In the beginner’s course, extruding lesson, the instructor very rightly says “use references”, but I wish there would be more examples about working from a reference. It’s easy enough to just use the instructor’s finished product; will there be examples as the course goes on, about how to think about a reference, and approach breaking it down into steps you can take in Blender?
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Using references means nearly anything goes.
it’s not meant to be a one-to-one conversion.
Like building a house, you can use a blueprint.
But, the idea behind using a reference is that you create a more recognizable scene. Then using your memory. What makes a house a house? A flag a flag …?
Like " I want to have a sunset lighting", so explore the internet for examples of ’ sun set’.
Or, my figure needs to walk slowly and be depressed. research on those subjects.
The subject of breaking it down is difficult. Because there are soo many ways to do this. The focus lies on Blender usage. While learning this, you also learn how to use the basic shapes Blender provides, and create your own. Creating building blocks, and doing the breakdown by yourself.
This takes time and experience. So, do many small projects. Don’t set your goals too high. Just do the challenges, asked you to do. Step by step your creating much larger and complex scenes.
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Thanks for this, and I agree (to the extent that I’ve done much of anything from a reference).
What I had hoped to ask about (or suggest) was that while this course is a terrific, gentle introduction to the tools in Blender, and the ways in which they can be used, it would also be really nice to get a similarly gentle intro to what you might be thinking about when using references.
But like you said, maybe that’s just something that takes experience, and I should be diving in more (and worrying less :).
Again, thanks!
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It can be a simple as having the item in front of you to look at.
Or you could be taking real life measurements. Perhaps for your room or desk and items on it.
Some people are happy with one view photo and make it up to be roughly like that.
I end up spending as much time looking for reference as making the things often!
It amazes me how almost no one ever gets simple clay tiles right on the well, early in the course, and that includes Mikey the instructor! Even he has a ‘looks about ok’, ‘near enough good enough’, approach. Whereas I even having a far better idea from the start of how they work, checked tilers sites, how to lay them, dimensions, Batten size, spacing, etc. Wasted effort? Probably! But more satisfying to me.
Sculpting and making many shapes box modelling benefit from good side and front views placed in Blender, or full working technical drawings, blueprints as some call them these days, the same.
Then things like textures, effects, finishes, you can gues at what your think ‘rust’ looks like, or have something rusty in front of you. Wood, has grain direction, constructions alter the way the grain runs for practical purposes.
In the end that is why so much stuff made is just fantasy, sci-fi, cartoon, anime, etc. avoiding all reality, anything goes and is ‘right’. There is no reference or blueprint for an alien spacecraft!