Blender (software) facts for kids

Quick facts for kids
Blender

Screenshot of Blender 4.5.1
Original author(s)	Ton Roosendaal
Developer(s)	Blender Foundation, community
Initial release	January 2, 1994; 31 years ago (1994-01-02)
Stable release	4.5.1  / 29 July 2025; 21 days ago (29 July 2025)
Preview release	4.5.0 / May 2, 2025; 3 months ago (2025-05-02)
Written in	C++, Python
Operating system	Linux, macOS, Windows, IRIX, BSD, Haiku
Size	290–397 MiB (varies by operating system)
Available in	36 languages
List of languages Abkhaz, Arabic, Basque, Brazilian Portuguese, Castilian Spanish, Catalan, Croatian, Czech, Dutch, English (official), Esperanto, French, German, Hausa, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Kyrgyz, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Simplified Chinese, Slovak, Spanish, Swedish, Thai, Traditional Chinese, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese
Type	3D computer graphics software
License	GPL-2.0 or later

Blender 4.4 splash screen

Blender is a free and open-source software tool. It helps you create amazing 3D computer graphics. You can use Blender on many computer systems like Windows, macOS, and Linux.

People use Blender to make animated movies, cool visual effects, and digital art. It's also great for designing models for 3D printers. You can even create interactive 3D apps and virtual reality experiences. Blender is also used to make video games.

A film called Flow (2024) won an Academy Award and was made using Blender.

Blender's Story: How It Started

A cube in Blender (version 3.6.2)

Blender began as a special tool for an animation studio in the Netherlands called NeoGeo. It officially launched on January 2, 1994. The main creator was Ton Roosendaal, who was a co-owner and software developer.

The name Blender came from a song by the band Yello. This song was used in NeoGeo's demo reel. Some ideas for Blender came from an older program called Traces. Ton Roosendaal had developed Traces for the Commodore Amiga computer.

In 1998, Blender became available online for free. Later, NeoGeo closed down. Ton Roosendaal then started a new company, Not a Number Technologies (NaN), to keep developing Blender. At first, it was sold as shareware, but NaN went bankrupt in 2002. This stopped Blender's development for a short time.

In May 2002, Roosendaal created the non-profit Blender Foundation. Their main goal was to continue developing Blender as a free, open-source project. They started a campaign to raise money to make Blender's source code free for everyone. They reached their goal, and on September 7, 2002, Blender became free and open-source. Today, many people in the community and employees of the Blender Institute help improve Blender.

Meet Suzanne: Blender's Monkey Head

In February 2002, the company that made Blender, NaN, was about to close. Before it did, they released Blender 2.25. As a fun "Easter egg", the artists added a 3D model of a chimpanzee head. They called it "monkey" in the software.

It was created by Willem-Paul van Overbruggen. He named it Suzanne after an orangutan in the film Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

Suzanne is like a special test model for Blender users. Other programs have models like the Utah Teapot. Suzanne is a low-polygon model with only 967 faces. It's often used to quickly test materials, animations, and lighting. You can find it as a basic shape, just like cubes or planes.

The biggest Blender contest even gives out an award called the Suzanne Award. This shows how important this monkey head is to the Blender community!

What Blender Can Do

Creating 3D Models

Forensic facial reconstruction of a mummy by Cícero Moraes

Blender supports many basic shapes. These include polygon meshes, Bézier curves, and text. It also has an advanced polygonal modeling system. This system lets you do things like "extrude" (pull out parts) and "bevel" (round edges).

Modifiers: Special Effects for Models

Modifiers add different effects to your models. These effects don't permanently change the model. They can be applied when you render or export your work. Examples include making surfaces smoother or adding thickness.

Sculpting: Shaping Digital Clay

Blender lets you sculpt digital models. It's like working with clay. You can add details, smooth surfaces, and reshape your models. This is useful for making complex characters or objects.

Geometry Nodes: Building with Rules

Geometry Nodes Editor in Blender 3.2

Blender has a system called Geometry Nodes. It lets you create and change shapes using a visual graph. This means you can build complex scenes with rules. For example, you can scatter many objects across a surface. This system was added in Blender 2.92. It helps you create things without changing the original model.

Simulating Real-World Physics

Blender can simulate many real-world effects. It can show smoke, rain, dust, and even cloth moving. It also simulates how liquids and solid objects behave.

Fluid Simulation: Making Water Flow

Physics fluid simulation

The fluid simulator can show liquids like water pouring into a cup. It uses special methods to make fluids look realistic. You can adjust how particles and resolution work.

Blender also has tools for soft bodies and rigid bodies. It can create ocean waves and particle systems for hair.

In Blender 2.82, a new fluid system called Mantaflow was added. It replaced the older system. Blender 2.92 added another system called APIC. This improved how vortices look and made calculations more stable.

Cloth Simulation: Realistic Fabric

Cloth simulation makes fabric look real. It works by simulating how points on a 3D model move. This creates effects similar to soft body simulations.

