Core Blender Development: Understanding the Essential Source Code

Learn the essential source code of Blender and its unique build system. This book provides the inner workings of the Blender C-based source code, and will be indispensable for those wanting to contribute to this important open-source project.

Blender is an open-source 3D modeling and rendering software package used in the production of assets for animated projects, 3D printing, games, and even scientific visualization. This book goes in depth and discusses the primary modules related to the GUI and the geometric modeling work. You’ll start by learning how to reverse engineer geometric operators, and from there move on to the main features of the source code and how to apply them. When done, you’ll have the necessary foundation for exploration in other modules of the Blender source code.

Lack of software engineering knowledge, such as experience with large cross-platform code base, remains insurmountable for many new developers. While the Blender site includes much useful information, it is not detailed enough. Core Blender Development breaks down the barriers to entry for open-source development in 3-D modeling.

What You’ll Learn

• Find the code for various functions and editors in Blender
• Track down bugs, and contribute new functionality to the Blender code base
• Examine the .blend file and how it stores Blender state
• Understand the Blender core code base beyond the community website documentation
• Review the explicit code traces and source files of descriptions of the code base

Who This Book Is For

Primarily for novice to intermediate level developers and programmers with an interest in Blender, graphics, and visualization, who likely don’t have experience of reverse engineering a large code base.