Professional just means paid occupation. Amateur means unpaid. His business is BlenderGuru - he’s obviously a professional.
the old interface left a bad taste in a lot of people’s mouths. Blender is much better now, but the stigma is still there.
That said, today every time someone mentions how hard it is to use, someone else brings up the “10 year old kid making tutorials on blender” case. And it’s true- 10 year old kids on youtube have learned how to use it- so it is not hard per se, just slightly different from other software.
So my take on this is that you need to show what impressive results blender can produce to professionals - big impressive pictures on the main page.
At the same time you need to put some sort of an inspiring story- how blender is so straightforward that anyone can learn it. You can literally make a point of how straightforward it is. Cgcookie should hire that 10 year old kid to make some of the tutorials just to hammer that point :B
In lots of cases, new users have started with maya or 3dsmax, so you can also think of putting forward the features that blender does have and/or are more convenient in blender.
You can hammer on the point that blender is both a modelling and sculpting package, it does textures and the rest of the pipeline. With autodesk products there is a lot of hopping from one package to another.
You can hammer on the point that because blender is so open source, it’s development is extremely rapid- we get new features faster than others, we get access to these features as they are being developed and we get to affect the development with our feedback/work. You can put a list of this year and previous year google summer of code projects. Put links to what’s in the works.
You can make a point of how fast blender devs fix bugs. Maya has had 10 year old bugs- still not fixed.
Make a big point of how advantageous open source is and how blender is open source, how sony and dreamworks and pixar are embracing open source as a development model too.
some inspiring quotes help too:
“Blender puts the 3d studio in the hands of the people”
“the greatest gift to the world of cgi”
“I wrote a bug report at the tracker and blender devs squashed it the next day”
“Open source development by the entire world, driven by pure passion”
Ton quotes some industry giants on blender at his twitter. Take those quotes from twitter and put them with the other inspiring quotes- on the main blender page.
etc etc. 
We need inspiring quotes linking to inspiring stories on the main page. We need huge impressive images of productions using blender.
We need a page explicitly listing new features in releases. Not just at some wiki page hidden somewhere- but at a dedicated section of the website- something like a blog - scrolling down you get dated posts- showing the pace of development- the impressive number of things added on multiple releases all laid out on a single page.
If that’s not ok, then look at how zbrush does it.
http://pixologic.com/zbrush/
main page links to the zclassroom and the zblog.
dedicated features page with big shiny screenshots and cool images:
http://pixologic.com/zbrush/features/ZBrush4R6/
features neatly organised in tabs
About anyone has the capacity to learn Blender, but you have to see it from a professionals point of view. Unlike kids and hobbyists, they can’t have a big stall in productivity in order to get up to speed on difficult to use software, because they already have deadlines they have to hit. Due to the large initial learning curve, many don’t even use Blender even as a utility app as part of their overall pipeline.
No matter what people say, or show, it still takes 2 weeks to a month to have any efficiency, so they typically will drop it and go with quicker solutions.
Right, no amount of website redesign or icon redesign will help with that. I can’t imagine any veteran CG artist shallow enough to fall for that. So Blender has an image problem, largely driven by pre- and misconceptions, and less about practicality. If Blender could deliver more results better and faster than the alternative, it could have the ugliest website and Ace Dragon’s icon and still be respected (by the right audience).
Instead this topic seem to focus on the lowest common denominator of what is regarded as “professional”, to try and “sell” Blender to “new users”, as if that is the missing piece towards the “#1 spot”, preferably by the end of this year. I understand why this would be important to a guy like Andrew Price, who makes a living selling beginner to intermediate training to new users, no matter if they are so shallow to be swayed by consumer marketing and modern icons. It’s not that Blender is not “professional” enough, it’s that BlenderGuru needs more customers.
Hell, the last two years Blender was in the Top 5 of CGSociety’s retrospective, it has always been friendly regarded at Siggraph, this year Pixar changed the license of OpenSubdiv because of Blender and Valve sees a role for it in their business model. The change of perception is happening, slowly, despite of the current presentation. The interest in Blender at companies where I freelance is growing, and trust me they don’t care about the visual marketing of the software itself. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Blender become part of the toolset at many companies in 3 years time, without major changes to the default interaction, and if you don’t want to invest in it, it’s your loss.
I’m all for making a better website presentation, but I don’t think it is a magic bullet that will bring about the second coming of Blender. It will happen slowly without people noticing, driven by development, and hopefully soon talks of Blender not being “pro enough” will be more of a joke than it already is.
