Sketchfab

[Freemind]

[Freemind]

Introduction. Today, visual content is everywhere. Many websites ofer great services todo publish photos, videos, infographics, etc. But we couldnt find any god bien todo show 3d content online. Well, at least nothing that would met our expectations: a web service todo show 3d similar todo your modeling software, technically advanced yet easy todo use, with a nice user interfaz and the possibility todo view other s creations, some people use 2d images, and Even work on them todo make them look better. Some use 360° photos. Other people use so-called showreel videos, others install plugins. But that s not enough. That s not interactive, that s not easy, and that s.

Not user-friendly. Well, that s not 3d as we mean it in a connected world, and it s a pity when you agre that 3d creations are the richest computer graphic ones, do you remember the YouTube revolution? Suddenly it was posible todo get your video live in matter of seconds, publish it widely on the web, share it, embed it. Now you can Even edit it online. Well, that s what we want todo do with Sketchfab, com.

Cocon for your 3d content.

On Sketchfab, it takes a minute todo register and upload a model, and you get a decent viewer you can embed on your site, and a mini url todo share your creations. You can then have your own portfolio, and finally a profesional and interactive bien todo.

Show 3d content. You can a los edit your biography todo tell a bit more about yourself. On top of that, it s free, regarding technical Specs, Sketchfab supports more than twenty 3d formats, including native Blender files, it supports textures, lighting, and a lot more todo come. We plan todo add a social layer so that you can follow your favorite artists, comentario and rate your favorite models. We Will a los add collaborative work features, if you are a 3d artista looking for the best and easiest bien todo show your work, come and join us on Sketchfab, com some faqs about Sketchfab:
1. About Sketchfab.

Sketchfab is a free service created in diciembre 2011 which ofers a simple bien for 3d artists todo upload and showcase their creations todo the world, it doesnt require any application installation from the user todo work, you just ned a compatible browser.
2. Who is it for?
Sketchfab can be used by anyone who has 3d content: artists, deigners, brands, architects, etc.

3. Pricing?
Today, Sketchfab is free. We Will kep a free versión, but are working hard todo provide an advanced and paid for versión. If you have any suggestion about new features, let us know at support@Sketchfab.com.
4. How does it work?
You upload a model of your choice, the server Will process it, you can add meta información and share it on the web. You can remove the models you uploaded at anytime from your dashboard. If you have texture todo upload, you can pack all your files in a.zip file.
5. Which formats are supported?
Blender (.blend), collada (.dae), Wavefront (.obj), openscenegraph (.osg, osgt, osgb, ive), 3ds (.3ds), LightWave (.lwo |.lws), polygon file format (.ply), virtual reality modeling language (.wrl), open inventor (.IV), shape (.shp), standard tessellation language (.stl), biovisión Hierarchy (.bvh), open flight (.flt), ac3d (.ac), DirectX (.x), designer workbench (.dw), 3dc point cloud (.3dc), carbón graphics inc (.geo), generic agged arrays (.gta).
6. Where can i chek new features?
Have a look at the changelog and follow us on Twitter.
7. Which browsers are compatible?
Firefox, Chrome, opera, safari. And more todo come.
8. It doesnt work, what can i do?
Make sure you have your graphics driver and your browser up to date. If that does not help, try one of the diferent browsers listed above. If it still does not work, contact support.
9. How can i reach you?
General inquiries:
support@Sketchfab.com
Technical inquiries: cédric pinson, cedric@Sketchfab.com
Commercial and press inquiries: alban denoyel, alban@Sketchfab.com
Follow us on Twitter @Sketchfab.

