Good job working against the current to learn blender! I sure remember myself how difficult it was.
That said, i think you’re picking up the pitchfork a bit early.
Blender has been made far more intuitive, and easier on new users, without removing features and functionality. On top of restructuring the entire architecture of blender, such that it’ll be easier to add new, and better features in the future.
There is also a ton of overlap between 2.79 and 2.80. If you know how to do something in 2.79, then it’ll probably not take you very long at all to guess how its done in 2.80. so all those millions of posts you were referencing, are still very useful.
Not to mention, a large portion of them wont be needed anymore, as users can easier guess their way to the solution now without having to ask for help.
Blender is moving down a more mainstream path, while keeping the fundamentals that made blender great again. Its incredible to see how much addoptation its getting. EPIC is integrating functionality it into unreal engine, SideFX is creating a bridge with houdini, and im fairly sure more is to come.
Large game studios are picking up blender, as a replacement for Maya, Max, Cinema4D, and such. I’ve been helping people get into blender for several years now, and lately i’ve noticed a surge of individuals from the industry whos newly getting into it, and that has all to do with the new 2.80 release.
So, stick to 2.79 for as long as you want, but just know that the longer you wait, the harder it’ll be to make the jump.
You only need to bite the bullet once, and it will only hurt for a few weeks. Then you’re back in action, in top speed, with far more room for improvement.
To reply to the guy you replied to -
I started using Blender when it was 2.79, and learning it wasn’t that hard really. For what kind of a feat you are talking about I really don’t know. The only reason why people think it’s hard to learn blender is maybe because of the whole right click select and the 3d cursor workflow. Other than that I didn’t found blender to be any harder to learn than any other software. Like all of them it takes time to get used to it.
That being said, I haven’t used 2.79 that much before I switched to 2.8 . The only bad thing about 2.8 I think is that tool box panel that I think it’s totally pointless. Having addons use the toolbox panel was really nice. Now everything has to be jammed to the N panel.
Other than that I don’t see why the new UI is “negative improvement”. It’s cleaner and better looking. And is just as useful as the old one…except the tool box panel. And with time things will improve even more.
I think the development of Blender has been well balanced. I don’t always agree with everything that is changed. But that is not limited to Blender. Other software goes through various UI breaks with the past. Photoshop comes to mind in recent versions. Some of the working hot keys were completely changed up.
Software is a moving target always. You absolutely have to figure in some time in each week over long periods of time, to learn what is new. That will never change with any software you use.
At my studio we held off on using Blender 2.8 for a while in production, because of bugs and getting everyone (including me) up to speed with it. So that had practical benefits. But we always had one or two people playing with it in advance just to be not completely in the dark.
I like it when something changes and gets improvements. I have been using Blender since 2.49b and I have seen a lot of changes for the better. And it just keeps getting better. Better tools, better UI, more features.
Another factor to consider is perception. While Blender in many ways is the “same old Blender” to many of us, it is brand new to other people. And if the perception is that the UI is “improved” and making more sense, then that is positive for the Blender ecosystem. And this last development initiative has brought a lot of positive and frankly unprecedented happenings to Blender funding, professional and corporate recognition as well as backing.
The future will hold (gradually over time) much better functionality and UI enhancements.
Blender is growing up. Grow with it or miss out. That is your choice.
No, I can only render flat images and use the z-depth as displacement, that doesnt help for 3D models and characters.
True reflections, true transmission, good-looking shadows, more comprehensive render passes.
blender internal render was just fast enough without being so limited.
For compositing, creating custom render passes using a material for the whole scene, clay render. And it helped me do some hacks for NPR that arent possible now.
It is still available to cycles but cycles is way too slow for me.
Any practical example? I cant see any other uses for “baking” a displacement map other than rendering out a surface with a gradient to get the height values.
And if you’re talking about normal maps, then that can still be done as usual.
I’ve never used internal, so this does not apply to me, but did internal do anything that eevee cannot do?
I just dont think they take the old internal engine super serious anymore. And i can see why, its super old, and outdated. Im glad they’re moving on.
Hey, I hear some of your complaints, but after using 2.7* and then 2.8…not only is it a vast improvement in my eyes, but it’s actually damn pleasing to use in my opinion. I work faster in Blender than I ever did in Maya and Max. It’s the truth.
