■1: Bad addons, Wet streets, and Hacks for beauty

Beginners, shun addons

If you a beginner in Blender, or just a beginner in an area of Blender, try not to scroll the Superhive Blender market. It will tempt you with addons that “revolutionize your workflow.”

99% of these addons are not useful to me, because I know Blender. Like I showed once, a lot of the addons just do what Blender can already do. And I feel bad for the suckers who buy them.

(Side note, the people who make these addons should make tutorials instead.)

Learn the built-in tools first. You don’t need an addon for retopology yet. Learn the built-in way. When you’ve mastered it, you will know which addons are useful and which ones are a waste of money.

Tutorial: Hacks for beauty

This talk by Martin Sweers is about simple hacks that make an outsized impact on the shot. Very good.

Inspiration: industrial design

This magazine shows nice industrial design. Skim the weekly roundups for good ideas, nice design, and good photography.

Tip: wet it down

In Hollywood they often do a “wetdown” before filming. They spray the ground with water. Streets look better when wet.

Filmmakers all know this. 3D artists seemingly don’t.