24 ms·

Apple Joins Blender Development Fund

826 points by dagmx 5y ago

dagmx 5y ago
Apple also submitted a patch to port Cycles to run on Metal. https://developer.blender.org/T92212 https://developer.blender.org/T92212
- valine 5y ago
  Cycles is good first step if Apple wants to make blender fully functional on Mac. I wonder if they'll ever attempt to port Eevee to metal, that seems like the logical next step if Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS.
  - JAlexoid 5y ago
    "Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS" - that would be a poor decision.... although, they really don't care for the pro market in any case.
    - striking 5y ago
      They've already deprecated OpenGL. Drivers on macOS are locked at OpenGL 4.1, which is missing a whole lot of nice features. Not because the hardware doesn't support them, but because Apple doesn't want to keep maintaining OpenGL. And why would they? OpenGL is really unpleasant from a hardware manufacturer's / integrator's / OS author's perspective, it makes app ports for mobile that much harder unless you're using GL ES, and Metal works and many apps have a Metal renderer now. If you find the mere idea of Metal distasteful because it's an API that can't be used on other platforms, you can use Vulkan and MoltenVK to get there. You're confusing not caring for the pro market with their approach to vertical integration. They care for the pro market, but they're not willing to compromise on ripping out what they consider to be dead weight.
      - hulitu 5y ago
        > And why would they? OpenGL is really unpleasant from a hardware manufacturer's / integrator's / OS author's perspective That's why it must be deprecated. Why do we need to reinvent the wheel over and over again ? I get it, X sucks and the answer to this is .... wayland. OpenGL sucks and the answer to this is ? DirectX ? Vulkan ? SDL ? Libcaca ? ( sorry i forgot ncurses). Just like an old builder: you have some bricks, use them.
        viktorcode 5y ago
        Apple had their answer in form of Metal. Vulkan, DX12 came out later.
        JAlexoid 5y ago
        If memory serves - they introduced Metal as a high efficiency low level API for games, not a generic rendering API. Deprecating opengl was confusing for me.
        user-the-name 5y ago
        No, Metal is a general purpose 3D API, and has always been. Games are just one of the biggest things 3D APIs are used for, but Metal is for all uses.
        rudedogg 5y ago
        I've only dabbled in GPU programming, but I think the issue is more serious than this. It's not really pointless churn. OpenGL was released 29 years ago, and the way GPUs work now vs then is massive. Apparently developers want low level access, and that is what Vulkan/Metal give them. As a user I wish Vulkan had a path without so much setup. I'm not sure if that's possible, or maybe it would defeat the purpose. It seems like it would be nice for hobbyists/beginners like me who just want to get a triangle on the screen and play with shaders though.
        5y ago
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      The pro market that matters has already added Metal support long time ago.
  - kitsunesoba 5y ago
    Blender’s UI would also need to be ported to Metal, as that’s currently OpenGL if I’m not mistaken.
    - hallarempt 5y ago
      Everything Blender shows on screen is rendered using OpenGL.
  - outworlder 5y ago
    > that seems like the logical next step if Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS They should just allow third-party OpenGL implementations. OpenGL on OSX is stuck in the past. It would be great to see Metal die a fiery death too, and Vulkan being adopted. The current situation is just DirectX once again.
    - user-the-name 5y ago
      "Allow"? They aren't doing anything to disallow them? You can use ANGLE if you want, for instance? I wouldn't recommend using OpenGL for any new software, though, it is hopelessly clunky and outdated for modern applications.
- progbits 5y ago
  I guess some will see this as good news, but further entrenching Metal is just sad in my opinion. So much wasted effort just because they can't admit they lost the standards game and won't move to Vulkan. The generous interpretation is they just don't want to invest into that if it isn't "broken" but the cynic in me can't help but think at least part of the motivation is being different and maintaining the wall around the garden.
  - user-the-name 5y ago
    Vulkan isn't a viable alternative for Apple. Apple wants to give developer an easy to use API to encourage them to use it as much as possible. Vulkan does not offer that.
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      Why didn't they just build a higher-level API on top of Vulkan then? Surely it's not a lack of developers, interest or resources, is it?
      - pjmlp 5y ago
        If they have to build their own snowflake on top of others API, specially since Khronos doesn't care about C++ as shading language, why bother?
    - cma 5y ago
      Nah they want lock in, in the Epic Suit Epic used almost none of their libs but had to use Metal to function, and they were about to extract leverage by pulling a dev license for desktop. All POSIX and Vulkan/OpenGL and they could have stayed safe.
  - Encounter 5y ago
    Metal is by far a much friendlier API than Vulkan. Its approach with opt-in complexity is arguably the correct one. (Ever tried writing a Vulkan "Hello triangle" from scratch?) It's also gaining some nice features that are usable out of the gate, rather than waiting on Vulkan extension standardization and adoption. It simply makes the most sense for Apple.
- heartbreak 5y ago
  This is fantastic news. On Big Sur currently, it’s very difficult to get GPU rendering working with Blender.
npteljes 5y ago
It's very validating to see FOSS become industry standard. It's well deserved, and people also deserve to have legitimate free access.
yrgulation 5y ago
This is great news. Two features i’d love to see implemented are a dedicated retopo view and a sketchup like modelling view. I’d be willing to contribute financially to these two (don't have deep pockets but i’d spend 1k or two to have native support implemented).
msci100 5y ago
First time I'm hearing about Blender. Seems super cool. With a python API, would there be some automated way to turn drone footage into 3D environments?
- ragebol 5y ago
  Sure, but it seems you are looking for (monocular) SLAM?
  - msci100 5y ago
    I was thinking more so to add 3d objects to previously recorded drone footage. Would SLAM be the best option there?
    - zachareid 5y ago
      This video is awesome for what it sounds like you're trying to do. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY8Ol2n4o4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY8Ol2n4o4A
    - avhon1 5y ago
      SLAM would be to build a 3D model of what you filmed with a drone. Adding CGI to drone footage doesn't require that, and is absolutely something Blender can do. Look at its motion/camera tracking features.
punkbit 5y ago
Great news! Always been a fan of Blender Foundation :)
netol 5y ago
In the website, Apple lists "Alex Bender" as press contact. Interesting coincidence.
agumonkey 5y ago
Kudos to the creator for pursuing his original vision. Immense success :)
mimsee 5y ago
> ... Apple has joined the Blender Development Fund as a Patron Member. To find out what "Patron Member" means, it's 120k or more per year[0]. It's the highest corporate tier Blender has. Nice to see Apple supporting open-source. [0]: https://fund.blender.org/corporate-memberships/ https://fund.blender.org/corporate-memberships/
- prox 5y ago
  It’s great positive advert for Apple, and also no money for them. Not even a blip on their balance sheet. If they are going to contribute, that would be interesting.
  - novok 5y ago
    Cheaper than hiring one engineer to work on custom improvements on it.
- PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
  > Nice to see Apple supporting open-source. ... in a domain where they have either no products or their own products have clearly failed to obtain traction. Not going to happen for anything where there's an even reasonably successful Apple product, I think we can be sure of that. So yes, it is really nice to see Apple supporting Blender but let's not confuse that with open source/libre software in general.
  - azinman2 5y ago
    Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
    - justicezyx 5y ago
      And: Downvoted whatsoever... Edit: And it indeed is downvoted whatsoever...
    - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
      No damnation involved. Just clarity about what "supporting open source" means in the context of Apple.
webmobdev 5y ago
Probably just to make sure that Blender remains available for their platform. If popular programs aren't available for their ARM / macOS platform, it can hurt them. Good for Blender.
- all2 5y ago
  Another comment in this thread speaks directly to this concern. Though, I would argue the move is likely also part of a larger move back into the "creative market" of designers, cinematography, etc.
- outworlder 5y ago
