It’s been quite a while since I used Blender now. I think I left around the first BF release, that was 2.26 or something?
A few days ago I grabbed one of the later compiles, 2.31a, to check out the current status of things… Yup, I had spotted something about the old Traces code ending up in the BF tree and so on…
Just have to say that Blender is REALLY starting to go sky-high in terms of features as well as instant appeal.
The new GUI looks gorgeous, and all the new features in both modeling and rendering are truly kicking a lot of major ass. With the release of the manual as well, there’s no telling where all this will end. All these drop-down menus make it a lot easier to get up to speed for new users, I’m sure.
The material interface has become somewhat confusing though, but that’s just a minor detail.
Basically - congratulations to the developers, the community and everyone else! Blender is SO on the right track here.
Hi Jamesk, good to see you posting here! How are things going for you with Cinema 4D? I tried out Cinema 4D myself, but I didn’t find the interface as productive as I found the UI’s of Blender and Lightwave. I’m just not a fan of windows driven 3d UI’s. I hope it’s working for you. I’m looking at getting a seat of Lightwave because I like the product and I like the user based community. Also I think that Blender and Lightwave are perfect as a 3d setup. See ya!
I’m having some trouble getting used to the new interface and new hot keys. The new Material settings will also require more time for me to learn. But it’s coming along nicely and there are constant upgrades with the BF releases and more with the BF CVS and Tuhopuu2 releases. I can’t complain. Oh and the amazing python scripts! Oh yeah.
JA: It’s all running smoothly in C4D-land… Just like Blender nowadays, the Cinema interface is totally customizable, so it’s pretty easy to build a layout that suits ones personal taste. You can put anything anywhere, set up loads of separate layouts (pretty much like the screens in Blender) as well as integrate any plugin or script in the menus or toolbars with a few clicks. And to split hairs, it really is not a windows based GUI, it only looks like it - in reality it’s all C4D’s own widgets and handlers and so on and so forth…
>>> I’m having some trouble getting used to the new [Blender] interface and new hot keys
That’s pretty understandable. Luckily I’ve forgotten most of it by now, so it’s almost like using an entirely new application. Very exciting. I had to freshen up my memory a bit on it because I’m going to use the sequence editor for some compositing around christmas…
And I never really liked LightWave (or Max, Maya and XSI either for that matter), so I guess it’s a good thing there’s so much out there to choose from!
everything is ok.but will somebody tell me why the hotkey for recalculating the normals in a mesh has been changed from Alt+N to Ctrl+Alt+N?why waste time and energy pressing one more extra key for no apparent reason!!! :-?
As far as I remember it’s always been ctrl+N > recalc normals outside
and
ctrl+shift+N > recalc normals inside.
I just check in 2.25 and 2.31a.
The only difference is that alt+N and Ctrl+Alt+N worked also in 2.25 for “recalc normals outside” (useless redundance if you ask me).
They both do nothing in 2.31a.
Being the one who reworked the hotkey management, I’ll just confirm what Jean said since it’s the absolute truth. Ctrl-N is Recalc Outside, Ctrl-Shift-N is Recalc Inside and N pops up the Transformation Properties panel. Any other combination doesn’t do anything.
