7 important discoveries at the 2009 Blender Conference
Posted on 26. Oct, 2009 by Andrew Price in Articles
This years Blender Conference was one of the biggest ever. With over 200 attendees, 40 presenters, and topics ranging from 2.5 updates to protein expressions, there was a lot to take in.
Here are the 7 discoveries you cannot miss…
1. Surge in gaming development
From the announcement of the speaker lineup, it was obvious that change was in the air. A total of 11 gaming presentations were held, in comparison to last year’s one. No doubt thanks to the Apricot project, Blender is being looked at as a commercial game development platform.
Several announcements for commercial games were announced, including: Super Yum Yum, Thorworks, Pokme and Foreign Legion, as well as special discussions on iPhone development, digital puppetry and sensory controlled gaming.
2. Blender is being used in numerous real world applications
Another pleasant surprise was learning how many uses blender has outside of it’s pretty graphics. There were presentations on using blender for robot guided medical interventions, fire safety and smoke physics, protein expressions and improving road safety. All this has proved once again that the possibilities of Blender are limitless.
Using Blender to improve road and tunnel safety
3. Full time developer
Arguably the most exciting news was the announcement that Blender will be receiving some serious tender loving care in the form of a fulltime developer for 12 – 18months. The funding was received from an anonymous sponsor who needs the API sped up for business purposes. He proposed that hiring a developer full time might fix the issue. Not only does this greatly benefit the community, but it sends a strong statement about blender’s impact on commercial studios.
4. Frustration over lack of documentation
When Ton held a round table discussion on Blender education, I don’t think he expected the heated discussion that arose. Several beginners spoke up about the difficulties of trying to learn Blender from scratch, stating that at times it was impossible to learn some features due to missing documentation. At the 60 minute mark the discussion was far from finished and had be continued upstairs. Although a resolution didn’t seem to have been made, it was clear that the community needed to be more focused on the learning aspect if we want to encourage more users.
And on that note…
5. Enthusiastic users are scarying away the public
A special presentation by Tom Musgrove educated us on “How to be an effective Blender advocate”. His presentation covered common etiquette in the 3d industry, and how not to deter future users from Blender by being obnoxious.
Ouch.
Ouch.
The presentation was good advice for anyone in any field. It’s common knowledge that repulsive behaviour will drive anyone away. But a subtle reminder could be what the community needs right now.
6. Amazing entries at the Suzanne Awards
One of the more pleasant surprises was the quality of entries into the this years suzanne awards. I spoke with Ton after the screening who said “it was almost like being at a real film festival”. Couldn’t agree more. From the start of the 90 minute screening till the end, the audience was engrossed in the mixed stories and visuals each artist brought to the competition.
The festival was summed up nicely by an equally impressive award ceremony in which the winners were announced:
Best Character Animation: Dragosaurio
Best Design: Evolution
Best Short: Memory
7. Durian is going to be “epic”
Or should I say Sintel (the new title)
Colin Levy lived up to the high expectations of the community when he delivered a polished presentation of what we can expect in the third open source movie. Starting with a teaser trailer, he went over concepts, showed some storyboards, then handed the microphone over to the rest of the team to show off their current progress.
The results speak for themselves…
Concept artist David Revoy, talking about the proposed look for the main character.
Did I mention that all of this was completed in less than 3 weeks?
The finished result is looking very promising indeed.
If you never been to a blender conference before, I’d highly suggest attending the next one. It’s a brilliant opportunity to network with like-minded people and recieve feedback on new ideas and proposals. So what are you waiting for?
Shiretoko
26. Oct, 2009
I’ve been searching for someone who’s made a wrap-up of the conference, finally I found one
Thank you very very much!
B.Tolputt
26. Oct, 2009
OK, far from the echo chamber I thought the conference would be – the talk by Tom (overly enthusiastic advocates) and the learning curve / documentation discussion seem to be real issue being taken seriously.
Perhaps Ton is not aware or has cooled down from earlier years, but there was a time when he was quite the enthusiastic advocate as well… “Blender is for Blender users” comes to mind
Glad to see this trend is being addressed though!
Le@ndro
26. Oct, 2009
I know this will be some day in the Durian web page… but as the impatient person I am, I thank you VERY much!
Grate coverage!
felix
27. Oct, 2009
I’ve got to agree with Letterips presentation,
I’ve been relatively active in the cgtalk’s blender forum
mostly answering blender questions where I can,
and Ive noticed the a lot of the same points.