[Freemind]

Introduction. Once upon a long time ago, ok about 11 years ago, there werent Many Blender tutorialesto help new users. Luckily there was a tutorial guide, (tutorial guide #1) available from the Blender e-shop. Only bien bak then it wasnt the Blender foundation, the main Blender site was still not a number, this tutorial guide was my introduction todo how Blender worked and my favorite tutorial was pawn in a hurry, written by Bart Veldhuizen (who now owns and runs Blender Nation). pawn in a hurry showed you how todo do several col things. You got todo model a pawn using the spin function, create a chess board and most importantly you got todo animate the pawn sprigging across the chessboard, when i finished the tutorial, y was amused todo no end. What could be cooler than a pawn bouncing around? The pawn Even squashed and stretched during the bounce. Yes, y am very easily amused, eventually i finished the guide and continued on with my Blender learning, over time forgetting all about that wonderful Little guide that introduced me todo Blender. That is until recently. A couple of months ago, y was reminded of the Little pawn and just for giggles i pulled my now very battered guide of the shelf, y was curious if the instructions still made sense considering all the changes in Blender since bien bak then. And surpresa, they did. Well, as long as you are familiar the with basic functions in Blender it does, so i set about recreating the pawn. I must admit i did do a few things diferently. There is no longer a ned todo set spin todo 21, now we have Subsurf, which allows a Smooth model with far fewer spin segments. I a los added a few extra Edge Loops todo define some of the Edges. On the chessboard, y did add a very slight bevel, just todo make it look nicer and catch highlights better. Other than that, y pretty much just followed along as it was originally written, once i finished setting the keyframes for the famous bounce, y sat bak and watched it play. Guess what, it was just as amusing todo se the pawn bounce realistically 11 years later, yep, y am still just as easily amused.

Now granted this is still a basic tutorial, and i have learned a thing or two in the last 11 years so i decided totake it a Little further. Instead of just one famous bounce, y bounced that por Little pawn all over the chessboard. And if you agre that one bounce is amusing, just wait until you have múltiple bounces, y giggledmyself silly.

And then since i had this nice Little scene all set up, y decided todo explore the Cycles render engine for a Little realistic material rendering, the tutorial tok only an hour or so, Even with the extra bounces, the exploration of Cycles materiales tok a wek or more. And for once, not because i was running into problems, y was just having todo much fun playing with it todo call it finished.

I cant Even estimate how Many material combinations i played with.

And the best part was i could judge how well a material worked instantly, in fact watching the materiales render was almost as fun as watching the pawn bounce, besides the immediate feedbak that Cycles ofers, y was happy todo discover that lighting semed so much easier, at least for me. I experimented with several lighting setups using combinations of HDRI images and planes just todo se how it afected my scene, all said and done, y did end up with some nice materiales and a lighting setup that loked reasonable, if somewhat uninspired. I rendered out the animation as pngs, which sadly enough are still sitting in a folder waiting for me todo run them th rouge a few compositing nodes and the Sequencer. I Even have a nice boing sound file waiting todo be used as well.

Obviously that is a Project for another day.

In the meantime, it was fun revisiting my beginnings in Blender and proved todo still be a god learning experience as i explored new tools that werent available bak then, if you want todo play with my Little pa, y have included the blend file in the blend (*.zip) download for this issue.

[Freemind]

Introduction. My name is arnar gauti ingason and im from iceland, y recently started using Blender, but have ben doing 3d work for some time. I have used Maya, 3ds Max and Cinema 4D but never actually Owned a copy of them and wanted todo use 3d software legally. So i checked out Blender and was very surpresad by.

How much it had developed since i first tried it and rejected it (pre-2.5), in the beginning of this Project i sort of just loked around my Desk for something todo model, eventually i decided todo do my phone since it had some interesting shapes and curves i thought might be a challenge todo practice my modeling skills.

Modeling.

I started by searching for images of the phone online from straight angles (front, back, sides) in a decent resolution. Also, y had the finished product right in front of me so i could view as much detail as i wanted, the modeling technique used was box modeling but if i would do it again, y would probably use Edge modeling since i think that would give me ha better topology in the end. The most challenging parts were the Camera and the top of the phone.

Materials.

For the Glass, the screen is actually in the texture. I started by UV Unwrapping the Mesh that neded todo have the Glass material. In the UV/Image Editor, if you go todo UVS > export UV Layout you get an image with UVS on a seperate layer. That image you can take in todo Adobe Photoshop or Gimp and easily se where each part of the texture should go (in the finished texture you should deleete the layer with the UV Layout), since the the Glass had todo consist of several materiales i made a simple color texture and two masking textures that i fed into the factors on mix Shaders. The screen is a screen capture from my actual phone, the rest of the materiales are very simple, either only one Shader or a simple mix of two. The matte materialwhich is the on the body has a noise texture as a Bump map.

