Slashdot Mirror
Blender Gets Audio Sequencing
Qbertino writes "The universal GPLd 3D tool
Blender that was
bought free by the Blender community not so long ago, has gotten
audio sequencing added to its feature set. This has
been missing ever since the integrated Video NL (Non-Linear)
Editor/Sequencer was introduced. The only other 3D package
known for its integrated Video NLE is the proprietary
Houdini, which also
runs under Linux but comes at something like $3000 for its small featureset. This finally gives
the OSS community a lightweight alternative to
this and eases syncing 3D animation and audio a great deal. Audio sequencing will be integrated in the upcoming 2.28 release of Blender. Early
adopters can
download here."
Make smoothies? I hope so! Mmmm, smoothies...
Blite my shiny metal ass!
Just like those all-in-one cell phones, or printers/copiers/scanners/faxes, I suspect that they will have to compromise on quality, lest they end up with some bloated software product.
I'd much rather have separate best-of-breed software packages, than an integrated one that does everything OK, but not great.
-- Samir Gupta, Ph. D. Head, New Technology Research Group, Nintendo Co. Ltd., Kyoto, Japan.
Blender is definitely a great success story. Like Gimp is to Photoshop, Blender is to Maya. Though Photoshop is still the heavyweight tool for photo manipulation and though I'm an experienced Gimp user, I know that there are things that Photoshop can do that Gimp cannot do as easily. But the $500 price tag for Photoshop makes me a big, big Gimp fan. It does everything I need. Same for Blender. It is not in the same class as Maya but with a little work, can do many of the same things. In fact, it's at the point where it competes well against many of the lower end commercial packages costing hundreds of dollars.
Blender's primary target is to be able of making ready-to-publish video from scratch. Composing audio is a priority, unless you aim to recreating the beginnings of cinema.
I thought it was really keen, too.
Paint Shop Pro 5 doesn't even compare to MS Paint, and you can get that nowadays for free, it comes with windows, you only have to pay a $100 for windows. Or whatever it costs, I have never seen it for sale actually, haha.
Hey! That's my sig you're smoking there!
Sorry for the nitpick, but for the sake of not propogating mis-information, Houdini has anything but a small feature set, modeling/rendering/compositing very powerfull scripting, CHOPS/SOPS very powerfull particle systems, its been around quite a bit longer then blender as well. More along the lines of Maya Unlimited and Softimage XSI featureset wise.
http://www.sidefx.com/
It is free and complete and equal in power to the commercial version. There are no time limits.
p le /index.shtml
Of course there's a catch. This version uses a non compatible file format that is only read by this version. But then again, you're learning how to 3D model, right?
http://www.aliaswavefront.com/en/products/maya/
I'm totally impressed. I can't even figure out how to use blender much less resequence my audio (or whatever)!
Seriously... Anyone out there know how to use Blender? Wanna send me some links to documentation, particularly tutorials? Even better would be tutorials that are up-to-date!
Nosce te Ipsum
Good example of featuritis is the GIMP and their script-fu menus. Who else but a geek would write a library framework for plugins that often crash and take the program out with them.
The easier the interface, the less features, the better. All of the software I love to use (except Photoshop) fits this mould. Not that Photoshop is bad; it's the best. The problem with Photoshop is too many features to get to the work I need to do.
Heute die Welt, morgen das Sonnensystem!
Blender may be crap, but at 2 megs it is hardly bloated.
Photos.
Maybe it's just me, but they seem to be rather confused between the "About Blender" pages, the Changelog, etc...2.2.7 specifically says cartoon shading doesn't work. "About Blender" says it does. Which is it, guys?
Then, note that a lot of file formats don't work on Linux- only Win + MacOS X. None of the plugins work in OS X yet...so on. It's beta quality stuff, like walking into a house and the owners keep telling you "no, don't open that door, it's not on the hinges!" or "watch your step" when you pass by the 3-foot hole in the floor. Oh, but look at the MARVELOUS sun porch they just finished!
