Below is a list of splash screens from previous Blender versions. Blender 2.40 Alpha 1. Blender 2.40 Alpha 2. 2.3 Series 2003 - 2005. Blender fails to encode unless a compatible set of values is used. Albeit lossy, DNxHD is a pretty nice compression format for size/quality ratio. Depending on your needs and preferences, it might be a good idea to render animations to lossless image. The original plan for Blender 2.80 was to work on all GPUs that have OpenGL 3.3 drivers and were released in the last 10 years. However, we have found that there are many graphic cards that support OpenGL 3.3 in hardware, but have critical bugs in the OpenGL drivers. CVE-2009-3850: Blender 2.34, 2.35a, 2.40, and 2.49b allows remote attackers to execute arbitrary code via a.blend file that contains Python statements in the onLoad action of a ScriptLink SDNA. Older Version Stealing Blender Files - posted in Graphics Design and Photo Editing: I installed Blender 2.79 from Software Manager in Linux Mint 19.1. Then I saw it was not the latest version so I.
In 1988, Ton Roosendaal co-founded the Dutch animation studio NeoGeo. NeoGeo quickly becamethe largest 3D animation studio in the Netherlands and one of the leading animation houses in Europe.NeoGeo created award-winning productions (European Corporate Video Awards 1993 and 1995)for large corporate clients such as the multinational electronics company Philips.Within NeoGeo, Ton was responsible for both art direction and internal software development.After careful deliberation, Ton decided that the current in-house 3D tool set for NeoGeo wastoo old and cumbersome to maintain, and needed to be rewritten from scratch.In 1995 this rewrite began and was destined to become the 3D software creation we all know as Blender.As NeoGeo continued to refine and improve Blender, it became apparent to Tonthat Blender could be used as a tool for other artists outside of NeoGeo.
In 1998, Ton decided to found a new company called Not a Number (NaN)as a spin-off of NeoGeo to further market and develop Blender.At the core of NaN was a desire to create and distribute a compact,cross-platform 3D application for free. At the time, this was a revolutionary concept as mostcommercial 3D applications cost thousands of dollars. NaN hoped to bring professionallevel 3D modeling and animation tools within the reach of the general computing public.NaN’s business model involved providing commercial products and services around Blender.In 1999 NaN attended its first SIGGRAPH conference in an effort to more widely promote Blender.Blender’s first SIGGRAPH convention was a huge success and gathered a tremendous amount ofinterest from both the press and attendees. Blender was a hit and its huge potential confirmed!
Following the success of the SIGGRAPH conference in early 2000, NaN secured financing of €4.5M fromventure capitalists. This large inflow of cash enabled NaN to rapidly expand its operations.Soon NaN boasted as many as 50 employees working around the world trying to improve and promote Blender.In the summer of 2000, Blender 2.0 was released.This version of Blender added the integration of a game engine to the 3D application.By the end of 2000, the number of users registered on the NaN website exceeded 250,000.
Unfortunately, NaN’s ambitions and opportunities did not match the company’s capabilities andthe market realities of the time. This over-extension resulted in restarting NaN with newinvestor funding and a smaller company in April 2001.Six months later NaN’s first commercial software product, Blender Publisher was launched.This product was targeted at the emerging market of interactive web-based 3D media.Due to disappointing sales and the ongoing difficult economic climate,the new investors decided to shut down all NaN operations.The shutdown also included discontinuing the development of Blender.Although there were clearly shortcomings in the then current version of Blender,such as a complex internal software architecture,unfinished features and a non-standard way of providing the GUI, the enthusiastic support fromthe user community and customers who had purchased Blender Publisher in the past, meant thatTon could not justify leaving Blender to fade into insignificance.Since restarting a company with a sufficiently large team of developers was not feasible,Ton Roosendaal founded the non-profit organization, Blender Foundation, in March 2002.
The Blender Foundation’s primary goal was to find a way to continue developing andpromoting Blender as a community-based open source project.In July 2002, Ton managed to get the NaN investors to agree to a unique Blender Foundation plan toattempt to release Blender as open source. The “Free Blender” campaign sought to raise €100,000so that the Foundation could buy the rights to the Blender source code and intellectual propertyrights from the NaN investors and subsequently release Blender to the open source community.With an enthusiastic group of volunteers, among them several ex-NaN employees,a fundraising campaign was launched to “Free Blender”.To everyone’s surprise and delight the campaign reached the €100,000 goal in only seven short weeks.On Sunday, October 13, 2002, Blender was released to the worldunder the terms of the GNU GPL.Blender development continues to this day, driven by a team of dedicated volunteersfrom around the world led by Blender’s original creator, Ton Roosendaal.