Bringing Models to Life with Animation

Blender has many tools for animation. You can make characters move using "armatures" (like skeletons). You can also create different shapes for objects to change over time. Blender's Grease Pencil tools let you do 2D animation. This means you can draw directly in a 3D space.

Rendering: Making Your Art Look Real

An architectural render showing different rendering styles in Blender, including a photorealistic style using Cycles

Blender has three main render engines since version 2.80: EEVEE, Workbench, and Cycles.

Cycles is a "path tracing" render engine. It creates very realistic images. It can use your computer's CPU or GPU to render.

EEVEE is a real-time renderer. It's fast and great for seeing your work as you create it. It can also be used for final images.

Workbench is for quick previews. It helps you see your model while you are working on it. It's not for final, high-quality renders.

Cycles: The Realistic Renderer

Cycles is a powerful render engine. It's designed to be easy to use but still has many features. It was added to Blender in 2011. Cycles can use modern computer hardware to speed up rendering.

Using Your Graphics Card (GPU) for Rendering

Cycles can use your computer's graphics card (GPU) to render faster. There are different ways to do this, depending on your graphics card. For example, Nvidia cards use CUDA or OptiX. AMD cards use HIP, and Intel cards use oneAPI.

You can even use multiple GPUs to render faster. This is like having a "render farm" on your computer. It helps process frames or parts of images at the same time.

Apple computers with M1 chips and AMD graphics cards also have support for Cycles.

How Cycles Calculates Light

Cycles uses a "path tracing" method to calculate light. It sends many light rays from the camera into your scene. These rays bounce around until they hit a light source. This process is called "sampling." More samples mean a clearer image but take longer to render.

Blender 3.0 introduced Cycles X, which made the path tracing faster and better.

Open Shading Language: Custom Materials

Blender lets users create their own special materials using something called Open Shading Language (OSL). This helps artists make unique, detailed textures that fit any object perfectly.

Using the node editor to create a moldy gold material

Materials: How Objects Look

Materials control how your 3D objects look. They define how light interacts with the surface, inside, and even the shape of the object.

• The surface shader controls how light reflects or passes through the object's surface.
• The volume shader describes how light behaves inside the object.
• Displacement shaders can change the actual shape of the surface. This makes textures look more detailed.

EEVEE: Real-time Rendering

EEVEE is a fast, real-time renderer. It was added in Blender 2.8. Its name comes from the Pokémon species Eevee. It stands for "Extra Easy Virtual Environment Engine."

EEVEE Next, released in July 2024, brought many new features. It improved how light and reflections look in real-time. It also made volumetric rendering better. Future plans for EEVEE include even faster rendering with hardware ray-tracing.

Workbench: Quick Previews

Workbench is the default 3D viewport system. It's used for quick previews while you are modeling or animating. It's not for final renders.

Other Renderers You Can Use

Blender can also work with other render engines. Some are free and open-source, like LuxCoreRender. Others are paid, like Pixar RenderMan.

Texturing and Shading: Adding Detail

Blender lets you add textures and colors in many ways. You can paint directly on your models. You can also use "nodes" to create complex textures.

Post-production: Finishing Touches

The Video Sequence Editor (VSE)

Blender has a "compositor" that helps you combine different parts of your render. It also has a video editor called the Video Sequence Editor (VSE). You can use it to add effects, change colors, and edit your videos.

Plugins and Scripts: Adding New Tools

Blender supports Python scripting. This means people can create custom tools and add-ons. These help with tasks like importing files or automating work. Many add-ons make Blender even more powerful.

File Formats: Saving Your Work

Blender uses its own ".blend" file format. These files can hold everything for your project. This includes scenes, objects, materials, and images.

• Most ".blend" files work across different Blender versions.
• You can link data from other ".blend" files. This is useful for reusing assets.
• Blender saves your interface settings in the ".blend" file.

Blender can also import and export many other 2D and 3D file formats. This helps it work with other software.

Supported File Types

Importing Files

2D Images

.bmp, .dxf, .jpg, .png, .tif, .tga, .exr, .svg, .webp

3D Models

.3ds, .abc, .blend, .bvh, .dae, .fbx, .gltf, .obj, .ply, .stl, .usd

Videos

.avi, .mkv, .mov, .mp4, .ogv, .webm

Exporting Files

2D Images

.bmp, .dxf, .exr, .jpg, .png, .svg, .tif, .tga, .webp

3D Models

.abc, .blend, .bvh, .dae, .fbx, .gltf, .obj, .ply, .stl, .usd

Videos

.avi, .mkv, .mp4, .ogv, .webm

How to Use Blender: The Interface

Blender's user interface underwent a significant update with Blender 2.57, and again with the release of Blender 2.80.

Commands: Shortcuts and Menus

Most actions in Blender can be done with keyboard shortcuts. There are also easy-to-use menus. You can change numbers by dragging them or typing values. You can even use math in the number fields!

Modes: Different Ways to Work

Blender has different "modes" for working with objects. The two main ones are Object Mode and Edit Mode. You switch between them with the Tab key.

• Object Mode lets you move, scale, and rotate whole objects.
• Edit Mode lets you change the tiny parts of an object, like its points or faces.

