Blender Basics Classroom Book, 5th Edition

Jim Chronister’s 5th edition has been online for some time now, but I missed it. It’s a corderstone for Blender education, so if you’re teaching Blender be sure to check it out!

After a long break in development, the Blender Basics Classroom Book has received a much needed update. The 5th edition is now available on the Central Dauphin School District’s website, free for any educational use that follows the Creative Commons license. Print it, link it, rework it as needed. The book has grown to 266 pages, adjusted for the current version with added activities, intro to Cycles, motion tracking, chromakeying, chapter reflections, academic standards alignment, 3D printing, and more. As always, RoboDude it there with helpful tips and has earned the cover of this edition. Videos on YouTube reflect the new chapters and I am currently adding more.

While Cycles is an alternative to most activities in the book, we still focus many activities in the classic render engine. As with many educators, schools have limited budgets and can’t afford nice video cards, making Cycles a rough alternative when having 30-80 students attempting to render projects during the course of the day. With that in mind, there are some suggestion to speed up Cycles in the book.

The book can be found here.

The YouTube playlist is linked from the Book’s webpage, and can be seen below.

Happy Blending!