Not sure where to start learning Blender? Begin here.

CG Cookie
Wes Burke

The most common question we've received over the years is, 'Where should I start, and what should I take next?' I was motivated to ensure this stays accessible in the top navigation and pinned at the top of the community page. 

1. The Blender Basics - Streaming for Free

2. CORE Fundamentals - It's like a college degree but different

If you're brand new to Blender, looking for a refresh, or transitioning from another software, you should enroll in these two pieces of Blender training in that order. ;) 


Happy Blending! 


Wes



15 loves
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  • Alvaro Tellez(Alvareanu) replied

    Hi Wes,

    Thank you for posting this, it's exactly what I was looking for as I'm about to finish The Blender Basics course and I just got the membership.

    I saw a lot of referencing and recommendations to the Mesh Modeling Bootcamp course and I just wanted to ask if there's a lot of overlap between that and the CORE Fundamental ones or if I can skip that one in favor of CORE?

    1 love
  • Wes Burke replied

    I would vote to dive into the CORE learning flow, with then the Mesh Modeling BootCamp as a side-quest. :) 

    My pleasure and congrats on getting through the Blender Basics course! 

    2 loves
  • Ashish Pali(blinkash) replied
    Thank you for your post. As a beginner, it's difficult to understand where to begin. 
    • Happy Blending!
    1 love
  • Pavlov Sylvain (PavlovSylvain) replied

    Really helpful for posting this, as I am just getting started!

    • Your welcome!
    1 love
  • thomas Girsch(Nanithom) replied

    Hey there, im a filmmaker and I do a lot of commercials for brands and products plus I am working for an independent news channel covering geo-political themes.

    I was interested in learning Blender mostly for making realistic environment or objects later to be integrated with real footage that I film with my cameras and also for my journalistic work - visualising concepts in 3D(if you know Fern on Youtube then that is exactly what I was aiming for).

    I have just finished the amazing Blender Basics course by CGCOOKIE on YouTube and I am subscribed as a premium member at your website.

    I am wondering what is the right path for me ? should I dive into the CORE Fundamentals course and then move on ? or would you recommend a different path for me ? I would say that camera movement and at the end - rendering a video to be used as part of my production process - is what I am looking for.

    I am keen to learn and I have the patient - I just want to make sure that I am not wasting time by not learning what I need to learn.

    thanks a lot !

    1 love
  • Henry Cheney(Chenhen01) replied

    Hello, 

    I've just done the press start and the Basics on youtube which have been awesom. As someone totally new to Blender this has been great. I'm originally a Sketchup user who works in Archviz workflow with D5 render. I am now looking to get into more complex modelling tool that has more to it than what Sketchup can offer (it's great for a lot of things, but lacks in some areas). It sometimes seems that Blender can do everything, which I certainly don't need to know, yet! I want to lock in modeling so that going forward I can also use the workflow of going to Unreal, so a better understandin of UV mapping and good topology I think will be key.

    My question is, am I better off trying to find more specific modelling tutorials that are more relevant to Archviz, or are the fundamentals and other courses inside CG Cookie going to scratch all the itches?

    A couple of the courses from Kent Trammell look interesting the industrial & minimalisum. 

    Many thanks

  • Omar Domenech replied

    Hello Henry. I think it's all about the Miyamoto Musashi quote "If you know the Way broadly, you will see it in everything".

    In other words, you can watch any tutorial and you'll start to get the foundations to do whatever you want. I think you miss out on so much if you go straight to what you want to focus on, and without noticing, you'll find yourself just copying what you see on screen and not really getting it, because it is giving you the results you are after and you'll just imitate. On the other hand, when you know the way broadly, when you focus on learning the fundamentals, you have a solid bedrock to just go at anything, including the Archviz. So I think it is best that you watch tutorials that gives you exactly what you are looking for, after you have chewed on the solid bedrock of the holistic approaches of modeling. 

    I'd say even if you have some background in 3D, I suggest you start with the Blender Basics (which you have done already) Linking just in case:

    https://cgcookie.com/p/library

    So you can move on to CORE:

    https://cgcookie.com/p/core

    Press Start is more a tech demo, to show Blender, it's not super beginner friendly.  After you got a hold on the basics, you can then start watching individual courses aimed at getting some specific result, and we'll link you up when the time comes.