See this all the time- developers working on the bright+shiny things, while leaving behind major, glaring problems. Guys, fix it up so existing stuff works, THEN add new toys. What good is a car that has a really sweet stereo setup, but only 3 wheels?
I get the distinct impression Blender developers have bitten off more than they can chew, but are back in the kitchen for dessert regardless...
Please help metamoderate.
say what?!
Some guy just sold me a shiny new xmms version 2 cd on the street....are you saying its a fake??
The Blender project is a major milestone in the progression of open source software. For the first time, a closed project was brought into the open by the users. Compared to others, they have been remarkably fast at bringing a working product to market. They have also been extremely responsible in respect for copyright, and are currently helping to bring more closed work into the open. This project is one class act, and I hope that their model is extremely successful.
"To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
It's interesting reading the posts bewailing software bloat, I wonder how many of these posts are submitted by media creation professionals? Have you taken a look at Newtek's VideoToaster lately? Or how about Final Cut Pro? Granted, both are more NLE video editors (Although VideoToaster comes with Aura and Lightwave) but both of these products are chock full of "bloat" and causing the industry leaders like Avid take notice. I'd much rather have a production suite with some "bloat" in order to curtail some of the endless Render -> Export -> Import/convert -> re-sync -> export -> encode -> master -> blah -> blah -> blah process..... I for one can't wait to try out the new blender features, nice work and full steam ahead!
1400x1250 in a 640x480 world...
Adding useful features is such a waste of time!
Now, rewriting it in Java, That would be a REALLY good use of development time!!
Erm.. 2.27 was just released earlier this month - the second release after the open-sourcing.
I love the IPAQ port of Blender!! 'Wireless 3D creation!'. Hopefully they will port another pocket pc version soon.
Ooooo, mspaint. Wow, with the XP version I can now save images in jpg and gif instead of just bmp.
Mod this girl down because she is nothing but a troll.
No, you stop taking credit for my posts!
Doppelganger!!!
Your psychedelic arguing with yourself and someone else simultaneously is too much for my divvy little brain to handle!
[brain explodes through monitor]
Blender has some really nice features, but the user interface really is as bad as its critics say. I have tried to get comfortable with blender a half-dozen times now, but every time I have realised that it isn't worth damaging my brain like that. I am no expert, but I managed to pick up 3ds MAX in a couple of hours, but blender is utterly opaque.
It is a great shame, as there are a ton on brillint features buried beneath that hideous UI.
Blender has more buttons then a 747 Jet Airliner. While its amazing to see that Blender raised enough money, I wish that they would rework the entire GUI.
I also use Windows (please dont kill me), and seem to experience some annoying problems with blender (like the window not resizing correctly to my resolution, and just annoying GUI bugs)
Unless I need something complex, I'll stick with milkshape.
Just because some of the newest features aren't fully fleshed out yet (quicktime support, multilingual interface, this new audio stuff, etc) doesn't mean things are broken.
Every single blender developer (of which there are many now, thanks to Ton's hard work and the fundraiser resulting in the code being opened) shouldn't have to concentrate on one new feature at a time. So naturally there will be several things being added at a time, at various stages of completion.
By the way, toon shading does work, we've had lots of releases since 2.2.7.
Blender just keeps getting better and better. I personally didn't/don't use the game engine features much, but plenty of people do and I think it's great that they're getting rebuilt now without the proprietary code that had to be removed for 2.2.16 (first release under the GPL). I DO think I'll be using these new audio tools, and I'm glad the people who have been working on them do not share your view that all existing features should be polished before anything new is added.
The GIMP, KDE, GNOME, the Linux kernel itself, are all huge projects with many facets which would never be as sophisticated as they are today without many developers plunging in and doing new stuff. Does the technique make for some rough edges? You bet. But it also results in full-featured and useful software.
