 Hello, everyone, how are your legs? I wish I had a chair right now, but I do not have it so what I'm gonna do I'm gonna stand somewhere and I think I'm gonna stay there for my talk and The poor camera man can just point the camera at me and sticks with that. Hello. Welcome to my talk The Blender conference is amazing my last Blender conference was 15 years ago and I can say that it grew a little bit quite a lot actually My talk It says journey Which means a very personal it also means I haven't reached the destination yet I don't think I will ever reach the destination, but you know what to say. It's about the journey It also says one person pipeline, which means I don't have any friends Yeah, it's not nice to laugh about that one, but okay Right, so hello. I am Sasha who the good in the next 20 minutes. I will teach you how to pronounce my last name No, just kidding. I Met my true love in 2004 and that was 10 years before I met my wife and she just have to accept I mean, I love Blender and I think a lot of us people here share this this passion for Blender I am also writer director for big buck bunny is the first Blender movie. They did in the Blender Institute And I also attempted to do some other things like animation whoo very hard small stuff and I Didn't really know what I was doing, but I enjoyed doing it for sure I also have to say I was surrounded by some very skilled people and one of them is sitting right here, Nathan and I want to say I've never told this, but the people that I was Surrounded with there were just a few of them, but they defined For me what it means to be an artist who is capable of doing a lot of things Who is able to wear different hats do different parts of production and That was really impressive to me and I think I was very spoiled because it's really hard to find similar in a later time Currently I am a showrunner at Omen Studios since 2011 in Singapore Some people here asked me what is a showrunner? So I had to scratch my head and I have to think about how to explain what a showrunner is Imagine you are a director, but there's way too much to direct too many episodes too many shows So you get other directors to direct for you. So as a showrunner I creatively direct the directors and at the same time I am involved in the the story development which Sometimes we do not talk about these things here. Let's say in the Blender conference, but I am heavily involved in that aspect, too The last one quite important for this talk. It's a bit of a spoiler And it took me more than 15 years before I started using Python Not just because it was very intimidating for me. It was also the idea that using Python it's just It's not possible for someone like me and I I Strongly regret this and I wish I realized earlier that Python is really for everyone if needed. So anyway So a bit about the work that I do so at Omen's I focus a lot on preschool series The vast majority is educational Tutainment which is very challenging in itself and we're talking about budget shows that need to be created really fast and It requires a lot of people to work on so did number 700 episodes means I have been involved in These episodes one way or the other as a script writer as a director and currently just as a showrunner basically How is my sanity right now? It's fine But it definitely weighs on you at some point and it is extremely challenging. You think it's preschool. It's very straightforward and simple No, it's actually really hard Um Sometimes when we have time we do short films at Omen Studios and we have a longer Time to focus on that we do it a bit on the side so we can further develop our our skills and Suffering our the last short film I focus on was finalized in 2021 we started it very earlier and It was a happy project for me because we did a Maya to Blender pipeline Animation Maya sent everything to Blender then all the lighting shading rendering etc is in Blender So there was like happy news for me I can also be part of the production which I really really enjoy Now it's about depression perception of life. So story-wise thematic wise It's a lot more serious which is a little unusual for me because I never quite do kind of serious stuff, right? So anyway, yes depression Serious thing, you know also recently with COVID happening. I mean it's definitely serious topic that we should be talking about funny enough Suffering was made Released to the public only yesterday and might have something to do with me being here So I used this talk to push my boss to finally release this one. All right Please check it out. It's very interesting project but anyway in late 2019 as I was working on suffering I Realized something really sad and that is that This would have been my last Project that I would be working on Blender because I knew that the following years I would be extremely busy I would be show running and I would not be touching Blender and this is not something that I wanted so I've decided on a Is there some water by the way? Oh, yes. Sorry, sorry camera man. I'm sorry. I just just this once This is very valuable time As I was saying I decided to do a personal project and the personal project is that I myself can fully focus on Blender And I can be happy again I call the project Project fuzzy. It's not official, but I'm just using it for now now for project fuzzy I had some primary objectives The first one is the most obvious one. It's fun to work on Problem is we sometimes lose sight of what we're doing. So I wrote it down I made sure I always remind myself this is like my prime directive if it's not fun I'm gonna stop doing it or I'm gonna change it. So this is really important for me The other one that I wanted is I wanted to be fast to create like really fast I don't have much time do it in my free time. So it has to be super fast. And when I say fast to create I'm referring to When the tools are already there the characters are already there I'm referring to the like the animated the the content basically The