Rebranding blender to attract new users means making it more like the other products, make feel at home. This will make current users grumpy. :mad:grrr
Coming from Maya,I learned Blender in a week or so.My main problem with this app is the lack of offline documentation for new users.I have learnt overtime that the best way to learn an app is to read the whole documentation to familiarize urself with everything the app is capable of.
Most times,its advisable to have an offline documentation,so u can make use of it anytime,also turning ur internet off,goes a long way in keeping u focused on completing a project.This is where Autodesk excels,all their applications have offline help downloads and this is how a lot of ppl have learnt how to use their software.They contain a lot of information,and u can even search for specific stuff.I can’t count how many times I have gotten solutions to little problems or ideas, workflows by just hitting the help button.
One shouldn’t have to ask on forums or google stuff when there is an updated offline documentation for easy use.
Some of the great things about Blender are the speed of development and access to very good addons developed by other users that contribute towards making ur workflow better.I don’t know of any other app that has this.I have to admit I got frustrated with Blender and dropped using it in March cause it was very inconvenient to use especially as Maya was more mouse oriented while Blender is keyboard oriented.
Presently, I am impressed with how well they have integrated Maya configurations and navigation into Blender.I use it all the time now and don’t miss Maya at all.Getting to sculpt,paint in both uv mode and 3d,edit ur mesh even after rigging without getting problems,faster and better viewport display of materials(though I would prefer the bge features in the viewport as well),not having to wait for a year to get new features.
Its the perfect software and I think a lot of ppl are beginning to notice especially with the familiar configurations and navigation options which makes usage easier especially for those coming from the popular apps.
Give Blender some time,its gaining popularity.Also,I think ppl are starting to buy into the idea that open source is the way forward.With open subdivs,bullet physics and Blender leading the way,this will happen.
Btw,I hope Bullet cloth without game mode comes to Blender soon.
How do you add to selections using Box or Lasso select with the Maya keys? Someone over at Polycount was asking and I can’t seem to figure out any way to do it.
I don’t think that’s possible yet with the Maya preset.I tried it too but it didn’t work.I usually switch to Sculpt mode and use the grab brush if I need to move a lot of vertices around.
They will probably improve on the presets in the next release but I wondering if it can be configured manually.Compared to past versions,this latest version has really improved the Maya keymaps.
Create a key in the settings
Shift + Alt will add to the selection.
Blender has already gained enough inertia to stand alone. And it’s continuing to gain traction. That was evident in the large expansive article (20 pages) about Tears of Steel, in CG magazine. Also at Sigraph, quite a few companies were shmoozing with Ton, company reps who are honestly appreciative yet more than a little stymied how Blender has come so far with so little. Blender is also proof that quality CG work can likely be done at greatly streamlined cost.
Moreover, from a user perspective regarding development, Blender seems to be moving in leaps and bounds unlike most other professional CG companies. Is that development smooth, or well mapped out? Sort of.
Regardless, the advances are coming quickly, are fairly stable, and the pace is exciting. I think that very rapidness of development is causing the big boys to sort of catch their breath. They’re watching close.
And if Blender gains just a few more wow advances, like more powerful sculpting and texturing, or more refined animation tools, it would be incredibly attractive to professional artists.
Two cents
Hey, Maya user as well. Two things really opened up Blender for me at least enough to give it a fair shake, and that was DemoHero’s addons and keymaps. It pretty much allowed right clicking to bring the the edge,vert, face in edit mode, while having a context sensitive menu pop up with one button as opposed the 4-5 you need with default blender. Control Space hid everything but the 3d viewport and showed it again upon press. Basically it really make Blender feel like Maya. Since around 2.63 it stopped working and I ended up just making my own. G being repeat last action, Q to hide or show the transform widget, ect.
Basically, you still need to really dig in and make some changes to get the feel the same or more friendly. If something like that could help me jump into Blender and not want to chuck it out the window, It probably can help other users coming from other applications as well.
For moving a lot of verts around, the closest thing I can think of in blender (without going into the sculpt mode) is proportional editing, which is kind of like having the soft selection (B) in maya selected. The icon for it in blender is horrible, lokos more like a dinner plate or a speaker than anything related to proportional editing.
More importantly though regarding presets, I think they need a new default with Blender classic being added to the options. Some default that wont turn away a large portion of users used to the usual universal control paradigm.
