How to really learn blender 3d and CGI

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    Muaaz Manzoor Can you tell me how someone can really learn something… I mean I started as a cg artist and followed every tutorial on the INTERNET including blenderguru, blendercookie, blendtuts, greg zaal tuts, ben simonds tuts and a lot of books(well almost all the books blender has excluding just a few which I will read when ever I will find time) and every video training dvd blender has excluding some from lynda.com and recently produced by 3dbuzz blender101 and blender 102 without the need to actually make those things taught in the tutorial and learned something new in every tutorial as a beginner… But now that I know my way around blender there is not much to learn in tutorials… So should one just blindly follow tutorials or should one just follow a tutorial of the things which he needs to learn… But as the nature of the cgi you are required to create a specific thing and you will never gonna get the exact tutorial or techniques needed to make those things happen in tuts. So what should one do

1…Continue reading books and following tuts blindly for the whole life or 2… Learn only the things that are required by him to create… If this is the option you would go for then also recommend me how I am gonnna learn the exact same thing which I am needed to know to create that awesome magical thing…
3…Any other method you pros use to learn new things in blender 3d and cg

If you dont understand anything please ask because I know my English and particularly communication skills are horrible.

Thanks…

Tutorials are a great way to learn the tools needed to create CG, but not the actual CGI itself. The only way you’re going to learn to create things in blender, is to just do them. A lot of 3D involves trial and error. A great example is a project I am working on. I need to model a penguin, I have tried to model it 5 or 6 different ways. It wasn’t until the 7th attempt that I found a method that works.

Challenging yourself to model at least one thing a day is great practice, and each time you model the better you will learn how the tools work and how they can be used to create a wide variety of 3D.

Thnaks for replying… I will try that and perhaps I have tried that in the past… What I really meant is that when you are struck at a point where you can do nothing because you lack some technical knowledge to learn something new… How would I approach to learn that technical thingy of which I am completely unaware of… Yes by watching a tut you can learn it … But there will be no exact tutorial that can help you… So what would you do… Read a book… again book will have same problem and you have to go through a lot of pages just to find that little bit of information… So
I think software manual will be the way to go… What you say in this regard. Thanks

Take a look at the work in progress threads. People are doing all sorts of fancy things with Blender, and by watching them stumble you can learn as well.

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I think that the best way to learn anything is just to do it. Learn the basics then start working on a project. As soon as you don`t know what to do next, look up some tutorials on the subject and continue. Repeat until you have reached the result you intended and in the end you have learned everything you need to know on that particular subject.

Alternatively, if you just keep on hitting a brick wall, you can ask around here. somebody is bound to have an answer for you if you ask real nice.

Just pick out something that you would like to “do.” Then, do it. Look at tutorials which talk about “doing similar things to what you’re now doing,” and maybe initially skim them instead of watching them all the way through.

Also, I suggest, look for ways to do things quickly. Decide what you want the finished picture to “look like,” then look for the shortest, cheapest, fastest way to get close to what you wanted to see. For instance, do small, low-resolution renders. Learn about the “OpenGL preview” renders and really use those. If you want to focus on a particular technique, ignore everything else. When you render something and it comes out not-quite what you expected, find a way to use what you’ve got.

That is very well put…in fact it is a method I personally use. Could not have said it better myself.

If you check on olx PAKISTAN,

They’re starting Blender courses(!!!)
I hopefully wouldn’t need that,though.
I had the same problem not long and I tried to ask for help on the forums…
Alas!I finally had help me myself after waiting for almost a week.

So try the forums (not everyone’s luck the same)
OR
you could ask someone senior (ME) about your problem:D

I feel you on this. I don’t think I’m the best out there with my art but definitely not the worse and will forever improve. So will you. However, it’s a very long and enduring path to success. One that many people may end up having to leave throughout their lives for any variety of reasons. However, what you, and of course everyone else in the world, want to know boils down to one single question. A question I ask myself everyday. How do you get good?

This opens up a whole new world of questions though. Does practice really make perfect? How should you practice? What’s the best way to go about something? Etc… We all have questions and tutorials seem to be the best way to go about answering them. Watch the pros at work and it’ll rub off on you, right? You’ll gain some technical knowledge and whatnot but there is only so much someone can tell you. For example, the concept of a backflip is very simple. Jump, rotate back, then land. We all ‘know’ how to do one. However, can you actually ‘do’ it? Without previous training and experience, probably not. So where does this lead? Now, this depends on what your goals are but in relation to the CG it means you need to take that knowledge you’ve gained from tutorials and learn how to apply it to what you do. In other words, practice. Tutorials are great in the beginning but as you advance you’ll want to tackle your own projects. Tutorials at this point should be mostly used for learning new software or as an aid. Not something you should follow to the letter like a recipe. Even still, tutorials are not bad and I encourage you to watch them and continue to read from time to time but mostly as something to aid your learning.