Version/Revision Milestones¶
The start!
1.00 – January 1994: Blenderin developmentat animation studio NeoGeo.
1.23 – January 1998: SGI version published on the web, IrisGL.
1.30 – April 1998: Linux and FreeBSD version, port to OpenGL and X11.
1.3x – June 1998: NaN founded.
1.4x – September 1998: Sun and Linux Alpha version released.
1.50 – November 1998: First Manual published.
1.60 – April 1999: C-key (new features behind a lock, $95), Windows version released.
1.6x – June 1999: BeOS and PPC version released.
1.80 – June 2000: End of C-key, Blender full freeware again.
2.00 – August 2000: Interactive 3D and real-time engine.
2.10 – December 2000: New engine, physics, and Python.
2.20 – August 2001: Character animation system.
2.21 – October 2001: Blender Publisher launch.
2.2x – December 2001: macOS version.
Blender goes Open Source
Blender goes Open Source, 1st Blender Conference.
Blender Publisher becomes freely available,and the experimental tree of Blender is created, a coder’s playground.
The first truly open source Blender release.
The second open source Blender release.
First of the 2.28x series.
Preview release of the 2.3x UI makeover presented at the 2nd Blender Conference.
Upgrade to stable 2.3x UI project.
A major overhaul of internal rendering capabilities.
Game Engine returns, ambient occlusion, new procedural textures.
Particle interactions, LSCM UV mapping, functional YafRay integration, weighted creases in subdivision surfaces,ramp shaders, full OSA, and many (many) more.
Another version full of improvements: object hooks, curve deforms and curve tapers,particle duplicators and much more.
A stabilization version, much work behind the scene, normal and displacement mapping improvements.
Transformation tools and widgets, soft bodies, force fields, deflections,incremental subdivision surfaces, transparent shadows, and multi-threaded rendering.
Full rework of armature system, shape keys, fur with particles, fluids, and rigid bodies.
Lots of fixes, and some Game Engine features.
The nodes release, Array modifier, vector blur, new physics engine, rendering, lip sync, and many other features.This was the release following Project Orange.
Multiresolution meshes, multi-layer UV textures, multi-layer images and multi-pass rendering and baking,sculpting, retopology, multiple additional mattes, distort and filter nodes, modeling andanimation improvements, better painting with multiple brushes, fluid particles,proxy objects, Sequencer rewrite, and post-production UV texturing.
The big news, in addition to two new modifiers and re-awakening the 64-bit OS support, was the additionof subsurface scattering, which simulates light scattering beneath the surface of organic and soft objects.
Serious bug fixes, with some performance issues addressed.
The Peach release was the result of a huge effort of over 70 developers providing enhancements toprovide hair and fur, a new particle system, enhanced image browsing, cloth, a seamlessand non-intrusive physics cache, rendering improvements in reflections, AO, and render baking,a Mesh Deform modifier for muscles and such, better animation support via armature tools anddrawing, skinning, constraints and a colorful Action Editor, and much more.It contained the results of Project Peach.
Bugfix release.
The Apricot release, cool GLSL shaders, lights and GE improvements, snap, sky simulator,Shrinkwrap modifier, and Python editing improvements.This contained the results Project Apricot.
Node-based textures, armature sketching (called Etch-a-Ton), Boolean mesh operation improvements,JPEG2000 support, projection painting for direct transfer of images to models, anda significant Python script catalog. GE enhancements included video textures, where you can play movies in-game,upgrades to the Bullet physics engine, dome (fisheye) rendering, and more API GE calls made available.
Blender 2.5x – The Recode!
This series released four pre-version(from Alpha 0 in November 2009 to Beta in July 2010) andthree stable versions (from 2.57 - April 2011 to 2.59 - August 2011).It was one of the most important development projects, with a total refactor of the software with new functions,redesign of the internal window manager and event/tool/data handling system, and new Python API.The final version of this project was Blender 2.59 in August 2011.
Blender 2.6x to 2.7x – Improvements & Stabilizing
Internationalization of the UI, improvements in the animation system and the GE,vertex weight groups modifiers, 3D audio and video, and bug fixes.
The Cycles renderer was added to the trunk, the camera tracker was added, dynamic paint for modifying textureswith mesh contact/approximation, the Ocean modifier to simulate ocean and foam, new add-ons, bug fixes,and more extensions added for the Python API.
The Carve library was added to improve Boolean operations,support for object tracking was added, the Remesh modifier was added, many improvements in the GE,matrices and vectors in the Python API were improved, plus new add-ons, and many bug fixes.