On the contrary. Impressions are important, and its far easier to make a bad impression than a good one. What one goes into Blender with is important, if they are going in with a good impression, the adoption rate is much easier. Professionals also like to feel like they are using professional tools for the most part. I mean right now If I go out an look for another job, and only put Blender on my resume, then I wont get hired here in LA. If I put something like Maya or some other application with a premium association onto it, even if the job doesnt require the software, suddenly I have the advantage. There’s this connotation that the more professional software you know, the higher your worth. I think how Blender is seen will make a much larger difference in how that dynamic works as it currently sits now, in addition to the continued question of donations and support.
That said, I dont think this needs to happen immediately, but also reflect changes within Blender itself as it develops in to a better tool. Some could even say the way Ton talks about Blender 3.0 as a type of rebrand/refresh of Blenders image.
Attract more people to Blender?
I dont know, but I just read on the statistics page Blender was downloaded 3,4 MILLION times in 2008, and thats five years ago… Of course not all downloaders become users, but still it seems Blender is incredibly well known already!
The amount of downloads =/= the amount of users, and definitely not the amount of active users. I know that I myself have downloaded Blender from the official website over 100 times in the years I’ve been using it and I suspect the amount of people who only download Blender and never use it is very high.
That’s why I personally think the bigger problem is in the “accessibility” side rather than “marketing.” Though both could probably use improvements. Blender gets a lot of downloads, possibly more than any other package. For some reason if you go to CGTalk, CGHub, Polycount, etc, most CG Artists there are not using Blender in their production pipelines at all.
Ha ha I love that. Then Blender would really make a splash… If you use Blender you’ll be just like these people. I think this could work:)
Please please please listen to the podcast before commenting on it you guys. If you still disagree then fine. Have at it. Otherwise we have a lot of useless conversation that it diffusing the topic by people who don;t even understand what the original is even about.
BTW, rebranding has nothing to do with changing the name of the program. And yes, “Rebranding” was a bad choice of words to begin with.
I’ve listened to the podcast and I think Andrew Price is missing the point. I don’t believe it’s in Blender’s interest to be number one, so why would it be a good idea to focus on “selling” itself instead of just going about the business of making a better program?
By making it sexy and appealing to the masses you now have to listen to the deafening noise of “why isn’t it like this, I want that… this isn’t Maya!” If I were a developer I couldn’t imagine I’d be pleased… it would no longer be fun to contribute to the community.
Let’s face it, the point of Open source is to be an alternative to the way things are currently done. So why would this project behave like it was a commercial entity? How about just growing a community organically, slowly, and everybody have fun. If you’re a professional who likes to use Blender, cool! I think it would be great to have something that the Krita team has currently implemented, namely professional support. This is where Canonical has focused it’s business model as well and look where they are?
Andrew has every right to his opinion of course, we simply have to recognize that it’s in his best interest that things develop this way. More popularity means more lucrative training market. As for the people that actually make Blender, what’s in it for them… and don’t say something as simple as money. There are other reasons for doing things in this world!
If you really want a program that is like everything else, than go buy it! If you like how Autodesk and friends do business, then all the power to you. Blender’s most endearing quality in my eyes is that it’s different… and that’s good!
I’m not sure what you mean. Krita and Canonical are focusing on trying to get into the professional world. The Blender Community creates a lot of resources. Training material, art assets, bug reports, donation/revenue, patches/addons, etc. What benefit is it to not try to grow?
there’s no problem with growth, there is however an issue with opening the flood gates. Taking pages from the marketing play books of major companies won’t end well for an open source project. To make an analogy, it’s similar to taking a privately owned company and then opening it to investors (publicly traded), before long decisions are not made for the benefit of the whole but soley for profit. Take a look around and tell me how well that’s working out for us!
By making it sexy and appealing to the masses you now have to listen to the deafening noise of “why isn’t it like this, I want that… this isn’t Maya!” If I were a developer I couldn’t imagine I’d be pleased… it would no longer be fun to contribute to the community.
Blender, in a way is already getting into more of a position where it’s more dependent on making sure it gets features professionals want, those making the monthly donations to the development fund aren’t doing it solely because they happen to like what the devs. are interested in implementing in their spare time 
Getting the functionality and tools people want = more donation money which means a larger core team which means faster development. Otherwise we may have the opposite scenario where people pull their donations and the foundation can no longer afford much of a core team. Granted, it’s not as ominous as a business going bankrupt if consumer demands are ignored, but it would still hurt the Blender project.