Book Image

Blender 3D Basics Beginner's Guide Second Edition

By : Gordon Fisher
Book Image

Blender 3D Basics Beginner's Guide Second Edition

By: Gordon Fisher

Overview of this book

This book teaches you how to model a nautical scene, complete with boats and water, and then add materials, lighting, and animation. It demystifies the Blender interface and explains what each tool does so that you will be left with a thorough understanding of 3D. This book starts with an introduction to Blender and some background on the principles of animation, how they are applied to computer animation, and how these principles make animation better. Furthermore, the book helps you advance through various aspects of animation design such as modeling, lighting, camera work, and animation through the Blender interface with the help of several simple projects. Each project will help you practice what you have learned and do more advanced work in all areas.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
Blender 3D Basics Beginner's Guide Second Edition
Credits
About the Author
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface
3
Controlling the Lamp, the Camera, and Animating Objects
Index

Time for action – introducing the three-point lighting system


I've prepared a simple lighting rig. The model is a statue of Blender Foundation's Sintel character. The rig has four layers. Layer 1 has the key light, Layer 2 has the fill light, Layer 3 has the back light, and Layer 4 has Sintel, the camera, and an Empty. Putting the lights on different layers lets you turn them on and off easily. I have set up 3D View as a QuadView window, as discussed in Chapter 2, Getting Comfortable Using the 3D View. This will let you adjust the lights in all axes without changing the windows.

In 3D View, the lamps are in black. You can see their location on the left side of the next screenshot, and the cones of light that are coming from them. As the active object, the camera is highlighted. The following steps will show you the three-point lighting system:

  1. Open the file 4909OS_11_light_test_rig_Sintel.blend from the download pack.

  2. Press F12. Can you see where the lights are coming from, as shown in the...