The world’s most popular free 3D computer graphics tool is getting a major upgrade; Blender 4.3 makes it an even more attractive alternative to more established rivals
- Blender 4.3 is now on sale
- Grease Pencil now supports real-world pixel and brush sizes, and linking light and shadow improves Eevee’s real-time rendering control
- The metal BSDF node adds hyper-realism with lab-quality data
Blender, the world’s leading open source 3D creation tool, has released version 4.3.
The update brings improvements that improve everything from visual appearance to performance and user experience.
With this update, Blender continues to close the gap between itself and the best animation software, further cementing its place as an alternative for 3D artists, animators, and developers.
Grease Pencil improvements for 2D and 3D artists
Blender 4.3 adds new upgrades to the Grease Pencil, allowing users to draw and animate directly in the 3D environment. In this update, brushes are now independent assets, meaning users can easily transfer them between projects. Users can also define brush sizes in pixels or real units, improving precision in drawings and animations.
There’s also a new Fill Gradients tool that makes it easier to create smoother gradients. Perhaps most importantly, all grease pencil operations are now multi-threaded, leading to faster performance, especially on complex projects that require high computing power.
Blender’s Eevee rendering engine has received significant upgrades in version 4.3. One of the key improvements is the introduction of light and shadow linking, giving users more control over how lighting affects different parts of a scene, allowing for finer adjustments and more dynamic lighting effects.
The user interface has also undergone changes to make it cleaner and easier to use. Icons are now fully scalable SVGs, meaning they can be resized without loss of quality. The maximum resolution of the interface is now limited only by system memory, giving users more flexibility in configuring their workspace.
Additionally, this update introduces a glowing border around the active window, making it easier to identify which window is in use, while color selection has been optimized for faster performance, further streamlining workflow for users.
Connecting and disconnecting video strips has been simplified and snapping has been improved. Multipass compositing, a feature also introduced in Eevee, allows users to apply multiple layers of effects. The color correction tools are extensive and provide additional options for fine-tuning the visual tone of scenes.
For those who work with metal objects, Blender 4.3 introduces the “Physical Conductor” mode within the Metallic BSDF node. This feature uses laboratory data to more accurately simulate how light interacts with real metals, resulting in more realistic metal surfaces. The addition of the “Orn” slider, which adjusts surface roughness, further improves the realism of materials such as wood and brick.
Via NotebookCheck