  > If popular programs aren't available for their ARM Not a problem. M1 blender benchmarks were already smoking the x86 Macs, despite the fact Blender was running on M1 with Rosetta. A native build is obviously better of course. But OSX ports are a bigger deal, in general, than the CPU architecture.
  - LysPJ 5y ago
    In case any readers were wondering, Blender LTS Release 2.93 has native support for Apple Silicon.
astlouis44 5y ago
Apple is getting more serious about 3D and the gaming market, which isn’t surprising considering the market size.
- zitterbewegung 5y ago
  More and more devices from Apple are getting LiDAR sensors so it makes sense to support it. Apple also is taking open source more seriously .
  - JAlexoid 5y ago
    Still waiting for FOSS version of Facetime ;)
    - FreezingKeeper 5y ago
      https://appleinsider.com/articles/10/06/07/apple_announces_open_standard_facetime_video_chat_for_iphone_4 https://appleinsider.com/articles/10/06/07/apple_announces_o... for those that don’t get the reference
    - wlesieutre 5y ago
      You can thank software patents for that https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/01/08/apple-denied-new-virnetx-facetime-patent-trial https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/01/08/apple-denied-new-...
- ravenstine 5y ago
  It definitely makes sense. Recently I had a need for a CAD program and rediscovered how insanely expensive commercial 3D software is for the average person. Sure, many companies now offer monthly subscriptions, but even those subscriptions are ginormous for the amount of relative value returned. Like, do I really want to pay $220 a month for AutoCAD when I only need to design a part for a non-commercial personal project every so often? I'm sure even a lot of small companies secretly pirate such software, especially if they are relying on something like Solidworks. I really don't know how anyone affords that package. And yes, there are sometimes free student editions of these packages, but unlike 15 years ago it's tough to get a hold of them without an email from an academic institution the company has verified. In my case, I was looking at AutoCAD because FreeCAD is... well, pretty terrible as a n00b. From what I can tell it works very differently in many ways from standard CAD applications. It's good for converting between formats, but it's not at all intuitive and seemingly minor actions with nothing but a cube in the workspace can cause it to go into a tizzy and completely freeze. EDIT: Ultimately I ended up using OpenSCAD. Commercial 3D software isn't even necessarily better, though. I know I yakked on about CAD, but I have a sort of background in Animation and used Autodesk Maya for many years, which would be the closest direct competitor to Blender. Dear lord, what a disaster of a software package. Granted, I haven't used it since the 2018 edition, but it's astoundingly bad in many areas. The main reason it's so widely used is that it's established and is capable of just about anything. The downside is that, like AutoCAD, the slightest breeze can make it crash unexpectedly. Anyone smart will save their scenes in ASCII format because who knows, something might go wrong during the saving process that makes your scene unable to open when you reboot Maya, and looking through the text-version of your scene may be the only way to fix or recover anything. That's not even all of it. And Maya is also very expensive. Unless you are a student, the only way to use Maya on a hobbyist level is to pirate it. Having switched entirely to Blender, although there's things about it that I still find unintuitive, it's a breath of fresh air having come from Maya. Unlike Maya, it's rare that anything I do will cause Blender to freeze or crash. The default viewport rendering not only looks better than Maya's "viewport 2.0" but just seems snappier. What I don't like about Blender is that it tries to do too much IMO. Does Blender really need a video editor and to clutter up the UI with references to it? Not specifically related, but what's with the way that modifiers work? It's kind of like Maya's "history" except it's both better and worse. Unlike Maya, you can actually change the order of how modifiers are applied. But modifiers are really only good for specific things. In Maya, the history of an object is far more generalized. But overall, I want to see Blender succeed and maybe, just maybe knock things like Maya down a peg, even if it takes another 20 years.
justinclift 5y ago
Wonder if this will lead to a functional iOS port of Blender? Pretty much the whole reason I went with a MS Surface tablet instead of an iPad of some sort, was the lack of Blender.
- WORMS_EAT_WORMS 5y ago
  Probably more augmented reality tools
- singhrac 5y ago
  Would be pretty wild to have a full Blender running on my M1 iPad Pro, though I imagine touch controls are somewhat tricky (maybe pen only?).
  - bee_rider 5y ago
    The UI is pretty flexible -- each panel can be resized and the elements of a panel can be blown up/shrunken. It does it's best to reflow things sanely... with varying levels of success.
- SXX 5y ago
  Not unless Apple open up their locked-in platform. Blender licensed under GPLv2 or later and fortunately it's completely impossible to change source code license.
  - masalah 5y ago
    Could you please elaborate how does Blender's license prevent them from having an ios port?
    - SXX 5y ago
      Appstore rules are incompatible with GPL. There a lot of past discussions on this topic: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/more-about-the-app-store-gpl-enforcement https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/more-about-the-app-store...
programmarchy 5y ago
Would be awesome if Blender got native support for exporting to USDZ.
cdiamand 5y ago
It's great to see Blender get the support. The user numbers seem to be arcing upwards. https://www.blender.org/news/blender-by-the-numbers-2020/ https://www.blender.org/news/blender-by-the-numbers-2020/ If you've ever had a passing interest in Blender or 3d modeling I recommend checking out the donut tutorial, which is fast becoming the "hello world" of blender - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPrnSACiTJ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPrnSACiTJ4 And check out all the donuts - https://www.reddit.com/r/BlenderDoughnuts/ https://www.reddit.com/r/BlenderDoughnuts/
- washadjeffmad 5y ago
  I've been helping add it to University curriculum because it's enabled us to contract and hire really talented and motivated people without the vendor tax of 3ds Max or Maya, and they usually have broader skill sets that we can apply elsewhere. Not knocking all the amazing people who use other software, but if you want new opportunity, use Blender!
  - yreg 5y ago
    We had a class on Blender in high school (mandatory even!) and it was very popular. A lot of people in our school played with Blender in their free time in the following years.
    - cmarschner 5y ago
      Why would a Blender class in high school be mandatory??
      - BossingAround 5y ago
        We had a mandatory Java class, why not a 3D modeling class?
      - FearlessNebula 5y ago
        Why wouldn’t it be? There’s far less practical classes that were mandatory
xvilka 5y ago
Hopefully, projects like Krita[1] and GIMP[2] would get more funding like Blender as well. [1] https://krita.org/en/support-us/sponsors/ https://krita.org/en/support-us/sponsors/ [2] https://www.gimp.org/news/2021/07/27/support-gimp-developers-sustainable-development/ https://www.gimp.org/news/2021/07/27/support-gimp-developers...
- tdrdt 5y ago
  While I agree I think the reason a lot of big companies are funding Blender is because they use it internally as tool. I can imagine Photoshop is used internally at Apple and they will just pay a license for this. So there is no reason they would start funding Krita or Gimp.
  - literallyaduck 5y ago
    Imagine if companies who heavily used Photoshop funded GIMP at half the license rate, and companies who used Illustrator funded Inkscape at the same half license rate. Donating to LibreOffice at half the rate you pay to office 365. The free alternatives would surpass the paid versions.
    - dagmx 5y ago
      That's a lot of ifs. You'd also need to have people in influential positions in the project. Let's not sugar coat that GIMP and Blender both went to great lengths to eschew industry workflow and UI/UX norms. they both only started shifting to more familiar paradigms when grassroots movements within their user communities pushed hard for it. Development time and money are only half the battle. Project leadership and politics are an unquantifiable effort. Blender for example has been capable of great things for a long time. Its surge in popularity was largely down to giving up the ideologies of its unique workflow.
- hallarempt 5y ago
  If Apple gave me 120k a year and made a merge request for a Metal backend for Krita, I wouldn't say no to either, being Krita's maintainer.
defaultname 5y ago
Apple's software and hardware arcs are coalescing into them going all in on AR/VR. Things like LIDAR, Photogrammetry, spatial mapping, USDZ / PBR and friends all come across as pretty marginal novelties on smartphones, but they are all a part of that strategy, and will make much more sense with a headset. They're coming out of the gate with a robust ecosystem. Blender is obviously a huge component of the software stack.