other one I said more for myself is that there's a potential for growth by that I mean something more than a hobby look again, maybe collaborations, maybe something on YouTube Anything basically because at some point we get a little older. So you want to make sure your free time You use it in a sort of a smart way Here is a very quick quick sample early sample So Animation wise it's very simple. Don't look at the bad animation. Look at the nice hair moving around moving around Here's another one. The first one was really easy. This one is much harder for me But again, look at the hair look at the hair look at the hair look at the simulation All right, these were some very quick samples now break down for project fuzzy what I wanted to do I wanted to create short video content to start with YouTube anywhere else. Maybe tiktok stylized characters stylized characters means symbol characters symbol characters means less controllers less controllers means Easier to animate right that is that was at least the plan at the same time Simulated hair like why simulated hair because you're adding complexity to it different reasons The project still needs a like a unique selling point So what makes this project interesting and hair it's not something that many people still touch right because it is that Complicated at the same time. It's actually a fun challenge. It's actually quite interesting, but that could be a personal preference and the last reason is is that in a way your Simulation does have the work You can have poor animation poor ish and The simulation if at least the simulation is proper it basically carries kind of like the quality of your work And that really helps actually Then the last one really important to a young target audience. Let's just say young target audience slightly different standard We are not talking about high quality stuff Like Pixar or like the blender studio Right and this was really important to me because I am familiar with that young audience and I can kind of understand that You don't have to make something super special And I'm sure you have all seen the blender studios making off how like they tweak all their animation And it's just it's really a lot of work for a young target audience. It's okay can let it go What did it mean for blender? Okay Evie has to be Evie for sure as I am not interested in render times There are 10 seconds or longer per frame including the hair. So you know the hair. It has to be just a few seconds Shitty laptop doesn't matter. It just needs to come out really fast The other thing that I wanted to do if is have multiple shots in one file Not necessarily all the shots You don't have to force it But if you can have more shots in one file and like the idea of pressing render Going out for a nap for a walk to the toilet, etc. Come back and you're done, right? I like that idea. This is really that I believe I want to do then the other two the last two is about the tools Tools to speed up your process So I need tools to do the the basic stuff to maintain stuff the boring stuff But also the complicated stuff and and at the same time those tools Would have to go to one location and you're looking at something as efficient as possible You need to find it in one spot The thing with blender is you can do a lot, but it's everywhere. It's everywhere Actually one thing in blender might be in three different locations, but it's still not in the location where you want it to be but it's fine because you and And this was my sort of my my mission call to action use python to unlock the full potential of Blender and the thing is I've never used python, but I knew I knew I had to do it if I wanted this here's one quick example and This example is linking characters linking the scripts of the characters Overriding the libraries and at the same time loading the scripts Now the video finished before I finished talking and you try to do this. Let's assume. You're not using the I forgot is the asset browser Not sure if it's called like that when I is it the asset browser right when I started this There was no asset browser yet. Now if you do it the conventional going through all the menus You're I would still be doing it So and this is really important. All right. I Want to give a quick? Like a very quick For you what happened in the last four years so late 2019. I had the idea In 2020 I started to focus on python for the first time mess way to learn Python is just write the tools that you want and I didn't realize it is actually that simple You don't have to follow any Python classes or anything write the tools that you want and that's how you learn python at the same time very soon Covid started it was really hard times for a lot of people. I took it as an opportunity I turned covid into coding We had to be forced to be at home great Finally, it is acceptable socially accepted to be at home constantly behind your computer. So That helped me a lot. All right. I think I'll just hold this and at the same time I Worked on my characters and this is how my characters look like at some point. So At the same time I continued to work on python write the tools that I want write the panels that I want anything that I needed that I thought I needed When the characters were done I started to do the pose and animation library the facial expressions poses, etc. Consist. You want to talk about efficiency You absolutely need that one right and it's Three years later. I was ready to animate. I completely hated it. So I changed it in a few months I made the decision to just change it completely and this was really important that at any time Make the change if you have a objective like it has to be fun Then make that change at the same time continue to work on python improve the tools improve the UI, etc then Chat GPT came what kept you It was three years too late not really I used it it helped it actually I learned a lot even though I was touching python for three years It actually helped me and this is you want to