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As someone using Blender for ~7 years, with over 1000 answers on Blender Stack Exchange and total score of 48.000: This tool is maybe useful if you want to lea
by Etherlord87 1y ago
As someone using Blender for ~7 years, with over 1000 answers on Blender Stack Exchange and total score of 48.000:
This tool is maybe useful if you want to learn Python, in particular Blender Python API basics, I don't really see other usage of this. All examples given are extremely simple to do; please don't use a tool like this, because it takes your prompt and generates the most bland version of it possible. It really takes only about a day to go through some tutorials and learn how to make models like these in Blender, with solid color or some basic textures. The other thousands of days is what you would spend on creating correct topology, making an armature, animating, making more advanced shaders, creating parametric geometry nodes setups... But simple models like these you can create effortlessly, and those will be YOUR models, the way (roughly, of course) how you imagined them. After a few weeks you're probably going to model them faster than the time it takes for prompt engineering. By that time your imagination, skill in Blender and understanding of 3D technicalities will improve, and it will keep improving moving onward. And what will you learn using this AI?
I think meshy.ai is much more promising, but still I think I'd only consider using it if I wanted to convert photo/render into a mesh with a texture properly positioned onto it, to then refine the mesh by sculpting - and sculpting is one of my weakest skills in Blender. BTW I made a test showcasing how meshy.ai works: https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/319797/60486 https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/319797/60486
- sbarre 1y agoYeah but remember this tool is, today, the worst it will ever be. This kind of work will only improve, and we're in early days for these kinds of applications of LLM tech.
- jappgar 1y agoLLMs aren't suited to this, just like they aren't suited to generating images (different models do the hard work, even when you're using an LLM interface). I agree with the parent comment. This might be neat to learn the basics of blender scripting, but it's an incredibly inefficient and clumsy way of making anything worthwhile.
- ghurtado 1y agoRight. This is like training an AI on being an Excel expert, and then ask it to make Doom for you: You're gonna get some result, and it will be impressive given the constraints. It's also going to be pure dog shit that will never see the light of day other than as a meme.
- sbarre 1y agoThat's fair, and perhaps a different kind of multi-modal model will emerge that is better at learning and interacting with UIs.. Or maybe applications will develop new interfaces to meet LLMs in the middle, sort of how MCP servers are a very primitive version of that for APIs.. Future improvements don't just have to be a better version of exactly what it is today, it can certainly mean changing or combining approaches. Leaving AI/LLM aside, 3D modeling and animation tech has drastically evolved over the years, removing the need for lots of manual and complicated work by automating or simplifying the workflow for achieving better results.
- latexr 1y agoI wish that “it will get better” wasn’t the response every time someone shares actionable advice and thoughtful specific criticism about the state of the art. You don’t know if it will get better. Even if it does, you don’t know by how much or the time frame. You don’t know if it will ever improve enough to overcome the current limitations. You don’t know if it will take years. In the meantime, while someone is sitting on their ass for years waiting for the uncertain future of the tool getting better, someone else is getting their hands dirty, learning the craft, improving, having fun, collaborating, creating. There is plenty of garbage out there where we were promised “it will only get better”, “in five years (eternally five years away) it will take over the world”, and now they’re dead. Where’s the metaverse NFT web3 future? Thrown into a trash can and lit on fire, replaced by the next embarrassment of chatting with porn versions of your step mom. https://old.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1mrygl4/this_is_fucking_insane/ https://old.reddit.com/r/singularity/comments/1mrygl4/this_i...
