Announcement #5 (9/4/18): This class if officially over. See page 26 for the closing post and don't forget to fill out the questionnaire!
Announcement #4 (8/27/18): REMINDER that this week's stream is on Wednesday, NOT Tuesday. I'm out of the office Monday (8/27) and Tuesday (8/28) but will be back in full grading force on Wednesday.
Announcement #3 (8/6/18): New way to Submit Homework. Please create a unique forum thread to contain all your homework submissions for the month, rather than everyone submitting in this main thread. More info on page 12.
Announcement #2 (8/7/18): Zsolt has done it again. He's prepared the report card document for this month. Feel free to monitor your grades there throughout the next 4-5 weeks.
Announcement #1 (8/6/18): Class is officially in session!
**Experienced Blender users are Welcome! Clarification about involvement on page 2 of this thread.
Welcome to the CGCookie Class: Getting Started with 3D Modeling & Blender 2.8! If you're interested in computer graphics, 3D modeling, and you're new to Blender / new to Blender 2.8, this class is where you need to be.
This "Class" format invites all Citizen members to focus together on a particular topic/skill for a month. Participation looks like this:
WHEN? The class will take place from August 6th - September 4th.
Abstract: The goal this week is to simply get familiar with the application. We’ve all been there: Opening Blender (or any 3D package), gazing at all the crazy UI, trying to orbit in the viewport, crying...Ok, maybe you were stronger than me and didn’t cry. But the reality is 3D software is daunting. There’s SO MUCH to digest especially when you’re a beginner.
This first week we’re going to overview Blender 2.8 and 3D from an absolutely beginner perspective. What is Blender for? What can it do? Wait, this isn’t a juicing seminar?
Goal of the Week: Get comfortable with Blender 2.8's UI, viewport navigation, creation and position objects.
Pre-recorded course to watch:
Week 1 Live Event (Remember to RSVP!)
Homework:
Abstract: Enter the world of mesh modeling: The oldest form of building 3D objects with your computer. We’ll discuss the technical art of “pushing and pulling verts” as modelers often call it. Welcome to this wild, geometric world!
Goal of the Week: Practicing editing a polygonal mesh's components to create a custom 3D model.
Pre-recorded courses to watch:
Week 2 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
Abstract: Digital sculpting is the more artistically intuitive method of 3D modeling. If pushing and pulling verts felt like the hard way of doing things, sculpting will be a welcomed alternative!
Goal of the Week: Practice digital sculpting.
Pre-recorded courses to watch:
Article to Read: Big Idea: Digital Tablets
Week 3 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
Abstract: At this point, you've been introduced to the key 3D modeling methods. Meaning that you have the tools you need to MODEL STUFF! This is where practice will make perfect. This is where you build stuff.
Goal of the Week: Be inspired to continue modeling and spend the week modeling or sculpting a challenging object.
Pre-recorded courses to watch: Modeling in Blender Learning Flow
Week 4 Live Event (Don't forget to RSVP)
Homework:
This thread is reserved for CG Cookie Citizens that are participating in the "Getting Started with 3D Modeling & Blender 2.8" class. Its purpose is to serve as central communication for all participating Citizens (excluding Hobby plan Citizens) to ask Kent and fellow participants questions and to post homework. As the instructor of the class, Kent will be monitoring this thread on a daily basis (especially Mon-Thurs) throughout the month of Auguest to review homework and answer questions.
Free members are welcome to observe the thread but please respect that communication and participation is reserved for Citizens.
bbsdwerbeagentur I just tested the convert options with 2.8 alpha 2 and it seems to work for me. I successfully converted a Curve > Circle to a mesh. I also successfully converted a mesh object with modifiers down to a modifier-less result - Essentially collapsing and applying object modifiers which is a common [hack] use for the conversion options.
But when I tried converting the default cube to a curve I got nothing. I think because that's not a valid conversion? I'm wondering if you're experiencing something similar.
silentheart00 I can confirm: "Export UV Layout" seems to be missing currently 😕
@theluthier In my case I was appending a curve object from a 2.79 file into 2.8. I just downloaded the lastest version, tried again and it worked . But converting still doesn't seem to work properly. I opened a new file to test out and I only could convert a Bezier Curve, the other curve objects still stay the same and nothing happens.
Edit: Just tried again and now I was able to convert other curve objects too. Very strange, can't find a similarity in behaviour for now.. 🤔
Okay.....the new release of 2.8 that just went out around four hours ago or so. There is awesomeness inside.
