Call for review: Blender Demoloop

by - 2012/03/29 25 Comments Random

Hi everyone!

Although this is not strictly Mango-related news, I would like to share it with as many blender users as possible. A few days ago Ton asked me to collect some nice blendfiles to use as Blender feature showcase for one of our sponsors: HP computers. This is called the Blender Demoloop and will be displayed on booths,  computers in stores, and so on. It will eventually fit on a USB stick as a portable demo. It will also be available for download under CC-BY license. I’m asking for support to the community for two reasons:

  • testing the demoloop and providing feedback
  • provide more/better contents for it

How to test the loop

You can download this archive (~300MB) and try opening either _start_demo_CPU.blend (cycles render will be done with CPU) or _start_demo_GPU.blend (cycles will use GPU). WARNING: you need a very recent (trunk) version of blender, which you can download here. Please be patient for a few seconds after you open the file, since the loop could take some time to start. If you encounter any issues please make sure to mention your blender build, OS and basic hardware config (RAM, GPU, ecc).

How to provide contents

Just leave comment here with a link to the content you would like to point out. We can accept only CC-BY, CC-0 contents. Your work will be properly credited of course.

Please help spread this message so that we can create an awesome showcase and prove Blender’s industry-level capabilities.

  1. Antoine says:

    I’m always amazed by all the talent you have, especially for modeling humans ! It’s just SO hard to make up a human and you’re doing is so well !

    Waiting for the final render ;-)

    Antoine

  2. Gianmichele says:

    Does it need a specific Blender version to run?

    I get an error on the Helicopter scene

    OSError: [Errno 9] Bad file descriptor

    Using standard Blender 2.62 64 bit on Windows.

    Also Blenderella turntable could use a bit of love in the anim curves ;)

  3. Gianmichele says:

    OK finally saw the whole demo.

    It looks fantastic! I just have a couple of comments for you:

    – Turntable need a bit love to make them more seamless (pops at the end of each turn)
    – Squirrel wings when looping back are a bit off.
    – Could do with a couple more scenes from Sintel (a snowy one, the big scale fight)
    – Mike pan has a lot of BGE scenes with the WOW factor

    Great work!

  4. shul says:

    The mac build in the link is from February.. can you update it ?

  5. Cool stuff :) I also get an error with the helicopter scene though, full output pasted here:

    http://www.pasteall.org/30487

    • francesco says:

      Hey! Thanks for testing. Are you using blender rev 45046 or later? Its extremely important to have an up-to-date demoloop script (20 March or more recent).

  6. Terry Wallwork says:

    I am using Blender SVN build 45256 on and Intel linux fedora 16 box with 6 gigs of ram using cpu rendering. Crashes with a seg fault after finishing the render of the helicopter.

