Blender Mini Manual

Blender Mini-Manual
Pdf byJoeri Kassenaar at http://blender.excellentWhale.com/

Blender Mini-Manual
Welcome to Version 1.5 of the online ‘quick-n-dirty’ Blender Manual in pdf format. This document contains information and instructions to get you on your way with Blender - the 3d modeling/rendering/animation software from the blender foundation. This online manual is an extract from thefirst chapters of the printed Blender Manual

Contents Introduction
Data Blocks The Blender data structure Blender Screens

Basic editing
Selecting Transformations Modeling Materials Files

Getting started with 3D
3D view manipulation Adding Objects Mesh editing Rendering

Download blender: http://www.blender3d.org/Download/ Blender Official Homepage - http://www.blender3d.org BlenderProgrammers Homepage - http://www.blender.org Initial HTML code and design provided by: Chris Frost and Tommy-Carlos Williams Pdf by: Joeri Kassenaar at http://blender.excellentWhale.com/

Introduction
The Object Oriented System Blender has a strictly object-oriented structure. Every aspect of the 3D world has been organized in small data blocks. By linking these together, making copies and editingor re-using them, you can build complex environments with a minimum of memory usage.

The main data blocks
Scene This is the ‘canvas’ of the 3D world. It contains the specific rendering information (camera, image resolution) and the links to Objects. Different Scenes can use the same Objects. Scenes can also be linked together to function as a (film) set. World This block contains sky, stars,exposure, and other environment variables. Object The basic 3D information block. This contains a position, rotation, size and transformation matrices. It can be linked to other Objects for hierarchies or deformation. Objects can be ‘empty’ (just an axis) or have a link to ObData, the actual 3D information: Mesh, Curve, Lattice, Lamp, etc. Objects can be linked to animation curves (Ipo) andMaterials as well. Mesh This is the triangles and quads mesh data. It contains vertices, faces, and normals. It can have a keyframe block for morphing. It can be linked to Materials. Curve Data to be used as Text, Bezier or BSplines and 3D Nurbs Surfaces. It also has a keyframe structure and can be linked to Materials. Material This data block contains visual properties such as colours, reflectivity andtransparency. It can be linked to eight different Texture blocks. Texture Use images, procedural formulas or plugins to define textures. Can be linked to Material, Lamp and World blocks. Lamp Data to be used for light information, as colours and shadow settings. Can be linked to Texture blocks as well. Ipo This is the main animation curve system. Ipo blocks can be used by Objects (for movement),but also by Materials for animated colours.

Introduction Data structure example
This Blender screen dump shows a simple Scene. There are three windows in this Screen example: • The large window is the 3DWindow. • The square ‘diagram window’ is called the OopsWindow in Blender. It displays the current blocks structure. • The third window displays the rendered image of this Scene. There arefour Objects in the 3Dwindow: a Camera, a Mesh plane, a Surface donut and a Lamp spotlight. All of these Objects have been created, modeled and positioned using the 3DWindow. Normally, selection in Blender only works on the Objects. Thus, in this example, only four different selections can be made. When you select an Object, the Blender interface immediately visualizes access to the entire structurethat has been linked with the Object. Therefore, it’s very important to always keep in mind that an Object is only the ‘bearer’ of a linked structure, a collection of blocks containing information about the actual 3D shape, the rendering properties or animation curves.

This structure is visualized in the OopsWindow. At the bottom is the Scene, named ‘1’. The Scene has links to the four...