Yes, as I said, it gave you more control over passes and materials, and it had true world space ray-tracing that could actually render reflection and refraction of objects not in the screen
Material override also allowed for you to create custom passes and mix them in compositing.
A practical example:
How do you make a character rigged with dynamic wrinkles but with multiple levels of subdivision?
You sculpt many variations of wrinkles to the face, bake them as displacement maps and control them using displace modifiers and drivers.
It was really powerful but nobody took it seriously because it was hard to set up.
I only hope eevee one day will get all the features that blender internal had.
Add a little glossy to reflection or refraction and you already double Cycles’s rendertime. True world reflections, without gloss? Yeah, welcome to the late '90!
Pretty much all the things Internal could do, are doable now either with Cycles or Eevee. If something is still out, it will surely come back.
Devs already explained why they removed Internal renderer (and game engine btw). Still people here and there argue that this wasn’t a good move.
Maybe these users have better insights of the code, and could have tell’em how to fix those areas?
Or they are just complaining, and say “they should have done better, so I could work just as two years ago.”
As @Richard_Culver says “Software is a moving target”. Let’s get our heads around this, a move along with it.
You can’t have light groups in eevee and you can’t have shader to RGB in cycles. Blender internal had both and it used to allow for some pretty crazy NPR stuff.
“If something is still out, it will surely come back.”
Shader to RGB is in Eevee, and lightgroups will eventually land in Cycles. A patch already exists!
And btw Blender Internal didn’t have GI or proper glossy reflection/refraction. So?
It was a hack to use and it was more of a hack to code and mantain. So?
If it was so good just use it. If you think it can do better things than current Blender go for it!
it’s still in 2.79 and the download will be available forever (or almost).
All I can do is suggest to not beg its return, and don’t waste time trying to convince the mass that this is the dark side of 3D technology.
If good and useful stuff was lost in the transition, and if it was really that good and useful, it will be a goal to bring it back. The final goal is to make Blender a good and useful tool for 3d artists.
Regarding the competitive notion of Blender. This one is a sliding scale. And obviously on a person to person. case by case basis.
People claiming Blender to be “as good as” something else is going to be based on their individual (or group’s) needs, as well as their experience/knowledge and use of the other software. This will be widely varied and random. There is no one absolute answer.
But if you back up and look more broadly at the numbers it starts to paint a bleaker and bleaker projection of growth for competing software.
I thought blender was over that viewlayer mess after collections were implemented. Now we’re trying to mimic those limited 20 layers workflow with collections and using up precious screenspace for those x-es. Why?
edit: just found out you could disable it by disabling default collection manager addon.
A concept of layers is far cleaner in many cases. They are the only reason I must use Blender 2.7 for design, Layers are fast and easy to move things out, bring them back - get stuff done!
I have read posts from many wise users suggesting Blender should implement an infinite layer system and collections, and would be ultimate.
It confounds how there are so many users who are so strongly opposed to having a layers system. Why do they make your workflow more difficult? If layers could be used in parallel with collections would that still bother anyone?
I personally find that I spend 3x longer doing same designs in Blender 2.8 than in 2.7!! I think it is because 2.8 is much heavier and requires many more points/clicks and organization steps than the good old simple 2.7 interface where everything took milliseconds to invoke because most of it was lightning fast hotkeys - if hotkeys are your thing…
Perhaps use collections as layers, and have quick grid of icons that are the collections, you could check or unchek for visibility for each collection as easy as with Blender 2.7.
You don’t need layers.
I liked the layer grid for visual queues where the rows/blocks had significance in my projects. In 2.8 each collection must be named (or else chaos incurs). But naming each collection takes time, where layers were much faster.
I like your suggestion and if collections could somehow allow users to treat them more like layer for rapid shifting around of objects then I might be able to keep pace with the 2.7 counterpart.
I am not sure if I am old school, or if old school is the only school, but I would really love to see a timed model design competition pitting Blender 2.7 against Blender 2.8 and see who can make models faster, I am not referring to rendering rates or artistic capability, just simply modeling things…
I am almost willing to bet that 2.79 kicks the pants off 2.8, and I would even pay to watch that competition!!
Left click “create new” , you don’t need to name the collection, it’s named for you if you don’t care.
Collection have more visibility features also than layers.
Someone could create an addon to display collections as a small grid like Blender 2.7 for quick access instead of using hierarchy.
I prefer a lot the new 2.8, but sure some people prefer old school