    [terry@localhost Binaries]$ ./blender
    found bundled python: /home/terry/Blender-SVN/Binaries/Blender-2.62-SVN45256-x86_64-GNU-Linux/share/blender/2.62/python
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/_start_demo_CPU.blend
    func:DemoMode.execute: 0 files
    Using config textblock: ‘demo.py’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/01_grim_lowpoly_baked.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/02_arizona.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/03_cataphract.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/04_blenderella_topology.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/05_helicopter.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/06_rabbit_gets_hit.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/07_BMW1M_MikePan.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/08_flying_squirrel.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/09_BMW3_glsl_realtime.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/11_island/island.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/12_k700/k700.blend’
    Adding: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/13_sintel.blend’
    found 12 files
    func:demo_mode_init
    {‘anim_time_min’: 4.0, ‘display_render’: 0.0, ‘anim_screen_switch’: 0, ‘mode’: ‘AUTO’, ‘file’: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/01_grim_lowpoly_baked.blend’, ‘anim_cycles’: 2, ‘anim_time_max’: 20.0, ‘anim_render’: False}
    Cycle!
    Cycle!
    Cycle!
    0
    1 ….
    func:demo_mode_next_file 1
    func:DemoMode.cancel
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/02_arizona.blend
    func:demo_mode_load_file
    func:DemoMode.execute: 12 files
    func:demo_mode_init
    {‘anim_time_min’: 4.0, ‘display_render’: 5.0, ‘anim_screen_switch’: 0, ‘mode’: ‘RENDER’, ‘file’: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/02_arizona.blend’, ‘anim_cycles’: 0, ‘anim_time_max’: 8.0, ‘anim_render’: False}
    render
    1
    2 ….
    func:demo_mode_next_file 2
    func:DemoMode.cancel
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/03_cataphract.blend
    func:demo_mode_load_file
    func:DemoMode.execute: 12 files
    func:demo_mode_init
    {‘anim_time_min’: 4.0, ‘display_render’: 4.0, ‘anim_screen_switch’: 0, ‘mode’: ‘AUTO’, ‘file’: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/03_cataphract.blend’, ‘anim_cycles’: 1, ‘anim_time_max’: 8.0, ‘anim_render’: False}
    2
    3 ….
    func:demo_mode_next_file 3
    func:DemoMode.cancel
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/04_blenderella_topology.blend
    func:demo_mode_load_file
    func:DemoMode.execute: 12 files
    func:demo_mode_init
    {‘anim_time_min’: 4.0, ‘display_render’: 4.0, ‘anim_screen_switch’: 0, ‘mode’: ‘AUTO’, ‘file’: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/04_blenderella_topology.blend’, ‘anim_cycles’: 1, ‘anim_time_max’: 20.0, ‘anim_render’: False}
    Cycle!
    3
    4 ….
    func:demo_mode_next_file 4
    func:DemoMode.cancel
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/05_helicopter.blend
    Dependency cycle detected:
    Profile-056.004 depends on Curve.003 through Curve Parent.
    Curve.003 depends on Profile-056.004 through Curve Modifier.

    Dependency cycle detected:
    Profile-056.005 depends on Curve.005 through Curve Parent.
    Curve.005 depends on Profile-056.005 through Curve Modifier.

    Dependency cycle detected:
    Profile-056.006 depends on Curve.006 through Curve Parent.
    Curve.006 depends on Profile-056.006 through Curve Modifier.

    Dependency cycle detected:
    Profile-056.007 depends on Curve.010 through Curve Parent.
    Curve.010 depends on Profile-056.007 through Curve Modifier.

    func:demo_mode_load_file
    func:DemoMode.execute: 12 files
    func:demo_mode_init
    {‘anim_time_min’: 0.0, ‘display_render’: 5.0, ‘anim_screen_switch’: 0, ‘mode’: ‘RENDER’, ‘file’: ‘/home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/05_helicopter.blend’, ‘anim_cycles’: 0, ‘anim_time_max’: 0.0, ‘anim_render’: False}
    render
    mesh_ensure_tessellation_customdata: warning! Tessellation uvs or vcol data got out of sync, had to reset!
    CD_MTFACE: 0 != CD_MTEXPOLY: 1 || CD_MCOL: 0 != CD_MLOOPCOL: 0
    mesh_ensure_tessellation_customdata: warning! Tessellation uvs or vcol data got out of sync, had to reset!
    CD_MTFACE: 0 != CD_MTEXPOLY: 1 || CD_MCOL: 0 != CD_MLOOPCOL: 0
    4
    5 ….
    func:demo_mode_next_file 5
    func:DemoMode.cancel
    read blend: /home/terry/Downloads/blender_demoloop/blends/06_rabbit_gets_hit.blend
    Memoryblock free: attempt to free NULL pointer
    Aborted (core dumped)

  7. Terry Wallwork says:

    Well Mr Biship beat me to it :P

  8. sid350 says:

    Not sure if it fits, but here is my example of fast sculpting in Blender http://dl.dropbox.com/u/5437729/Pet_sponsor_creature_test.blend

  9. paperMogwai says:

    Everything went fine for me, with the latest build from http://www.graphicall.org for OSX.