Akta
27. Oct, 2009
100% agreed with everything, especially on the impressive amount of talks about BGE (mine included
). This clearly shows how Blender is a 360 degrees tool compared to other commercial software such as Maya, 3DS, Houdini etc.
Daworm
27. Oct, 2009
Can I just say… This is awesome, as a newcomer to Blender the general wrap-up information is quite an eye-opener… I like that short animation sequence for the fight.
Looking forward to Duri… Sintel sorry.
fiammybe
27. Oct, 2009
A big part of the conference was also the dinner imo. It was nice to see Ton doing a ‘tour de table’.
What I noticed though, is that most game developers were still using another, proprietary engine (Unity3dD, Trinigy). Blender was used as modeling software, but the BGE still has some catching up to do.
James
27. Oct, 2009
Bad documentation my a- I mean heck theres essential blender, the blender wiki and loads for beginners on youtube
ton
27. Oct, 2009
“What’s makes it worse is that the presentation came at the request of Ton, who identified this problem in the ever growing community of perhaps too enthusiastic users.”
This is not true; the presentation was an initiative from Tom Musgrove himself. And although Tom’s remarks make a lot of sense, I’m not worried at all about bad PR or fanbois bashing other programs. I’m used to it, happens since beginning.
-Ton-
9
27. Oct, 2009
>proprietary engine (Unity3dD, Trinigy). Blender was used as >modeling software, but the BGE still has some catching up to >do.
BGE engine can’t be used commercially by indie team on platforms like iPhone, XBox Live etc due to the LGPL license – Unity, Trinigy, Shiva and others can – and even the open source Bullet and OGRE technologies – that is the problem with fairly limited / niche – but still cool – usage of BGE commercially.
Bastian
27. Oct, 2009
Let the bashing begin…
Its hard to be fair when enthusiasts from other software are bashing Blender because they are to stupid – here we begin
– to use it.
No seriously. Thanks for the insight
Blender is rocking the world!
Bastian
27. Oct, 2009
… im totally into game development.
For the BGE to be used its need to be decoupled from Blender/GPL and have cleared its license and sublicense issues.
And at its best, its needs a C/C++ interface.
Marcus
27. Oct, 2009
Documentation:
There is tons of high quality tutorials.
With Blendertips.com, the Blendernation Links project and Neal Hirsig, Blenderunderground, just to name a few, there were also made good attempts to offer tutorials in an organized way for beginners.
The only problem:
On blender.org, the button to “Education” is not very prominent. There should be a big ornage button “Beginner Tutorials”.
The Education button leads to a few tutorials, but they seem incomplete. Links to further education is missing.
The “Blender Documentation” link is BROKEN!
Well, there should be a list to the links mentioned above and the big button on the frontpage, that’s all. Shouldn’t be too much of work.
Tobin
27. Oct, 2009
suprised to see this on a mac
in regards to dealing with blenders PR, as a blender user who uses blender in graphic design ( and other stuff as a hobbyist) whenever i have dealt with another company requesting files i have always attached every format i think would be useful for the agency usually 3 to 4 formats depending on what they are using, but in asked for files in return i usually get “oh we use …. and you wont be able to open that with blender” but when i persist i get a file… but that is heartbreaking, i think alot of folk think blender is like a swift 3d or something along those lines.
Ignorance basically. If i was to suggest a way of changing this i would say heavily label durian ( made with blender opening credit that could be quite nice with clips from blender being used.. and get it into as many 3d forums, video hosting sites (with tags that are well thought out).
and possibly even make press packs… pdfs that people could print, a cd master to go with of the video and the current blender and get volunteers to mail it to companys in their area that would be interested, i mean i know it wouldn’t necessarly get them to switch, but it could spark interest and lead to more use… and definitely more knowledge about the software which i find to be the biggest obstacle. anyway i dont think it would do any harm and wouldnt be hugely difficult to set up
Tim, LA
27. Oct, 2009
I was not at the conference and I think even as user of other software it’s still difficult to learn Blender because many things aren’t logical!
In addition to that Point 4 and 5 scrare me to chance to Blender because I love my professional tutorials (beginners to professionals) and community (Maya)!!
Sorry guys, maybe in a few years!
Nixon
27. Oct, 2009
I don’t get why the whole blender advocate thing blew so big in first place. Some of the fanboi issues are up to discussion..and like Ton didn’t miss to state here and at blendernation it was not him who came up with that topic.
Don’t get me wrong I understand some of the critiques, tho I think its totally minor subject compared to technical aspects and the capabiities of blender in general.