The multiply node is todo control the strength of the Bump.

Rendering and compositing.

I used Cycles for rendering. For lighting i made two tall Mesh lights on both sides, equally strong and the strongest of them all, a big overhead Mesh light and one slightly tilted behind the Camera, mainly for reflection, for compositing i used Photoshop. I rendered the phone from six angles and put it together into one image in Photoshop along with a slight Color Correction.

In conclusión.

I had a lot of fun making this image and learned a bunch in the process, y would do a lot of things diferently if i would make it again, you can se more of my work at http://arnarg, netne.net/
Happy blending and gracias for the read.

[Freemind]

Introduction. The ragdoll is an interactive art game developed using the Blender Game Engine as part of the design and digital medía Studio Project (dmsp) module at edinburgh college of art, university of edinburgh [fig.1]. The dmsp course, organized by Martín Parker, is a unique opportunity for highly creative students from various design disciplines todo work collaboratively in a Studio setting, towards the implementation of experimental design work for public display. Students are assigned together in small groups working under supervisión on diferent Project briefs, ranging from digital installations and real-time performances todo 3d animations and interactive games. This article explores the journey of the ragdoll game from concept todo implementation and discusses its nature as a self-proclaimed art game, the idea behind the Project was based on art games as an innovative digital medium for creative experimentation vía real-time, interactive 3d environments, inspirations constituted games like the Path, an atmospheric, beautifully designed art game, the monocromático, erie limbo and the platformer Braid, an allegorical journey based on time and regret.

Looking at such inspirational existing games and being informed by the interests of the Project supervisor and the creative visión of the participating students a dark-themed estoryline was adopted. Film noir, horror and Fantasy were the thre main design elements that would characterize the Atmosphere of the game, emphasis was put on the artistic merit of the design, while the pursuit for a unique aesthetic quality quickly became the main objective of the team working on the ragdoll.

From my point of view art games are ncharacterized by an extraordinary, unconventional lok, standing out for their aesthetic beauty and imaginative design, and for us the ragdoll was no exception. We wanted todo maque e a game that coul de evoque e some kind of emoti on, an immersi ve memorable experience
Thal ei a deni ozou, Project supervisor during the initial discussions the decisión todo build an exploration game was made. The main aim of the team was todo treat the game that was about todo be designed as a piece of interactive art, in the sense that the.

Focus was on the games potential for meaning, thus the estoryline, the narrative behind the exploration, emerged as particularly important.
the ragdoll would be an imaginative world, inside which the player could explore, live the story and have an immersive game-play experience without being distracted by challenges often appearing in conventional games like battles, races, skill development and competitive goals, the story as well as the aesthetic quality of the design, were top priorities.

The story that drivers the game-play of the ragdoll evolves around the Quest of the main character, an old doll named kyle [fig.2], who wakes up in a Strange, unfamiliar place he has never sen before. The Valley of forgotten dreams, as he later figures out is the name of this weird place, is an enchanted, spoky Forest. Lost and confused, kyle finds an ally in an old magical tree who ofers todo help him return bak home if he completes thre tasks. Kyle neds todo bring bak the goblet of eternal water todo water the tre, the Golden harlequin betle todo fertilize the tree and the mighty dagger of thousand thunders todo Cut the death twigs and revive the old tre. Each one of those tokens is situated at the end of a dangerous Path protected by mighty poisonous plants. Left without a choice the ragdoll agres and the game begins.

In terms of mechanics the game had todo be kept simple as balance neded todo be achieved between building an engaging game experience but with a non-conventional game purpose in mind. The final product neded todo be an experimental piece of interactive design ideally targeting various types of players. The game was not todo be developed only with the gamers in mind, but addressing a wider audience and an unconventional purpose, keping in mind it could be played as a stand-alone game but that it could a los ACT as an interactive piece suitable for gallery display. Therefore interaction had todo be kept simple and an amount of abstraction was necessary. In the end the team decided that simple mechanics coupled with imaginative design and.