  10. Everything went just fine, no problem to talk about. I use my own build from the trunk, so it couldn’t be fresher than that. Ubuntu 11.11 x64, NV GTX 460 (drv 295).

  11. Ludovic Pinelli says:

    Everything went fine for me too, on Win7 64 with the build given in the article.
    And really impressive to see :)

  12. PhysicsGuy says:

    Very good idea to have a nice demo loop. If a company like HP will run this demo in their booth at conferences, it will be good PR for both HP and Blender. I’m currently on a rather flaky wifi connection in the train, but will download and run the loop as soon as I have more bandwidth.

  13. Dimitris K says:

    Blender 2.62.2 r45134
    OS: Ubuntu 11.10 64bit
    CPU: PHENOM II X6 1055T 2.8GHZ
    RAM: 12G
    VGA: GEFORCE GT430

    Start_demo_CPU: http://www.pasteall.org/30501

    Start_demo_GPU: http://www.pasteall.org/30502

  14. Tudor C says:

    Blender 2.62 r45256
    OS: Ubuntu 10.10 x64
    CPU: AMD Athlon(tm) 64 X2 Dual Core Processor 4400+
    RAM: 4 GB
    GPU: eGeforce 7900 GT (doesn’t run cycles)

    All went smoothly!

  15. Alex says:

    Blender 2.62.3 r45256
    OS: Ubuntu 11.10 x64
    CPU: AMD FX 4100
    RAM: 8 GB
    GPU: GTX 560 ti

    Works perfect.

  16. Jeroen Mank says:

    Crashed at the helicopter on an obsolete computer system.
    Blender built 45279
    System:
    Windows XP sp3
    CPU: 2*intel P4 processors 3.2 GHrz each
    2GB ram
    nVidia GeForce 6200 Turbo Cache.

    I opened the helicopter .blend (first one, not the GPU one) and then it did render on cycles. Took for ever (I could’ve gone on a holiday while it was rendering if it were an animation) but it worked.

  17. Stuart says:

    Both loops worked successfully on the following systems:

    Custom-built PC
    OS: Vista (Home Premium) 64-bit SP2
    CPU: Intel Core2 Quad Q9400
    RAM: 4GB
    GPU: GeForce GTX 260 @ 1920×1080
    Blender 2.62 x64

    Custom-built media PC
    OS: Ubuntu 11.04 i686
    CPU: AMD Phenom 2 X6 1055T
    RAM: 4GB
    GPU: Onboard ATI Radeon HD 4250 @ 1920×1080
    Blender 2.62 r45277 i686
    (this system also successful with Ubuntu 11.10 x86_64 and Blender 2.62 x64)

    HP Mini 1001TU Netbook
    OS: Ubuntu 11.10 i686
    CPU: Intel Atom N270
    RAM: 1GB
    GPU: Intel Mobile 945GME Integrated Graphics
    Blender 2.62 r45277 i686

  18. Lukas Treyer says:

    I’ve made some parametric approaches: the parametric stairs example may be of interest for you?
    http://www.ia.arch.ethz.ch/2012-03_parametric-models-with-drivers/

  19. Kocer says:

    Works very good (GPU)

    Blender 2.62.3 r45526
    OS: Ubuntu 11.10 x64
    RAM: 8 GB
    GPU: GT 555M

  20. Matt says:

    Yay! This was the motivation I needed to set up and compile blender trunk (r45656). Now, Happily, I have blender trunk, and the this demo loop works great.

    I am somewhat of a blender noob, and I will have to study these files to figure out how they were done.

    (Sorry to post on an older thread, I just hadn’t gotten a chance to compile blender until now).

  21. francesco says:

    Thanks to everyone for your feedback! An updated version of the demoloop is available here for further testing :) /random/call-for-review-blender-2-63-demoloop/