Copying Blender

There are some parts of the Gingerbread man tutorial that aren’t very up to date, I’m afraid. I think you might be better off starting here:

http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/BSoD/Introduction_to_Character_Animation

There are also two books out now both geared to beginners, the first one listed in my sig, Introducing Character Animation with Blender, and Essential Blender, the general introductory guide from the Blender Foundation. Of course, the information you need is all available for free in tutorials here and there, but it can be hard to hunt down exactly what you need, so having it all in one place and clearly laid out in a book is handy.

Specific questions about the Gus tutorial, you can always ask here. It’s still a good tutorial. (And “where is the subsurf button?” is probably the most asked question ever in this forum, so if that’s the question, try a search.)

There are also great video tutorials at blendernewbies.com, blenderunderground.com geneome.net and elsewhere. Check out the tutorials section at blendernation.com for a whole bunch.

In my opinion, the 2 best online resources for a new user are the guide that bugman_2000 just linked too and the online video tutorials that Neal made available. They explain almost all the things that new users get confused about.

here is the link to Neal’s video tutorials http://www.gryllus.net/Blender/3D.html
if you spend some time with the introduction to character animation and the video tutorials it should get you on the fast track to learning blender :slight_smile:

Thanks guys. I’ll check out these links and see what I can download.

Hey Tarzan,

Blender can take a while to get accustomed to. I got frustrated my first few times using it too… so don’t give up!

To do a box select is a lot like selecting a bunch of icons on your windows desktop. The one difference is that you have to press B on the keyboard first. After you have done that, its just like in windows, press and hold the left mouse button to start your selection, drag the mouse and it will create the ‘box’ that will select everything inside of it, release the mouse button when you’re ready and you’re done!

A couple of notes:

  1. your mouse cursor should be in one of the 3d viewports when you press B, not say, over top of the button controls

  2. I’ve heard that some video cards have problems where they don’t actually show the selection box in blender. You can still use the tool exactly as i described, but it is harder since you don’t have visual feedback.

Lots of people say Blender is hard for beginners, that might be true.
But believe me Maya et al. are not easier…
I am not starting this “who is better” discussion, I am just a OpenSource Fan…

I printed the Yellow Submarine pdf tutorial from the link that Postmodern Boy provided. The instructions are accurate and easy to understand. I’m about half way through it and I’m excited about what I’m learning. It might not look exactly the way the tutorial shows but I don’t care. I can improve my skills another time.

I can’t wait to learn more and do more complex stuff. I still want to make a walking person. And I love all the stuff with water and oceans that I see on youtube. I want to learn how to do that. This is fun!

Thanks for all the replies. I appreciate it.