Reply To: How do you learn/ how did people learn things in cg by themselves?

[Ronald Vermeij]

(PART 2 of 4)

TIP: I ALWAYS TRY TO HACK THE MINDSET OF THE CREATORS TO FULLY UNDERSTAND HOW STUFF WORKS:
You can see 1 example of this process over here (regarding wanting to know how Blender Cycles works)
https://cgcookie.com/t/974-blender-cycles-technical-developer-question-about-various-types-of-cycles-shader-data-streams
https://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?446798-Blender-Cycles-Technical-(developer)-question-about-various-types-of-Cycles-Shader&p=3291018#post3291018

Yes I’ve started follow the relevant CGCookie classes (Blender Basics, Lighting, Composting, Rendering).
These nice beginner-level courses got me started into understanding the “Cycles mindframe-work”.
Now, I’m on a quest to FULLY LEARN how Cycles works at the GPU HARDWARE  LEVEL of thing, so I can fully control it the way I WANT IT TO and being  dependant on the fragmented bits and pieces of information that  somebody else is willing to share (for free). So I have:
– Searched for, gathered, and read all types of Cycles “manuals” online.
– Look on the internet for free e-books on Cycles.
– Watched many tutorials (beginners, advanced, expert) on Cycles.
– Contacted some Blender developers since i prefer to always go to the source of things.
– Asked a couple of questions on BlenderArtist-forum and BlenderStackExchange.

Only to find out – during this Cycles Learning Journey – that
“Sourcecode never lies, always paints the complete picture”.

So I continued my Cycles Knowledge journey, quest and:
– Installed Git on my computer.
– Downloaded the latest blender Open Source repository.
– Bought a few books (learning C and Python the hard way).
– Refreshed my old C and C++ Coding skills.
And now I have finally arrived at the level I want to understand Cycles, the SOURCE(-code)

Yes it took me a _little_ longer then I expected, but now I have what I WANT.
All materials needs to really start learning the way I want it too.
And look what I ALSO have learned ALONG THE WAY.. It was worth it too.