Blender’s final presentation started with announcing the coming of the new inteface. In fact, the Winter Camp event came just at the right time for them to work on the 2.5 release. By improving their interface they aim to be ready to attract the best designers, pushing the product to the next level. Referring back to the Winter Camp networks theme, Tom Roosendaal has four keys focus point to build up a good community. The first is to understand and facilitate people’s self-interest, that people want to also get something out of it or will leave. The second point is to not take yourself to seriously but, and this is point three, set ambitious goals. In Blender’s case this means saying to Hollywood… “up yours” and produce high quality animations without the dominating Hollywood business model. Point four is to stop the navel-gazing, to jump out of the ivory tower and get those feet wet, go where the things actually happen without thinking to much on a abstract level about who you are and how to do thing different and, and this is the last point, don’t listen to people who talk, but look at what they do

…so get to work!

Blender finished with a series of their productions, showing what they can do and how they have evolved during the last two years. Although they have set out to become a serious competitor to Hollywood, I did think it left a bit too strong of a Hollywoodesque feeling; differentiating from Hollywood might also be a good strategy. For now however, it seems a smart way to show there is an alternative to the big players and at the same time get a free ride in the slipstream of the Hollywood animated movies marketing apparatus.

[vimeo]http://www.vimeo.com/1084537[/vimeo]