start modeling one of the
nice things you can do is to actually model
| | 03:16 | with a Subdivision Surface applied, in
that way you can model your object simply
| | 03:22 | and then you can see the smoothed
or more complex result as you model.
| | 03:27 | But the actual model that you're using
is the simple box rather than the more
| | 03:33 | complex curved surface underneath.
| | 03:35 | And we're going to be using
this a lot more during the course.
| | 03:38 | So go ahead and practice editing this
object and get used to how Subdivision
| | 03:43 | Surfaces works, because we are going
to be using those a little bit more
| | 03:46 | later in the course.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating a simple creature| 00:01 | Now let's go ahead and start putting
our modeling skills to use and build
| | 00:06 | an actual character.
| | 00:07 | We are going to build this little
creature here and we are going to start off
| | 00:11 | just very simply and just build him
using a number of Blender's tools.
| | 00:17 | So the first thing we want to do is
just hit File>New and I just want to start
| | 00:22 | off with a new scene.
| | 00:23 | Now we are actually going to just
build him up starting with a cube.
| | 00:26 | So the first thing I am going to need is
some additional detail with which to model.
| | 00:32 | So the first thing I want
to do is subdivide this cube.
| | 00:35 | So I am going to hit the Tab key and
then hit Subdivide in the Mesh Tools widow
| | 00:42 | and then our Number of Cuts, I am
going to bring it up to about 3.
| | 00:46 | Now what I want is enough detail to model,
but not enough so that I have too much detail.
| | 00:51 | So with modeling it's always kind of a
balance between enough detail and too much.
| | 00:56 | So let's start with three cuts in the
Subdivision and then I'm going to go
| | 01:01 | into Edge Mode here and I'm going to
Alt+Select and then Shift+Alt+Select
| | 01:08 | these vertical edges.
| | 01:09 | Okay, so what I want is I want all
four edges of that cube selected.
| | 01:16 | And now I'm just going to use my
Scale Tool and I don't want to scale this
| | 01:20 | evenly, I just want to scale it in the
Y direction and then in again along X, I
| | 01:26 | don't want to scale it vertically.
| | 01:27 | So if I use just a global scale,
it would shrink it down vertically.
| | 01:31 | And really what I am trying to do is
just kind of soften those edges just a
| | 01:34 | little bit, so that way I don't have
corners so to speak when I'm working
| | 01:39 | with this character.
| | 01:40 | Now next thing I want to do is as I've
got this all selected, I am going to hit
| | 01:44 | the A key twice to select all and I
just want to scale that up a little bit, he
| | 01:49 | is actually a little bit taller than
what I had and then let's go ahead and
| | 01:52 | start moving him up.
| | 01:54 | Now if I want to I can actually apply a
Subdivision Surface Modifier to this, so
| | 02:01 | I can see what my modeling looks like.
| | 02:03 | So let's go ahead and do that and then we'll
start adding some more detail to this character.
| | 02:08 | So I am going to go again over to
my Modifiers Panel here and just add
| | 02:14 | Subdivision Surface and then in terms
of Subdivisions, 1 is fine, if you want
| | 02:19 | you can bring it up to 2 that should be
enough for this type of modeling here.
| | 02:23 | Let's go ahead and start working on the legs.
| | 02:25 | So I am going to move this up
and I'm going to go into Face Mode.
| | 02:29 | So I am going to hit Ctrl+Tab, select
Faces and then just right-click and then
| | 02:34 | Shift+Right-click on these faces, okay.
| | 02:38 | And then in order to get the legs, the
easiest thing to do is just do an Extrude
| | 02:41 | Region, so I am going to extrude those
down, just a little bit at first because
| | 02:46 | really I want enough for a leg joint.
| | 02:48 | And if I want I could actually
scale these in just a little bit.
| | 02:52 | I want to make sure that my Pivot Point
is on something that will work, either
| | 02:57 | Individual Origins or Bounding Box
Cursor or something like that, and then just
| | 03:01 | scale that in so those are somewhat square.
| | 03:04 | If you look each one of those is
square and then let's go ahead and Extrude
| | 03:08 | again and Extrude one more time.
| | 03:11 | Now what I am trying to do is kind of a
smaller Extrude towards the bottom and
| | 03:14 | that will give him a little
bit more of a footpad there.
| | 03:19 | Okay, so now we've got his basic legs.
| | 03:22 | Now if we want we can start
reshaping the body a little bit and again I'm
| | 03:27 | just roughing this out.
| | 03:28 | So, let's go ahead and
actually go back to Edge Mode.
| | 03:31 | So again, I am hitting Ctrl+Tab+Edge and
then just right-click on the edges here
| | 03:36 | towards the front of his body, so
basically that, and then let's just go ahead
| | 03:42 | and move that up and in perhaps.
| | 03:45 | Again, I am just kind of trying to
give him a little bit of a belly and again
| | 03:49 | we're just kind of, just
playing with this a little bit.
| | 03:52 | Now one of the things also is that we
do need to start blocking out the area
| | 03:56 | for the character's arms and his mouth, so
let's go ahead and actually start with the mouth.
| | 04:03 | The first thing I want to do is I want
to get a little more detail in this area
| | 04:08 | so that I can start
working on the character's mouth.
| | 04:11 | So what I need to do is add in some Edge Loops.
| | 04:14 | So I am going to do a Loop Cut and
Slide, and first I am going to do a
| | 04:19 | vertical one right here and I'm not
going to really slide it, I am just going
| | 04:23 | to keep it in the middle.
| | 04:24 | We'll worry about
positioning this a little bit later.
| | 04:27 | I am going to do that again, right here.
| | 04:29 | Okay, so I've done it on either side
of that center line and then let's do
| | 04:34 | one across this way.
| | 04:37 | Now this should give me enough detail
to start modeling the character's mouth.
| | 04:42 | Now I am actually going to do it what
seems to be a little bit high, but I'm
| | 04:47 | going to take this Edge Loop here and
just move it up a little bit and then I am
| | 04:51 | going to start moving
vertices down to make his mouth.
| | 04:56 | So I need to go into Vertices mode, go
here Vertex, middle click on that one,
| | 05:02 | move it down and then right-click
on that one, move it down and then
| | 05:06 | Shift+Right-click on each one
of these and move those down.
| | 05:10 | Now what I am trying to is get this
area to look a little bit like a mouth, we
| | 05:14 | can certainly fine tune it after we
get the detail kind of blocked in.
| | 05:19 | So again, I am just starting rough and then
we are going to be adding detail as we go.
| | 05:24 | So now that I have this you can see that
these four faces can be at the start of
| | 05:29 | the character's mouth.
| | 05:30 | So actually I am going to kind of flatten
that out just a little bit like that, okay.
| | 05:34 | So now I've got something pretty
close and again, we can change this later.
| | 05:38 | So let's go back into Face Mode, again
Ctrl+Tab, right-click on these four faces.
| | 05:43 | Now this is going to be the character's mouth.
| | 05:46 | So let's do an Extrude Region and the
first one, I am just going to Extrude it
| | 05:50 | just a little bit, because I want
a harder edge to that mouth cavity.
| | 05:55 | So right now I am just going to bring
it in just a little bit, in fact it might
| | 05:59 | be better to hide my Subdivision Surface
Modifier right now and just see exactly
| | 06:05 | what I'm working on in the mesh.
| | 06:08 | So if I make this deep like this, then we're
going to have a very gradual edge to his mouth.
| | 06:14 | I really want this to be fairly shallow
like this, so that way we kind of have a
| | 06:18 | hard edge going into his mouth.
| | 06:20 | So I am going to hit Extrude Region one
more time and this will create his mouth
| | 06:25 | cavity and because this is his mouth
cavity we can also scale this up a little
| | 06:30 | bit just to give a little bit of room
to make it look a little more like an
| | 06:34 | empty mouth, and then let's go
ahead and just turn this on again.
| | 06:37 | I'm going to go over to my
Subdivision Surface Modifier, turn on my little
| | 06:40 | Eyeball here and you could see
now I've got the basics of a mouth.
| | 06:44 | So as you could see, we're starting to
block out the basic shape of the character.
| | 06:49 | We still have a lot of refining to go,
but let's do just do a little bit more.
| | 06:53 | I am going to go ahead and select
these faces at the top and let's choose a
| | 06:59 | little bit of proportional modeling here.
| | 07:00 | So I am going to go ahead and Enable
Proportional Modeling and then just kind of
| | 07:04 | pull his head up just a little bit.
| | 07:06 | So again, we are trying to get that
curve at the top of his head and so now as I
| | 07:10 | lift this up you can see that the
mouth also proportionally is a little bit
| | 07:15 | lower on the character, so that makes
it a little bit easier in terms of size.
| | 07:19 | And if want, I could actually scale of this.
| | 07:21 | Hit the S key, scale that head up just
a little bit and as you can see we're
| | 07:26 | starting to block out this character.
| | 07:29 | Now I am going to go ahead and stop
here, because our next step is modeling
| | 07:33 | the character's arms.
| | 07:35 | I am going to use another modifier with that.
| | 07:37 | So, at this point we've blocked out the
basic shape of the character, his legs,
| | 07:41 | his mouth and the shape of his head.
| | 07:44 | But we still have a long way to go.
| | 07:46 | But just remember, when modeling
something like this you basically just start
| | 07:50 | with a simple shape and
then just add detail as needed.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Symmetrical modeling with the Mirror modifier| 00:01 | Now let's take a look at how
to do Symmetrical Modeling.
| | 00:04 | In Blender this is done
using the Mirror Modifier.
| | 00:07 | Now I have this basic character and
we've got some of the parts blocked out, but
| | 00:12 | we still need to block out the character's arms.
| | 00:14 | Now the arms are kind of a symmetrical
thing where you have a right arm and a left arm.
| | 00:19 | Now, I could just model them individually,
I am going to hit Tab and go in here.
| | 00:24 | For example, if I wanted to I could
take the faces around where the arms socket
| | 00:30 | would be and I could just
extrude those by doing Extrude Region.
| | 00:34 | But what I'm doing on the left side of
the character is not reflecting on the
| | 00:40 | character's right side.
| | 00:42 | So, there is a very distinct
possibility that this won't be exactly symmetrical.
| | 00:46 | So I am going to go ahead and undo that.
| | 00:48 | Now one way you can do it in some
programs is to select both of them and extrude
| | 00:54 | them at the same time, but that
doesn't really work quite as well in Blender.
| | 00:58 | So probably the best way to do these
sorts of modeling is to use the Mirror
| | 01:02 | Modifier and this is actually a really
good modifier, I like this one a lot.
| | 01:07 | So what we have to do first is we
have to cut our character in half.
| | 01:11 | So I am going to go into X-ray Mode
here, just by clicking this little button
| | 01:16 | down here and I'm going to position the
character so that I'm seeing him pretty
| | 01:21 | much from the front.
| | 01:22 | I could go into a front view at this
point, but it looks like I can get it from
| | 01:26 | here and then I am going to hit B to do
a Box select and just select all of the
| | 01:32 | faces on the character's right side.
| | 01:35 | Now I am going to scroll around here
just to make sure that I've got everything
| | 01:40 | and I do, so I am just going to go
ahead now and hit the Delete key.
| | 01:44 | Now a Menu option comes up and it
asks you what you want to delete, the
| | 01:47 | Vertices, the Edges, the Faces,
do you want to delete everything.
| | 01:50 | Well, in this case I just want to
delete the Faces and when I do that the
| | 01:55 | character is cut in half.
| | 01:57 | So now that we have that, we
can start mirror modeling him.
| | 02:02 | But before I do that I want to
actually get rid of my Subdivision Surface
| | 02:05 | Tool and start from scratch, because really
we want, we want a mirror and then subdivide.
| | 02:12 | So I want the mirror to be at the bottom.
| | 02:14 | So I am just going to delete
Subdivision Surfaces, add in the Mirror Modifier
| | 02:18 | and again we're in the Modifier Panel here.
| | 02:21 | And once we do, what you get, actually
you do get a little bit of some extra
| | 02:25 | geometry, but it doesn't seem to be right.
| | 02:28 | Well that's because by default the
mirror modifier is going along the X-axis, so
| | 02:33 | it's in other words just
going along this red axis here.
| | 02:37 | We're actually modeling along the Y-axis,
so if I click on the Y-axis and click
| | 02:42 | off the X-axis, you'll see that it
makes a perfect mirror of the character.
| | 02:48 | And down here we have what's called a
Merge Limit, and what that does is it just
| | 02:52 | says any vertices that are within
this limit will get stuck together.
| | 02:58 | So because we started with our character
exactly in the middle, this should just
| | 03:02 | stick together all the way.
| | 03:04 | Now one of the things you don't want
to do is start moving this centerline.
| | 03:08 | So if I go into Vertex Mode for example
and I move one of these, you'll see that
| | 03:13 | everything is mirrored, but we
really don't want that to happen.
| | 03:17 | So be sure to respect the center line.
| | 03:19 | But we can continue to model anywhere
on the character and it will be reflected
| | 03:25 | on the other side, which is really, really nice.
| | 03:28 | So, let's use this to actually
start creating the character's arms.
| | 03:32 | So the first thing I am going to do is
let's go ahead and go into Edge Mode here
| | 03:37 | and I'm going to select this Edge Loop
here and just move it up just a little
| | 03:41 | bit, because what I want to do is kind
of bring this amount of detail down just
| | 03:45 | a little bit and then I'm
going to go into Face Mode.
| | 03:48 | I am going to select these four faces
on the side of the body, right here and
| | 03:54 | we're going to extrude.
| | 03:56 | So I am just going to do an Extrude Region.
| | 03:58 | And notice how when I extrude that
actually mirrors on the other side, which is
| | 04:03 | really kind of cool.
| | 04:04 | So, now that I have this I can use my
Scale Tool to kind of square this up a
| | 04:09 | little bit and may be shrink it down
and again, I want this arm to have kind
| | 04:14 | of a circular profile.
| | 04:16 | So I will need to bring in
the edges and the vertices.
| | 04:19 | So let's go ahead and go into Edge
Mode here and I want this to move down and
| | 04:26 | then I am going to go into Vertex Mode,
select the corners of this box, hit S
| | 04:33 | to scale and scale them in just so that we
get more of a circular outline, so there we go.
| | 04:40 | So now, again Ctrl+Tab go into Face Mode,
shift those and now we can extrude the
| | 04:47 | rest of the character's arms.
| | 04:49 | So I am going to do an Extrude
Region, extrude out a little bit more.
| | 04:52 | I am going to scale those down just a
bit and then do another Extrude Region.
| | 04:58 | So this is basically the roughed out arms.
| | 05:01 | We're going to finish these a little bit later.
| | 05:03 | So I just kind of want to show you some
of that as to how the Mirror Tool works.
| | 05:08 | Now let's go ahead and use the
Mirror Tool to add some more detail.
| | 05:11 | We still need an eye socket for our character.
| | 05:14 | So we can do that by going into Edge Mode.
| | 05:17 | So I am going to deselect, go into Edge
Mode and for this character I am going
| | 05:23 | to go ahead and turn off X-ray here.
| | 05:25 | I want his eye to be almost
on the outside of the top lip.
| | 05:29 | So I want some detail on this side
and on this side and enough to make a
| | 05:34 | circular outline so that I can extrude
an eye socket into the character's head.
| | 05:40 | So we're going to need a few more Edge Loops.
| | 05:43 | So I am going to select Loop Cut and
Slide and I'm going to select right here on
| | 05:49 | the inside of the mouth and lay one
in here, lay one on the outside of the
| | 05:54 | mouth, right there, okay.
| | 05:56 | So that gives me enough vertical detail.
| | 05:59 | I still need more horizontal detail.
| | 06:02 | And again, we're going to do
another Loop Cut and Slide.
| | 06:04 | So I am going to go ahead and add in
one here, one here and one more and again
| | 06:11 | remember, we click, drag and then click again.
| | 06:15 | So what I've created is enough detail,
so that when I go into Face Mode, I can
| | 06:21 | select these four faces and that will
be the outline of the character's eye.
| | 06:28 | Now, if I zoom in here, you'll
see that well it's still square.
| | 06:32 | Just like with the arm I will need to
kind of bring in the edges of this and
| | 06:36 | that's pretty easy to do, because all
we have to do is go into Vertex Mode and
| | 06:41 | then deselect everything and then just
right-click and Shift+Right-click and
| | 06:46 | select all of these.
| | 06:47 | Hit Scale, bring those in, so that
way you can even see it's starting to
| | 06:52 | look like an eye, okay.
| | 06:56 | Now, I've got some of these here are a
little bit too far forward, so I am just
| | 07:01 | going to go ahead and move those in
just a little bit as well as these.
| | 07:07 | And then let's go into Face Mode,
so I am going to go ahead and select
| | 07:10 | these, position them, make sure that they are
pretty flat and then let's do another extrude.
| | 07:16 | So I am going to do Extrude Region, make
the inside of the eye socket and do one
| | 07:20 | more to give the eye socket some depth.
| | 07:22 | So again, just like with the mouth, we
want kind of a little tight ring around
| | 07:26 | here and then a little bit of
depth to hold that eye socket.
| | 07:30 | Deselect and look what we have.
| | 07:32 | So, this is some of the
workflow for symmetrical modeling.
| | 07:36 | As you can see this
could be very, very powerful.
| | 07:39 | Now we still have a lot more
reshaping to do on our character, we could
| | 07:42 | probably add some more detail
around the belly and still reshape the
| | 07:46 | character's eyes and that sort of thing.
| | 07:48 | But you can see that we've got most of
the major shapes already blocked out.
| | 07:53 | Now the Mirror Tool is something
that we'll eventually want to apply.
| | 07:59 | Once we have our character fully
modeled and we've got the symmetry where we
| | 08:03 | want it, we will hit
Apply to that Mirror Modifier.
| | 08:07 | But not right now, we actually want to
keep this on as we continue to refine the
| | 08:12 | character, and once he is done then
we'll apply it and it will bring the
| | 08:17 | character back to one entire mesh.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Joining mesh objects| 00:01 | Another way to add complexity to a Mesh
Model is to join multiple meshes together.
| | 00:06 | Now, we can do that with this particular
character, by joining his hand to his body.
| | 00:12 | But before we do that, let me give you a
little background on how this all works.
| | 00:18 | So before we do anything, I'm just
going to do a simple File>New, and this
| | 00:23 | brings up a simple Cube.
| | 00:25 | Now, I'm going to move this Cube out of the way.
| | 00:27 | And we've done this before, where we
actually take an object and we add a new one.
| | 00:32 | So I'm just going to add in a Mesh>UV
Sphere, and this is basically pretty simple.
| | 00:38 | We have two objects in the scene;
| | 00:40 | we have the Cube and we have the Sphere.
| | 00:44 | Now, something different
happens when you're in Edit Mode.
| | 00:48 | So I'm going to right-click on this
Sphere, hit Tab to go into Edit Mode.
| | 00:53 | Now I'm going to add in, using Shift+A, a Mesh,
and I'm going to add in another UV Sphere.
| | 01:01 | Now, when I do that, you'll see that,
well, I get a Sphere here, but if you look
| | 01:08 | over here in the Outliner,
I only have one object.
| | 01:12 | If I hit Tab to go out of Edit Mode,
notice how both of these objects are selected.
| | 01:18 | In other words, they're
actually the same object.
| | 01:22 | So when I added the first Sphere in,
in Object Mode, it came in as an object,
| | 01:29 | but when I added in the second object
in when I was in Edit Mode, it added in
| | 01:34 | the faces and combined the two as one.
| | 01:37 | Now, this can actually be quite handy,
because if you just need some additional
| | 01:41 | detail and you want it attached to
the model, you can do it very quickly.
| | 01:46 | Now, if you want to do this after
the fact, then you can also join them
| | 01:51 | together externally.
| | 01:52 | So if I select my Sphere and then Shift
+Select my Cube, we can combine them.
| | 01:58 | Now, this is important, the last
object you select will be the master object,
| | 02:04 | so in this case, the Cube is the last one
selected, so the Sphere will go into the Cube.
| | 02:10 | And we can join them by doing Object>
Join, and the hot key for that is Ctrl+J.
| | 02:16 | And once we do that, notice how the
original Sphere goes away and all we have
| | 02:21 | now is a Cube object.
| | 02:23 | And that contains all of those vertices.
| | 02:26 | In other words, the detail from
all of those objects goes into one.
| | 02:30 | So now, if your brain has been going in
fast forward, you can see how we can do
| | 02:34 | this with the hand on our character.
| | 02:37 | So I'm going to go ahead and just open
up that file one more time, and let's go
| | 02:41 | ahead and scroll in.
| | 02:43 | Now, I've got basically a separate
object here, and this is just a hand;
| | 02:48 | I can hit Tab here so you
can see how this is built.
| | 02:51 | Basically, I just took a
Cube and extruded out a thumb.
| | 02:54 | So he is going to have mitten hands, he
is not going to have full fingers, but
| | 02:59 | that's fine for this particular character.
| | 03:01 | But what we want to do is
just join this together.
| | 03:05 | So I'm going to select my hand and then
Shift+Select my character, whose name is
| | 03:09 | still Cube, and then
we're going to do Object>Join.
| | 03:14 | And now, they're one object.
| | 03:17 | And also notice how, because I still
have the Mirror Modifier on them, that it
| | 03:23 | actually mirrors the additional
geometry, which is kind of cool.
| | 03:28 | So now, the next step is to actually go
in, and stitch together this open space,
| | 03:34 | and we'll do that in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Stitching vertices| 00:00 | Now that we've joined our hand to our
character, we still need to stitch up
| | 00:04 | the gap between the two parts, and we can do
that using either the Merge Tool or Remove Doubles.
| | 00:10 | I'll show you how to do both.
| | 00:11 | Now, the first thing we need to do
is we need to connect up that gap.
| | 00:16 | So I'm going to Zoom in here and we're
going to do a little bit of modeling here.
| | 00:20 | I'm going to right-click to select my
object, hit Tab, and the first thing we
| | 00:25 | need to do is we need to delete
these faces so that we have open edges.
| | 00:29 | So I'm going to go into Face Mode,
right-click, and Shift+select these eight
| | 00:37 | faces, so basically I'm
selecting the faces on both sides.
| | 00:41 | Hit the Delete key, while deleting faces.
| | 00:44 | So now we've got kind of this open edge and
all we have to do is connect them together.
| | 00:49 | So we can do that in Vertex Mode using Snap.
| | 00:53 | So if I go into Vertex Mode, select one
of these, and I'm going to go ahead and
| | 00:59 | turn on Snap and turn on Snap to Vertex.
| | 01:04 | Then, I'm going to hit G for Grab and that
should Snap to any one of those vertices.
| | 01:12 | And once I do that, I can left-click to
let go and then right-click on the next
| | 01:17 | one, hit G and then Snap.
| | 01:20 | So it's basically, pattern
is, right-click, G, Snap.
| | 01:25 | So I'm just going to go ahead and
just go all the way around and just Snap
| | 01:30 | all those together.
| | 01:31 | So it's only eight vertices,
it shouldn't take too long.
| | 01:36 | So now that we have these snapped
together, you might fool yourself into
| | 01:41 | thinking, oh, well, that's all we have to do.
| | 01:43 | No, what we have here is we have
a situation where we have multiple
| | 01:49 | vertices stuck together.
| | 01:51 | So first thing I want to do is go
ahead and turn off Snap, but if I were to
| | 01:54 | select one of these, you can see
that I still have kind of a double;
| | 01:58 | I have two vertices basically
snapped to the same point in space.
| | 02:03 | So if I wanted to, I could
just merge them together.
| | 02:08 | So we have a Merge command here, and
all I have to do is select both vertices.
| | 02:14 | So I'm going to go ahead and deselect,
and let's go ahead, and I'm going to use
| | 02:17 | my Circle Tool here.
| | 02:18 | So I'm going to hit C and select
these two vertices, so hopefully that will
| | 02:23 | select both of those.
| | 02:25 | And then all I have to
do is merge them together.
| | 02:29 | So I can do this under Mesh>Vertices,
we have an option here called Merge, but
| | 02:33 | let me show you a quick little secret.
| | 02:35 | Vertices, Edges, and Faces, each one of
these have their own menu, and all you
| | 02:40 | have to do is hit Ctrl and the first
letter of each one, so Ctrl+V for Vertices,
| | 02:45 | Ctrl+E for Edges, and Ctrl+F for Faces,
and we can get that menu very quickly.
| | 02:52 | So if I want I can do Ctrl+V>Merge,
and where do we want to merge, we want to
| | 02:57 | Merge those At Center and it should merge those.
| | 03:00 | And if we wanted to, we could go around
and merge all of them individually, but
| | 03:06 | if you have a lot of Vertices,
that's going to get very, very tedious.
| | 03:09 | So let me show you the faster way to do this.
| | 03:12 | First thing, I want to do is select all of this.
| | 03:15 | So I'm going to turn on X-Ray Mode and
then I'm going to just Lasso+select by
| | 03:22 | holding down Ctrl+Left Arrow, and
I'm Lasso selecting all of those.
| | 03:27 | So now what I've done is, I've actually
selected each one of these, and each one
| | 03:33 | of those is a double vertex.
| | 03:34 | In other words, they're
basically called doubles.
| | 03:37 | I'm going to hit Ctrl+V to bring up my
Vertex Menu, and we have an option here
| | 03:41 | called Remove Doubles.
| | 03:43 | So once I do that, you'll see
here it says Removed 8 vertices.
| | 03:48 | Well, that's the number I have around
there, so basically what it's done is it's
| | 03:52 | merged those together in one operation.
| | 03:55 | Makes it much nicer.
| | 03:57 | So if I go into each Vertex, you
can see now it's all tied together.
| | 04:04 | If you go into Face Mode, you can
see that the edges are stuck together.
| | 04:09 | So now I've got my parts stuck together.
| | 04:13 | So now I have my hand on my character
and it's also mirrored on the other side.
| | 04:19 | So now all I have to do is just go
through and do some modeling to kind of clean
| | 04:25 | that up and make it proportional.
| | 04:28 | So let's just go over
this process one more time.
| | 04:31 | In order to stitch together two objects,
you need two open edges that have the
| | 04:37 | same number of vertices, and then you
snap vertices from one to the other, and
| | 04:43 | then once they're all snapped together,
you select all the vertices and then
| | 04:47 | you do Remove Doubles.
| | 04:49 | It should work every time.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Finalizing a simple creature | 00:01 | Once the character's hands are
stitched to the body, the character is pretty
| | 00:05 | close to being finished.
| | 00:06 | Now, we do have a few things that we
should do as we start to finalize this mesh.
| | 00:11 | One is, we still need to fit
the eyes to the eye socket.
| | 00:16 | So the eyes are going to be just
simple Spheres, so let's just go ahead and
| | 00:19 | add in a UV Sphere.
| | 00:22 | Now, this comes in a little bit big,
so we definitely want to scale that down
| | 00:26 | to about the size of that eye socket, and
let's go ahead and just move that into place.
| | 00:34 | And I'm just kind of getting it pretty close.
| | 00:38 | Now, one of the things I'm kind of
realizing is that the eye might be a little
| | 00:41 | bit big, but actually, it's nice to
have the eye a little bit bigger than the
| | 00:45 | eye socket, that gives you a
little bit more room to play with.
| | 00:49 | So maybe I can scale it down
just a hair, but not too much.
| | 00:52 | You don't want it so it's inside the eye
socket, you actually want it a little bit bigger.
| | 00:57 | And now, once I have that, then all I
have to do is select my mesh, go into Edit
| | 01:02 | Mode, and then just kind of tweak
the position of those edges here.
| | 01:07 | So I'm basically just going
to select Double Vertices.
| | 01:12 | So I want to make sure I select this outline.
| | 01:15 | Notice how we have this kind of double
line around his eye, so I want to make
| | 01:20 | sure that when I select one vertices, I
also select the inner and the outer one.
| | 01:25 | Now, these vertices at the back really
don't matter, because we're not going to
| | 01:28 | see those, those are just to
give a little bit more depth.
| | 01:31 | And again, I'm just trying to
bring these in so that they're kind of
| | 01:35 | sitting around the eyeball.
| | 01:37 | Now, we also can play with these.
| | 01:39 | Obviously, as we get into animating
character, these are going to be able to be
| | 01:43 | manipulated to give them a
little bit of expression as well.
| | 01:46 | So when I have this on X-Ray Mode
there is the possibility of selecting Back
| | 01:50 | Facing Vertices, and so you
have to be careful of that.
| | 01:53 | So if I, for example, click here, I'm
actually selecting this vertices in the
| | 01:57 | back, so I want to make sure I
don't do that, which I was doing.
| | 02:02 | And again, I'm just going to go ahead
and just dial this in, as closely as I can.
| | 02:07 | Now, I'm not going to get too precise there,
but I think you understand what the process is.
| | 02:13 | Now, once I have that eye pretty much in
place, I'm going to hit Tab, we can see
| | 02:18 | how it looks, we can actually put a
Subdivision Surface Modifier on it, just to
| | 02:23 | make sure how it looks.
| | 02:24 | Now, one of the things I'm noticing is
that, that eye is a little far into the
| | 02:28 | eye socket, and maybe I can bring that
out a little bit. Yeah, there we go.
| | 02:32 | That makes it look a little bit better.
| | 02:34 | So once I have that, then I can also
just duplicate that eye, and we just hit
| | 02:39 | Duplicate Objects in order to duplicate
that, and I can just move that over in
| | 02:44 | the Y direction, and it should
just match up pretty closely.
| | 02:49 | The eyes are pretty much in place.
| | 02:51 | And so now we still have this
character mirrored, and we still have
| | 02:54 | Subdivision Surfaces on him.
| | 02:56 | So let's go ahead and first thing I want
to do is just apply that Mirror Modifier.
| | 03:02 | And when I do that, now
the character is one mesh.
| | 03:08 | So I'm going to hit Tab to go into
Edit Mode, just to make sure that
| | 03:11 | everything went properly, and looks
like the mesh is pretty much in place and
| | 03:17 | the way that I want it.
| | 03:19 | Now, if I want to do some more work on
this, one of the things I could do is use
| | 03:23 | some of sculpting tools
just to smooth things out.
| | 03:27 | So actually, I am going to do that.
| | 03:29 | I'm going to go out of Edit Mode into
Sculpt Mode, and I want to make sure that
| | 03:35 | my Symmetry is turned on and, again,
we're symmetrical around Y for this
| | 03:39 | particular character.
| | 03:41 | And then for the Tool, I'm actually
going to do a Smoothing Tool, because one
| | 03:47 | of the things I'm noticing is that
there's a little bit of unevenness here, if
| | 03:51 | you can kind of see it in the light, and
that's just because of the way that it was modeled.
| | 03:54 | So I want to make sure that my brush is
fairly big, and then I'm just going to
| | 03:59 | kind of stroke him a little
bit and that will smooth him out.
| | 04:04 | Now, you can see how that's already
just kind of evening out some of that rough
| | 04:08 | spots in the character.
| | 04:10 | Now, I don't want to get too much on
his head but, again, I can just smooth
| | 04:17 | that out, and you can see how that's
already giving him a much better sort of profile.
| | 04:24 | And again, we can also decrease the
Strength of this, so that way it's not too tough.
| | 04:31 | In other words, we have to do a few more
clicks, but that's not that big of a deal.
| | 04:34 | Now, once you get the character the way
that you like it, go ahead and Save him out.
| | 04:41 | Also make sure that he's smooth shaded,
and then the next step to do is to
| | 04:45 | actually put some textures on him.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating text| 00:00 | Now, let's take a look at
how to create text in Blender.
| | 00:04 | I'm going to go ahead and just start
with File>New, and we're just going to
| | 00:08 | start with a blank file here.
| | 00:10 | I'm going to go ahead and right-click
on this Cube and delete it, and that way
| | 00:15 | we have some free space with which to work.
| | 00:18 | So the first thing I'm going to
do is go ahead and Add some Text.
| | 00:22 | And when we do, well, the word
Text comes up, and there is our text.
| | 00:27 | Now, if you want to edit the text,
just like you would do with a mesh, you go
| | 00:31 | into Edit Mode, you do the same for text.
| | 00:33 | So when I go into Edit Mode, a
little cursor comes up, and I can hit my
| | 00:37 | Backspace and I can type whatever I want.
| | 00:41 | So you can basically just type, and then
when you hit Tab to go back into Object
| | 00:46 | Mode, you're in Object Mode.
| | 00:48 | Now, when we have text, we have a special
tab here in the Properties Panel for the Text.
| | 00:55 | So we can have a number of options here,
such as what's the Resolution for Render.
| | 01:02 | In other words, how much
does it in-between that shape.
| | 01:06 | And do we want to Fill both
the Front, the Back, or None.
| | 01:09 | So, in other words, do I want to
see this from the Back and the Front.
| | 01:13 | Texturing, basically how
do you want to texture that.
| | 01:16 | We'll get into Texturing a little bit later.
| | 01:18 | And then Geometry, do
you want this to be Offset.
| | 01:22 | In other words, do you want it
skinnier or bigger or smaller?
| | 01:25 | I'm going to go ahead and
set that to actually back to 0.
| | 01:30 | The next option is Extrude;
| | 01:32 | do you want to extrude
this, and if so, how much?
| | 01:35 | So I'm going to extrude it just a little bit
so that we have a little bit of depth there.
| | 01:41 | And then, do we want to Bevel the Front
of that, do we want to Bevel it or not?
| | 01:46 | And then what's the Resolution of that
Bevel, do you want it kind of Circular or
| | 01:50 | do you want it Angular,
and that's what this will do.
| | 01:53 | Now, we can also change the Font.
| | 01:56 | Now, this gets a little technical,
because you need to know where your Fonts are
| | 02:00 | stored on your computer.
| | 02:02 | Now, on a UNIX system it's
in usr/lib/fonts, I believe.
| | 02:08 | On a Windows system, it's in
the Windows folder, under Fonts.
| | 02:13 | And then all of the Fonts are here.
| | 02:16 | Now, if you want you can just select
whichever Font you want, and if it's a
| | 02:20 | valid Font, it will come up.
| | 02:22 | And once you've loaded the Font, you can
go to the Font Menu here and now you have 2.
| | 02:27 | Now, this Bfont is just the one that
comes stocked with Blender, but we can add
| | 02:33 | in any additional Fonts.
| | 02:34 | So if I wanted to add in one more, I could do
that, and I have a lot of Fonts on this system.
| | 02:41 | But basically, just select
whichever Font you want, and there you go.
| | 02:45 | So now I can pick between any one of these.
| | 02:51 | Now, in addition to this, we
also have Paragraph alignment.
| | 02:55 | Now, this typing box isn't limited to
just one line of text, you could actually
| | 02:59 | type entire paragraphs.
| | 03:01 | And in that case, we want to have
Center, Left, Right, Justified, just all of
| | 03:06 | your standard type of text options here.
| | 03:10 | We can also add Boxes
around the text if we want.
| | 03:15 | And once you've created your text, it does
show up as a standard object in the Outliner.
| | 03:22 | So now I have my Text Object here as
well as any other object I would want in
| | 03:28 | my scene.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Boolean tools| 00:00 | Another nice modifier is the Boolean Modifier.
| | 00:04 | Now, this is familiar to anybody who
has used CAD or solid modeling, and what
| | 00:09 | it does is it allows you to take one object
and use it to cut away or add to another object.
| | 00:15 | So let's take a look at how to use this.
| | 00:17 | I've got two objects here;
| | 00:19 | I've got a Cylinder and a Cube.
| | 00:22 | So I am going to go ahead and select
the Cylinder and move it down so that
| | 00:26 | it overlaps the Cube.
| | 00:28 | In fact, we should probably
take a look at this in Wireframe.
| | 00:31 | I just want this to make sure
that it's intersecting that Cube.
| | 00:35 | Now, I'm going to select the Cube,
itself leaving the Cylinder unselected and we
| | 00:42 | are going to go over to the Modifiers
Panel of that Cube and add a Modifier, and
| | 00:46 | in this case we are going
to add the Boolean Modifier.
| | 00:49 | Now, at this point it's not doing
anything, and that's because we need to select
| | 00:55 | the object to be the effecter.
| | 00:58 | In other words, the object is
going to cut or add to the Cube.
| | 01:02 | If we click here, we can select
Cylinder and now something happens.
| | 01:08 | In fact, it's probably better to take a
look at this in Wireframe, because the
| | 01:12 | highlighted orange is really the
effect of the Boolean operation.
| | 01:18 | So we have three options;
| | 01:20 | Intersection, which is the area of the
Cube that intersects with that Cylinder;
| | 01:26 | Union, in other words,
the Cube plus the Cylinder.
| | 01:31 | You can see how the orange
Wireframe completely encloses the Cylinder.
| | 01:36 | And then we also have Difference, and
what that does is it creates a little hole
| | 01:42 | where the Cylinder intersects with the Cube.
| | 01:46 | Now, this is actually live, so if I
were to move the Cube, you can see that the
| | 01:52 | Intersection spot actually moves with that Cube.
| | 01:57 | So once we have a Boolean and we like it,
probably the easiest thing to do is to hit Apply.
| | 02:02 | Now, once I hit Apply, that freezes
the effect and now we can move the Cube
| | 02:10 | off of the Cylinder.
| | 02:12 | And if I go into a Solid Mode,
you can see what happened.
| | 02:16 | So Booleans are really good for creating
mechanical objects, hard surface objects.
| | 02:22 | Typically you don't use Booleans
for things that are going deform, like
| | 02:26 | characters and those sorts of thing.
| | 02:28 | And the reason is because when you
create a Boolean, you see how we get all of
| | 02:35 | this additional geometry, and so that
makes it very hard to deform the object.
| | 02:41 | Now, this may look clean and render
very nicely, but if we start to move
| | 02:45 | vertices around, the model will break up.
| | 02:47 | So remember, Boolean is an active
operation until you hit Apply and also use
| | 02:54 | it on solid objects.
| | 02:55 | Deformations and Booleans don't agree.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Vertex groups| 00:00 | Now, as you start working with more
complex meshes, there are times when you'll
| | 00:04 | want to identify certain parts of
that mesh and be able to come back to it
| | 00:09 | later, and this is where
Vertex Groups comes in handy.
| | 00:13 | It allows you to save off groups of
vertices that you can select later, and this
| | 00:19 | can be really important, particularly if
you have difficult selections that take
| | 00:23 | a while to construct.
| | 00:25 | You can save those
selections and then come back.
| | 00:28 | So let's take a look at how this works.
| | 00:30 | So I've got this simple character here,
and I am going to go ahead and select
| | 00:33 | him and go into Edit Mode, and I want
to make sure that I'm in Vertex Mode as
| | 00:38 | well, so I am going to be selecting
Vertices, and let's go ahead and just
| | 00:42 | select one of his hands.
| | 00:43 | I am going to go ahead and select
his left hand or the vertices that
| | 00:46 | comprise his left hand.
| | 00:48 | And once I have these selected, I want
to go over in the Properties Panel to
| | 00:53 | this little triangle here, and
this stands for the vertices.
| | 00:58 | So if you'll scroll down here,
you'll notice we have a roll out here
| | 01:02 | called Vertex Groups.
| | 01:03 | And right now that's empty, but we can
create a new group to hold these vertices.
| | 01:10 | So I am going to go ahead hit Plus and
that creates a blank group, but I want to
| | 01:15 | give this a more descriptive name.