write your tools with python This is the best moment chat GPT. It might not be great bar It isn't great but there's so many options and they can help you and they can even teach you and it is Amazing how well it works when you want to learn this. So if you want to start this is the time I Continue to work on python. So what happens and we're here on this day and this one this sounds silly, but This is the it's fun. I can do it model made it up completely Obviously the z axis is how much you like it the x axis the further it is on the x plus The more skilled you aren't basically, right? So Why is it important that you look at your task? Why is it important that you know if you know roughly where your Tasks or the principles or whatever job that you need to do lies Then you know that if it is in the up corner you focus on it If it's at the bottom you should change it on that side if it's on that side You should avoid it if it's on that side You should just improve it. That's all and that's really important now. This is me late 2019 Now interestingly, okay few things python was outside didn't touch it cannot put it in right? I don't know if it's fun or not, right? Okay, what else? There's a strong correlation between how much how good you are at it and how much you like it There are some also small exceptions to that for example layout easier than animation, but it is Equally tedious at least for me Rigging I'm not a technical person and this is really important I wouldn't highlight this because I'm using python now, but I'm not technical at all rigging. However There was it's more rewarding and that's why I enjoyed it more even though I'm not good at it at all And I think look at yourself what you're doing and maybe whenever you start a project But you stop halfway. Is it because you have reached something that doesn't give you that pleasure So is there a way you can change it manipulate it? So what happens? 2022 so when I basically had my first characters. I started the The animation the poses etc. So what happened is two things python had a rough start but I It's fun. It's really fun Actually, it was Tom Rosendahl who once said coding is really fun. Have you ever tried coding? and The thing is I I Didn't get it for 15 years and I wish that I listened and it is really fun And it is very rewarding actually what happened at the same time is that animation and layout. I didn't like it I didn't enjoy it. There's different reasons for that So old system old idea three years and then the new idea which I basically changed to in just a matter of months All right first thing Controllers right I had 50 to 55 controllers on the original and the later. It's like around 45 controllers I think the old one is still good because that's a rigify. I think they have around 255 controllers at least the ones that are meant for controlling, right? So if you're not a fan of animation what you do is you have to reduce that number, right? Okay, another really really big important This is the reason why my joy for animation went down the original had no squash and stretch And I'm I should know it's a principle. Of course it makes it more fun But I was so involved in the technical side and the hair aspect that I forgot about the most important thing that principle So I got less hair But I had squash and stretch and it changed how much I enjoyed it now this fact It doesn't change so much about how much I enjoyed it, but it definitely helps speed up the process You're going to simulate all of this. You're gonna have all the cash then having like, you know, the other one the new one much easier Okay, another thing I Mentioned that I tried to do as many shots at the same time as possible Now the problem is if you have a very rigid sort of pipeline where you say I'm gonna do all the layout That you reach a point that you just done with it when you're finally can start your animation Okay, finally, I can do animation you do your animation all your shots and that's what that's what broke me too Because animation is hard. So what I did it, you know what? I'm still gonna put all the shots together or as much as I can but I'm gonna jump her out I have started with one layout shot if I want to I immediately animated then I do the layout for a shot later And it actually helps me to keep my momentum going keeps me happy, etc. So Very quick pipeline itself So because I am my own director, I do not have to storyboard I do not have to do an animatic what I do need is some form of planning now in my case My planning are these really simple roughs or thumbnails So what you want to do you need to know the shots that you have how many shots roughly the screen direction That main actions and that's it. That's fun. It's good enough for me. It's not complicated stuff basically again It's for preschool Then we have to lay out an animation I mentioned I will not do animatic which means that the layout is still important Right, I still have to get that timing, right? But I'm creating tools that I can fix that timing anywhere during the stage now all the yellow stuff Semi-automated just with a few buttons a few adjustments and everything is done. So it's much easier So the biggest challenge for me is always the layout and animation right in 2019 I had the idea of creating These tools basically I just showed you the linking the characters basically it's just a few buttons all your characters They are loaded now And I also imagined I want to create a floor set up a floor that has shadow only and the other one is basically Managing the hair simulation for linked characters. It's very tricky This is what I ended up with and it's still growing Python is really fun and it's not just fun. There is a beauty in it. It's that creation It's really great. So what I've done is I split this up in three add-ons The first one is general tools that help me and the other two are specific to the project itself They're specific to the characters. They're specific to the hair simulation. Don't have to