Exploring Blender’s features and tools
Blender often feels like five pieces of software in one package. While it’s amazing that it has so many facilities, it does mean that every time you think you’ve acquainted yourself with the basics, you then discover something else it can do. For this tutorial we’ve chosen Blender features that might sound intimidating (such as physics simulation or shader programming) but that are surprisingly easy to get up and running. You can take a stab at the sections individually, but you’ll probably get more out of the tutorial by following them in order.
As ever, you’ll often want to start with a blank scene when working with something new (File>New>General). Unless we mention that we’ll be working with the default cube, delete it before you start work (select with left mouse button and then press Delete).
Working with text
Blender has facilities for working with 3D text that you could use to create a 3D logo. You could even animate it. Spinning metallic text, here we come! Start by adding a text object (Add>Text). The first problem is that the text is flat against the floor when first created. As it’s just a standard Blender object, prop it up vertically using the Object Properties tab in the Properties Browser on the lower right-hand side of the screen. To do this, change the Rotation X field in that panel to 90.
If you want to edit the text, go into Edit mode by pressing Tab. From here, you