- onelovetwo 5y ago
  It also helps blender is a competitor to Epic's Unreal
  - Arelius 5y ago
    Sort-of? They both compete in rendering, specifically for ArchVis. But otherwise they complement each other more than they compete. Likely why Epic is also a member of the Blender Development Fund.
  - SXX 5y ago
    I guess you confuse Blender 3D editor with Godot game engine. Blender had built-in game engine, but it's been frozen and removed few years ago. Also Epic is sponsoring Blender Fund too.
    - benjaminjackman 5y ago
      And Epic granted money to Godot: https://godotengine.org/article/godot-engine-was-awarded-epic-megagrant https://godotengine.org/article/godot-engine-was-awarded-epi...
      - Miraste 5y ago
        While it's great that Godot is getting better funding, that's about the worst insult I can think of. Epic is so confident that Godot will never be a serious competitor that they're giving them charity money. We'll see; there was a time when Autodesk viewed Blender as an also-ran too.
mathnode 5y ago
This is great. Highly unlikely, but maybe Apple could release some gems from the Shake code base into the Blender compositor?
- ink404 5y ago
  What is the Shake code base?
  - ur-whale 5y ago
    > What is the Shake code base? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_Real https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_Real https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shake_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shake_(software)
- ur-whale 5y ago
  > Apple could release some gems from the Shake code base into the Blender compositor You're assuming they still have a copy of the source code :( I'd love to see some of the Shake feature set make it into Blender: - node-to-code + code-to-node - 2.5D motion blur for transforms - general concatenation of image transforms for single pass resampling. - general C-style code expressions available in any text field of the UI and being able to reference any other variable in the entire UI - ability to call any function from libc / external DSO's directly from any text field in the UI. etc ...
  - mathnode 5y ago
    I’d love to take a look at it. Some bigger studios did buy copies of the source for $50k pet-site. It’s probably long gone.
- berkut 5y ago
  Very unlikely they'd use that code directly - would likely be easier to re-implement the features wanted natively in the blender codebase... On top of that, there were always suspicions that some of the Shake codebase didn't come from perfectly 'legal' origins from an IP perspective in the early days (its API was very similar to something Alias was working on at the time, and became Maya). I've heard rumours that was a reason the people responsible for Shake were never considered for SciTech awards.
ryanwhitney 5y ago
This is awesome. While far from a Mac app in terms of UI norms, I‘ve found blender to feel more at home on a Mac than expensive heavy hitters like Cinema 4D which still fails to render text and icons at a native resolution out of the box. I’m a very light 3D user, but I’ve been really impressed with it.
- heartbreak 5y ago
  Cinema 4D R25 (released at the end of last month) finally overhauled the user interface. It looks much better (and much more like Blender) on macOS now.
illwrks 5y ago
Blender is a fantastic piece of software. I've dabbled with it for years but the 3.83 version and higher with the improved UI has made it better. That coupled with some 3d printing marketplaces have made for some interesting experiments!
ur-whale 5y ago
This is great news. IMO, Blender is a greatly under-rated FOSS story, on par with the kernel and firefox.
elil17 5y ago
They may want to use it for TV production as well.
masalah 5y ago
Great news, Blender is an amazing piece of software that I always wanted to do more with but never eventually get the time/effort to learn.
dsizzle 5y ago
Kind of funny that the name of the Apple press contact person for this story on Blender is... Bender.
- yardshop 5y ago
  He's got an L in his first name, so a good anagram for him would be: Axe Blender!
- halfdaft 5y ago
  yeah, noticed that :)
- recentdarkness 5y ago
  First thing that popped into my too
- boopmaster 5y ago
  something of a blender bender
amelius 5y ago
The "problem" I have with Blender is that I can use it about once or twice a year, and of course every time I forget how it works (or the UI has been updated to include an even bigger maze of options). It would be great if Blender had an API on which someone could develop a more beginner-friendly UI. (Curious to know if that happens to be the case).
- frayesto 5y ago
  I think Blender does have a Python API [1]. I used this somewhat during my graduate school days to do rendering. [1]: https://docs.blender.org/api/current/index.html https://docs.blender.org/api/current/index.html
- outworlder 5y ago
  I have the same problem, but I am not sure other software is much better. Say Maya or 3DS Max. Try spending an year away and then come back to them :) Blender does seem to have a UI that's optimized for power users. It's amazing to see someone that's experienced working with it, seems to be very practical. Maybe there should be a 'beginner' view though, hiding some more 'esoteric' options.
- dorkwood 5y ago
  This guy has made a bunch of custom pie menus, which seems to be the kind of thing you're describing. https://github.com/HEAVYPOLY/HEAVYPOLY_Blender https://github.com/HEAVYPOLY/HEAVYPOLY_Blender
- hrnnnnnn 5y ago
  Check out bforartists, it's pretty much what you're describing. https://www.bforartists.de/ https://www.bforartists.de/
mekster 5y ago
I'm not a user but I know Blender had existed for quite a while but how is it gaining traction a lot these days suddenly? Is there something that makes it a first choice for many professional users?
- sprkwd 5y ago
  - It's cheaper than alternative with no subscription lockin - Faster updates - Quicker bug fixing - now works well in the pipeline - strong ecosystem
- nightcracker 5y ago
  From what I have read (I don't do 3D modeling myself) Blender has overhauled its UI significantly over the past couple of years to great praise of a lot of people.
  - sbuk 5y ago
    This is exactly the reason. Most 3D software has esoteric UIs, but Blender's workflow was extreme. Since its initial OSS release (2.4?) the UI has matured and changed significantly for the better. Its far more approachable now, and follows paradigms that every other solution does. It fits nicely in the pipeline alongside tools like Houdini.
syntaxing 5y ago
I really hope this means GPU support on macOS for blender is coming soon!
cmarschner 5y ago
I‘ve spent countless hours learning Blender over the past few months (being completely oblivious of other 3D software to that point), mostly through many excellent Youtube videos like from BlenderGuru, and I think it is the most wicket piece of software I have tried to learn in decades. It makes learning the fundamentals of vi a piece of cake. It has hundreds of features, dozens of property dialogs, and most of all it requires a very peculiar interaction style that is very different from 2D editors like the ones found in Office/Google docs. The difference is similar to switching from a notepad/Word paradigm of being in edit mode by default to switching to the command mode in vim. The most important learnings so far have been: - Instead of creating objects from scratch, the paradigm is to modify shapes, starting from a number of primitives. That’s why you get the “default cube” when you start it. An important operation is extrude, which copies the selected parts of a mesh and connects the copies to their original. So if you want to draw a curve, you place a default curve and then use an operation like extrude or subdivide to add new points. - There is a heavy interaction between mouse and keyboard. Depending on the task, it is vital to learn the keyboard shortcuts by heart. Those are often single keystrokes - e.g. tab for switching between object and mesh edit mode, 1/2/3 for switching between vertex/edge/face selection mode, g for moving the selected item, x/y/z to lock to an axis, x for delete, f for filling edges or faces into the mesh, e for extrude etc. while all of this is also possible to do with the mouse, there is a 10x productivity boost from learning the 10, 20 keystrokes that are used all the time. - It is highly extensible through plugins, mostly written in Python, though, unfortunately, lower layer operations are only exposed in C++. All of the youtube videos use one of the many screencasting plugins, which display the recent mouse buttons or key presses - it is a good idea to use a numpad, mainly to switch between different views The benefit: even with minimal manipulations in the lighting settings and the materials of the created objects, the renderer can already create raytraces that are absolutely jaw-dropping. But: Even after several months I still often ask myself “how do I tell it the computer”. I feel like I have barely scratched the surface of what the tool can do. Rendering pipelines? Sculpting mode? Probably 2022. Curious about the hottest tips from the HN users :-)
