Introducing Why Blender Why?! Blender Tutorial Video series.
Why Blender Why is a video series of motion graphics that quickly answer your most common Blender questions to help get you over "the gap." This project is the brainchild of CG Cookie Citizen Member Omar Domenech.
- Let's meet Omar
- What is the gap?
- Blender inside of Blender,
- Watch the first three videos at the bottom
Meet Omar
You have likely seen Omar in the CG Cookie forums, answering your questions or responding in our Blender Discord server. Omar is one of our Instructor Assistants. His active participation as a helpful community member put him high on the list of CG Cookie Citizens to talk to when we decided to add IAs to the Cookie crew. (Our other IAs are Adrian, Martin and Shawn).
In his new role as IA, Omar jumped in to answer your questions and has also been logging those questions in an epic google doc along with relevant solutions. This effort wasn’t only meant for his own benefit. He also considered that this collection of questions and answers could be a helpful resource for others.
Omar began noting the most common Blender questions and noticed a “gap” that needed…something. Enter Why Blender Why?!
For a little background on the birth of Why Blender Why, I'll share some of Omar's thoughts from this initial pitch.
He began with:
I'll try to make this as short as possible. No one likes walls of text. So short story long...
Something you should know about Omar is that he claims to have a fear of walls of text and is somewhat uncomfortable with the English language.
On the other hand. Omar has a talent for taking us on a verbal journey in every conversation. When asked a simple question, Omar's answer can feel like a pegasus ride over a rainbow to arrive at a pot of gold. 🌈
What is, "The Gap"?
Omar describes the gap like this:
I feel there is a gap between somewhere and anywhere. You see, when you are watching a Blender tutorial you follow through an orderly situation, it's a bit rehearsed, because no one wants to see a tutorial of someone wrestling with Blender, troubleshooting a lot, which is how it realistically looks like when we are working for reals. Normally you follow the exact same steps as in the tutorial and then you shift to trying it on your own and that's when trouble happens. You realize Blender acts up and not doing what you expect, but you don't troubleshoot, you just go back to the tutorial and you see the answer and you complete the goal. Easy, you mirror what's in the video.
But then you get ambitious, you want to try something for yourself, your own creation, and now when you get stuck there is nothing to go by, no video, now you have to troubleshoot on your own. Here's where that gap I was talking about is born. Now you don't know how to get out of your unique situation and you shout to the sky "Why Blender, Why!?"
You may try watching a Blender tutorial and hope that somewhere in there you see a situation that may get you out of the circumstance you are in, but that may not happen or in the least it may take a long time, it's a gamble. So you go surfing the web typing "Why is blender" or "How do I in Blender" or "What is this in Blender" and hopefully after reading through forums and seeing people in your situation, you may find the answer.
This is where the real value of having a friend who knows Blender is like a miracle to you, just call your friend and tell him dude, why is my floor plane rendering black? And your friends go with you trying different things out. Or say you don't have any friends, then you go to Discord to ask people or you go to the CG Cookie forums.
So that's the description of what I call "The Gap". I have found myself there countless times while I was learning Blender.
Why Blender Why?!
Omar was determined to fill that gap. He considered just sharing his document but wanted something more tangible, visually interesting, and immediately helpful. He could see these answers in the form of an explainer video, but Omar is not comfortable speaking to the camera and feared his accent would be distracting. So he found a way to use Blender to overcome these perceived roadblocks. He leaned into motion graphics (no talking head required). Then he did the most meta thing we never could have imagined.
Omar built Blender in Blender to take you inside Blender.
Like a dream within a dream or an Oreo inside an Oreo, or like wearing jeans and putting jeans on top again. I figured well, it's a cool way to show what to do in Blender, to be in it like no one has before to take you for a ride.
Omar told us all this and sent us some test versions of the project, then went back to quietly answering your questions during breaks in his day job while we stared in wonder at his work.
Watch the first three videos of Why Blender Why
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