Software » Animation 3D » Blender 4.2

Blender 4.2 LTS splash by Blender Studio
Released July 16th, 2024

Video Recap
Round-up of what’s new, in detail.

New features overview by Jonathan Lampel from CGCookie and Harry Blends.
EEVEE
NEXT LEVEL

The next generation of the render engine EEVEE is here. Completely rewritten from scratch to allow global illumination, displacement, better SSS, viewport motion blur, and so much more.

Sunsational
Lighting
Lighting is a breeze with added support for screen space global illumination.

EEVEE can automatically extract intense lights from the World environment and treat them as Sun lights, improving the lighting quality and casting real shadows.

Raytraced global illumination in real-time. No lights, purely lit and shadows produced by the World environment.
Vector displacement now
Bump up your game
Real displacement is now supported by EEVEE.

Just like in Cycles, setting your materials to “Displacement and Bump” will combine true displacement and bump mapping for finer details. Vertex position is modified.

SSSuperb Scattering
Subsurface Scattering now doesn’t leak between objects and has no energy loss.

The subsurface translucency is now always computed, and the associated option has been removed.

Left: Blender 4.1 — Right: Blender 4.2 LTS
Turn Up the Volume
Dithered volumetrics provide a much more stable result while navigating the scene.

Blurry Vision
Motion blur is now visible in the 3D Viewport through the camera view and supports a custom Shutter Curve, matching Cycles.

Real-time motion blur in the 3D Viewport.
MORE EEVEE
Virtual Shadow Maps
Unlimited BSDFs
New Transparent Shadows option
Unlimited number of Lights
Lights now support ray visibility options
Multithreaded Shader Compilation
Refined User Interface
Shadow Map Raytracing
Lights are now visible through refractive surfaces
Glossy lighting no longer leaks at the back of objects
Better quality Depth of Field
New Backface Culling option for shadows
Materials Dithered render method
Thickness output
Improved Blended materials
Raytraced Transmission now affects all BSDF nodes
Better Image Stability
MIGRATION PLAN
Even though conversion to the new EEVEE happens automatically and most scenes should just work, some adjustments are required for a smooth transition.

Community Videos
I tried Eevee Next... Here's What I Learned
I tried Eevee Next… Here’s What I Learned
How I Make REALISTIC Renders with EEVEE Next!
How I Make REALISTIC Renders with EEVEE Next!
Everything you need to know about EEVEE Next
Everything you need to know about EEVEE Next
CYCLES
MAGICAL, PRETTIER, SMOOTHER, FASTER

Cycles got a massive upgrade to make your renders not only look better, but also render faster. It’s a kind of magic.

RAY TRAVEL
The new Ray Portal BSDF transports rays to another location in the scene with a specified ray position and normal.

It can be used to render portals for visual effects and other production rendering tricks.

See the documentation for details and example node setups.

Cycles Ray Portals
Simulating a camera feed using Ray Portals.
Cycles Thin Film Interference
Soap bubbles effect (IOR 1.7, 400nm)
THIN FILM INTERFERENCE
The Principled BSDF now supports physically accurate thin film interference effects for specular reflection and transmission.

Initially, this is only applied to dielectric materials, support for metallic thin film effects is planned.

SOFT VOLUMES
Blender 4.2 LTS is your go-to for rendering volumes, with improved volume light sampling that delivers smoother results for spotlights and area lights.

Less noise. Faster.

Classic (White Noise)
Blue Noise
Blue Noise (denoised)
Classic (White Noise)
BLUE NOISE
Blue noise dithered sampling to improve the visual quality of renders. This mainly helps when setting the maximum number of samples to a low number, and for interactive viewport renders.

New files use this mode by default, while existing files can be changed in the Sampling → Advanced panel.