- runevault 5y ago
  Sculpting mode is worth learning. Grant Abbitt has some great tutorials on that front. Though if you dive too far into that you may wanna look at getting a Wacom tablet or similar. Actually Grant has a lot of good tutorials in general on Blender.
creamytaco 5y ago
Blender won, in a few years it will kill every and all competition. It is a great example of open source disrupting markets that have been traditionally entirely dominated by proprietary software.
schleck8 5y ago
The patrons are now: -Nvidia -Facebook -AMD -Amazon -Epic -Unity -Apple ... with Google, Intel, Microsoft and Adobe among the other sponsors. https://fund.blender.org/ https://fund.blender.org/
deleted 5y ago
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drawkbox 5y ago
Glad to see Apple supporting more open 3d tools. Apple was huge in getting open standards funded at Khronos for OpenGL ES, WebGL and more. These investments led to lots of great things and innovations. The market for 3d tools is one of the most fixed markets out there and the tools are expensive, that has caused interoperability issues and standards being more proprietary. For instance, COLLADA wasn't great but it was one standard they pretty much broke in favor of FBX, which is probably better but also less open/standard. Hopefully these investments can help change that in the 3d tools market a bit. Even getting your hands on Maya, 3ds Max, ZBrush, Houdini, Cinema4D, etc was difficult until recently. Blender might have made the pricing on those more competitive as well as Unity/Unreal opening up more on pricing. Blender is opening up 3d tools for all and that is a good thing. The app used to be a usability complexity problem but is getting very competitive in usability and less complex on entry. Tools are like games, they should be easy to approach and more advanced on the backend/detail to master for advanced users, simplicity should always be the goal for tools.
- Pulcinella 5y ago
  Cinema4D is still ~$100 a month unfortunately. I prefer it’s interface to Blender, even with Blender’s recent UI updates. I don’t think my preference is strong enough to support forking over $100/month, though. The others have a “lite” version or an indie subscription that is significantly cheaper. When you have those, and a lot of other software is is around $10-50 a month, C4D’s pricing is egregious.
  - sprkwd 5y ago
    Autodesk subs pricing is insane. https://www.autodesk.co.uk/products https://www.autodesk.co.uk/products
- neop1x 5y ago
  Except for OpenGL deprecation on Mac and forcing devs to use their proprietary Metal instead of cross-platform Vulkan...
bodge5000 5y ago
Its great to see that Blender is slowly but surely becoming an industry standard. I was talking to my younger brother about this the other day. He and his girlfriend have just finished Uni. My brother is trying to get into a career with CG for film, and his girlfriend into graphic design. Its not great for my brother as he does have to learn a few tools like Maya and the like, but 90% of his work has been in Blender, which is wonderful to see for someone who's been using Blender since the "old-old UI" days (you know the one) when it was considered as having no chance at being able to compete. But on the graphic design side, the walls are much higher. His girlfriend can't afford the adobe suite right now, but it would seem has no other option. I naively suggested looking at the open source offerings and was, in the politest way possible, essentially laughed out of the room. I was told it didn't matter if the tools were as good or even better than say Photoshop, because its not industry standard. Bonus points as well if you use the most expensive OS. I'm not sure how true it is that you can't get a job unless you use those tools personally as well, but I'm no expert and I imagine they'd know more about this than me. I thought it was funny to compare to programming, which I do know. There are industry standard languages, kind of, but all the ones that are industry standard (key word being standard, of course niche ones do apply) are all free. Bonus points if you use a free operating system. I know they're completely different fields, and what "works" for graphic design would never work for programming, I just thought it was funny
- dorkwood 5y ago
  Photoshop is no longer an industry-standard design tool, at least in digital. Most designers I know and work with use Figma, which is a browser-based collaborative design tool. It also has an unlimited free plan, which is great for students!
  - dagmx 5y ago
    Photoshop was never really a standard for the kinds of work Figma is used for. The closest Adobe historical products would be Illustrator, or the now defunct, Fireworks. Adobe doesn't really have a product to compare to Sketch or Figma. The closest currently is Xd but it's only a partial replacement
  - 5y ago
tomxor 5y ago
html, body { cursor: default; whyyy!?
zucker42 5y ago
The fact that Blender has been so successful has probably done immeasurable good for the graphical art industry. Think about how many students who otherwise couldn't have were able to learn 3D modeling because of the program. I know at least one person who's entering that field after learning Blender in their spare time. Honestly, I think Blender is one of the most successful open source projects of all time. It's such a good model for how open source can be successful.
devwastaken 5y ago
Autodesk continues to hurt itself in it's confusion. When I was in HS it was super easy to officially get their software as apart of a school. Now they require you to show student id's that many schools don't have, or give scanned documents of your attendance there. You know what students do? Pirate. Or just use blender. Nobody wants to use products they don't know, and by Autodesk being managed by old stupid people they hurt their future business. Same with Adobe. Fire yourselves and replace with engineers.
spikepuppet 5y ago
I used Blender for years in Uni and when I was trying to get my own little game studio going. It was an awesome tool, but (at least at the time) a little overwhelming. Just the amount of things you could do was amazing. And how you could extend it was awesome. So it makes me very happy to see Apple help fund it.
neotek 5y ago
Blender is truly one of the most incredible pieces of software I’ve ever used in my entire life. The user interface may look daunting at first glance, but it’s actually incredibly intuitive to use and contains a host of amazingly powerful features that I desperately wish would find their way into every other program I use. For example, absolutely any aspect of the interface can be bound to any key combination simply by right clicking on the control and choosing “assign keyboard shortcut”. You can adjust values, check and uncheck boxes, execute any menu command, trigger any action, and reconfigure it all on the fly in whichever way suits your workflow in that particular moment. Another example: every internal function is searchable and executable by hitting F3 and typing a fragment of the code path / menu item title / function name into the box provided. Can’t remember how to slide a vertex along an edge? Just hit F3 and type “ve sl” and the function you’re looking for will be right there at the top of the list. And another example: every input field can derive its value from simple Python calculations, called Drivers. Let’s say you have a 300 frame animation and you want to change the strength of a mesh deformation from 0 to 1 based on the current frame number. Rather than keyframing anything, you could simply enter ‘#frame / 300” into the deformation modifier’s strength input field and Blender will take care of the calculations for you. You can reference other input values by right clicking on that input and choosing “copy data path”, which will copy the internal reference to that particular piece of data to the clipboard so you can use it to power another input’s driver. So for the above example, if you weren’t sure how many frames your final animation was going to be and you didn’t want to have to go back and change the “300” every time you changed the animation length, you could simply copy the data path for the “frame end” input field and use that in the calculation instead, ie ‘#frame / bpy.context.scene.frame_end’ (that may not be the exact correct path, I’m describing this from memory just as an example of the concept). Every variable is exposed and can be referenced by almost any other variable. If your Driver is more complex than a one liner, you can open a fully featured driver editor window which lets you set and name variables within the driver’s scope, describe parametric functions, and tie multiple drivers together across multiple objects. Everything is extensible, everything is controllable, everything is connected to everything else — the power it gives you is simply unparalleled, I’ve never used any software of any kind that even came close to putting this much raw control into the user’s hand.
- 5y ago
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826 points by dagmx 5y ago

