DIGIPENDENCE - declare yours!

The magazine was started for the blender community, having the aim of publishing a bi-monthly PDF magazine; free for download. The goal of the magazine is to provide quality learning content for the blender community, from the efforts of the community itself. BlenderArt Magazine is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.5 license.

• Articles/Tutorials on Baking normal maps from a high poly model
• Big Bobby Car (Organic Surface Modeling)
• Normal Mapping in Blender
• Lighting and Film Making Tricks: Conveying
• MAKING OF: 'A Cassette Tape'
• MAKING OF: 'Dusting Off A Surprise'
• Bookreview - INTERVIEW: David Hickson - Blenducation
• & more…

After posting about Blender Magazine’s 19th issue, a publication which

was started for the blender community, having the aim of publishing a bi-monthly PDF magazine; free for download. The goal of the magazine is to provide quality learning content for the blender community, from the efforts of the community itself.

I thought that I’d check out their previous eighteen issues, all of which pre-date digipendence.com. This post will give a quick review of what’s available. Released under under the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.5 license, they - along with work/example files - can be downloaded individually (see each description), or in one large zipped file (it’s a tar.gz).

ISSUE 1 - Mechanical Modeling: Features Tutorials on Modeling, Texturing, and Animating a robot, tutorial on Plane line intersection, and more… as well as new flashes on Gimp 2.34, Blender 2.40, and the Montreal Conference. download issue+files	ISSUE 2 - Animation Special: Features Tutorials on Spider Rigging, Game Character Rigging, Animating falling feathers, the Making of “Age of Steam” (Issue 1 cover), and more… as well as articles on Project Orange, Foss.in report, and review of Stop Staring book. download issue+files
ISSUE 3 - Rendering Special: Features Articles/Tutorials on Using Yafray in professional environments, Learning how to use the Sunflow rendering system, Yafray Caustics, Yafray GI & HDRI, DPI (Dots per inch) explained, and Rendering optimization, and review of Digital Lighting & Rendering book. download issue+files	ISSUE 4 - Character Modeling: Features Articles/Tutorials on Character Modeling at Plumiferos, Modeling a Butterfly, Rapid Prototyping in Blender, Blender2Pov, Character Design 2D sketch to 3D, ResPower Super/Farm, MakeHuman, and more… download issue+files
ISSUE 5 - Modeling Techniques & Blender Scripts: Features Articles/Tutorials on Blender Material Library, Gen3 - Tree Generator, UV Mapping Techniques, Blueprint Setup, Spin Modeling, Modeling Rupert, A Sonorous Trip, and more… download issue+files	ISSUE 6 - Blender for Architecture & Games Special: Features Articles/Tutorials on Blender Normal Mapping, Architecture Visualization Tips & Tricks, From 2D Cad Drawing to Blender, The making of Cathedral, The making of Burley Brawl Scene, and more… download issue+files
ISSUE 7 - Blender Materials: Features Articles/Tutorials on Artistic Glow Using Blender’s Compositor Nodes, DOF Using Blender’s Compositor Nodes, Creating a Realistic Environment for BGE, Blender and Displacement Mapping, Blender and Vector Blur, and more… download issue+files	ISSUE 8 Car Modeling Mega Issue: Features Articles/Tutorials on Textured Metal Shaders, Making a Low Poly Car, Modeling a Car Rim, Modeling Tires, Making of ‘Cutting The Waves’, Making of Scale Model, Car Body Modeling: An Approach and more… download issue+files
