Software update: Blender 2.68

Version 2.68 of the open source and cross platform 3D program Blender has been released. This application is intended for 3d modelling, animation, rendering, post-production, interactive creation and playback. More information about the extensive possibilities of Blender can be found on this page are being found. This program includes the open source animation movies Elephant’s Dream, Big Buck Bunny, cinder and Tears of Steel made. Below are the release notes for this release.

Blender 2.68
Many different mesh modeling tools were added and improved. Cycles render performance was improved on Windows and on GPUs. The motion tracker can now automate placement and choice of markers more with new tools. Smoke rendering quality has been improved to reduce blockiness.

Python scripts and drivers are now disabled by default when loading files. This is for improved security, without this feature malicious .blend files could cause problems. see the Python security documentation for details.

Modeling

Improved bridge tool to bridge multiple loops at once, subdivision, surface blending and bridging face regions. New grid-fill tool filling a grid from edge loops, X mirror and projected proportional editing, snap to symmetry, face split option for dissolve, vertex connect cut across faces.

physics

Smoke has improved rendering quality avoid blockiness, and subframe simulation support to handle fast moving emitters. Particles can now be emitted from faces generated by modifiers that were not in the original mesh.

usability

Improved weight painting tools, mask modifier for sequencer strips, 2D image paint more consistent with 3D painting, better key shortcuts display, quick enabling and disabling of multiple layers or visibility, auto indent for multi-line Python statements,

Addons New addons are Texture Atlas to bake shadow and lightmaps for an entire scene, and Edit Linked Library, for quick editing of linked assets.

Cycles Render

Rendering performance has been improved on CPU and GPU and support for new GPUs was added. A new Mist render pass is available, Ray visibility is now supported for all light sources, and new Nodes have been added. Hair rendering on the GPU has been enabled as well.

Motion Tracker

Some new features and smaller improvements to existing ones were done for motion tracking. Main features are markers’ position refining, which allows you to refine marker position after it was occluded by an object, and automatic keyframe selection, which tries to automatically find a best keyframe for the reconstruction.

Python Security

Auto-running Python scripts can now be controlled more securely.

Bug fixes

In addition to the new features, over 280 bugs that existed in previous releases have been fixed.