Apple also submitted a patch to port Cycles to run on Metal. https://developer.blender.org/T92212 https://developer.blender.org/T92212

valine 5y ago
Cycles is good first step if Apple wants to make blender fully functional on Mac. I wonder if they'll ever attempt to port Eevee to metal, that seems like the logical next step if Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS.
- JAlexoid 5y ago
  "Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS" - that would be a poor decision.... although, they really don't care for the pro market in any case.
  - striking 5y ago
    They've already deprecated OpenGL. Drivers on macOS are locked at OpenGL 4.1, which is missing a whole lot of nice features. Not because the hardware doesn't support them, but because Apple doesn't want to keep maintaining OpenGL. And why would they? OpenGL is really unpleasant from a hardware manufacturer's / integrator's / OS author's perspective, it makes app ports for mobile that much harder unless you're using GL ES, and Metal works and many apps have a Metal renderer now. If you find the mere idea of Metal distasteful because it's an API that can't be used on other platforms, you can use Vulkan and MoltenVK to get there. You're confusing not caring for the pro market with their approach to vertical integration. They care for the pro market, but they're not willing to compromise on ripping out what they consider to be dead weight.
    - hulitu 5y ago
      > And why would they? OpenGL is really unpleasant from a hardware manufacturer's / integrator's / OS author's perspective That's why it must be deprecated. Why do we need to reinvent the wheel over and over again ? I get it, X sucks and the answer to this is .... wayland. OpenGL sucks and the answer to this is ? DirectX ? Vulkan ? SDL ? Libcaca ? ( sorry i forgot ncurses). Just like an old builder: you have some bricks, use them.
      - viktorcode 5y ago
        Apple had their answer in form of Metal. Vulkan, DX12 came out later.
        JAlexoid 5y ago
        If memory serves - they introduced Metal as a high efficiency low level API for games, not a generic rendering API. Deprecating opengl was confusing for me.
        user-the-name 5y ago
        No, Metal is a general purpose 3D API, and has always been. Games are just one of the biggest things 3D APIs are used for, but Metal is for all uses.
      - rudedogg 5y ago
        I've only dabbled in GPU programming, but I think the issue is more serious than this. It's not really pointless churn. OpenGL was released 29 years ago, and the way GPUs work now vs then is massive. Apparently developers want low level access, and that is what Vulkan/Metal give them. As a user I wish Vulkan had a path without so much setup. I'm not sure if that's possible, or maybe it would defeat the purpose. It seems like it would be nice for hobbyists/beginners like me who just want to get a triangle on the screen and play with shaders though.
        5y ago
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    The pro market that matters has already added Metal support long time ago.
- kitsunesoba 5y ago
  Blender’s UI would also need to be ported to Metal, as that’s currently OpenGL if I’m not mistaken.
  - hallarempt 5y ago
    Everything Blender shows on screen is rendered using OpenGL.
- outworlder 5y ago
  > that seems like the logical next step if Apple wants to permanently remove OpenGL from macOS They should just allow third-party OpenGL implementations. OpenGL on OSX is stuck in the past. It would be great to see Metal die a fiery death too, and Vulkan being adopted. The current situation is just DirectX once again.
  - user-the-name 5y ago
    "Allow"? They aren't doing anything to disallow them? You can use ANGLE if you want, for instance? I wouldn't recommend using OpenGL for any new software, though, it is hopelessly clunky and outdated for modern applications.
progbits 5y ago
I guess some will see this as good news, but further entrenching Metal is just sad in my opinion. So much wasted effort just because they can't admit they lost the standards game and won't move to Vulkan. The generous interpretation is they just don't want to invest into that if it isn't "broken" but the cynic in me can't help but think at least part of the motivation is being different and maintaining the wall around the garden.
- user-the-name 5y ago
  Vulkan isn't a viable alternative for Apple. Apple wants to give developer an easy to use API to encourage them to use it as much as possible. Vulkan does not offer that.
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    Why didn't they just build a higher-level API on top of Vulkan then? Surely it's not a lack of developers, interest or resources, is it?
    - pjmlp 5y ago
      If they have to build their own snowflake on top of others API, specially since Khronos doesn't care about C++ as shading language, why bother?
  - cma 5y ago
    Nah they want lock in, in the Epic Suit Epic used almost none of their libs but had to use Metal to function, and they were about to extract leverage by pulling a dev license for desktop. All POSIX and Vulkan/OpenGL and they could have stayed safe.
- Encounter 5y ago
  Metal is by far a much friendlier API than Vulkan. Its approach with opt-in complexity is arguably the correct one. (Ever tried writing a Vulkan "Hello triangle" from scratch?) It's also gaining some nice features that are usable out of the gate, rather than waiting on Vulkan extension standardization and adoption. It simply makes the most sense for Apple.
heartbreak 5y ago
This is fantastic news. On Big Sur currently, it’s very difficult to get GPU rendering working with Blender.

npteljes 5y ago

It's very validating to see FOSS become industry standard. It's well deserved, and people also deserve to have legitimate free access.

yrgulation 5y ago

This is great news. Two features i’d love to see implemented are a dedicated retopo view and a sketchup like modelling view. I’d be willing to contribute financially to these two (don't have deep pockets but i’d spend 1k or two to have native support implemented).

msci100 5y ago

First time I'm hearing about Blender. Seems super cool. With a python API, would there be some automated way to turn drone footage into 3D environments?

ragebol 5y ago
Sure, but it seems you are looking for (monocular) SLAM?
- msci100 5y ago
  I was thinking more so to add 3d objects to previously recorded drone footage. Would SLAM be the best option there?
  - zachareid 5y ago
    This video is awesome for what it sounds like you're trying to do. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY8Ol2n4o4A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY8Ol2n4o4A
  - avhon1 5y ago
    SLAM would be to build a 3D model of what you filmed with a drone. Adding CGI to drone footage doesn't require that, and is absolutely something Blender can do. Look at its motion/camera tracking features.

punkbit 5y ago

Great news! Always been a fan of Blender Foundation :)

netol 5y ago

In the website, Apple lists "Alex Bender" as press contact. Interesting coincidence.

agumonkey 5y ago

Kudos to the creator for pursuing his original vision. Immense success :)

mimsee 5y ago

> ... Apple has joined the Blender Development Fund as a Patron Member. To find out what "Patron Member" means, it's 120k or more per year[0]. It's the highest corporate tier Blender has. Nice to see Apple supporting open-source. [0]: https://fund.blender.org/corporate-memberships/ https://fund.blender.org/corporate-memberships/

prox 5y ago
It’s great positive advert for Apple, and also no money for them. Not even a blip on their balance sheet. If they are going to contribute, that would be interesting.
- novok 5y ago
  Cheaper than hiring one engineer to work on custom improvements on it.
PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
> Nice to see Apple supporting open-source. ... in a domain where they have either no products or their own products have clearly failed to obtain traction. Not going to happen for anything where there's an even reasonably successful Apple product, I think we can be sure of that. So yes, it is really nice to see Apple supporting Blender but let's not confuse that with open source/libre software in general.
- azinman2 5y ago
  Damned if you do, damned if you don’t.
  - justicezyx 5y ago
    And: Downvoted whatsoever... Edit: And it indeed is downvoted whatsoever...
  - PaulDavisThe1st 5y ago
    No damnation involved. Just clarity about what "supporting open source" means in the context of Apple.

webmobdev 5y ago

Probably just to make sure that Blender remains available for their platform. If popular programs aren't available for their ARM / macOS platform, it can hurt them. Good for Blender.