Bmesh was merged with the trunk, with full support for n-sided polygons, sculpt hiding, a panoramic camerafor Cycles, mirror ball environment textures and float precision textures, render layer mask layers,ambient occlusion and viewport display of background images and render layers.New import and export add-ons were added, and 150 bug fixes.
Old Versions Of Blender
A mask editor was added, along with an improved motion tracker, OpenColorIO, Cycles improvements,Sequencer improvements, better mesh tools (Inset and Bevel were improved), new keying nodes, sculpt masking,Collada improvements, a new Skin modifier, a new compositing nodes back end, and the fixing of many bugs.
Fire and smoke improvements, anisotropic shader for Cycles, modifier improvements,the Bevel tool now includes rounding, new add-ons, and over 200 bug fixes.
Dynamic topology, rigid body simulation, improvements in UI andusability (including retina display support), Cycles now supports hair,the Bevel tool now supports individual vertex beveling,new Mesh Cache modifier andthe new UV Warp modifier,new SPH particle fluid solver. More than 250 bug fixes.
Freestyle was added, paint system improvements, subsurface scattering for Cycles, Ceres libraryin the motion tracker, new custom Python nodes, new mesh modeling tools, better support for UTF-8 text andimprovements in Text editors, new add-ons for 3D printing, over 260 bug fixes.
New and improved modeling tools, three new Cycles nodes, big improvements in the motion tracker,Python scripts and drivers are disabled by default when loading files for security reasons,and over 280 bug fixes.
Even more modeling tools, Cycles improved in many areas, plane tracking is added to the motion tracker,better support for FBX import/export, and over 270 bugs fixed.
Cycles gets basic volumetric support on the CPU, more improvements to the motion tracker,two new modeling modifiers, some UI consistency improvements, and more than 560 bug fixes.
Deformation motion blur and fire/smoke support is added to Cycles, UI pop-ups are now draggable.There are performance optimizations for sculpting mode, new interpolation types for animation,many improvements to the GE, and over 400 bug fixes.
First Version Of Blender
Cycles gets volume and SSS support on the GPU, pie menus are added and tooltips greatly improved,the Intersection modeling tool is added, new Sun Beam node for the Compositor, Freestyle now works withCycles, texture painting workflow is improved, and more than 220 bug fixes.
Cycles gets improved volumetric support, major upgrade to Grease Pencil,Windows gets Input Method Editors (IMEs)and general improvements to painting, Freestyle, Sequencer and add-ons.
Support for custom normals, viewport compositing and improvements to hair dynamics.
Integrated stereo/multi-view pipeline, Smooth Corrective modifier and new developmental dependency graph.
Pixar OpenSubdiv support, Viewport and File Browser performance boost,node auto-offset, and a text effect strip for the Sequencer.
OpenVDB support for caching of smoke/volumetric simulations, improved Cycles subsurface scattering,Grease Pencil stroke sculpting and improved workflow,and reworked library handling to manage missing and deleted data-blocks.
Cycles support for spherical stereo images for VR,Grease Pencil works more similar to other 2D drawing software,Alembic import and export support, and improvements to Bendy Bones for easier and simpler rigging.
New Cycles features: Denoising, Shadow catcher, and new Principled shader.Other improvements were made to Grease Pencil and Alembic. Support was also added for application templates.
Blender 2.8 – Revamped UI
A totally redesigned UI for easier navigation; improved viewport, gizmos, and tools.With Eevee a new physically based real-time render engine was created.The Grease Pencil got a big overhaul and is now a full 2D drawing and animation system.Replacing the old layers, collections are a powerful way to organize objects.Other improvements: Cycles, Modeling, Animation, Import/Export, Dependency Graph.
Revamped sculpting tools, Cycles OptiX accelerated rendering, denoising,many Eevee improvements, library overrides, UI improvements and much more.
UDIM and USD support, Mantaflow for fluids and smoke simulation,AI denoising, Grease Pencil improvements, and much more.
3D Viewport virtual reality scene inspection, new volume object type, Cycles adaptive sampling,Cycles viewport denoising, sculpting improvements, and much more.
Blender 2.9 – Refining 2.8
Improved sky texture, Eevee motion blur, sculpting improvements,revamped modifier UI, improved modeling tools, and faster motion blur in Cycles.
Outliner improvements, property search, improved mesh Boolean operations, animation curves,volume object and display improvements, and more refined sculpting tools.
Geometry nodes, primitive add tool, sculpting improvements, Grease Pencil curve editing,Cycles vertex color baking, APIC fluid simulations, video sequencer improvements, and much more.