My name is Joakim Tornhill and I started “Blender Insight” January 2018.
The reason was simple. I saw that people had a hard time understand the cycles nodes and I wanted to help.
So, I started a YouTube channel and called it “Blender Insight”. The name was chosen because I also wanted people to understand the mechanism behind the nodes and not just how to make a good result. Simply… give all a good “Insight”. I could have called it “Nodes Insight”, but it could be that I show other stuff as well in the future :).
(You can see it here: https://www.youtube.com/c/jtornhill)
The next thing I did was to find a place where all those that wanted to go even deeper could go. A Facebook group called “Blender Procedural textures” was born. In just three months it became a place for over 1 000 enthusiasts.
(…and this you’ll find here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/388923314889254/)
However, still the question popped up. “How should I connect the nodes? I don’t get it!”.
Could I do more?
Yes, I could write a manual… and so I did! I wrote two in fact. One about how to make things look old and one beginners manual.
(Beginners manual: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1zk2mWLxdRZmNLi6uww32LvGUJUQimrPFFKaoFbZ7_Jc/edit?usp=sharing)
(Manual about aging stuff: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1fWaorEppgDpnP08XbTKipR7S0JdARZgoMI9ApmCmBa4/edit?usp=sharing)
During this time I did a lot of examples, a lot of testing and used all the knowledge I had built up during those five years I worked in Blender to create materials using the cycle nodes.
I got in love with doing materials!! The thing is that now I’m really stuck in the subject and use all of my spare time to challenge myself and see where the limits of me and Blender are when it comes to material.
…and I still want to share that! I also understand that all people can’t fall in love with the task of creating materials, so now another thing is born… my Web page and I will fill it with all materials I can possible do!!
I will always upload complete .blend files, so the material is not static. You can fine tune and change it as you want. The material is free for you to download… it’s even free to resell!
What do I want in return?
- I want you to try the nodes and learn how they work.
- I want you to have fun with the material and use it shamelessly much :).
- I want you to understand how much effort I put in to this.
- I want to be able to do this full time for you guys.
The last two bullet points are the hardest. I invest time, but also some money in equipment, domain names, web pages and so on and I will keep doing that even if I don’t get anything for it, because I love this. However, if you feel for it… and also want to give something back… then pop by my Patreon page and add a few dollars if you like what I’m doing. Who knows? This could perhaps be full time and then, I promise, you will have a ton of useful stuff here!
Patreon page:
https://www.patreon.com/BlenderInsight
Now, have fun… plunge through the textures and take whatever you want :)!!