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About the Author

Avatar image for Bart Veldhuizen
Bart Veldhuizen

I have a LONG history with Blender - I wrote some of the earliest Blender tutorials, worked for Not a Number and helped run the crowdfunding campaign that open sourced Blender (the first one on the internet!). I founded BlenderNation in 2006 and have been editing it every single day since then ;-) I also run the Blender Artists forum and I'm Head of Community at Sketchfab.

22 Comments

  1. @Bart

    Hi, what video format is the post in? For some reason a while back in my browser firefox 3, has stopped being able to see certain videos appearing in blendernation? I'm trying to figure out if it is vimeo videos and whether anyone else has this problem and knows how to solve it.

  2. How did he drag and separate the vertices at around 4:15? I've never used that kind of function (other than P which makes separate meshes).

  3. Thank you for this, saw a different way of looking at some issues that I have encountered in modeling through your processes. Looking forward to trying out the things that you demonstrated

  4. Ah, the convenience of embedded video with the added bonus of music I can normally only hear when I'm shopping for clothing at the mall. Thank you for that. ;-)

  5. Impressive video but it would be nice to see some videos like that witch are not in time-laps. Also I had to turn the sound off since I can't stand jazz. Other than that, it was a good video :)

  6. Wonderful any way you look at it... so many thanks. Showed me that I will continue practicing my left hand keyboard technique for speed and intuitive control. You are so inspiring...

    Sorry for this long response, I just never see anyone talking about actual keyboard practice techniques. After I set up my first plane, as he was showing, three trys and I was feeling the lovely flow he was showing. I could focus on shaping my object form. This is like practicing the piano to get good at playing music intuitively.

    KEYBOARD PRACTIC TECHNIQUE-
    Keyboard tilted with left side away, making it at angle to me. little finger resting just on the edge of CTRL key ready to pounce on it. The thumb working the following keys G,R,F,B,alt-key [grab,rotate,face,B-select,extrude selected]. While, middle two fingers help stabalize my hand in the arrangement. I keep the gimble translator on, since it's nice to have control of a quick move down an axis. Noticed he did this too. Ctrl-spacebar gives you quick access to changing between rotation, scale and translator gimble once it is activated by selecting the tiny finger pointing icon on 3d view window tool bar.

    Left hand support makes ctrl-R loop cut quick to apply and alt-key quick for ring-select. Right hand is busy staying in pace with left hand moves as all it has to do is work right, left and middle mouse button. I have a wheel mouse with a side middle mouse button select, so this works very nicely as I use my index finger between LMB and wheel to zoom. Thumb is in position for rotating view, while left hand fourth finger can quickly move to left keyboard shift key and thumb side MMB click for panning view. It's all about learning co-ordination through hours of practice. Forced practice I might add.

    I have worked in several other 3d programs, however Blender amazes me how intuitive and natural the keyboard commands are arranged. It has the best ever 3d view rotation manipulation. Not sure how a left handed person will adapt, I am slightly ambidexterous from years of forced practice drawing, painting and sculpting. Same as keyboard typing, you got to learn how to not have to look at the keyboard to keep your focus on the screen and work. It's tough, I am still working on total control.

    I learned long ago that the tilt angle of the 3d viewin Blender gives you really nice working flow in extrusions, rotating and moving points and edges as much as great control in retopology and other modeling methods. Blender is best of the best.

    Note to the comment about speed video... Vimeo and others have pause, enlarge view and you can slide the time line where you want it after the streaming downloads to your computer. I prefer getting more in a short time. For settings, I keep a notepad open to type notes in my blender shorthand notation for later. This is time lapse, so don't be too worried about looking at the speed. I hardly ever have sound turned on when watching videos. There are controls on your computer for that.

    Best to all... always...

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