Get to grips with new real-time animation techniques and tricks to improve your artistic and technical skills in shading, 3D rendering, and scene creation using Blender 3.0

What’s inside

• Thorough explanations of real-time rendering engine concepts using practical projects
• Step-by-step instructions on how to update workflows to Blender 3.0
• Intermediate to advanced-level tutorials on creating art inside Blender

You’ll get the most out of this book if

• You're a 3D animator, sculptor, modeler, or a concept artist who wants to use EEVEE to speed up your work in movies, TV, and game design
• You have a basic to intermediate-level understanding of 3D programs and ray-tracing engines

What your journey will look like

This book will give you a high-level overview of what EEVEE is capable of. As you progress, you'll get to grips with topics like Geometry Nodes, Rendering Techniques, using shortcuts like Kitbashing and Alphas to speed up scene creation, volumetrics, reflections, adding lights, cameras, and even special effects like fire and smoke — all in EEVEE.

You'll learn by working through actual scenes from start to finish, implementing the knowledge you learn along the way. By the time you've completed the book, you'll will have created three separate works by leveraging with the full power of Blender's EEVEE.

Some of the things you’ll learn from this book

• How to leverage EEVEE Render Properties for optimal outcomes
• Shading processes, including those that are both traditional and more cutting-edge
• Composition and how to create effective concept art inside Blender
• Procedural workflows to shorten the artistic process instead of getting mired in details
• Intermediate Blender workflows for working in a professional environment
• How to develop different art styles and learn why each style has different workflows and conventions
• Creating interactive, rapid changes in Blender's EEVEE engine

Table of Contents

1. Introducing EEVEE – A Real-Time Rendering Engine
2. Creating Materials Fast with EEVEE
3. Lights, Camera...
4. Non-Physical Rendering
5. Setting Up an Environment with Geometry Nodes
6. Screen Space Reflections – Adding Reflection to the Water
7. Faking Camera Effects for Better Renders
8. Using Alphas for Details
9. Lighting an Interior Scene
10. Working with Irradiance Volumes and Cubemaps for More Accurate Rendering
11. Kitbashing – Adding Details Fast
12. Special Effects with EEVEE – Fire and Smoke
13. Exploring the Wide World of Blender

About the Author

Sammie Crowder first discovered Blender 8 years ago, and she has been using it to create ever since. After self-teaching while working at a library for several years, she started using Blender as an educator, creating short - and long-form animations that explain complex scientific concepts for the University of Colorado. Following several years of developing that program, she transitioned to using Blender 3D to create synthetic data for machine learning applications. Her current focus is on education, using Blender and other tools to get underserved groups into technology and art-based industries. She lives in beautiful Colorado with a dog, two cats, a lizard, and her partner. When she's not working in Blender she likes to read, hike, and garden.