MORE CYCLES
Upgraded to OpenImageDenoise 2.3 for improved quality
New World Override option for View Layers
New Roughness input in Subsurface Scattering node
Intel GPU rendering now supports host memory fallback
Motion Blur settings are now shared with EEVEE
GPU accelerated denoising support for AMD GPUs on Windows + Linux
Reduced Blender installation size due to GPU kernels compression
GPU accelerated denoising supported on CPU renders
Principled Hair with the Huang model provides better close-up renders
EXTENSIONS
EXTENSIONS ADD-ON ARE- ON
Add-ons and themes have received a big overhaul and are now unified as Extensions.
The best part? They can be updated right from within Blender!

EASY
INSTALL
Getting extensions has never been this easy:

Drag & Drop from websites such as extensions.blender.org
Bundle them in production or educational environments.
Support for “legacy” add-ons.
Install from disk.
Install via drag and drop
Install via drag and drop from extensions.blender.org
Update Extensions from Blender
Update Extensions from within Blender.
STAY
UP-TO-DATE
Extension repositories can check for updates automatically on startup. This can be disabled on a per-repository basis

WORK
OFFLINE
Internet access is fully optional, and off by default.

You can always install extensions manually via Install from Disk (or drag and drop the zip file into Blender) or by using System extensions repositories.

Allow Online Access or continue happily offline
Allow Online Access or continue happily offline.
EXTENSIONS PLATFORM
An ever-growing hub of community-made, free, and open-source extensions for Blender.

extensions.blender.org
A new community-managed website for sharing and discovering free and open-source Blender extensions.

Detailed descriptions with images, videos and user ratings.
Complete history of versions for present and future releases.
Community review and approval process.
Easy installation via drag and drop.
Blender Extensions Platform website.
Blender Extensions Platform website.
Extensions Manage in Blender
Extensions Manager in Blender.
MANAGE
EXTENSIONS
Extensions can be managed from the Preferences.

Search for new extensions.
Install and uninstall.
Check for updates.
Drag, drop. Ready to go!
The Extensions Platform connects authors with users, and extensions with Blender.

Installing add-ons and themes is now a breeze.

STUDIO FRIENDLY

Thanks to portable installation, new environment variables, custom bundling of extensions, Blender 4.2 LTS is easier than ever to integrate in studio pipelines.

Khronos PBR Neutral
Tone Mapper
The recently released tone mapper by Khronos, aimed at displaying true-to-life assets, is now built into Blender.

Khronos PBR Neutral
AgX
Standard
Khronos PBR Neutral
Khronos PBR Neutral enables faithful reproduction of a product’s base color, hue and saturation when using PBR rendering under grayscale lighting, while eliminating HDR artifacts around highlights.

DRAW THE LINE

Polyline joins the family of gestures (lasso, box, and line), allowing for a quick way to create polygonal shapes.

Polyline Trim
Polyline Trim
Polyline Face Set
Polyline Face Set
Polyline Mask
Polyline Mask
Polyline Hide
Polyline Hide
Polyline Trim tool used to create boolean operations that can add or remove geometry.

COMPLETE
TOOLSET
Additionally, the Line gesture is now supported for Trim, Face Set, and Hide.

The Lasso gesture is now supported for the Hide tool too.

Line Trim
Line Trim
Line Face Set
Line Face Set
Line Hide
Line Hide
Lasso Hide
Lasso Hide
Projects to Look forward to in 2024
PUT IT TO THE TEST
Share and compare your computer’s score with openly accessible benchmarks provided by the Blender community.

ENTER THE MATRIX

A whole new socket type for matrices makes it easier than ever to work with transformations using nodes. This lays the ground work for the future of Geometry Nodes with advanced custom geometry operations. The new socket type comes alongside a wide range of new nodes as well as the integration into existing ones.

New Matrix socket used for placing the pizza boxes.
Transform Socket - Pizza Delivery Geometry Nodes 4.2 demo
TRY IT YOURSELF
Get the file used in this video to play with the new Matrix socket.