| | 01:16 | So I am going to go ahead and call it Lt_Hand.
| | 01:19 | Now once I have this, it's
still an empty container.
| | 01:23 | I don't have those vertices in
that left hand group yet.
| | 01:28 | In order to do that I have to hit the
Assign key, and once we do that, those
| | 01:33 | vertices are now in that left hand group.
| | 01:36 | So I can now select or deselect those
vertices simply by highlighting those and
| | 01:43 | hitting Select or Deselect.
| | 01:45 | Now, if I wanted to add more
vertices to this group, I could.
| | 01:49 | I could right-click this vertices here
and Hit Assign, and now when it selects,
| | 01:53 | it selects all of those.
| | 01:55 | Or if I wanted to, I could
remove that from the group.
| | 01:59 | So when I Select or Deselect,
it's removed from the group.
| | 02:03 | So you can Assign or Remove individual
vertices or groups of vertices from the Vertex Group.
| | 02:10 | Now, this can be really handy if you
can select a few of them, you can assign
| | 02:14 | them to the group and then turn them
all around and select a few more and,
| | 02:18 | again, assign them to the group
and kind of have this additive way of
| | 02:21 | building that group.
| | 02:22 | So that's one way of doing it.
| | 02:25 | Now, there's another way of creating
groups and that's actually a little bit quicker.
| | 02:29 | So I am going to scroll over here, and let's go
ahead and select the vertices in the right hand.
| | 02:35 | Now, if I wanted to I could create an
empty container and then assign those
| | 02:40 | vertices to that, but there's actually
a faster way, and there's actually three
| | 02:44 | ways of getting to it, so
let me show you all three ways.
| | 02:47 | The first one is the longest path, we
hit Mesh>Vertices, and then we scroll
| | 02:52 | down and there's a Vertex Groups option, and
here's where we can actually do all of our work.
| | 02:58 | But this is three menus.
| | 03:00 | So if we wanted to, we could cut it
down to two menus by hitting Ctrl+V, and
| | 03:05 | that brings up just that Vertices Menu
and, again, we can scroll down to Vertex
| | 03:09 | Groups and we have all of that.
| | 03:11 | But actually the fastest way of doing
it is just hit Ctrl+G for Group and this
| | 03:16 | way we can either Assign it to a New
Group, Assign it to the Active Group, or
| | 03:22 | Remove it or even Set the Active Group.
| | 03:25 | So there's a number of options here.
| | 03:27 | Right now we're just going
to Assign it to a New Group.
| | 03:31 | So what happens is it creates a blank
group and then assigns those vertices.
| | 03:36 | So it's really just a one step process,
much easier than actually creating the
| | 03:41 | empty group and assigning them.
| | 03:42 | Now, again, we have a left hand group and this
one, well, this one needs to be renamed again.
| | 03:48 | So let's call it right hand.
| | 03:50 | And once we have that, we
can Deselect or we can Select.
| | 03:55 | And we also have our Left Hand one,
where one can Select or Deselect, and we can
| | 03:59 | actually Select both of them
or Deselect either one of them.
| | 04:04 | Now, notice here how we have a Vertex
Group here in the Outliner, underneath my
| | 04:11 | Character, and this really is just a way
to set which group is the Active Group.
| | 04:16 | So notice how when I select this one
or that one, you can find those groups.
| | 04:21 | So those are some of the
basics of Vertex Groups.
| | 04:25 | As you can see, it's a really good way
of taking complex selections and making
| | 04:30 | them easy to reselect.
| | 04:32 | Now, one example is
perhaps the character's mouth.
| | 04:34 | If you wanted to, you could select all
of the vertices around the character's
| | 04:37 | mouth, which may be difficult to
select at first, but once we have it, we can
| | 04:41 | make it into a group and come back to it.
| | 04:44 | So there's all sorts of uses for
this tool, and I'm sure you'll get a lot
| | 04:49 | of good use out of it.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
5. Staying OrganizedUsing the Outliner | 00:00 | Now let's take a look at how
to get organized in Blender.
| | 00:04 | Probably the first place that you
need to get organized is in the Outliner.
| | 00:08 | This is a great interface into your scene.
| | 00:12 | Now, we've used the Outliner
just a little bit in this course.
| | 00:16 | The thing that you know how to
do is to select objects by name.
| | 00:20 | So for example, I can click
on the Chair and select it.
| | 00:24 | I can left-click on the
Couch and also select it.
| | 00:28 | Now, before we go too deep into this,
let me go ahead and expand this window
| | 00:33 | here so that we can get a
full look at the Outliner.
| | 00:37 | Now, if you notice here we have
individual entries for each of these objects
| | 00:43 | and clicking on them selects the object,
and also notice, when I click it, the
| | 00:48 | selected object actually has a little
circle around it that tells me it's selected.
| | 00:53 | Now, next to it, I have this little +/-.
| | 00:58 | So if I were to select the Couch and hit
the Plus sign, you'll see that I've
| | 01:02 | got more options underneath here.
| | 01:04 | If I were to hit the Plus sign on
this little vertex thing, you'll see that
| | 01:08 | this is actually the geometry of the
object and attached to that geometry I
| | 01:15 | have the Materials.
| | 01:16 | Actually, I have two Materials;
| | 01:18 | one for the fabric of the
Couch, the other for the Legs.
| | 01:21 | If you go down here, you'll see
that I also have some Vertex Groups for
| | 01:26 | this object as well.
| | 01:28 | So each one of these entries can
contain kind of subheads or additional
| | 01:33 | information about this object.
| | 01:37 | So if I hit the Minus
signs, I can collapse them all.
| | 01:41 | Now, another thing you can do in the
Outliner is you can name and rename objects.
| | 01:47 | So for example, if I were to select the
Floor, I could right-click over it and
| | 01:52 | hit Rename, and then I could type
in a new name. Let's call it Rug.
| | 01:58 | When I do that, you'll
notice how it resorts this list.
| | 02:02 | Rug goes a little bit further down.
| | 02:05 | That's because this is an alphabetic list.
| | 02:07 | Now, another way to rename it is to
Ctrl+left-click, and that just gets you
| | 02:12 | instantly into that Rename, and I can
hit Floor, just type in the name again,
| | 02:18 | and you'll see it resorts that list.
| | 02:21 | Now, along the top you'll see
we have a couple of menus here.
| | 02:25 | The first one is the View Menu, and
this basically shows whether or not these
| | 02:31 | columns here Show, these are called
Restriction columns, and we'll get to
| | 02:35 | those in a little bit.
| | 02:36 | And then we can also do what's called
Show Active, which is actually everything
| | 02:41 | in the scene is active right now.
| | 02:43 | And probably the most important one is we
can Show or Hide the levels of the Outliner.
| | 02:49 | So let me just show you what this does.
| | 02:50 | When I hit Show/Hide One Level, it
expands every single one of these.
| | 02:55 | So it's like it hit the Plus sign on
every single one and it expanded all of those.
| | 03:01 | Now, I can get to this more quickly by
hitting the Plus sign on the number pad,
| | 03:07 | and when I do that, it
expands it a little bit more.
| | 03:09 | Now, if I want to collapse it, all I have to
do is hit the Minus sign on my number pad.
| | 03:15 | So I hit minus sign once, it
collapses it one level, hit minus sign the
| | 03:19 | second time, it collapses it to where we were.
| | 03:23 | The third time, it
collapses it to just the scene.
| | 03:26 | Now, we can have multiple scenes in Blender;
| | 03:30 | we'll get to those in just a little bit.
| | 03:32 | So I am going to go ahead and expand this
scene and see everything that's in there.
| | 03:36 | Now, the second option is a Search Menu.
| | 03:40 | So we have some Search options;
| | 03:43 | we can do Case Sensitive or not, or we can
just type something into this Search Menu.
| | 03:50 | If I type in Chair, you can
see that the Chairs show up.
| | 03:54 | Now, this brings me to another thing that I
need to talk about and that's naming scheme.
| | 04:00 | This search box only works if you
know what the names of the objects are.
| | 04:05 | So as you start building objects in
Blender, be sure to give them logical names,
| | 04:13 | because that way you can get to
them very easily using the search box.
| | 04:17 | If you have a really complex scene, you
may be scrolling through your Outliner
| | 04:22 | quite a bit trying to find those objects,
but a really good naming scheme allows
| | 04:27 | you to search them very easily.
| | 04:29 | Now, let's take a look at this column here;
| | 04:32 | this is called the Restrictions column,
and what it does, it restricts Blender
| | 04:36 | from doing certain things.
| | 04:38 | Now, this first column is
visibility in the Viewport.
| | 04:42 | Now, it's only visible in the Viewport itself.
| | 04:45 | So if I were to click off both of those
Chairs, they would become invisible in
| | 04:52 | the Viewport, so I can't see them.
| | 04:53 | But, and this is important,
they do show up in rendering.
| | 04:58 | So if I were to do a quick render of
this image by selecting Render>Render
| | 05:03 | Image, or just hitting F12, then
I can see how the render shows up.
| | 05:08 | Now, even though these objects are invisible
on my Viewport, they are visible in the Render.
| | 05:15 | So that can actually clear up a lot of
confusion, and you'll say, well, my scene
| | 05:20 | looks like this, but it's rendering differently;
| | 05:22 | go ahead and take a look, make sure
that the objects aren't just hidden.
| | 05:25 | Now, another way to hide
objects is through the Object Menu.
| | 05:31 | So if I were to right-click on this
Chair and go into Object Menu, go up to the
| | 05:37 | top here, you'll see I have a Show/Hide option.
| | 05:40 | So if I wanted to I could just Hide Selected.
| | 05:43 | Now, what it does is it hides the
object and it also just clicks that option
| | 05:47 | off in the Viewport.
| | 05:49 | And I have some additional options
here, so I can show the hidden objects.
| | 05:55 | And another really cool thing is that
if I select one object or a couple of
| | 06:02 | objects, I can hide the unselected objects.
| | 06:07 | In other words, I can hide everything
but the objects that I'm looking at.
| | 06:10 | Now, this can be a really great way
to isolate certain parts of your scene.
| | 06:16 | So again, I'm going to go
ahead and just Show Hidden.
| | 06:20 | Now, remember, all of this works just
in the Viewport; it doesn't render.
| | 06:25 | So if we want things not to render, we
actually have a column for that as well,
| | 06:30 | and that's this far right column
where you have all of these cameras.
| | 06:34 | So if I were to turn these off, that
means the objects themselves won't render.
| | 06:39 | So if I turn off the Chairs, hit F12 to
Render, you'll see that the Chairs don't
| | 06:47 | render, even though
they're showing in the Viewport.
| | 06:50 | Now, this can be used very effectively
to isolate certain parts of your scene.
| | 06:55 | If you wanted to render certain parts and
leave other parts unrendered, you can do that.
| | 07:01 | It's a great way to do a simple
type of render layers functionality.
| | 07:05 | There's a lot of things that you
can do with this Render option here.
| | 07:09 | So I am going to go
ahead and turn those back on.
| | 07:11 | Now, the last one is this middle
column, and this basically just turns
| | 07:16 | selection on or off.
| | 07:18 | In other words, it restricts
me from selecting the object.
| | 07:22 | So if I were to click off the
selection for the Chairs, I could select
| | 07:27 | the Table, I could select the Floor, but when
I click over the Chairs, I can't select them.
| | 07:34 | If I were to hit A to Select
All, it selects everything here.
| | 07:39 | In fact, you can see it here, all of
these options have little circles around
| | 07:44 | them, which means they are all
selected except for the Chairs.
| | 07:48 | So that's, again, another great way to
control your scene and keep it organized.
| | 07:55 | If there is an object there and you
really don't need to select it, just go
| | 07:58 | ahead and turn it off here and that way
you won't be accidentally selecting the
| | 08:03 | wrong thing every time.
| | 08:06 | So those are some of the basics of the
Outliner, and we'll continue to go deeper
| | 08:12 | into the Outliner as we work our way
through the course, but hopefully this will
| | 08:17 | give you a much clearer
view of how the Outliner works.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using layers| 00:01 | Another way to organize your
scene is to organize it into layers.
| | 00:05 | Now, Blender has a Layers Panel that's
at the bottom of every 3D Viewport, and
| | 00:11 | we have a total of 20 layers.
| | 00:15 | So we have groups of 5 times 4
to make a total of 20 layers.
| | 00:21 | In this scene I've actually added
those objects into a couple of different
| | 00:25 | layers, and if we start clicking these
buttons here, we can see what layers are active.
| | 00:31 | So if I click on this button here, you
can see that the first layer contains the
| | 00:36 | Furniture, the Chairs, and the Tables.
| | 00:39 | This second layer contains the
accessories, in other words, the Bowl of fruit,
| | 00:46 | and the third layer contains the Floor.
| | 00:49 | Now, if I want to turn all the layers
on, all I have to do is hold down the
| | 00:54 | Shift key while selecting them.
| | 00:56 | Now, notice how the layers
actually are dark when they are active.
| | 01:02 | If they're inactive, they turn gray.
| | 01:06 | Now, one of these layers actually has
an orange dot in it, and that's because
| | 01:10 | that's the layer with the active objects.
| | 01:14 | So if I were to select the
Floor, the Layer 3 shows up.
| | 01:18 | If I were to right select
the Bowl, Layer 2 shows up.
| | 01:22 | If I click on a piece of
Furniture, then Layer 1 shows up.
| | 01:27 | So those are some of the
basics of how to look at layers.
| | 01:30 | Let's show you a little bit
about how to create layers.
| | 01:34 | So I am going to go ahead and do a File>New,
and we basically just have a Cube in the scene.
| | 01:42 | Now, in this case when you first
create a brand new scene, it only has one
| | 01:47 | layer, as you can see here.
| | 01:49 | Now, if I click on the second layer,
you'll see that, well, there is nothing in
| | 01:53 | any of these additional layers.
| | 01:55 | I am actually going to go ahead and
click on Layer 2 and add in a UV Sphere, and
| | 02:02 | I am going to move this over a little bit.
| | 02:05 | Now, as you can see, now
we have two active layers;
| | 02:09 | I have the layer with my Cube, as well
as with my Lights and my Camera, and I
| | 02:17 | have the layer with the Sphere.
| | 02:20 | Now, if I want I can Shift+Select
and show both of those layers.
| | 02:25 | Now, if I click on the layer with the
Cube and add in another object, let's
| | 02:32 | go ahead and add in a Torus and move
that over, that object shows up in the
| | 02:40 | layer that's active.
| | 02:42 | So I've got Layer 1 was
active when I created that Torus.
| | 02:47 | Now Layer 2 is still just the Sphere.
| | 02:51 | Now, if I want to move that
Torus over to Layer 2, I can do that.
| | 02:56 | So I just need to make sure that I
highlight that, and I can do it in one of two ways.
| | 03:02 | One is to go into the Object Menu, and
there's an option here called Move to
| | 03:07 | Layer, and the hotkey for that is M.
So let's just go ahead and hit M, and
| | 03:12 | you'll see that I get an option here
that tells me which layer I can put it in.
| | 03:18 | So if I want to I can click on Layer
2 and now that object is in Layer 2.
| | 03:25 | So when I click on Layer 2,
now I have those two objects.
| | 03:29 | Now, objects can also exist in multiple layers.
| | 03:34 | So if I were to select the Torus again
and hit M, all I would have to do is hit
| | 03:41 | Shift and select both of these layers,
and now the Torus is in two layers.
| | 03:48 | So when I select this layer, Layer 1,
it's in this layer, and when I select
| | 03:54 | Layer 2, it's also in that layer.
| | 03:58 | So layers are a really handy way to
hide and show objects and also restrict
| | 04:05 | portions of your scene, so that
way you can work more efficiently.
| | 04:10 | One common way to use layers is to put
your Lights and your Cameras in separate
| | 04:14 | layers, so that way you
can hide them if you want.
| | 04:18 | Another way to use layers is to put the
background objects in a separate layer.
| | 04:22 | And I am sure as you start creating
more complex scenes, you'll find plenty
| | 04:27 | of uses for layering.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating groups| 00:00 | You can also organize your scene into groups.
| | 00:03 | Now, groups are basically just names
that are attached to objects, and so you
| | 00:10 | can use groups to do common
operations on larger groups of objects.
| | 00:16 | Let me show you the simplest way to
use groups, and that's as a way to
| | 00:19 | select multiple objects.
| | 00:22 | So I have this scene here.
| | 00:23 | In fact, I am going to go ahead and
pull up my Properties Panel so I can see it
| | 00:27 | a little bit more, and I am going to go
ahead and right-click and Shift+Select
| | 00:32 | both of the Chairs, and
then I'm going to group them.
| | 00:36 | So I am going to go Object>Create New Group.
| | 00:39 | Now, the hotkey for this is Ctrl+G.
So when I do that, you can see how the
| | 00:45 | outlines turn green and that
tells me they are in a group.
| | 00:50 | If I go over to the Object Panel here
and I scroll down, you will see that I
| | 00:55 | have a group for these objects,
and by default it's called Group.
| | 01:01 | We can certainly rename it.
| | 01:03 | I am going to go ahead and
rename that group, Chairs.
| | 01:07 | So now both of these objects
are in a group called Chair.
| | 01:11 | So if I deselect them, select
this object, it's in Chairs.
| | 01:15 | Select this object, it's in Chairs.
| | 01:18 | If I select the Table, well, that's not there.
| | 01:21 | Let's go ahead and Shift+Select both of
those Tables and make a group for them.
| | 01:26 | So I am going to go ahead and hit
Ctrl+G, and that creates a Group.
| | 01:31 | Now, if I look here in the Groups,
you will see that this Group was added.
| | 01:38 | Now all I have to do is rename it.
| | 01:40 | I am going to call it Table or Tables,
and now I have a group for the Tables and
| | 01:47 | a group for the Chairs.
| | 01:49 | So how does this help me?
| | 01:51 | Well, now that I have them defined
as parts of a group, I can select
| | 01:56 | everything in that group.
| | 01:57 | So if I go into my Select Menu,
under Grouped, I can select Group.
| | 02:03 | Now, the hotkey for this is Shift+G.
| | 02:07 | So if I select something else, say the
Chair and hit Shift+G and select Group,
| | 02:13 | it selects both of those Chairs.
| | 02:15 | If I select the Table, hit Shift+G and
select Group, it will select everything
| | 02:21 | in the Tables Group.
| | 02:23 | So this is a really nice way
to select multiple objects.
| | 02:28 | Now, one of the really cool things is
that objects can belong to more than one
| | 02:33 | group, which means we can have all sorts
of varying types of selection sets, and
| | 02:39 | this can be very handy when you're
working with complex scenes and want to
| | 02:44 | select certain groups of objects all at once.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with scenes| 00:01 | Another way to organize your data
within Blender is to use scenes.
| | 00:05 | Now, scenes can be used to create
different setups of the same objects or
| | 00:10 | completely different sets within your project.
| | 00:14 | So by default Blender has a scene and
we can see that here in the Outliner.
| | 00:20 | We also have a window up along here in
the Information Panel, and this allows us
| | 00:26 | to see the available scenes.
| | 00:28 | Now, if we want to add one,
we can certainly do that.
| | 00:32 | We have a Plus sign here
which allows us to add scenes.
| | 00:35 | We have a couple of options here.
| | 00:37 | One is New, and the other one is Copy the
Settings and Link the existing Objects and so on.
| | 00:43 | Let's go through these.
| | 00:45 | The first one is a New Scene.
| | 00:48 | So if I do that it
creates an entirely new scene.
| | 00:52 | If you look here we have Scene and then
we have Scene.001, and notice how that
| | 00:59 | shows up in the Outliner as well.
| | 01:01 | Now, because we just created a New Scene,
we actually created a blank palette in
| | 01:07 | which we can place anything.
| | 01:09 | So if we wanted to we could
add in a Sphere, for example.
| | 01:14 | So now that Sphere is in this Scene.
| | 01:17 | If I click over to the other scene, it's
all the objects that were in that scene.
| | 01:23 | So we have two completely different
setups here in each individual scene.
| | 01:28 | Now, if I want I can make copies of my
existing scene and I can either Link or
| | 01:35 | not Link the Objects.
| | 01:37 | Let me show you what I mean.
| | 01:40 | So in this case we want
to do a Link Objects Scene.
| | 01:44 | So we are going to create Scene 2, and
this one, if you open it up, you will see
| | 01:49 | that, well, it looks exactly
like the scene I had before.
| | 01:53 | So I'd go to my original scene and
then I'd go to Scene 2, it's the same.
| | 01:58 | Well, let's try and change it.
| | 02:00 | Let's go ahead and move the Chairs around.
| | 02:03 | I am going to go ahead and
push those Chairs further apart.
| | 02:05 | Now, if I go back to my original
scene, you'll see that, well, the Chairs
| | 02:10 | are still in the same place, and that's
because we created what's called a Linked Scene.
| | 02:15 | So the objects that move in one scene
also are reflected in the other scene.
| | 02:21 | Now, if I want I can make differences in
this second scene, but if I wanted to I
| | 02:27 | can make the second scene different, but
that means adding in additional things.
| | 02:31 | So let's go ahead and add in a big
Cube here, and we can see now I've got an
| | 02:36 | additional object in this scene
that I don't have in the other.
| | 02:41 | So that's the difference, is
that I'm adding things into it.
| | 02:44 | Now, if we want we can also take this
original scene and just make a copy of it.
| | 02:51 | So if I click here and go Full Copy,
what this does is it actually creates an
| | 02:58 | additional scene, in this case,
Scene 3 that has all those objects, but
| | 03:04 | they're not linked.
| | 03:05 | So if I move the Chairs in this one and
go back to the original, you'll see that
| | 03:15 | I've got my differences here.
| | 03:17 | And in this third scene, which is a
Full Copy, I have copies of every single
| | 03:22 | object in that scene.
| | 03:24 | Now, with the scene is, when you
actually go into these scenes, these are used
| | 03:30 | for organization, but they
can also be used for rendering.
| | 03:32 | So if I were to render this particular
scene, you would see that I can render
| | 03:39 | these objects separately.
| | 03:42 | So in other words, what I'm
creating here is separate scenes for
| | 03:46 | organization and for rendering.
| | 03:48 | So you can have a scene for your long
shot and then another one for the close
| | 03:53 | up, different scenes with
different lighting options and so on.
| | 03:57 | This can be very flexible in
the way that you use Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating hierarchies| 00:00 | Parenting is another way to organize objects.
| | 00:03 | It allows you to connect objects in what
are called Hierarchies, so that you can
| | 00:08 | move one thing and others will follow along.
| | 00:12 | A simple example will be this Tray, which has
a Teapot and a Cup and a Saucer on top of it.
| | 00:17 | Now, if I select the Tray and I
move it, you'll see that, well, nothing
| | 00:23 | moves along with it.
| | 00:24 | That's because these are all separate.
| | 00:27 | If you look here in the Outliner, we
have the Cup, the Plate, the Spoon are all
| | 00:31 | separate, we don't have them
connected together in a Hierarchy.
| | 00:34 | Now, we can fix that by creating the Hierarchy.
| | 00:38 | So let's go ahead and start
with the Cup and the Saucer.
| | 00:42 | So if I take the Plate here and move it,
you'll see that the Cup and the Spoon
| | 00:46 | don't move along with it, but
I can fix that by parenting.
| | 00:50 | So if I select the Cup and Shift+Select
the Spoon, and then select the Plate
| | 00:58 | last, now this is a case
where selection order matters.
| | 01:02 | I have to select the parent object last.
| | 01:04 | Now, once I have everything selected,
I can go over to Object>Parent>Set and
| | 01:12 | then we can set it to the object.
| | 01:14 | But probably the easiest way is to hit
the hotkey, which is Ctrl+P. So when I
| | 01:19 | hit Ctrl+P, it asks me, do I want to
set the Parent to the Object, I click Yes,
| | 01:25 | and now, notice how it's changed in my Outliner.
| | 01:30 | I have the Plate, but if I expand that,
you'll see I have a Cup and a Spoon underneath.
| | 01:36 | So if I right-click on the Plate and move it,
the Cup and the Spoon move along with it.
| | 01:42 | Now, if I take the Cup and I move it off
of the Plate, it's still attached, so I
| | 01:48 | have to make sure that
everything is properly placed.
| | 01:52 | Now, I can have multiple levels of Hierarchy.
| | 01:54 | So let's say we wanted the Plate and
the Teapot to be parented to the Tray, we
| | 02:01 | can do that as well.
| | 02:01 | All I have to do is right-click on the
Plate, Shift+right-click on the Teapot,
| | 02:07 | and again, Shift+right-click on the tray last.
| | 02:10 | Again, the parent object is the last selected.
| | 02:13 | Then I hit Ctrl+P, set Parent to Object,
and now look at how the Outliner has changed.
| | 02:20 | We have the Tray is now the parent of
the Plate and the Teapot, and the Plate is
| | 02:26 | the parent of the Cup and the Spoon.
| | 02:29 | So when I take my Tray and I move it
around, everything follows along, and I
| | 02:35 | can still take my Plate and move it, and
the Cup and the Spoon will move along with it.
| | 02:40 | So we are really getting
multiple levels of parenting.
| | 02:44 | These are called Hierarchies, and
they're very important, not only for
| | 02:48 | organizing your scene, but as
you'll see later, they are very important
| | 02:51 | for animation as well.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
6. Applying Materials Assigning materials to objects| 00:00 | Once you've modeled an object, the next step
is to add some color and shading to that object.
| | 00:07 | We can do this using Blender's materials.
| | 00:10 | So in this lesson, we're going to go
through some of the basics of materials and
| | 00:14 | how to apply them to your objects.
| | 00:18 | So in this scene I have a
simple sphere and a cylinder.
| | 00:22 | So let's go ahead and start off with the sphere.
| | 00:24 | I am going to right-click on it and
go over here to the Properties panel.
| | 00:29 | Now materials are applied and
managed under this panel here.
| | 00:35 | It has a little circle here,
and it looks like a sphere.
| | 00:39 | And in this case, we have no
materials in the scene, so nothing shows up.
| | 00:42 | It's kind of blank.
| | 00:44 | If we want, we can add in a material.
| | 00:46 | If there are materials in the
scene, you will find them here.
| | 00:49 | And obviously, we don't have one, so
we're going to have to create a new one.
| | 00:53 | So I am going to hit on this plus
sign here for New and all of a sudden the
| | 00:58 | interface lights up.
| | 00:59 | We have a material here up on our slot,
and we can have multiple materials per
| | 01:04 | object, and we'll get to
that in just a little bit.
| | 01:07 | Then each material has a name.
| | 01:10 | So when you start creating
materials, it's always a good idea to have
| | 01:13 | somewhat descriptive names.
| | 01:15 | In this case, I am actually going to do
something a little bit generic and I am
| | 01:19 | going to call this Color_A.
| | 01:21 | So we're just going to create a color.
| | 01:23 | And under here we have
some options for the material.
| | 01:26 | One is to create it as a surface, which is,
9 times out of 10, what we'll be doing.
| | 01:31 | But we also have options to
create the material as a wireframe;
| | 01:34 | a volume, which is kind of for special effects;
| | 01:37 | or a halo, and notice how it
changes in the viewport as well.
| | 01:41 | But I am going to go ahead and
click on surface and keep it there.
| | 01:45 | Now below this, we have a preview,
and we can preview just the color.
| | 01:50 | We can preview it on an object such as
a sphere, a cube, the monkey, or we can
| | 01:57 | look at it as strands or as a volume.
| | 02:00 | Well, I am going to go
ahead and keep it on a sphere.
| | 02:03 | And then below this, we
have a bunch of other options.
| | 02:07 | We have Diffuse, which is
the main color of the object;
| | 02:10 | Specular, which is the
highlights; how it shades;
| | 02:14 | transparency;
| | 02:15 | Mirror, which is reflecting;
| | 02:17 | Subsurface Scattering, which just
kind of gives you a translucent effect,
| | 02:21 | strands for hairs those sorts of things;
| | 02:24 | and a number of other options
such as how it shadows, and so on.
| | 02:28 | Right now, we are just going
to stick to some of the basics.
| | 02:30 | All we're going to do is
change the color of this.
| | 02:32 | So I am going to click on the Diffuse
option here, and when I do, you can see a
| | 02:38 | color picker comes up.
| | 02:39 | Now you're probably familiar with color
pickers if you've used any other type of
| | 02:43 | graphic software, but let's
go through some of the basics.
| | 02:46 | We have as our first picker an RGB
slider here, and so you can slide your R,
| | 02:52 | your G, or your B. And
notice how these go from 0 to 1.
| | 02:57 | Some packages go to 255;
| | 03:00 | these go to 0 to 1, but they
pretty much work the same regardless.
| | 03:04 | We also have a spectrum here, so we
can change the color however we want.
| | 03:09 | We have another way of picking
which is Hue, Saturation, and Value.
| | 03:14 | So obviously, we can change the Hue here,
Saturation, and Value, which is light and dark.
| | 03:21 | If we want, we can also do Hex.
| | 03:24 | So, if you have a hex number for
the color, you can just type that in.
| | 03:27 | Or you could also
eyedropper any color in the scene.
| | 03:31 | So I am just going to go ahead and
create kind of a nice cool color, like maybe
| | 03:35 | a blue or a green or something like
that, and then just click off of this.
| | 03:39 | Once we've put a color in that Diffuse
channel, notice how our preview shows up,
| | 03:44 | and also notice how the
object itself reflects that color.
| | 03:49 | So color is applied to this object and so
now we can kind of see that in the viewport.
| | 03:55 | Now, the color is not applied to the
second object because it doesn't have
| | 03:59 | any materials applied.
| | 04:01 | So let's go ahead and take a look at that.
| | 04:02 | We're going to go ahead and
right-click on the cylinder.
| | 04:05 | And again, we can add in either a new
material or we can choose an existing one.
| | 04:11 | In this case, we actually
do have an existing material.
| | 04:14 | We have Color_A, which if
we want, we can apply it.
| | 04:17 | But let's go ahead and
create a new material for this.
| | 04:21 | So I am going to go ahead and
click on that New button again.
| | 04:24 | And in this case, we're going to
have another material called Color_B.
| | 04:30 | And let's just go straight to the
Diffuse color picker, and I'm going to go
| | 04:34 | ahead and just make a kind of a reddish color.
| | 04:37 | So now we have two colors here.
| | 04:39 | If I want, I can now
change the color of the object.
| | 04:43 | So if I want to change this cylinder
from Color_A to Color_B, all I have to do
| | 04:49 | is just click here and now I
actually have some menu options.
| | 04:53 | So if I want to, I can change it to Color_
A or click again and change it to Color_B.
| | 04:59 | So that's one way of adding color to an object.
| | 05:02 | Now, if you want, we can also add
multiple colors to an object as well.
| | 05:07 | So if I click on my sphere, right
now I only have one color in here.
| | 05:13 | I have just one slot for color.
| | 05:15 | And if I want, I could do
the same thing I just did.
| | 05:17 | I can add Color_B, which then
just replaces this, or Color_A.
| | 05:22 | But if I want, I can create
another slot for another material.
| | 05:27 | So all I have to do is hit the plus
sign here and it creates a whole new place
| | 05:33 | to create a material.
| | 05:34 | So if want, I can either select an
existing material or select New and
| | 05:40 | create another color.
| | 05:41 | So let's go ahead and
create one more color here.
| | 05:45 | So now I have another material.
| | 05:47 | We can call it Color_C.
| | 05:49 | So now I have Color_A and
Color_B available to this sphere.
| | 05:55 | But, as you can see, it's only
using that first color, Color_A.
| | 06:00 | If I want to apply that second color
then I need to tell it where to assign
| | 06:06 | that, and we can do this in Edit mode.
| | 06:08 | So I am going to hit Tab, go into
Edit mode, and then hit the A key to
| | 06:13 | deselect everything.
| | 06:15 | And then let's go in to Face mode.
| | 06:17 | I am also going to go into X-ray mode
here, and then just Lasso+Select that
| | 06:23 | top part of the sphere.
| | 06:26 | So you can see, I have
selected a bunch of faces here.
| | 06:29 | Now, once I have those selected,
I can then assign them to a color.
| | 06:35 | Notice how once I went into Edit mode,
this additional set of buttons came up.
| | 06:40 | So if I want, I can assign
that color to those faces.
| | 06:47 | If I deselect here, you can see now
my sphere has two different colors.
| | 06:52 | Now, what's really cool is I
can also select by material.
| | 06:57 | So if I want, I can create a
material just to select things with.
| | 07:00 | So if I want, I can select those faces
or deselect them, and I can also assign.
| | 07:05 | So let's do this one more time.
| | 07:06 | Let's go ahead and hit plus.
| | 07:09 | We're going to create one more slot.
| | 07:11 | And in this case, we're going to choose Color_B.
| | 07:15 | So now I have three colors available,
but only two of those were assigned.
| | 07:19 | So let's go ahead and do a Lasso+Select
of the bottom of the sphere, and now I
| | 07:24 | am going to select Color_B and assign it.
| | 07:28 | So now I have three colors on here.
| | 07:31 | I have A, B, and C. So now when I go back out
in Object mode, you can see how it's assigned.
| | 07:39 | So those are some of the basics of materials.
| | 07:42 | Now, we can assign materials to the
entire object, or we can have multiple
| | 07:47 | materials assigned to
individual faces within the object.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Diffuse shaders| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at the various
diffuse shaders we have available in Blender.
| | 00:05 | Before we get started, let me explain
that I've set up my interface a little bit
| | 00:10 | differently. I have an image editor on
the left and a viewport on the right.
| | 00:15 | This way, when I hit Render I can see
my image immediately in that viewport
| | 00:22 | and still keep working.
| | 00:23 | So in order to render, probably the
easiest thing to do is just hit the F12 key
| | 00:28 | and that will very quickly render your image.
| | 00:32 | So let's talk about diffuse shaders.
| | 00:34 | In the default Blender material, we
have two main options here: Diffuse, which
| | 00:40 | provides the color and Specular,
which provides the highlight.
| | 00:45 | So in this one you notice how the color is
kind of a blue and the highlight is white.
| | 00:51 | If I wanted to, I could change the
color of that highlight, so make it a much
| | 00:56 | brighter color, something like that,
and if I hit F12, you can see how it's
| | 00:59 | kinds of little bit yellower. But for right
now, let's just take this out of the equation.
| | 01:05 | I'm going to go ahead and just
remove specularity, so this way we're just
| | 01:10 | dealing with the diffuse shader.
| | 01:12 | So if I hit F12, you'll see that
I get kind of matte-colored object.
| | 01:18 | In other words, it's all diffuse
with no specularity--and we'll get to
| | 01:23 | specularity in just a little bit. But let's
take a look at some of these diffuse shaders.
| | 01:28 | By default we have the Lambert shader
applied, and notice how there's about five
| | 01:33 | other defaults that we have.
| | 01:35 | Now the Lambert is just a good
all-around diffuse shader, and what it does is it
| | 01:41 | takes your basic color--in other words
this diffuse color--and then it shades it
| | 01:46 | to a darker color depending
upon where the light is hitting.
| | 01:51 | So in this default render here, we get
where the area is lit, we get this color,
| | 01:56 | and then as a light becomes less
intense, or in other words as it falls off, we
| | 02:02 | go to a dark color.
| | 02:04 | Now the shader really controls how this
light-dark shading applies, so if we go
| | 02:11 | from Lambert to the next one--
and that's called OrenNayar--
| | 02:15 | notice we have a new
parameter and that's called Roughness.
| | 02:20 | By default, that's set to 0.5. When it's
at 0 it's pretty much like the Lambert
| | 02:26 | shader, but what the Roughness does is
it adds a little bit of roughness to the
| | 02:30 | surface so that it
scatters light a little bit more.
| | 02:35 | So if I were to hit F12 and render
this, you can see that it gets a little bit
| | 02:39 | rougher, and then as I bring it up--let's
go ahead and bring up to somewhere about
| | 02:44 | 1.6 or so--you can see how it starts to
kind of even out these areas. And you can
| | 02:52 | see it pretty nicely here in the preview.
| | 02:55 | So you notice as I increase the Roughness,
it kind of makes it a little bit darker.
| | 03:01 | If I decrease the Roughness, you
can see how I get lighter areas.
| | 03:06 | The next one is the Toon shader.
| | 03:08 | Now what this does is it basically is a two-
tone shader. Either it's light or it's dark.
| | 03:15 | In other words, the shading just goes
almost immediately from light to dark. So
| | 03:19 | if I were to render that, you
can pretty much see how that works.
| | 03:23 | Now, the only options we have here is the size.
| | 03:27 | In other words, at what point
does it go from light to dark?
| | 03:31 | So if I increase the size that will
give me more lit area. And then we also
| | 03:37 | have a smoothing option, and that just gives
me a little bit of a gradient between those.
| | 03:42 | So if I were to bring smoothing all the
way up, it becomes a Lambert shader, so
| | 03:47 | that smoothing is really what your hard edge is.
| | 03:50 | If I bring this all the way down,
you can see I get a very hard edge.
| | 03:55 | The next one after that is the called
the Minnaert shader, and this actually
| | 03:59 | gives you kind of a rim light affect.
| | 04:03 | By default, we have this option here
called darkness, and let's go ahead and just
| | 04:07 | render it at default, and you can see that well,
| | 04:10 | it's pretty close to that Lambert
shader. But if I bring darkness all the way
| | 04:15 | down to 0, notice how it kind of lights
up and I get this rim-light effect, so
| | 04:21 | let's take a look at how that actually renders.
| | 04:24 | You can see I get this kind of rim-
light effect around the object, and this is a
| | 04:29 | really good way to get kind of a
backlight or rim-light effect without having to
| | 04:34 | actually put a light behind the object.
| | 04:38 | If we go the opposite direction, if we
bring the Darkness above 1, let's say we
| | 04:43 | bring it up to, say, 3, what
happens is we get a dark center.
| | 04:49 | So really anything above 1
starts to accentuate this effect.
| | 04:53 | Now if this is desirable or not,
that's really up to you, but typically when
| | 04:58 | you use this, you tend to keep the darkness
between 0 and 1 to get that rim-light affect.
| | 05:06 | Now the final shader is
called the Fresnel shader.
| | 05:09 | Now this works very similar to a
Fresnel lens, and what it tends to do is bend
| | 05:14 | the shading towards the side.
| | 05:16 | So if I were to render it like this,
you'd get kind of almost a hard line here,
| | 05:21 | because what it's not
doing is it's not really shading.
| | 05:24 | So if I bring my Fresnel effect up--
let's say I bring it up to let say about 1--
| | 05:32 | and I bring my factor, which is kind
of multiplication factor, up to about 2,
| | 05:37 | you can see how it starts to get
darker where it was normally lighter.
| | 05:42 | It's almost like an inverse shader.
| | 05:44 | So when I render that, you can see how
I get that darkness and if I bring that
| | 05:49 | down a little, that factor, you can
kind of see how we can dial that in.
| | 05:54 | Now the last value--let's go
back to the Lambert value here.
| | 05:58 | Now the last option that we have--and
this applies to all of these shaders--is
| | 06:02 | the intensity, and this is really
just the intensity of the color.
| | 06:07 | So it's almost like a color fader.