ISSUE 9 - Space: Features Articles/Tutorials on Creating Heatwave Exhaust Effect with the Displace Modifier, How to Make A Realistic Planet In Blender, Making A Sun like Star in Blender, Modeling An Alien Using Subsurf, Texturing An Alien Using Nodes, Modeling a Lowpoly Spaceship, The Making of “Project Utopia” and more… download issue+files	ISSUE 10 - Organics: Features Articles/Tutorials on Taonui Face Modeling, Managing Metaballs, Modeling & Rigging a Frog, BlenRig: An Introduction, Froggy Walkthrough, Extinction Level Event, an Animated Castle Effect Walkthrough, Another Interview in ‘Meet The Blenderhead’, & more… download issue+files
ISSUE 11 - Mechanical: Features Articles/Tutorials on Producing Models with Accuracy, Amateur Mechanisms, Solid Device Construction, How to create a ‘Weld Joint’, Using Blender As NURBS application, Burned Bridges - Walkthrough, Another Interview in ‘Meet The Blenderhead’, & more… download issue+files	ISSUE 12 - Texturing Special: Features Articles/Tutorials on Multi-Layered Plastic Shaders, Tangent Space Normal Maps, Creating Realistic Flame, Blender-to-Kerkythea, Texture Seam Removal, Roof Tops - Making of, Another Interview in ‘Meet The Blenderhead’, & more… download issue+files
ISSUE 13 - Fantasy Special!: Features Articles/Tutorials on Making a ‘Realistic’ Underwater Rift, Creating a ‘Tree Character’, Using ‘Auto Masonry’ Script, Video Editing in Blender, Making of - Andy Tear Liquid Tubes, Making of - Glass Girl, Meet the BlenderArt Team, & more… download issue+files	ISSUE 14 - Cartoon & Game Engine: Features Articles/Tutorials on Modeling & Rigging a Cartoon-looking Spider, Making a Low Poly Character from High Poly, Material Retouching using Node & Vertex Color, Creating a Cartoony animation with Blender, Learning the Blender Game Engine, Blender Game Networking, Making of Orion Tear, Making of a Teenage Duck, Making of Monkey Game Project, Case Study on Blender’s Realtime Engine & more… download issue+files
ISSUE 15 - Animation: Features Articles/Tutorials on Taking Your Animation to the Next Level, Acting for Animation, Product Modeling: SDS and Details, Product Rendering, Hero’s Blender Animation’s, Facial Expressions in Stupidus, Einstein Dwarf, Blender in a Classroom & more… download issue+files	ISSUE 16 - Wow Factor: Features Articles/Tutorials on Skin Shading using multi-layered SSS, Realistic Smoke in Blender, Twirl of Smoke in Blender, Making hair for Wolf, Gone with the waves, Burn Them All, Procedurally Driven Scene, Making - Meet the Eye & more… download issue+files
ISSUE 17 - Lights, Camera, Action!!!: Features Articles/Tutorials on Making lightsabers using Blender’s composite nodes, 3 Strip Technicolor Conversion, Baking Light Projection and Shadows, Using the Sequence Editor, Lighting: Plan it out, Interview with ‘Tony Mullen’, Interview with ‘Allan Brito’, a book review of ‘Blender 3d Architecture, Buildings, and Scenery & more… download issue+files	ISSUE 18 - Landscapes, Environments & Sets!: Features Articles/Tutorials on Baking AO Maps for Terrain Using Blender 3D, Game Physics and Paths, CNC Machining with Blender, Create Scenes with a Seamless Background, Making of: A Big City For A Game, Making of: A Fantasy Landscape, Making of: The Scene of a Dream, Interview with Roland Hess & more… download issue+files

Paperback: 155 pages
Publisher: Michael Wiese Productions (MWP)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1932907424
ISBN-13: 978-1932907421
Product Dimensions: 27.7 x 18.8 x 1.3 cm

The second edition of this classic is even better than the first. It’s subtitled: “Great Camera Moves Every Filmmaker Should Know”, and indeed it contains a great deal of information that some people pay a lot of money to learn in film school.

Not that a book can replace a class necessarily, but there are tried and true shots, methods and techniques for making a film. Yes, story is important, but there are certain ways of doing things, certain types of shots, that are very important to know. Some of these aren’t obvious (which is sort of the point), but which help move story along visually in a way that helps people to enjoy what they are watching.

