So about the blender guru article..

Disclaimer: I used to be in CG society in late 2014, sort of between the two sides here

Andrew Price took a statement from his “Advice for the 17 year old me” Podcast and decided to turn it into a full on article…
Results?
Pretty much what you’d expect from an article titled (Why I avoid Blender art forums)
Lot of rage,

This time it’s kind of justified, kind of.

First of all,
Andrew Price isn’t completely wrong not even 75% percent wrong

Yeah you might improve if you are pressured by people around you
Like, I remember how horrible I was back in '12, when I never posted my work(and never will!11)
Or received criticism, I thought that making a transformers movie was easy, just use vray!1 it’s not hard1!1

Then I joined a fanart community
since the standards at the time were pretty low I actually caught on and became a little bit better
Before I continue this story would like to clear up one thing(Because what I’m about to say is going to support the other camp)

ANDREW PRICE IS NOT LEAVING BLENDER
Seriously I don’t know which part of the people’s arse they got this from but
HE’S NOT
He said something similar to this article like 3 years ago in early 2014 in a podcast

Didn’t leave then, wont leave now

Al right now to continue

It actually got to the point where I surpassed the majority of people there
Did I stop getting better? No actually I still am getting better
You see the feeling that you are actually better artwork than the majority of people in a society is actually motivating(I know I sound like I got it all figured out but eh, yeah I do ;))

You see, being in a small society actually helps you get better at what you do

Also another thing

starting out in the hardest level is called bad game design, just saying :slight_smile:

And honestly Andrew, what did you think was going to happen? You could have titled your article ANYTHING else just not this, you are basically inviting hatred

and this line “Why Blender forums (usually) won’t help you grow”

is giving hatred a nice warm cushion and a cup of coffee



(Image by this guy)

Link: http://www.blenderguru.com/articles/why-i-avoid-blender-forums/

I generally agree with him. Personal take on it:

“But as a whole, the average is lower than an equivalent larger cg site.”

  • In all fairness a lot of the impressive artwork in other forums is done by users with non licensed software amounting up to 10 000usd. Some even use multiple overlapping softwares eg Max for modeling, maya for rendering with Vray/Arnold, Nuke(super expensive) for comp, Mari textures etc etc. Income - starving artist; Price - insane. It’s good they know all that but realistically it’s not really fair comparison when you are loaded with unlicensed market leading software and take on a freeware not matter how capable it is.

  • Second yes there are a lot of new users as he mentions in this article. It might dilute things and often stupid(like myself) talk the loudest. Generally new users are more engaged and try be helpful though.

“Why Blender forums (usually) won’t help you grow.”

  • I got started with Blender about a year ago. This place has been the most amazing resource to help me make the switch. I am particularly grateful to CodeManX for his help on python! Mods are always quick to react and help as well! What is perhaps most amazing is that the developers take time to engage, explain, listen to users and share their insight! This transparency and engagement is practically unheard of elsewhere. This is what makes Blender so uniquely refined as it has weathered countless criteria, feedback from the community.

  • Paces like blenderartist, cgcookie and blenderguru help you reinvent yourself. I used max, maya for very long time and became stale, blinded in my routines. There comes a point with any software when you stop learning and just press the same buttons to get the job done. You might think you know it all or give yourself an excuse not to explore alternative workflows but in reality you only stagnate. The above mentioned resources have helped me reinvent myself by learning Blender, see things from a new perspective and truly enjoy art again.

I do understand that people might exhaust most of this novelty and not absorb much at a point, they will have other priorities and will be unwilling to invest time on obsolete discussions. Blender has matured rapidly in recent years and i think community, quality of works will also continue to grow and mature with it.

1 Like

“1!1!!1!11!11!1!1!11!!11!!!11!1111!!1!11!11111!!!11!1”

I love the Twitter feeds and the facebook groups because you can make some friends and communicate and challenge each other to learn and grow. I share here, but for the most part I’ve kinda let things go.

I think for Art the best places to grow is visit a musea of ‘classic art’
As for CG art, even disneys … it doesn’t even come close to it.
And I doubts if such a term should exist.

As it remains to be seen if CG works will stand the test of time

Calling yourself a CG artist, is fine, there are so many people who call themselves Artist these days; but again it remains to be seen if…

This article is more about SEO than anything. Thin but effective. I’m surprised he didn’t include a Top 10 list and an infographic.

There’s a bit of good content (opinions) in the 120+ comments. Don’t get sucked into the debate there or here if you have better things to do. It’s an energy-sucking waste of time.

This tactic can burn you in the long run, Andrew. Especially when done poorly. You are hurting your brand.

-LP

Stop being so cynical.

Stop being so naive.

Btw I like Andrew. I wish him continued success.

-LP

I agree with Andrew on the always bettering yourself and having people around who are better helps. But we can’t alway find our ideal learning environment, usually we have to work with what we have. I think he might have missed the point a little bit. I don’t think he found a better environment at Pixar, but a different one. My dad is an artist and makes his living off of his art. The one thing I always noticed was that he had piles and piles of art books, from the ancient to the modern.

I think the real point is that you should strive to diversify your skills and go out of your comfort zone every now and then. Even the top CG art sites have a community and you can see certain tropes and common styles in each of them. I don’t think there is anything wrong with the art posted here, but if you only look at the images posted here then you are doing yourself a disservice. I like Andrew and I find his ideas and discoveries a lot of fun. But I think that BA is just as good a place to find art as CGsociety or any other site. Don’t limit yourself to just one. :slight_smile:

I think forums are great if your IQ is above 100 and your self esteem is not so bad that the success of others hurts you.
Come on, seriously!?