There are also other modes for painting, sculpting, and more.

Workspaces: Your Custom Setup

Blender's screen can be divided into many sections. Each section can show a different part of Blender. You can save different layouts, called "screens," for different tasks. For example, you can have a layout for video editing or for texturing. You can customize everything to fit how you like to work.

Blender's Development Journey

Game engine GLSL materials

Since Blender became open-source, it has changed a lot. Many new features have been added. These include better animation, a new particle system, and fluid simulations.

The Google Summer of Code program has helped a lot. Students work on Blender projects during the summer.

Blender used to use a system called Phabricator for development. But it is now moving to a new system called Gitea.

Blender 2.8: A Big Change

Planning for Blender 2.8 started in 2015. The goal was to make the interface better and add new rendering features. A project called Code Quest helped speed up development. Blender 2.80 was released on July 30, 2019. It brought a new look, the EEVEE renderer, and many other improvements.

Cycles X: Faster Rendering

In April 2021, the Blender Foundation announced Cycles X. This was a big update to the Cycles render engine. It made rendering much faster. Cycles X replaced the old Cycles engine in Blender 3.0. It offers a huge performance boost.

Getting Help with Blender

Blender has lots of help available online. Its website has detailed documents. There are also many online communities, like the Blender Stack Exchange, where you can ask questions and get support.

Blender in Movies and Games

Flow on the splash screen of Blender 4.4

Blender started as a tool for an animation company. It was used in the film Spider-Man 2 for early animations.

The film Friday or Another Day was the first feature film to use Blender for all its special effects. It won an award at a film festival.

The Secret of Kells, an Oscar-nominated film, was partly made with Blender. Blender has also been used for shows on the History Channel.

Plumíferos, a full-length animated film, was made entirely in Blender. Special effects for Red Dwarf season X were also created using Blender.

Blender was used for pre-visualizations in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Some art for Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS and Wii U was also made with Blender.

The music group Death Grips used Blender for music videos. The TV series The Man in the High Castle used Blender for visual effects.

NASA uses Blender to create interactive web apps. For example, they made an app to explore the Curiosity rover on Mars. Many 3D models on NASA's website are in Blender's format.

The animated short film Alike (2015) used Blender as its main tool. Blender was also used for CGI in the movie Hardcore Henry.

Director David F. Sandberg used Blender for shots in Lights Out and Annabelle: Creation. Blender was used for parts of the credits in Wonder Woman.

The film Cinderella the Cat used Blender for animation. The 2018 film Next Gen was fully created in Blender.

The 2019 film I Lost My Body used Blender's Grease Pencil tool. This allowed artists to draw over 3D animation.

Ubisoft Animation Studio started using Blender in 2020. Khara and Project Studio Q are also moving to Blender.

The 2020 film Wolfwalkers and the 2021 Netflix show Maya and the Three were partly made with Blender.

VFX company Makuta VFX used Blender for the film RRR.

Blender was used in the 2023 film Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. Sony Pictures Imageworks used Blender's Grease Pencil. A fan animator also used Blender for a Lego scene in the film.

The 2024 Latvian film Flow was made entirely in Blender. It won an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature.

Blender in Schools and Research

Because Blender is free and open-source, it's used a lot in schools. Universities like the University of Michigan use it to teach 3D art and animation. Blender is also used in research to create images for computer vision and AI training.

Blender's Creative Projects

Big Buck Bunny promotional poster

Sintel promotional poster

Tears of Steel promotional poster

Since 2005, the Blender Foundation has started creative projects. These projects help improve Blender. They have made films like Elephants Dream, Big Buck Bunny, Sintel, and Tears of Steel. They also made a game called Yo Frankie!.

Blender Online Services

Blender Foundation Services

Blender Studio

Blender Studio is an online platform. Members can get Blender add-ons and courses. They can also follow the making of Blender Studio's open movies. It started in 2014 as Blender Cloud. It helps fund Blender's development.

The Blender Development Fund

The Blender Development Fund is a way to support Blender's development. Individuals and companies can donate money. Big companies like Epic Games, Nvidia, and Microsoft contribute.

Blender ID

The Blender ID is one login for all Blender services. You can use it for Blender Studio, the Blender Store, and more.

Blender Open Data

Example of Blender Benchmark in use

Blender Open Data collects and shows benchmark data. This data comes from the Blender community using the Blender Benchmark software.

Blender Store

The Blender Store sells Blender merchandise. You can buy shirts, socks, and other items.

Blender Extensions

Blender Extensions is where you can find add-ons and themes. You can install and update them directly in Blender.

Blender's Release History

This table shows important updates in Blender's history. Green means the current version, yellow means supported versions, and red means older versions.

Blender is available for Windows, macOS, and Linux. It runs on 64-bit systems. Blender 4.5 LTS was the last version to support macOS Intel.

More to Explore

• Andrew Price – The Blender Guru
• List of free and open-source software packages
• List of video editing software
• List of 3D printing software

See also

In Spanish: Blender para niños