With the falling price of video cameras, computerized editing and the rise of sites on which to share videos, it seems like everyone is busy shooting a movie of some sort, be it a kid’s birthday party, a friend’s wedding, a sporting event, or something more ambitious like a documentary or a feature. And it’s not just filmmakers or videographers which will find the book valuable. This book is very helpful for cartoonists, sequential artists, animators and pre-viz artists too.

Jose Cruz is both an illustrator and a storyboard artist, and his images really convey Jeremy Vineyard’s jargon-free explanations. It’s important to know not just the how, but also the why. It’s always helpful to see explanations in action and this book accomplishes this by using examples from well-known movies. Imagine being to be able to watch a movie on DVD, using the remote to pause at a scene and then referring to the book to see how it was done, and understand why.

While only 155 pages, this book contains a wealth of information. It covers basic cinematic techniques, composition techniques, crane techniques, techniques of movement, techniques of perspective, specific camera techniques and editing techniques as well as a very long list of miscellaneous techniques. Because its value is not just in being instructional, but also serving as a reference guide, it doesn’t have to be read from the first page to the last page, one can just jump in anywhere. The six-and-a-half index is especially helpful as it contains the names of movies (several hundred spanning more than a century of filmmaking). This makes it easy to look up a particular film, flip to the right page, and see how a certain shot was made.

“Setting Up Your Shots” is designed in a ‘wide-screen’ format, just like a movie, and can easily be slipped into a Ziploc baggie and tossed into a backpack and taken along on a shoot.

Buy from Amazon.ca, Buy from Amazon.com.

Paperback: 280 pages
Publisher: Michael Wiese Productions (MWP)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1932907491
ISBN-13: 978-1932907490
Product Dimensions: 27.7 x 18.8 x 1.8 cm

Sheridan College is famed world-wide for its award-winning animation programs (Computer Animation, Digital Character Animation, Digital Visual Effects.). Full disclosure: I took their one year Media Fundamentals program. Author Ellen Besen, who has been working in the field for over 35 years, is a former faculty member, while illustrator Bryce Hallett is a Sheridan graduate and has enjoyed a very active career working on a variety of films, music videos and tv shows. This is important because it shows the publisher’s commitment to putting out a book written by people in the industry and ‘in-the-know’.

Many people are lucky enough to go to animation or film school, but not everyone does. Some people take a class here and there, while other people are completely self-taught. I have mixed feelings about the value of going to film school. These days, with the advent of less expensive, but still-powerful computers, and the wide variety of software available, some of it free or very cheap, as well as alternate distribution channels (YouTube, Vimeo, bittorrent, burning one’s own DVDs, etc), it’s easier than ever to actually make an animated film. Whether or not it’s any good is another matter.

Story is still important, but so is knowing how and why to do things when making an animated film. People who don’t go to school don’t always have the benefit of knowing these ’secrets’, and often have to learn by trial and error, if ever. Subtitled: “100 Principles Every Animator, Comic Book Writer, Filmmaker, Video Artist, and Game Developer Should Know”, it is exactly that. This solid widescreen style 245-page book covers subjects like ideas, scripts, storyboards, film structure, sound, animation techniques, performance, timing and special effects.

This handsomely-designed and beautifully-illustrated book will serve as an instructional guide, and also for a reference for years to come.

Buy from Amazon.ca, Buy from Amazon.com.

The magazine was started for the blender community, having the aim of publishing a bi-monthly PDF magazine; free for download. The goal of the magazine is to provide quality learning content for the blender community, from the efforts of the community itself. BlenderArt Magazine is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 2.5 license.

Features Articles/Tutorials on Rig a Boat’s Rigging, Perpetual Motion Machine Rigging, Caterpillar Soft Track, Animation Temporal Verification, KnowHow - Armatures aren’t just for Characters, KnowHow - Meshdeform Modifier, Bookreview of Animating with Blender by Roland Hess & more…

Blender Art Magazine #19: (download magazine + files)