Blender Tutorial #3: Do You Want to Build a Snowman?

In the first Blender tutorial you learned how to navigate the main 3D viewport using the mouse (wheel to zooming in and out, MMB to rotate and Shift-MMB to translate) and keyboard shortcuts (1/Shift-1 for front/back view, 3/Shift-3 for right/left view, and 7/Shift-7 for top/bottom view). You have also learned how to manipulate objects ('s' to scale, 'g' to grab/translate and 'r' to rotate).

To Do:

  1. Watch and follow along Tutorial 3: Building a Snowman (19 mins)

    In this tutorial you will learn how to create a simple snowman out of primitive shapes: UV spheres, ICO spheres, cylinders, and cones. You will practice the skills you have learned in earlier tutorials, and learn how to duplicate objects and how to select/deselect multiple objects.

    Here is a summary of the keyboard shortcuts you will be using in this tutorial:

    Number pad  1 / Ctrl-1   Front / Back view
     3 / Ctrl-3  Right / Left view
     7 / Ctrl-7  Top / Bottom view
     g  grab and move the selected object(s) freely
     g followed by axis label (x, y or z)  grab and move the selected object(s) along the specified axis (x, y or z)
     r  rotate the selected object(s) freely
     r followed by axis label (x, y or z)  rotate the selected object(s) about the specified axis (x, y or z)
     r followed by axis label (x, y or z) followed by number  rotate the selected object(s) about the specified axis (x, y or z) by the specified number of degrees;
     for example, r y 30 means "rotate 30 degrees about the y-axis"
     s  scale the selected object(s)
     s followed by axis label (x, y or z)  scale the selected object(s) in the direction of the axis
     s followed by Shift-axis (Shift-x, Shift-y or Shift-z)  scale the selected object(s) in the plane orthogonal to the specified axis
     x  delete the selected object
     Shift-c  place cursor to origin (0,0,0) and change view to include ALL objects. Think of it as "HOME"
     Shift-a  bring up the "Tools" menu to add new meshes, etc.
     Shift-d  duplicate the selected object(s)
     b  box-select multiple objects
     a  select / deselect all objects

    Be ready to demo your snowman and alter it according to ad hoc guidelines given by the instructor.

  2. Watch and follow along Tutorial 4: Saving and Recovery (11 mins)

    This is a simple, intuitive and straightforward tutorial that covers the tasks of saving your work, creating multiple backups of your work, and recovering previous work.