[ENDED] BC1-1808 - August 2018 Class Homepage - Getting Started with 3D Modeling & Blender 2.8

jakeblended Yes.

QUESTION:  How do I download Blender 2.8 Alpha?  When I do it from the Blender Builder page, it downloads the non-alpha version.

thecabbagedetective, @theluthier 

How about this.  Maybe we can post our lessons, but explain that we have more experience than a beginner.  Maybe post our blend files, so the beginners can download and pick apart our projects to ask questions.  That way, we're helping and participating?  

Something like that?

williamatics Are you downloading on Windows?  I just downloaded the "New Compiler" version for Windows 64bit and it shows the alpha tag in the splash screen.

@theluthier  Aha, that clears some things up, thanks. I don't believe anyone here has any intentions of flexing, it's more so the concern that their skill will be misinterpreted as such. CGCookie - especially as a learning environment - is by far one of the most relaxed and friendly teaching platforms I've seen and we all want that to be maintained, but as you said it's more than likely easy enough to sniff out the ne'er-do-wells, which is thankful because I'm rather dim when it comes to that haha.

I definitely agree with the proposition @charmn-one made, it seems like a great way to help out fellow students and personally, with the desire to be a VA, this would go hand-in-hand with that. Even last month, which was considerably more advanced, had a vast amount of helpful advice and solutions to problems (which thanks again to you all by the way, really got me out of some scrapes), so I believe us as a community are more than capable of being an asset to the teaching process.

@theluthier Have you ever thought of asking some user reviews (with results) to promote classes here on CGCookie? If so, I'd be happy to write one :p. My hoverbike render is almost finished btw, so I could include that if it doesn't look like complete garbage :).

I'm looking forward to the live streams and the community participation! I was only able to catch the one sculpting live stream from the vehicle modeling course and it was fun, inspiring, and educational.

Good times. Thanks.

~angel

@theluthier Thanks, that makes me a lot less conflicted about the situation.  Back to being just excited for this class!

 I've had a little trouble trying to port 2.7 projects to 2.8; they open, but for instance when I try to change the viewport from solid to a shaded or rendered view, 2.8 crashes.  I'm working right now to finish up my current project so that I have nothing left going on in 2.7 by the time the class starts.  I believe 2.8 will be hitting beta state about halfway through the month, so unless it is  crashy or buggy I think I might shift permanently to 2.8 after the class ends. 

williamatics Hello William, if you haven’t found the link already, just scroll down on the down load page (https://www.blender.org/download/) and select the “latest experimental builds” button and that should take you where you want to go.

ullreym I already figured it out, thanks!

@theluthier Thank you very much for clarifying. I also wasn't sure whether I should participate or not, and I thought it would be better to sit this one out. But since you are going to use Blender 2.8 and I've been waiting to sink my teeth into it for a while now, I'm really looking forward to joining the class. I think my take on this will be to push simple techniques to their limits (to show beginner users what they'll be able to do in no time, and maybe, hopefully, to also inspire them) and to try and be more active in the thread.

Could somebody please explain what light probes are?  I have no idea what they do.

williamatics My understanding is simplistic and maybe incomplete, but here's what I know:

A light probe is like a 360-degree image that describes the lighting in a scene.  Think of an HDRi - an HDRi contains two kinds of information, an actual photo image (which is what you see in the background and in the reflections of the objects in the scene) and lighting information, so that the 3D objects in the scene are lit (ostensibly) the same way as things in the photo image.  The part of the HDRi that contains the lighting information is a "light probe".  

I think you can make or import or otherwise  use a light probe in Blender without an entire HDRi image, but I don't know how the particulars on how do that.  I think light probes independent of HDRi are more often used for game environments like in Unity, rather than Blender still images or animations.  But I could be wrong about that. 

Reading through the so far posts and seeing the familiar avatars from June I would like just repeat again, that BC3-1806 class was really special.. You guys are amazing with keeping the spirit of the classes and willing to help others so much.

This idea with introducing Blender 2.8 is quite inspiring, personally would like to join again of course, anyway simply the reason is because only a CG Cookie class is able to keep me opening Blender everyday. That does not matter whether being beginner or on any level, the point is like the Nike slogan - Just Do It.

As Katerina mentioned I would like to be also more active in the thread, for example from the report card we will see the absolutely new members in classes and could provide a kind of hypercare for them, with the target of keeping both the motivation and technical ability to post homeworks on all the 4 weeks. Because let's admit Blender is hard, especially at the beginning

what does this mean.  remember to RSVP  . and this: ask me anything (AMA) style. what is ama style?

yyukinoh1989 I'm pretty sure AMA stands for Ask Me Anything.  I don't really see what RSVPing does; you can still attend without RSVPing.

yyukinoh1989 RSVP is from French and stands for Répondez s'il vous plaît. In English it means "please reply" and is sometimes used in formal business communication. 

I think Kent is trying to turn the classes into high-profile events. :-)

hey both thanx for the explenation (my english isnt not so good yet so if i make mistakes like writing etc pls correct me i would love to improve my english too this way :) )
also i wonder what happens if i become a citizen now by upgrading for one month. can i still apply for the first classes or am i not allowed since i wont be able to complete them all ?
if i am allowed to enter (even if its for 1 or 2 sessions where do i sign up and what happens if i cant follow class due to my diffrent working hours that constantly change ?  can i still review it or isnt that possible ?