Hey there,
I am looking for methods to gamify my learning journey, as I am a usually unmotivated person. I would like to turn my blender renders into a score I can keep track of. I need your help to come up with ideas how to do it in a way that won’t backfire terribly. I am thinking about doing this in a way that I publish my renders and ask you guys to review it on a scale of 1 - 10 for modelling, shading, color theory, animation (if applicable), composition, and rendering. The only problem I have with this way is that not enough people will see my renders to rate them. Is this really a problem?
Leave your ideas here please 
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I’d be willing to give feedback
Also, it may be fun for you to check out BlenderGuru’s doughnut tutorial, it’s pretty good for getting used to Blender
And I’d recommend to have your motivation to learn Blender clear before you begin
let me find that video…
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sure, thanks I did the donut tutorial, the original one, been learning blender for a long time just in short 1 month bursts so I didint get far
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If you manage to make a small project every week and post it in the feedback section I will make a quick review if you manage to post every week. Once you miss a week I will stop giving feedback. Would this be motivation enough?
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I think it will, thanks
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I was worried here people only respond to the top posts, but this is simply not true. This basicly solves the issue. I will post a weekly render in feedback section. Anyone willing to review it will be much appreciated, thank you for being so open
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You may also consider a thread in the Sketchbooks section- it’s a small but lively community over there that loves giving feedback
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I guess I’ve never heard the word before: “gamification.”
Just please realize: when you look at “professional graphics,” whether “game” or not, you are looking at the product of experience that takes a long time to master. Furthermore, as with all “creative” things, you (by design …) never get any hint of the process that finally lead to “what you now see.” (It all just “seems like magic.”)
Start with “baby steps.” But also, as you do so, "set a goal." Realize also that the actual business relies on teamwork: there is simply too much for any single individual.
Another thought from my “real job” – project planning. Decide where you first want to go, then plan(!) how you intend to get there. Then, “set out,” comparing – and recording(!) – your daily progress against that plan. “Fully expect to encounter many rocks,” but, write them all down. (I call it my personal “Captain’s Log.”) Each time you encounter something that you don’t (yet …) know, write it down. When you find the solution, write that down too. Whether or not you record your journey in a public forum like this one, record it for yourself. (“Oh, here it is again: how did I solve it last time?” You can go back and look.)
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Hello and welcome here !
Well, in any practice you have to work regularly, maybe you’d like to learn a music instrument, drawing, dancing, a foreign language, CG … Sometimes it’s going to be easy and you’ll enjoy your lessons, sometime you’d probably like to do something else instead, but you have to force you to keep doing it no matter what.
Unless it’s getting super counter productive, like you are ill or you didn’t sleep last night, stuff like that 
Obviously you can use some little tricks to stay as motivated as you can, like taking baby steps to not feel overwhelmed, getting feedback from other artists, keep track of your work so you can see your progress months after mounts…
Sadly there isn’t a special trick to always enjoy learning, or stay motivated.
It needs efforts and sometime it’s hard or unforgiving, but the motivation generally grows when you overcome these difficult times in your journey.
Also, beginning is pretty difficult as that’s where you’re the most fragile, when you start to get a bit experienced it become easier.
I’d say ask yourself if you really like to become good at 3D, and if that’s the case are you willing to spend a good amount of time and effort to get there ?
Maybe you might better pick another hobby that will keep you more motivated, or that is a bit easier to learn…
If you think it’s something recurring in everything you try to do ( to loose motivation) maybe that’s you feel depressed or something else, or it’s just that you need to learn to overcome small loss of motivation in your life in general…
What helps me in that case is to remember why I wanted to practice in the first place, or what level I’m trying to reach, rather than just thinking about now and why I’d prefer do nothing rather than struggling at 3D or else…
The good thing is that once you manage to get good at something, you can use the same techniques to learn something else, so it can really change how you approach things in your life in general.
And about the gamification, that’s really how I consider blender, I like to overcome some challenges that’s why I like when there is always something a bit difficult for me, or something to learn… Obviously it’s an art to pick the right subject so it’s not getting too difficult, but learning something new, solving a problem or managing to model something complex I always find that rewarding…
I don’t play video-games but I consider blender just like one.