all2 5y ago
Another comment in this thread speaks directly to this concern. Though, I would argue the move is likely also part of a larger move back into the "creative market" of designers, cinematography, etc.
outworlder 5y ago
> If popular programs aren't available for their ARM Not a problem. M1 blender benchmarks were already smoking the x86 Macs, despite the fact Blender was running on M1 with Rosetta. A native build is obviously better of course. But OSX ports are a bigger deal, in general, than the CPU architecture.
- LysPJ 5y ago
  In case any readers were wondering, Blender LTS Release 2.93 has native support for Apple Silicon.

astlouis44 5y ago

Apple is getting more serious about 3D and the gaming market, which isn’t surprising considering the market size.

zitterbewegung 5y ago
More and more devices from Apple are getting LiDAR sensors so it makes sense to support it. Apple also is taking open source more seriously .
- JAlexoid 5y ago
  Still waiting for FOSS version of Facetime ;)
  - FreezingKeeper 5y ago
    https://appleinsider.com/articles/10/06/07/apple_announces_open_standard_facetime_video_chat_for_iphone_4 https://appleinsider.com/articles/10/06/07/apple_announces_o... for those that don’t get the reference
  - wlesieutre 5y ago
    You can thank software patents for that https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/01/08/apple-denied-new-virnetx-facetime-patent-trial https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/01/08/apple-denied-new-...
ravenstine 5y ago
It definitely makes sense. Recently I had a need for a CAD program and rediscovered how insanely expensive commercial 3D software is for the average person. Sure, many companies now offer monthly subscriptions, but even those subscriptions are ginormous for the amount of relative value returned. Like, do I really want to pay $220 a month for AutoCAD when I only need to design a part for a non-commercial personal project every so often? I'm sure even a lot of small companies secretly pirate such software, especially if they are relying on something like Solidworks. I really don't know how anyone affords that package. And yes, there are sometimes free student editions of these packages, but unlike 15 years ago it's tough to get a hold of them without an email from an academic institution the company has verified. In my case, I was looking at AutoCAD because FreeCAD is... well, pretty terrible as a n00b. From what I can tell it works very differently in many ways from standard CAD applications. It's good for converting between formats, but it's not at all intuitive and seemingly minor actions with nothing but a cube in the workspace can cause it to go into a tizzy and completely freeze. EDIT: Ultimately I ended up using OpenSCAD. Commercial 3D software isn't even necessarily better, though. I know I yakked on about CAD, but I have a sort of background in Animation and used Autodesk Maya for many years, which would be the closest direct competitor to Blender. Dear lord, what a disaster of a software package. Granted, I haven't used it since the 2018 edition, but it's astoundingly bad in many areas. The main reason it's so widely used is that it's established and is capable of just about anything. The downside is that, like AutoCAD, the slightest breeze can make it crash unexpectedly. Anyone smart will save their scenes in ASCII format because who knows, something might go wrong during the saving process that makes your scene unable to open when you reboot Maya, and looking through the text-version of your scene may be the only way to fix or recover anything. That's not even all of it. And Maya is also very expensive. Unless you are a student, the only way to use Maya on a hobbyist level is to pirate it. Having switched entirely to Blender, although there's things about it that I still find unintuitive, it's a breath of fresh air having come from Maya. Unlike Maya, it's rare that anything I do will cause Blender to freeze or crash. The default viewport rendering not only looks better than Maya's "viewport 2.0" but just seems snappier. What I don't like about Blender is that it tries to do too much IMO. Does Blender really need a video editor and to clutter up the UI with references to it? Not specifically related, but what's with the way that modifiers work? It's kind of like Maya's "history" except it's both better and worse. Unlike Maya, you can actually change the order of how modifiers are applied. But modifiers are really only good for specific things. In Maya, the history of an object is far more generalized. But overall, I want to see Blender succeed and maybe, just maybe knock things like Maya down a peg, even if it takes another 20 years.

justinclift 5y ago

Wonder if this will lead to a functional iOS port of Blender? Pretty much the whole reason I went with a MS Surface tablet instead of an iPad of some sort, was the lack of Blender.

WORMS_EAT_WORMS 5y ago
Probably more augmented reality tools
singhrac 5y ago
Would be pretty wild to have a full Blender running on my M1 iPad Pro, though I imagine touch controls are somewhat tricky (maybe pen only?).
- bee_rider 5y ago
  The UI is pretty flexible -- each panel can be resized and the elements of a panel can be blown up/shrunken. It does it's best to reflow things sanely... with varying levels of success.
SXX 5y ago
Not unless Apple open up their locked-in platform. Blender licensed under GPLv2 or later and fortunately it's completely impossible to change source code license.
- masalah 5y ago
  Could you please elaborate how does Blender's license prevent them from having an ios port?
  - SXX 5y ago
    Appstore rules are incompatible with GPL. There a lot of past discussions on this topic: https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/more-about-the-app-store-gpl-enforcement https://www.fsf.org/blogs/licensing/more-about-the-app-store...

programmarchy 5y ago

Would be awesome if Blender got native support for exporting to USDZ.

cdiamand 5y ago

It's great to see Blender get the support. The user numbers seem to be arcing upwards. https://www.blender.org/news/blender-by-the-numbers-2020/ https://www.blender.org/news/blender-by-the-numbers-2020/ If you've ever had a passing interest in Blender or 3d modeling I recommend checking out the donut tutorial, which is fast becoming the "hello world" of blender - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPrnSACiTJ4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPrnSACiTJ4 And check out all the donuts - https://www.reddit.com/r/BlenderDoughnuts/ https://www.reddit.com/r/BlenderDoughnuts/

washadjeffmad 5y ago
I've been helping add it to University curriculum because it's enabled us to contract and hire really talented and motivated people without the vendor tax of 3ds Max or Maya, and they usually have broader skill sets that we can apply elsewhere. Not knocking all the amazing people who use other software, but if you want new opportunity, use Blender!
- yreg 5y ago
  We had a class on Blender in high school (mandatory even!) and it was very popular. A lot of people in our school played with Blender in their free time in the following years.
  - cmarschner 5y ago
    Why would a Blender class in high school be mandatory??
    - BossingAround 5y ago
      We had a mandatory Java class, why not a 3D modeling class?
    - FearlessNebula 5y ago
      Why wouldn’t it be? There’s far less practical classes that were mandatory

xvilka 5y ago

Hopefully, projects like Krita[1] and GIMP[2] would get more funding like Blender as well. [1] https://krita.org/en/support-us/sponsors/ https://krita.org/en/support-us/sponsors/ [2] https://www.gimp.org/news/2021/07/27/support-gimp-developers-sustainable-development/ https://www.gimp.org/news/2021/07/27/support-gimp-developers...

tdrdt 5y ago
While I agree I think the reason a lot of big companies are funding Blender is because they use it internally as tool. I can imagine Photoshop is used internally at Apple and they will just pay a license for this. So there is no reason they would start funding Krita or Gimp.
- literallyaduck 5y ago
  Imagine if companies who heavily used Photoshop funded GIMP at half the license rate, and companies who used Illustrator funded Inkscape at the same half license rate. Donating to LibreOffice at half the rate you pay to office 365. The free alternatives would surpass the paid versions.
  - dagmx 5y ago
    That's a lot of ifs. You'd also need to have people in influential positions in the project. Let's not sugar coat that GIMP and Blender both went to great lengths to eschew industry workflow and UI/UX norms. they both only started shifting to more familiar paradigms when grassroots movements within their user communities pushed hard for it. Development time and money are only half the battle. Project leadership and politics are an unquantifiable effort. Blender for example has been capable of great things for a long time. Its surge in popularity was largely down to giving up the ideologies of its unique workflow.
hallarempt 5y ago
If Apple gave me 120k a year and made a merge request for a Metal backend for Krita, I wouldn't say no to either, being Krita's maintainer.