- soulofmischief 1y agoOn the other hand, as both an artist and machine learning practitioner, I think most artists are only seeing the surface layer here and have little insight on its derivative, the algorithms and state of research which are advancing the state of the art on a weekly basis. It'll never be obvious that we're at the critical moment because critical phase changes happen all at once, suddenly, out of nowhere. There is an insane amount of low-hanging fruit right now, and potentially decades or centuries of very important math to be worked out around optimal learning strategies, but it's clear that we do have a very strong likelihood of our ways of life being fundamentally altered by these technologies. I mean already, artists are suddenly having to grip with all sorts of new and forgotten questions around artistic identity and integrity, what qualifies as art, who qualifies as an artist... Generative technology has already made artists begin to question and radically redefine the nature of art, and if it's good enough to do that, I think it's already worth serious consideration. These technologies, even in current form, were considered science fiction or literal magic up until very recently.
- latexr 1y ago> I think most artists are only seeing the surface layer here and have little insight on its derivative (…) > Generative technology has already made artists begin to question and radically redefine the nature of art (…) So which is it? Are artist not understanding the potential of the technology, or are they so flabbergasted they are redefining the nature of art? It can’t be both. > There is an insane amount of low-hanging fruit right now Precisely. What I’m criticising is the generic low-effort response of assuming that being able to pick low-hanging fruit now indicates with certainty that the high-hanging fruit will be picked soon. It doesn’t. As an exaggerated analogy, building the first paper airplane or boat might’ve been fun and impressive, but it was in no way an indication we’d be able to construct rockets or submarines. We eventually did, but it took a very long time and completely different technology. To really drive the point home, my comment wasn’t specifically about art or LLMs or the user I replied to. What I am against is the lazy hand-wavy extrapolation which is used to justify anything. As long as you say it’s five years away, you can shut down any interesting discussion. > These technologies, even in current form, were considered science fiction or literal magic up until very recently. I don’t recall science fiction or magical stories—not any that weren’t written as cautionary tales or about revolution, anyway—which had talking robots which were wrong most of the time yet spoke authoritatively; convinced people to inadvertently poison or kill themselves and others; were used for spam and disinformation on a large scale; and accelerated the concentration of power for the very few at the top. Not every science fiction is good. In fact, plenty of it is very very bad. There’s a reason the Torment Nexus is a meme.
- voxleone 1y agoIt's a neat tool. But i suspect it can only ever be as good as Blender. Of course I could be wrong.
- Etherlord87 1y agoPython is Turing-complete, so everything is possible, but the tool has a long way to go.
- blakcod 1y agoLet’s be honest most are just looking to get acquired. Then enshittified.
- ghurtado 1y ago> Yeah but remember this tool is, today, the worst it will ever be. True. And it if it stops to be a path forward because a better approach is found (something more likely than not), then this is also the best it will ever be.
- parineum 1y agoHammers have existed for thousands of years and still can't do my laundry.
- dash2 1y agoWhat if I don't want to spend a few weeks learning Blender? What if I just want to spend a couple of hours and get something that's good enough?
- numpad0 1y agoThen you don't get any positive recognitions for the product anyway.
- ghurtado 1y agoIf you think the results in that page are "good enough", then I assure you, as a heavy blender and Gen AI user, that it would take you much less time to get this good at blender (about Logo turtle level) than it would to figure out how to run this model yourself locally, with all the headaches attached. Without question.
- raincole 1y agoThe best thing you can do is to just make money. I am serious. The current 3D GenAI isn't that good. And if when they eventually become good enough they won't be very cheap to run locally, at least for quite a while. You just need to wait & hoard spare cash. Learning how to use the current models is like trying to get GPT1 to write code for you.
- spiralcoaster 1y agoSounds like you're looking for something like an asset store, or open source models.
- exasperaited 1y ago... is like... What if I don't want to learn guitar? What if I just want to spend a couple of hours and get something that sounds like guitar? I tend to say in this situation: you can do that. Nobody's stopping you. But you shouldn't expect wider culture to treat you like you've done the work. So what new creative work are you seeking to do with the time you've saved?