But in any case, the source of your motivation should come first within you and later, at some point it will become reinforced by others…
Anyway, I hope you’ll have fun on your CG journey and feel free to ask for feedback or if you want to keep this conversation rolling !
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I think my first realization that animation was a hobby I wanted to pursue was when I got a Nintendo DSi at age 15 and downloaded the cult-classic FlipNote Studio. I had a blast learning the basics of frame-by-frame 2D animation on that thing, particularly when I started sharing my animations online on the now-defunct FlipNote Hatena website, to the point where I was ignoring the vast majority of Nintendo DS game releases because I was too busy making increasingly-complex animations and stories on the FlipNote Studio app. I think I can see why Nintendo has made no real effort these days to bring back FlipNote Studio, if there are people like me who would put thousands of hours into a free little animation app at the expense of missing out on the latest 200±hour, $70 Legend of Zelda game. Thankfully, I seem to be getting to that point now with Blender, too, though it is obviously FAR more complicated than a crude little pixel animation app on a Nintendo handheld and it has taken me almost a decade to finally find working in Blender “fun.”
I can’t imagine giving up video games entirely, though. I’ve already basically given up on TV and movies for entertainment, basically because it’s impossible to turn off the “Blendering” part of my brain now and I find myself nitpicking the VFX or story in mainstream entertainment, rather than just sitting back and enjoying like I used to do before I went to school for animation. On a more positive note, I also now have a way to make my own stuff if the stuff from, say, Warner Bros isn’t doing it for me anymore–making what I want to see in entertainment is certainly less toxic than just griping about media I disagree with like 90% of YouTube channels and 99% of forum topics these days.
At the risk of being compared to Ned Flanders, a fictional Simpsons character, the only book I’ve ever really felt compelled to read cover-to-cover is the Bible. Other than that, it was just MAD Magazine in my teen years (before the magazine basically ceased production, stupid social media making funny magazines obsolete), Calvin and Hobbes in my childhood years, and I never got into YA novels despite being the perfect age when series like Harry Potter, Maze Runner, and Hunger Games were at their peak.
Besides Blender and video games, my other hobby is long-distance running, so you can see why I need at least ONE objectively-unproductive hobby (video games in this case) for when I am too burnt out for the other hobbies and genuinely need rest before going back to work (or hobbies that require a lot of energy). But again, I can see why Blender can be a good and even fun substitute for gaming, just fiddling around with different things and different PBR and NPR rendering styles like fiddling around with the “Ultrahand” in the latest Zelda game, Tears of the Kingdom. Blender also basically replaced Minecraft for me, making actual 3D models is just more rewarding than making voxel (3D pixel) art in Minecraft.
With the current state of the gaming industry, quite frankly, I can definitely see myself and others spending more time playing around with Blender than with a soulless corporate product from Microsoft or Ubisoft, and no matter how much money people spend on the microtransactions, such companies will fire their top talent in droves because it’s not even about the customer and the quality of the final product anymore, just expectations of infinite growth in a world with finite (and dwindling) resources. I have laid off of genres like fighting games or games meant to played with a mouse and keyboard for fear of developing wrist injuries (I’d rather develop Carpal Tunnel Syndrome from over-doing it in my latest Blender animation than a silly game), and mostly play my childhood favorite genres, 3D platformers and turn-based RPGs, on portable devices like the Steam Deck so they don’t have to eat into my work or “productive-hobby” time.
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Interesting idea.
I did a whole series of gamification badges for the p0rn community which were awarded according to the result of learning new techniques and also awarded for the completion of a scheduled participation. Task badges awarded usually resulted in the purchase of either courses or other products, ha!
I imagine that gamification could work with learning blender and could result in purchasing products such as add-ons to help level up a skill set.
It’s obviously just an offer you don’t have to take seriously. But I think having a goal / date you work towards helps with staying motivated.