So if I want to, I could bring down the
| | 06:11 | Intensity to fade that color out to black.
| | 06:15 | Now typically they keep the color
at 0.8, but if you want, you can again
| | 06:21 | bring it up or down.
| | 06:24 | So those are some of the
basics of diffuse shaders.
| | 06:26 | Now one of the really interesting
things about Blender is that it does decouple
| | 06:32 | diffuse and specular, which kinds of
makes it a little bit nicer in terms of
| | 06:36 | creating your own custom looks.
| | 06:39 | But for right now, just understand how
the diffuse shaders work and we're going
| | 06:43 | to move on to specularity in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with specularity| 00:00 | Specularity basically shows the
highlights or the shininess of a surface.
| | 00:07 | Specularity can also be used to show the
character of a surface, such as the roughness.
| | 00:12 | If you can imagine a service that's
fairly rough, it would have kind of modeled
| | 00:16 | or diffuse type of specular highlights.
| | 00:20 | It also can be used to
show the shape of an object.
| | 00:23 | So specularity can be very important
in the way that we create materials.
| | 00:29 | So in Blender we have a
number of options for specularity.
| | 00:34 | As we've seen before, we can change the
color of our specular highlights, so if
| | 00:39 | I were to click here and basically make
it a color, somewhat like teal, we could
| | 00:44 | see how that shows up.
| | 00:46 | If I hit F12 to render, you
can see that on my actual object.
| | 00:51 | Now I'm going to go ahead and turn my
specularity back to white, and let's take a
| | 01:00 | look at some of the
specular shaders that we have.
| | 01:03 | Now we have a whole list of specular
shaders here, and this is actually pretty
| | 01:08 | cool because Blender allows us to
mix and match our diffuse and specular
| | 01:14 | shaders. A lot of software
doesn't allow us to do that.
| | 01:17 | So this actually gives us maximum
flexibility in the way that we construct our materials.
| | 01:24 | Now, in this case the default material
is called CookTorr or Cook Torrance, and
| | 01:30 | this is a good overall shader.
| | 01:32 | It can be used for a lot effects.
| | 01:34 | It's pretty good at doing plastic or kind of
shiny-type surfaces, and it has two options.
| | 01:41 | As with all specular
shaders, we have an Intensity.
| | 01:45 | As we have seen before, if we turn
the Intensity down to 0, it goes away.
| | 01:49 | If I turn the Intensity up, you can see
how it gets very intense here. And we also
| | 01:54 | have a Hardness control.
| | 01:57 | So this basically controls this soft
edge between the center of specular
| | 02:02 | highlight and how much it falls off.
So if I turn the Hardness down all the way,
| | 02:08 | you can see how it basically
can consume the entire object.
| | 02:12 | If I make it very, very hard and I
turn it way high up, say to around 200 or
| | 02:17 | so, you can see how you get a very,
very hard highlight, and you can see that in
| | 02:22 | the rendering as well.
| | 02:23 | Now by default, this is set to 50, and
so let's go ahead and set it back there.
| | 02:29 | And let's go ahead and set
our intensity back to 0.5.
| | 02:33 | Now the next one is called Phong and
again, it's very similar to Cook Torrance.
| | 02:39 | Phong is actually used a lot in glass.
| | 02:43 | It actually is a little bit softer.
| | 02:45 | So if I increase the intensity, you'll
notice I don't get as much of a hard
| | 02:49 | circle in the center. But it's
basically about the same as Cook Torrance in
| | 02:54 | that it has a Hardness
control as well as an Intensity.
| | 03:00 | The next one is Blinn.
| | 03:02 | If you've used other 3D software, this
is a very popular one there, and it's
| | 03:06 | actually probably one of the more natural ones.
| | 03:08 | You can use it for a lot
of different options here.
| | 03:11 | So in addition to Intensity and Hardness,
we have another one called IOR, which
| | 03:18 | is Index of Refraction.
| | 03:20 | Now Index of Refraction is just
another way of doing Hardness.
| | 03:24 | If I bring this up fairly high to, say, 10
and I'll also bring my Hardness up, you
| | 03:31 | can see how I can get a very, very
tight highlight here, and that's almost like
| | 03:36 | kind of a glassy ceramic-y type surface.
But I can go the other direction too.
| | 03:40 | I can bring my Hardness down and drop
my Index of Refraction down, and you can
| | 03:48 | see I can get kind of nice dull
kind of shine type of surface.
| | 03:52 | So this actually is just another way
to create custom types of specularity.
| | 03:59 | Now, the next one is Toon.
| | 04:01 | Now this is pretty straightforward.
| | 04:03 | It's very similar to the Toon diffuse,
and basically it has the same controls.
| | 04:08 | It has a Size as well as a Smooth, so the
Size will basically just control how big that is.
| | 04:14 | In other words, where does it fall off
from the specular highlight to nothing?
| | 04:19 | And then the smoothness,
| | 04:20 | we can go from hard edge here all the
way down to a softer type of highlight.
| | 04:29 | Now, one of the cooler things about the
Toon specularity is that you can use it
| | 04:36 | on other diffuse shaders, so you
don't have to use it on the Toon shader.
| | 04:41 | Obviously if you use with a Toon shader you
can use it together, but you don't have to.
| | 04:46 | You can use it with the Lambert
or an OrenNayar, really any one.
| | 04:50 | This is a good example of where you can mix
and match specularity and diffuse shaders.
| | 04:56 | Now the last one is called Wardlso and
again, it hasn't Intensity control and it
| | 05:02 | also has a Slope control.
| | 05:05 | So if I turn up the intensity a little
bit here, this Slope control is kind of a
| | 05:10 | cross between feathering the Hardness
control and the Index of Refraction. And
| | 05:16 | again, it just gets a little
bit of a different effect.
| | 05:19 | You can see how I have that, so if I
turn it way up, let's say I turn it up to
| | 05:23 | 0.4, you can see how I can get a very
nice diffuse one. And if I turn all the way
| | 05:30 | down, let's say to almost 0 or just
above 0, say 0.05, you can see how I can get
| | 05:38 | a very, very hard highlight.
| | 05:41 | So I find this one to be a very
flexible one, but really, they all have their
| | 05:46 | own characteristics and their own benefits.
| | 05:48 | Probably the best thing to do is just
to play with them and experiment with
| | 05:52 | them to see what works for you.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the Ramp Shader options| 00:00 | In addition to adding color to your diffuse
and specular channels, you can also add ramps.
| | 00:07 | Now, ramps are basically a gradation
of both color and transparency that can
| | 00:12 | really transform the way
that your materials look.
| | 00:16 | So right now we're going to work
with ramps in the Diffuse channel.
| | 00:20 | So I'm going to down Specularity so we
can see exactly how these ramps work.
| | 00:25 | So I'm going to take Specularity, turn
it down to 0, and let's hit F12 just to
| | 00:31 | see how this renders.
| | 00:33 | Now, you'll notice in both the Diffuse and
Specular channels we have a check box for Ramp.
| | 00:39 | If I check it in the Diffuse channel,
you'll see how the preview really changes a lot.
| | 00:46 | And that's because we've added in this
ramp that goes from black and transparent
| | 00:51 | on the left to white and opaque.
| | 00:56 | Now, we can really see how this works
by using this control along the bottom
| | 01:01 | called Factor, and really what is
happening here is that this ramp is being laid
| | 01:06 | over the diffuse color.
| | 01:09 | So underneath this we have a red
diffuse color and we're laying over the white.
| | 01:15 | Now, if we turn this Factor control down,
we're basically turning off the ramp.
| | 01:21 | This is kind of a mixer as to how
much that ramp affects the diffuse color.
| | 01:27 | So at 0 it's 100% diffuse, and as we
turn up, notice how the lit areas of the
| | 01:36 | object are starting to turn white.
| | 01:40 | That's because this is how this ramp works.
| | 01:43 | The left side is the shaded areas of the object;
| | 01:49 | the right side is the lit areas.
| | 01:52 | So if I were to change this color, you
can change it to, for example, yellow,
| | 01:59 | and you can see how I'm now fading
from yellow down back to the original red.
| | 02:05 | And if I were to render this, you
could see this a little more clearly.
| | 02:08 | So the lit areas are yellow, which is in
the ramp, and the shaded areas are red,
| | 02:16 | which is in that diffuse color.
| | 02:18 | Now, if I want, I can change
everything in this by clicking on the right side
| | 02:24 | here, and you notice how this
little black square comes up.
| | 02:27 | If I click on that, I get a color picker.
| | 02:30 | And so I'm going to go ahead and turn
up my value here, and let's go ahead
| | 02:35 | and change it to blue.
| | 02:38 | In addition to the RGB values, we
also have an additional one called A for
| | 02:44 | alpha, and this shows up
here in this checker box square.
| | 02:48 | So as I dial it in, you can see how
it's becoming more and more opaque.
| | 02:54 | So if I bring it up to 1, this
completely replaces that red color underneath.
| | 03:01 | And so when I render this, now
I'm going from yellow to blue.
| | 03:07 | So, now by taking out all of the
transparency and making this completely opaque,
| | 03:13 | I've replaced my red diffuse
color with a yellow-blue gradient.
| | 03:18 | Now, this can be used for all sorts of things.
| | 03:21 | One of the ways I like to use it is
to add a little more pop to my shading.
| | 03:26 | If I turn my Factor down, let's take a
look at how the default shading works.
| | 03:32 | In fact, I'm going to hit F12 to see this.
| | 03:34 | And what we have here is we're going
basically from a red color down to black.
| | 03:40 | So essentially what this does is it
just starts here and it just shades it all
| | 03:46 | the way down to black, so it's
really just using this one slider.
| | 03:50 | Now, if you know anything about the
way color works, basically what this is
| | 03:54 | doing is it's doing a gradient
across a maximum of 256 colors.
| | 04:00 | But if we want to get a little bit
more of a rich shading, we can make this
| | 04:04 | go over more colors.
| | 04:06 | So let's go ahead and pick a default
color for our shading, so let's say let's
| | 04:10 | go ahead and pick something like a
light green, or something like that.
| | 04:14 | And then let's go ahead and
pick a color for our shading.
| | 04:17 | So we could start with that light
green but maybe make it a little bit more
| | 04:21 | bluish or something like that, maybe
a darker blue, and even bring down by
| | 04:26 | Intensity a little bit like that.
| | 04:28 | So now once I have that and I dial it
up by dialing up my Factor, you'll see
| | 04:34 | that when I render this, it's now
going from green to kind of a darker blue.
| | 04:41 | So what I'm getting here is
I'm getting a much richer color.
| | 04:44 | In fact, if I saturate that just a
little bit more, you can see it probably even
| | 04:50 | a little bit better here. So let's do this.
| | 04:52 | So you can see how I'm not
just going from green to black;
| | 04:55 | I'm going from green through blue,
and then ultimately to black.
| | 05:00 | So this allows your colors to go
over a greater range and can give you a
| | 05:03 | little bit more pop.
| | 05:06 | Now, this gradient is not
just limited to two values.
| | 05:09 | We've been basically just clicking on
the right and left side of this to get our
| | 05:14 | values, but if we want, we can
add in as many points as we want.
| | 05:20 | So we have a button here that
basically can move from left to right here, so
| | 05:24 | each point is numbered.
| | 05:26 | So right now we have two points:
| | 05:28 | we have .0 on the left, .1 on the right.
| | 05:32 | But if we want, we can add in a middle point.
| | 05:35 | So all I have to do is hit Add and it
adds this third point in the middle.
| | 05:40 | And now we can change
where that middle point is.
| | 05:45 | We can also change that color.
| | 05:47 | So if I were to click on this, I
could make it another type of color.
| | 05:51 | So you can see now we have a
more interesting gradient here.
| | 05:55 | And I can move this however I want.
| | 05:57 | If I want to, I can also
add in additional colors.
| | 06:01 | So if I wanted to, I could add in
that purple there and take this third
| | 06:06 | color and make it more of a green,
and again just change it and affect it
| | 06:13 | however I want.
| | 06:16 | If I want to step through these, I can
just hit this button here to step through
| | 06:21 | each one of these points, or
I can just click on the point.
| | 06:25 | Another way to add additional points
is to hold down the Ctrl key and just
| | 06:29 | left-click and that gives
you an additional point.
| | 06:32 | If you want to, you can just get rid
of additional points by just hitting
| | 06:35 | the Delete key here.
| | 06:37 | So I'm going to go ahead and delete
all these out and make it back into
| | 06:40 | a two-point gradient.
| | 06:44 | In addition to this, we have Mix controls,
and these are very similar to the way
| | 06:49 | that Photoshop Mix controls work.
| | 06:52 | And this is basically how does it
mix back into the original color?
| | 06:58 | Typically, we keep this on Mix,
but you can change it if you want.
| | 07:02 | And another really cool
little option here is this Input.
| | 07:06 | Now, we've been working with this as a
shader, but we can also take the input
| | 07:12 | from different places.
| | 07:13 | In other words, the input
for the ramp is the shader.
| | 07:17 | So again, right side is the lit
portion, left side is the shaded portion.
| | 07:24 | But we can change this.
| | 07:25 | We can say the lit portion is
dependent on the energy in the scene, in other
| | 07:31 | words, the way that the light hits the object.
| | 07:34 | And a lot of times this can provide
a lot smoother sort of transition.
| | 07:39 | This actually is a little bit more
realistic, and I actually like the way this works.
| | 07:44 | Another really cool option is to change
the shading based on where the normals are.
| | 07:48 | Now, if you're not familiar with
normals, normals are basically the direction
| | 07:53 | that the surface is pointing.
| | 07:54 | So if the surface is pointing
directly towards us, it's the lighter color;
| | 07:59 | if it's pointing away from
us, it's the darker color.
| | 08:02 | So let's go ahead and play with this.
| | 08:04 | Let's go ahead and make this kind of
the whole thing a darker color here,
| | 08:07 | like maybe a purple.
| | 08:09 | And then I'm going to go ahead to this
color here and let's make it lighter.
| | 08:13 | Let's make it kind of almost
like a yellow type of color.
| | 08:16 | I'm going to increase my value here.
| | 08:18 | And what you can see here is that we
can almost create like a rim-light effect.
| | 08:23 | So when I shade this, you can see how
the portions of that surface that are
| | 08:28 | facing away from us are the lighter color.
| | 08:32 | And this can be really handy in
areas such as creating transparent or
| | 08:37 | translucent surfaces, like as a glass
kind of curves away from you, you're
| | 08:42 | starting to see through more of a
thickness of the glass, so you're seeing less
| | 08:46 | transparency and more of the color of
the glass, and this can really help to
| | 08:50 | sell that effect as well.
| | 08:52 | Now, you don't have to use this
with just the Lambert shader as well.
| | 08:57 | You can add in, for example, if you
wanted to work with the Toon shader, you
| | 09:01 | can do it that way.
| | 09:02 | Or if you want, you can use
it with the Minnaert shader.
| | 09:05 | And that's actually kind of cool
because if you decrease the darkness, you can
| | 09:10 | actually combine the edge light of the
shader with the color itself, so then you
| | 09:17 | can get actually kind of
almost double that effect.
| | 09:21 | So those are some of the ways
that you can use ramp shaders.
| | 09:24 | Now remember, ramps are
laid over the diffuse color.
| | 09:29 | You can have as many points as you
want within a ramp, and you can mix it
| | 09:33 | however you want to the original color.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Additional shading options| 00:00 | Now, let's take a look at some
additional shading parameters that we have for
| | 00:05 | our materials. And these are all just
little tiny parameters that we can use, and
| | 00:10 | they're found under the
Diffuse and Specular options. In fact,
| | 00:13 | I am going to go ahead and collapse these
so that we can just see these Shading options.
| | 00:19 | Let's go ahead and render the object as it is.
| | 00:22 | Now, the first one is basically just
called Shadeless, so it takes off all of
| | 00:28 | the shading and it just
makes it a solid-color object.
| | 00:31 | Now, this can be useful if you want
something to just be a light emitter and you
| | 00:35 | just want it to be a solid color.
| | 00:37 | This is a great way to do this.
| | 00:40 | Down the side here we also have what's
called Tangent Shading, and what this
| | 00:44 | does is it really changes the way
that the specular highlight works.
| | 00:50 | Next one is Cubic Interpolation, and
this again just changes a little bit the
| | 00:55 | way that it interprets the shading.
It basically will add a little bit more
| | 01:01 | shading, depending upon how the light hits it.
| | 01:03 | Now, we also have three additional sliders.
| | 01:07 | This one is called Emit, and as you
can see, as you dial it up, it basically
| | 01:13 | allows it to emit lighting.
| | 01:15 | So this is kind of a way to
create an object that self-illuminates.
| | 01:18 | So if I set it to about 0.5, you can
see how I still get a specular highlight,
| | 01:25 | which I don't get with Shadeless,
| | 01:27 | but my shading itself starts to go away.
| | 01:31 | So this affects the Diffuse channel.
| | 01:33 | Now, if I turn it down pretty low, to say
about 0.1, this actually is a great way
| | 01:40 | to get the simulation of ambient,
or bounced, lighting in the room.
| | 01:43 | It's a great way to soften your shadows.
| | 01:46 | So if you have just a little bit of
emit on your object, you can kind of soften
| | 01:51 | the look of your scene.
| | 01:52 | So this is with Emit at 0.1. If I bring
it back down to 0 and do a render, you
| | 01:58 | can see how these shadows get a lot darker.
| | 02:01 | Now the next one depends upon the
amount of ambient light in the room.
| | 02:05 | Now, we can add ambient light into a
scene, and this is how much of that ambient
| | 02:10 | light the object receives.
| | 02:12 | Finally, we have a Translucency
effect, which basically makes the object
| | 02:17 | slightly translucent. And as you can see,
it changes it just a little bit, and
| | 02:22 | you'll see it a lot at the edges. And
if we have a light behind the object, you
| | 02:27 | would see it the most.
| | 02:31 | So those are some additional
shading options you can use to fine-tune
| | 02:35 | your materials.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating reflections | 00:00 | Now let's take a look at how
to do reflections in Blender.
| | 00:04 | I have a simple scene here, and it's got a
couple of spheres, a cylinder, and a camera.
| | 00:11 | And let's go ahead and just do a quick render.
| | 00:13 | I am going to hit F12. And what you can see
here is that, well, there are no reflections.
| | 00:19 | We have a couple of solid spheres and
the checkerboard on our floor plane.
| | 00:24 | So I am going to go ahead and add
reflections to the sphere, and we will go
| | 00:27 | through so many options for
reflections on that object.
| | 00:31 | So I am going to go ahead and expand this
up a little bit here so we could see it.
| | 00:35 | So I have my sphere and it has
a texture on it called Sphere.
| | 00:40 | Let's go ahead and change that to
Reflective so that way we have a more
| | 00:45 | descriptive name, and let's scroll down
to the Mirror rollout here. And this is
| | 00:52 | where we can add reflections. But
before I do that I'm actually going to go
| | 00:57 | ahead and collapse some of these rollouts, so
that way we can see it along with the preview.
| | 01:03 | So when I turn on Mirror, it gives me a
bunch of controls. The most important
| | 01:08 | control is called Reflectivity,
and this is how much it reflects.
| | 01:12 | And you can actually see
how this works in the preview.
| | 01:15 | So if I turn it up, you can see how that
checkerboard is reflected in that viewport.
| | 01:22 | So let's just put this right in the middle.
Let's just put it a .5 and just hit F12 to render.
| | 01:28 | So you can see how this adds some
additional reflectivity. So this makes us ball
| | 01:35 | from a white ball into kind of a
shiny metal ball, or a mirrored ball.
| | 01:41 | And so if we want we can bring up
Reflective a whole lot. If we bring it up all
| | 01:46 | the way, it becomes perfectly
reflective, which is not so natural,
| | 01:50 | so let's go ahead and
roll that back a little bit.
| | 01:52 | I am going to keep it at .75, just so that we
have a pretty good reflection for this example.
| | 02:00 | Below this we have a color picker. So
right now it's set to white, which means
| | 02:07 | it will reflect whatever color is
given to it, but we can tint the reflection
| | 02:12 | with this color picker.
| | 02:14 | So if I click on it and I give it kind
of a purple hint here, you can see how
| | 02:20 | that affects my preview,
and it also affects my scene.
| | 02:26 | So the saturation of this color
determines how much it's tinted.
| | 02:31 | So if I go over to my HSV here, I can
turn down the Saturation and you can see
| | 02:37 | how it becomes less of an effect.
| | 02:40 | So you can really still see the tint
here in the whites of that checkerboard,
| | 02:45 | but as the Saturation goes down, that
tinting goes down as well. And I am going
| | 02:50 | to go ahead and turn that to 0.
| | 02:51 | Now over here to the right we have
Fresnel effect, and that's pretty much the
| | 02:57 | same as the Fresnel effect we
saw before when using ramps,
| | 03:01 | but let's go ahead and take a look at it.
| | 03:03 | I am going to turn this up to 3, and you
can see how it affects the reflections.
| | 03:09 | Basically what it does is it pushes the
reflections off to the side. So when I
| | 03:14 | have the Fresnel up above 1, that
actually tends to make the center less
| | 03:20 | reflective and the edges are the
ones that receive all the reflections.
| | 03:25 | Now this Blend control basically just
controls how that Fresnel effect blends
| | 03:31 | into the object here, and you can
see how that works in the preview.
| | 03:36 | So I am going to go ahead and turn Fresnel off.
| | 03:38 | We are going to turn it back to 0 here.
| | 03:40 | And now let's take a look at Depth.
| | 03:43 | Now Depth controls how many
times an object or material reflects.
| | 03:49 | So in this case I have it set to 2, so when
I render, I can have up to two reflections.
| | 03:56 | This doesn't work as well with just
one object in the scene, because what we
| | 04:01 | need to do is have something reflecting a
reflection in order to see how this works.
| | 04:06 | So let's go ahead and make the floor reflective.
| | 04:08 | I am going to go ahead right-click on
the object called Floor; in fact, you can
| | 04:12 | see it here in the outliner.
| | 04:14 | And if I scroll up here, you will see
I have a checker pattern applied, or a
| | 04:20 | checker material applied.
| | 04:22 | So if I hit my material selector here, I
can scroll down and find the Reflective
| | 04:27 | material that we created.
| | 04:29 | And when I do that, both the floor and
the sphere have that reflective material.
| | 04:36 | So I am going to go ahead and scroll
back up so we can see our options here.
| | 04:40 | So let's take a look at Depth.
| | 04:42 | I am going to go ahead turn Depth
down to 0 and do a quick render.
| | 04:49 | And this shows it very, very well,
because really we are not reflecting any
| | 04:54 | reflections. So the sphere sees the
plane without reflections, so it sees it in
| | 05:00 | kind of a neutral color.
| | 05:02 | Same for the floor. The floor sees the sphere.
| | 05:05 | It's not reflecting the reflections.
| | 05:07 | If I turn that up to 1, you can
see that little bit more clearly.
| | 05:12 | So what we've got here is now I'm
reflecting the reflection one time.
| | 05:17 | It still creates a little bit of a spot there.
| | 05:20 | So if we want, we can turn it up to
say 3 or 4 and then render again.
| | 05:26 | Once you get enough iterations,
you get a realistic effect.
| | 05:30 | So it depends on how many
reflective objects you have in the scene.
| | 05:34 | Now more Depth will affect render
performance because you're bouncing
| | 05:37 | more light waves around.
| | 05:40 | So I am going to go ahead and select the
plane again, and I'm going to change it
| | 05:46 | back to that checker pattern, and then let's
go ahead and right-click back on the sphere.
| | 05:52 | And I want to take a look at Max Distance.
| | 05:56 | So if I do a quick render here,
you'll see that it's basically reflecting
| | 06:00 | everything, and this controls
how far an object reflects.
| | 06:05 | So when Max Distance is at 0, it
reflects everything. As soon as we bring it up
| | 06:11 | above 0--let's bring in up to 6.
| | 06:14 | So if I render this with a Max Distance
of 6, you will see that, well, it's kind
| | 06:20 | of seeing the spheres, but it doesn't
have enough distance to see the cylinder,
| | 06:26 | and it certainly doesn't see the sky.
| | 06:28 | So what we can do is we can actually
limit how far things reflect, and that can
| | 06:33 | actually be very useful.
| | 06:35 | So if I want, I can turn this up to a
larger number, let's say about 20, and if
| | 06:42 | I render, there you can see how now
it's starting to get a little bit of the
| | 06:46 | sky, but it's not perfect.
| | 06:48 | So if I set it back to 0, you can
see how it does a perfect reflection.
| | 06:54 | Now the last parameter is
called Gloss, and that's over here.
| | 06:59 | By default it's at 1 and
makes the object perfectly glossy.
| | 07:04 | How you use this is you turn down the Gloss.
And by default it can be kind of sensitive,
| | 07:09 | so let's go ahead and just turn
it to .9 and do a quick render,
| | 07:14 | and you'll instantly see a little bit
of a difference. You will see how the
| | 07:18 | reflections are a little bit blurry.
| | 07:21 | They're not perfect, and this can be great.
| | 07:23 | What it says is that surface
is not perfectly reflective.
| | 07:27 | As we turn it down--let's go ahead turn
it down to say .7--and do another render,
| | 07:34 | you see how it starts to fizzle out
actually pretty quickly. So something
| | 07:39 | even as high as .8 will give you some effect,
but again, it will blur it out fairly quickly.
| | 07:46 | Now also notice how this
might be a little bit modeled.
| | 07:49 | This is because we have a number of
samples. And the higher the number of
| | 07:54 | samples the more accurate this will be,
but again, at the expense of rendering time.
| | 08:01 | So those are some of the basics of
how to add reflectivity to some of your
| | 08:06 | materials in Blender.
| | 08:08 | Now reflections can add a lot of
realism, but if they're too perfect, they
| | 08:13 | start to lose realism.
| | 08:15 | So try to find ways either using Max
Distance or Gloss or even the Fresnel effect
| | 08:21 | to give it a little bit of variation in
its reflectivity, which will add a lot
| | 08:25 | more life to your objects.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding transparency and refractions| 00:00 | If you want to create materials like
glass or translucent plastic, transparency
| | 00:06 | becomes a very important
component of those materials.
| | 00:09 | So let's take a look at
transparency and how we can use it in Blender.
| | 00:14 | So I've got a basic scene here with
a white sphere in the little and it's
| | 00:21 | obscuring a couple of the objects behind it.
| | 00:23 | This is a great way to show
off how transparency works.
| | 00:27 | So let's go ahead and do a quick render
of the scene, and as you can see, there's
| | 00:32 | no transparency in here as of yet.
| | 00:35 | So I'm going to go to my Camera
Perspective window, right-click on that white
| | 00:39 | sphere, which is this one here,
and let's go to the Materials panel.
| | 00:43 | Now I have a one material applied
to the sphere and it's called Sphere.
| | 00:48 | But let's go ahead and just change
the name to Transparent, just so that we
| | 00:53 | have a descriptive name. And let's go
ahead and scroll down to our options.
| | 01:00 | So if I want to make this
transparent, we have an option here
| | 01:03 | called Transparency.
| | 01:04 | I'm going to go ahead and click this
on, but so that we can see everything,
| | 01:09 | I'm going to go ahead and close
down some of my rollouts here.
| | 01:14 | So when I click this on,
you'll notice we have three options.
| | 01:18 | The important ones here are
Ray Trace and Z Transparency.
| | 01:22 | Now Z Transparency is really just a
simple, basic, rudimentary transparency
| | 01:28 | with nothing like refractions or any sort of
handling of lights. But it's pretty simple.
| | 01:34 | We have an Alpha which basically just
turns down the visibility of the object.
| | 01:40 | So if I want to set that at .5, you
can see how it's now 50% transparent. And
| | 01:47 | when I render, you can see how--okay,
I've got some transparency, but this
| | 01:51 | really doesn't look like
glass or any sort of object.
| | 01:55 | Now for this we also have a Fresnel
effect, which again just works like any
| | 02:01 | other Fresnel effect.
| | 02:02 | It tends to push the effect towards
the edges. So if I type in 3 and hit F12,
| | 02:09 | you can see how it kind of gives
a little bit more of an effect.
| | 02:12 | In other words, it tends to keep the
transparency in the middle and fades it out
| | 02:18 | towards the edges. And this is actually
a little more realistic, because if you
| | 02:22 | think about it, a transparent sphere,
as you go towards the edges, you actually
| | 02:27 | have more material blocking you, because
it's at a different angle, so you get a
| | 02:32 | little bit more of a realistic effect.
| | 02:34 | But if you want to get a really, really
good realistic effect, you want to go to
| | 02:39 | the Raytrace parameters here.
| | 02:41 | Now this retains all of these other
controls, so it retains Alpha and Fresnel.
| | 02:48 | So if I do a quick render of this with
nothing else added, it looks pretty much
| | 02:53 | the same. But these additional controls
really give us a lot more ways to affect it.
| | 03:00 | The most important one is Index Of
Refraction, IOR, and this tells you how much
| | 03:06 | of a lens effect this is going to give.
| | 03:10 | In this case, this is a sphere, so we're
going to actually have a lower index of
| | 03:15 | refraction. So let's go ahead
and just put this down to say .9.
| | 03:19 | And as you can see what happens in the
Preview is that as this goes down, you
| | 03:24 | can see how it tends to
refract towards the center.
| | 03:28 | If I go above 1, you can see how it
pushes it out. So let's go ahead and put
| | 03:33 | it back to .9 and do a quick render.
| | 03:38 | Hit F12 and now you can see how
I've got a much more glassy effect.
| | 03:44 | This is actually refracting the checkers on
the floor as well as the objects behind it.
| | 03:49 | If I put it up a little bit higher,
say at .95, I get a little bit less of an
| | 03:55 | effect and it becomes
probably a little bit more realistic.
| | 03:58 | And if I want to, I can put it above
one. Let's go ahead and just put it to
| | 04:02 | 1.05, just a little bit over 1, and you
can see how it has an immediate affect.
| | 04:09 | It tends to push those out. And for
this shape object that's not really
| | 04:14 | a realistic effect, so again, let's just
put it back to .95 and do a quick render.
| | 04:20 | Now just like with reflections, we
also have a Depth control right here, and
| | 04:27 | this controls how many
things you can see through.
| | 04:31 | So let's go ahead and take this green sphere,
| | 04:36 | let's go ahead and apply the Transparent
material to that. And then I'm going to
| | 04:40 | go ahead and move that in
front of the other sphere.
| | 04:46 | Let's go ahead and go down to our
Transparency panel, and I'm going to select the
| | 04:50 | Depth and turn it to 0.
| | 04:54 | When I hit F12, you'll see that I
have no depth to my transparency,
| | 05:01 | so it's really not transparent at all.
| | 05:04 | If I bring it up to 1 and do a quick
render, you'll see that oh, okay, well, I
| | 05:09 | get transparent stuff for what's
behind it, but I can't see through two
| | 05:14 | transparent surfaces at once.
| | 05:17 | So this one is transparent to the
floor and the objects behind it, but where
| | 05:22 | we have this intersection, I can't see
through the transparency of the object behind it.
| | 05:29 | So if I turn it up to 2, you'll see
how--okay, I'm starting to get that,
| | 05:36 | but really you need to turn it
up to 3 in order to get a complete
| | 05:41 | transparency there.
| | 05:42 | All right, let's go ahead and turn up
to 4, and again, just to get a little
| | 05:46 | bit more bounce here.
| | 05:49 | So as you can see, the Depth will
limit how many things you can see through.
| | 05:54 | So if you have multiple transparent
objects in the scene, you'll want to turn
| | 05:59 | that up a little bit.
| | 06:00 | Now the last one is Gloss and again
that's very similar to the gloss that we
| | 06:05 | used in reflections.
| | 06:07 | So if I keep this to a fairly small
number, say .95 or so, and do a quick
| | 06:13 | render, you can see how it gives kind
of a translucent frosted-glass effect.
| | 06:19 | Now this can be very handy because
not everything is perfectly transparent.
| | 06:23 | We have smudges and oily surfaces
and all that, and this can help you to
| | 06:28 | simulate these within Blender.
| | 06:32 | So those are some of the
basics of transparency in Blender.
| | 06:36 | Now Raytrace is your best
option for realistic transparencies.
| | 06:42 | It will take a little bit more render
time, and you will need to have Raytrace
| | 06:45 | turned on in your render.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Subsurface scattering| 00:00 | If you want to add additional realism
to your scene, you might want to consider
| | 00:05 | using Subsurface Scattering.
| | 00:07 | Now Subsurface Scattering basically
stimulates the scattering of light beneath a
| | 00:13 | surface, so in other words
subsurface scattering.
| | 00:16 | And this can be particularly
good for semi-translucent objects.
| | 00:21 | Marble is a great candidate for
subsurface scattering, as are things like
| | 00:25 | translucent plastic or milk. Skin is
another one that can really benefit from
| | 00:31 | subsurface scattering.
| | 00:33 | So let's take a look at how to do
some skin on this little creature that
| | 00:38 | we've been building.
| | 00:39 | Now right now I have a very neutral
material on my character, so if I hit F12 to
| | 00:44 | render, you can see how--
well, he looks pretty solid.
| | 00:49 | Now in this scene I have two lights:
I have one in front of him and one
| | 00:54 | directly behind him--
| | 00:55 | in fact, if I select that, you can see
how that kind of comes up behind his head.
| | 01:00 | Now when I zoom into this render,
you can see the effects of that light.
| | 01:06 | It lights the top of his arm, but also,
because it's behind his head, you don't
| | 01:11 | really see through that head, and
this is what gives it the impression of
| | 01:16 | being fairly solid.
| | 01:18 | Subsurface scattering can give kind
of a nice transparent look to the skin.
| | 01:24 | So if I turn it on, you'll see
we have a number of controls here.
| | 01:29 | Probably the best way to get the hang
of it is to just to play with a few of
| | 01:32 | the presets. So we have a number of them here:
Chicken, Apple, Cream, Marble is another great one.
| | 01:40 | We're going to go ahead and select
Skin2, and let's just do a quick render just
| | 01:46 | to see the instantaneous effect of this.
| | 01:51 | Now notice how this
renders a little bit more slowly.
| | 01:54 | This is because Subsurface
Scattering is computing-intensive.
| | 01:58 | It will increase render times.
| | 02:01 | Now that it's rendered though, let's take
a look at this a little bit more in detail.
| | 02:05 | Notice how this arm is no longer shaded;
| | 02:08 | it's more lit up by this backlight.
| | 02:11 | We also have the same effect that's
almost like that rim light effect on this
| | 02:16 | side of the head, and it
looks much more like skin.
| | 02:20 | Now we have a number of controls here.
One is Index Of Refraction, in other
| | 02:26 | words, how does it bend light?
| | 02:28 | Scale is basically the scale of the
object, and so it basically just determines
| | 02:35 | how the light is scattered, how deep it goes.
| | 02:38 | It gives you kind of a sense of scale
in the scene. So basically larger objects
| | 02:43 | will have less subsurface
scattering than smaller ones.
| | 02:46 | Next, we have RGB Radius, which is
basically how much does it blur and what
| | 02:51 | colors does it blur?
| | 02:53 | So in this case, we've got red fairly
high, which means that the scattering is
| | 02:58 | a little bit more biased towards red,
which is how we got that orangey kind of color.
| | 03:04 | Now down here we also have Scattering
Weight: Does it scatter towards the front
| | 03:09 | of the object or the back?
| | 03:10 | The other ones affect the color of the
skin of the character. So in this case we
| | 03:17 | have this color here,
| | 03:20 | and by default we're not blending that color in.
| | 03:24 | So if we were to turn this totally up,
you can see how in the preview it goes
| | 03:31 | from being mostly white to being this color.
| | 03:36 | If I were to render this now, you can
see how the character is now starting to
| | 03:41 | take on the color of the skin. But we
still have the subsurface scattering here,
| | 03:48 | and a lot of that is
determined by this RGB Radius.
| | 03:52 | Now this will also work with textures.
| | 03:56 | Now we haven't really gotten
into textures at this point.
| | 03:59 | That's going to happen in the next chapter.
But let's just get a little preview here.
| | 04:03 | I'm going to go over to this panel here,
which is our Texture panel, and you'll
| | 04:08 | see I actually do have a
texture applied to this character.
| | 04:11 | And all I need to do is just turn it on
in order for it to take effect. So I'm
| | 04:16 | going to scroll down here to a
rollout called Influence, and we're going to
| | 04:20 | click on the Color option
here, make sure that it's at 1.
| | 04:25 | And then I'm going to go
ahead and do a quick render.
| | 04:29 | Now notice how that texture comes in
pretty nicely; in fact, if I turn on
| | 04:38 | texturing in my viewport, you can
what the original texture looks like,
| | 04:42 | and you'll see that in the original
texture his face or his belly area is
| | 04:47 | white. And what we have here though is
we have it coming in this kind of the
| | 04:51 | skin color, and the reason is because
it's actually blending both the color
| | 04:56 | here, and the texture.
| | 04:59 | But more importantly, notice how we
still get our translucent effect, and we
| | 05:06 | still kind of get that rubbery skin look.
| | 05:09 | Now if I wanted to use just this
texture, all I have to do is just turn down
| | 05:14 | that color and leave the texture where it is.
| | 05:18 | And know when I render, you'll see
that I get just the texture itself, but
| | 05:25 | with subsurface scattering. So you can
see that pretty nicely here in the arm
| | 05:30 | and around the head.
| | 05:32 | And also notice how the white is still
a little bit kind of skin colored, and
| | 05:38 | that's because again this RGB Radius
determines the scattering color, and we've
| | 05:43 | got some scattering coming
both from the front and the back.
| | 05:47 | So as you can see, Subsurface
Scattering is a really cool feature.
| | 05:51 | It can give you a nice, natural look
with just a few tweaks to the presets.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
7. Adding TexturesAdding a simple texture| 00:00 | In this chapter, we are
going to go over textures.
| | 00:04 | Now textures can add additional
realism to your materials, and they can
| | 00:09 | be bitmapped images.
| | 00:10 | They can be procedurals.
| | 00:12 | There's a whole array of ways to
create textures, and we'll get in to those.
| | 00:17 | But before we do that, we need to
understand a little bit about the Texture panel
| | 00:21 | and how textures relate to materials.
| | 00:24 | So we are just going to add a very simple
texture so we can understand some of that process.
| | 00:30 | So we are going to start off very simply.
| | 00:32 | I just have the default scene open here, and I
am going to go ahead and select my default cube.
| | 00:39 | Now I am going to go ahead into my
Materials panel here. In fact, I am going to
| | 00:44 | go ahead and expand that so we have a
lot of room to see what we are doing here.
| | 00:47 | I am just going to keep the standard
default material, and we are going to go
| | 00:52 | ahead and just change the diffuse color a
little bit so that it's a little bit more blue.
| | 00:57 | Now this is just a solid color, but if
we want to add something a little bit
| | 01:02 | more rich, we can use a texture.
| | 01:05 | You can find Textures over here under
this little checkerboard button, and this
| | 01:09 | brings up the Textures panel.
| | 01:11 | Notice how this is very similar to the
Materials panel in that we can have a
| | 01:15 | list of multiple textures and we can
apply multiple textures to an object.
| | 01:21 | But right now let's just stick with the
default texture, and that's called Tex.
| | 01:25 | If we want, we can change the name to
whatever we want, but let's just go ahead
| | 01:30 | and keep it to default.
| | 01:32 | Now under here we have a Type.
| | 01:34 | This is the type of
texture that we want to apply.
| | 01:37 | If I click on this, you will see I get
a list. And we can have anything from
| | 01:42 | Clouds, if we want we can just
go through some of these Clouds.
| | 01:45 | Here you can see these are cloud textures.
| | 01:48 | Environment maps. Images or movies, this
would be for bitmaps. We can do Marble.
| | 01:53 | We can do Stucco, that sort of thing.
| | 01:57 | And each one of these, if you notice,
they have their own parameters, and each one
| | 02:03 | has its own custom things that you can do.
