Why Grease Pencil?

Grease Pencil Definition from Wikipedia

The grease pencil, is a wax writing tool also known as a wax pencil, china marker, or

chinagraph pencil , which is a writing implement made of hardened colored wax and is useful

for marking on hard, glossy non-porous surfaces. Marks made by grease pencils are resistant to

moisture and can usually be removed by rubbing the marked surface with a paper towel.

So why Blender Grease Pencil?

When using Blender to construct 3D Scenes and generate animations it has been useful for

artists to sketch notes on the computer screen. This does not mean that a crayon, as described

above, was employed but that a digital marking was superimposed on the work being created.

This marking is drawn on a separate digital layer which is easily modified or removed when the

work is finished.

Sketching freehand notes is accomplished by drawing Strokes (lines), therefore, the concept has

been developed to drawing sketches of characters and scenery as depicted in a cartoon drawing.

Further development has seen the lines forming the sketch animated thus creating full 2D

Animation. This 2D Animation, in Blender, is constructed within the Blender 3D environment

providing a flexible animation tool. The tool has been termed, the Grease Pencil and is applied

within a dedicated 2D Animation Workspace.

A Workspace is the arrangement of panels and windows containing controls as seen on the

computer screen when the program is run.

To understand this concept, begin by downloading and installing Blender.

To follow the instructions provided in this book it is suggested that you employ Blender 2.92.0.

Philosophy of the Book

The philosophy employed in this publication is to introduce Blender by describing the program's

Graphical User Interface (GUI) and give short descriptions and examples of the controls and

their function. The Controls constitute the Tools for performing the different operations which

produce specific results. Knowing what Tools are available and where they are located is the key

to understanding Blender.

Blender Platforms

A computing platform or digital platform is the environment in which a piece of software is

executed. It may be the hardware or the operating system (OS)

Blender is a cross platform application for Windows Vista and above, Linux and Mac OSX 10.6

and above operating systems.

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