- dash2 1y ago
- jimmis 1y agoAs a designer/dev working on AI for customer service tools, who has to constantly reminding stakeholders that LLMs aren't creative, aren't good at steering conversations, etc. I wish there was more focus on integrating AI into tools in ways that make work faster, rather than trying to do-it-all. There's still so much low-hanging fruit out there. Other than the obvious (IDEs), wish there were more tools like Fusion360's ai auto-constraints. Saves so much time on something that is mostly tedious and uncreative. I could see similar integrations for Blender (honestly the most interesting part of what op posted is changing the materials... could save a lot of time spent connecting noodles).
- btown 1y agoI think there’s a really interesting point here that even if a model is capable of planning and reasoning, part of the skillset of a creator is that asking for the right thing requires an understanding of how that model is creating its artifacts. And in 3D, you won’t be able to do that without understanding, as an operator, what you’d want to ask for. Do you want this specific part to be made parametrically in a specific way for future flexibility, animation, or rendering? When? Why? And do these understandings of techniques give you creative ideas? A model trained solely on the visual outcome won’t add these constraints unless you know to ask for them. Even if future iterations of this technology become more advanced and can generate complex models, you need to develop a skillset to be able to gauge and plan around how they fit into your larger vision. And that skillset requires fundamentals.
- myhf 1y agoThe article is about language models. Language models are not capable of planning or reasoning.
- Etherlord87 1y agoIt depends on the definitions of these words. Basically, AI pretends to be a human, it pretends to think, it pretends to plan and reason. In a few last years we've pushed this pretending quite far.
- overfeed 1y ago> I don't really see other usage of this My hot-take: this is the future of high-fidelity prompt-based image generation, and not diffusion models. Cycles (or any other physically based renderer) is superior to diffusion models because it is not probabilistic, so scene generation via LLM before handing to off to a tool leads to superior results, IMO - at least for "realistic" outputs.
- ghurtado 1y ago> My hot-take: this is the future of high-fidelity prompt-based image generation and not diffusion models Why are those two the only options?
- overfeed 1y ago> Why are those two the only options? I made no such claim. The only thing I declared is my belief in the superiority of PBR over diffusion models for a specific subset of image-generation tasks. I also clearly framed this as my opinion, you are free to have yours.
- ghurtado 1y ago> also clearly framed this as my opinion, you are free to have yours. Yes, thank you for your generosity. You very clearly framed your opinion as a dual choice ("this instead of that", "rather than", "either or"). The most natural way to read your comment is that way: one or the other. That's the way the English language works. If you meant something else, you should have said something else.
- overfeed 1y agoYou may have missed my first 3 words that did the level-setting. Infact, the first word should have been enough to signal subjectivity, that's just how the english language works. Hot take: a piece of commentary, typically produced quickly in response to a recent event, whose primary purpose is to attract attention
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- tarr11 1y agoOne of my hobbies is Houdini which is like Blender. While I agree with you that you can build a nice parameterised model in a few days - if you want to make an entire scene or a short film, you will need hundreds if not thousands of models, all textured and topolgized and many of them rigged, animated or even have simulations. What this means is that making even a 2 minute short animation is out of reach for a solo artist. Your only option today is to go buy an asset pack and do your best. But then of course your art will look like the asset pack. AI Tools like this reduce one of the 20+ stages down to something reachable by someone working solo.
- latexr 1y ago> Your only option today is to go buy an asset pack and do your best. There is a real possibility the assets generated by these tools will look equally or even more generic, the same generated images today are full of tells. > What this means is that making even a 2 minute short animation is out of reach for a solo artist. Flatland was animated and edited by a single person. In 2007. It’s a good movie. Granted, the characters are geometric shapes, but still it’s a 90 minute 3D movie. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatland_(2007_Ehlinger_film) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatland_(2007_Ehlinger_film) Puparia is a gorgeous 2D animated film done by a single person in 2020. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puparia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Puparia These are exceptional cases (by definition, as there aren’t that many of them), but do not underestimate solo artists and the power of passion and resilience.
- oblio 1y agoPuparia is a 3 minute short film that took a veteran artist 3 years to make. I think you're making OP's point.