So if I change this to Marble, you can
| | 02:07 | see the number of options expands.
| | 02:10 | But we are not going to get
into that too much right now.
| | 02:13 | Now as you start changing the texture, you do
want to be able to see how it looks on the material.
| | 02:19 | So we have a preview here of the
marble, but we can see it either on the
| | 02:25 | material itself or on both.
| | 02:28 | So you can see this is my texture and
this is how it looks on the object. In
| | 02:32 | fact, if I go over to my Materials
panel, you'll see that that texture has
| | 02:37 | overridden my diffuse color.
| | 02:40 | And you'll say, well, it doesn't
really override it because I have white and
| | 02:44 | black here and in my
material I have blue and fuchsia.
| | 02:50 | Well actually that is what it's doing,
and let me show you where that's affected.
| | 02:56 | If we go all the way down to the
Influence rollout here, you'll notice that this
| | 03:01 | has a color associated with it,
and that seems to be that color.
| | 03:07 | Well it is, and what we can do is we
can actually change this color if we want.
| | 03:11 | And if we look at this, we will see
that what's happening with this particular
| | 03:15 | texture is that it's overlaying the original
color, so it's almost like an alpha channel.
| | 03:22 | So where this is black the original
color shows up; where this is white the new
| | 03:29 | color shows up. And in this
case it's that yellow color.
| | 03:34 | Now this is just one way
for these textures to work.
| | 03:36 | If we were to apply a bitmapped texture
it would completely override the color.
| | 03:41 | But let's stick with this for just
a little bit and take a look at how
| | 03:45 | this Influence works.
| | 03:47 | The Influence is basically
what is the texture affecting?
| | 03:51 | So in this case, and by
default, it affects the color.
| | 03:55 | So if I turn this off, you'll see that
well the additive color goes way. If I turn
| | 04:01 | it on, you can see I can
dial it back to 0 or dial it up.
| | 04:07 | But we don't have to affect just color;
| | 04:09 | we can affect other parameters.
| | 04:12 | So if I were to click on Intensity,
you can see how that kind of pops in.
| | 04:16 | If I were to affect Emit, what this
does is it takes the white and it adds that
| | 04:22 | to the Emit value in the shade. Or in
other words it makes itself illuminate
| | 04:27 | where it's white and keeps it the
standard color where it's dark. In fact if
| | 04:32 | I turn off Color, you can see how that affects it,
so basically it turns up Emit for those areas.
| | 04:38 | So I am going to go ahead and turn that
off. And we can also affect things like
| | 04:42 | Specular or Geometry.
| | 04:44 | If I turn this on for Normal, you can
see how all of a sudden this white-and-
| | 04:49 | black area now becomes a normal map.
| | 04:53 | So in other words it creates
bumps on the surface of our object.
| | 04:57 | So I am going to go ahead and turn this off.
| | 05:00 | Now how this blends back into the
original color is determined by this
| | 05:05 | Mix parameter here.
| | 05:07 | So how this color blends back into the
original depends on this Blend parameter
| | 05:13 | here. By default it's set to Mix, but
we can certainly do an additive--in other
| | 05:18 | words, add to the original color.
| | 05:20 | We can multiply the original color, we
can darken, and so on. If you're familiar
| | 05:26 | with Photoshop, you would probably be
familiar with these as well, because these
| | 05:30 | are very similar to the Blend
modes you find in Photoshop.
| | 05:34 | But I am going to go ahead
and turn this back to Mix.
| | 05:36 | Now once we have this texture
applied, it does show up in my material.
| | 05:43 | Now the one thing is you don't really see in
the material where that texture is coming from.
| | 05:49 | If you're in another package, such as
Maya or something like that you might see
| | 05:52 | a little marker here that tells me that my
diffuse color is coming from something else.
| | 05:57 | So it's a little bit different than
some packages, but just know that you have
| | 06:01 | your texture here and the Influence
determines which channel in the shader or in
| | 06:07 | the material that it's affecting.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using bitmaps| 00:01 | Now let's take a look at how to
use image maps as part of a texture.
| | 00:06 | Now I have a very simple chair here in my
viewport and we have a basic material applied.
| | 00:12 | Let's go ahead and add in a texture.
| | 00:15 | So I am going to go over here to
my Texture panel here at the little
| | 00:18 | checkerboard, and you will see that I
have no textures in the scene at the moment.
| | 00:22 | So let's go ahead and hit the New button.
| | 00:25 | You will see that by default it
brings in this procedural texture.
| | 00:28 | Now this is not what we want; we want an image.
| | 00:32 | So I am going to go ahead and click on
this and scroll up until I find the entry
| | 00:35 | that says Image or Movie, and let go.
| | 00:39 | And you will see that, well, its dark.
| | 00:41 | Well that's simply because we haven't
loaded the image yet, but we can find that
| | 00:46 | under this file browser here.
Under Image, I am going to hit Open.
| | 00:50 | Fabric_Dots is the name of it in
the Chap07 folder, and hit Open Image.
| | 00:56 | So this is just a polka-dotted fabric pattern.
| | 00:59 | So if I want to see this on my
material, I can. You can see how I've got my
| | 01:04 | polka dots and they're applied to my object.
| | 01:07 | But they look a little stretched. In
fact, let's go ahead and do a quick render
| | 01:11 | here. And you can see that I am
getting that same stretching on my object.
| | 01:17 | Now this actually brings up one of the
fundamental concepts of image mapping.
| | 01:22 | We have a 2D image.
| | 01:25 | We have a flat image that
only has X and Y coordinates.
| | 01:29 | But we have a 3D model. So we need to
map this 2D image to the 3D model. In
| | 01:36 | other words, we kind of have to gift-
wrap our flat paper on to this object to
| | 01:41 | make sure that all the textures apply.
| | 01:43 | Now we do that using Mapping.
| | 01:45 | Now in our Texture panel, we
should have a Mapping rollout here.
| | 01:50 | And this has a number of options. The
one that we want to focus on right now is
| | 01:55 | called Coordinates. By default, it's set
to Generated, which are basically just
| | 02:00 | Blender-generated
coordinates for the default objects.
| | 02:03 | But we really don't want that;
we want more specific mapping.
| | 02:07 | Now this chair has already been
mapped and to use the mapping that's baked
| | 02:11 | into the object, we select UV Mapping. And this
is probably what you will use most of the time.
| | 02:19 | Now you can see when I selected that
that my sphere stops streaking, and I have
| | 02:25 | the texture applied little
bit more rationally here.
| | 02:29 | And if I render this, you can see how
the mapping that's already baked into the
| | 02:33 | chair takes effect and now I get a
pretty good application of that texture.
| | 02:40 | Now once we have this, you will say, well,
I also want to see this in the viewport.
| | 02:45 | Well we do have a textured option in our
viewport shading, and let's go ahead and
| | 02:49 | take a look at that.
| | 02:51 | And we will instantly see that, well,
we have a little bit of a quirk here.
| | 02:56 | This actually brings up
one of the quirks of Blender.
| | 02:59 | The image used in the viewport shading
does not have to be the same one in the
| | 03:05 | material; in fact, they are separate.
| | 03:08 | So this is really because I can
actually have multiple textures in a material
| | 03:13 | and Blender doesn't really
know which one to choose.
| | 03:16 | I mean I could have a texture for the color,
| | 03:18 | I could have one for the
transparency, one for bump mapping.
| | 03:23 | So Blender doesn't know which
one to show in that viewport.
| | 03:27 | So we have to tell it.
| | 03:29 | We can do that by using the UV Editor.
The easiest way to get to this is to just
| | 03:35 | use one of the standard layouts, so I
am going to click here and scroll down
| | 03:39 | until we get UV editing.
| | 03:41 | And what this does is it just brings
up a standard layout here where we've
| | 03:45 | got the UV/Image Editor on the left side and
then just a standard viewport on the right.
| | 03:53 | Now, in this viewport I am going to go
ahead turn on the texture even though we
| | 03:56 | are not going to see it--we will
see it pop up once we get this fixed.
| | 04:00 | What we have to do is we have to
select the faces of this object and then
| | 04:05 | apply that image to them.
| | 04:08 | So in order to get to the faces, I need
to go into Edit mode. I can hit Tab or
| | 04:14 | select it from here.
| | 04:15 | Now notice how as soon as I hit this,
all of those polygons show up in this UV
| | 04:22 | image viewport. But I want to make sure
that I get into Face mode, so I am just
| | 04:26 | going to go ahead and click here, or you can
do Ctrl+Tab to make sure you are in Face mode.
| | 04:31 | And then I want to make sure
that I have everything selected,
| | 04:34 | so I am going to go ahead and hit A.
And once I've done that then all I have to
| | 04:39 | do is apply that image to those objects.
| | 04:42 | So I am just going to go here, over into
my UV Image Editor, and you'll see along
| | 04:47 | the bottom I have an entry here called
Image. Click on that. Hit Open Image. And
| | 04:54 | I'm going to select the same
fabric dots that I had before.
| | 04:59 | And once I do that, you can see
how now it shows up in the viewport.
| | 05:03 | So all I have to do is hit Tab, and there it
is, and then when I render, it looks to same.
| | 05:11 | Now we still have a bit of a
disconnect because this image here is not
| | 05:16 | necessarily the image that we render.
| | 05:19 | So let's go through this process again
and just load a different image so I can
| | 05:23 | show you how that works.
| | 05:25 | I am going to go into my perspective
viewport, hit Tab, and make sure that all of
| | 05:31 | my faces are selected.
| | 05:33 | Then over here, since I already have
an image selected, I can just change it
| | 05:37 | here. So I am going to go under Image,
select this little file browser, and this
| | 05:41 | time I am going to select a
different image. I have one out there called
| | 05:44 | CardboardBox that we can use.
| | 05:47 | And when I do that notice how that
image changes. So if I hit Tab, you'll see
| | 05:52 | that well now I've got this image on my
chair, but that's only for the viewport.
| | 05:58 | If I hit F12, you will see that
it's still rendering my materials,
| | 06:04 | and that's because, if I go over to my
default here, you'll see that I still have
| | 06:09 | that as my texture selected here.
| | 06:13 | So just be aware that the texture that
you have in your viewport may not match
| | 06:18 | the one you have in your materials,
and if that's the case, then make sure you
| | 06:22 | select all the faces in your
object and apply the proper texture.
| | 06:27 | So to refresh, in order to add a
bitmapped texture you need to load it in the
| | 06:34 | Texture panel and then make sure that
your Mapping Coordinates are set to UV.
| | 06:40 | In order for the bitmap to show up in
the viewport, you need to go into the UV
| | 06:45 | Editor, select all the faces in the
object, and then load the image onto those faces.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Mapping textures in the UV Editor| 00:00 | Now let's use the UV Image Editor to
precisely align a bitmap to an object.
| | 00:07 | Now we already touched on this editor a
little bit in taking a bitmap image and
| | 00:13 | just showing it in the viewport, but
we also can use it to precisely map the
| | 00:17 | image to the object.
| | 00:19 | So let's go ahead and select this
object here and go over to Materials panel,
| | 00:24 | add a new material--just hit that plus
sign--and then let's go to the Textures
| | 00:30 | panel, and you will see we have no
textures either, so I will just go ahead, hit
| | 00:33 | plus, add in a texture.
| | 00:36 | On this Type, we are going to add Image
or Movie, and then we are going to go
| | 00:40 | down to our image and click Open. And we
are going to hit CardboardBox, which is
| | 00:46 | the image that we are using.
| | 00:47 | And you can see now we
have that cardboard box image.
| | 00:50 | Now if we hit F12 to render, you'll
see that, well, it's not mapping properly.
| | 00:56 | And part of that is because we just
don't have our mapping coordinates set to UV,
| | 01:01 | so let's go ahead and set those to UV.
And let's take a look at both here. And
| | 01:09 | let's go ahead and do another render.
And you can see it's still not right.
| | 01:15 | So let's go ahead and start
mapping this image to the box.
| | 01:21 | So what we need to do is
open up a UV Image Editor.
| | 01:25 | Now I need this open at the same time
as my viewport, so probably the easiest
| | 01:29 | thing to do is to just left-click up
here and drag over another window and then
| | 01:35 | change this one on the
left to the UV/Image Editor.
| | 01:39 | Now what this does is it shows an image
and then what I can do is I can map this
| | 01:45 | object against that image.
| | 01:48 | Now we did this before, so let's go
ahead and just do the basics here. In our
| | 01:52 | User Perspective viewpoint we are going
to hit Tab and we are going to go into
| | 01:58 | Face mode and hit A to select all faces.
| | 02:05 | Now, in here we are just going to go
ahead and open up the image that we want.
| | 02:09 | We are going to go into our
Chap07 folder and open up CardboardBox.
| | 02:14 | Now when I do that you can see how when
I am in Texture mode now, that shows up.
| | 02:23 | So you can see that I have that
image of the box mapped one to each face.
| | 02:30 | Well, that's not really what I want.
| | 02:32 | I really want to match the unfolding
of this box to this image. And you can
| | 02:37 | notice how this image is basically just
a box that's been unfolded and laid flat.
| | 02:43 | Now this UV/Image Editor, if I expand it, you
can see how it has a number of controls here.
| | 02:51 | Now probably the most
important ones are down here.
| | 02:54 | This allows us to basically
select edges, faces, and vertices.
| | 02:59 | So if I were to select faces here, what
I'm doing is I am selecting the faces
| | 03:04 | that are on this object.
| | 03:08 | So if in here, in this UV Editor
window, if I hit G for grab, I can move that
| | 03:14 | face, and you can kind of see how I
have all of these faces connected. In
| | 03:19 | fact if you see here, you can see
how as I move that face, it changes the
| | 03:25 | mapping on the object.
| | 03:28 | So what we have here is basically a
way to match the faces on this object to
| | 03:35 | the flat image map.
| | 03:37 | But the easiest way to do this is to
unfold my box. In order to do that, I need
| | 03:42 | to create some scenes.
| | 03:45 | And I can do that by going into Edge
mode. So I am going to hit Ctrl+Tab, go
| | 03:51 | Edge, and then start
selecting the edges that I want.
| | 03:57 | Now if we look at this image, you will
see that we have three panels connected
| | 04:02 | here and then the top panel is also connected.
| | 04:06 | So what I want to do is select those
three panels here. So I want one, two, three.
| | 04:12 | These are edges, so in other words,
that's this edge here, swivel over to the
| | 04:18 | other side, and then
Shift+Right-click to select these edges.
| | 04:25 | So now that I have all of these edges
selected, I need to define them as the scene.
| | 04:33 | So we go into Mesh > Edges > Mark Scene.
| | 04:38 | And when I do that, notice how they
turn red. And that shows me this is how
| | 04:43 | this object will unwrap.
| | 04:46 | So anything that's not red will be continuous;
anything that is red is one of these scenes.
| | 04:52 | So now that I have that, I can go into
Face mode, select all my faces, and unwrap it.
| | 05:01 | So I am going to select Mesh > UV Unwrap.
Notice that we have a lot of options
| | 05:06 | here, but I just want to pick this top
one called Unwrap, which recognizes those
| | 05:10 | scenes and unwraps the object.
And as soon as I do that, notice how this
| | 05:15 | interface here changes.
| | 05:18 | What we have now is the faces of this
object are now unwrapped according to
| | 05:23 | those scenes, and it actually looks pretty close.
| | 05:26 | So what we can do here is go through our UV
Editor and align those so that it lines up.
| | 05:34 | So what I can do is I can actually
select faces, edges, or vertices here.
| | 05:42 | And so, if I want, I can select each one
of these faces individually and in order
| | 05:47 | to move them I just use the keyboard
shortcuts G for grab. So if want, I can
| | 05:52 | select those faces, I can select this
face here, hit G for Grab, and move it.
| | 05:56 | And notice how it's moving in
that right user perspective viewport.
| | 06:00 | Now if I want I can select all of them,
so all I have to do is hit A and that
| | 06:06 | selects all of these. And if I hit G
for grab, that means I can move these, and
| | 06:12 | you can see how now my bitmap, as I
dial this in, it's starting to line up.
| | 06:18 | So I am going to go ahead and try and
position this fairly accurately. And now
| | 06:25 | what I can do is I can go in and fine-tune it.
| | 06:29 | So if you can see here, I've got
it actually pretty close here.
| | 06:34 | I've got my box pretty much lined up.
| | 06:37 | It seems like the bottom scene though
isn't quite working, but we can fix that.
| | 06:41 | So let's go ahead and navigate over to
here and just select this face here, hit
| | 06:48 | G to grab, and just move it down a little bit.
| | 06:52 | Now if I want to, I could actually go
through a face at a time, an edge at a
| | 06:56 | time, same commands for this as it is
for regular viewport. Basically I select
| | 07:01 | an edge, you can just right-click to
select those edge, G to move it if I want.
| | 07:07 | Or if I want I can align it however I want.
| | 07:10 | So again, if I want to select this edge
here and hit G to grab and move, you can
| | 07:16 | see how I'm aligning this. Notice the
top of that box. I can totally change how
| | 07:22 | this bitmap maps to my object.
| | 07:24 | So let's go ahead and select some
vertices here. Again, it's just right-click, G
| | 07:29 | for grab, and we can move those around.
| | 07:33 | Now, you also have other commands besides grab.
| | 07:36 | You can certainly scale.
| | 07:38 | You can certainly rotate as well.
| | 07:40 | So for example, if I were to go into
Face mode here, select a face, I could G
| | 07:47 | grab and move it, or I could hit R to
rotate it, or I could hit S to scale it.
| | 07:55 | Okay, so you have a lot
of different options here.
| | 07:59 | So those are some of the
basics of how to use this UV Editor.
| | 08:02 | Now when I hit Render you can see how
this pretty much lines up. And this is how
| | 08:08 | we assign those UV coordinates that
we are using in that Textures panel.
| | 08:14 | So when I go over here to Textures and
I say the Coordinates are UV, this is
| | 08:20 | where it's pulling it from.
| | 08:21 | So now once we have these assigned,
we can use this bitmap and it will
| | 08:26 | map perfectly.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using UV projections| 00:00 | In addition to unwrapping objects by
defining scenes, we can also create
| | 00:06 | projection mapping, which basically
projects a sphere or a cylinder or a cube
| | 00:12 | onto our object to get some rough
mapping that we can later tweak.
| | 00:17 | So let's take a look at how to do that.
| | 00:19 | I've got a basic cylinder here, which is
basically just a soup can, so let's go
| | 00:24 | ahead and just select that
and apply a texture to it.
| | 00:28 | So I am going to go into my Texture
panel here, create a new texture, scroll
| | 00:33 | down to Type, select Image or Movie,
| | 00:37 | open the image, and in this case we are
going to open up SoupLabel, and you could
| | 00:42 | see that's a very simple label of soup.
| | 00:45 | And then for Coordinates, again we want
to make sure that we're on UV Coordinates.
| | 00:50 | So let's do a quick test render.
And that is not anywhere near what we want, so
| | 00:55 | let's go ahead and start mapping this.
| | 00:57 | So I need to go into a UV editing mode,
so let's just go ahead and use the
| | 01:02 | default UV editing layout here.
| | 01:05 | So I've got my can, and let's turn that
onto Textured so we can see what's going
| | 01:10 | on. And now let's go ahead
and see what the mapping is.
| | 01:13 | So I am going to tab into Edit mode, hit
Ctrl+Tab to make sure I am in Face mode,
| | 01:19 | and make sure all my faces are selected.
And then under Image, here in the UV
| | 01:24 | Editor, I am going to go ahead
and open that SoupLabel image.
| | 01:30 | So as you could see, we've just
mapped a face at a time to the image.
| | 01:32 | So each face has that image mapped
entirely, which is kind of what we had
| | 01:37 | with the box before.
| | 01:39 | But let's go ahead and use projection
mapping to get our image a little bit closer.
| | 01:45 | So I am going to go ahead and scale this
down, so we can see our UV Image Editor
| | 01:49 | and open this up just a little bit.
| | 01:53 | Now I have all of the faces selected.
So under Mesh, we have UV Unwrap.
| | 02:00 | Now we previously did Unwrap, but we
have a number of additional options here.
| | 02:07 | One is called Smart UV Project, and what
that does is it takes the object and it
| | 02:14 | projects a cube onto the object and it
tries to find everything that connects.
| | 02:22 | And in some instances, this can be a
great place to start, but I think we
| | 02:26 | can actually do better.
| | 02:28 | So under Mesh again, we have UV Unwrap.
| | 02:31 | We also have some additional ones,
such as Follow Active Quads. But the most
| | 02:36 | commonly used ones are these three here.
| | 02:38 | One is called Cube Projection, so
basically it surrounds the object with a cube
| | 02:42 | and finds the closest faces to that cube.
| | 02:47 | Cylinder Projection which seems oddly
appropriate to this object here, or Sphere
| | 02:52 | Projection which projects
from a spherical projection.
| | 02:56 | So in this case, let's go
ahead and use Cylinder Projection.
| | 02:59 | What that does is it creates a projection,
and it doesn't actually look quite right here.
| | 03:05 | But under Cylinder Projection, if we
scroll down to this tab here, we've got a
| | 03:11 | number of options here.
| | 03:13 | One is, do we want to view this on the
equator, on the poles, or align it to the
| | 03:19 | object which is basically what we want
to do, and then how do we want to align
| | 03:23 | it? Do we want to align
it to Polar XY or Polar ZX?
| | 03:29 | And then also, what's the radius of the
object, and do we want to clip this to
| | 03:34 | bounds or do we want to scale it to bounds?
| | 03:37 | And when I scale to bounds, what it
does is it scales the edges of that to the
| | 03:42 | edges of my bitmaps, so pretty
much aligns it very, very closely.
| | 03:49 | So once I click off of that,
then I can go in and start editing.
| | 03:54 | Now if you'll notice here, I've got
the soup label pretty much aligned.
| | 03:59 | That's because these thin
narrow faces are aligned.
| | 04:04 | But the tops and the bottoms aren't quite
right, and that's because, again, it's
| | 04:11 | cylinder-projecting this, so it's not
doing the top and bottom properly because
| | 04:16 | those don't need to be cylinder projected.
| | 04:19 | They need to be planar
projected, or they need to be flat.
| | 04:23 | So we can change that very easily.
| | 04:25 | All we have to do is select those faces.
| | 04:28 | So I am going to go ahead and deselect
this and then just do a Ctrl+Lasso here,
| | 04:34 | left-clicking, to select the top of my object.
| | 04:38 | And now I can again just take this part
of the object and do another type of unwrap.
| | 04:45 | So in this case I am going to do UV Unwrap.
| | 04:49 | Let's try Smart UV Project, which
basically does just a smart way projecting that,
| | 04:54 | and we are going to hit OK. And yes,
that does work, and because those were the
| | 04:59 | only ones selected, it projected those.
| | 05:02 | And you can see how it just made it snap
to the edges of that border, but we can
| | 05:07 | actually scale that pretty easily.
| | 05:09 | So what I am going to do here is
select either those faces or here we can
| | 05:15 | actually select the whole object,
because it's disconnected. And I am just
| | 05:19 | going to go ahead and right-click on
this, and then just hit Scale to scale
| | 05:23 | this down and then G to move it. And I am
just going to move it over part of that red area.
| | 05:32 | So now if we select everything, you see
that these faces are cylinder projected
| | 05:39 | whereas this one is
pretty much planar projected.
| | 05:43 | So as you can see we can take
different parts of the object and use different
| | 05:47 | types of unwrapping techniques to
fine-tune each part of the object to the best
| | 05:54 | mapping technique that we have.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| UV mapping a character| 00:00 | Now let's use our knowledge of UV
mapping to map something a little bit more
| | 00:04 | complex, and that would be this
character that we've been working on.
| | 00:08 | So let's go ahead and get this
character set up and the rough UV mapping
| | 00:13 | applied, and then we'll fine-tune it.
| | 00:15 | I am going to select my character here,
and the first thing I am going to do is
| | 00:18 | turn off Subdivision Surfaces.
| | 00:20 | It will make it a lot
easier to apply these maps.
| | 00:23 | So I am going to go to my Modify
panel here, find my modifier, which is my
| | 00:28 | Subdivision Surface, and go ahead
and click off the visibility here.
| | 00:33 | We can turn this on later.
| | 00:34 | Now this character
already has a material applied.
| | 00:39 | And let's go ahead and go over
to Textures and apply the texture.
| | 00:43 | So I am going to hit New, create a slot
for that texture. Under Type, we're going
| | 00:49 | to add in an image and open that image,
and it's going to be called Body-1.jpg.
| | 00:58 | Now once it's there, we also should
probably change our coordinates from
| | 01:03 | Generated to UV, and do a quick render,
and obviously we need to do some work here.
| | 01:11 | So, let's go into UV Edit mode.
Probably the easiest way to get there is to go
| | 01:16 | into the UV Edit Layout from the
Standard Layouts here. And we've got our
| | 01:22 | character and a UV editor.
| | 01:25 | Now before we actually get into this UV editor,
we need to set up the seams on our character.
| | 01:33 | So we need to unwrap the character,
and in order to unwrap it, we need to tell
| | 01:38 | Blender where the seams are.
| | 01:40 | So if you think about it, probably the
easiest way to visualize where the seams
| | 01:45 | need to go is to think of this
character as a stuffed animal.
| | 01:50 | And how would you do a
pattern for a stuffed animal?
| | 01:54 | Well, if I were going to do it, I would
go ahead and create a front and a back
| | 01:58 | and then the do the arms separately as well.
| | 02:01 | So let's go into Edit mode. And to
create the seams, we need to be in Edge mode.
| | 02:07 | So I am going to go ahead and turn off X-ray
here, so we can see exactly what we're doing.
| | 02:12 | And I want to make sure that I am in
Edge mode here. And so I want to
| | 02:17 | select this Edge Loop.
| | 02:19 | So I can do that by hitting Alt
and right-clicking on that edge loop.
| | 02:23 | Now I want this to go around to the arms,
but I really want the arms to be separate.
| | 02:29 | But actually, it's easier to make this all a
seam and then remove the seam from the arm.
| | 02:33 | So I am going to go ahead and
hit Mesh > Edges > Mark Seam.
| | 02:38 | So now I have a seam all the way
around that character, but now I want to go
| | 02:43 | ahead and unmark the arm.
| | 02:44 | So I am going to go into my front
view here, and I'm going to deselect
| | 02:51 | everything and then just do
a Lasso+Select of each arm.
| | 03:01 | And now I've selected all of the
edges on that arm here, but we can just go
| | 03:06 | ahead and clear that out.
| | 03:07 | So I am going to go Edges > Clear Seam.
And when I've done that, now you can see
| | 03:12 | how it's pretty much cleared out all
the seams except for these two little nubs
| | 03:17 | here, so I am going to go ahead and
Shift+Select these, on both sides, and again
| | 03:25 | just do a Clear Seam. Let me
show you a little shortcut here.
| | 03:28 | If I hit Ctrl+E, I can pull up that Edge
menu and just do a Clear Seam that way.
| | 03:33 | So now I have everything but these
little rings around the arms, so I can
| | 03:37 | just go ahead and hit Shift and
right-click on these to select the areas
| | 03:44 | around the arm, on both sides.
| | 03:52 | Now that I have both of these
selected, again we're going to do Mark Seam.
| | 03:57 | So now that I have these seams marked,
I can now start to unwrap my character.
| | 04:05 | So I'm going to go into Face mode,
select everything, Mesh > UV Unwrap > Unwrap.
| | 04:14 | And now that puts it out into my UV editor.
| | 04:18 | Now you see I have four
little groups of faces here.
| | 04:25 | In fact, if we click on this little
button here, this allows us to select each
| | 04:30 | one of these groups of faces here.
| | 04:33 | But before we do that, let's go ahead
and put the image in so that way we
| | 04:37 | can lay this against our texture map.
| | 04:40 | So I am going to go ahead and hit
Open Image, Body-1.jpg, and now that we've
| | 04:46 | opened it, you can see how I've
got all of these against that.
| | 04:51 | Now all I have to do is fit these to this image.
| | 04:54 | Now I am going to go ahead and turn on
Textured in my perspective viewport here,
| | 04:59 | so we can see how this fits.
| | 05:01 | Now before we do that,
let's go ahead and fix the arms.
| | 05:06 | When we unwrap the arms, you can see how
it unwrapped them from kind of a bad angle.
| | 05:12 | So let's go ahead and select those
particular faces and unwrap them in a different way.
| | 05:19 | So I'm going to go ahead into the
X-ray mode here, and I want to make sure I'm
| | 05:25 | still in Face mode. I am going to
deselect everything by hitting A, and then I
| | 05:31 | am going to Ctrl+Left-click to Lasso
select both the left and right side. And
| | 05:38 | I want to get up to there, so all I have to
do is hit Ctrl+Plus to add some more in there.
| | 05:43 | And so now I have these, all I have to do
is to Mesh > Unwrap > Cylinder Projection,
| | 05:51 | and what that does is it again
unwraps them as if they were a cylinder.
| | 05:57 | So now when I select everything, you
can see how each one of these is unwrapped
| | 06:02 | pretty flat and now I can start tweaking
these in the UV editor, and we are going
| | 06:08 | to do that in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Fine-tuning UV mapping| 00:00 | At this point, we should have our
character basically unwrapped, but we don't
| | 00:05 | have our flat pieces fitted to our image, and
that's what we are going to do in this lesson:
| | 00:11 | we're going to fine-tune the mapping.
| | 00:14 | So I'm going to go ahead and start
by selecting each individual island.
| | 00:19 | So I am going to make sure I'm in
Island Select mode here and just right-click
| | 00:23 | on the island that's his arm and hit S
to scale. And I just want to scale that
| | 00:29 | down enough so that I can hit G for grab
and position it over a part of the mesh
| | 00:37 | that's all purple, so
somewhere like right around there.
| | 00:41 | And I can do the same for this other one:
right-click on it, hit S for scale, G
| | 00:46 | for grab, and I might have to
scale this down little bit more.
| | 00:51 | And as I move it, you can see how it
actually affects what's going on in this
| | 00:55 | viewport here. So I am going to hit G
for grab to move this and again, I may
| | 00:59 | have to scale this down just a little bit more.
| | 01:02 | So now I've got that off to the
side, so now my arms are purple.
| | 01:06 | And I also want to take the back of
the character and again keep him purple.
| | 01:11 | So again, I want to scale
that down just a little bit.
| | 01:13 | And what I am trying to do is just make sure
that this is not over any of this white area.
| | 01:20 | And what's really cool is I can
actually overlap, so I can actually use the
| | 01:23 | purple in the map for both the
arms and the back of the character.
| | 01:27 | Now, most of our fine-tuning is going
to be with the front of the character,
| | 01:32 | which is this little island here.
| | 01:34 | So I am going to go ahead and move that
roughly into place. And notice how this
| | 01:39 | black spot is going to be the mouth.
We have the mouth as right here.
| | 01:43 | So I wan to make sure that I position
that fairly centered, and then scale it up
| | 01:48 | so that I've got it about the right scale.
| | 01:53 | And again, just move that down,
just somewhere around there.
| | 01:57 | And again, you can see on this
character how that mesh is applied.
| | 02:03 | In fact, I want to make sure I turn off X-ray
here so you can see that a little bit better.
| | 02:12 | Now, probably the most important
part is this area around the mouth.
| | 02:15 | You could see how this black part of the
mouth is spilling out onto the sides of his lips.
| | 02:20 | So let's go ahead and
start there and affect that.
| | 02:24 | So, I am just going to zoom in and
again, the navigation in this window is the
| | 02:29 | same as navigations in many of the 3D windows.
| | 02:31 | So I am going to go ahead
and select all of these faces.
| | 02:34 | I am going to go down here, select in
the Face mode, and just Shift+Right-click
| | 02:41 | each one of these faces.
| | 02:43 | I can hit B to box select as well.
| | 02:46 | So I want to make sure I select these, and now
I can continue to select with the Shift key.
| | 02:51 | I am going to fine-tune these ones here.
| | 02:55 | They are a little thin, so it's kind
of hard to get them with Box Select.
| | 02:58 | So now I've got all of those rings.
| | 03:01 | I can hit G to move and so I am going to go
ahead and center that, and then S to scale.
| | 03:08 | So I am going to scale that up so the
edges of this are beyond the darkness of
| | 03:15 | that dark spot there.
| | 03:16 | And then I can scale in Y as well.
| | 03:20 | So I can hit S to scale, and I can scale up
and down in Y, so S and Y to scale up and down.
| | 03:27 | And now I've just got to fix these corners here.
| | 03:31 | So I can go into either Edge or Vertex
mode--let's go into Vertex mode here--and
| | 03:38 | just sort of right-click on Opposite Vertices.
| | 03:41 | So I am going to right-click here and
here, hit G for grab and Y to constrain it
| | 03:47 | vertically, left-click to set that, and
again Shift+Right-click to select these
| | 03:55 | ones and again move them down.
| | 03:58 | And so what I am trying to do here is
just get this outline closer to what
| | 04:04 | I have on my object.
| | 04:07 | So again, G Y. And again, I'm just
kind of moving these into place.
| | 04:17 | And now I can go into these other
vertices here, get those out of the way.
| | 04:25 | And now as you can see, I'm starting to
get--the inside of his mouth is black and
| | 04:30 | the outside is white.
| | 04:32 | And so we can also start playing
with other parts of the character.
| | 04:37 | So we can start fine-tuning how his
white belly fits into the equation here.
| | 04:43 | So I can for example, select some of
these and scale them in X to bring them in,
| | 04:50 | or I can select some of
these and scale them out.
| | 04:55 | And so you can see how if I scale them
in or scale them out you can see how it
| | 05:00 | affects how this positions to the character.
| | 05:04 | So we can keep going with this, but I think
you get the general gist of how this works.
| | 05:10 | So I am going to go ahead and stop
here, and let's go back into our default
| | 05:14 | layout and turn on
Texturing to see what we have. Okay.
| | 05:18 | So that actually does look pretty good.
| | 05:20 | I am going to go into my Modifiers and
turn on Subdivision Surfaces, and you could
| | 05:26 | see I actually have it pretty close.
| | 05:28 | We can continue to fine-tune these, but
as you can see, it's a bunch of simple
| | 05:32 | tools and just a lot of patience is
what you need to get these UV maps aligned.
| | 05:38 | So just to go over the process, we
need to, first of all, create our seams, so
| | 05:44 | think of the character as a stuffed
animal, or how would you create a fabric
| | 05:50 | version of this object, and then create
the seams for that pattern, unwrap, and
| | 05:57 | then start to fine-tune the position
of the character's mesh to the image map
| | 06:05 | in the UV editor.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating Bump and Normal maps| 00:00 | Textures can also be used to create
normal and bump maps, and these will allow
| | 00:06 | you to create the illusion of a rough surface.
| | 00:11 | So I have a simple sphere here and
it already has a material applied.
| | 00:16 | Let's go ahead and add in a
texture and turn that into a bump map.
| | 00:21 | So I am going to just go ahead and click
on New. And right now we have Clouds as
| | 00:27 | the default, but let's go ahead and
scroll down and select Wood. And I like this
| | 00:32 | because it has these nice stripes here.
| | 00:35 | Now, we can certainly modify this as
we want, but let's just use this basic
| | 00:40 | standard wood material here.
| | 00:42 | And you can see how it is mapped to the
object, and so we can get a few more stripes here.
| | 00:48 | Let's just put this on Object mode, and
let's just do a quick test render here
| | 00:52 | to see what we have.
| | 00:54 | So we've got the stripes
going around our object.
| | 00:57 | I am going to go ahead and
expand this so we can see it.
| | 01:02 | Now we can set bump mapping
here in the Influence tab.
| | 01:07 | All we have to do is just
click under Geometry > Normal.
| | 01:11 | It's actually normal and bump
mapping, and as soon as we do, look at what
| | 01:15 | happens to the material.
| | 01:17 | We have a bumpy surface. And if I were
to render this, you could see I have a
| | 01:23 | pretty good approximation of that bump map.
| | 01:26 | But also notice how we're getting a
little bit of aliasing here, and that's
| | 01:30 | because of the resolution of our mesh.
| | 01:35 | If we wanted to get a little bit more
resolution, we could actually subdivide this,
| | 01:40 | so let's go ahead and do that.
| | 01:41 | We are going to go into our Modifiers
and select Subdivision Surface and turn
| | 01:47 | the Render up to about 3.
| | 01:48 | I am going to go back over to my Textures
here, and let's go ahead and do a quick render.
| | 01:54 | Notice how this takes a
little bit longer to render.
| | 01:56 | That's because you have
more surface to work with.
| | 02:00 | But as we add in subdivisions, you can
see how we get a much better look here.
| | 02:04 | Now we can affect the bump mapping
either by the normal size, so basically how
| | 02:11 | much normal mapping we have.
| | 02:13 | So if we turn this up a lot, you will
see we get a much deeper effect. I
| | 02:19 | am going to turn that back down to about 1.
And we also have the method of bump mapping.
| | 02:27 | Do we want to just do the default method?
| | 02:29 | We have another one called Compatible
which is compatible with other bump maps,
| | 02:33 | the Default method, another one here
called Best Quality, which actually does
| | 02:38 | give you the best quality, again
at the sacrifice of render time.
| | 02:42 | So we can also, if we want to, go over
here and make it a negative bump map, in
| | 02:49 | another words make the bumps into holes.
| | 02:54 | Now with bump mapping, just remember
that the light colors are what's creating
| | 03:00 | the bumps. Dark colors create no bumps;
light colors create bumps. And you can
| | 03:06 | use not only these procedural texture,
such as wood, but you can also use bitmaps
| | 03:12 | or really any sort of image map.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Displacement mapping| 00:00 | Now when you use bump mapping,
it basically is a render effect.
| | 00:05 | It creates the illusion of a bumpy surface.
| | 00:08 | It doesn't actually change
the geometry of an object.
| | 00:13 | To do that, we require displacement mapping.
| | 00:17 | Now let's take a quick look at bump
mapping again, just to see how it works. So
| | 00:21 | I have this cube and if I do a quick
render of it, you see that, well, it's got
| | 00:27 | this black-and-white texture on, which we
can use as a bump map or a displacement map.
| | 00:33 | So if we go over to our Texture panel
here, so we can see under Influence, it's
| | 00:38 | influencing the color of the object.