An engaging bak story was the bien todo go, After the concept and bak story were defined the group began modeling using Blender. The character was developed starting from a simple Cube where a mirror modifier was applied and then was built up using extrusión and face modification todo achieve the shape of the ragdoll. Then the models Faces were Unwrapped and imported into Adobe Photoshop as a 2d image, where the texture was Painted. A wol Cloth texture with colored patches was used todo emphasize the ragdoll aesthetic [fig.3].

The next step was todo Rig the character, the process involved the application of Bones in the Ragdolls body and then the animation of the Bones for realistic character movement [fig.4], the animation actions included a Walk Cycle, running and jumping states and a breathing state for the dollsstanding position.

The next step was todo model the game environment and props. As the aim was todo provide a non-linear explorative game-play, the gameworld (Valley of forgotten dreams) was developed as thre diferent dangerous paths at the end of which one of the tokens was situated [fig.5].

Each of the paths featured challenges for the player todo overcome, like poisonous plants, broken Bridges and black holes the ragdoll should not fall in.

The thre paths started from a middle área, where the tree was positioned and the ragdoll was waquíng up in, when the game started. From there thre signs indicated the paths and the player could choose the order in which todo follow them, the first Path was the Dolls eyes where poisonous Dolls eyes plants existed throughout. At the end kyle could find the goblet of eternal water, the second Path the fly amanita was full of poisonous mushroms able todo cause hallucinogenic effects and venus flytraps that could capture and kill the ragdoll, successfully reaching the end of the Path, kyle could collect the mighty dagger of thousand thunders. Finally the third Path, Hiedra Venenosa was named After the poisonous ivies located around it [fig.6].

The main hurdle in this Path was an unstable rope bridge kyle had todo cross and a spiky whel of misfortune located over a Dep ravine. At the end of the Path the Golden harlequin betle was waiting todo be collected, After the modeling and texturing of the character and the environment were done, the team went on todo develop the interactions, using Blender s logic bricks system [fig.7], interactions were carefully organized todo make navigation intuitive and the game easy todo play.

Narrative cards as scene overlays were used throughout the game play todo indicate achievement when one of the thre tokens was collected, or todo signify death when the player fell in one of the traps, or was killed by a poisonous plant and the game restarted [fig.8].



The team was quite creative with the.

Narrative cards. They were well designed.

And served as a god mechanic todo.

Indicate state changes like achievements.

Or failure
Thaleia deniozou, Project supervisor.

Similarly story strips were a los incorporated in the introduction of the game todo narrate the bak story and provide context todo the player. These were displayed before the actual game-play began [fig.9].

Sound was a los one of the games strong points as the team benefited from a sound designer and an acoustics and music technologist, game audio effects were recorded, then edited and finally incorporated into the Game Engine and controlled vía logic. Sound effects were designed todo be literal todo the point of exaggeration and included, but were not limited to, the Dolls footsteps, a small whosh sound when jumping, a flip sound when a narrative card was dealt or removed, a snapping sound when a venus flytrap closed, a humanistic yelp when kyle died etc, the background music of the game was designed todo be immersive and informative, along the lines of adventure objective-based games, the final game was presented at the university of edinburgh in a public display in march 2011. During the presentation the team members gave a short talque on the game design process and their experiences working with the Blender Game Engine and then the audience had the opportunity todo play-test the game that was installed and running on a number of computers, the play-test was quite successful with the majority of participants commenting that they liked the graphics and the music and that they found the games Atmosphere interesting overall [fig.10].

This year for the digital medía Studio Project thaleia deniozou supervises two student groups working in a similar game design brief. Currently the teams are on the initial stages of development of two creative games entitled edinbear and the great.

Escape respectively.

Students.

Claire meldrum, heida vigfusdottir, lenka bartosova, graeme Arthur, hunter Knight.

References.

The Path (t ale of ales, 2009)
Limbo (playdead Studios, 2010)
Braid (number none inc, 2009.