I've tried several 3d modelling packages. Most of them have innovative and different user interfaces. I've found blender's ui to be hard to get to grips with. It's incredibly cluttered and the shortcut keys aren't standardized. You're also presented with a myriad of buttons and switches that easily confuse.
I am smart - much smarter than you - Hibbert!
if i ever meet you i will kick your ass
Yes, this is a fucking "SLASHdot trolling session". Yes, this is going out live. See the fuckign cameraman? And the smashed up autocue? The boom operator's pointing at YUO , you stupid penis head.
gimp isn't dead. Far from.
still reading?
If you want to post it, you have to post in the better-developed sibling thread of insanity and hilarity. Fucktard.
Slow Down Cowboy!
Slashdot requires you to wait 2 minutes between each successful posting of a comment to allow everyone a fair chance at posting a comment.
It's been 53 seconds since you last successfully posted a comment
I was just using Blender this afternoon and was wondering if a new version was available, so I went to check out their website . Lo and behold, I saw this news announcement. Dammit! ! I could have submitted the story way earl ier!
Thank you.
I think it's obvious that the person who originally started this fucking retarded thread was a complete plagiarising moron. If you agree with me, post a reply plz plz plz!
Does anyone do any fact checking at all on /. ? Here's the current pricing which ranges from 1299 to 17000:. html
http://www.sidefx.com/sales/pricing/index
Simply because fixing bugs is boring and often tedious. Not many people get their kicks bug fixing. Writing new features is much more appealing since it is a) new and b) makes Open Source Project X that much more comparable to Closed Source Project Y
So new features are added first because they are fun and increase product visibility. Bugs often take a back seat due to the drudgery associated with them.
Damn.. That link should be www.elysiun.com not elyiun.
Hoe is audio sequencing going to improve anything for a drunken robot?
Oh, wait, remembering my own drunken ramblings, this makes a lot of sense.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
I hereby declare this the most successful shindig of the season!
A toast...to the Simpsons!
How's about someone get to work on a fully featured audio sequencer for linux?
I'm super happy that we can now sync music to animation in blender. It's just too damned bad we don't have an app to actually make that music in linux.
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
Okay, and UNDO is going to be implemented when? Seriously, I can't take a graphics package without an UNDO feature seriously.
TODO: Something witty here...
The 2.27 has international languages for the widgets. When you start it up you will get CHINESE syntax,fonts. Go to the Blender 2.27 folder and then the .blender folder and delete the only FONT . Will get you back to english . I emailed those guys , maybe they fixed it.
I use Photoshop at work, but far prefer PaintShopPro 7AE. I find more in PSP for my needs than with Photoshop. GIMP, I didn't have much fun there, however I guess we still to what we know.....
I am glad that there are viable alternatives these days for most tools.
Thats just awesome. Blender is an nice 3d package and its coming along nicely. Though it needs a more configurable user interface and alot of graphical refinements which gives the n00b a more straight forward approach to it i think its cool to see every new added feature. Its not fair to compare it to Hodini though since that is the biggest powerhorse of all package and beats the crap out of maya with its procedural workflow (but Maya is easier with character animation and houdini makes the FX job). So hopefully Blender will adopt many features from the bigger packages and will be an alternative for small studios trying to make there way in the biz.
;)
Perhaps well see flash/shockwave output someday
don't you DARE tell me we have no sound apps in linux.
Woah there, brother. Taking this a bit personally?
Yes, I will dare tell you that there aren't any sound apps in linux or, rather, no decent ones. I've used most of the apps you mentioned above (and then some) and have found them all lacking. Name one artist who says "Oh man, I could never give up my linux box for audio."
Give me something with the feature set and usability of apps like Reason, Cubase, etc. and only then will I tell you that Linux has made it in the synth/sequencing world. Give me the Gimp for sound, then I'll shut my piehole.
"It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." -David Hume
Good example of featuritis is the GIMP and their script-fu menus. Who else but a geek would write a library framework for plugins that often crash and take the program out with them.