Firstly, there's something I've actually been waiting a little while for, which is new default Workspaces. These were called Layouts back in 2.7x, and maybe I'm the only one who ever used them; but I did have a set of my own default layouts saved to my startup file - for modeling, texturing, shading, compositing, etc. Most of them were based on the kind of simplistic ones that Blender shipped with; but I really liked switching between layouts quickly to jump between shading and compositing for example, without having to try and do one kind of work when my screen space was really set up for a different kind.
So in 2.8, the layouts as I mentioned are called Workspaces, and they open as tabs in the top bar. So now switching between screen layouts is as easy as clicking between different tabs. The ones they've shipped as defaults need a little tweaking, but they are still very good as they are now and worth taking a look at. Plus of course, you can make and save your own workspaces. You can customize practically everything about a workspace - not just which panels are open but which TABS inside those panels are automatically expanded when you first open the workspace, what kind of shading mode the viewport (if any) is in, and suchlike. About the only thing you can't do is have viewports in different workspaces set to different modes - if you're in Sculpt Mode or Edit Mode all viewports in all workspaces will be in that mode until you change it, but that's a minor inconvenience.
Right now the workspace tabs in the top bar are automatically sorted alphabetically, but they plan on making these sortable by dragging and dropping tabs.
And the second thing - this is great. In the Lookdev viewport shading mode - that's the middle one, between Solid and Rendered modes - 2.8 now comes with HDRis for lighting built into this mode! They have five already - from HDRiHaven - but they're asking the community to suggest more, like they recently did with matcaps a couple of weeks ago. These HDRi's won't appear in the background and they won't render - but in lookdev shading mode they will provide scene lighting and reflections to objects.
jakeblended I discovered the Workspaces feature a couple days ago before they added all the other ones today, and I was so excited about it. It's so much easier for a generalist to switch between different workspaces than to finagle the windows around. They talked about it in a livestream today, too! I really like this feature.
And awesome about the built-in HDRi!
jakeblended You are not the only one, I also made a few layouts that I like to switch between. I especially like that you can quickly navigate between them with Ctrl+left/right arrow key. Do they support this in 2.8? (Well, I think I'll find out for myself in a couple of minutes when I download the latest build. :-) )
I noticed a few things and wonder if anyone knows more about it:
1) It seems that the Bevel modifier has to be on top of the modifier stack now to show up. Do you think they will fix that or is this a new "feature". It doesn't really make sense to me.
2) Is it possible to export objects as .fbx files yet? When I click the Export button I only have the option to export my objects as .dae or .abc!
3) The "Remove Doubles" option (now named "Remove Double Vertices") isn't visible in Edge or Face selection mode when pressing W.. Do I have to switch to Vertex selection mode now every time I want to remove doubles? :/
4) In 2.79 I could press "^" or "-" on my Numpad and only the objects I selected were visible and everything else was hidden until I pressed one of the buttons again. Is there a new shortcut for this in 2.8 or is this feature simply not implemented yet?
Wtf? Standard cube on scene is triangulated?
1) Works for me right after Subdivision Surface for example.
2) Nope. .fbx imp/exp addon is still "Need upgrade to 2.8x"
nekronavt Lol, it's actually triangulated.
To 1): Oh, you're right, it works when you add the modifers in 2.8 but when appending/ importing a cube with a mirror modifier and a bevel modifier below it for example from 2.79, the bevel modifer does only show up when you move it on top. o.O
jakeblended Thanks for the rundown on the lates 2.8 features! You're like our very own Spy for the People 😎
bbsdwerbeagentur The hiding shortcuts are now H (hide selected), Shift+H (hide unselected), and Alt+H (show hidden). You can also find these under Object->Show/Hide.
hope i can start watching the livestream recorded version tomorow morning :D
at work i managed to sneak in and take a peek . look forward for this homework.
would not tryed it out of myself but i love challenges . so for homework its melvin 3 primitive shapes and then a human head ? can we decide how the head looks like if its a male or female . the age . style (realistic or anime etc) or are there certain restrictions ?
TIP: If you are multi-resolution sculpting and your geometry is in the wrong place, try using the nudge brush to nudge it back into place.
silentheart00 Thanks but that's not what I mean. In 2.79 you can hide objects with the same shortcuts as well. I mean a feature called "toggle in and out local view". Try selecting an object in object mode and press NUM/ and you see what I mean. It's one of the most useful and important features of Blender in my opinion.
bbsdwerbeagentur Ah, well, I haven't had to use something like that, so I can't help you there.
@theluthier I have two questions about face sculpt.
First one is again about texturing. It should be like a "marble" sculpt, or we can put some skin on it? And the second question is depends on first - if we are allowed to use texturing, can we use hair particles too? New hair bsdf in 2.8 looks awesome, wanna try it.