Reply To: Does anyone have time to spare? I’m new to Blender

[Don Newman]

The first recommendation is to watch Andrew Price’s talk on The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Artists and then start developing the habits. And then watch it again. I keep it bookmarked and watch it every few weeks as a reminder of what habits I need to continue work on. I’ve presented it to friends and coworkers as not just for artists but anyone wanting to learn a skill. I’m now working with our HR department to utilize it as a foundation for personal development training at work.

Second is to start at the basic courses and flows and start working through them. Even if you feel you are beyond that because having a good foundation is going to make everything else easier. My first introduction to Blender was watching live streams of artists in the cosplay community using it for 3D printing. I was amazed at the stuff they were doing at the time. Now that I’ve been learning on here, I find it painful watching them now. They haven’t gotten any worse, but they also haven’t gotten any better and I see them struggling with the same things they were struggling with over a year ago.

Third is get involved beyond the courses you want to take. This could be separated out into different ways but since they are all optional on their own, I encourage you to at least do one of them. Watch courses beyond what you are wanting specifically to know, you will pick up tips and tricks that relate back to what you are wanting to do. Do the examples in the courses along with doing the exercises for even more practice. Grade exercises but also read the comments made on them to learn from the feedback given as well, you might be doing the same things and not realize until you see it pointed out. Watch others work through following artist time lapses on YouTube or live streams on Twitch to help get a feeling of how the small technical steps are combined into effective workflows. And one you are obviously doing by posting this topic is get involved with community discussion.

Fourth, and I can’t stress this one enough, remind yourself daily that what you are doing is awesome. It is easy to fall into the trap of watching artists that have been doing this full time for years and then comparing ourselves having only done it for a short while part time. The truth is by even trying it you are already above average since the majority of the population has probably never heard of Blender, let alone used it. Even amongst the community, your voice is still valuable and don’t be afraid of providing feedback on work that you might consider better than yours. Best case scenario is you noticed something they didn’t or had forgotten about and they will thank you for that making you feel great. Worst case is you point out something but was intentional on their part and they might explain why they did it that way giving you an opportunity to learn from them.

It seems like I could go on forever, but I’m going to cut myself off at a fifth and final tip. Don’t focus on learning just from experts. Watching other beginners not only shows us a level of skill that seems more within our grasp, but is usually closer to our own work to notice the individual things they are doing better and how instead of clouded within the 582 things an expert is doing better that can be overwhelming to take in.