I think of that fanboi discussion wich came up here as crap…somehow it feels like a shot into blenders legs….see the post above me (Tim,LA) and you’ll see that this will cause more negative criticism from outside than it will solve any abstract issues about some blender communities behavior ….
Anyway negative PR is PR aswell, and I’m far from believeing that blenders enthusiasts are as bad as Apple or other products fans wich will tend to oversize the things they like and downsize everything else. Its just the way things happen.
It sounds like better not be enthusiastic about anything or people won’t buy your story…( i wish the world is never going to be like this)!
So my 2cents : I dont like that this came up as one of the major subjects, its a strange topic anyway and the 4 statements, be nice, helpful, be knowledgeable and respectful are such generic statements that I felt like someones shoving chewed out morales into my head wich should be common sense for many people anyway .
But anyway great that u wrapped this up so nicely and hope you enjoyed your trip to amsterdam!
Keffertjuh
27. Oct, 2009
I’d like to just point out that the site, as Marcus has already stated, really needs an update…I do not consider myself a beginner anymore, but I do remember how my experience of working with Google (yeah, it exists XD) has helped me out more than looking for tutorials through the site…
Also, if you go through help – tutorials in the interface you end up on the site with some tutorials that I think are getting into it too fast….
I started out with the Blenderwiki…it took quite a while to finish, but at least I had the knowledge to use Blender by myself as I was done
(sorry if this was a vague comment…I sort of lost track of my point…:P)
Erwin Coumans
27. Oct, 2009
@Bastian: “For the BGE to be used its need to be decoupled from Blender/GPL and have cleared its license and sublicense issues.
And at its best, its needs a C/C++ interface.”
I’m working on the GameKit project, a .blend game player using purely BSD/MIT/Zlib style licenses. It runs on Windows, Linux, OSX and preliminary iPhone.
http://gamekit.googlecode.com and http://oolongengine.googlecode.com
xsinick
27. Oct, 2009
I agree with Ton.
There is a hostile air in some major blender forums.
It scares away anyone interested in the community.
Especial game developers who are having there samples cracked by prominent members of the forums.
Thomas Eldredge
27. Oct, 2009
Thanks for this article. I am taking the PR/enthusiasm issue very seriously and this a good and necessary discussion to have in the community. I am personally highly enthusiastic about Blender and this discussion has made me check myself and my activities to be sure they are in line with the vision and intent of the developers.
Regarding the ineffective advocacy practices I can agree on these points. The summing up (be nice, helpful, respectful, knowledgeable) is pretty much common sense for advocacy in general, though I would like to see a more comprehensive plan for effective advocacy practices. I have my own methods and I would like to solicit comment on how these are perceived by the developers and community.
First and foremost I try and present Blender as highly accessible, not just the fact that it is free, but the fact that it is cross-platform, can run with limited resources, and that its functionality can be extended both with its API, and by open-source development.
In general I do not compare Blender to other 3D packages, mostly because I learned 3D using Blender and have limited experience with any other package. Though I do explain that I feel especially grateful for Blender because without it I might not have had the resources to learn 3D in the first place.
My overall interest in Blender advocacy comes from the fact that through Blender I have gained a more solid understanding of mathematics, programming, and to a certain extent, physics. Early in my education I was hopelessly lost especially in understanding math. It wasn’t until I started learning Blender that I really started to understand the purpose of algebra, trig, and calculus (though calc is still really hard for me). Playing with ipo curves, setting up particle systems and force fields, playing with game dynamics, and writing simple scripts allowed me a more tactile learning environment in which math seemed not only necessary, but applicable and even fun.
My advocacy of Blender is mostly devoted to the idea that Blender is an educational tool that can be used to inspire and empower students not only in art, but in math, science, and technology. I also use Blender to create art for the sake of art, and I know it is ever becoming a more sophisticated tool for professional use, but my primary interest in Blender is in its potential benefit as an educational tool.
Of course this raises the question- how can we use Blender for education if one of the recognized problems is a lack of educational resources on how to use Blender? I don’t have a good answer for this except to say that I am teaching Blender at a local computer club, and the goal of my first class series is to assemble a group of high-school teachers to learn Blender, and then develop a ‘Blender for the Classroom’ curriculum that can be used to introduce students to math and physics concepts using Blender as a vehicle.
I should also add that I am from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, US, and here we have deep, long-standing problems with public education and this has in large part shaped my views on the educational utility of open-source in general and Blender specifically. I hope I haven’t gone off-topic here, but I am very wary of the possibility of scaring people away from Blender. I am openly passionate about Blender, but I want to be sure my passion isn’t reckless or counter-productive to my goals of using Blender to advance general education.
