Tag: Blender

Episode 14: Chandra Models and VR stuff

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Episode 14: Chandra Models and VR stuff
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A few updates and some cool Chandra X-ray Observatory stuff!

Links mentioned in the episode:

Museum & Informal Education Alliance https://informal.jpl.nasa.gov/museum/

Kim Arcand https://www.kimarcand.com/

Walking Among the Stars (VR stuff) https://chandra.cfa.harvard.edu/vr/

Chandra 3D models https://3d.si.edu/collections/Chandra

PPA Youtube channel https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-pfVOHnkvAV_fdnKLdqzwA/videos

Stellarium Landscape zip files for easy installation https://github.com/waystar/StellariumLandscapes/releases/tag/v1.1

Episode 11: FOSS for Video Editing

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Episode 11: FOSS for Video Editing
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This week I followed a rabbit hole that led me to rediscover some projects I’d previously not liked, but now they have the potential to be what I need.

Links from the episode:

unfa channel   https://www.youtube.com/user/unfa00

TechHut channel   https://www.youtube.com/user/TechHutus

TechHut top 10 Linux apps  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xeVJydgFKWo

Vokoscreen  https://github.com/vkohaupt/vokoscreenNG

KdenLive  https://kdenlive.org/en/

KDE   https://kde.org/

OpenShot Video Editor   https://www.openshot.org/

ShotCut  https://www.shotcut.org/

Blender  https://www.blender.org/

Natron  https://natrongithub.github.io/

Episode 9: Resources for Astronomy Art with Blender

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Episode 9: Resources for Astronomy Art with Blender
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This week I chat about some interesting tools and tutorials for using Blender for non-visualization Astronomy stuff.

Links for this week:

Cycles X   https://code.blender.org/2021/04/cycles-x/

Fulldome Production With Blender https://github.com/waystar/2019-Blender-Workshop-Materials

How to make planets in Blender   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6224Wisxwxc

Darkfall Shader Library intro  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vbj20u53uW8

The Shader Library   https://darkfallblender.blogspot.com/p/the-shader-library.html

Mark Kingsnorth original nebula tutorial (files no longer available, but still good to read) http://www.markkingsnorth.com/2017/01/31/blender-nebula-group-node-tutorial-download/

Mark Kingsnorth Nebula Generator on BlenderMarket https://blendermarket.com/products/nebula-generator

3D Star Map (link to demo version and store in description)  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRshK5qhJDA

Black Hole art from Void_SW on BlenderNation https://www.blendernation.com/2021/05/04/hand-picked-blender-art-4/

Create a Black Hole in Blender – Iridesium   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5naMFeWTBeY

Procedural Galaxies in Blender 2.91!  -CBaileyFilm   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XQXI5KownU

Procedural Solar Flare Shader Blender Tutorial!  – CBaileyFilm   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9anTO45bCM

Mustafar Procedural Lava Planet Shader  – CBaileyFilm   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LCztNvPGq1w

Episode 8: Some Resources for Astronomy Visualization with Blender

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Episode 8: Some Resources for Astronomy Visualization with Blender
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Another update and a look at some interesting resources for learning to take astronomy data into Blender for visualization. It’s how the magic gets made!

AstroBlend   https://www.astroblend.com/

AstroBlend   https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAUcA4vXe2IPdnCjBslj6XQ

AstroBlend at 2015 Blender Conference   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0vY-sl1oXME

Dr. Jill Naiman   https://www.astronaiman.com/

Dr. Brian Kent   https://www.cv.nrao.edu/~bkent/blender/

Matías Gárate’s  Blender & Astronomy Tutorial. Using Voxel Data for 3D visualization    https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLjFmkbKBKd0WuhhbR2MGPXZyWW7TPcNSw

Episode 3: Thoughts on Getting Started in Blender

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Episode 3: Thoughts on Getting Started in Blender
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This week I talk about how I got started using Blender and ways to go about learning it if starting today.

Links mentioned in this episode:

Darkfall Cosmic Shaders https://darkfallblender.blogspot.com/ , https://youtu.be/vbj20u53uW8

Blender https://www.blender.org

Waylena’s inexplicably popular 8-second video https://youtu.be/PICxEYvYT-

Blender online user manual https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/

Blender Fundamentals playlist https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLa1F2ddGya_-UvuAqHAksYnB0qL9yWDO6

Waylena’s Blender for Fulldome Workshop Materials https://github.com/waystar/2019-Blender-Workshop-Materials

Ron Proctor’s Youtube Channel https://www.youtube.com/c/RonProctorProfile/featured

Cosmic Shaders from Darkfall

I saw this on my YouTube subscriptions feed last week. Very cool stuff. There is a good blog post on using the add-on as well: https://darkfallblender.blogspot.com/2021/03/blender-add-on-shader-library-version.html

Downloaded the python script from the Pastebin link provided in the blog post. Then installed the add-on through Blender Preferences.

The Shader Library is accessed through the 3D View. If you don’t see the tabs on the right, hover over the 3D View and hit the “N” key on the keyboard.

There are several shader types and options to choose from.

The add-on creates the node tree for the shader. This is a great way to quickly see what node trees can do without creating them from scratch.

I added some compositing to get a nice glow in Cycles.

Have to separate out the Environment (background as set up in “World” panel) and blur foreground alpha separately from the image to get that nice glow.


I always look for a Cycles way to make things glowy since I ultimately use fisheye for use in the dome. Eevee is super fast and that bloom is wonderful, but it’s a no-go when rendering straight to fisheye.

Episode 1: State of the Open Sources

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Episode 1: State of the Open Sources
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In this debut, I briefly go over some of my favorite open source packages and what I typically use them for.

Links mentioned in the episode:

Blender https://www.blender.org/
GIMP https://www.gimp.org/
Inkscape https://inkscape.org/

Krita https://krita.org/en/
ImageMagick https://imagemagick.org/
G’MIC https://gmic.eu/

Audactiy https://www.audacityteam.org/
Scribus https://www.scribus.net/
LibreOffice https://www.libreoffice.org/
OpenShot https://www.openshot.org/

Fun with Blender and Mars

Had a bit of fun making videos to celebrate in the weeks leading up to the Mars Perseverance landing. This one was one of my favorites.

Links from the video:

Blender http://www.blender.org​

Blender HiRISE DTM Importer http://github.com/phaseIV/Blender-Hir…​

HiRISE DTM Quickstart http://www.uahirise.org/dtm/howto.php​

Terrain model data http://www.uahirise.org/dtm/dtm.php?I…​

Mars Perseverance Mission http://mars.nasa.gov/mars2020/

Plexus Effect

Video on Odysee

So I spent my morning digging into a tutorial by Chris P on YouTube building a lovely Plexus Effect using Blender and Animation Nodes. There were a few stumbling points due to the tutorial being for slightly older versions of both, but they weren’t so different as to be a huge problem. And if I were more practiced with Animation Nodes it would have been much easier to figure out those differences.

My resulting video isn’t a super high quality because it was rendered for upload to Odysee/Lbry. I don’t know if there is a way to embed as there is with the other video players out there.

My result video on Odysee