And you can see that here in the preview.
| | 00:44 | Now, if I turn this off for color and
go over to Geometry here, under Influence,
| | 00:51 | and turn on Norm, you can see how I
can create a normal map, or bump map, that
| | 00:58 | has that cross effect.
| | 01:01 | So if I do a quick render, you can see how yeah,
I do get those lines embossed on that surface.
| | 01:09 | But if we scroll in, you can see
that well it's not really affecting the
| | 01:12 | geometry of the object.
| | 01:15 | To do that we need a displacement map.
| | 01:18 | So I am going to turn off the
Norm and turn on Displacement.
| | 01:23 | Now, this particular cube
doesn't have a lot of detail.
| | 01:28 | If I look at it in Edit mode here,
you will see that I only have a few
| | 01:34 | subdivisions on each side. And this is
actually going to be a problem when it
| | 01:38 | comes to actually displacing this object.
| | 01:41 | That's because it doesn't
have enough detail to displace.
| | 01:45 | Now remember, displacement mapping
actually changes the structure of the object.
| | 01:50 | It actually displaces the geometry.
| | 01:53 | So in order to displace
geometry, I need more geometry.
| | 01:58 | Now I can do that in one of two ways.
| | 02:00 | I can simply make my mesh more
complex, which is really going to bog down my
| | 02:04 | scene, but probably the more
efficient way is just to add a subdivision
| | 02:08 | surface to my object.
| | 02:10 | So I am going to go select my object,
go over to Modifiers here, and add in a
| | 02:16 | subdivision surface. I can probably
keep my Render settings at two, and let's
| | 02:21 | just see what happens.
| | 02:22 | This is the default. And you can see
that, okay, so now that displacement
| | 02:28 | really works. If I turn up my Render
settings to, say, 3 or 4 and hit
| | 02:34 | Render, you can really see how this works.
| | 02:38 | The displacement map actually
changes the structure of the geometry to
| | 02:45 | match that image map.
| | 02:48 | So this is a very efficient way
of creating additional geometry.
| | 02:52 | Now if I go over here, you can see I
have a Displacement option here, and this
| | 02:56 | is actually a physical displacement.
Actually, it's an actual measured value, so
| | 03:01 | if I want to, I can make it a bigger number, or I
can go negative to turn those bumps into divots.
| | 03:11 | In other words it becomes a
channel rather than a bump.
| | 03:16 | So the one downside to displacement
mapping is that you do need more geometry,
| | 03:21 | but Subdivision Surfaces can help
you add this without too much overload.
| | 03:27 | So remember bump mapping is a surface effect;
| | 03:29 | it does not change the underlying
geometry. Displacement mapping, however, does,
| | 03:34 | although you do need
enough geometry to displace.
| | 03:39 | So go ahead and use these as you want.
| | 03:41 | I would tend to opt for bump mapping
first and if that doesn't work, then going
| | 03:46 | to displacement mapping.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the Node Editor| 00:00 | Another way to create textures for
your objects is to use the Node Editor.
| | 00:04 | Now this allows us to connect multiple
textures together into a network of nodes
| | 00:10 | that create a more complex texture.
| | 00:13 | Let me show you how this works.
| | 00:15 | The Node Editor is a separate window here.
| | 00:18 | So I'm right now in my 3D viewport.
| | 00:21 | So I am going to go ahead and size this
down here, and I am going to click on my
| | 00:25 | top-right corner here and create a
new viewport. And under that I'm going to
| | 00:30 | select the Node Editor.
| | 00:33 | Now this is just another window, but it
allows us to do a number of different things.
| | 00:39 | Now we have three modes here:
| | 00:41 | we can use this for materials,
| | 00:43 | we can use us for textures,
and we can use it for images.
| | 00:48 | I am going to select the
middle button here for textures.
| | 00:51 | Now I have my cube selected, and on
that cube I have a default material.
| | 00:57 | Now I want to add in a texture.
| | 01:00 | Now typically, I would just go over
to this Texture panel and hit New.
| | 01:05 | But when I am in the Node Editor, you
can hit that same button here. So these
| | 01:11 | two buttons are equivalent.
| | 01:12 | So if I hit it in the Node Editor,
notice how it creates a new node in my
| | 01:18 | Properties panel. But I don't want
to use my default node here, I want to
| | 01:22 | actually use the nodes in the Node Editor.
| | 01:25 | So if I click Use Nodes here, notice
how some nodes pop up. And by default it
| | 01:32 | just gives us a basic checkerboard pattern.
| | 01:35 | So if I want, I can actually change this,
and I can basically make a texture, such
| | 01:40 | as a blue-and-white checkerboard. And if
I want, if I hit Render, you'll see that
| | 01:45 | it actually shows up on that cube.
| | 01:49 | So what we have here is we have a node
here called Checker which is feeding into
| | 01:56 | this output, which is
what's feeding this preview.
| | 02:00 | So if I disconnect this node, notice
how this output and the preview go blank.
| | 02:06 | If I select this color node here,
you'll see that I can drag out a line and I
| | 02:11 | can plug that into my color channel,
and again that shows up in my preview.
| | 02:16 | Now I am not limited to checkerboard.
| | 02:19 | So, if I select this node and just hit
the Delete key, then that goes away and I
| | 02:24 | can add in any other type of node I want.
| | 02:27 | If I go here to the Add menu, you will
see I have a number of different types of
| | 02:33 | nodes that I can use to either
add in texture or to modify them.
| | 02:38 | So for example here, we have our
standard textures, such as Clouds and Wood and
| | 02:42 | Stucco and all of that, but we also
have patterns such as the checkerboard we
| | 02:47 | just used. Or we have Bricks.
| | 02:49 | So let's go ahead and select Bricks
and bring that up and you will see that
| | 02:54 | nothing really shows up in
this panel until we plug it in.
| | 02:57 | So I am going to go ahead and
left-click on this color, drag out this line, and
| | 03:02 | plug it into the color of this output node.
And you can see how it shows up in my preview.
| | 03:10 | Now, I have a number of
options here that I can change.
| | 03:13 | I can change the thickness of my mortar.
| | 03:16 | I can change my offset of the bricks.
So for example, and if I want to, I can
| | 03:20 | make my mortar thicker or
thinner, just by dragging this.
| | 03:24 | I can change the color of the mortar.
| | 03:26 | So if I want I can left click on
this mortar and we can make it a
| | 03:30 | lighter-colored mortar.
| | 03:32 | I can also change the color of my bricks.
| | 03:34 | So if I click on this yellow
brick, I can change it to red.
| | 03:37 | Now I am not limited to just
what's in these panels here.
| | 03:42 | If you notice here, we also have
inputs into all of these. Just like we had
| | 03:46 | input this Output node, I can also
feed into any one of these an additional
| | 03:53 | color, or an additional node.
| | 03:55 | So if I want to, I can add in another
node. So if we go here to Textures and
| | 03:59 | let's say I wanted to add in Clouds,
that node will come up, and I can left-click
| | 04:04 | and drag that and this
cloud has an output of a color.
| | 04:09 | So if I want to, I can take this
color of the clouds and plug it into the
| | 04:14 | mortar of my brick color. And you can
see how now this cloud color is showing
| | 04:20 | up as my mortar color.
| | 04:23 | Now, this is a little extreme,
but I can certainly change this.
| | 04:26 | So if I wanted to, I could take my
black color and make it a little bit more
| | 04:31 | gray, and you can see now my mortar is
a more modeled type of gray. And you can
| | 04:37 | see how this also shows up in my preview.
| | 04:41 | Now if I hit F12 to render, you can
see how this shows up on my object.
| | 04:47 | So as you can see, there are
a lot of possibilities here.
| | 04:51 | You can certainly plug nodes into
other nodes, so it's a really great way to
| | 04:55 | create highly custom textures and materials.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
8. Working with LightAdding lamps to a scene| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at lighting in Blender.
| | 00:03 | Lighting not only illuminates the scene,
but it also can add mood and drama to
| | 00:09 | your scene, so lighting is very important.
| | 00:12 | So we are going to start off by taking
a look at a very simple light called the
| | 00:16 | point light, and then move on from there.
| | 00:18 | So in this scene I have a simple cup and
saucer, and it has no lights in the scene.
| | 00:24 | If I hit F12 to render, you will see
that, well, you won't see much actually,
| | 00:29 | because there is no light in
the scene; it renders black.
| | 00:33 | So we can fix this of course by adding a light.
| | 00:37 | So I'm going to go into my Add menu.
And lights in Blender or called lamps, so we
| | 00:43 | have five different types of lamps.
We have Point lamps, Sun, Spot, Hemi, and Area
| | 00:49 | lamps, and I am going to select the Point lamp.
| | 00:52 | Now when this comes up, you will see
that I have it selected, and if I want to
| | 00:58 | see a rough approximation of the light,
I can turn on Textured mode, and you'll
| | 01:04 | see that the light actually
can be seen in my viewport.
| | 01:08 | So if I move the light up, you will see
how it affects the lighting of the scene.
| | 01:13 | Now this is a point light, which means it's
kind of like the bare light bulb in the room.
| | 01:17 | It generates energy in all directions.
| | 01:20 | So with it directly above the cup,
you'll see I am not getting any shading on
| | 01:24 | the side of the cup, so I need to move this.
| | 01:26 | I am going to move this in Y a little bit
over here so I have a pretty nice illumination.
| | 01:34 | Now with this light at default, it may
or may not be bright enough. Let me go
| | 01:40 | ahead and do a quick render
and we will see what happens.
| | 01:43 | And this scene actually looks a little
bit dim, and part of this is because of
| | 01:48 | the way default lights work in Blender.
| | 01:52 | If I have this light selected, I can
go over to my Lighting panel, and this
| | 01:58 | allows me to control all the different lights.
| | 02:01 | For right now, let's just jump straight
down to the Falloff value. And this is by
| | 02:07 | default set to Inverse Square, which
is actually natural lighting. Real-world
| | 02:13 | lights fall off with the
square of distance from the object.
| | 02:17 | That's why things get dimmer
the further you are from the light.
| | 02:20 | But for this, let's go ahead
and set this to something else.
| | 02:24 | We are going to set this to Constant,
so this provides constant illumination,
| | 02:28 | the light has no Falloff, and it
illuminates everything evenly.
| | 02:32 | So if I do a quick render, you will see
that I get a pretty decent render here.
| | 02:38 | So with this, let's go ahead and
take a look at some of these other
| | 02:41 | parameters for this lamp.
| | 02:43 | Along the top here, we have a
selection list of all the different types of
| | 02:48 | lamps. So I selected Point Lamp from
the Add menu and that's what I got, but if
| | 02:54 | I want to decide to change it, I can, later;
| | 02:57 | I can make it a Sun, a Spot,
a Hemi or an Area lamp.
| | 03:01 | Now notice how when I change this, the
controls I have for each light change as well.
| | 03:07 | So each light is a little bit
different in the way that it works.
| | 03:11 | Now with the point light the first
parameter that you will come across is this
| | 03:15 | color picker, and this basically just
allows us to change the color of light.
| | 03:20 | And you can see that here in
the camera perspective window.
| | 03:24 | I can make my lights really any color I want.
| | 03:28 | I am going to go ahead and
leave it at the default of white.
| | 03:31 | Now right below that we have an energy
variable, and that is basically my light
| | 03:36 | dimmer. It makes a light brighter or dimmer.
| | 03:39 | So if I bring it up, make it a larger
number, say let's make it about 3, and I do
| | 03:45 | a quick render, you will see that I
have too much light in the scene, and it's
| | 03:49 | blowing out the highlights.
| | 03:51 | And this is actually a very common
thing that you want to cross when lighting a
| | 03:54 | scene is that you have
too much light in the scene.
| | 03:57 | So it's always best to pay careful
attention to this energy variable. And if you
| | 04:02 | have too much light in the scene,
you can always turn the light down.
| | 04:05 | So if I bring it down say below 1 and
do a quick render, you can see how again
| | 04:11 | the scene is getting a little bit
dimmer because I have less light.
| | 04:16 | Now one reason why you have too much
light in the scene is because you have
| | 04:20 | more than one light,
| | 04:21 | so always pay attention to that Energy value.
| | 04:24 | I am going to return this to 1, and
let's go through the rest of these.
| | 04:29 | The next one is a negative light and
this basically just allows the light to
| | 04:32 | subtract light out of the scene.
| | 04:35 | So if you had too much light in the
scene, you can either turn down the
| | 04:38 | energy, or you could turn on a
negative light, which would suck out that much
| | 04:43 | light out of a scene.
| | 04:45 | So if this was a negative light
with an Energy of 1, it would basically
| | 04:49 | counterbalance that much light in the scene.
| | 04:51 | So this is kind of great
for fine-tuning your lighting.
| | 04:54 | Now below this we have Specular and
Diffuse, and these are actually pretty
| | 04:59 | important, and this allows us to
separate out the specular and diffuse channels
| | 05:04 | in the light, and we can turn it on and off.
| | 05:07 | Now notice how in this render we have
a little specular highlights around the
| | 05:10 | rim of the cup and the rim of the handle.
| | 05:14 | Now if I turn off Diffuse here and just
render the Specular, you'll see what I mean.
| | 05:20 | These are the specular areas. This is
where my specular highlights are showing up.
| | 05:25 | So if I want to, I can just render
those. And this is really nice for
| | 05:31 | anything where you are going to do
compositing later and you will want a
| | 05:34 | separate render channel.
| | 05:35 | Another cool way to use it is to
have multiple lights: one illuminates
| | 05:39 | specularity, the second illuminates
diffuse, and you can mix and match and have
| | 05:44 | separate lights that make the
specularity pop or whatever.
| | 05:49 | So if I turned off Specularity and just
render Diffuse, you will see that, well,
| | 05:54 | I get a pretty basic scene, but
there is no highlights. It's pretty flat.
| | 05:59 | So I am going to go ahead
and leave both of those on.
| | 06:01 | Now if we circle all the way back
around to our Falloff, we had it set to
| | 06:06 | Constant, but we have a number of other options.
| | 06:09 | We have Inverse Linear, which is
basically a straight-line falloff.
| | 06:14 | It's not quite inverse square, but it
gives you a bit of a falloff for your lights.
| | 06:19 | We also have Inverse Square, which we
talked about, which is realistic lighting.
| | 06:24 | We also have Custom Curves, which allow
you to fall the light off however you want.
| | 06:29 | And we also have a weighted light,
which, again, is more of a custom setting.
| | 06:34 | I am going to go ahead and return this
to Inverse Square, and let's again do a
| | 06:39 | test render. But before I do that,
let's go ahead and turn up the energy.
| | 06:44 | Remember, this light is falling off
with distance, so in order to get something
| | 06:49 | a little bit brighter, we
need to turn up the energy.
| | 06:53 | So I am going to go ahead and turn
this up to 8 and do a quick render.
| | 06:58 | When I do that, you can see how now
that light actually does illuminate the
| | 07:02 | scene. In fact, it seems to be over-
illuminating it just a bit, so we can
| | 07:06 | certainly turn that down.
| | 07:08 | Let's turn that down to about 5 here
and again just do a quick render.
| | 07:13 | And you see how when you have a
falloff set, your lights are going to have to
| | 07:19 | be brighter to illuminate something
than they would with a constant falloff.
| | 07:24 | Now also notice when this
energy goes up, your preview changes.
| | 07:29 | Now this preview is kind of set
for a constant value of lighting.
| | 07:32 | It doesn't calculate falloff, so
you are not going to get accurate
| | 07:36 | representation in your viewports.
| | 07:39 | The last value we have is this Distance
value. So if I dial this down, you see
| | 07:44 | that there's actually a sphere that
surrounds our light, and when we click that
| | 07:49 | sphere on, we can see the maximum
distance that this light can fall.
| | 07:54 | So this is actually kind of nice.
| | 07:55 | If you have a light that's maybe
illuminating something it shouldn't, you can
| | 08:00 | actually turn on the Sphere to look at
the distance, to make sure that you're
| | 08:05 | not illuminating something you shouldn't.
| | 08:07 | It's a great way to limit the
effect of lights in the scene.
| | 08:12 | So if I turn that on and render this,
you'll see that it actually darkens the
| | 08:16 | scene again, because what happens with
this distance is at this line, the light
| | 08:23 | is at half its intensity,
| | 08:25 | so that's kind of your sphere
of influence for that light.
| | 08:30 | So those are some of the basics
of how to use the point light.
| | 08:33 | Now remember, the point light extends
light in all directions, and you can have
| | 08:39 | multiple types of falloff, as well
as many different types of color.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Fine-tuning ray-trace shadows| 00:00 | In the real world, lights actually cast
shadows, areas where light is blocked.
| | 00:05 | Now in a 3D program you can turn shadows on
and off, and we have multiple types of shadows.
| | 00:12 | So let's take a look at
ray-trace shadows in Blender.
| | 00:16 | Now I have this basic scene setup, which
is our point light shining on a cup and
| | 00:22 | a saucer, and let's just do
a quick render of that scene.
| | 00:26 | So as you can see, we get shading on
the side of the cup, but the scene doesn't
| | 00:31 | look realistic because there is no
shadow. And we can add that in very simply.
| | 00:36 | Now this is a point light so we have an
option for no shadow or ray-traced shadows.
| | 00:42 | Let's go ahead and turn this on, but
when you turn on shadows, you do need to
| | 00:48 | make sure they are
turned on in renderer as well.
| | 00:52 | So I am going to introduce you to
this panel here, which looks like a little
| | 00:55 | camera, and that's our Render panel. And
if we scroll down here, you'll see under
| | 01:00 | Shading, we have a number of options.
| | 01:03 | One is, do we want to see textures,
another is, do we want to see ray tracing, and
| | 01:09 | that's things like the reflections in
the table? And because we're using ray-
| | 01:14 | trace shadows, we need to make sure
that this is turned on, and obviously we
| | 01:19 | also need to make sure that these
Shadows option is turned on as well.
| | 01:23 | So once we have Ray Tracing and Shadows
turned on, we can go ahead and do a quick render.
| | 01:30 | Now notice as soon as we turn on
Shadows, the render time goes down just a
| | 01:34 | little bit, and that's because
shadows do take time to render.
| | 01:38 | But we do have a very defined shadow here.
| | 01:42 | Now, it's pretty black, and it's kind of
hard edged, but we can change that as
| | 01:47 | well. But we are getting shadows in the scene.
| | 01:50 | Now if you don't want actual black shadows,
there are a number of ways to get rid of them.
| | 01:55 | One is to add more ambient light in the
scene, but another easy way is just to
| | 01:59 | change the color of the shadow, and
this color picker allows you to do that.
| | 02:04 | So I am going to go ahead and just
change the color of the shadow to a dark
| | 02:08 | gray, instead of black, and
let's just do a quick render.
| | 02:13 | So as you can see, even a dark-gray
shadow adds a little bit more realism. We
| | 02:18 | can actually see into the shadows.
| | 02:20 | They are not completely black and opaque.
| | 02:22 | We can actually see what's beyond that shadow.
| | 02:25 | So that actually adds a little bit of realism.
| | 02:27 | If we want to, we don't
have to have just gray shadows;
| | 02:30 | we can certainly make them a different
color. So if I wanted to make a dark blue
| | 02:34 | shadow, I could do that as well.
| | 02:38 | Now in this scene, a dark blue shadow
might not be the exact thing we want, but
| | 02:42 | if we had something that was
semi-transparent or something like that, that
| | 02:46 | might work very well.
| | 02:47 | So I am going to go ahead and make
sure I turn off my saturation here
| | 02:51 | and just make it into a dark shadow.
| | 02:55 | Now this shadow that we have is very hard edged.
| | 02:58 | You can see here, we have got here a
very crisp edge, that shadow, and
| | 03:01 | sometimes we want that,
| | 03:03 | but there are times where we
don't want a hard-edged shadow;
| | 03:06 | we want something as a little bit fuzzier.
| | 03:09 | We can change that under the Sampling option.
| | 03:13 | One is the number of samples. So when we
ray-trace we fire rays of light towards
| | 03:19 | the object and that will give us our shadows.
| | 03:22 | So with only one ray, we are
going to get that sharp edge.
| | 03:27 | So what we need to do is bring this up.
| | 03:29 | So I am going to bring it up to 8.
| | 03:32 | But we also need to affect this
value here for Soft, and so we want to
| | 03:37 | bring that up a bit.
| | 03:38 | So let's bring it up to about 1.5 or
so. And now with 8 samples and a Soft
| | 03:44 | value of 1.5, you will see that we are
actually going to get a softer edge on this shadow.
| | 03:51 | So one thing you'll notice is that with
more samples you have longer render times,
| | 03:56 | so you have to kind of balance
quality against the number of samples.
| | 04:01 | In this case, I'm looking at the
shadow and it's a little modeled.
| | 04:05 | It's not quite smooth enough.
| | 04:08 | So I'm going to actually bring up my
samples to say 16, which again will
| | 04:12 | increase my render time, but it
should give me a more accurate result.
| | 04:18 | So with 16 samples you see you get a much
softer edge with a little less graininess.
| | 04:24 | So higher samples increase render
time but also increase the quality of
| | 04:30 | the soft shadows.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using spot lamps| 00:01 | The Spot lamp is probably the next
most popular lamp in Blender, and it allows
| | 00:06 | you to confine light to a
very specific beam of light.
| | 00:10 | Think about it like a spotlight in the
theater where it highlights a certain area.
| | 00:14 | A flashlight or car headlight would be
another good example of this type of light.
| | 00:19 | Now we can add these in under the Add
menu and go under Lamp > Spot. And when I
| | 00:25 | bring it in, it brings in basically
this lamp, and you can see that it has this
| | 00:30 | cone of light that we can work with.
| | 00:32 | Now if I turn on Texturing in my
camera viewport, I can see how this works.
| | 00:38 | So if I move my light up, you will see
how we get this kind of pool of light
| | 00:45 | over the cup, and that's because we
are confining the light to this cone.
| | 00:51 | Now if I were to move this back and
forth along the Y axis, you can see how this
| | 00:56 | pool of light moves with the actual light.
| | 01:00 | So as this cone moves off the
cup, the light moves off as well.
| | 01:05 | But I can also rotate this into
position here, and you can see now we have
| | 01:10 | this light on the cup.
| | 01:11 | Now when we go into our Light tab
here--it looks like a little spot light--
| | 01:16 | you'll see that under this we have a lot of
the same controls we had for the point light.
| | 01:22 | We have Color, Specular, Diffuse.
| | 01:24 | We also have Falloff.
| | 01:25 | And I am going to go ahead
and set my Falloff to Constant.
| | 01:28 | We also have a number of
different types of shadows.
| | 01:31 | We actually have what's called a buffer
shadow, which we will get to in a little
| | 01:35 | bit, but I am going to turn on Ray Shadows.
| | 01:37 | Now let's just go ahead and do
a quick render of this light.
| | 01:42 | So the render shows that we
actually have a cone of light that's
| | 01:46 | illuminating our object.
| | 01:48 | I am going to go ahead and size down
this Shadow rollout, and you'll see we have
| | 01:54 | an option here called Spot Shape.
| | 01:57 | The first one is the size of the
beam, so is this going to be narrow?
| | 02:02 | In fact, let's just go ahead and see this in
solid view here. Is this going to be
| | 02:07 | narrow or is it going to be wide?
| | 02:11 | So if I make it more narrow, if we
render that here, we could actually render
| | 02:16 | just part of that cup.
| | 02:18 | Okay, so I have got this really focused
down. Or we can make it a little bit wider.
| | 02:24 | We also have a Blend option, and this
controls the sharpness of the edge.
| | 02:29 | So if I bring this out so it's just
above the cup here and turn this all the
| | 02:35 | way to 0 and render, you'll see that this
pool of light has a very, very hard edge.
| | 02:42 | This Blend option allows you to change
that from hard edge to soft edge, so if I
| | 02:48 | bring it way up--you can see
how we have this inner value here.
| | 02:52 | So if I bring this up to say 0.75, you
see, when I render it, it goes from a
| | 02:57 | very sharp to a very soft edge.
| | 03:01 | So this is really just the
softness of the edge of that cone.
| | 03:05 | Now typically, the default is about 0.15,
but we can make it whatever we want.
| | 03:11 | We also have the option of making
this a square instead of a circle.
| | 03:16 | So if I were to render this as a
square, you can see how this turns from a
| | 03:21 | circular beam of light
to a square beam of light.
| | 03:23 | Think of it as having barn doors on your light.
| | 03:28 | We also have an option here called Show
Cone, and this is actually kind of nice
| | 03:32 | because it allows you to see exactly
what the light is illuminating, and this is
| | 03:37 | really just for visualization
of where the light is falling.
| | 03:42 | So if I would have to render this,
| | 03:43 | it would render pretty
much the same as we had here.
| | 03:47 | But if we want to, we can turn on what's
called a halo, and that's actually kind
| | 03:52 | of a volumetric render effect.
| | 03:54 | So if I were to render this with a
halo, you can see how you can actually
| | 03:58 | see that beam of light.
| | 04:01 | Now the actual intensity of
this halo is controlled here.
| | 04:05 | So if I dial it down, I get
less of an effect, or more.
| | 04:10 | So those are some of the basics of Spot
lamps, a more controlled lamp that allow
| | 04:15 | you to place light exactly where you want.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Fine-tuning buffer shadows| 00:00 | When you use Spot lamps you have an
additional type of shadow that you can use,
| | 00:05 | and that's called the buffer shadow.
| | 00:07 | Now these are shadows that are created
using a bitmap, rather than ray tracing,
| | 00:12 | and they can render much more quickly.
| | 00:15 | So if you're using Spot lamps, it's
a good idea to take a look at buffer
| | 00:18 | shadows to see if they'll work for you.
| | 00:20 | Now I have a simple scene here with a
Spot lamp shining on a cup, and this is the
| | 00:27 | scene we used in the last lesson.
And let's go ahead and select the lamp and
| | 00:31 | change the shadow from
Ray Shadow to Buffer Shadow.
| | 00:36 | Now we have a number of options with
Buffer Shadow. The first one is the color
| | 00:41 | of the shadow, which is pretty much
the same as you have for the Ray Shadow.
| | 00:44 | And then down here we have controls
for this specific type of shadow. And we
| | 00:49 | have a couple of different buffer types,
as well as controls for those buffer types.
| | 00:55 | Now we're going to take a look first
at Classic-H, which is probably the one
| | 00:59 | you're going to use most. It's
actually an update of the Classical one.
| | 01:04 | It actually works a little bit better.
| | 01:06 | So under this we have, first of all,
Filter Type, and this is basically how
| | 01:11 | does it blur the shadow?
| | 01:13 | We're just going to leave this on Box.
And then down here we have a Softness
| | 01:17 | control, a Size control, in other words,
the size the bitmap uses calculate
| | 01:23 | the shadow, a Bias control.
| | 01:25 | Now this controls how the shadow
aligns with the object. Remember, this is a
| | 01:30 | bitmap that is overlaid on the image,
so this controls how that works. And then
| | 01:35 | the number of Samples.
| | 01:36 | Now this is the number of samples to
create a soft shadow. So let's go ahead and
| | 01:40 | just do a quick render here to see what
the default give us. And as you can see,
| | 01:46 | it's a very workable shadow. So let's
take a look at some of these controls.
| | 01:51 | Now the first one is called Soft, and
let's go ahead and just dial that down to
| | 01:55 | 0 and render. And as predicted, we get a
very hard-edged shadow, because softness
| | 02:03 | is 0, and not soft is hard.
| | 02:07 | So if we want, we can dial up the
number of samples and that can make the
| | 02:12 | shadow even crisper.
| | 02:13 | Now this size here is just the size
of that bitmap that it calculates.
| | 02:19 | If you get too big, you're going to
have more bitmap than you have image,
| | 02:23 | so large numbers really kind of give
you a diminishing return; after a certain
| | 02:27 | size, they don't really have much effect.
But you can see when I turn it up to
| | 02:31 | 2048, I get a much crisper shadow.
| | 02:35 | That's because a 512, I'm actually
under-sampling in relation to the image, so
| | 02:41 | you can see how I'm getting
a much crisper shadow here.
| | 02:44 | Now I'm going to turn that back down
to 512, and let's go ahead and turn
| | 02:49 | softness all the way up.
| | 02:51 | I'm going to turn it up to a very high number.
| | 02:54 | Originally, it was at 3, but I'm
going to bring it up to 32. And this will
| | 02:58 | actually shows you how
it calculates this shadow.
| | 03:02 | So with a very high value for Soft, it
shows you how it calculates a sample.
| | 03:07 | You can see we have a bunch of different
samples of this shadow from different angles.
| | 03:14 | It moves the light around to give you
different shadows, and then it blends
| | 03:18 | those together. But the larger this
soft value, the further it moves the light,
| | 03:25 | and so you get this multi-shadow affect
if you have not enough samples, and that
| | 03:31 | brings us down to this.
| | 03:32 | This is actually the number of samples we're
using. How many times do we move that light?
| | 03:37 | So with 3, with a Soft value of 32, you
notice you're not going to get a really
| | 03:42 | good-looking shadow, but we can
certainly bring that up. So let's bring that up
| | 03:46 | to, say, 10 and then do a render.
| | 03:49 | Now with more samples, that means it
moves the light more times and it has more
| | 03:54 | sub-shadows to blend together to make
this soft shadow. And notice how the
| | 03:59 | shadow looks soft and it looks really
nice, and more importantly, it renders a
| | 04:05 | lot faster than a ray-trace shadow.
| | 04:08 | Now I'm going to bring my Samples back
down to 3 here, and I'm going to bring my
| | 04:13 | Soft value back down to 4, and then
I'm going to do a quick render here.
| | 04:19 | Now we're using the Classical-H buffer type.
| | 04:22 | Now one of the reasons we use the
Classical-H buffer type is because it's a
| | 04:27 | new algorithm that Blender instituted
back in 2.4 or so, and what it does is
| | 04:33 | it prevents objects from
self-shadowing and actually corrects some errors in
| | 04:38 | the original algorithm.
| | 04:40 | So with these values, if I go into a
Classical buffer type, you'll actually see
| | 04:46 | some of the errors that we can get.
So because of the specific values I have, we
| | 04:51 | actually have a little bit of an error
here in that we have a white spot in our
| | 04:55 | shadow, and that's what can happen
when you use this Classical buffer type.
| | 05:00 | So I tend to always keep it on Classical-H.
| | 05:05 | Now if you want, we do have some
additional buffer types. We have what's called
| | 05:09 | a Deep buffer type.
| | 05:10 | Now this has all the same controls as
Classical and Classical-H, but it has a
| | 05:17 | compression value for the shadow, and
what that does is it gives you more bit
| | 05:23 | depth in the shadow area so that
way you can get more image in that shadow.
| | 05:29 | This is really better if you
render at higher bit depths.
| | 05:32 | Now the last one is called a Regular
Shadows, and that's really just a very
| | 05:37 | simple, basic shadow and it basically
just renders a simple shadow like this. And
| | 05:43 | we only have one control which is for
Bias, and so a higher biased value, say such
| | 05:50 | as 3, will give you a slightly different result.
| | 05:55 | In other words, the bias basically just
moves the shadow. Notice how the shadow
| | 05:58 | moved a little bit forward here.
| | 06:00 | So I tend to keep my
shadows on Classical-H. Classic-H
| | 06:05 | is probably the best general-purpose
algorithm to use. But remember, buffer
| | 06:11 | shadows are based on a bitmap, which
means they render faster, particularly
| | 06:17 | for soft shadows.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using Hemi lamps| 00:00 | When lighting a scene there are
times when you'll need an overall general
| | 00:05 | light, such as light
coming from a specific direction.
| | 00:08 | This is where we use the Hemi lamp,
which just creates directional light.
| | 00:14 | So we're going to go ahead
and add in a lamp called a Hemi.
| | 00:17 | When we bring it in, you can see how
it looks kind of like a hemisphere, and
| | 00:24 | basically this light is an
infinite hemisphere that projects light.
| | 00:28 | So it's kind of like a spotlight in
that the light is directional, but it
| | 00:33 | doesn't have a specific source, so it
doesn't create a cone, such as a spotlight.
| | 00:38 | If we go into the Properties panel for
this, you can see that the Hemi light
| | 00:43 | has very few controls.
| | 00:45 | We have control for Color, and Energy,
Specular, and Diffuse, and that's about it.
| | 00:50 | The Hemi light does not cast
shadows, but it does have direction.
| | 00:55 | So if I were to bring this directly
above that cup and just do a quick render,
| | 01:02 | you can see that we get a
general light from above that cup.
| | 01:07 | You can probably see this a little
bit more if I point the light in a
| | 01:10 | specific direction.
| | 01:12 | So if I were to point this light
completely to one side, such as this, then if I
| | 01:19 | render, you can see that I'm getting
light coming from the back of the cup.
| | 01:25 | So if there is was a light coming from
here, you can see I get shadows here and
| | 01:29 | here. And we can do the same on the other side.
| | 01:32 | So if I were to point the light that way,
you can see how I'm getting light coming
| | 01:38 | from this direction on the cup as well.
| | 01:40 | Now one of the things about this light
is that it's not location-specific, so
| | 01:47 | even though I have this icon here
floating in space, it doesn't mean that that's
| | 01:53 | where the light is originating.
| | 01:55 | Again, the light originates from infinity,
so it doesn't really matter where this is;
| | 02:00 | this just controls the
direction of light, not the position.
| | 02:04 | So if I were to even keep this light
above the cup and point it straight up, I
| | 02:10 | should get a nice under-lighting affect, okay.
| | 02:13 | So as you can see, this light can be
very useful in creating directional light.
| | 02:19 | Its only control really is the
direction of the light and the color.
| | 02:24 | There is no position of the light.
| | 02:26 | There are no shadows. But you can
use it for a nice general illumination.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Working with Area lamps| 00:00 | Blender's Area lamp provides light from a
specific region, rather than a point or a source.
| | 00:08 | So let's take a look at how to use this.
| | 00:10 | I'm going to add in an Area lamp and
when you bring it in, if we zoom in, you'll
| | 00:16 | notice that it's a square, and this is
where the light is originating. So we're
| | 00:21 | actually projecting light from the square.
| | 00:24 | This is really great for something like
a soft box or a window that's generating
| | 00:29 | light, because when you combine this
with shadows, it actually can create some
| | 00:34 | interesting effects.
| | 00:35 | But let just look at the
basics of how to use this.
| | 00:38 | I'm going to click on the Area Light
tab in my Properties panel, and you'll
| | 00:43 | notice that, just like with most
lights, we have a color, Energy.
| | 00:47 | We also have Distance and Gamma.
| | 00:50 | Gamma is actually contrast, but
Distance is actually very important. Let's go
| | 00:55 | ahead and position this light.
| | 00:57 | I'm going to go ahead and move it up and move
it over and I'm going to rotate it into place.
| | 01:05 | So I'm going to go ahead and rotate
it just like I did with that spotlight
| | 01:07 | so that is just pointing at the cup. So let's
do a quick render, see what this looks like.
| | 01:12 | Well, this is awfully blown out, and
that's because the area light doesn't
| | 01:18 | have any sort of falloff except for
this Distance control and if we zoom out,
| | 01:23 | you can see that this light has a
dotted line. At the end of that line is
| | 01:28 | where this distance is.
| | 01:29 | So this is typically where that
light is evenly illuminating the scene.
| | 01:35 | So we have a choice:
| | 01:36 | we can move the light back or reduce the
distance. Probably easier to reduce the
| | 01:41 | distance, so let's go ahead and do that.
| | 01:42 | I'm going to drag this Distance down
and bring it up so that it's just touching
| | 01:47 | the top of the geometry there,
so somewhere around there.
| | 01:51 | In this case I have around 7 or so.
