It’s been five years since the first edition of Introducing Character Animation with Blender came out, and a lot has changed in the world of Blender. Interest in Blender has exploded. When the first edition of this book came out, it was the only English-language book on Blender in print. Now, as this second edition of the book arrives, there are well over a dozen books that I can think of offhand, to say nothing of commercial training DVDs and professional online tutorial services, none of which were around five years ago. Clearly somebody has begun to sit up and take notice.

It’s clear why, too. Blender has been making its mark in ways that are increasingly hard to ignore. The first Blender Open Movie Project movie, Elephants Dream, premiered as the first edition of this book was being written. Since that time, two more movies, Big Buck Bunny and Sintel, have been released to increasing fanfare. Each of the movies has been more ambitious than the first, and each has fulfilled its ambitions impressively. In addition to the movies, the Blender Institute has released a complete game and a half dozen professional training DVDs by some of the world’s top Blender creators. When I wrote the first edition of this book, I felt I had something to prove. Now, five years later, it is clear that Blender is proving itself.

In addition to the prolific content output of the Blender Institute, the coding of Blender has progressed at a rapid pace. Between the release of Big Buck Bunny and Sintel, the underlying event-handling and data-handling frameworks of Blender were entirely rewritten. This made it possible to completely re-conceive the user interface and Python scripting API, both of which were also rewritten as part of the overhaul. The result is a completely revamped application that has managed to earn kudos both from longtime Blender users and from longtime critics alike.

If you’re new to Blender, there’s never been a better time to learn. Although there will always be a learning curve to acquiring 3D graphics skills, the new interface is more intuitive and user friendly than ever before. If you’re coming from other software, you’ll be pleased to see that the interface is fully configurable (there is even an option for Maya-style interface presets accessible directly in the splash screen).

The new Blender has been a long time coming, and it is designed to last. Now that it is finally stable and ready for professional use, adoption of Blender by users of all kinds, from young hobbyists to old pros, is bound to continue even more rapidly.