Oscar
27. Oct, 2009
Oh snap, I probably shouldn’t have missed that Blender Zealot talk…good to know for the future
See everyone next year!
Don
27. Oct, 2009
I am still newish to the Blender scene. I just think Blender is a wonderful program that has power, stability, and versatility. It’s great that all those who can, and that do, put so much effort into this “Orange Entity” Blender 3D. I’m not sure that as much personality and heart goes into the more main stream software out there. Blender has many tutorials in print and video and with many of the authors of these tutorials ask for suggestions for tutorials we would like to see. They also offer these tutorials for sale at very affordable prices. I have purchased a least 4 books on modeling, physics and animation. I know there are books on composting, architectural modeling that I’ve had my eye on.
I am very thankful for the hard work that goes into this wonderful work on so many levels that it enables me to express my thoughts and present them to those that wish to see them.
Best Regards, Don
PixelOz
27. Oct, 2009
It’s interesting to see some people still complain about the learning curve for Blender and yes there are issues there but this is one of the areas that will be affected a lot in the coming changes for the software in 2.5.
The changes that are going to happen to the Blender interface alone are a mayor thing and that’s the interface only, leave alone the many other big improvements that it will have in this version.
I believe that the changes that are being done to Blender in 2.5 could be a turning point for the software, and I mean that with all the criticism that Blender has in some things the truth of the matter is that it is a very useful piece of 3D software even in it’s current form and is one that is free and that why I’m an advocate of it, because by being such a capable software and being freely available it opens the door for many people to start in the world of 3D graphics .
One area for example in which the software can help is by giving the opportunity to younger people to start early in using and understanding 3D graphics and animation because younger people like teenagers and children may not be able in many instances to afford a good quality 3D software cause they may be years away from having a decent job that will allow them to afford such and that’s why I think that the interface changes can make a big impact there precisely because in children or younger people the ease of use of the software can be even a bigger issue than it is for adult beginners.
One thing that I think that the Blender community has to be careful with is in my opinion not to rush the release of the new version until the software is fairly well behaved because with the kind of changes they are talking about including so many changes to the base software code there is the possibility of Blender coming out with more bugs than normal and that is not good, people’s expectations for the new release have being raised pretty high and I think that it would be better that the program was released late than with too many bugs.
This is an important moment in the history of this software and I think that it can be an important moment in the history of open source software overall too because Blender is raising the bar for the quality and capability of open source 3D software and Blender is an important part of the Open Source software landscape just as The Gimp, Inkscape, Open Office and others are.
There have been a lot of expectations for the open source software concept and some software have fallen short of the mark but many software like Blender, the ones mentioned above and others are starting to show that open source software can be quite capable of producing some serious results, of doing some serious work and that they are real programs that people can really use to do some of the things that they want to do so please Blender people don’t goof now, better a little late with a solid Blender release than too early with a program full of problems.
There is a lot that can be done with software such as Blender and other open source software. So overall keep up the good work but take it a bit easy, best of wishes to the Blender project.
Baptiste
27. Oct, 2009
Hey Andrew
Thanks for this short on the conference. For me it was fun to meet the people behind the names and pics, and I found out that everyone was very open, and collaborative. The community is great. On the topic of education, there is a steep curve to starting blender, and some people get lost alot, so some consideration has to be taken, especially with 2.5 coming up.
Andrew, it was nice meeting you, and thanks for making the hangar and airstrip
.
PS: math and blender do fuse
, 360/5 = 72° 
, and spin 
.
Cya
Rev. Stump
27. Oct, 2009
“5. Enthusiastic users are scarying away the public”
Can I still wear my Blender t-shirt to Services?
Rev. Stump
B.Tolputt
27. Oct, 2009
Well, Ton’s distancing of Tom’s talk is not very surprising but is disappointing.
Ton is very much the figurehead of Blender development. People closely watching the development know there are others just as capable &/or just as useful to the project, but Ton is the one people get to see. It would appear that he has chosen the “Theo de Raat” style of community management over the “Linus Torvalds” style.
I much prefer the inclusive view the Tom/LetterRip espouses over the “Blender is for Blender users” with the implied “…and the rest of you can bugger off“. It’s quotes like that which encourage the forum trolls.
Erwin Coumans
27. Oct, 2009
>For the BGE to be used its need to be decoupled from >Blender/GPL and have cleared its license and sublicense >issues.
