I’m on Twitter!

09Jun09

http://www.twitter.com/blndr08

Check it out!

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Essential Blender Book

03Jun09

I’ve spelled this out a bunch of times – I had to move the file to a different server because everyone was having problems.  To get the PDF of the Essential Blender Book go to my Tuturials page on the blog and click on “Essential Blender” under Community Tutorials.  Here’s a direct link:

http://www.newvisionanimation.com/files/essential-blender.pdf

I don’t mean to sound rude, but I’ve been dealing with this problem for a very long time.  It works fine now and I’m still getting emails and comments about where to download it from.  Enjoy!

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CMS Project Delayed

26May09

I regretfully have to postpone the CMS project for a bit – I’m currently working on a website with login capabilities for a national organization as well as a small CMS system for the same people.  Luckily I can develop everything simultaneously, just not as efficiently as I had originally hoped.  I’m also re-designing the underlying structure of the CMS project (again) – I’m not going to post a completion date until I’m sure that I can get something out by then.  In the meantime I’ll just say “in the near future”.

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Blender Conference in Argentina

15May09

Pablo Lizardo enlightened me on a Blender conference held in Argentina at the Facility Mathematics, Physics, and Astronomy (FAMAF).  There will be workshops, merchandise sales, seminars, and many more activities to participate in.  If you are in the area, go ahead and check it out!  The conference will take place on June 29-30, 2009.

For more information, check out the website at http://www.cheblender.org/.

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New Free Blender Rig

04May09

Mangojambo has developed a free rig for Blender users!

In my opinion it looks a bit like the Animation Mentor character, so I hope he doesn’t run into any trouble there.  I added this rig to my page of free character rigs, so get it while you still can!

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O.R.E (Open Rendering Environment)

01May09

I heard about this service a while back but forgot about it.  It’s called O.R.E, or Open Rendering Environment.  Basically, with this service, you  can upload your Blender render projects using the plugin to be rendered using CPU’s from other users on the service.  Right now membership is by invitation only, but rumor has it that jesterking on the Blenderartists forums can help you out if you ask.  I’m going to try the service out – it will drastically reduce my render times for sure!  For more information, visit the website at http://www.renderfarm.fi/.

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Blender 2.49 RC1

26Apr09

That’s right, Blender 4.9RC1 is out!  Just some under-the-hood updates as we move toward the v2.50 release.  If you want to check it out, go on and download it: http://www.blender.org/development/current-projects/changes-since-248/.

On a side note, I’m learning C++ now too .  Maybe as I progress I’ll port over the NewVision CMS to a binary download.  The release date for that is still June 1 as of now – I’d like some feedback too!

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NewVision CMS Update

20Apr09

So I’ve done some more work on my project-based content management system.  I took a few hours and re-evaluated and changed the underlying database structure a bit to make it a little more user friendly.  There are some small things I need to fix but I’m slowly getting toward a more usable system.  I’m going to set a tentative release date at June 1, 2009.

I’ve also decided that I’ll offer two different kinds of accounts – a (somewhat) limited free account and an unlimited premium account for a fair price.  Here’s the breakdown of each account:

Free Account

* maintain up to 5 projects and 10 additional users per project

* message users associated with your projects

* upload and manage files (file types and space will be limited)

* access to a page to report system bugs

Premium Account

* maintain unlimited projects and users

* message users associated with your projects

* upload and manage files (support for all file types and unlimited space)

* access to a page to report bugs and get customer support

What do you think?  I want to make this as versatile as possible, so let me know what you think would make this project more beneficial.  Let me know!

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Textured Lighting in Blender

16Apr09

Blendernewbies has come out with a new tutorial on how to take your renders to that next level with textured lighting!

[Textured lighting] will allow you to create interesting light and shadow patterns that can help frame the “story” and context of your scene; thus helping you to create scenes that no longer appear to exist within the all too common CG vacuum. They will also allow you to add subtle variations to your lighting instead of the ultra-clean lighting often seen when using very basic lighting techniques.

You can find the tutorial on the Blendernewbies website: http://blendernewbies.blogspot.com/2009/03/enhance-your-blender-renders-with.html

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Essential Blender Problems Fixed!

12Apr09

I finally decided to move the Essential Blender book on pdf to a different server – there were a lot of people that kept getting errors when trying to download it from wordpress.  The link is updated under the “Tutorials” page so you should now be able to download the file from the new location no problem.  If you still can’t download it, email me.  Frankly I’m tired of technology not working the way I want.  Hopefully there isn’t anything more to worry about.

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