defaultname 5y ago

Apple's software and hardware arcs are coalescing into them going all in on AR/VR. Things like LIDAR, Photogrammetry, spatial mapping, USDZ / PBR and friends all come across as pretty marginal novelties on smartphones, but they are all a part of that strategy, and will make much more sense with a headset. They're coming out of the gate with a robust ecosystem. Blender is obviously a huge component of the software stack.

onelovetwo 5y ago
It also helps blender is a competitor to Epic's Unreal
- Arelius 5y ago
  Sort-of? They both compete in rendering, specifically for ArchVis. But otherwise they complement each other more than they compete. Likely why Epic is also a member of the Blender Development Fund.
- SXX 5y ago
  I guess you confuse Blender 3D editor with Godot game engine. Blender had built-in game engine, but it's been frozen and removed few years ago. Also Epic is sponsoring Blender Fund too.
  - benjaminjackman 5y ago
    And Epic granted money to Godot: https://godotengine.org/article/godot-engine-was-awarded-epic-megagrant https://godotengine.org/article/godot-engine-was-awarded-epi...
    - Miraste 5y ago
      While it's great that Godot is getting better funding, that's about the worst insult I can think of. Epic is so confident that Godot will never be a serious competitor that they're giving them charity money. We'll see; there was a time when Autodesk viewed Blender as an also-ran too.

mathnode 5y ago

This is great. Highly unlikely, but maybe Apple could release some gems from the Shake code base into the Blender compositor?

ink404 5y ago
What is the Shake code base?
- ur-whale 5y ago
  > What is the Shake code base? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_Real https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nothing_Real https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shake_(software) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shake_(software)
ur-whale 5y ago
> Apple could release some gems from the Shake code base into the Blender compositor You're assuming they still have a copy of the source code :( I'd love to see some of the Shake feature set make it into Blender: - node-to-code + code-to-node - 2.5D motion blur for transforms - general concatenation of image transforms for single pass resampling. - general C-style code expressions available in any text field of the UI and being able to reference any other variable in the entire UI - ability to call any function from libc / external DSO's directly from any text field in the UI. etc ...
- mathnode 5y ago
  I’d love to take a look at it. Some bigger studios did buy copies of the source for $50k pet-site. It’s probably long gone.
berkut 5y ago
Very unlikely they'd use that code directly - would likely be easier to re-implement the features wanted natively in the blender codebase... On top of that, there were always suspicions that some of the Shake codebase didn't come from perfectly 'legal' origins from an IP perspective in the early days (its API was very similar to something Alias was working on at the time, and became Maya). I've heard rumours that was a reason the people responsible for Shake were never considered for SciTech awards.

ryanwhitney 5y ago

This is awesome. While far from a Mac app in terms of UI norms, I‘ve found blender to feel more at home on a Mac than expensive heavy hitters like Cinema 4D which still fails to render text and icons at a native resolution out of the box. I’m a very light 3D user, but I’ve been really impressed with it.

heartbreak 5y ago
Cinema 4D R25 (released at the end of last month) finally overhauled the user interface. It looks much better (and much more like Blender) on macOS now.

illwrks 5y ago

Blender is a fantastic piece of software. I've dabbled with it for years but the 3.83 version and higher with the improved UI has made it better. That coupled with some 3d printing marketplaces have made for some interesting experiments!

ur-whale 5y ago

This is great news. IMO, Blender is a greatly under-rated FOSS story, on par with the kernel and firefox.

elil17 5y ago

They may want to use it for TV production as well.

masalah 5y ago

Great news, Blender is an amazing piece of software that I always wanted to do more with but never eventually get the time/effort to learn.

dsizzle 5y ago

Kind of funny that the name of the Apple press contact person for this story on Blender is... Bender.

yardshop 5y ago
He's got an L in his first name, so a good anagram for him would be: Axe Blender!
halfdaft 5y ago
yeah, noticed that :)
recentdarkness 5y ago
First thing that popped into my too
boopmaster 5y ago
something of a blender bender

amelius 5y ago

The "problem" I have with Blender is that I can use it about once or twice a year, and of course every time I forget how it works (or the UI has been updated to include an even bigger maze of options). It would be great if Blender had an API on which someone could develop a more beginner-friendly UI. (Curious to know if that happens to be the case).

frayesto 5y ago
I think Blender does have a Python API [1]. I used this somewhat during my graduate school days to do rendering. [1]: https://docs.blender.org/api/current/index.html https://docs.blender.org/api/current/index.html
outworlder 5y ago
I have the same problem, but I am not sure other software is much better. Say Maya or 3DS Max. Try spending an year away and then come back to them :) Blender does seem to have a UI that's optimized for power users. It's amazing to see someone that's experienced working with it, seems to be very practical. Maybe there should be a 'beginner' view though, hiding some more 'esoteric' options.
dorkwood 5y ago
This guy has made a bunch of custom pie menus, which seems to be the kind of thing you're describing. https://github.com/HEAVYPOLY/HEAVYPOLY_Blender https://github.com/HEAVYPOLY/HEAVYPOLY_Blender
hrnnnnnn 5y ago
Check out bforartists, it's pretty much what you're describing. https://www.bforartists.de/ https://www.bforartists.de/

mekster 5y ago

I'm not a user but I know Blender had existed for quite a while but how is it gaining traction a lot these days suddenly? Is there something that makes it a first choice for many professional users?

sprkwd 5y ago
- It's cheaper than alternative with no subscription lockin - Faster updates - Quicker bug fixing - now works well in the pipeline - strong ecosystem
nightcracker 5y ago
From what I have read (I don't do 3D modeling myself) Blender has overhauled its UI significantly over the past couple of years to great praise of a lot of people.
- sbuk 5y ago
  This is exactly the reason. Most 3D software has esoteric UIs, but Blender's workflow was extreme. Since its initial OSS release (2.4?) the UI has matured and changed significantly for the better. Its far more approachable now, and follows paradigms that every other solution does. It fits nicely in the pipeline alongside tools like Houdini.

syntaxing 5y ago

I really hope this means GPU support on macOS for blender is coming soon!

cmarschner 5y ago

I‘ve spent countless hours learning Blender over the past few months (being completely oblivious of other 3D software to that point), mostly through many excellent Youtube videos like from BlenderGuru, and I think it is the most wicket piece of software I have tried to learn in decades. It makes learning the fundamentals of vi a piece of cake. It has hundreds of features, dozens of property dialogs, and most of all it requires a very peculiar interaction style that is very different from 2D editors like the ones found in Office/Google docs. The difference is similar to switching from a notepad/Word paradigm of being in edit mode by default to switching to the command mode in vim. The most important learnings so far have been: - Instead of creating objects from scratch, the paradigm is to modify shapes, starting from a number of primitives. That’s why you get the “default cube” when you start it. An important operation is extrude, which copies the selected parts of a mesh and connects the copies to their original. So if you want to draw a curve, you place a default curve and then use an operation like extrude or subdivide to add new points. - There is a heavy interaction between mouse and keyboard. Depending on the task, it is vital to learn the keyboard shortcuts by heart. Those are often single keystrokes - e.g. tab for switching between object and mesh edit mode, 1/2/3 for switching between vertex/edge/face selection mode, g for moving the selected item, x/y/z to lock to an axis, x for delete, f for filling edges or faces into the mesh, e for extrude etc. while all of this is also possible to do with the mouse, there is a 10x productivity boost from learning the 10, 20 keystrokes that are used all the time. - It is highly extensible through plugins, mostly written in Python, though, unfortunately, lower layer operations are only exposed in C++. All of the youtube videos use one of the many screencasting plugins, which display the recent mouse buttons or key presses - it is a good idea to use a numpad, mainly to switch between different views The benefit: even with minimal manipulations in the lighting settings and the materials of the created objects, the renderer can already create raytraces that are absolutely jaw-dropping. But: Even after several months I still often ask myself “how do I tell it the computer”. I feel like I have barely scratched the surface of what the tool can do. Rendering pipelines? Sculpting mode? Probably 2022. Curious about the hottest tips from the HN users :-)

runevault 5y ago
Sculpting mode is worth learning. Grant Abbitt has some great tutorials on that front. Though if you dive too far into that you may wanna look at getting a Wacom tablet or similar. Actually Grant has a lot of good tutorials in general on Blender.