When you tackle your projects I want you to really think about what you’re doing. Think about the overall design or why you decided to apply that texture there or why are you setting up your nodes like this or that. There are tedious parts in CG but ask yourself periodically just what it is you’re doing. Practice doesn’t make perfect so much as it makes habits. Be active when you practice. Change up your formula and see if there are better ways of doing things. Be like a sponge and soak up as much knowledge as you can and then apply it in different ways til you find something that works. I will say again though, don’t just passively practice, I have fallen into this trap and you will not improve. You can draw for 20+ years and still have it look the same as when you began by just practicing passively. You gotta really strive for it to make a difference.

Also, I want to add one last thing. Studying traditional art, using reference, examining color theory, design principles, etc… may all very help assist you. However, using REFERENCE IMAGES and working on DESIGN is essential. I know, I abused caps there but I can’t stretch this enough. How can you model/sculpt/draw/anything a bird if you’ve never seen one before? You’ll need something to go off of. Every made up creature in the world shows likeness to the real world in someway or else no one would ever believe it. Also, it doesn’t matter if you are a godly painter if your design has flaws like lines clearly out of perspective. Design and scene composition is important.

This was a pretty long post but something I think about quite a lot. Best of luck to you and remember, there is no set in stone way of doing things. It is up to you to discern what you should practice and what methods to use. This comes over time. Good luck!

A great website I’ve been using to help me learn is this:

http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/

It’s 60 dollars monthly though or 500 a year but I have found it very useful. Once you feel up to it and have some spare cash I would definitely recommend it.

I have been doing some of the challenges on polycount forum lately. They give you a concept and you share your results and exchange ideas on the forum. It’s a great way to expand your skills and challenge yourself.

I think That’s some serious somethin you said,I agree.

but you should see his location before giving that link
AND
I(technically) have never played a single legal video game EVER.
you can figure out the rest and the reason yourself:D

But you’re damn right.
The site’s awsome…

looks like you are ready to stat experimenting by yourself. Making art , any form of art is an extremely complex subject. There is no book or video tutorial than can even begin to cover this complexity. So in the end nothing beats the scientific process.

Observe -> Theorise -> Experiment -> Observed …

For me the best way to learn is my observing and recreating photos, analysing slowly everything understanding its meaning and structure down to the molecular level. There is no limit to how much you can learn, and knowledge is everything. Practice also helps you refine your knowledge, it allows you understand the relationship of thing and how small details affect the final result.

Dont try to confine yourself in specific method or way of doing things, keep an open mind, always try to get out of your comfort zone.

yeah the magic word is PRACTICE !!!

and it’s not related to blender or CGI only, but for … every … job … in … the world !!!

really !

A little bit of insanity goes a long also. Not to mention being as tenacious as a pit bull.

I can’t stress enough the importance of not relying too much on tutorials. Do not limit your creativity to what the tutorials have to offer. Just do your thing, and if you hit a wall, huff and puff and blow it down… unless of course it’s a brick wall. in that case, look for a specific tutorial that shows you how to blow it down.

the problem solving involved in CG is a huge part of the experience. do not miss out on your own journey

Don’t limit yourself to Blender tutorials. I learned a neat trick only yesterday from someone demonstrating how to model a character in Maya. It involved joining a hand (16 verts) to an arm (14 verts) in a simple and efficient way. Very useful. Generally the most experienced modellers are using other software, but techniques can still apply to Blender.

I always liked the " what the hell does this thing do? " approach, which involves going through the interface and finding stuff you do not understand, and looking it up… a variation of which is to go through the list of hotkey commands, and when you run into one the description of which you do not understand, look it up.

Usually, the reason why we want to learn these graphics tools is because we want to do some art work, animation, etc. When I was starting with 2d I had this logo project in mind that I’ve put on paper and ink. I followed 2d app tutorials about creating stylized letters, different kinds of objects, projects not entirely related to making logos, just to get familiar with the tools and workflow to achieve the project I had in mind.

If you don’t have any personal project you’re interested in making, then you’re stuck. All you do is duplicate what others are doing without any end goal in mind.

As a 3D artist you must be interested a bit in technology and technological terms. I have a technical degree and understand technological terms and explanations how a 3D software works. The real experts in 3D are the programmers and mathematicians. The artists just use the software. There is no art beside concept artists. Working after tutorials and books is no art.