Blender 2.61 is out!

**angelize** · 16 December 2011, 08:15 PM

The first official version with the new Cycles render engine is now available at Blender.org I haven't had a lot of time to play with it just yet but it seems much more stable now than some of the earlier testing builds I tried. Dynamic paint and the Ocean simulator look to be very interesting too.

So has anyone else grabbed this new version? What are your thoughts?

**guyke** · 17 December 2011, 07:47 AM

I haven't yet, Frances. Probably somewhere next week. I'm still struggling with 2.60...

**ODdOnLifeItself** · 17 December 2011, 08:19 AM

Hello Frances

It's good news!

I did download it and start some "tests". As yet, there seems to be an easy way to set up displacement maps, but they haven't implemented normal maps (for Cycles). I am assuming it's because the internal renderer is a scanline renderer and it takes more to put the hooks into it so that it functions with Cycles.

One annoying thing that I have noticed is that several times when going to do a save as, it hasn't remembered the original filename, so have to put it all in again. It didn't happen often, but it happened a couple of times, so there is some issue.

All in all though...from first looks, it looks great... one can use either renderer, though realize that there are some changes to the scene that will be necessary in going from one to the other. Cycles tends to make "better" looking renders... the internal renderer is easier to use in terms of setting up scenes with applied materials.

I think it will go one of two ways, they will either make the applications of textures for bump maps, specular maps, etc. easier to do OR there will be some node set-ups that become standard which do the same thing albeit in a different manner.

Right now, I am just going in and creating simple scenes and seeing what hoops I have to jump through.

It does appear stable... haven't (yet) had one crash or problem other than some settings issue relating to my newness with Cycles.

I'd say check it out. There's nothing to lose, since the Blender Internal renderer is still there and all the old scenes should pull in just right.

None of us here, yet are using the tracker feature, but that looks cool. It gives a way to integrate Blender objects into a video-taped scene, even if the camera is erratic in its motion.

It just gets better and better...and again, for the same low price... NOTHING!

Peace

James

**ODdOnLifeItself** · 17 December 2011, 12:26 PM

I like the shiny, reflective, glossy textures. They're (depending on settings) a little bit satiny as well.

Since the setting up of textures is totally different (Cycles vs. Blender Internal), it takes some experimenting to understand...

This is my first real play/study with Cycles...