I recently found a great collection of Star Trek ship models for the Blender 3D modeling program, and started playing around with the Voyager one. Then I decided to see if I could cast a shadow on the ship and the monkey head included with Blender fit the need perfectly. After all, it WAS designed to test shading and reflection settings, just like the teapot in other programs, since it can cast a shadow and reflection on itself.

I’m nowhere near being well-versed in Blender(I didn’t design either object in the scene), but this recent bit of play has helped. Before this, the only things I’ve made in Blender were a snow man and a very simple scene that was meant to get perspective right on one comic(simpler to just draw it). I had intended on using Blender for the backgrounds in the comics, but then I got on Second Life and it was at least 10x easier. Been building the backgrounds in Second Life ever since. I need to switch to a higher-quality program, though, since Second Life has lots of building limitations, is slowed by cheap broadband, and is intended to be a SOCIAL  environment. People will talk to you even if you’re in Busy mode, which I normally am.

I plan on having some 3D backgrounds set on land, and Second Life is best for flat, non-natural surfaces, so I ‘m testing out Blender and Unity3(game development program) for those. Not sure what I’ll end up using, but Blender seems more versatile, since I can render high-quality videos with that as well. On the other hand, Unity3 has a tree-making function and is designed for easy landscaping. I don’t know.

Whee!