What is the main reason you use Blender?

Hello guys

I am conducting a small survey to know more about Blender. Why is your main reason you use it? cuz its free? cuz its support? its potential customization? its tools? its connection to other standalones/softwares? its workflow? its people/community?

if you have 2 mins to spare please answer this google survey

or you could answer in this same thread, as well

thanks

I came because it was free.

I stayed because it turns out to be a pretty cool application. I really only use it for modeling at the moment, but after having used it for a while (and with a few very minor customizations) I like it better than Maya (which I use on a daily basis too).

But the fact that it was free was the initial hook and the incentive to get over the first learning hump. The supposed “weirdness” of the interface never bothered me, but the hiding of commands under key strokes without a menu equivalent was difficult to overcome. During that time I repeatedly abandoned Blender for Maya. But the fact that it was free kept me coming back. In time I learned the Blender interface and now I enjoy it enough to not want to switch away very often anymore.

Edit: The fact that the outliner makes me want to stab myself in the eye with an icepick and yet I still want to use blender is a pretty powerful testament to the rest of the program.

It’s free
It’s very powerful program for modelling,rigging and animation

My favorite 3D app is Houdini, which I believe to be the best 3D software all around, but Mantra, Houdini build-in render engine, although as good as Arnold, is too slow for personal projects, and integration of other render engines is somewhat lacking, not to mention that they can be costly for personal projects.

Blender on the other hand is free, open source, Cycles rocks and it runs on both Nvidia and AMD GPUs, I am looking forward to Eevee as well, which is very promising so far, the Blender communities are also unique, Blender is also light, it can be run from a USB key, and the list goes on!

I’ve shirked proprietary since I retired my Amiga, and apart from a couple of brief spells, have used Linux exclusively since around 1998.

To me, FOSS (whether the license to use it costs cash or not, when I say free, I mean as in liberty, not beer) is where the best stuff comes from, simply because it’s built from passion, rather than financial gain or obligation.

This survey was honestly not very good, at least 2 questions that should have been multiple-choice.

Pretty much for the same reason as bvz2000 - its free to download.

That said, its also because its available for linux and is powerful enough to keep up with its commercial counterparts. At some point you simply learn to deal with its interface, which in equal parts is both annoying and impressive. Oh, the built-in compositor is most welcome too!

The only thing that makes me miss Maya is Blender’s lack of a C++ SDK for developing compiled plug-ins.

I’ll bite.

  • Free. No overhead with rented/bought, but never used licenses and no shady dishonest software use.
  • Freedom. Learning 3D is career long quest. It’s devastating to think that software you aligned with for over a decade has uncertain future (cough XSI, Combusition, Toxic) or you are at mercy of closed roadmap that has shown clear vector of polarization and stagnation to a point you’ll struggle to compete professionally (@LW, max without plugins). That you do not “OWN” the software and at mercy of whatever questionable policies are implemented.
  • Very comprehensive modeling tools. Coupled with few Python scripts it is the fastest modeling workflow I am aware of.
  • All in one software, no polarization nonsense. Tracking tools are top noch. Sculpting tools are very powerful with no other app having comparable built-in capability. Not every time you need Realflow like Fluid FX or Nuke like composition. 9/10 times Blender delivers.
  • Very powerful and streamlined modifier workflow that allows for semi nondestructive process, greatly accelerating modeling and enabling iterative changes (including for clients).
  • Cycles - Instant GPU preview render. It’s a big thing for anyone who knows words “ActiveShade” or “IPR”
  • Perfect for Indies, small studios as it utilizes all hardware for rendering (CPU and/or GPU).
  • Ideal for network rendering for animations/cinematics- no plugin dependencies, no licensing problems, works on any OS and once again utilizes all hardware.
  • Allows ultimate customization (python). You are not dictated to mindlessly follow inefficient routines that frustrate you when you just want to focus on art. Work way you want, takes a few minutes to write operator to optimize any issues you might have. Just look at Hardops and Speedflow.
  • Feature packed releases! Blender packs more updates in 2 months than many other companies in a year. Monopolies are concerned with profit which means minimal expense, maximum price. Blender is concerned with best tools for artists and it really shows.
  • Developers, team behind it are absolutely amazing! How do they achieve such astonishing results with so little resource? With most other software any aspect you take feels like it’s rushed out to meet a deadline and then left unchanged for a decade. With Blender anywhere you look you see very intelligent paradigms and weathering of countless criteria by community. The very paradigms by Ton such as Database structure and data linking, 3d cursor, UI etc are just another level of thinking that in certain cases might lead to uncontrollable smiling as you work with that program.
  • Developers consider with community. I have only been here for about 3 years, but seen so many changes and additions which were initially expressed by community (e.g modo like repeat select, weld for screw modifier, mirror modifier extra attributes, UI changes, amazing bevel shader, weighted normals modifier, alembic etc). Might seem for some as it does not happen at fast enough pace, I’m sure that would change with greater budgets (read: more donations). Consider, this happens nowhere else as artists are voiceless in other communities.
  • Community. There’s a thousand scripts and answers to any problems you might encounter. You are not isolated as artist. Every few days when I google for solution to some problem (mostly .py) I see posts by CodeManX and Campbell. I feel immense gratitude to them and others for taking the time and helping.
  • Same can be said about talented artists who share their insights and workflows. You dont need 10 000usd worth of suspicious software to follow something amazing done by a Blender artist. It’s free.
  • Rapid release cycle (daily, experiemental and feature specific builds). Ability to modify code and combine patches.
  • Often clients prefer open source format submission (e.g Unis).
  • Current viewport is very fast and good to work with (maxed antialiasing). Looking forward to Eevee.
  • Other things like ridiculously fast startup time, OS independence (have both win and linux)
    ETC…