Yeah, one big difference is that videogames are designed to keep you entertained and addicted, while blender is more a tool… So yeah probably one can’t completely replace the other.
Also it’s natural to have some unproductive activities, I’m not really into gaming, but I watch a lot of movies/anime/series and I have a bunch of other activities unrelated to CG. It would be impossible for me to just do 3D 16hours a day, even if on some occasion when I’m really in a personal project that can append.
And anyway, to stay creative we need to feed our imagination with some stuff…
But yeah, at least for me 3D is like a game, should it be a construction game like lego, a problem solving game, or a quest to become good at the craft…
Generally I set myself a goal that I’ve got only very little idea on how to get there, then slowly figure out as I progress and then at some point I feel thrilled by the result, like a kid with a new toy !
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I am probably a bit of a workaholic these days, I admit. It’s boring here and a lot of my irl friends have long since moved away, so it’s fine. I’ll definitely need to look into more relaxing hobbies (at least on weekends) if I ever get to a point where I work in 3D full-time, doubly-so if my company has some non-compete clause preventing me from doing personal projects (although I think some executive orders or laws or something have been passed in the US recently that make it more difficult for companies to use non-compete clauses against employees legally–thanks, President Biden!).
I’m still between two minds whether to keep “Blendering” as a hobby or try again to turn 3D animation into a proper “job,” because of course in the latter’s case it would no longer be healthy or pleasurable to just fiddle around with Blender after a long day of work.
Still, more to the point of this actual thread, perhaps people can look to the game-ified tutorials in actual games like RPG Maker MV or especially Mario Maker 2 to get ideas on how to “gamify” learning Blender. Or just copy the model used in Duolingo or whatever learning app on phones on how to learn and practice stuff a few minutes each day. In my personal opinion, though, apps like Duolingo are terrible for learning anything beyond the sheer basics, and eventually the user will have to develop the energy and willpower to work on what they want to learn at least an hour a day (as opposed to 15 minutes a day) to truly begin to grow. I suppose “Duolingo”-style learning is good when you first start as an absolute beginner, though.
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I don’t think such things exists in CG, some people do blender on their working day, and keep working on their personal projects in their spare time. To me this is a bit too much as I prefer going out or doing sports to get a better balance, but it’s ok to do CG 16h/24… Especially if it’s a period and not all your life…
I think we enjoy things by contrast, to me it’s cool to get out as I spend most my time inside. And then it’s enjoyable to be back inside again. Same with CG. Doing only that tend to get me a bit depressed…
Yeah sure that can be felt that way, it really depend on the kind of jobs you get.
It can be cool to do CG all day with great artists, therefore you don’t need to keep doing that back home.
But in any case personal projects from time to time also help to keep the motivation high.
Yeah I agree with you, that might be useful to get the basics but at some point some game rules will be hard to apply to CG for sure !
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Something else to remember is that “video games,” although these days they are certainly “3D,” are otherwise an entirely different discipline from “video and movies.” Even though “Blender” can provide models (and so forth …) to both of them.
A “video game” is necessarily “a slave to the hardware.” But, it also relies on the idea that “someone who is desperately fighting off a horde of invaders from the Planet Zurn” is probably not finely-critiquing the graphics.
Whereas: someone who’s watching a video or a movie is in an entirely different situation. (He might be a “CG nerd,” but he probably isn’t.) The media-production process entirely occurs before, not while, the media is being viewed.
Blender can be equally applied to both scenarios.
I guess that’s why I reacted with puzzlement to the term: “gameification.”
Well, from my understanding gamification is a way to organize something a bit like a video game, where you get points/XP when you achieve something, sometime with some levels and so on…
This very forum got some of that aspects with badges for instance. And anyway views/likes are also similar to scores you can make in a game even tho I’m not sure the term gamification apply.
Obviously me playing with blender like if it’s a video game is something a bit different and it’s not what gamification is…
At the end of the day we probably make better progress when the learning experience / work is entertaining and when we can measure our progress.
On the other hand finding our own motivation, within ourself, is important in general, is that something that can be learned ? I tend to think it is, but it would be interesting to get others opinion on that …
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