And now let's go ahead and do a render.
| | 01:59 | So when we do the render, you can see
how the exposure of that scene is much
| | 02:04 | better. But we can continue to
control how this light works.
| | 02:09 | If you scroll down here, you'll
see that we have an Area Shape.
| | 02:13 | So if I take a look at this area light
here, you see right now it's a square.
| | 02:18 | We can change the size of the square or
if we want, we can turn it into a rectangle.
| | 02:25 | Now by itself, this shape doesn't have
that much of an effect. So if I were to
| | 02:30 | make this, for example, a long rectangle,
you'd think that okay this is going to
| | 02:35 | be like a tube light or something like
that. But when I actually do the render,
| | 02:39 | you'll see that, well, it looks
pretty much the same. But where this really
| | 02:45 | takes effect is when you have shadows.
| | 02:49 | So let's go ahead and turn this back
to a square and bring it back down to
| | 02:52 | the default Size of 1.
| | 02:57 | And let's go ahead and open up Shadows,
and you'll see that Area Lights have a
| | 03:01 | Ray Shadow option. And just like with
all ray shadows, we can actually give it a
| | 03:06 | color, and then we have a number of
different types of samples. Just go ahead
| | 03:11 | and leave this at the default
and just do a quick render.
| | 03:17 | Now with the Samples at 1, you'll see
that the render has a very hard edge, and
| | 03:22 | this is typical for most ray-trace
shadows. That's because we're only casting one
| | 03:27 | ray of light and so we're going to
get a sharper shadow. But if we bring the
| | 03:32 | number of Samples up, say to 4, and go
ahead and do another render, you'll see
| | 03:37 | that the shadow gets a little bit softer.
| | 03:42 | So as you can see, with more
samples, we're getting a softer shadow.
| | 03:47 | That's because we have an area from
which to project those samples, or in
| | 03:52 | other words, rays of light, and this is where
the size of your area light comes into play.
| | 03:58 | If we make the Size smaller--let's go
ahead and bring it down to say 0.25--and
| | 04:04 | keep everything else the same, when we render,
we're going to get a much sharper shadow.
| | 04:12 | So as you can see, with a
smaller light we get sharper shadows.
| | 04:16 | That's because the sample rays
are coming from a smaller area.
| | 04:21 | So conversely, if we bring this up to,
say, 5 and make it a really big light,
| | 04:26 | you're going to get much softer shadows.
| | 04:31 | So with a bigger light I get much
softer shadows, but also notice that the
| | 04:36 | bigger light creates a much grainier
shadow, and that's because we don't have
| | 04:41 | enough samples to cover a light of that area.
| | 04:44 | So if we are going to use bigger lights
then we're going to need more samples,
| | 04:49 | so I'm going to bring this up
to 16 and then do another render.
| | 04:54 | So as you can see, with more samples,
the render becomes all a lot smoother.
| | 05:00 | Now one of things you'll notice with area
lights is that they're very render-intensive.
| | 05:05 | It takes a long time to render with area lights.
| | 05:08 | So if you can get soft shadows or the
same effects using different types of
| | 05:13 | lighting that are more efficient,
please go ahead and use them.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating sky and ambient light| 00:00 | When you start rendering scenes,
there are many times when you'll need a
| | 00:04 | background to go behind your objects.
| | 00:07 | Take a look at this house, for example.
| | 00:08 | We have basically a black background behind
the house, and this is the Blender default.
| | 00:14 | Now typically, if the house isn't
being shot at night, you'd want to see
| | 00:19 | something like a sky or something
behind that house that isn't black. Well, we can
| | 00:24 | change this by using the
World settings within Blender.
| | 00:28 | So all we have to do is go over here to
this little panel here that looks like a
| | 00:33 | planet Earth and click on it, and
you'll see that it's the World panel.
| | 00:38 | Now in here we have a number of controls to
add color and gradients to our background.
| | 00:44 | Now the first one you want to
take a look at is the Horizon Color.
| | 00:48 | If I click on this, it brings up a
color picker. And so let's say I wanted to
| | 00:53 | have a blue-sky background, so all I have to
do is find the blue that I like and click OK.
| | 01:01 | So once I have that, I can hit a render
and you'll see that this horizon color is
| | 01:08 | now my background color.
| | 01:10 | Now if I want, I can go even further.
| | 01:13 | We have two additional colors: one is
Zenith Color, the other is Ambient Color.
| | 01:18 | Zenith Color allows you to create a ramp.
| | 01:22 | So if I click on the middle option
here, which is called Blend Sky, you can
| | 01:28 | see that the Zenith Color becomes
active. And by default it's black, so we go
| | 01:33 | from black to blue, but we can
change it to whatever we want. So let's go
| | 01:37 | ahead and make a sunset.
| | 01:38 | So I'm going to go ahead and change
| | 01:40 | my Horizon Color to kind of a yellow
here, a yellow orange like it's being
| | 01:49 | sunset, and let's change our
Zenith Color to a darker purple.
| | 01:55 | And so now that I have this, you can
see I have this gradient. So when I hit
| | 02:01 | Render, you'll see that that gradient shows up.
| | 02:05 | Now in this case, it maps this
gradient here to a virtual sphere around your
| | 02:12 | scene. So you may not get that purple
at the very top and you may not get the
| | 02:18 | yellow at the very bottom.
| | 02:19 | That's because it's mapping it more
to the world than to my actual image.
| | 02:24 | If I want to map this exactly to my
frame, all I have to do is click Paper Sky.
| | 02:29 | Notice how it changes a little bit
here, and when I render again by hitting
| | 02:33 | F12, you can see how the top of that
image is my Zenith Color, and towards the
| | 02:39 | bottom, it's my Horizon Color. So that's the
way to fit that gradient exactly to your screen.
| | 02:46 | Now we have another option here called
Real Sky, and if I click on this, you'll
| | 02:51 | notice that I get the sky on the top and
on the bottom, and then in the middle I
| | 02:57 | get this horizon color.
| | 02:58 | And what this does is it creates an
actual sky where the horizon is at the
| | 03:05 | horizon in the scene. So if were to do
a render of that, you'll see that I get
| | 03:10 | kind of yellow band through the middle.
| | 03:12 | So if you use Real Sky, you have to
have your camera placement exact, so that
| | 03:17 | way this horizon matches up
with the horizon in your scene.
| | 03:21 | So I'm going to go ahead and click that off.
| | 03:24 | Now the last option we have here is
called Ambient Color, and this really just
| | 03:29 | controls the over all base light in the
scene. So this is basically the darkest
| | 03:34 | you can ever go in a scene. By default,
it's black. And you can really see it
| | 03:39 | here in the shadows.
| | 03:41 | I have basically just one light here in the
scene, and it's creating a very dark shadow here.
| | 03:48 | Now if I wanted to, I could actually
change the color of that shadow in the
| | 03:52 | light, but if I want to create an
overall ambient light, I can do it here.
| | 03:57 | So if I click on this Ambient Color and
just bring it up to 30 or 40% gray here,
| | 04:03 | and let's go ahead and render,
| | 04:05 | you can see how everything in that scene is
grayed out, so the darkest color is this color.
| | 04:11 | So typically, you'll want to keep this
fairly low, maybe slightly above black, so
| | 04:15 | that we don't get exact pure black, but
we get stuff that's fairly dark, and so
| | 04:20 | something like this is
probably a little more realistic.
| | 04:24 | But again, you can use this very
creatively. If you want to tint an entire scene,
| | 04:28 | you can do that with the Ambient Color.
| | 04:30 | So to refresh, the Horizon Color and
the Zenith Color both create a ramp
| | 04:35 | for your background.
| | 04:36 | Horizon Color alone will
just create a single color.
| | 04:41 | If you want to match your sky to your
frame, then be sure to use Paper Sky.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding background images| 00:00 | Many times you'll want to use something
other than a gradient for your background.
| | 00:04 | Often we'll use a bitmap of a sky or
something like that to create a background.
| | 00:10 | So let's show you how to add
a bitmap to your background.
| | 00:13 | Now I have the scene I was working
on before, and in my world I have this
| | 00:19 | gradient set up. So let's do a
quick render to see what we have.
| | 00:23 | So we have this set up to Paper Sky and a
Blend Sky with this Horizon and Zenith color.
| | 00:30 | Now if you want to add a background image,
it's very similar to working with materials.
| | 00:36 | All you have to do is keep the World
selected and then go immediately over
| | 00:41 | to the Texture panel, and when we do
that we can add in a new texture. It
| | 00:47 | understands that you came over
from the World panel here, so we have
| | 00:50 | Texture, World, or Both.
| | 00:52 | So with the default Clouds, you can
see it's overlaying the clouds over that
| | 00:58 | gradient. But in this case I really
don't want to use a procedural texture;
| | 01:03 | I want to use a bitmap, so I'm going to
go select Image or Movie. And then under
| | 01:08 | the Open tab here we're going to select
sky. Open Image. And you'll see I have
| | 01:13 | a blue sky with white clouds, and what it's doing
right now is overlaying that over the gradient.
| | 01:21 | So let's scroll down and
see how we can adjust this.
| | 01:25 | So I'm going to close off a bunch of my
rollouts and go to the Influence rollout
| | 01:30 | here. And the most important one here
is this Blend Control. What this does
| | 01:36 | is it blends in the bitmap over the gradient.
| | 01:42 | Now if I turn that off, you'll see that I
have just a gradient and this has the blend.
| | 01:48 | Now we have a couple of Blend options here.
| | 01:51 | We can have Add, Subtract,
Overlay, all sorts of different ones,
| | 01:55 | Darken, Saturation, and so on.
| | 01:58 | And some of these may work, some of
these may not, but I'm going to keep this
| | 02:03 | at Mix for the moment.
| | 02:05 | And what we're going to do is we're
going to blend in the bitmap here using
| | 02:09 | these ones along the bottom.
| | 02:10 | So I'm going to click on Horizon, and then I'm
going to turndown Blend here all the way off.
| | 02:17 | So basically we're not blending
anything; we're just replacing the Horizon color,
| | 02:22 | which was yellow, with the sky bitmap.
| | 02:25 | So once I do that, you'll see that I get
sky at the horizon, and then its still
| | 02:31 | fades up to the Zenith color,
which is that purple color.
| | 02:37 | Now if I want, I can replace the
entire gradient with the bitmap just by
| | 02:42 | clicking on at Zenith color. And I can
now have a complete bitmapped sky with none
| | 02:49 | of that gradient behind it.
| | 02:51 | And now if I want, I can mix in the
Horizon color. Let's say I did want kind of
| | 02:56 | a yellowish horizon.
| | 02:58 | I can still do that just by bringing
this slider down, and so I can still
| | 03:02 | have that Horizon color.
| | 03:04 | So those are some of the basics of
adding a bitmap as your background image.
| | 03:10 | Now remember, just start on the World
tab and then go immediately to the Texture
| | 03:14 | tab and add in whichever texture you want.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating sunlight| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at the last
lamp in Blender, and that's the Sun lamp.
| | 00:05 | And this creates a good approximation of
sun, and it can also add in sky as well.
| | 00:12 | So let's go ahead and add in a Lamp > Sun.
| | 00:15 | Now the Sun lamp basically works
the same as a Hemi lamp, in that it is
| | 00:20 | directional and not positional.
| | 00:22 | So really the only thing that
matters is the direction of the light.
| | 00:26 | So I can basically keep this light here
at the origin where it came in, or if I
| | 00:31 | want, I can move it anywhere I want in the scene.
| | 00:34 | Now I'm going to move it a little bit
up here so we can just see it, but the
| | 00:38 | direction of the light is
really all that matters.
| | 00:40 | So if I rendered this as is, you'll get
light from above. In other words, you'll
| | 00:46 | get pretty much noon sky.
| | 00:49 | Now if I want to I can rotate this, so
if I rotate it this way, then you can see
| | 00:54 | how the light now comes
from the front of the building.
| | 00:59 | So if I change this to Local and I
angle this a little bit more, you can see how,
| | 01:05 | again, I can get light from the side.
| | 01:08 | One of the big differences between the
Sun lamp and the Hemi lamp is that the
| | 01:12 | Sun lamp allows you to do shadows.
| | 01:14 | So if I go down to the very bottom here
you'll see I have a Shadow rollout, and I
| | 01:19 | can cast a ray shadow. And the
parameters for this are pretty much the same as
| | 01:24 | for the point light, so I won't go into
those, but let's just go ahead and see
| | 01:28 | that we can cast a shadow with this light.
| | 01:31 | Now probably the most interesting
feature with this light is the Sky &
| | 01:36 | Atmosphere controls, and these allow
the light to create an artificial sky as
| | 01:42 | well as an artificial sun.
| | 01:45 | So I'm going to go ahead and turn
this on, and as you can see, it creates a
| | 01:50 | horizon with a sky. And if we render this,
you'll see that my sky gets replaced by
| | 01:57 | this particular sky.
| | 02:00 | Now we have a number of options here
for controlling this effect, but if you
| | 02:05 | want, an easier place to start are with a
couple of standard presets we have. We
| | 02:10 | have a Classic sky, we have a
Desert sky, and we have a Mountain sky.
| | 02:16 | Now the only difference between these
is that it just changes the settings to
| | 02:20 | reflect the preset, so once we dial in,
say, a mountain sky, we can still continue
| | 02:26 | to tweak the effect.
| | 02:27 | So let's take a look at
what this looks like in render.
| | 02:30 | And so you can see it basically just
has a gradient, but we don't have the
| | 02:34 | sun visible in the sky.
| | 02:36 | Well, that's because the sun
is actually behind the camera.
| | 02:40 | Now if you look in this scene, you can
see that the camera is here, facing at
| | 02:44 | about a 30-degree angle towards the house.
| | 02:48 | Now in order to see the sun, we have to
actually point the sun at the camera. So
| | 02:55 | I'm just going to go ahead and
change the angle of my sun so that it's
| | 02:59 | pointing pretty much towards that camera, and
you can kind of see it here in this viewport.
| | 03:05 | So when I change the angle so that it
points at the camera, you can see how now I
| | 03:10 | can see that sun in the sky.
| | 03:12 | In fact, if I angle it up just a hair here,
it might actually come in a little bit
| | 03:16 | lower in the sky so you can see it.
| | 03:18 | Now you may think that because the
sun is here in the viewport, that's where
| | 03:23 | it is here in the render, but that's not
really the case. Again, the sun is not positional;
| | 03:29 | it's just angular, so it really depends
on the angle in relation to the camera.
| | 03:33 | So even if I move this sun completely
out of the frame here in the perspective
| | 03:37 | viewport, I would still get the same render.
| | 03:41 | Remember, it's really the
angle in relation to that camera.
| | 03:46 | So now that we can actually see the sun
in our render, let's go ahead and start
| | 03:50 | playing with some of these parameters.
| | 03:52 | Now one of the first ones is Blending.
| | 03:54 | This is how it blends to the original
background. And again, we have all of our
| | 04:00 | blending controls here, but the
one that's most important is Factor.
| | 04:03 | If I dial this down to zero,
I get the original background.
| | 04:07 | If I dial it up, then I
start to get the sun, okay.
| | 04:12 | And typically this is at 1, which
basically just completely replaces that
| | 04:16 | blend sky with my sun.
| | 04:19 | Now I can also create a brightness for
my horizon, so how bright is it down here?
| | 04:26 | And again that shows up very nicely in
that render. Or if I want, I can turn my
| | 04:31 | Brightness down to zero to
have a not-bright horizon.
| | 04:35 | The other important one is the Sun
controls. How bright is this sun?
| | 04:41 | So we can certainly make the sun brighter and
so that will definitely show up in my render.
| | 04:46 | I can make it dimmer.
| | 04:49 | I can also change the Size of the
sun. So a smaller sun with the same
| | 04:55 | brightness will make the actual ball
of the sun smaller, but the brightness
| | 04:59 | will stay the same.
| | 05:00 | So if I make my sun bigger, you'll
notice that it actually looks a little bit
| | 05:04 | bigger in relation to that.
| | 05:07 | Again, I can see my sun a little bit better.
| | 05:09 | These parameters can really
be tweaked as much as you want.
| | 05:13 | I would suggest starting with one of
the presets and working from there.
| | 05:16 | Now, the final control here is Atmosphere.
| | 05:20 | So again, do you want to add in
atmosphere to your render? And that basically
| | 05:25 | just gives you kind of a fog effect here.
So as I add in Atmosphere, I can start
| | 05:31 | to see how much Atmosphere I have, in
terms of how much does a sun affect it, as
| | 05:37 | well as what's the distance of that atmosphere?
| | 05:41 | So again, the higher the distance, the
more atmosphere I have; the lower, the
| | 05:45 | less effect I have.
| | 05:46 | So you can create a hazy morning effect
again just by adding in a little bit of
| | 05:51 | Intensity here and not too much.
| | 05:54 | So those are some of the parameters
that you can use with the Sun lamp, and you
| | 05:59 | can see this is a very, very
versatile tool that you can use to create
| | 06:03 | realistic skies.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Ambient occlusion| 00:00 | Another popular form of lighting in
Blender is called ambient occlusion.
| | 00:05 | Now this is very similar to ambient
lighting, but it adds in additional shading
| | 00:10 | that gives it a much more realistic
effect. So let's take a look at this scene.
| | 00:15 | I have my standard cup and saucer, but
I've removed all the textures so you can
| | 00:20 | see the effect more clearly.
| | 00:22 | Now let's go ahead and render this
scene. And as you can see, there are no
| | 00:27 | lights in the scene.
| | 00:28 | Now ambient occlusion does
not need a light to work.
| | 00:33 | It's kind of like ambient lighting, in
that it's just an overall lighting in the scene.
| | 00:39 | It's not a specific light.
| | 00:41 | So we can get to ambient occlusion by
going into our World panel and scrolling
| | 00:46 | down to Ambient Occlusion.
| | 00:48 | When I click that on, you'll
notice how two panels light up: Ambient
| | 00:52 | Occlusion and Gather.
| | 00:54 | Let's just go ahead and do a
quick render of ambient occlusion.
| | 00:58 | Now as you can see, we get shading in the scene.
| | 01:02 | That's because we're
creating an overall ambient light.
| | 01:05 | Now ambient occlusion can be
controlled. So we have a factor here, which is
| | 01:10 | basically how much ambient
lighting are we adding into this scene?
| | 01:14 | We can either add or multiply
against the existing background.
| | 01:20 | So if we turn this down, say to 0.24,
0.25 or so, and do a quick render, you'll
| | 01:27 | see that the overall ambient lighting
has been reduced, and this is great
| | 01:32 | if you're going to be using this in
conjunction with other lights, so that you
| | 01:35 | can have another light actually doing
this specular of the diffuse, but you
| | 01:38 | still have an overall
ambient lighting in this scene.
| | 01:41 | I'm going to go ahead and
turn this up to 1.00 again.
| | 01:45 | Now the color of the ambience is
based on the Ambient Color in the World
| | 01:50 | setting. So right now it's black,
| | 01:52 | so my darkest Ambient
Color is going to be black.
| | 01:56 | I can change this to any color I want.
| | 02:00 | Usually we can change it to something
like a dark gray to give it just a little
| | 02:04 | bit of a brighter effect. Or if we want,
we can tint this by adding in a color.
| | 02:11 | So if I wanted to, for example, make this
a green color, I could, and you'll see
| | 02:17 | that now my overall ambient lighting is green.
| | 02:21 | I'm going to go ahead and turn that
back down to a dark gray, something like
| | 02:27 | that, and then let's just do one more render.
| | 02:30 | Now another way to control how this
effect looks is to go down to the Gather tab.
| | 02:36 | By default, it's set to Raytrace, and
so it uses ray tracing to create that
| | 02:42 | overall ambient effect.
| | 02:44 | Now ray tracing can be
expensive in terms of render time.
| | 02:49 | So we have a number of samples here that
can control how much ray tracing it uses.
| | 02:56 | So with the default sample of 5, you
can see how in this particular image we
| | 03:00 | still get a little bit of graininess.
But if we want to, we can turn that up.
| | 03:05 | Let's say we bring it up to 10.
| | 03:07 | We can render that again, and you can
see how with more samples it smoothes out
| | 03:13 | the graininess. But it also adds render time.
| | 03:17 | So you have to find balance between
acceptable graininess and the render time.
| | 03:22 | So if we want, we can also do
another type of gathering, and that's
| | 03:27 | called Approximate.
| | 03:28 | And what this does is it just
approximates the ambient occlusion effect, and
| | 03:33 | sometimes this may just be good enough.
| | 03:35 | If we do a render with the default
settings here, you'll find that in this
| | 03:40 | particular scene we get kind of a harsh effect.
| | 03:42 | You'll see that the dark areas are very
dark and the light areas are very light,
| | 03:48 | but we can smooth that out by using sampling.
| | 03:52 | So if I bring up my Sampling passes just to 1,
you'll see that this moves out very nicely.
| | 03:58 | But again, the more passes
you have, the more render time.
| | 04:02 | But overall Approximate Gather is
actually a little bit faster than ray tracing,
| | 04:07 | at the expense of accuracy.
| | 04:09 | Now I'm going to go ahead back to
Raytrace and turn my samples down to 5.
| | 04:14 | Now we have another way of doing
ambient occlusion, and that's using what's
| | 04:20 | called Environment Lighting.
| | 04:22 | Now if I switch off ambient occlusion
and turn on Environment Lightning, if I
| | 04:27 | render that, you'll see I get pretty
much the same effect, because really
| | 04:31 | Environment Lightning is just
another form of the ambient occlusion.
| | 04:35 | Now Environment Lightning pulls its
color not from the Ambient color here, but
| | 04:40 | from a selection that we have.
| | 04:42 | By default it's at white, but we can
use the Sky Color or the Sky Texture.
| | 04:49 | So if I change this to Sky Color, I can
turn on my Blend Sky here and give it a
| | 04:56 | Horizon color, let's say a dark blue,
and a Zenith color, let's say a very pale,
| | 05:01 | blue, and what we can do now is use
that to create my ambient occlusion.
| | 05:07 | So when I hit Render on this, the
dark areas will be my Horizon color, the
| | 05:13 | light areas will be my Zenith color, so you
can see I get an overall tint of the scene.
| | 05:19 | Now if I wanted to change this a lot,
I could for example, change my Zenith
| | 05:23 | color to a yellow or something like that,
and then again render and you can see
| | 05:29 | how it goes from yellow to blue.
| | 05:32 | Now another way to do
this is with a Sky Texture.
| | 05:36 | Now we did this before in a previous
lesson, but if we want to, we can go over to
| | 05:41 | the Texture panel and add in a new texture.
| | 05:45 | By default, it's set to Clouds, but
let's go ahead and pull in an image.
| | 05:49 | We're going to pull in that same sky
background that we used in the previous lesson.
| | 05:56 | Now in order for this to show
through, we need to change our Influence.
| | 06:01 | So I'm going to go ahead and turn my
Blend down to 0 and turn on Horizon and
| | 06:06 | Zenith, and this will go ahead and make
this bitmap show up as the background.
| | 06:12 | Now if I go back to my World settings
and make sure this is set to Paper Sky, I
| | 06:17 | can use this to create my ambient lighting.
| | 06:20 | So if I turn this Environment Lightning
on to Sky Texture, it will now derive my
| | 06:26 | Environment Lighting from this bitmap texture.
So if I hit Render, you'll see how this works.
| | 06:34 | So with that render complete, you can see
how it's pulling the colors from my sky.
| | 06:40 | This is a great way to
get very realistic lighting.
| | 06:44 | You create a Sky texture, turn on
Environment Lighting, and then you can balance
| | 06:48 | this using the energy in the
scene against the real lighting.
| | 06:54 | So just to refresh, ambient occlusion creates an
overall ambient lighting, and we have two forms:
| | 07:01 | we have ambient occlusion, which is
just a simple color or if we want to have
| | 07:06 | more complex lighting, we
can use Environment Lighting.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
9. Cameras and Rendering Working with cameras| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at
cameras and rendering in Blender.
| | 00:04 | We're going to start off
with the basics of cameras.
| | 00:07 | So I have a camera here and if I select
it, you'll see that we have a Properties
| | 00:13 | panel here. And if we click on the
little camera icon, we can see what the
| | 00:18 | camera properties are.
| | 00:20 | Now the camera has Lens
parameters as well as Display parameters.
| | 00:25 | So let's take a look at the Display
parameters first, and then we'll get
| | 00:29 | into Lens parameters.
| | 00:30 | Now your Display properties really just
show the limits of the camera--and we'll
| | 00:34 | get into these as we go
through the other variables here.
| | 00:38 | You can turn on whether or not it shows
how far the mist comes from the camera.
| | 00:42 | You can also turn on Title Safe, and
you can see that here in the camera
| | 00:46 | perspective window, and this just shows
where you have your safe area in your render.
| | 00:53 | We can also turn auto off and on the
name of the camera, and this is in case you
| | 00:57 | have multiple cameras in the scene and you
want to know which one you're looking through.
| | 01:00 | Now in addition to this, we have a Size
parameter, which basically just grows or
| | 01:06 | shrinks the size of the camera icon,
and then this Passepartout is basically
| | 01:13 | just how much gray do we have on the
outside of this camera, in the camera
| | 01:18 | perspective viewport?
| | 01:20 | Now let's get into actually using
the cameras, and we have a couple of
| | 01:25 | options, here under Lens.
| | 01:26 | Now by default, it's set to Perspective,
which is typically what we're going to be using.
| | 01:31 | You want this to behave like a real-world lens.
| | 01:35 | If you want, you can switch it to
Orthographic, which flattens out the
| | 01:39 | perspective and makes it a very flat render.
| | 01:42 | I'm going to keep it on Perspective.
| | 01:44 | Now when you have perspective, you can
have basically a focal length, which is
| | 01:49 | typically in meters, but you also
can do a focal angle in degrees.
| | 01:54 | They're basically the same.
| | 01:56 | Now the focal length is 35 millimeters,
so this is the same as a 35-millimeter
| | 02:01 | lens on a 35-millimeter camera.
| | 02:03 | Now this is basically a mild wide-angle
lens and if we want, we can change this
| | 02:09 | to zoom in by making the focal length
longer. So let's say we make it about 135,
| | 02:15 | which is a good portrait lens,
and you can see how that zooms in.
| | 02:20 | You can also see how it kind
of flattens out the perspective.
| | 02:24 | So if I were to move this camera back--
let me zoom out here, here we go--
| | 02:29 | to get that character in my title
safe, you can see how I've got a much
| | 02:34 | flatter perspective.
| | 02:35 | If I change this back to 35
millimeters, you see how it basically goes a lot
| | 02:41 | further away, but when I bring that
character in so he's aligned to my title
| | 02:46 | safe I have much more depth in the image.
| | 02:49 | In fact, I can exaggerate this by going
wide wide-angle, in fact going fisheye.
| | 02:54 | Let's go ahead and make this into an
8-millimeter lens and as you can see, as I
| | 02:58 | get much closer, I get a real
distorted perspective, which may be good for
| | 03:03 | certain types of scenes.
| | 03:04 | You also can see how close that camera is to
his face to get him completely in the scene.
| | 03:10 | Now I'm going to go ahead and just put
this back to 35 millimeters, and again
| | 03:15 | truck back the camera so
that he is within my title safe.
| | 03:20 | Now in addition to this, we
have a number of parameters here.
| | 03:23 | One is called Shift and
the other is called Clipping.
| | 03:26 | Now Shift basically just shifts your
camera up or down depending upon what these
| | 03:32 | values are, and so this is a really
good way to just really fine-tune and tweak
| | 03:37 | the positioning of a camera.
| | 03:38 | Now in addition to this, we have Clipping,
and this is basically how far into the
| | 03:44 | scene can the camera see?
| | 03:46 | Now this actually can be useful with
special effects if you want to do stuff in
| | 03:50 | the foreground and then background stuff,
because what you can do is, if you move
| | 03:54 | this back, as we get closer, you can see
how it's starting to eliminate the grit
| | 04:00 | here, and then as we get around 16 or
15, you'll see how it starts to basically
| | 04:06 | illuminate the character. So this
is as far as that camera will render.
| | 04:11 | So if I bring it all the way in, you
can't see anything, because we don't have
| | 04:16 | anything in front of the camera.
| | 04:18 | It's completely clipped.
| | 04:19 | So as soon as I hit his face, you can
see that. And if I were to actually do a
| | 04:23 | render of this by hitting F12, you can
see how it only renders up to that point.
| | 04:29 | We're not getting his ears
or the rest of the character.
| | 04:32 | So I'm going to go ahead and put
that back out to a longer number.
| | 04:36 | Now we have one more option here, and
that's called Depth of Field, and we'll get
| | 04:39 | into that a little bit later.
| | 04:41 | So those are some of the basics of
how to operate a camera in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating camera targets with constraints| 00:00 | When you add a new camera into a scene,
you'll need to place that camera so that
| | 00:05 | it's pointing at the
object that you want to frame.
| | 00:08 | So let's take a look at some
ways to position our cameras.
| | 00:12 | Now, we can do this manually or
we can do it with a constraint.
| | 00:16 | So let's go ahead and add
a camera into the scene.
| | 00:20 | Now, when the camera comes in, it comes
in at the 3D cursor, and it's facing down.
| | 00:25 | Now, if we want to look through the
camera, all we have to do is select a
| | 00:28 | viewport and turn it on to Camera.
| | 00:31 | Now, we can move this camera just
using our Move tool and as you can see as I
| | 00:36 | move this camera up, you can see the
top of the character's head. Or if I want, I
| | 00:40 | can rotate that camera a
little bit and move it into place.
| | 00:44 | Now, I can switch between
global and local moving.
| | 00:48 | So, if I move this, say, here
globally, you can see how that works.
| | 00:54 | Now, if you want to actually
manipulate the camera along its own axis, you
| | 00:58 | would set your coordinates to Local.
And this is actually kind of nice because
| | 01:03 | the blue axis is kind of your truck and then
your red and green axes are your up and down.
| | 01:10 | Okay, so it just depends on how you want
to move your camera, but a lot of times
| | 01:14 | putting it in Local mode helps a lot.
| | 01:16 | Now, sometimes this isn't always
the best way to position your camera.
| | 01:23 | A lot of times you will want to have
your camera pointing at something and you
| | 01:26 | just want to move it around and
always keep that object centered.
| | 01:30 | We can do this by creating
what's called a constraint.
| | 01:33 | So, I have my camera selected, and I'm
going to go over to my Properties panel
| | 01:37 | and click on this little chain link
here, and that's called Object Constraints.
| | 01:42 | So we can add in a constraint to have
this camera always pointing at something.
| | 01:48 | Probably the easiest one to
use is called Damped Track,
| | 01:52 | so I'm going to select that, and we
actually only have a few options here.
| | 01:55 | One is what's the target?
| | 01:57 | In other words, what is this camera pointing at?
| | 02:00 | So, all I have to do is select any
object in the scene, and in this case we
| | 02:04 | want it to point at the head.
| | 02:06 | But you can see as soon as I do that,
it flips over, and it's pointing at
| | 02:10 | the wrong direction.
| | 02:11 | But we can change that just by
selecting which axes we want that to move along,
| | 02:16 | and in this case the -Z axis
seems to be the one that works.
| | 02:21 | Now, once we do that, our motion
controls will actually keep the camera
| | 02:26 | pointed at that object.
| | 02:29 | No matter where I move the camera,
it's going to automatically rotate to have
| | 02:34 | that object in the view.
| | 02:35 | Now, often we don't really want
to point at a specific object;
| | 02:39 | we want to be able to
place our target in the scene.
| | 02:42 | So, in this case we want to create a
helper object that we can point at and we
| | 02:46 | can place that helper object wherever we want.
| | 02:49 | So, we're going to add in a new type of
object, and it's called an Empty object.
| | 02:54 | So, when I click on that, it's
basically just an empty object.
| | 02:58 | It's a little cross that
we can see in the viewport.
| | 03:01 | It doesn't render, and we can
also see it in the outliner.
| | 03:04 | So, I'm going to reselect my camera and
under Object Constraints, instead of my
| | 03:09 | target being Head, it's
going to be that Empty object.
| | 03:12 | Now, I can take this Empty object and
place it wherever I want in the scene
| | 03:17 | and also move the camera to match that.
| | 03:20 | Now, and order to make this a little bit
more understandable, we can rename this
| | 03:25 | Empty object into say Target, and now
we have a target which we can select and
| | 03:32 | that will be where the camera is always pointed.
| | 03:36 | What's really cool about this is that
you can animate the target or you can
| | 03:39 | position the camera and animate it as well.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Render properties| 00:00 | Now let's take a look at some of
the properties we have with rendering.
| | 00:04 | We have been playing a little bit with
the Render menu as we've been working
| | 00:09 | through the course, but let's go
through it now in detail to understand all of
| | 00:13 | our render options and properties.
| | 00:15 | Now, in any scene you have, in your
Properties panel, you'll have a little
| | 00:20 | camera option here, and this is the same
for any object that you have selected,
| | 00:25 | so this is actually kind of a common
property to anything in the scene. And
| | 00:30 | under this, we can control everything
that we need to control about rendering.
| | 00:34 | So, our first rollout here is what are
we rendering, an image or an animation?
| | 00:40 | Now, these two actually are duplicated
here under the Render menu, and we can
| | 00:46 | hit F12 or Ctrl+F12 to render, and that's
the exact same thing as hitting this button.
| | 00:51 | Now, when we render, how do we want to display?
| | 00:55 | Do we want to display in the Image
Editor? Do we want to display Full Screen, in
| | 01:01 | a new window, or do we
want to keep the existing UI.
| | 01:04 | Well, I'm going to go ahead and render
this in a new window and you can see how
| | 01:08 | it creates a brand-new window
that we can actually render into.
| | 01:12 | Now, this window is actually the same
as an Image Editor window here, and we can
| | 01:18 | actually use that if we want, but I
also have an Image Editor in my current
| | 01:23 | layout here, so it also
will render into that as well.
| | 01:26 | I'm going to go ahead and
set this back to Image Editor.
| | 01:30 | Now, in addition to this, we have
Layers, which we'll get to in just a little
| | 01:34 | bit, and that allows you to render out
layers so you can composite them later.
| | 01:38 | Now, the next rollout is actually very
important and that's the dimensions of our scene.
| | 01:44 | We have a number of render presets here.
| | 01:46 | We have a bunch of HD presets here for
both 1080 and 720p, and we can select any
| | 01:53 | one of those we want.
| | 01:54 | And notice how when you select a preset
it changes the Resolution settings, the
| | 01:59 | Aspect Ratio settings, and the Frame Rate.
| | 02:02 | So, if I go to, say, NTSC 4:3, notice how
the Frame Rate goes to 29.97. And again,
| | 02:08 | we can change this to whatever we want.
| | 02:10 | Now, also notice, when we have NTSC
4:3 it's giving us that 720x486 ratio.
| | 02:18 | Now, this is a ratio originally
created for D1 video, and it actually
| | 02:22 | has non-square pixels,
| | 02:25 | so the pixels are actually narrower in
the vertical direction and so we have an
| | 02:30 | aspect ratio that's not one to one.
| | 02:33 | Typically, when you do NTSC- or D1-type
rendering, you'll do a 0.9 ratio, and you
| | 02:39 | could actually do that here as well.
| | 02:41 | You can just put 1 into the Y-
direction and 0.9 into the X, but 10 and 11
| | 02:47 | also do the same thing.
| | 02:48 | Now, if we scroll down on here a
little bit further, you'll see Anti-Aliasing,
| | 02:52 | and this is really how it smoothes out
the edges of the scene as it renders.
| | 02:57 | Now, we have a number of different
algorithms that we can use, and you can go
| | 03:02 | ahead and play with those.
| | 03:04 | We also have different levels of anti-
aliasing. And just know that the higher the
| | 03:09 | Anti-Aliasing number, the
longer it will take to render.
| | 03:13 | Now, below this we have a Shading rollout,
and we've played with this a little bit here.
| | 03:17 | We can turn Ray Tracing on and off, as
well as Shadows, and just remember that if
| | 03:22 | things like shadows or ray tracing
aren't coming through, go ahead and check
| | 03:26 | here to make sure that it's
not accidentally clicked off.
| | 03:30 | Now, below that we have Performance and
this basically tells us how much of the
| | 03:36 | computer it will use to render.
| | 03:38 | Now, if we have it set to Auto-detect
it will pick up how many processors you
| | 03:43 | have in your system.
| | 03:44 | This particular one has four
processors, and it will render on all of them.
| | 03:50 | If we want, we can also have a fixed
number of threads, which means we can limit
| | 03:55 | resources it's using for rendering.
| | 03:56 | So, if you want to continue to work
and render in the background, you can set
| | 04:00 | this to a number lower than the number
of processors you have in your system.
| | 04:05 | Now, finally, at the bottom here, we have
an Output option, and this is where it's
| | 04:10 | going to be saving files, as well as what format.
| | 04:14 | So by default it's saving to your tmp
directory. On Windows that will be C:/tmp,
| | 04:22 | and it will save in the PNG format, or
any one of these other formats, so we can
| | 04:28 | do JPEG, Targa, TIFF.
| | 04:30 | We can also do HDR formats.
| | 04:32 | There is a lot of different
formats that Blender supports.
| | 04:36 | And we can also select whether we want BW,
RGB or RGB with Alpha (RGBA). And do you
| | 04:43 | want to add file extensions and do
you want to overwrite existing files?
| | 04:47 | So, if we're going to render over something,
do you want it to overwrite a file or not.
| | 04:52 | So those are some of the
options that we have with rendering.
| | 04:56 | So, as you start to render your final
scenes, just be aware of all of these
| | 05:01 | properties that can help you to
render more accurately and faster.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Rendering animation| 00:00 | Up until this point, we've been
rendering individual images in Blender, but we
| | 00:05 | can also render animation.
| | 00:08 | So let's take a look at how to do this.
| | 00:10 | I have a scene already set up with animation.
| | 00:14 | Now we haven't really gone through
animation at this point, but we're just
| | 00:17 | going to render it,
so let's take a look at this scene.
| | 00:20 | We have a pool ball
that's rolling into the scene.
| | 00:24 | So, if I want to, I can left click on
my timeline and scrub it or if I want to
| | 00:30 | play it, I can hit this Play button down here
and we can see a quick preview of the scene.
| | 00:37 | Now, I'm going to go ahead and hit
Stop, and let's go ahead and render this.
| | 00:41 | Now, if we want, we can just hit this
button that says Render Animation, but
| | 00:45 | we really don't have everything set up to
render to the proper place and in the proper format.
| | 00:51 | So let's go ahead and do that first.
| | 00:54 | So, if we scroll down here to our
Dimensions, we can see we have a number
| | 01:00 | of different options.
| | 01:01 | I'm going to go ahead and select
HDTV 72p, and this will render a slightly
| | 01:08 | smaller file so that it will
render quicker for this demonstration.
| | 01:12 | Now, we also have a Frame
Range that we can render.
| | 01:16 | At this point, I have 30 frames on my
timeline, but I'm going to go ahead and
| | 01:22 | bring that down to 10.
| | 01:24 | So I'm just going to type in 10.
| | 01:27 | Now, if I want, I can create a frame step,
which means I can render every second,
| | 01:31 | every third or every fourth frame,
or whatever number I type in here.
| | 01:36 | We're going to leave this at 1.
| | 01:38 | Now the Frame Rate is
important if we render to a movie file.
| | 01:42 | Now, if we're rendering single images, it
won't matter as much because the frame rate
| | 01:48 | will be determined when we re-import
those images into our editor or After
| | 01:53 | effects or whatever we're
using to finish off our animation.
| | 01:57 | Now that I have these set, we can go
down to the bottom and make sure we're
| | 02:00 | outputting to the right
place with the right name.
| | 02:04 | Now, under Output we have a
path as to where this will render.
| | 02:10 | If we want, we can click on this folder and
browse to the place where we want a render.
| | 02:14 | So, I'm going to go to my Desktop/
Exercise Files/Chapter 09/Render, hit
| | 02:21 | Accept and now you can see it's at//render/.
| | 02:25 | Now, this double slash in the front
means it's just going to be relative to
| | 02:31 | where this file is located.
| | 02:34 | So, this file is already
in the Chapter 09 folder.
| | 02:38 | So I'm going to go ahead
and also type a prefix in this.
| | 02:42 | Since this is a pool table, I'm going
to type Pool_ and then after that it will
| | 02:48 | fill in the rest of the information.
| | 02:51 | Now under here we have a File
Extensions check box, and I can either turn this
| | 02:58 | on or off, and this will basically
just put an extension after the file name.
| | 03:03 | Typically we keep this on.
| | 03:04 | And then we also have an Overwrite button.
| | 03:06 | Will this overwrite an existing
image with the same name, and I'm going to
| | 03:11 | go ahead and keep that on as well.
| | 03:13 | Now, in this case I'm going to render
to a JPEG file, but we have a number
| | 03:19 | of different options here.
| | 03:20 | We have a bunch of different image
files, including Cineon and HDR files.
| | 03:26 | We also have movie files, so you can
render to an AVI, you can render to H264,
| | 03:30 | MPEG, Ogg, a number of
different movie codecs and files.
| | 03:37 | But we're going to just keep this simple;
we're going to render to JPEGs in RGB.
| | 03:42 | Now that we have this all set, let's
go ahead and render the animation by
| | 03:46 | hitting this button or hitting Ctrl+F12.
| | 03:51 | Now, I actually have a file browser
open here, and you can see these images as
| | 03:57 | they render and come in.
| | 03:59 | So when this renders, it takes that
prefix that we had, Pool_, and then appends a
| | 04:06 | four-digit number with the frame number.
| | 04:10 | Now, if we were to render
incremental frames, it would actually jump.
| | 04:14 | So if I was rendering every second
frame, it would do 1, 3, 5, and so on.
| | 04:19 | But as you can see, this renders fairly quickly.
| | 04:22 | Now, if were to render a movie file, it
would just create one file and render that.
| | 04:28 | Now typically, it's probably better to
render individual images, particularly if
| | 04:33 | you have long sequences.
| | 04:35 | If you're rendering a movie file and
the render gets interrupted, you kind of
| | 04:39 | have to go back to the beginning.
| | 04:41 | Rendering individual frames gives you
a much better security, because you can
| | 04:46 | have that individual frame and if the
render fails or if your computer gets
| | 04:51 | turned off accidentally, you still
have all the frames that were rendered.
| | 04:55 | Now, let's just take a look at this animation.
| | 04:57 | I'm just going to go ahead and open this
with Windows Photo Gallery here. And we
| | 05:02 | can just step through the
images and see how that renders.
| | 05:08 | So those are some of the
basics of rendering in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Adding motion blur| 00:00 | When you render animation, a lot of
times you'll want to have motion blur
| | 00:05 | applied to your scene.
| | 00:07 | Now this just adds another layer of
realism, and it creates the blur effect
| | 00:12 | you have when you take a picture of an object
that moves within the length of the exposure.
| | 00:19 | So I have a simple scene here, and it's
basically just a pool ball rolling into the scene.
| | 00:26 | Now if I put it around frame 22, so
it's somewhere near the center of the
| | 00:31 | screen and I do a quick render,
you'll see that it doesn't look like it's
| | 00:36 | moving in this scene.
| | 00:38 | Now if we were to actually animate this
and play it back, you'd see it kind of
| | 00:42 | go from frame to frame, and it
wouldn't have a sense of realism because it
| | 00:47 | wouldn't have a blur to it, or a motion blur.
| | 00:50 | We can fix that by adding in motion blur.
| | 00:54 | We do this under the Render Properties panel.
| | 00:57 | There is a rollout here
called Sampled Motion Blur.
| | 01:01 | Let's go ahead and open
that up and click that on.
| | 01:04 | Now if we just render with the default
settings, we get nothing, because we need
| | 01:11 | to have multiple motion samples.
| | 01:14 | We have two properties here:
we have Motion Samples and Shutter Length.
| | 01:20 | So if I turn Motion Samples up to 4,
you can see how this effect works.
| | 01:26 | Now what it's going to do is it's
actually going to render the scene four times.
| | 01:32 | And if you notice, each time it
renders, that ball moves just a little bit.
| | 01:37 | And then at the end, it takes those four
renders and then combines them together
| | 01:42 | into a single image and
then creates the motion blur.
| | 01:47 | Now, the amount of blur that we have
is dependent upon the Shutter Length, so
| | 01:52 | this is how long the shutter is open.
| | 01:55 | At a default level of 0.5, it's open
for half of whatever my frame rate is.
| | 02:01 | So if I'm at 24 frames a second,
it's open for a 48th of a second.
| | 02:07 | Now, I can certainly bring this down and this
would lessen the effect, or I can bring it up.
| | 02:13 | So let's bring this up to, say, 1,
and let's take a look at it again.
| | 02:18 | Now again, it's going to render four
times, and because I've got my shutter
| | 02:23 | open wider, you can see that the ball
is moving more in each render and I'm
| | 02:29 | getting more motion blur.
| | 02:31 | Now you can go above 1, and that will
give you an enhanced motion blur, but you
| | 02:37 | have to be careful because in that
instance, the ball may actually move ahead of
| | 02:42 | where it's supposed to be.
| | 02:43 | But let's go ahead and give a larger value for
our shutter speed, just to see how this works.
| | 02:50 | So I'm going to put in 3, and you'll see
that it's actually going to render that
| | 02:54 | ball moving quite a bit in each frame.
| | 02:58 | Now when this happens, you'll
see a little bit of a problem here,
| | 03:03 | and the problem is that I
don't have enough motion samples.
| | 03:06 | I only have four samples, but the ball
is moving quite a bit with each sample.
| | 03:14 | And so what I'm going to have to do is
up the number of samples to compensate
| | 03:18 | for the fact that I'm
opening the shutter for so long.
| | 03:21 | Now this will also apply to
objects that are moving very quickly.
| | 03:26 | So the faster an object moves through
a scene, the more samples you'll need.
| | 03:31 | So in this case, let's go ahead and
add in, say, 10 samples, and the render is
| | 03:36 | actually going to take quite a bit longer
because we have to render that scene ten times.
| | 03:41 | But you'll notice that in each render the
ball itself is moving just a little bit less.
| | 03:48 | That's because I'm dividing
that three into ten parts.
| | 03:53 | So when I actually have more samples,
you can see I get a much better and much
| | 03:58 | smoother motion blur.
| | 04:01 | So those are some of the basics of motion blur.
| | 04:03 | And yes, it does add a little bit of
render time, but it can a lot more realism.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating depth of field| 00:00 | One more way to add realism to
your scene is to add depth of field.
| | 00:05 | Now this simulates the blurring you get
when you have some objects in and out of
| | 00:10 | focus within a scene,
| | 00:12 | so it's basically a camera-focus effect.
| | 00:14 | Now we do this by setting up what are
called composite nodes in Blender, so
| | 00:20 | we're going to get a
little taste of those as well.
| | 00:22 | Now I have a simple scene here with
three coffee cups and a camera and one
| | 00:28 | light in the scene.
| | 00:29 | Now if I hit F12 to render, you will
see that, well, the coffee cup looked
| | 00:34 | just fine, but they're all in focus,
which is really what this will be
| | 00:38 | without any depth of field.
| | 00:40 | So let's go ahead and add in some
depth of field to get some selective focus.
| | 00:46 | We do this in a couple of steps.
| | 00:48 | First, we have to set up the camera.