Personal opinion, based on nearly 2 decades with several other leading softwares. Today a happy Blender, Houdini user.

PS. Survey link is a bit limited (few options, no multiple select?)

Good for industrial design, product demo’s, basic simulations, and marketing.
Main reason, very good mesh editing options, basic simulations, and a super render engine.

I simply like it most…
I find it comfortable and it’s powerful enough to do most of what I throw at it… It does lack some precision modelling tools, to be honest, though…
Also, no heavy installers or such, I can carry it around in a flash drive. Always a plus.

Because it’s free and powerful, but certainly not because it’s straight forward to use - at least from a beginner point of view :stuck_out_tongue:

I checked it out because it was free…I stayed because it is as good or better than many 3D packages already available…It has outstanding support and community, easily extendable via addons…and there are a lot of addons + exporters…plus it is easily extendable using python…one of the most widely used and easily approachable languages…

I was initially attracted to the idea of open source, especially after years of bad experiences with Autodesk. But finally I love the way it works and the modeling system, where the user is not treated like a fool and has the important thing in front of him, without strange abstractions like the UVs of 3dsMax.

Mainly I love it that it is a complete suite to create models, and it is not lazy at any particular point, it is consistent and constant in everything I use.

free & freedom

Started to expand my toolset, and it was more or less a no brainer to start with it
Now I’m a fan of the workflow.

Free and no registration required.
Then again, I’m not a “3D artists”, and have no such ambitions.
But I use it for work related renders of the stuff we present to customers.
They’re good enough for their use, but a true 3D artist would laugh :slight_smile:

It’s free, and the foundation folks are pretty hype about jumping on to trends and adopting new techniques and systems early. There’s always a cool new thing to play with.

Plus I love rubbing it in the faces of folks who only use autodesk products, not gonna lie.

The first 5 points of cgstrive’s (awesome) answer are the main reasons that I use Blender, but his whole answer contains many of the reasons (great community, developers, can see where it’s heading, etc.) that keep my enthusiasm for Blender so high.

The reason I switched was that I never really enjoyed using Maya, and I had lots of bad experiences with it crashing (and hiding the recovery file in some stupid system folder somewhere that is invisible by default, sometimes corrupting said file) and although I didn’t normally have to deal with the licensing restriction frequently, one day I did and it just pushed me over the edge. Basically, I had just moved to a new company, which was a small independent game developer, from a larger company. I started off using a Maya trial because the copy of Maya we had was on the PC of someone that had left, and in another country, so deactivating the license so I could use it would take a little while. I just kept using the trial for the rest of the month and got used to the updated modelling tools. Eventually, the trial was due to expire, and we managed to get the license information of the old version so that I could use that instead. Even though I had a valid license, I couldn’t download the version of Maya I needed from the Autodesk website, although they did have the support patches… Finally, I downloaded a pirate copy of that version, and after scanning it, installed it using the legit keys. Whilst it worked, I was bummed to lose access to all the modelling tools I’d gotten used to.

A while later, there was a less busy time in the project, and I decided to try doing one of my tasks in Blender, and whilst it took longer because of the learning curve, the modelling tools were sooo much better than those in Maya, and I learned enough that I knew I was done with Maya for good (I mostly just used Maya’s modelling and texturing tools, so switching was not so hard). This was at version 2.69 or so, and the amount of features and bug fixes added to Blender since then is staggering.

1- I’m probably in a minority but I actually really like the Blender UI. I mostly use it with the Maya navigation and Blender shortcut keys.
2- The other reason is it’s really fast for modeling, I dont have to dig through layers of menus to do operations.
3- It’s feature rich but still feels light.
4- The price… Free!
And even though Blender 3D itself is free, I’ve paid for a couple of awesome Blender Addons. Usually very affordable.
That’s my list of reasons why I use Blender.

I do architectural visualization.
The traditional choices cost too much and ignore their users’ needs.

I used Max from day 1 (the DOS days!) and used Vray for many years.

Blender and Cycles are just as good. The choice is a no brainer to me.