>And at its best, its needs a C/C++ interface.
For this, I started the GameKit project: it uses only BSD/MIT/Zlib style licenses, and it can directly read .blend files. See gamekit.googlecode.com
camino1961
27. Oct, 2009
I am and continue to be excited about the future of Blender.
I hope the conference comes to New York City someday.
Keep up the great work. The Blender community is the best!
camino1961.com
Ron McDowell
27. Oct, 2009
Wow… best news was Ton’s wonderful guidence on etiquette as artists. He hit on all the trouble spots that have curled my skin when I hear people ranting, bragging or just… fooling with a good thing.
As artist, we need a strong belief in persona… no doubt about that and acceptable. Doesn’t mean you don’t learn some things from almost anyone around you. Always felt it best not to “weigh” what I think of someone’s comments, work or whatever… in my attitude of the world, since it keeps me tuned understanding mindsets and environments.
Blender has alowed, in it’s development, to break the digital mold of… automated techniques giving intuitive personal control and I like that about Blender.
Okay… now I am going overboard too. I use other 3d as well and try to spread word of Blender to anyone with interest in 3d.
Thanks Ton and everyone in the loop making Blender a reality,
ron
Andrew Price
27. Oct, 2009
@Ton
My mistake, I spoke with Tom Musgrove before the doors opened on friday and he mentioned that you wanted him to fill a spare slot with an advocacy speech. I guess I jumped to conclusions. I have corrected the article
@Baptiste
It was a pleasure meeting you too! I will be sure to use your mathematical approach to arrays in the future. Thanks again for the tip
@B.Tolputt
I don’t think Ton implied this at all. He was merely pointing out that it wasn’t his idea.
Joel
27. Oct, 2009
The documentations seems adequate to me. There is a ton of information, some does need to be cleaned up, updated and removed though.
I remember my frustration at Blenders learning curve in the beginning and the amount of stuff to learn. I don’t think this can be eliminated though. It is a complex program that can do complex things.
Ron McDowell
27. Oct, 2009
Newbie start-up, in my opinion, is mostly about direction. Straight forward simple stuff to get the bug going and then links to the most current more advanced moves.
I agree, there is lots of info out there. Still remember my learning curve and lots has improved since my start… oh yes! Weeks and months pushing myself… step by step. New people need to understand that about any thing 3d. Been there with other 3d too.
B.Tolputt
27. Oct, 2009
This is the quote I framed my above disappointment on. When the figurehead developer of an open-source project says the above, it just gives the fanboi trolls the support they need to continue the behaviour.
Ton is a smart guy, he could have stated it was Tom’s idea alone without adding the above quote. That he actually continued on after the clarification strongly implies he either agrees with the behaviours or at least has no desire to see it stopped (unlike Tom).
Nixon
27. Oct, 2009
Maybe he just tries to be realistic …somehow the whole struggle is some sort of software poitics driven issue.
I think Ton is aware of both sides. Rude blenderheads aswell as marketing teams wich roam the net with the same interest for promoting commercial products.
I think he’s proud of what the blender community grew to and doesn’t see the urge to condition anyones behavior or stand in for anyone who might got things wrong.
After al times could be worse ( and i bet they been) and we are all grown ups!
ccherrett
27. Oct, 2009
B.Tolputt
Shocking you would now be telling Ton how to behave.
Possibly he has taken more blender bashing hate than anyone?
Bastian
28. Oct, 2009
Erwin Coumans: “For this, I started the GameKit project: it uses only BSD/MIT/Zlib style licenses, and it can directly read .blend files. See gamekit.googlecode.com”
Wow, nice i’ll see you there
Wray Bowling
28. Oct, 2009
Dear Andrew,
I enjoyed meeting you, and everyone else! I’m biased on this but after I gave my talk on digital puppets, I heard a lot of chatter going on about midi and osc and 3d controller support and so on and so forth. I did a lot of jumping in to groups of people and asking “what are you all talking about” and was surprised that they were talking about… me!
I’m happy to report two things:
1. right clicking on a button to go to the documentation HAPPENED as of a day ago. I’m so glad I was sitting in that room for the debate. Beautiful.
2. I got a *two* coders on board for OSC implementation. They think it will take about a week. I’m drawing up the plans riiiight now.
Steven Jenkins
28. Oct, 2009
I thought Blender 2.5 was supposed to be released during this conference. How much longer?