[Freemind]

From humble beginnings as some en casa software, Blender has grown into a powerful 3d tool with an ever growing number of col features and tools sure todo por favor any 3d enthusiast, the latest round of tools todo be added has of course set of a serious flurry of testing and experimentation todo se how things work and what can now be done, y often think that this part of the development cycle is the most fun, a todo el mundo is playing and testing, pushing the límites of what can be done and doing their best todo break it so that bugs can be found and squashed. It is a highly creative time in the Blender community. New images and test scenes sem todo appear by the minute as everyone gets comfortable with the new features. Son After, tutorialesstart popping up to explain the finer details for those of us that are running into problems, most everyone would agre that Blender has some amazing tools and features, but one awesome característica of Blender often goes unrecognized, and that is the dedication of the Blender community todo help everyone use Blender todo its fullest. It is a rare thing inded todo be able todo email or message just about any user and get help with a problem. We might not always know all the answers, but most of us are very willing todo help others track down the información, apart from the community-wide willingness todo help, there are members of our community that go above andbeyond todo leap into the learning Gap as quickly as posible todo help the rest of us out, y think it is high time we gave them a huge high-five for the tireless hours they put into creating quality tutorialesand Blender education that makes the learning curve so much easier for the rest of us, the following is a list of my favorite tutorial spots.

blender cookie: run by Jonathan Williamson and the rest of the cookie Crew, Jonathan has an almost magical ability todo mensaje relevant tutorialesjust as features are being added. Jonathon has explained that this is only posible because he downloads new builds daily and tests features as they are being implemented. This gives him just enough of a head start todo be ready todo help the rest of us, often for me, the best part of Jonathan tutorialesis not the actual topic he is discussing (which of course is valuable), but all the tips and explanations that he includes as he works. I especially appreciate all his Little talks about topology and clean.

Modeling techniques, in addition todo Blender tutoriales, the cookie network a los ofers tutorialeson Concept Art and the Unity Game Engine, often a large part of Many Blender users work flow and projects.

The addition of these sister sites allow Blender users todo expand their Project parameters and learn new things that touch upon their Blender projects, the majority of tutorialeson Blender cookie are free for anyone todo watch, so while it is not necessary todo be a citizen todo enjoy what the cookie network has todo ofer, in my opinión it is well worth the very reasonable price that they charge.

blender gurú: run by Andrew price Andrew produces high quality tutorialesthat provide a well rounded look at projects, generally from start (modeling) todo finish (compositing). For those interested in product shots, mandrew has done several excellent.

Tutorialeson how todo show an object todo best advantage. These are some of my favorites from Andrew site, he has a los started a well received nature academy where he teaches users how todo create realistic nature scenes.

blenderdiplom: run by gottfried Hoffman.

Tutorials on gottfried site often focus on special effects and col new ways todo use Blender features and tools. There are a los a variety of extremely interesting projects often presented as a series as well as interviews with members of the Blender community.

blendtuts: run by Oliver Villar.

Oliver ofers a nice variety of tutorialesin both english and spanish. In addition todo all the tutorialeson his site he a los has a hologram Project for sale in his e-shop that covers concept, modeling, materiales, animation, rig, compositing and lighting. The Project is available in both spanish and english.

blender nerd: run by Greg zal, rex harby and tanner Casey.

They have recently launched a brand new look todo their site, which had already ben full of great tutorialeson a variety of Blender topics. One interesting new addition todo their site is the ability for users todo upload their own tutorialesto share with Blender nerd users, there are of course Many more valuable tutorialessites in the Blender community, and of course with that Many todo track it starts todo become dificult todo kep up with who is doing what. Which is why i cheat. I discovered that by following one very connected blenderhead, y could be kept informed about new tutoriales, news, images and col projects, Terry wallwork, better known as adventures in Blender has an uncanny ability todo always know what is going on where in the Blender community. I am beginning todo suspect that he has found a bien todo hard wire himself into the internet, which while possibly ODD, works out well for me. I follow him on Twitter and g+. T erry a los has an adventures in Blender website where he reviews Blender books and tutorialesseries. His interviews are always well written and very insightful, let s all give our Blender educators a big Blender hug and do what we can todo support their continued eforts on our behalf.