The Complete Guide to Blender Graphics: Computer Modeling & Animation, Third Edition

Blender is a free and open source graphics program for computer modeling and animation. It contains all the tools necessary for creating models and scenes that may be made into still images or animated movies. Like its predecessors, the third edition of The Complete Guide to Blender Graphics: Computer Modeling and Animation provides a single, comprehensive, up-to-date source for using Blender. It introduces the Blender features with examples and diagrams referenced to the graphical user interface (GUI), the arrangement of windows and panels containing the controls for operating the program.

In addition to revisions to match the most recent version of Blender, fresh examples have been added. The contents have been organized into a building-block fashion, presenting basic subjects such as textures and lighting in the early chapters before explaining their roles in more complex techniques such as fluid and smoke simulation in later chapters. The book also covers alterations that have been made to the GUI and significantly expands discussions of advanced features, enabling veteran and beginning users to take advantage of the full potential of Blender.

This book also has a companion website, www.silverjb.limewebs.com, offering supplementary material for using further advanced techniques once the concepts and methods presented in the book have been adequately mastered. These techniques include fracturing, building walls or obstacles that can be demolished, dynamic painting, and path animation.

Blender is a program in constant development, with new features being added progressively. This new edition of The Complete Guide to Blender Graphics gives detailed instruction on the latest version of the program. Using visual references and practical examples, it removes the frustration from the learning process in using the basic and advanced capabilities of Blender.

John M. Blain, Coffs Harbour, New South Wales, Australia