http://www.blendernation.com/2013/10/30/new-book-open-shading-language-for-blender/
Finally.
The very 1st book to talk about OSL in Blender! Yey~! Here it is the first original and fresh book that properly covers OSL! This is actually quite a BIG thing, although somewhat very modest. Just like when Blender goes from 2.49 to 2.5x until today, it was MAJOR, but very MODEST.
I really like that attitude, big kudos to Blender and people like Michel.
So, I got my hand on the book, it only cost under A$10 (after all money conversions) and it worths every dollars. It may be cheaper for you depending on the strength of your currency.
https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/368598
I downloaded the epub format and reading the book on iBooks (iPad).
THE AUTHOR: MICHEL ANDERS
Let's talk about the author a little bit that I knew of (by searching on Google).
This Blender OSL book is the 3rd book that Michel self-published, as mentioned here:
https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/varkenvarken
Apart from this original OSL book, Michel also has written an active blog on OSL:
http://blenderthings.blogspot.nl
I actually read that blog a lot during my OSL study and exploration. Many shaders over there are pretty complex though!
Michel other blog:
http://michelanders.blogspot.com.au
There is some more personal trivia about the author inside the book, which is kind of nice.
TOPICS COVERED IN THE BOOK
The book started with introduction on why you would learn to write OSL code for shading and texturing.
That question above is definitely something everyone had in mind when they stumbled into something called OSL or Open Shading Language.
Some are probably happy to just use the already provided nodes (which is alright, and can get you quite far in production), while some others get more curious and like to know more about OSL and unlock its huge potential.
From intro topic, the book quickly moves to simple practical OSL shader. It covers a bit about Data types (int, float, string, void, point like data types, array, struct).
Slowly the topics ramp into important topics like: Patterns, Vectors, Normals.
I quite like one chapter titled "Mapping vectors" which covers multiplication (Scale) and Rotation of vectors. This is very important and gladly he answered this big question I had for a very long time.
From then on, Michel goes into specific simple procedural textures and shaders like the basic Checker texture, Polka Dots, before soon we get to more exotic and interesting shaders: Leopard shader, Diamondplate, etc. I have to admit that some shaders are pretty sophisticated.
Michel will give you "warning" whenever we are dealing with Math inside the shader. Math is something that often scares the artist, but we should not be because computer will do the complex calculation based on certain formula, we just need to set it up. So that is the idea that I still tell myself every now and then.
In between shader examples, he will go through and break down the Math behind it. There are thing like Symetry operations concept that explain how we can create a complex texture by mirroring it.
There is one chapter that talks about Splatter shader, where we could use our own PNG texture and randomly stamp the images, here is an example usage using my own coin.png texture (it has Alpha):
With the book, he also provided the working example files, the OSL files and Blender files. Over 80+ shaders given for you to use and to study.
MY VERDICT
I have to say that I am very happy to get hand on this book. It helps me a lot to put together my OSL knowledge so far in place. If I have time to revisit my older post on OSL, I could make the code more efficient followint the example structure of Shader shown on the book.
It is very inspiring for me. Maybe one day I write and publish my own book as well.
Many other books that talk about procedural textures (mostly for Renderman) goes really complex, too fast. But this one slowly explains what important and covers the foundation to help you move.
Similarly to myself, I think Michel put big emphasis on the procedural texture design and creations. OSL can actually do a bit more on top of procedural texture creations, however the most fun bit is the texture creation.
This book is MUST HAVE book in your library for any Shader Artists who has interest in learning OSL or shader writing in general.
MATTER OF CODING AND PROGRAMMING
Again, I have to give encouragement for "artist" who never write code before, since writing OSL shaders involves creating functions and goes further with Computer Graphics theory.
Programming ... is not hard, it just takes time to learn. I was afraid of any coding few years back, which I wish I had not been.
Just like I used to have fear of cooking and used to order foods from restaurants or just cook instant noodles in the past, well... apparently cooking from raw ingredients is not that hard.
Surely, we cannot create amazingly delicious foods at the beginning. But by time and with time, we eventually can.
Watch some movies like these for inspirations (fairly off-topic, but to make a point):
- Jiro: Dream of Sushi
- Taishoken: God of Ramen
And you will figure out soon that many of "amazing works" out there are simply taking some time to create and every skill takes dedication and passion (and obsession) to master.
I don't know what path of programming you will go through from ZERO to HERO, but I am sure you will find a way to overcome any obstacle if you continue not to give up. Remember you can always ask and there are always some nice people out there will answer when you are stuck.
Many of solutions are out there. In fact, many of tools to help you are out there as well.
Processing Programming Language
Start here:
http://www.imaginary-institute.com/blog/author/andrew/
http://funprogramming.org/
But also read some great books out there on Processing.
ChucK Music Programming -> NEW!
https://www.coursera.org/course/chuck101
http://chuck.cs.princeton.edu
There is also Pure Data, Super Collider, and Max (node based).
DESIGN BY NUMBERS by John Maeda
John Maeda's book DBN and tool to learn visual programming is a must read and explore.
Python Programming
http://learnpythonthehardway.org
And many more sources on Python. Remember that inside Blender, we already have Python to play with on any computer at any time. If you use Mac or Linux operating system, you already have Python. Even Raspberry Pi computer has Python!
There is a joy in continuosly learning and discovering, and if you are in Computer Graphics, never stop learning.
OTHER STUFFS
Crazy WebGL Mario at Shader Toy:
https://www.shadertoy.com/view/Msj3zD
Post a Comment
EmoticonClick to see the code!
To insert emoticon you must added at least one space before the code.