Then we have to set up composite that
| | 00:52 | actually creates the depth of field.
| | 00:55 | So I'm going to go ahead and right-
click on my camera, go over to my Camera
| | 01:00 | Properties panel, and down here we
have an entry called Depth of Field.
| | 01:05 | But before I do that, I'm
going to turn on Display > Limits.
| | 01:10 | Now this displays a number of things.
| | 01:14 | The one thing you want to take a look at is
this little cross right here at the camera.
| | 01:19 | This is really my depth of field distance.
| | 01:23 | So if you scroll up to Depth of Field
here, you can move this number up and down,
| | 01:28 | and notice how that cross moves along
that line. And this tells the camera where
| | 01:35 | it's going to focus.
| | 01:37 | Now if we want, we can actually pick any
object in the scene and have that set as the focus.
| | 01:42 | So if I were to select Cup_02, it would
set that so that I have that in focus.
| | 01:49 | But regardless of how you set this, this
is really going to be your focal point.
| | 01:56 | Now if we do a render right now,
we're not going to get anything, because we
| | 02:00 | really haven't set up Depth of
Field to take advantage of this number.
| | 02:04 | We do that by setting up what
are called compositing nodes.
| | 02:08 | And so what I have to do
is go into my Node Editor.
| | 02:11 | So I'm going to select this 3D View,
and I'm going to go into the Node Editor.
| | 02:16 | Now I'm going to click on the far-right
button here which has these pictures, and
| | 02:22 | that's my composite nodes.
| | 02:24 | And what it does is it adds a node-
based compositing program that allows us to
| | 02:29 | do all sorts of effects.
| | 02:30 | So I'm going to click on Use Nodes,
| | 02:33 | and when I do that, you see we
actually only have two nodes.
| | 02:37 | We have our Render layer
and then our Output here.
| | 02:41 | Now if I hit F12 to render, you'll see
the image will show up in that render layer.
| | 02:47 | Now this is a node-based compositor and
so we can add in any sort of nodes we want.
| | 02:54 | So if I wanted to, I could add in a filter.
| | 02:58 | I could add in an effect,
Distortion, any sort of effect.
| | 03:03 | So for example, if I just wanted to do
brightness and contrast, I could do Color >
| | 03:06 | Brightness/Contrast and we can
actually create a network to allow us to add
| | 03:11 | brightness and contrast.
| | 03:13 | So what I have is my render, and before
I actually go to final output, I'm going
| | 03:17 | to plug my render into the image input
of this Brightness/Contrast, take the
| | 03:23 | image output of that and plug it
into the image input of my output,
| | 03:28 | and now I can have brightness or
contrast in my scene. So you could see I can
| | 03:33 | make this a lot more contrasty if I want.
| | 03:36 | And you could do all sorts of
effects with this composite node.
| | 03:41 | But right now we're here to actually
create depth of field, so I'm going to go
| | 03:45 | ahead and select this
composite node and delete it,
| | 03:48 | and then we're going to add in a different node.
| | 03:50 | We're going to add in a filter called Defocus.
| | 03:56 | And what that does is that
gives me my depth of field.
| | 03:59 | So again, I'm going to take my
render layer, click on Image, and find the
| | 04:04 | image input on my Defocus, and then
select the image output on my Defocus and
| | 04:10 | plug it into my output.
| | 04:13 | Now because this is a depth-based
effect, I also need to connect my Z-Buffer.
| | 04:19 | So here on my Render layer I have a Z output.
| | 04:23 | So I'm going to left-click on that
and plug it in to Z here, and this should
| | 04:29 | give me a Defocus here.
| | 04:31 | So now all I have to do is click on Use
Z-Buffer and I can start to get my effect.
| | 04:38 | Now I have a number of controls here.
| | 04:40 | One is fStop, and then
Maximum Blur and then Threshold.
| | 04:45 | Let's start with fStop.
| | 04:47 | Now if you're familiar with cameras,
you'll know that high fStops mean
| | 04:51 | infinite depth of field.
| | 04:53 | So an fStop of my default here of 128
means I'm not going to get any defocusing.
| | 04:58 | The lower the fStop, the
more depth of field you get.
| | 05:02 | So I'm going to bring this
down to a very small number.
| | 05:04 | Let's bring this note to, say, f-2.
| | 05:07 | And as soon as we do, you can see
that I'm getting my defocus effect.
| | 05:13 | So we also have a Maximum Blur, so
we can actually turn that up or down.
| | 05:20 | But the other one is actually kind of nice.
| | 05:21 | It's called Threshold, and this
determines how wide my focal area is.
| | 05:27 | So a bigger number puts more stuff in focus.
| | 05:31 | So if my Threshold is bigger,
you'll see that it kind of stretches out.
| | 05:37 | And then we also have how many samples
are we using to actually create this effect?
| | 05:43 | So if we want to, we can type in a
bigger number to get less graininess, and that
| | 05:49 | will create a better effect.
| | 05:51 | Now another option here is the Bokeh Type.
| | 05:55 | Now if you're familiar with
camera lenses, you'll know that this is
| | 05:58 | representative of how the
aperture of the camera works.
| | 06:03 | So by default, it's circular, but we
can change it to any shape we want, so
| | 06:08 | basically triangular,
square, hexagonal, and so on.
| | 06:11 | A lot of times Hexagonal works a
little bit better, and it can give you
| | 06:15 | another type of effect.
| | 06:17 | Now if I want to change the focus in
the scene, I can certainly change my
| | 06:22 | depth of field here.
| | 06:24 | I can either select a different object,
so let's say Cup_01 and go ahead and
| | 06:30 | render, and that will put that object into focus.
| | 06:34 | Or if I want, I can basically select
that, hit Backspace, and then my Depth
| | 06:41 | number comes back up here, and
then I can dial it in if I want.
| | 06:46 | So as you can see, adding depth of
field is a little more complex than other
| | 06:51 | effects in Blender, but you can
get some really great results.
| | 06:56 | All you have to do is set your depth of
field in your camera and then just add a
| | 07:01 | Defocus filter in between your Render
layer and your Output in the Node Editor.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
10. Basic Animation Understanding the Timeline| 00:00 | Animation is probably one of the
more important features of Blender,
| | 00:03 | so let's take a look at animation, and
we're going to start with the Timeline
| | 00:09 | which is the core of the
animation process in Blender.
| | 00:13 | Now I have a simple scene here, and
you may have seen the scene before.
| | 00:17 | It's billiard balls on a pool table. And we
have our Timeline at the bottom of the screen.
| | 00:24 | It's this window, from here down, and
it's basically where we can scrub our
| | 00:30 | animation as well as set
keyframes and step through our animation.
| | 00:34 | Now the easiest way to use the Timeline
is to simply left-click in this window
| | 00:39 | and we can scrub through the animation.
| | 00:43 | So as you see, the frames are numbered
along the bottom, and we basically just
| | 00:47 | jump from frame to frame as
we move from left to right.
| | 00:51 | Now we also can go from frame to frame
here, using this box, where we can just
| | 00:58 | step through the frame number. Or if we
want, we can type in a frame number if
| | 01:03 | we want to jump to a specific frame.
| | 01:06 | Now if you want to play back your
animation, we have animation controls here.
| | 01:12 | The forward-facing triangle plays forward.
| | 01:16 | And when you activate that, notice
how it turns into a pause button.
| | 01:21 | If I hit the pause button, I can then reselect
the backwards-facing triangle to play backwards.
| | 01:27 | Now we have a couple of other options here.
| | 01:30 | This goes to the very end or the very
beginning, and this steps forward and back
| | 01:35 | a keyframe at a time.
| | 01:37 | So you have to have
keyframes enabled in your scene.
| | 01:41 | Now when you're playing back, do you
want to sync--and that's this option here--
| | 01:45 | do you want to sync, do you want to sync to AV?
| | 01:48 | If we're using audio, that's what
we might need. Or do you want to drop
| | 01:53 | frames to maintain sync?
| | 01:55 | So if we have this at 24 frames a second,
do we want to play it at 24 frames a second?
| | 02:02 | If it can't make that frame
rate, it will drop frames.
| | 02:06 | No Sync means it will play as fast
as it can up to the maximum rate.
| | 02:12 | So if it's at 24 frames a second, it will
never go over, but it might play slower.
| | 02:17 | Now, we also have start and end frames here,
| | 02:21 | and this basically shows you how
much time we have for animation.
| | 02:26 | So our start frame can be at 1, it can be at 0,
| | 02:29 | we can certainly just bring these up
and down by clicking the arrows, or we
| | 02:34 | can type in a number.
| | 02:36 | So if I want this to be a longer
animation, I could type in, say, 60, and you could
| | 02:41 | see how when I do that, it goes
beyond the end of the window here.
| | 02:47 | But we have the ability to zoom in and
out in our window, and this operates just
| | 02:54 | like any other viewport.
| | 02:55 | All I have to do is either roll the
middle mouse button or hit Ctrl and the
| | 03:01 | middle mouse button and I can zoom in and out.
| | 03:03 | Now if I hit Shift and the middle
mouse button, I can pan this left or right.
| | 03:10 | Now another thing you'll notice is
that along the bottom we have our frame
| | 03:14 | numbers, but if you notice on each
side of these, we have a little dot.
| | 03:18 | So if you click on that dot, you can also zoom.
| | 03:22 | So if I click on this dot and then move it
right or left, you can also zoom your Timeline.
| | 03:28 | Now we also have options for keyframing,
which we'll get into in the next lesson.
| | 03:34 | And we also have some View options here.
| | 03:36 | Do we want to view the selected channels, in
other words, the object that we have selected?
| | 03:41 | Do we want to view all the keyframes?
| | 03:43 | And then also, do we want to
see this in frames or in seconds?
| | 03:47 | So if I change this, you can see how
it's actually showing me seconds plus
| | 03:51 | frames or just frames by themselves.
| | 03:55 | So those are some of the basics of
Blender's Timeline, and we're going to get
| | 04:00 | into animation in the next lesson.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Animating objects| 00:00 | In Blender we create animation by
setting keyframes, so let's go ahead and
| | 00:05 | create a simple animation and
learn about how to set keyframes.
| | 00:10 | I have a simple scene here with a car
sitting on a ground plane, so let's go
| | 00:15 | ahead and animate this car
driving across the screen.
| | 00:19 | Now before we do this, I'm going to
actually scale down the length of my animation.
| | 00:24 | By default, we have this set to 250
frames, and it'll definitely take a lot less
| | 00:31 | than 250 frames for this car
to drive across the screen.
| | 00:35 | So I'm going to go down to my Start and
End values here and I'm going to type in
| | 00:39 | 60 for my End value.
| | 00:41 | Now when I do that, notice how a lot
of Timeline goes away and my active area
| | 00:46 | just shrinks down to the
left side of the screen.
| | 00:49 | Now, I can expand this in a couple of ways,
but probably one of the easiest is to
| | 00:53 | grab this little dot here on the side
and then just drag. What that does is it
| | 00:57 | scales up my Timeline.
| | 01:00 | Now if I want to center this, I can
just left-click on the Timeline anywhere I
| | 01:05 | want and move left or right and
that will pan the Timeline itself.
| | 01:09 | I can also grab the other side, but
really any side works, and so what I want to
| | 01:13 | do is get this Timeline centered.
| | 01:16 | Now that I have it, let's go
ahead and set our first keyframe.
| | 01:20 | I'm going to right-click to select my
car. And what we need to do is position
| | 01:24 | the car at the beginning of the
animation and also set the Timeline to the
| | 01:28 | frame that is the beginning of the animation.
| | 01:31 | So I'm going to scrub my Timeline so
that my cursor is at frame 1, and you can
| | 01:35 | see that here, and then I'm going to just
move this car back to the edge of this plane.
| | 01:43 | Now moving the car itself does nothing.
| | 01:45 | We need to be able to set a keyframe.
| | 01:48 | We can do that in a couple of ways.
| | 01:51 | The first way is to explicitly set
the keyframe. In other words, you tell
| | 01:55 | Blender exactly when and
where you want to set a keyframe.
| | 01:59 | We can do that either in the Transform
panel of the car's Properties panel, or
| | 02:04 | we can do it here in the Transform panel.
| | 02:06 | These are basically the same value. So
it doesn't matter if we do it here on the
| | 02:12 | viewport or in the Properties panel;
| | 02:14 | it's the same process.
| | 02:16 | Now all we have to do is just right-
click and say Insert Keyframes, or we can
| | 02:21 | just hover over that menu and hit I,
which is the hotkey. So if I hover over
| | 02:28 | this and hit the letter I on the
keyboard, notice how we get this yellowed out,
| | 02:32 | and that tells me that there is a keyframe.
| | 02:35 | I'm going to go ahead and close
this Transform window. And so yellow means
| | 02:39 | we have a keyframe here, and also if I
scrub my Timeline, you'll see that I have
| | 02:44 | another keyframe here.
Again, it's a yellow keyframe.
| | 02:48 | This tells me that I have
a key set in the Timeline.
| | 02:51 | So in order for something to animate, we
need at least two keyframe, so I'm going
| | 02:56 | to go ahead and scroll over to, say,
frame 50, and then I'm just going to move my
| | 03:00 | car over towards the end of the screen.
| | 03:05 | Now doing that by itself will not
animate. In fact, as soon as I move my
| | 03:09 | Timeline, you'll see it snaps back.
| | 03:12 | I have to create another keyframe.
| | 03:16 | Now we can do that in one of two ways.
| | 03:18 | I can just position the car and
hit I again, like I did before.
| | 03:23 | Another way to do it is to just
automatically set the keyframe, and we can do
| | 03:28 | that here by pressing this little red
button. And what this does is it sets
| | 03:33 | automatic keyframe. So whenever you
move the object, it'll set a keyframe to
| | 03:38 | reflect that position.
| | 03:39 | This can be very easy to use.
| | 03:41 | It can also be a little hazardous,
because if you accidentally move an object,
| | 03:46 | you'll also create a keyframe.
| | 03:48 | So be a little bit careful when you use
this option. But by clicking this button,
| | 03:54 | all I have to do now is just move the
car and you can see how it brings up the
| | 03:59 | keyframe not just for the
location of the car, but for everything.
| | 04:04 | And the reason it does that is
because next to this, we have an option here.
| | 04:10 | This tells you what gets
automatically set for keyframes, basically any
| | 04:15 | Available channel, Location, Rotation,
and we can go down to Scale and those
| | 04:20 | sort of things. But it's set to
Available, which means it'll set a keyframe for
| | 04:25 | just about anything.
| | 04:28 | And so once we have this, we can just
hit the Play button, and you can see the
| | 04:32 | car drives across the
screen and rolls to a stop.
| | 04:36 | Now if I want to, I can create
additional keyframes. So let's go over to the
| | 04:42 | middle of this and go to frame 25, and
let's go ahead and slide the car over, so
| | 04:47 | let's go ahead and make the car do a
curvy path, and as soon as I do that, you'll
| | 04:51 | see I get another keyframe.
| | 04:54 | So once I do that, you can see how the
car moves from one place to the other.
| | 04:59 | But it doesn't look realistic,
because in order for the car to move to that
| | 05:04 | spot, it needs to be facing in that
direction. Well, we can change that simply by
| | 05:10 | adding a key for rotation.
| | 05:12 | Now if you notice, the first
key I set was for just Location.
| | 05:17 | Rotation and Scale are set as green,
and what that means is that they don't
| | 05:22 | have a keyframe at frame 1. At frame 25,
they're both yellow, as well as 50,
| | 05:29 | they're both yellow, but green means
that something is animating, but we're not
| | 05:34 | on a specific keyframe.
| | 05:36 | So if I want, I can just rotate this car
to go into the direction of travel, and
| | 05:45 | now you can see it's driving around that
corner. And again, once we get here, we
| | 05:50 | also need to make it pointing
in that direction of travel.
| | 05:55 | So now once I have this, I can play it back.
| | 06:02 | So as you can see, there are
several different ways of setting keys.
| | 06:06 | You can explicitly set keys in Blender by
hovering over any value and hitting the I key.
| | 06:14 | If we want to automatically set keys,
then we need to press this little button
| | 06:18 | on the Timeline and then be careful
to only move the object when we want to
| | 06:24 | set a key.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Animating properties| 00:00 | One of the really nice things about Blender
is that you can animate just about anything.
| | 00:05 | Now we took a look at how to animate
an object's position and orientation in
| | 00:09 | space, but you can animate really any
property of an object. Everything from
| | 00:14 | the color of an object to the
brightness of the light, really anything that
| | 00:19 | you can add a number to, you can animate.
| | 00:21 | So let's take a look at how to animate
some lights in this scene to see how to
| | 00:25 | animate things other than motion.
| | 00:28 | Now I have this scene here, which is
the car driving through the scene from the
| | 00:32 | last lesson, and we have a light in that scene.
| | 00:36 | It's called point light.
| | 00:38 | Now, if we want to see it, we can go
ahead into our viewport and just turn on
| | 00:42 | Textured mode and we can the
brightness of the light in this mode.
| | 00:47 | So you see we have an Energy value for
this light that we can turn up and down.
| | 00:52 | So let's go ahead and turn the
light off and dim it back on.
| | 00:56 | This Energy is kind of like the dimmer for
a light, so let's go ahead and animate it.
| | 01:00 | So we are going to go
ahead and start with this at 0.
| | 01:04 | Now I can either slide it to 0 or just type in 0,
and once we do that, we need to set a keyframe.
| | 01:11 | Now we do this exactly the same way
we did for position in the last one:
| | 01:15 | we just hover the mouse over the value
and hit the letter I on the keyboard.
| | 01:20 | Now notice how that turns yellow, and
that tells me that I have set a keyframe
| | 01:25 | for that property. And you can also
see the keyframe on the Timeline.
| | 01:30 | So let's go forward to, say,
frame 10 and turn up the lights.
| | 01:35 | So I can just slide this up, but if I do,
you'll see that I don't have a keyframe
| | 01:40 | set, because I don't have automatic keyframing.
| | 01:44 | Now if I want, I can turn on automatic
keyframing here and turn that light up.
| | 01:51 | So you can see how this value
automatically comes up, and now when I go over
| | 02:01 | here, say to frame 40, I want to go
ahead and keep this at that value.
| | 02:06 | So if I want, I can turn
this off and do it the same way.
| | 02:09 | I can just hit I and again,
that will just set the keyframe.
| | 02:13 | So either way it works. So what we've
done is we've turned on the light, we've
| | 02:18 | kept the light on until frame 40, and
then a frame 50, I am going to go ahead
| | 02:23 | and just type in 0 and then hit I,
since I am already here, to turn that off.
| | 02:29 | So let's go ahead and just play this.
And as you can see, the lights go on and off.
| | 02:37 | Now we don't just have to animate single values;
| | 02:41 | we can also animate things such as color.
| | 02:44 | So we can, for example,
change the color of the light.
| | 02:48 | So let's go to frame 15 here, and we have
the color of the light in this value here.
| | 02:55 | Now again, all we have to do is hover our
mouse over the value and hit I and it sets.
| | 03:02 | So let's go into the middle of this
animation and set the color to a different
| | 03:06 | value. Let's go ahead and turn the
light into kind of a reddish color here, and
| | 03:12 | go ahead and hit I. Now notice how
when I animate color, it creates a yellow
| | 03:21 | box around the color.
| | 03:23 | It doesn't actually make the box itself a color,
because we want to be able to see that color.
| | 03:28 | So we can go ahead and turn that light
back to white if we want. Again, just go
| | 03:33 | ahead and max it all out here and
then again just hit I. So once we've done
| | 03:40 | that, you can see how I've turned the
lights up, changed the color, changed the
| | 03:45 | color back, and turned the lights off again.
| | 03:48 | Now that's just one small example of
how to animate things other than position.
| | 03:53 | You can animate almost any
variable or any property in Blender using
| | 03:58 | these methods.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Editing animation in the Graph Editor| 00:00 | When you animate in Blender and you set
a lot of keyframes, but you also need to
| | 00:05 | be able to edit your animation and
change the values of those keyframes, change
| | 00:10 | how things interpolate, and we can
do a lot of that in our Graph Editor.
| | 00:16 | Now the Graph Editor is a separate
editor that we can include on the interface.
| | 00:21 | Now when you start using the Graph
Editor you kind of need to make decision as
| | 00:25 | to how you want to organize your layout.
| | 00:28 | Now a lot of people will take their Timeline
and just change it over to the Graph Editor.
| | 00:33 | You can do that by clicking here and
left-clicking on Graph Editor and it
| | 00:37 | will change it over.
| | 00:39 | But a lot of times that kind of
eliminates the functionality of the Timeline,
| | 00:42 | which can be very handy when
you're working with animation.
| | 00:46 | So I am going to leave my Timeline on,
and let's create a separate panel just
| | 00:52 | for the Graph Editor.
| | 00:53 | So I am going to go up to my top corner here,
left-click and drag, and create a new window.
| | 01:00 | Now I like to have a horizontal window,
mostly because I am working with time
| | 01:04 | and you want to be able to scrub left and right.
| | 01:07 | So then all we have to do is
change this to the Graph Editor.
| | 01:11 | And here is the Graph Editor.
| | 01:13 | Now you can see it has a Timeline along
the bottom, very similar to the Timeline
| | 01:19 | that we have here. And if I left click
and scrub in my Timeline, you can see how
| | 01:25 | it moves in conjunction
with whatever frame I am at.
| | 01:28 | And you can also see that we have
some animation here in the scene.
| | 01:32 | So we have this ball moving up and down.
| | 01:35 | Okay, so the Graph Editor really is
for editing animation curves in Blender.
| | 01:43 | So let's right-click to select our
object and then in the Graph Editor window, we
| | 01:47 | are going to do Select All. Or we can
just hit A. What that does is it shows all
| | 01:52 | of the animation curves for that object.
| | 01:56 | Now you'll notice here on the left side
of the screen, we have all the different
| | 02:01 | channels that we're animating.
| | 02:03 | So you can see here in my Transform
panel that I'm animating Location,
| | 02:07 | Rotation, and Scale, and that's what I
have here for my animation curves. And if
| | 02:13 | I left-click on any one of these, they
will highlight. So you can see that Y
| | 02:17 | location basically moves from one value to the
next. My Z location basically goes up and down.
| | 02:24 | That's this blue line.
| | 02:26 | X, well X really doesn't do much,
because the object isn't moving in X. And
| | 02:31 | Rotation and Scale aren't doing much either.
| | 02:33 | Really we are just animating Y
and Z in this particular scene.
| | 02:37 | Now next to each one of these we have a
couple of buttons here that allow us to
| | 02:42 | mute animation, as well as to lock.
| | 02:45 | So if I were to select my Z location
here and hit this button, notice how the
| | 02:50 | blue line goes gray. And what that does
is it just turns off that curve, so it
| | 02:55 | doesn't have any effect.
| | 02:57 | So because the ball was here on the
ground at the point where I turned it off,
| | 03:02 | it will stay on the ground
throughout the animation.
| | 03:05 | But if I turn this on,
you will see it comes back.
| | 03:10 | Now the effect of this is dependent
upon where you turn it on and off.
| | 03:13 | So if the ball is in the air when I turn
it off, it will just stay at that value.
| | 03:19 | If the ball is on the ground, it will
stay at that value. And then next to this
| | 03:28 | we have a lock, and notice how it turns
this curve into a dotted line, and that
| | 03:32 | means we can't edit it.
| | 03:34 | This can be really handy if you are only
working with a few curves and you don't
| | 03:38 | want to accidentally select other curves.
| | 03:40 | Now if we move over to the right, we
actually have our Curve Editor viewport.
| | 03:45 | This is just a 2D editor, like any other
2D editor in Blender, which means we can
| | 03:50 | navigate through it using our middle
mouse button. So if I middle-click, and
| | 03:55 | drag, you can see how I can pan.
| | 03:58 | If I roll my middle mouse
button, I zoom in and out.
| | 04:02 | If I hold down the Ctrl key and middle
mouse button, if I move my mouse left and
| | 04:07 | right, we zoom left and right, up and
down, we zoom up and down. So I can zoom
| | 04:13 | this way or this way or both.
| | 04:17 | Now we do have a cursor
in this viewport as well.
| | 04:21 | So if I left-click and drag on
this, I can slide my animation.
| | 04:25 | But notice how we have a second line
that intersects with this, and that's kind
| | 04:30 | of a 2D cursor, very similar to the
3D cursor we have in the viewport.
| | 04:35 | So in the viewport we have this 3D
cursor which can be a point of action,
| | 04:40 | so if we create an object that comes
into that place, and so on. And the same
| | 04:44 | thing happens here in this viewport.
| | 04:46 | But typically we don't need it, so I
tend to scrub animation towards the bottom
| | 04:51 | here so that this doesn't quite get in the way.
| | 04:54 | Now we can also select and edit keyframes.
| | 04:57 | So let's go ahead and move our cursor
over. And if I want to, I can right-click
| | 05:01 | over a key. So if I right-click on
any one of these keys, notice how this
| | 05:07 | Curve Editor comes up.
| | 05:09 | It is basically a Bezier handle. And if I
right-click and drag, you can see how I
| | 05:15 | can actually change the value.
| | 05:17 | Now if you look over here under
Transform, you can see how that value actually
| | 05:21 | changes as I move the curve.
| | 05:25 | So this is basically just literally
changing the value that we have for that.
| | 05:30 | Now, on either side of this we have
Bezier handles, so you can right-click and
| | 05:36 | drag and then you can actually let go
and position that curve however you want.
| | 05:42 | And once you have that curve positioned
exactly the way you want it, you can
| | 05:46 | right-click to set that.
| | 05:48 | And so what that does is it
actually creates a different type of curve.
| | 05:52 | Notice how now the ball is going
dipping down a little bit before it jumps up,
| | 05:57 | and that's just because all we did
was change the character of that curve.
| | 06:02 | Now these curves are Bezier by default,
but we can change the type of curve as well.
| | 06:07 | A lot of times we will want to have a
linear curve so that things move very evenly;
| | 06:13 | they don't slow in or slow out.
| | 06:14 | We also can have constant curves, which allow
you to move from one position to the other.
| | 06:20 | So we can select multiple curves in
our editor using the same tool we use for
| | 06:26 | 3D editing and that's by hitting the
B key and doing a box select. So this
| | 06:31 | looks very familiar. All we have to do
is left-click and select all of our keys.
| | 06:36 | And then if we want, we can go into our Key
menu here and we can change how it interpolates.
| | 06:42 | So we have Constant
Interpolation, Linear, and Bezier.
| | 06:46 | By default it's Bezier, and also notices
how the hotkey is called T, for Interpolation.
| | 06:53 | So go ahead and hit this to Linear,
and notice how all the curves really go
| | 06:57 | away and it just become straight lines.
And so now the object is basically
| | 07:01 | moves in straight line.
| | 07:03 | And for some animation this may be
advantageous. And notice how also the
| | 07:08 | Bezier handles go away.
| | 07:11 | Now if we want, we can again hit T, and
that just brings up this menu, and we can
| | 07:17 | change it to Constant.
And this is basically a square wave.
| | 07:20 | So it basically goes from one value to the
next, and it just hops from value to value.
| | 07:26 | Now if we hit T again and go back to Bezier, it
actually will remember your old interpolation.
| | 07:33 | So remember how I changed this curve
so that it dips down. It will remember
| | 07:37 | that and bring that back.
| | 07:39 | Now we have a number of other options
here, and one of the ones I do want to
| | 07:43 | show you is the Filters option here,
and this allows you to filter what you're
| | 07:48 | looking at in the Graph Editor.
| | 07:49 | If you have a lot of things selected
or a lot of animation going on, you'll
| | 07:54 | often want to pare down the things that
are showing up on the screen, and these
| | 07:59 | filters can turn off anything that you want.
| | 08:02 | So for example, if I click on this
one here, it will turn off all location
| | 08:07 | information. Or it can turn off
materials if you are animating those lights, if
| | 08:11 | you are animating those, and so on.
| | 08:13 | So those are some of the
basics of the Graph Editor.
| | 08:16 | Now just understand that you can have
multiple curves showing up in the Graph Editor.
| | 08:21 | It works pretty much like any 2D
viewport: you can zoom around and you can edit
| | 08:27 | the curves to create custom effects.
| | 08:29 | It can be very powerful and hopefully
you'll get to use this a lot more as
| | 08:34 | you animate in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Using the Dope Sheet| 00:00 | Another way to edit
animation is to use the Dope Sheet.
| | 00:04 | Now this doesn't use animation curves;
| | 00:06 | it basically just allows you to move
keyframes around and create new ones.
| | 00:10 | But it can be a lot faster than the
Graph Editor in a lot of situations.
| | 00:15 | So let's go ahead and open up a
window to add in a Graph Editor.
| | 00:18 | So I'm going to go up into the right
corner of my viewport here and left-click
| | 00:23 | and drag down a horizontal window.
| | 00:25 | And again, because I'm working with
time, I like to have a horizontal window
| | 00:29 | to put my editor in. And so we're going to
find the Dope Sheet and go ahead and select that.
| | 00:35 | Now this actually has all of the
animation in the scene represented as
| | 00:41 | little diamonds here.
| | 00:43 | And if I want, I can scroll in by
grabbing this little icon here. And you'll see
| | 00:48 | that I have a number of options here,
but basically the ones I want to look at
| | 00:53 | are the ones for the billiard ball.
| | 00:55 | In fact, let's go ahead and zoom down
a little bit. And you can see that each
| | 00:59 | key here is actually broken down into
separate keys for X, Y, and Z, so in that
| | 01:06 | respect it's similar to the Graph Editor,
but we don't have curves between them--
| | 01:11 | we just have the keys themselves.
| | 01:13 | Now this is a simpler way of looking at
your animation. But you don't have all
| | 01:19 | the curves in place. It's just a really
easy way to move keys around, and a lot
| | 01:23 | times it can be faster.
| | 01:25 | So as we scroll through, you can see
how we've got a set of keys in the middle,
| | 01:29 | where the billiard ball is
reaching the top of its arc.
| | 01:33 | So you can see, as we play this, the ball
basically just does a quick bounce. And
| | 01:39 | so we have a key here.
| | 01:41 | Now if we want, we can move that
key or just parts of that key. So if I
| | 01:46 | right-click and drag, you can
see how I'm dragging that key.
| | 01:50 | Now look down on the Timeline.
| | 01:52 | You can see how it's snapping
along with the keys in the Dope Sheet.
| | 01:57 | So if I put it on frame 12 and
left-click to lock it in, now my ball goes up a
| | 02:04 | lot quicker and down a lot slower.
| | 02:06 | So if I wanted to move that back, again,
all I do is right-click over it and
| | 02:12 | drag, and once I let go of that right-click,
it's locked until I left-click to set it.
| | 02:19 | So another thing we can do is change
individual keys. So let's say we want it to
| | 02:26 | have its peak somewhere earlier.
| | 02:29 | Let's say I want to move that
key for Z Location up a little bit.
| | 02:32 | I can right-click on just that key and
drag, and now you can see how I'm just
| | 02:38 | moving that one key for that one channel.
| | 02:41 | So if I move that, say, to 10, left-click
and lock it in, you'll see I get another
| | 02:46 | key here at 10, but when I go to that
key, you'll see that the only thing keyed
| | 02:52 | is location for Z; everything else is not keyed.
| | 02:56 | And when I go over to 15, everything is
keyed except for that one I move. So I
| | 03:01 | can move individual
channel keys around if I want.
| | 03:07 | Now I can also use this as a
keyframing interface. So if I go over here
| | 03:12 | somewhere around 21 or so, I have a
Key menu here, so that we can insert
| | 03:18 | keyframes and the hotkey for that is I.
So if all I do is hit I over this, we
| | 03:23 | can key all channels or only the selected
channels, which will be, in this case, Z Location.
| | 03:29 | So if I hit I, only selected channels
that creates one key for that. And again I
| | 03:35 | can move that around if I want,
and again, left-click to lock it in.
| | 03:41 | Now another thing we can do is we can
actually duplicate keys, so if I were to
| | 03:45 | select, for example, this and Shift+
Select another one, you can actually use the
| | 03:49 | same selection tools we have
in any other part of Blender.
| | 03:53 | So if I select Y and Z here at frame 26,
| | 03:58 | I can go Key > Duplicate and then it
allows me to dial that additional key in
| | 04:06 | and then left-click to lock it in.
| | 04:09 | So it's a great way to
actually duplicate keys as well.
| | 04:13 | Now another thing you want to be aware
of is that any value that isn't really
| | 04:18 | animating will show up with this black bar.
| | 04:21 | So remember, in this animation we were
really only animating Y and Z. X and all
| | 04:28 | the other variables were pretty much
held constant throughout the animation.
| | 04:32 | So if something is constant from one frame
to the next, it will show up as a dark line.
| | 04:38 | So those are some of the basics of the
Dope Sheet, and as you can see, it's a
| | 04:42 | very fast way to move keys around and
reorganize and re-time your animation, so
| | 04:48 | I'm sure you'll find it valuable as
you continue to animate in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Path animation| 00:00 | There are many times when you'll need to
animate objects in very specific paths,
| | 00:05 | and you can use animation paths to do that.
| | 00:08 | So let's take a look at how to
attach an object to a path for animation.
| | 00:13 | Now in order to do this, we need
to first create an animation path.
| | 00:18 | Now this is called a curve. And we
really haven't dealt too much with curves,
| | 00:22 | but we can find them under Curve > Path.
And once we have that, we can zoom in
| | 00:28 | on it, and you'll see it's
basically a Nurbs type of curve.
| | 00:33 | Now we can edit this curve by going
into Edit mode. You'll notice we have
| | 00:38 | a lot of little chunks there, but you'll
see that we have individual vertices here.
| | 00:43 | And just by pushing and pulling
those vertices, we can reshape that curve.
| | 00:47 | So if wanted to, I can move
this really wherever I want.
| | 00:52 | In fact, if I wanted to, I can go into
my Quad view and that might make it a
| | 00:55 | little bit easier to edit.
| | 00:57 | So as you can see here in my top ortho
view, we can go ahead and create a nice
| | 01:03 | curve for this object to move around.
| | 01:06 | So I'm just going to go ahead and
right-click on each of these and move them
| | 01:10 | around, and you can see how the curve
kind of sticks to those points here.
| | 01:17 | And this is a classic Nurbs-based
curve, in that the curve itself doesn't
| | 01:22 | move over the points;
| | 01:24 | it actually moves in between them.
So the points define the outer edge of the
| | 01:29 | curve rather than the
curve moving through the points.
| | 01:33 | So once I have this curve defined--
and you can actually put the curve into
| | 01:38 | 3D space if you want.
| | 01:39 | So I'm going to go back to Quad view here,
and let's go ahead and take a look at
| | 01:46 | this curve. In fact, again I can select
each one of these and just move them up,
| | 01:51 | so let's say we want to have this
go up in a little bit of an arc.
| | 01:55 | Okay, so that should be a pretty good curve.
| | 02:01 | So you can make whatever shaped curve
you want, but the idea here is to get a
| | 02:06 | curve, and once we're done,
we can tab out of Edit mode.
| | 02:09 | Now in order to attach the object to the curve,
you need to use what's called a constraint.
| | 02:15 | Now we've used constraints a little bit,
but you can find them here under this
| | 02:19 | little chain link here. So I'm going to
right-click on my billiard ball here and
| | 02:24 | click on the Constraints tab.
| | 02:28 | So we're going to add in a constraint.
| | 02:30 | Now we have a number of them here.
