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Blender is a free and open source 3D graphics package. Originally created by Ton Rosendaal, Blender is developed by a community of artists and designers. Even though Blender is an open source project, it offers a wide range of features that can rival professional graphics software.

Availability

Blender is supported on three major operating systems: Windows, Mac and Linux. However, for Windows users, a minimum of Windows 7 is required. There is no installation required to run Blender as it is completely portable. Blender can be run on machines with at least 4 GB of memory, 2 GHz processing power and a graphics card with 1 GB of RAM, but higher specifications are recommended for Blender to run smoothly.

Functions

In addition to powerful modeling tools, Blender also features a built-in path-traced rendering engine known as Cycles for faster, more realistic rendering.

Blender also has its own animation tools and game engine. With Blender, users can create their own animated movies directly from the package. It can also be used to code games and export models to other game engines.

Users can also do post-processing in Blender using VFX and modeling tools as Blender comes with a built-in compositor as well as a camera and object tracker. Users can also add particles, smoke, fire and hair for a more immersive simulation.

From artists, For artists

Blender has all the tools any artist or animator needs to create 3D graphics. It may be difficult for users to understand and use at first, but it is certainly one of the least complex design software.