read all this I'm gonna try to show a few. All right. This one is my scene builder. So Put a few cameras as many as I want to Replace that default queue with the floor. I'm gonna turn to rendered and a sky at a sun at a very subtle backlight which works great with hair and the last one Optimized EV. It just does a little a lot of little things everywhere. For example ambient occlusion Now some of these they seem very basic and they are While at the same time for example the Sun. It's just a sunlight But with some little tweaks and fixes to serve my purpose and you can basically Create these very simple operators that you immediately get what you want now Because I do all these stamps I could potentially also put that under one button and this is my most used button Where I just do everything and since there's one button I can put it under quick favorites Popping is so much fun. It's really so fun Right now when I create a sky or a world this is basically the notes that it creates I do not import this from another file. No, I just the script itself that places this and I was so intimidated to How do I write this actually these this is super simple now to control this? I Do not go into That note set up what I do is basically I create a UI I create custom properties that can control the properties in these notes So this is a very quick example where I can change. Let's say the gradients radial linear change the colors Change the type of linear. Is it like a global linear or that's one that's stuck to the camera, all right Which is really nice very fast very easy now Then I also wanted to animate it because if I've all one multiple shots I want to change my sort of background over time then I realized If you have custom properties you can animate the custom properties, which you see basically right there But they will not automatically update the properties in my world setup, which means it doesn't work So I made it work. So I made it work that it whenever I keyframe something I Put it puts a button there Now it's not gonna do anything. So here I'm just animating the different custom properties that control my My world's no tree basically. Yeah, you don't see anything here. Once I press that little button It changes. So what I can do is I just set it to Constant interpolation and I can automatically change all my lighting for all my backgrounds for the different shots Now that blue button there that I press basically what it is is a handler a handler can run Specific code in a certain situation in this case. It runs a code during frame change So whenever you change your frame, it's gonna look at Basically your keyframes and it works brilliant Right this one camera control camera control is an example. Well, I've just taken all the existing attributes Properties and I just put them together because I'm using a lot right. This is the one This is actually called binds to bind the camera to a marker It's it's already there. I just put it basically elsewhere now oddly enough. I call it key Which is incorrect because you're binding. You're not key framing anything You're just putting a marker and your camera knows that it has to basically become active So but key feels more intuitive. It's my add-on. I can do what I want Now another one and I learned from basically the previous one the binding your camera to a marker I want to do the same for motion blur. Can you animate motion blur like by default? You cannot but yes, you can by using markers So I add a marker Where it's basically says there's no motion blur I guess somewhere somewhere else Then I will say motion blur should go on I go somewhere else I say there should not be any motion blur and here there's motion blur again, okay different reasons Why would I want to do that motion blur adds time to it obviously right to your renders? So I want to reduce that one by a being able to control go on go off. It's really great Can shave off another two seconds of the render maybe and I will show the results of that later Let's see. Okay. This one is hair simulation So what I've done is I put a lot of general settings together And I put like very character specific settings together and I'm able to control it the great thing about the hair cache system If you just play once it'll automatically cache it So I'm using that method to basically cache it after a single play and I shift it to I move it to bake basically So everything's together very quickly. I can do all this entire process Now here is a quick example of how this looks like no audio no motion blur motion blur no motion blur Motion blur and that's it for that one. So Okay, it seems that I am Running slightly out of time already. So unfortunately I cannot talk about some of the other tools which is for example Animating collection visibility, which is very challenging. So I'm just gonna play it and whoever wants to see it on YouTube So I've managed to kind of have a very easy pipeline for animating the collection visibility So I will not going to the details on that one now and there are some other things that I've done I'm actually using some very strange things. I'm gonna I'm gonna skip this one I'm gonna show the last one that I have which is Which is this one So what I'm doing, I'm using my view layers as Like a single there is an option that you can you can see it in the right side Use for rendering right what I'm doing. I'm rendering only one view layer per frame So I can use that to create a tool that makes me actively change my few layers And it's really weird No crashes so far But it allows me to basically organize my files really quickly automatically set up The nodes basically and that's about it. All right. What's next? Blender 4.0 is coming. It's gonna break some scripts and Which means great can fix more stuff in Python and it's really awesome I Wish I had more time to show if you want to If you want me to share some of this, please contact me Just send me an email and I would love to get back to you. Thank you very much