One is called Follow Path, but that's
| | 02:35 | actually kind of the old technology way
of doing it. The better way to do it is
| | 02:39 | to use what's called Clamp To.
| | 02:42 | So I'm going to add in a Clamp to
constraint, so this object will be constrained
| | 02:47 | to a target, and that target has to be
a curve, and that curve is called Nurbs
| | 02:52 | Path. And as soon as I do,
it snaps to that path.
| | 02:57 | Now we can select which axis of the
object we're using to move along that path.
| | 03:04 | Let me show what I mean.
| | 03:05 | If I select X, that means that moving the
objects X translation moves it along the path;
| | 03:13 | Y means if I move it along the green
axis; and Z means I'll have to move it
| | 03:18 | along the blue axis.
| | 03:19 | So I'm going to keep this on the Y.
And then all we have to do to move this
| | 03:23 | along the path is just to set some keyframes.
| | 03:26 | So I can move it over here and
basically set a keyframe for location.
| | 03:34 | So all I have to do is hit I, and
you can see I have a keyframe, move my
| | 03:39 | Timeline, and again, red is what moves it.
| | 03:43 | If I move green or blue, it doesn't.
Red is X, so I can move this all the way
| | 03:48 | over here, set it another keyframe,
hit I, or I can just turn on automatic
| | 03:53 | keyframing, and then I can
move that wherever I want.
| | 03:58 | So now I've basically just moved it and
wherever it moves, it moves along that path.
| | 04:05 | Now if you want, we can go back to the
constraint, and if you click on Cyclic, it
| | 04:10 | will actually cycle that as well.
| | 04:17 | So those are some of the
basics of animating to a path.
| | 04:20 | Now remember, you have to start with a
pathed curve, and then once you get your
| | 04:24 | curve into the proper shape, you attach
the object using a Clamp To constraint.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
11. Character RiggingFacial animation using shape keys| 00:00 | Now let's dive into character rigging.
| | 00:02 | We're going to start with facial
animation and take a very quick look at how to
| | 00:08 | create facial shapes for
animating your characters.
| | 00:12 | I'm going to start with this little
creature that we've been building. And the
| | 00:17 | way that you do facial animation in
Blender is using what are called shape keys.
| | 00:22 | Now, you can find these
under the Object Data panel.
| | 00:27 | So if I select my object and under my
Object Data panel, you'll see a rollout
| | 00:32 | here called Shape Keys.
| | 00:34 | Now what this does is it remembers various
shapes that you model into the character.
| | 00:41 | So this is a little bit different
than morphing or blend shapes in that
| | 00:45 | everything is located here.
| | 00:47 | You don't create separate models
and then combine them together;
| | 00:50 | you just create them on the fly.
| | 00:53 | So I'm going to hit the plus sign here,
and this creates a key called Basis, and
| | 00:58 | that's just my basic key.
| | 01:00 | This is my neutral position of my
character. And I'm going to keep that like it is.
| | 01:06 | And I'm going to add in a second one
by hitting the plus key again. And let's
| | 01:11 | just do a really simple mouth shape.
| | 01:14 | I'm going to go ahead and do one called
Closed_mouth, and we're just going to type that in.
| | 01:19 | And now, all we have to do is model that.
| | 01:21 | So let me show you very quickly how this works.
| | 01:25 | I'm going to hit the Tab key to go
into Edit mode, and I want to be in Vertex
| | 01:30 | mode right now. And I just want
to close the character's mouth.
| | 01:35 | So I'm going to turn on Proportional Editing--
| | 01:40 | that will help me a little bit--and make
sure that I've got my proportions right
| | 01:46 | by hitting G and rolling my middle mouse button.
| | 01:49 | And now once I do, I'm just going to
go ahead and start moving parts of his
| | 01:54 | mouth so that we can close
his mouth. And again, I'm just
| | 01:59 | Shift+Right-clicking and selecting
these vertices here, and so I'm just
| | 02:03 | trying to get that mouth closed.
| | 02:09 | So as I start to move up, you'll notice
that my proportional editing is pushing
| | 02:13 | that part of the mouth up, so I'm just
going to turn that off for a second here
| | 02:17 | and try and get his mouth fairly closed.
And I can even pull it down a little
| | 02:25 | bit from the top here,
| | 02:26 | so I'm just going to go ahead and
select that vertices along the top of his
| | 02:30 | mouth and pull that down
as well, and there we go.
| | 02:36 | So now I have another shape.
| | 02:39 | Now I can continue to model this.
| | 02:41 | I can make really any shape that I want,
but once I'm there, all I have to do is
| | 02:45 | jump to Object mode and the
object goes back to the base key.
| | 02:50 | Now, this closed mouth that I just
created has a number associated with it, and
| | 02:56 | that is the value that we get right here.
| | 03:00 | So I've got my character now
opening and closing his mouth.
| | 03:04 | Now you can see it probably a
little bit easier if I put on a
| | 03:08 | subdivision surface.
| | 03:09 | So I'm going to go over to my Object
Modifier panel and select Subdivision
| | 03:13 | Surface and then go back to my Object
Data panel, and let's go ahead and see how
| | 03:18 | he closes his mouth.
| | 03:20 | Okay, so now his mouth isn't quite closed,
but we can certainly fix that by going
| | 03:25 | back into Edit mode.
| | 03:27 | So when I go into Edit mode, you can
see that because I have Closed_mouth
| | 03:31 | selected, I have that key, no
matter what it's dialed in at.
| | 03:36 | So then I can select these underlying
vertices here. Actually, I'm going to go
| | 03:41 | into Edge mode and select these.
| | 03:44 | There we go and there we go.
| | 03:51 | So now I've got his mouth closed.
| | 03:53 | So we can continue along with this.
| | 03:56 | This is just a real basic example here.
| | 03:59 | You can do multiple mouth shapes.
| | 04:01 | You can do shapes for the eyes.
| | 04:04 | You can do blinks, that sort of thing.
| | 04:06 | You can really create as many shapes
as you want. And once you have multiple
| | 04:10 | shapes, you can dial them in or mix them.
| | 04:13 | Now, I have one that I've already done
here, and this is called Chap11_02.blend,
| | 04:20 | and in this one I added in
another shape key, and that's a blink.
| | 04:24 | So what I can do is I can take that
and I can blink the character and I can
| | 04:29 | close the mouth, so these are additive.
| | 04:32 | So you can add them together and mix
them together just like you would with any
| | 04:37 | other type of shape animation.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Understanding armatures| 00:00 | Facial animation is just one component
of building a character and rigging him.
| | 00:06 | That shape animation really doesn't affect
things like the arms, the legs, and the body.
| | 00:11 | For that, we really need an armature.
| | 00:14 | Now, armatures are basically like bone
systems that go through your character
| | 00:19 | and allow you to deform the
character by moving the bones.
| | 00:23 | Now, before we actually fit an armature
to this character, let's go through some
| | 00:27 | of the basics of armatures so that way
we really understand what we're working
| | 00:31 | with before we proceed.
| | 00:33 | So I'm going to take this little
character that we have and I'm just going to go
| | 00:37 | ahead and hide him by clicking on
this little eye icon in the viewport. And
| | 00:42 | let's just do a quick
look at how armatures work.
| | 00:45 | I'm going to go into a front
orthographic viewport and under my Add menu, I'm
| | 00:53 | going to select armature.
| | 00:55 | Now, armatures and bones in Blender are
a little bit different than the ones you
| | 01:00 | find in other packages such as Maya or 3ds Max.
| | 01:04 | Everything stems from a single bone,
so when you create an armature you're
| | 01:09 | basically creating a single bone and
then growing that bone into your character.
| | 01:15 | So let's take a look at the basics of a bone.
| | 01:19 | We have three modes for an armature.
| | 01:22 | We have Object mode, which is the object
itself, and that way I can move it in space.
| | 01:30 | Then we have Edit mode, and this is for
creating the armature in the character.
| | 01:35 | In other words, this is where you
actually build your skeleton for your
| | 01:40 | character, and this allows you to go
into each bone and find individual parts of
| | 01:46 | that bone and work with them.
| | 01:48 | Then finally, we have what's called Pose mode,
and this is where we actually do animation.
| | 01:54 | But right now we're going to kind of
hang out in Edit mode, and so let's go
| | 01:58 | into this and see what we have.
| | 02:00 | Now, each bone has a base, a body, and the tip.
| | 02:07 | Now if you select the body, you can
move the whole bone in Edit mode.
| | 02:12 | If you select the tip or the
base, you can position that bone.
| | 02:17 | Now under the Properties panel we do
have an option for Armature, and we also
| | 02:24 | have an option for each individual bone.
| | 02:27 | Right now, let's take a
look at the Armature panel.
| | 02:31 | We do have a couple of Display options.
| | 02:33 | By default, it sets it to this
octahedral display, which is pretty much what you
| | 02:39 | would expect from any type of bone.
| | 02:41 | These look very similar to
the bones in other packages.
| | 02:44 | We can also display the bones in
Sticks, as Box Bones, Envelopes.
| | 02:49 | Now this is actually very important
because you can actually see what parts of
| | 02:53 | the mesh each bone is affecting using
this mode. Or we have Wire, which is a
| | 02:59 | very light way of seeing it.
| | 03:01 | Now if you want, you can
click on names for the bones.
| | 03:04 | You can show the axes of each
individual bone, and that can be very important
| | 03:10 | for things such as seeing
which axes you need to rotate.
| | 03:16 | If you want, you can also turn on X-Ray
mode, and what that does is it allows you
| | 03:19 | to see the bones through the skin of
the character. And then if you want, you
| | 03:24 | can do Delay Refresh.
| | 03:26 | Now sometimes if you have a complex
character, it's going to try to refresh the
| | 03:31 | deformation of the mesh while you pose
a character and that can slow you down,
| | 03:36 | and this will give you a little bit
faster interaction so you pose the skeleton
| | 03:39 | and then the character will snap to skeleton.
| | 03:42 | Now in addition to this, we can group bones.
| | 03:45 | We have Pose Libraries, which we'll
get into, and we can do Ghosting when we
| | 03:49 | get into animation.
| | 03:51 | Now that we understand the
components of a bone, let's show you how to
| | 03:55 | actually build those into a skeleton.
| | 03:58 | We actually do it by using Armature tools here.
| | 04:02 | Now, if you notice, we actually have
some modeling tools for our bones. One is
| | 04:08 | Extrude, another is Subdivide.
| | 04:10 | So if we want to, we can actually extrude bones.
| | 04:13 | I'm going to go back into my front
viewport here, and let's go ahead and hit
| | 04:19 | Extrude, and when you do, you can
see how this bone actually extrudes.
| | 04:25 | So if I want a bone on top of this one,
I can simply extrude it. And if I want, I
| | 04:31 | can extrude it again, and so this
is how we create a chain of bones.
| | 04:36 | If we want, we can also subdivide bones.
| | 04:38 | So I can right-click on the body of a
bone and subdivide it, and I can move that
| | 04:43 | subdivision as well.
| | 04:44 | So if I want to reposition bones, I can
do that. And again, the tip of the bone
| | 04:49 | defines where it's positioned.
| | 04:51 | So if you select the tip of the bone
underneath, it will go ahead and scale
| | 04:56 | underneath, so you can see that.
| | 04:57 | Now, if we want to create
trees of bones we can do that.
| | 05:01 | We can select the bone here and
extrude to one side or the other.
| | 05:07 | So I can extrude out this way, hit
Extrude again, and extrude out this way.
| | 05:14 | It's very similar to 3D modeling.
| | 05:19 | And again, each one of these has a name
associated with it, and it's all located
| | 05:26 | underneath this Armature object in the Outliner.
| | 05:30 | So if we scroll down and select the
armature, you'll see that we can select
| | 05:34 | each individual bone.
| | 05:36 | If we want, we can Ctrl+Left-click on
these to give them a name, so we can just
| | 05:42 | type in a new name if we want.
| | 05:45 | So these tools allow us to literally
grow a skeleton for our characters.
| | 05:51 | We're going to start with a single
bone and then extrude, subdivide, and add
| | 05:56 | additional bones to create the
skeletons that our characters need.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Fitting an armature to a creature| 00:00 | Once you understand the basics of
armatures, you can start creating an armature
| | 00:04 | for your character.
| | 00:06 | We're going to create an armature for
this little creature here, and I'm going to
| | 00:10 | go ahead and select him. And let's go
into Wireframe mode. And you'll notice that
| | 00:15 | he is actually pretty dense in his
wireframe, and that's because I have a
| | 00:19 | Subdivision Surface modifier.
| | 00:21 | I'm going to go ahead and delete this
so that he looks a little bit simpler.
| | 00:25 | Then let's go ahead and just click
here and restrict selection so that way I
| | 00:31 | don't accidentally select him.
| | 00:33 | Now probably the easiest way to build an
armature is in a quad view, so let's go
| | 00:39 | ahead and do Toggle Quad View so we
can see our character. And I'm going to go
| | 00:44 | ahead and get him centered here.
And let's go ahead and add in an armature.
| | 00:52 | So when we add in an armature, we really
only have one option, Single Bone, and
| | 00:56 | that brings it in at our 3D cursor.
And the first thing we want to do is leave it
| | 01:01 | in Object mode and position the base of
that armature. So I'm going to position
| | 01:07 | it right about here.
| | 01:09 | Now what I'm trying to do here is get
this aligned to edge loops of the character.
| | 01:16 | Now if you think about it, his hips are
going to be right around here and the
| | 01:19 | bottom of his belly is here, so I
really want to try and get that first bone
| | 01:24 | placed properly. And then let's go ahead
and start positioning and adding in new bones.
| | 01:32 | So I do that by going into Edit mode.
| | 01:34 | I can just hit Tab and that puts
us into Edit mode. And I can select
| | 01:38 | individual bones, move them around,
or I can just select the tips or the
| | 01:42 | bases of the bones.
| | 01:44 | So I'm going to go ahead and select
the tip of this bone and scale it down so
| | 01:48 | that it's pretty much even with this
edge loop towards the middle of his waist,
| | 01:53 | so right around here, and this will be
the start of what we're going to use to
| | 01:57 | deform that part of the body.
| | 01:59 | So next we need to add more bones, and
probably the easiest way to do that is
| | 02:04 | under Modeling, and we can just hit Extrude.
| | 02:07 | I'm going to right-click off of that and just
use my Move option here to move it into place.
| | 02:14 | And another way that extrude is just to
use you're the hotkey E for Extrude. So
| | 02:19 | I'm going to position this bone right
about here, and again I'm looking at the
| | 02:24 | edge loops of this character.
And before I go too far, I need to start giving
| | 02:30 | everything descriptive names.
| | 02:32 | So if we go into our Outliner here,
you'll see under Armature we have the
| | 02:38 | armature itself and then there are
bones. So that first bone can be renamed, and
| | 02:43 | then we have a second bone, so
let's go ahead and rename this.
| | 02:46 | I'm going to hit Ctrl+Left-click to activate
Rename and let's just call this one Spine.01.
| | 02:54 | And the second one, we're going to
just call that Spine.02. And as we start
| | 03:00 | creating bones, I want to keep in mind
that I want to name them, so that way I
| | 03:03 | have to go back through and rename
them all at once. And if we want, we can go
| | 03:07 | into our armature and display the names so
that way we know exactly which bones we have.
| | 03:13 | So let's go ahead and add in another bone.
| | 03:17 | I'm going to hit E for Extrude, and
I'm going to extrude this next bone. And
| | 03:22 | because I've been naming these .01, .02
it gives me a .003 in my name, which is
| | 03:30 | actually nice, because it's
kind of automatically naming it.
| | 03:34 | So now once I've got this spine,
I can start creating my branches.
| | 03:38 | I can go up into my head or I can create
my arm. Let's go ahead and do the arm first.
| | 03:45 | So again I'm going to extrude, and this
time I want to place this right around
| | 03:50 | where that shoulder is going to be.
| | 03:53 | So if you think about it, your shoulder
is just above and outside of the armpit,
| | 03:59 | so somewhere around here. So if you
think about proper placement of these bones,
| | 04:04 | think about it anatomically, because
this arm is going to rotate around this
| | 04:09 | point, so I want to make sure
I get this aligned properly.
| | 04:13 | And again, you want it slightly to
the outside of that armpit; otherwise,
| | 04:17 | you're going to get your armpit going into
the body and it's going to look unnatural.
| | 04:21 | So once I have that--let's go ahead
and expand that out and I can't quite see
| | 04:26 | this I'm going to have to squish this
down. And let's go ahead and rename this
| | 04:32 | Shoulder.L. And let's go ahead and keep extruding.
| | 04:36 | So I'm going to hit Extrude again, and
this time I'm creating my bicep and my
| | 04:40 | elbow, so I want to make sure I place
my elbow bone here. And let's go ahead and
| | 04:45 | rename that Bicep.Left, and you
can see how we're doing this.
| | 04:49 | I'm just going to go ahead and create the
rest of the bones, so that way it's pretty easy.
| | 04:54 | So I'm going to select this, E for
Extrude, create the wrist, E for Extrude again,
| | 05:00 | and create the tip of the finger.
| | 05:02 | Now I have my character aligned very
precisely along the zero points of each
| | 05:08 | axis, so I'm pretty confident that when
I draw these bones they're going through
| | 05:13 | the center of the character.
| | 05:15 | So that's the basics for the arm
structure. Let's take a look at how to do the
| | 05:20 | leg structure as well.
| | 05:21 | So again, we can just click on this
bottom bone here and extrude again, and this
| | 05:26 | is going to be our hip. And I'm not
going to name these right now, because I
| | 05:29 | want to go ahead and go through this
really quickly, create a knee, an ankle.
| | 05:37 | And if we want it depends on the
character and the character type, but we may
| | 05:40 | want to create a foot bone, so I'm
going to go ahead and do that, just create a
| | 05:43 | little bone here and that represents his
foot, even though it doesn't really have a
| | 05:48 | foot, but I'll just go
ahead and make that small.
| | 05:51 | So those are some of the
basics of creating the armature.
| | 05:54 | Now another thing you may want to do is
create additional bones to help with the
| | 05:59 | deformation of the character.
| | 06:02 | So if, for example, we have this
character, he is pretty chubby, so we may need
| | 06:07 | additional bones to get the effect of
the spine out to the edge of his belly.
| | 06:13 | If we were to bend, for example, this
arm, you can see that the spine and the
| | 06:19 | elbow are almost
equidistant from the edge of his hip.
| | 06:24 | So if want this to be defined by the spine
then we need to create a bone to do that.
| | 06:30 | So we can basically just zoom in,
select this area, and again E for Extrude, and
| | 06:36 | extrude a bone out for that side, middle
again, E Extrude, another bone for this
| | 06:43 | side, and we can also do it front and back.
| | 06:45 | So again, select this, Extrude, and one
more for the back, and we can continue to do
| | 06:54 | that around his body.
| | 06:56 | Now, when you get to his head you may
want to create ones that specifically
| | 07:01 | deformed his eyes, so that way
his eyes move along with the head.
| | 07:05 | But those are some of the basics for how
to position your armature bones to the mesh.
| | 07:13 | Now go through your character and make a
full skeleton, and then we'll come back
| | 07:18 | and learn how to use that
skeleton to deform a character.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Deforming a character with an armature| 00:00 | When you get your armature fitted to
the mesh, the next step is to deform the
| | 00:05 | mesh to the armature.
| | 00:07 | So let me show you what I
have here in Wireframe mode.
| | 00:10 | You can see I've got this armature here,
and I have got basically right and left
| | 00:16 | legs and I also have some extensions
here on the spine just to help with
| | 00:23 | deformation of the body itself.
| | 00:26 | And so now that I have all of this in place,
I can now deform the mesh using the armature.
| | 00:33 | So the way that we do that is we select the
mesh and then we Shift+Select the armature.
| | 00:40 | So the armature is the last thing selected.
| | 00:44 | Then under Object, we do Parent > Set >
Armature Deform, or we can just do it by
| | 00:51 | hitting Ctrl+P, and this
will say Armature Deform.
| | 00:56 | Do we want to do it With Empty Groups,
Envelope Weights, or Automatic Weights?
| | 01:01 | Envelope Weights uses the weights that
surround each bone to deform the mesh.
| | 01:08 | Automatic just gives it its best
guess. For this character, Automatic
| | 01:12 | should work fairly well,
| | 01:13 | so let's go ahead and just select
that. And now that we have it, it's
| | 01:17 | pretty much deforming.
| | 01:19 | Now again, once I have this mesh
deformed, I don't want to move it.
| | 01:25 | So again, I am going to go ahead and restrict
selection in the viewport for that creature.
| | 01:31 | And let's take a look at how
this mesh deforms my character.
| | 01:34 | We can go back into Solid mode here,
but when we do, we can't see the armature.
| | 01:40 | We can't see what we're working with.
| | 01:42 | But we can go over to our armature's Object
Data panel and scroll down and click on X-Ray,
| | 01:49 | and that allows me to see
the armature through the mesh.
| | 01:53 | Now once you have your armature fitted,
in Edit mode, we can go to the next mode,
| | 01:59 | which is Pose mode. So we have
Object mode, which we are in now.
| | 02:03 | If we hit Tab we would be in Edit
mode, which allows us to move the bones
| | 02:06 | around. And then finally we have Pose mode, which
allows us to actually post and animate the mesh.
| | 02:14 | So I can take my meshes here and I can
start to rotate them, up and down, back
| | 02:24 | and forth, and see exactly how that mesh works.
| | 02:29 | I can do this either globally or locally.
| | 02:31 | Okay, so it is deforming my character.
| | 02:37 | Now there are parts of the character
that you may not want to deform, or there
| | 02:42 | may be bones that you don't want to move.
| | 02:45 | Like for example, if I have this eye
bone here, you can see that yeah, I can do
| | 02:50 | that to deform the head, but I
don't really want to move that.
| | 02:53 | So one of the things we can do is we can
start to lock down the action of bones
| | 02:58 | so only some bones can rotate and
others can't. We can do that in the Transform
| | 03:04 | menu. So we can just select bones and
just start locking them off, and you can see
| | 03:09 | how as I lock off my Rotation here,
then I can actually move those bones.
| | 03:16 | So for example, some of these bones
in the head I might now want to rotate
| | 03:19 | because I want to rotate
the head from down here.
| | 03:23 | Another thing you can do is you can
restrict bones to certain axes so that you
| | 03:28 | can only rotate them around a specific axis.
| | 03:31 | This will be good for the elbow for example,
which only really moves along one axis.
| | 03:37 | So the next step is to go through and
understand how your bones are rotating
| | 03:42 | and restrict those bones that you may
not want to accidentally rotate when
| | 03:46 | animating the character.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Setting up inverse kinematics| 00:00 | When you create a basic armature,
the bones manipulate the character by
| | 00:05 | rotating, and this is called forward kinematics.
| | 00:08 | But there are times when you'll need
inverse kinematics, which will stick a bone
| | 00:13 | to an actual object or position in the scene.
| | 00:16 | This is particularly useful
in the feet of the character.
| | 00:19 | You want the feet to stay planted on
the ground, but you may want to move the
| | 00:23 | hips of the character or the rest of the
character around to position them above the feet.
| | 00:27 | So let's take a quick look at
how to set up inverse kinematics.
| | 00:31 | Now I have my character here, and I am
just going to put him into Wireframe mode
| | 00:35 | so we can kind of see what we're doing with him.
| | 00:38 | And I want to take the legs and put an
inverse-kinematics chain at the ankle so
| | 00:44 | that way I can keep the
feet planted on the ground.
| | 00:47 | So we are going to do
this by going into Pose mode.
| | 00:50 | Now we are going to do this by creating
an object to use as our end effector for
| | 00:58 | the inverse kinematics.
| | 01:00 | So I'm going to add in just an empty object.
| | 01:05 | And this is just an object that doesn't
render, and we can use this as our end
| | 01:09 | point of our IK chain.
| | 01:12 | Now I am going to go ahead and rename this.
| | 01:13 | We are going to call this IK_Right, so
it's the right side IK, so I am going to
| | 01:18 | move it under that ankle there.
| | 01:21 | And this is a little big, so I am just
going to go ahead and scale it down so
| | 01:24 | it's a little bit more
proportional to my character.
| | 01:28 | And I just want to make sure that it
is underneath that ankle or is close to
| | 01:32 | that ankle bone as I can make it.
| | 01:34 | So now once I have that placed, I can right-
click to select my armature and go into Pose mode.
| | 01:43 | Now what I want is I want this
bone here to point to this object.
| | 01:49 | And that way, when I move the
object, it will control the chain.
| | 01:53 | So we can create IK by using a constraint.
| | 01:57 | Bones in Pose mode have an additional
tab in their Properties panel, and that's
| | 02:02 | called Bone Constraints.
| | 02:04 | You will not see this in Edit mode. So if
I go into Edit mode, that disappears, so
| | 02:09 | we have to be in Pose mode. Select the
bone with a little chain on it and we hit
| | 02:14 | Add Constraint > inverse kinematics.
| | 02:17 | And now it's going to ask you for two things.
| | 02:20 | One is what is the Target?
| | 02:23 | And that's going to be IK_Right, and notice
how when I do this it snaps to that object.
| | 02:29 | The other one is called the Pole Target,
| | 02:32 | and that basically just
controls where the knee is pointed.
| | 02:36 | Because this character has such tiny,
little knees, we probably won't need
| | 02:40 | to worry about that.
| | 02:41 | Now once I have this in place, you
can see how a little line shows up.
| | 02:46 | And this basically controls the entire
chain. So I have my IK actually goes not
| | 02:52 | just from my ankle to my hip, but
actually to the center of the character.
| | 02:57 | So if I right-click on IK_Right, you
can see how when I move that, it's actually
| | 03:03 | moving this character at the hip,
which really is not what I want to do.
| | 03:06 | So I am going to go ahead and select this
bone, and make sure I'm still in Pose mode,
| | 03:11 | and then under the Bone panel, you
will see we have a rollout here for
| | 03:15 | Inverse Kinematics.
| | 03:17 | And what we can do is we can actually
just turn off inverse kinematics for this
| | 03:21 | bone, so I am just going to go ahead and
lock this down in all three directions,
| | 03:25 | and notice how that kind of
just goes right back into place.
| | 03:29 | And then when I move this bone, it
will just move these two bones rather
| | 03:34 | than the entire chain.
| | 03:36 | So this now allows me to
position and move the character.
| | 03:41 | So if I were to go back into Object
mode here, I can move my entire character
| | 03:48 | and his feet will still stick to those objects.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Controlling the hips and body| 00:00 | Once you have your IK handle set up, you
can now start to manipulate your character,
| | 00:06 | but often it's a good idea to add a
third control at the hips so that way you
| | 00:10 | have your classic three-
point control for your character.
| | 00:14 | So right now I have two little IK handles
here and those control the feet of the character.
| | 00:22 | But I really want to also
be able to control the hips.
| | 00:25 | Now right now I can select the armature
itself and go into Object mode and move
| | 00:30 | that, but that's kind of a little tedious.
| | 00:33 | I'd like to be able to just grab
another object in the scene rather than
| | 00:38 | going into that armature.
| | 00:39 | So I am going to turn this back to Pose
mode, and let's go into Wireframe here.
| | 00:44 | So what I want to do is add something
around the hips that I can grab so I
| | 00:47 | can move the character.
| | 00:49 | Probably the easiest thing to do is
just to add a curve called a circle.
| | 00:53 | We are often ready with circles here.
And just go ahead and move that up so that
| | 00:58 | it's somewhere around the hips.
| | 01:00 | In fact, if we want to we could snap, but it's
just along as it's close, we should be okay.
| | 01:06 | Once we have that in place,
let's go ahead and rename this Hips.
| | 01:11 | Then all I have to do is parent
my creature's armature to the hips.
| | 01:17 | So I am going to select a bone here.
| | 01:19 | I am going to go back into Object mode.
| | 01:22 | So that way I can select
the entire creature armature.
| | 01:25 | Then I am going to
Shift+Right-click on my circle.
| | 01:29 | Then all I have to do is parent. So I
can do Object > Parent > Set > Object, or
| | 01:35 | just take Ctrl+P, and I can set my parent.
| | 01:39 | Now once I have this, I have three
objects that I can use to control my character.
| | 01:45 | So when I move my circle, the body of
the character moves and when I select any
| | 01:51 | one of these IK handles, they can move as well.
| | 01:55 | So this gives us real good control
of the lower part of the character.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Animating in Pose mode| 00:00 | Now that we have our hips and our feet
in place and we have inverse kinematics
| | 00:05 | set up for the lower body,
| | 00:07 | we can also animate the upper body
using forward kinematics, in other
| | 00:11 | words using rotations.
| | 00:14 | Now if we wanted, we can continue to rig
the upper part of the character, but we
| | 00:18 | can't just animate in Pose mode, so to
keep things simple, this is how we will
| | 00:23 | animate this particular character.
| | 00:26 | Now my character still has a skeleton
on the inside and in order to animate, we
| | 00:32 | do need to be in Pose mode, so I am going to go
ahead and select my armature and go to Pose mode.
| | 00:37 | Now I want to be able to see my
character as I animate, so with my armature
| | 00:43 | selected, I am going to go over to my
Armature Properties panel. Let's go
| | 00:47 | ahead and turn on X-Ray, and this will show
the bones through the skin of the character.
| | 00:53 | But these octahedral bones are
pretty big, and you really can't see the
| | 00:57 | character through those, so we can
either set it to Stick, Bounding Box Bone,
| | 01:02 | Wire, any one of those.
| | 01:04 | I kind of like Stick because it's
substantial enough so I can select it, but not
| | 01:08 | so much that I can't see the character.
| | 01:11 | A lot of times you can also animate in Wire.
| | 01:14 | But let's go ahead and put it into Stick mode.
| | 01:16 | Now in order to actually animate a joint,
you just need to keep it in Pose mode
| | 01:22 | and then select that joint by
right-clicking and we can animate.
| | 01:26 | Now you do need to set keyframes on a
joint. So if I was to select this right
| | 01:32 | shoulder, all I have to do is
go ahead and hit I to set my key.
| | 01:38 | Then I can move the character forward
and then rotate that and again set a key
| | 01:45 | by hitting I. Now if I want, I can keep
Automatic Keyframing as well on and that
| | 01:52 | will go ahead and set keyframes for
everything. So if I were to rotate this, it
| | 01:58 | would set keyframes for everything.
| | 01:59 | So probably the easiest thing to do is
just keep Automatic Keyframing on and you
| | 02:04 | can see how I can animate my character.
| | 02:07 | So if I wanted to, I can move
forward to another frame, turn him,
| | 02:11 | and again I can just use this to
create a test animation if I want.
| | 02:15 | So as you can see, I can set
keyframes for everything, but when I set my
| | 02:21 | keyframes for my body motion, I needed to
make sure that I at least set a first keyframe.
| | 02:28 | So you want to make sure you set that
first keyframe and then go ahead and
| | 02:33 | set your remainders.
| | 02:34 | So as you can see, it's fairly
easy to animate in Pose mode.
| | 02:41 | So let's go ahead in the next
lesson and actually do a quick animation.
| | Collapse this transcript |
| Creating a test animation| 00:00 | Let's go ahead and set up this character in a
simple scene so that way we can animate him.
| | 00:06 | Now I already do have a camera in the
scene and if we want, we can just animate
| | 00:11 | to that camera. So if I hit numpad 0,
you can see that I have a camera set up,
| | 00:17 | and we can use that to animate to.
| | 00:19 | But I do want to have a couple
of viewports open so that way
| | 00:24 | I can see him from the top or the left view,
| | 00:27 | so I am going to go ahead
and rearrange my layout here.
| | 00:29 | I am going to left-click on the top
corner here, and I am just going to drag out
| | 00:33 | another window here, and we will just
make that a regular perspective window.
| | 00:38 | And then over here on the left side, I
am going to go to my top-right corner,
| | 00:42 | drag this down, and we can make
this into a top view by hitting 7.
| | 00:48 | So that way I have a couple of different
views into my scene and I can still use
| | 00:53 | my camera here in the bottom-left
corner to see exactly how the scene looks.
| | 00:59 | So let's go ahead and make this character take
one step into the scene and wave to the camera.
| | 01:03 | So we're going to start off
with our first, initial pose.
| | 01:07 | So we're going to go ahead
and start creating keyframes.
| | 01:10 | So I'm going to set my first pose here.
| | 01:14 | So I am going to go ahead and grab my
IK handle here, my IK_Right, move his
| | 01:20 | foot back just a little bit, and I do
want to go ahead and keep this open so I
| | 01:26 | can go ahead and start setting
keyframes for this particular node here.
| | 01:30 | I am going to ahead and grab the right
one and maybe put his foot forward just a
| | 01:34 | little bit. And again, I am going
to hit I just to set some keyframes.
| | 01:39 | And let's go ahead and just turn on
Automatic Keyframing so that way it just
| | 01:43 | goes more naturally here.
| | 01:45 | So I am going to go ahead and
turn on Automatic Keyframing.
| | 01:48 | And I'm going to rotate him
slightly away from the camera.
| | 01:52 | And then I'm going to take his arms, and
I'm going to go into Pose mode, and we're
| | 01:58 | going to start rotating his arms.
| | 02:02 | And I want to make sure I set I
just so that I have rotation keys for
| | 02:07 | these objects here.
| | 02:08 | So I am going to go ahead and also pick
my waist here and rotate that. And I want
| | 02:14 | to stay in Local mode here so I can
see exactly how I'm moving my character.
| | 02:19 | So now my character is kind of facing
away from me on the screen, kind of has
| | 02:24 | his side to the camera, and let's go
ahead and fix this arm here. Oops. So I
| | 02:32 | am going to go ahead and fix these arm so we
can get him into place here, and there we go.
| | 02:38 | Okay, so now I've got this basic pose, and
let's go ahead and make him step into the scene.
| | 02:45 | Now a step for a character really is
dependent upon how big the character is and
| | 02:50 | how slow or fast he is, but for this
character, I am just going to take it at a
| | 02:55 | 8-frame step. So we are starting at frame 1.
| | 02:57 | I am going to scrub the Timeline
forward to frame 9. And again I'm going to
| | 03:04 | make this character step here, so I am going to
grab his IK handle and we're going to move him.
| | 03:12 | So I am going to go ahead and just grab
in the top view, and I want to make sure
| | 03:16 | I get that leg somewhere around the other leg.
| | 03:20 | Now notice how this is kind of pointing towards
that, but we have to rotate the body to match.
| | 03:25 | So I am going to take this body and then
rotate that and maybe even move it just
| | 03:31 | a little bit so that it lines up.
| | 03:37 | So this is going to be my final
footstep pose, and you can see in camera view,
| | 03:41 | it's not quite right, but once I squinch
him over just a little bit, you can see
| | 03:46 | how I've got a better pose.
| | 03:48 | And again this is a pose from the
camera view. So he is a little forward on his
| | 03:52 | feet. Maybe I can move
him back just a little bit.
| | 03:55 | So once I get that, then I can
just go ahead and start scrubbing.
| | 03:58 | You can see how already
he's turning into the camera.
| | 04:03 | But this isn't really a step;
| | 04:05 | it's more of a foot-slide.
| | 04:07 | We need to actually lift his foot up
and also drop his weight a bit because as
| | 04:11 | he lifts up, he is going to have to
lean forward and do some other stuff.
| | 04:14 | So let's go ahead and start with the foot.
| | 04:16 | Let's go ahead and select this IK
handle and just lift up his foot.
| | 04:22 | So now he takes a real step, okay.
| | 04:26 | But as he takes a step, he's going to
drop down a little bit. Because of his
| | 04:31 | weight he is going to drop to
this side and maybe move over,
| | 04:35 | and he also may lean forward just a little bit.
| | 04:38 | So we can actually take that on his
spine and we can rotate his spine forward
| | 04:45 | just a little bit here.
| | 04:51 | So as you can see here in this viewport,
he is now kind of leaning into that
| | 04:57 | turn, and then we are going to go
ahead and straighten him back up.
| | 05:05 | So now you can see how he comes in and
then he just kind of looks at the camera.
| | 05:13 | So, very simple. In fact we can
probably give him a little bit more bounce in
| | 05:18 | his vertical direction here,
| | 05:20 | so what I am going to do is as he
comes up, I am going to bring him down
| | 05:25 | here, bring him up as he comes up,
like this, and then just kind of settle
| | 05:34 | him down into his pose.
| | 05:38 | So now you can see how he kind of settles in.
| | 05:42 | And then let's just go ahead and make him wave.
| | 05:45 | So going to lean him over, so I am
going to go ahead and move forward to, say,
| | 05:51 | about 22 or so. And so he is going to
wave with his right hand, so I want to
| | 06:01 | make him lean a little bit more to his right,
right-click on there, and bring that arm up.
| | 06:10 | Now that arm is coming up a little
too fast, so I am going to go ahead and
| | 06:17 | rotate it down at frame
14 and then bring that up.
| | 06:25 | And then just kind of bring it back
down again into a more natural pose here.
| | 06:37 | And then maybe even straighten
him up a little bit at the end.
| | 06:46 | Then there we go. Very simple.
| | 06:52 | Now if we want, we can also add facial
animation on top of this. So I am going to
| | 06:56 | go ahead and deselect my mesh here, and
let's go ahead and come out of Pose mode,
| | 07:03 | back in Object mode.
| | 07:04 | And I am going to open up
my creature and select him.
| | 07:09 | So I am going to make sure I turn on
selection here, make sure that's on, and
| | 07:14 | go ahead and select my creature, and then
go over to the panel that has the Shape Keys.
| | 07:21 | So, we can start off with his mouth
close and maybe have him do a little blink
| | 07:26 | and then open his mouth.
| | 07:29 | So we're going to go ahead and start here.
| | 07:31 | We are going to set a keyframe for Mouth
Close at value of 1. So we are going to
| | 07:37 | start him with his mouth closed, and
then as he comes up he is going to blink
| | 07:42 | when he comes down and then
his mouth is going to open.
| | 07:45 | So we are going to send another value
here at frame 14 and then as he waves, we
| | 07:51 | are going to go ahead and open his
mouth. So there we go. Very simple.
| | 07:58 | And we can also do the same thing for Blink.
| | 08:00 | So I can again hit I to set a keyframe
at the beginning for my blink. And then I
| | 08:06 | want him to start blinking as he turns,
| | 08:09 | so at frame 6 I am going to keep it at a
value of 0, frame 10 I'm going to blink
| | 08:17 | his eyes, and then at frame 16
I'm going to open them up.
| | 08:22 | So now he does kind of a blink as
he comes in and opens his mouth.
| | 08:28 | So let's do a quick playback.
As you can see, he's pretty animatable.
| | 08:33 | So now let's go ahead into
my armature of my character.
| | 08:37 | I am going to go ahead and select his
armature again, turn off X-Ray so we
| | 08:42 | don't have to see that,
| | 08:43 | and let's go into our camera view
and turn on Textured so we can actually
| | 08:48 | see him in place here.
| | 08:50 | So I am going to go ahead and expand
this so we can actually see this window a little
| | 08:54 | bit bigger, and let's go ahead
and just hit Play. So there he is.
| | 09:02 | He is pretty much animating,
and he looks pretty good.
| | 09:06 | And so as you can see,
rigging isn't rocket science.
| | 09:10 | It's just a bunch of little tools that you
can connect together to create a character rig.
| | 09:16 | And go ahead and continue to play with
this little character and build your own
| | 09:21 | and create your own creatures in Blender.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
ConclusionGoodbye| 00:01 | Well that's just about it for
Blender 2.6 Essential Training.
| | 00:05 | I am George Maestri for lynda.com,
and I hope you enjoyed the course.
| | 00:10 | So have fun with Blender and
make some really great images.
| | Collapse this transcript |
|
|