Michael A. Beaver
28. Oct, 2009
I am quite disappointed that I didn’t attend this conference. Let me first state that I have been doing hardware 3d graphics development for over 20 years for Intel, Sun and Chips and Technologies. My hardware is in the ATOM n/z series. I am not an 3d artist or a mathematician.
This forum sparked 5 comments:
@Thomas Eldridge
Blender for Educators is a great idea. I would even support it with donations … as I have with other Blender donations in the past
@Developers
It would be very constructive if the research basis of their development and design decisions was more transparent. Could people publish references (e.g. GPU Gems, Game Programing Gems, etc)
@Tom Musgrove
It appears to me that we are now at a point with this software product that we need to be civil within our forums and we need to address problems in a more academic rather than emotional manner.
@Training
IMHO, training needs to be broken into 3 parts: for artists, for non-artists (me) and for developers/python experts/BGE
@Development schedule
I agree with the last post from Mr. Jenkins. I have no idea what is in Blender 2.5 Alpha1. This make me useless as a tester and more useless as a user. In particular I have about 5 BGE tests which do not work and no idea what needs to be modified between 2.5 and 2.49b.
Michael A. Beaver
28. Oct, 2009
OOPS one more comment: I worked on SONY CELL chip for SONY/Transmeta/IBM/Toshiba and the RT ray tracer software published by IBM using the YellowDog Linux implementation.
Nixon
29. Oct, 2009
@ Michael A. Beaver…-development schedule
If you want to get more info on the upcoming release of blender 2.5 i’d propose to take a look into the ’somewhat’ stable builds at graphicall.org . But for BGE tests i think there is still lots of things to be ported over for 2.5, I’m no expert but i think the game engine in 2.5 is still far from being reliable:/…
Concerning the general changes and new features I found the blender2.5 tours released by michael b. fox (mfoxdogg) very informative.
He has a blog at
http://blenderlabrat.blogspot.com/
where he’s constantly going thru features that been modified or added lately.
Concerning certain features I guess one has to contact the certain devs via the development blog or blender.org since the development seems to be quite compartmentalized.
Best regards
michael a. beaver
29. Oct, 2009
Thanks I’ve seen all oc the 9 tuts from mfoxdogg. This not what I need. If BGE (30 % complete/ pick a metric/) then I will hold off with submitting GLSL and BGE bugs.
I really want the devs to publish their back ground credentials and references for all design changes which are proposed. This is a major frustration with the development of this tool. We already seeing anonymous users hiring full time devs under their control to make a section of this tool viable for their particular application of blender.
XSI, Maya and Max do this with specific plugins or with external vendors creating significant extentions (e.g. XSI facial animation and lipsync system)
Case in point is the fiasco which surrounds GI/Volumetrics and Realtime raytracing. The research perfromed by the devs was less than transparent as well as the design tradoffs, project plan and development schedule. As a CELL developer I am well aware of the compute power necessary to realize this feature. I can do it with 3 PS3 machines acting in concert. Gettiing the 3d viewport to access this system seems to be less that trivial.
Aussiedude
12. Dec, 2009
I think this is absolutely spot on about the documentation and the advice for Blender users for when talking to users of other software. Best not to come out with, “I use Blender! Because it’s better than every other program, and here is why..”. It’s better to just say, “I use Blender, and I prefer it for these reasons..”. You wouldn’t hear a Maya user trying to explain to a 3ds Max user why Maya is better. And in truth, none of the 3 programs are better than each other really. They all have their good points and bad points, and they would appeal to various different people, depending on their individual needs.
Also, the documentation DEFINITELY needs work! I would absolutely love to see an easy to use documentation site for blender that organises for easy searching every component of the program, and a short example of how to use it. Combined with a few simple tutorials on how to do larger projects, and a beginner tutorial on how to use the interface.
There is ofcourse lots of tutorials out there for people to read, but they are all over the place and many of them are out of date because of how frequently the program is updated.
Though, documentation for new users and the interface, and how Blender users conduct themselves around other users of different programs *should* always be a serious issue. Because these 3 main issues really determine the adoption rate of Blender3D. The more friendly the userbase is, the simpler the interface is, and the clearer the documentation is, the more users that Blender will get.
So we should be always trying to improve on those 3 areas shouldn’t we?
Luis Chávez Hita
12. Feb, 2010
Hi,
I’d like to say that I translated to Spanish the point number 5 because I think is important to get more blender artists and grow up our community.
Also, I added my comments but they’re in Spanish too. I hope this help for non-english speakers.
http://con100.blogspot.com/2009/10/practicas-comunes-de-una-defensa-in.html