creamytaco 5y ago

Blender won, in a few years it will kill every and all competition. It is a great example of open source disrupting markets that have been traditionally entirely dominated by proprietary software.

schleck8 5y ago

The patrons are now: -Nvidia -Facebook -AMD -Amazon -Epic -Unity -Apple ... with Google, Intel, Microsoft and Adobe among the other sponsors. https://fund.blender.org/ https://fund.blender.org/

deleted 5y ago

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drawkbox 5y ago

Glad to see Apple supporting more open 3d tools. Apple was huge in getting open standards funded at Khronos for OpenGL ES, WebGL and more. These investments led to lots of great things and innovations. The market for 3d tools is one of the most fixed markets out there and the tools are expensive, that has caused interoperability issues and standards being more proprietary. For instance, COLLADA wasn't great but it was one standard they pretty much broke in favor of FBX, which is probably better but also less open/standard. Hopefully these investments can help change that in the 3d tools market a bit. Even getting your hands on Maya, 3ds Max, ZBrush, Houdini, Cinema4D, etc was difficult until recently. Blender might have made the pricing on those more competitive as well as Unity/Unreal opening up more on pricing. Blender is opening up 3d tools for all and that is a good thing. The app used to be a usability complexity problem but is getting very competitive in usability and less complex on entry. Tools are like games, they should be easy to approach and more advanced on the backend/detail to master for advanced users, simplicity should always be the goal for tools.

Pulcinella 5y ago
Cinema4D is still ~$100 a month unfortunately. I prefer it’s interface to Blender, even with Blender’s recent UI updates. I don’t think my preference is strong enough to support forking over $100/month, though. The others have a “lite” version or an indie subscription that is significantly cheaper. When you have those, and a lot of other software is is around $10-50 a month, C4D’s pricing is egregious.
- sprkwd 5y ago
  Autodesk subs pricing is insane. https://www.autodesk.co.uk/products https://www.autodesk.co.uk/products
neop1x 5y ago
Except for OpenGL deprecation on Mac and forcing devs to use their proprietary Metal instead of cross-platform Vulkan...

bodge5000 5y ago

Its great to see that Blender is slowly but surely becoming an industry standard. I was talking to my younger brother about this the other day. He and his girlfriend have just finished Uni. My brother is trying to get into a career with CG for film, and his girlfriend into graphic design. Its not great for my brother as he does have to learn a few tools like Maya and the like, but 90% of his work has been in Blender, which is wonderful to see for someone who's been using Blender since the "old-old UI" days (you know the one) when it was considered as having no chance at being able to compete. But on the graphic design side, the walls are much higher. His girlfriend can't afford the adobe suite right now, but it would seem has no other option. I naively suggested looking at the open source offerings and was, in the politest way possible, essentially laughed out of the room. I was told it didn't matter if the tools were as good or even better than say Photoshop, because its not industry standard. Bonus points as well if you use the most expensive OS. I'm not sure how true it is that you can't get a job unless you use those tools personally as well, but I'm no expert and I imagine they'd know more about this than me. I thought it was funny to compare to programming, which I do know. There are industry standard languages, kind of, but all the ones that are industry standard (key word being standard, of course niche ones do apply) are all free. Bonus points if you use a free operating system. I know they're completely different fields, and what "works" for graphic design would never work for programming, I just thought it was funny

dorkwood 5y ago
Photoshop is no longer an industry-standard design tool, at least in digital. Most designers I know and work with use Figma, which is a browser-based collaborative design tool. It also has an unlimited free plan, which is great for students!
- dagmx 5y ago
  Photoshop was never really a standard for the kinds of work Figma is used for. The closest Adobe historical products would be Illustrator, or the now defunct, Fireworks. Adobe doesn't really have a product to compare to Sketch or Figma. The closest currently is Xd but it's only a partial replacement
- 5y ago

tomxor 5y ago

html, body { cursor: default; whyyy!?

zucker42 5y ago

The fact that Blender has been so successful has probably done immeasurable good for the graphical art industry. Think about how many students who otherwise couldn't have were able to learn 3D modeling because of the program. I know at least one person who's entering that field after learning Blender in their spare time. Honestly, I think Blender is one of the most successful open source projects of all time. It's such a good model for how open source can be successful.

devwastaken 5y ago

Autodesk continues to hurt itself in it's confusion. When I was in HS it was super easy to officially get their software as apart of a school. Now they require you to show student id's that many schools don't have, or give scanned documents of your attendance there. You know what students do? Pirate. Or just use blender. Nobody wants to use products they don't know, and by Autodesk being managed by old stupid people they hurt their future business. Same with Adobe. Fire yourselves and replace with engineers.

spikepuppet 5y ago

I used Blender for years in Uni and when I was trying to get my own little game studio going. It was an awesome tool, but (at least at the time) a little overwhelming. Just the amount of things you could do was amazing. And how you could extend it was awesome. So it makes me very happy to see Apple help fund it.

neotek 5y ago

Blender is truly one of the most incredible pieces of software I’ve ever used in my entire life. The user interface may look daunting at first glance, but it’s actually incredibly intuitive to use and contains a host of amazingly powerful features that I desperately wish would find their way into every other program I use. For example, absolutely any aspect of the interface can be bound to any key combination simply by right clicking on the control and choosing “assign keyboard shortcut”. You can adjust values, check and uncheck boxes, execute any menu command, trigger any action, and reconfigure it all on the fly in whichever way suits your workflow in that particular moment. Another example: every internal function is searchable and executable by hitting F3 and typing a fragment of the code path / menu item title / function name into the box provided. Can’t remember how to slide a vertex along an edge? Just hit F3 and type “ve sl” and the function you’re looking for will be right there at the top of the list. And another example: every input field can derive its value from simple Python calculations, called Drivers. Let’s say you have a 300 frame animation and you want to change the strength of a mesh deformation from 0 to 1 based on the current frame number. Rather than keyframing anything, you could simply enter ‘#frame / 300” into the deformation modifier’s strength input field and Blender will take care of the calculations for you. You can reference other input values by right clicking on that input and choosing “copy data path”, which will copy the internal reference to that particular piece of data to the clipboard so you can use it to power another input’s driver. So for the above example, if you weren’t sure how many frames your final animation was going to be and you didn’t want to have to go back and change the “300” every time you changed the animation length, you could simply copy the data path for the “frame end” input field and use that in the calculation instead, ie ‘#frame / bpy.context.scene.frame_end’ (that may not be the exact correct path, I’m describing this from memory just as an example of the concept). Every variable is exposed and can be referenced by almost any other variable. If your Driver is more complex than a one liner, you can open a fully featured driver editor window which lets you set and name variables within the driver’s scope, describe parametric functions, and tie multiple drivers together across multiple objects. Everything is extensible, everything is controllable, everything is connected to everything else — the power it gives you is simply unparalleled, I’ve never used any software of any kind that even came close to putting this much raw control into the user’s hand.

5y ago

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