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Training Highlights
Stylized Rendering with Brushstrokes
Geometry Nodes from Scratch
Procedural Shading Fundamentals
Stylized Character Workflow

Training types
Course Documentation Production Lesson Workshop

Training categories
Animation Geometry Nodes Lighting Rendering Rigging Shading
Film Highlights
Wing It!
2023
Charge
2022
Sprite Fright
2021
Spring
2019
Project Highlights
Project DogWalk
Interactive
Gold
Showcase
BCON24 Identity
Showcase
Fighting with Grease Pencil
Article
Course
Procedural Shading: Fundamentals and Beyond
Introduction
  1. 01

    Introduction

    Free
  2. 02

    Definition

  3. 03

    Content Overview

  4. 04

    The Shader Editor

1: Fundamentals
  1. 01

    Colors, Values & Vectors

  2. 02

    Vectors and Pixels

  3. 03

    Coordinate Types

  4. 04

    Value Control

2: Procedural Textures
  1. 01

    Noise Textures

  2. 02

    Shape Control

  3. 03

    Repetition

  4. 04

    Texture Composition

  5. 05

    Space Manipulation

3: Shading Principles
  1. 01

    PBR

  2. 02

    Geometric Dependency - Context Sensitivity

  3. 03

    Generating PBR Maps

4: Shader Composition
  1. 01

    Blending & Masking

  2. 02

    Randomization

  3. 03

    Semi-Procedural Workflow

  4. 04

    Volumetric Shaders

5: Modular Setup
  1. 01

    Parametrization

  2. 02

    Nodegroups

6: Automation
  1. 01

    Drivers

  2. 02

    Animation

Workflow Examples
  1. 01

    Walls (Chapter 2+)

  2. 02

    Wood (Chapter 3+)

  3. 03

    Dynamic Walls (Chapter 4+)

  4. 04

    Wooden Boards (Chapter 5+)

  5. 05

    Fire (Chapter 6+)

  6. 06

    Rainy Window (Chapter 6+)

Files & Tools
  1. Example Scene
  2. Example Scene - Simplified Free
  3. Visualization (Chapter 1-4): Value Graph
  4. Visualization (Chapter 2-5): Space Origami
  5. Example Shader (Chapter 3-1): Rock
  6. Example Shader (Chapter 4-1): Dilapidated Cube Scene
  7. Example Shader (Chapter 4-3): Image Texture De-Tiling
  8. Example Shader (Chapter 4-3): Semi-Procedural Fishbones Boards
  9. Example Shader (Chapter 4-4): Procedural Volumetric Clouds

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Simon Thommes
Simon Thommes Author
License CC-BY
Report Problem
Files & Tools

Visualization (Chapter 1-4): Value Graph

3D Graph to analyze the value of texture maps Introduced in Chapter 1.4

Let me give you a quick breakdown of how the file works:

If you go into solid view, you can see that the scene consists of a whole bunch of intersecting planes.

Those have a shader that samples the texture's value from the XY-coordinates and mixes between transparency and emission by comparing the Z-coordinate to the value of the texture.

So a single one of these planes shows a simple line of the profile at the plane's position.

All together they create the whole graph by using a grid of planes.

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17 comments
Albert Campos
Albert Campos
Dec. 5th, 2022

love this one

Gary Brimer
Gary Brimer
July 2nd, 2022

Just a note as I start into this, all of the example files come up with Risky Connection and Virus warnings from McAfee. Might be something to look into.

shmuel lowenbraun
shmuel lowenbraun
Nov. 20th, 2022

@Gary Brimer  have the same problem

steve kacenjar
steve kacenjar
Aug. 10th, 2021

This is moving a bit fast for me.  I tried to reconstruct your first example with noise texture but nothing showed up on my plane. It remained white.  I did notice that you have a ghost-like set of nodes behind the foreground nodes.  I don't know what they do or how to produce them.  Maybe I need to start a more basic course.  This is cool stuff but for me it is going too fast without filling in the spaces.  I might come back to this later after I go through more basic  tutorials.

Domas Astrauskas
Domas Astrauskas
Sept. 14th, 2021

@steve kacenjar there are some lectures where you have to use prepared blend files and those files are not easily reproducable (as a programmer I think it is custom blend files)

fpowerm
fpowerm
Jan. 14th, 2021

is there a way to save this tab as a default I can pull up whenever i need? I love these visualizations but have no idea how to setup the perspective in other projects Excellent work btw Simon just going through these again

Simon Thommes
Simon Thommes
Jan. 14th, 2021

@fpowerm You can technically add it as a new workspace and scene to your startup file, then every file you create will have it as an option to switch to.

Riccardo Gagliarducci
Riccardo Gagliarducci
Dec. 7th, 2020

I think this tools should be a standard debug tools in Blender! Not being able to visualize the output of a node is like programming without error codes or others utilities.

Leslie Solorzano
Leslie Solorzano
Oct. 31st, 2020

Super smart! This is very useful to visualize how textures that say 3D and 4D work in a more intuitive way

Johnny "Brain Blast" Quasar
Johnny "Brain Blast" Quasar
Sept. 30th, 2020

Super thanks to you Simon! Visuals that let you see "behind the scenes", so to speak, definitely helps me understand an otherwise complex system.

Jonathan Walsh
Jonathan Walsh
Aug. 20th, 2020

Mate...this is the real in depth Blender learning, great stuff, many thanks.

Huân Lê-Vương
Huân Lê-Vương
Aug. 17th, 2020

i used this file for better understanding the workflow example 1. very helpful!

Simon Thommes
Simon Thommes
Aug. 17th, 2020

*@Huân Lê-Vương* Perfect, that's what I made it for as well! I'm glad it helps :)

papertripping
papertripping
July 19th, 2020

Hey Simon- Could you please show us how you made this .blend file? I think it'll help me better understand this course. Thanks! :)

Simon Thommes
Simon Thommes
July 21st, 2020

*@papertripping* Hey, to be honest, I don't think it adds a lot if I would make a separate video about this. But I added a quick breakdown to the description :)

Show more replies
Huân Lê-Vương
Huân Lê-Vương
Aug. 8th, 2020

*@papertripping* the node trees look intimidating :V it was easier in C4D for me with the clone system but i will have to adapt to the shading in blender.

Simon Thommes
Simon Thommes
Aug. 8th, 2020

*@Huân Lê-Vương* I made this file a while back when the nodes were much more limited and I had to use a ton more.

Now the noding system is more convenient to use

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