Blender 3.5 is here, and it is packed with features that will excite game developers and content creators.
The release comes with a range of impressive features, such as a viewport compositor, vector displacement sculpting, built-in hair assets, and many more.
In this article, we will explore key features that stand out in this release.
1. VDM (Vector Displacement Maps)
The first feature we want to highlight is the new VDM or Volume Displacement Maps.
This feature is a game-changer for sculpting in Blender.
VDMs have been a standard feature in Zbrush for ages, and Blender has now caught up. With VDMs, you can displace your sculpting, making it more 3D and adding more information. You can create scars, zippers, and even ears with ease.
The VDMs work like a brush, and Blender’s new asset system makes them easy to use.
Here are some key points to keep in mind when working with VDM brushes:
- VDM brushes work best on smooth surfaces.
- To enable VDM brushes, load an OpenEXR file suited for Vector Displacement, set the brush texture “Mapping” to “Area Plane,” and enable the “Vector Displacement” toggle.
- Avoid any overlaps with previous strokes when working with VDM brushes.
- Use a high “Hardness” brush setting to make the VDM effect more accurate. A lower Hardness will make the boundary of the stroke softer.
- Most VDM brushes and examples use the “Anchored” stroke method, which provides good control of the size and rotation of the displacement.
- The “Drag-Dot” stroke method can be used for more precise positioning.
- The typical “Spacing” stroke method can be used for making an array of shapes.
- Pressure sensitivity can give additional variations of size and strength along the stroke.
Additionally, artists can use the “Area Normal” Auto-Masking in the advanced brush settings to avoid affecting back-facing geometry.
Overall, this feature will open up new sculpting possibilities and make sculpting in Blender a breeze.
2. Hair Grooming Tools
Another significant update is the new hair grooming tools.
If you’ve used the previously released geometry node-based hair grooming tools, you’d know that they lacked a lot of basic features.
However, Blender 3.5 just added a bunch of new presets and tools that are definitely posing a threat to the old particle-based hair system.
I. Hair Assets
- Blender now comes pre-packed with a bunch of hair grooming assets.
- With these assets you can just drag and drop them to your systems and get going with it right away.
- The Essentials asset library contains 26 hair assets, which are split into categories such as deformation, generation, guides, utility, read, and write.
II. Hair Generation
- Blender 3.5 offers three new nodes for hair generation: generate hair curves, interpolate hair curves, and duplicate hair curves.
- Generate hair curves creates new hair curves on a surface mesh from scratch at point locations.
- Interpolate hair curves interpolates existing guide curves on a surface mesh.
- Duplicate hair curves duplicates hair curves a certain number of times within a radius.
III. Hair Guides
- Blender 3.5’s hair guides make it possible to clump, curl, and braid hair curves.
- Clump hair curves clumps together existing hair curves using guide curves.
- Curl hair curves deforms existing hair curves into curls using guide curves.
- Braid hair curves deforms existing hair curves into braids using guide curves.
IV. Hair Deformation
- Three new hair deformation nodes added in Blender 3.5.
- The hair deformation Nodes allow for frizz, smooth, and roll hair curves starting from their tips.
3. Real-Time Viewport Compositor
The new GPU-based compositor backend in Blender 3.5 takes the 3D Viewport to the next level.
It’s definitely going to encourage a lot more people to use the Blender compositor.
The biggest issue in the past with compositor had been that it was super slow and not real-time. But now it’s both fast and real-time.
While it’s not 100% ready yet, some common nodes like the fog low glare node and a few more are still unsupported.
Modeling while compositing is on is now possible, making the viewport experience something never seen before.
4. Other Updates and Improvements
Cycles Lights
Blender 3.5 has introduced some exciting updates for Cycles, the powerful renderer in Blender.
One of the most notable improvements is the use of a light tree to more effectively sample scenes with many lights. This feature allows for many light sampling, which results in reduced noise and provides better rendering results.
In addition to this, Cycles’ spot lights now support non-uniform object scale, which matches how EEVEE renders them. This allows for greater control and accuracy when lighting scenes.
Another exciting update for Cycles is the spread property in Cycles area lights, which mimics a gridded softbox in real life. This feature allows for more control over the softness and direction of light in your scene, resulting in more realistic and dynamic lighting.
Animation
The updated Pose Library now offers new options and shortcuts that allow you to work more efficiently.
For instance, holding Ctrl will flip the pose, while pressing E will let you “exaggerate” it beyond 100%. You can also drag to the left to subtract a pose, saving you precious time and effort.
Another new addition is the Ease operator in the Graph Editor, which helps align keys on an exponential curve.
Grease Pencil
The new Natural Drawing Speed timing mode in the Build modifier replays strokes using the speed of the stylus when it was performed, giving it a more natural feel.
Other Improvements
And that’s not all – there are plenty of other enhancements too:
UV Copy & Paste between meshes, improvements to Constrain to Image Bounds in Shear Operator, and better handling of poles in Sphere/Cylinder Projection.
Additionally, the new asset library “All” and improved Asset Libraries list makes it easier to keep track of all your assets.
Conclusion
Blender 3.5 is an impressive release with a range of powerful new features for creators to explore.
From hair assets to procedural fur to vector displacement sculpting, Blender 3.5 is an essential tool for 3D artists and designers.
To wrap it up, Blender 3.5 is a massive update, and we’ve only scratched the surface in this article. If you want to learn more about the new features, see the release notes or videos from Blender official website.