First, if you're seeing crashes, something is wrong with your installation or you're using a really old version. Second, script-fu, while ultimately not necessary, is very useful for automating certain image processing tasks, and is actually one of Gimp's strengths.
If we accept as given that most people code open source to "scratch an itch" not "replace something that works" (and that does seem to be true. Most "replacements" are replacements that do something more/different), then I don't think that this is true. Well, it is and it isn't. Hear me out.
A programmer working on a package to get it to do something that he needs done will work on it to the point that it does what he wants. A bug that blocks him from doing what he wants means that he's not done yet, hence bugs will get fixed as well. A counter-argument might be made that the programmer is less likely to write good code to fix a bug than to write good code to implement a feature, but, honestly, this is not a big issue. Fix the bug to where it's fixed, and next time you implement a feature, re-organize the code. That seems to be what most people do anyways.
But why, then, do we have buggy programs and no one willing to fix those bugs before implementing a feature? Well, very few people get up in the morning and thing "I'm going to knock out some bugs that don't really affect me today." Unless that person is the maintainer, of course, then he might think that.
People are goal oriented, not task oriented. I think that's one of the reasons why so few of us have the ability to do very good time management, yet most of us have the ability to get something done.
Anyways, that's my theory, let me know what you think.
Except that you can do basically the same with macros in photoshop, without ever writing a line of code. Not that coding is bad, nessesarily, but the GIMP API is majorly fugly.
TODO: Something witty here...
Photoshop has had this functionality for years, and it's user-friendly, process-oriented, and intuitive. Seriously, have you ever *used* photoshop? I gave GIMP a try, on several occasions. I think you owe it to yourself to see what the GIMP needs.
Heute die Welt, morgen das Sonnensystem!
Personally I have been using Hash Animation Master for about 3-4 years now. Has all the power of the big boys, but its only $300 and has a community which is very open and helpful. Patches come out all the time, and most bugs are found by the community.
If you want a 3d package but do not have $3000, but want something easy to use than any other, check out www.hash.com.
You are just karma whoring, posting on the top most posting and offtopic. I downloaded 2.27 for both windows and linux, there was no such chinese thing. This is a lie.
why o why are closed sourcecompanies obsessed with features ? why cant you fkin fix bugs instead of the current obsession with adding more and more features that add more bugs making it even more unstable, is it boredom or pride ?
do yourselves a favour and make the original application perfect ie: bug free , before adding more features/bloat?
MS word gets more and more features every release, and most users don't even use a lot of those features. photoshop gets more and more features every release, while most non-professionals and home users don't even need everything photoshop can do.
*sigh*
Now back to reality. Why do you blame OSS? Closed source is no different. If anything, it's *closed source products* that add more and more features without looking back. Compare the latest version of Opera with Opera 3. On the other hand, compare GNOME 2 with GNOME 1: they actually cleaned up the GUI and *removed* a lot of config options and replaced them with sane defaults and autodetection, sped up Nautilus many times, and fixed numberous of bugs.
As for your Mozilla comment: Mozilla is meant to turn out this way. The Mozilla browser suite as we know it is just a "technical demo": it was never meant to be the final product. Mozilla was destined to split off in seperate products that use the same browser engine.
That was a missunderstanding. Predictable though, I'll admit that.
Houdini is a kick ass product if you pay the price which is something like 9000$ for the full featureset version (renderman and mental ray included!).
The smaller featureset versions cost aprox. 3000$.
That's what I ment.
Having used both I must say Houdini is OK, but it's interface builds up slow as hell whenever it's redrawn which gives the impression of a somewhat clunky piece of software. I'll still have a look at the new version though, allthough I'm gonna stick with Blender. Also because Houdinis pricing is somewhat silly.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
idiot. The chinese fonts were default. And i posted up near the top as a warning. So fuck off.
So we have an advanced(?) macro recorder versus 3 full featured program languages.
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.