Giving Blender and Grease Pencil another try

I tried remaking my channel intro using free software such as Blender.

My first Blender + Grease Pencil impressions:

Get Blender here (grease pencil included):

The Complete Introduction to 2D Animation
Buy the complete introduction to 2D animation tutorial/video package:

My Photoshop actions for auto-matte and toning

Equipment I use:

Software I use:
Animation - TVPAINT
Animation - Adobe Flash/Animate CC, ToonBoom
Compositing - After Effects
Painting and Illustration - Photoshop
Video Editing - Premiere
3D - BLENDER

[AmyMist]

It’s funny, the progress of the intros almost feel a little bit like growth of the character as well. Like he’s gained more and more confidence as time goes on.

[E.M.A]

Blenders grease pencil is still relatively new, the thing is blender is first a 3d program but has many different parts of editing programs that are getting better with updates. I did notice you were using a slightly older version of blender, and while I understand the need to stay in a version to help flow... but there have been quite a few updates since 2.9 But yeah there are definitely some quality of life issues still present with feeling a bit wonky at times.... just updates are something to keep up on

[BagelCollector]

Quick tip: you can fill in multiple frames at once if you select them and then bucket

[saniancreations]

I like this version better than the previous one, but the one thing that bugs me a little is the window. You can see that it's just a thin surface rather than a wall with actual thickness. Other than that, this is an improvement.

[Pa_amb_tomaquet]

The lines were transparent-ish in 12:58 because the strength (the opacity of the line) should be set to 1 in order to be fully black. For some reason it is set on 0.6 by default every time you open a project, which you can solve by sliding the “strength” bar all the way to the right (the blue in the top center, next to “size” and to the pressure activator).

[esteban-iriarte-animation]

All versions are cool in their own way. But personally, I like this version the most. Mostly because I like the updated look of Bon Bon, but the 3D background and camera work is also quite charming. Love it! Thanks for sharing the process and your thoughts man.

[Dantti]

Grease Pencil can be intimidating at first, but it is a really great tool once you learn and understand all the possibilities it offers for absolutely free! Mixing 2D with 3D is the dream 🥰

[wailfulcrab]

To mitigate the '3d look' you could draw Grease Pencil outlines on the objects themselves, there is an option that places the stroke on top of the object surface

[harvochive]

I remember you drawing this live and I was shocked by your ability to draw and speak to us at the same time.

[pennylavendar]

I hope they continue to improve the drawing tool, its the only thing holding the program back for me personally. A Fox In Space had a workaround where he made a script that turns his grease pencil objects into png planes so that they can cast shadows and receive lights if you look him up.

[Charely]

Fun fact. If you export your grease pencil animation as an image sequence, you can re-import it as an image sequence on a plane and then it will cast shadows. But I love seeing you experiment more with blender.

[maurits_valk]

You can always animate in any program you want. Export it as a PNG sequence with a transparent background. Then import it into Blender through an Images as Planes 'Animated Sequence'. This will give place your animation on a plane mesh you can move in your 3D scene. Also be sure to use the alpha versions of Blender which usually has GP updates that improve performances (ie 3.3 right now).

[MrBongers]

22:16 _"... I was also learning more about TVPaint and I found some great features in that program that I'd never used before"_ I would like to hear more about your discoveries in TVPaint.

[garbagedumpster]

welcome to the blender community we apricate your contributions to the program and the devs are great people, rest assured grease pencil will keep getting better and better

[lokeyartist]

Multiframe select makes filling colors a lot faster

[Itskaidaorangeguy]

15:45 I was caught off guard I had to rewind 😭

[dugoo]

Aw I love the idea of adding more stuff to the room as memories later on. I love this version, never stop improving just because people miss the past. Nostalgia will do that to anyone.

[khalidhamed]

13:48 in the outline window on the top right, you can click on the filter icon and toggle the camera looking thing. it'll appear next to the eye and will enable / disable the object from appearing in renders. a bit faster than digging through the object settings. 👍
great video btw

[Namivi]

the 2022 version looks amazing!! just one thing... the window. PLEASE extrude the wall or give it a solidify modifier 😂 i really believe this would boost the look of the whole scene a lot, because right now you can see it's just a thin surface and it feels off. But besides that it's truly beautiful

[ShinDMitsuki]

I like this! I think it looks great. I will say, to "finish it off" you could take a render of the 3d scene, paint over it, and project the textures you painted onto it (or add them "properly"). That and maybe reduce the strength of the lights a little.

All and all it looks great. 3D illustrated style backgrounds in blender is something I've done personal research on, but I haven't started making YouTube videos or anything about it. Maybe I should.