Blender has a n00b stigma. Blender needs a re-brand. Blender needs to focus its resources on development rather than movies. Blender generally does represent a low/mediocre level of community based work, but that’s down to it being free and readily available to newcomers.

The fact is, this forum and any other Blender forum act as the first stepping stone to an entry-level Blender artist. It acts in some ways as a repository of information for those who use it to collect resources and it enables other artists to contact each-other. However to an experienced artist or Blender user, the majority of which move onto other forums and the ones who do stay, stay because they want to help and offer advice to others. Whether that’s in scripting, tutorials or thread helping.

So yes, in some ways he’s right - once you reach a certain level and you experience the level of work on other forums you feel less inclined to come here because it doesn’t challenge the mind or offer anything new… I like coming on this forum and checking out the modeling section because I like to offer up solutions in that area. But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that I’ve moved over to bigger, more professionally based forums such as Polycount for offering up my 3D addiction.

Also on the note of BF movies, I hope someone reads this. Seriously, I’ve been into Hangouts and meetups with other artists, some of which from Pixar and some from well known studios and none of them, not one that I’ve met has known, watched or taken an interest to the yearly movies. They know Blender, sure. These short videos seem to me, to only appeal to a new audience, as a showcase of what Blender is capable of. However that comes with its artists who use it, let the community build Blenders portfolio and use the resources it has and the people available to jockey together and develop new ideas and functionality.

As a Plone developer I have to use Python quite frequently and I appreciate that Python developers worthy of Blenders appraisal aren’t probably that easy to come by. But come-on.

Not to dis the artists of the movies, it’s good work. But I’m sorry fellas, that stuff doesn’t do it for me anymore…

Since you didn’t use a quote I’ll take it for granted that was directed at me.

It’s unsolicited advice from someone with no credibility so this is the best place for it. He is watching and he knows exactly what I am talking about. He may disagree but I don’t think he is thinking long-term. The article is mediocre content and that is not going to be good enough for very much longer. Plus he is getting people riled up and divided once again. It is not good for his brand. He could do so much better.

Think what you want.

-LP

Unless you can somehow re-license Blender and price it out of hobbyist range, then rebranding is not going to work as well you would think because you will still have news users posting their practice images with the rudimentary skill gained so far.

Short term gain maybe, but in the long term it may amount to nothing.

Actually it’s probably a response to the thread itself.

haven’t read andrew’s article yet, so i will limit my comment to art comparisons. what i like about the art posted here, is that when i go to artstation/cgsociety/behance etc., it is difficult for me to find unique stuff; it’s mostly sci-fi weapons, robots, unrealisticly perfect people and celebrities, and so on. all done with technical excelence (which is important, of course), but not very interesting for me in general. (also, i can understand why that’s so, but again, that’s still not interesting to see). whereas in the blender community i find more stuff that is interesting to me, and done from unique perspectives (even if not always accomplished with technical excelence).

I think for Art the best places to grow is visit a musea of ‘classic art’

+1

I guess that explains why he always seems out of the loop on Blender current events whenever he interviews guests lately.

Anyway, I completely disagree with the article. The whole thing is actually phenomenally poor advice.

Pinterest is the best art resource btw. It’s like a hand-pruned Google Image search.

Honestly, Andrew has been my go to guy. I come from one of the commercial, and expensive packages (C4D), but I’m a hobbyist, and ongoing cost is not sustainable. I’m still in very early days of Blender, and I rely on the knowledgeable to show me how to do what I can do with ease elsewhere. Andrew is a simply excellent resource for that, just to get me moving in the right direction.

Yeah you are probably right. It was a chance for me to elaborate on my comment anyway.

The answer to the question in the last line of your thread opener is obvious. Publishing a controversial article is a marketing tactic. It creates lots of buzz and lots of clicks. That translates into Google ranking. There is nothing unethical about it but you are supposed to do it with finesse. Not just throw a bomb and watch as the community flies into an uproar over it. It probably works for him anyway. He needs a steady stream of new users so Google is probably his main focus.

He probably laughs at my advice. We’ll see how it works out for him long-term. His market is ripe for competition.

-LP

It is kinda funny to see how people get so crazy about this. After all this is Andrew Price a person that always has to list quotes and citations before making an argument. Why I say this? Without it the argument would fell apart and the article would come across short sighted or kinda pointless.

Pointless is what I think about it.

Yes there are better forums to post your work to when you are advanced enough.
However this forum is nearly a must have for beginners to Blender and CG because you get design and technical feedback at once.

Should any serious person that is interested in refining your skill and getting feedback diversify their exposure? Yes! That is kinda common sense and why I feel Andrews post is rather pointless without adding any real constructive part.

This reminds me about the UI concept he did that went down in flames because he obviously spend more time on collecting quotes for making his case instead of really thinking about what Blender lacks and what is feasible to make it better. Fact is Blender does not need an makeover but it needs some order brought into the chaos.

I also comeback and post work because I am part of the community. The community gave me much so now I can give back.

What I also find finny that people only talk about Andrew - he made some pretty decent tutorials and some not so good once. But there are plenty of others who also do it. But like Larry stated they don’t use such a marketing music.

I think we all know that Andrew is good with numbers and statistics, whether that translates into being good with art is another thing since a lot of analytically minded people tend to find it more difficult to think creatively (likewise a lot of creative minds will find it more difficult to become good with data)

Andrew has usually been a bit more on the analytical side, which is a major reason why his business is where it is today.