- Ey7NFZ3P0nzAe 1y agoThere are always exceptions. I think the parent is refering to the many solo artists that would almost be able to make such great movies if not for some of the time constraints or life event etc. I'm sure there are countless solo artists that made 75% of a great movie then lacked time for unforeseeable reasons. Making the creation a bit easier allows much more solo artists to create!
- elif 1y agoAs someone who has tried to go through blender tutorials for multiple days, I can tell you, there is no chance I can get close to any of these examples. I think you might be projecting your abilities a bit too much. As someone who wants to make and use 3d models, not someone who wants to be a 3d model artist, this tech is insanely useful.
- echelon 1y ago0.0001% of the population can sculpt 3D and leverage complex 3D toolchains. The rest of us (80% or whatever - the market will be big) don't want to touch those systems. We don't have the time, patience, or energy for it, yet we'd love to have custom 3D games and content quickly and easily. For all sorts of use cases. But that misses the fact that this is only the beginning. These models will soon generate entire worlds. They will eventually surpass human modeller capabilities and they'll deliver stunning results in 1/100,000th the time. From an idea, photo, or video. And easy to mold, like clay. With just a few words, a click, or a tap. Blender's days are long in the tooth. I'm short on Blender, Houdini, Unreal Engine, Godot, and the like. That entire industry is going to be reinvented from scratch and look nothing like what exists today. That said, companies like CSM, Tripo, and Meshy are probably not the right solutions. They feel like steam-powered horses. Something like Genie, but not from Google.
- mxmilkiib 1y agoBlender will just add AI creation/editing
- echelon 1y agoWhy bolt magic rocket boosters onto a horse? That's like saying we'll add internet browsing and YouTube to Lotus 1-2-3 for DOS. It's weird, legacy software for a dying modality. Where we're going, we don't need geometry node editing. The diffusion models understand the physics of optics better than our hand-written math. And they can express it across a wide variety of artistic styles that aren't even photoreal. The future of 3D probably looks like the video game "Tiny Glade" mixed with Midjourney and Google Genie. And since it'll become so much more accessible, I think we'll probably wind up blending the act of creation with the act of consuming. Nothing like Blender.
- orbital-decay 1y agoOf course. It's a research paper, not a product.
- AndrewKemendo 1y agoI’m going to start calling responses like these “death rattles” There’s something uniquely spirited about narrowly focused experts feeling threatened by “AI” and responding like this wherein some set of claims are made (“AI will never be able to [insert your speciality]” or “This can’t do the [specific edge case in an expert at]”) except for the root claim: “This threatens both my economic stability because it will shift my market, and my social status because I have devoted 100,000 hours to practicing and expertise so that I can differentiate myself because it’s part of my identity”
- Etherlord87 1y ago> feeling threatened by “AI” Why the quotes there? I do feel threatened by AI, but not economically, not in the context of this article at least. > AI will never be able to I said no such thing. > This can’t do the I also didn't said that, I didn't focus on any particular thing it can't do. In general I don't voice my opinion, I think here the urge was just too strong because the examples were just too crude and I had to say if you think those are impressive, you can literally do it after a day's worth of learning; and I only flexed my expertise to give some strength to that statement and motivate people to really try. > “This threatens both my economic stability because it will shift my market, and my social status because I have devoted 100,000 hours to practicing and expertise so that I can differentiate myself because it’s part of my identity” I'm an OSHA inspector/instructor. I don't think what I learned in 3D will go to waste even if AI will actually start creating good 3D models (I wouldn't bet against it).
- aledalgrande 1y agoI don't know a lot about 3D modeling, but I can see that the objects created by this AI are way too high poly, which would be bad for performance if used e.g. in a game. But it still looks like a great prototyping tool to me, especially if you want to express an idea in your head to an actual 3D designer, in the same way UX designers can show a prototype to developers with Claude code now, instead of trying to repro an idea with Figma.