Blender Community Rescues Sources

Christoffer Green writes "Today the Blender funding campaign went through the 100k limit, sufficient now to pay for the ransom fee needed to make Blender Open Sourced. The Blender Foundation aims to have the deal signed before October 1, do a pre-release for donating members only at October 5, organize a Blender Conference in Amsterdam October 11-12-13, and make the official CVS release on October 13 for everyone. This doesn't mean that you should stop donating though. The foundation still depends on your contributions to cover costs that have been made."

Comments

Re:So, this means what?

[Angry White Guy]

From the website : Blender is a cross plaform 3D creation suite, allowing fully integrated modeling, animation, rendering, post production and interactive 3D creation and playback. We are in the process of bringing back the old Blender product website. For the time being check www.elysiun.com for more info.

Re:So, this means what?

[rknop]

So, blender is what?

It's a powerful 3d modelling/rendering/animation package. It's really quite impressive. You can download a binary version gratis now. (It's not the very latest version, but close; donating members get access to the latest released binary.)

A good full-featured 3d modelleing/rendering package was something that IMHO open source lacked and needed. Blender 3d fits the bill perfectly. Go to www.blender3d.com to learn more and to get the currently available binary.

(Wings 3d is another 3d modelling pacakge, which isn't as far along, but which shows a whole lot of promise. I'm pretty sure Wings 3d is also free software.)

-Rob

100k is a bit expensive

[cioxx]

I could swear, these things cost much less than that

Re:I still wonder where the millions went though

[WWWWolf]

Besides, blender the product, is ok, but the interface is so darn goofy it takes a hell of a lot of time to get used to it, especially when you compare it to the big boys in 3D world: 3DSMax, lightwave and Maya

And me, been raised in Blender (because I can't afford the "big boys" - sorry, I haven't really done the usual "get the warez if you're a student, buy the program if you do actual work" thing), found the other modellers clumsy, and can't see why people think Blender is "complicated" (yeah, takes a bit to get used to, but after that it's a dream to use). Sort of like when I got raised in GIMP and can't understand a) why people with Photoshop background can't understand GIMP and b) why people regard Photoshop so highly, GIMP sure has better interface (if not that big feature set, though).

So let me repeat: Blender has a wonderful interface once you get the hang of it. Smooth enough for my needs, anyway, and I actually get work done in it. I don't like the renderer, though - I hope the work will start to implement more export formats and/or interfacing with other renderers (Renderman support would be pretty neat).

It's a matter of choice of profession, I suppose. =)

Re:So, this means what?

[Elbereth]

From the website:

"After the campaign

• Blender's sources will be opened under the GNU GPL.
  
• No costs, site access and Membership will become gratis, and open for everyone.
  
• Membership will be still required for some community services, like access to CVS, forums, etc.
  
• Other services might be offered without Memerbership, open for everyone.
  
• Details on the services will be made available later."
  

So, it looks like the source code will be GPL. That's good. However, you won't be able to access the CVS without paying. That's bad. They might let you have access to other services. That's good. But there are no promises, and there are no details. That's bad.

This doesn't look like any open source project I've ever seen. I don't remember ever having to pay to access the linux kernel CVS. Hmmm. Well, I don't really care, anyways. I don't use 3D programs. I'm just trolling.

Re:Any other software Linux lacks?

[paulbd]

yes, and in fact the OSS community (in this case, myself and a small handful of others) already do!

ardour is my own contribution to this issue.

3 years of full-time unpaid labor, funded by income from amazon.com, tested in a commercial recording studio, aimed squarely at the high end market with low end costs.

its massive, its complex, its very very very hard for a novice to build, its only available from CVS at this time. do you think it will get better? you'd better believe it! package releases coming up within 6 weeks, v1.0 hopefully within 12 weeks.

Another GPL conversion recently completed

[Rick Richardson]

Just thought I'd mention that due to a generous money donation by a private sponsor, the LinuxTrade software was converted to the GPL on 08/30/02.

This is a great trend, IMHO.

So who get's the T-Shirt?

[Nutcase]

Promises are not easily forgotten. Who is the lucky person who gets the T-shirt?