Matrix Socket Nodes
List of Matrix Socket Nodes
POINT AND SHOOT

Node Tools are becoming more and more interactive! It is now possible to use information about the viewport and mouse position in the node-tree. Together with the new Wait for Click feature this lets you control exactly where the tool will take effect.

Impact Fracture tool created with Geometry Nodes.
Click Tools Impact Fracture geometry nodes 4.2 demo
TRY IT YOURSELF
Use the Impact Fracture tool created with Geometry Nodes.

Node Tools nodes
New nodes to ease the making of interactive Node Tools.
MORE GEOMETRY NODES
Scale Elements node is now 4-10x faster
Sample UV Surface is now 10-20x faster on large meshes
Multi-threading optimizations
See all Geometry Nodes changes
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EUR
SEQUENCER

The Video Sequencer takes another leap in design, tools, and performance.

BEAUTY
ALL AROUND
Strips are now rendered using a shader with rounded corners, making it easier to see at a glance where a strip ends and the next begins.

Active and selected strips have thicker outlines, and an extra dark edge around to improve contrast.

Video Sequencer Rounded Corners
Rounded corners, thicker outlines, improved contrast. Prettier and fun...

Photorealistic Rendering
Blender now features a powerful new unbiased rendering engine called Cycles that offers stunning ultra-realistic rendering.

The built-in Cycles rendering engine offers:

GPU & CPU rendering
Realtime viewport preview
HDR lighting support
Permissive License for linking with external software
Rendering in Blender with Cycles
Modeling in Blender
Fast Modeling
Blender’s comprehensive array of modeling tools make creating, transforming and editing your models a breeze.

Blender’s modeling tools include:

Keyboard shortcuts for a fast workflow
N-Gon support
Edge slide, collapse and dissolve
Grid and Bridge fill
Python scripting for custom tools and add-ons
Realistic Materials
With Blender’s new rendering engine the possibilities for materials are endless.

Key features are:

Complete Node Support for full customization
Physically accurate shaders like glass, translucency and SSS
Open Shading Language (OSL) support for coding unique shaders
Materials in Blender
Rigging in Blender
Fast Rigging
Transforming a model into a posable character has never been easier!

Blender offers an impressive set of rigging tools including:

Envelope, skeleton and automatic skinning
Easy weight painting
Mirror functionality
Bone layers and colored groups for organization
B-spline interpolated bones
Animation toolset
Whether it’s simple keyframing or complex walk-cycles, Blender allows artists to turn their still characters into impressive animations.

Blender’s animation feature set offers:

Automated walk-cycles along paths
Character animation pose editor
Non Linear Animation (NLA) for independent movements
IK forward/inverse kinematics for fast poses
Sound synchronization
rigging
Sculpting in Blender
Sculpting
Experience the joy of sculpting organic subjects using the built-in sculpting feature set of Blender.

Sculpting in Blender includes:

20 different brush types
Multi-res sculpting support
Dynamic Topology sculpting
Mirrored sculpting
Fast UV Unwrapping
Easily unwrap your mesh right inside Blender, and use image textures or paint your own directly onto the model.

Blender allows for:

Fast Cube, Cylinder, Sphere and Camera projections
Conformal and Angle Based unwrapping (with edge seams and vertex pinning)
Painting directly onto the mesh
Multiple UV layers
UV layout image exporting
UV Unwrapping in Blender
Compositing in Blender
Full Compositor
Blender comes with a fully fledged compositor built right in. That means no more exporting to third party programs, you can do it all without leaving the program.

The compositor comes with:

Impressive library of nodes for creating camera fx, color grading, vignettes and much more
Render-layer support
Full compositing with images and video files
Ability to render to multiLayer OpenEXR files
Multi-threaded
Amazing Simulations
Whether you need a crumbling building, rain, fire, smoke, fluid, cloth or full on destruction, Blender delivers great looking results.

Blender’s simulation tools include

Fluid – Realistic water and fluid simulations.
Smoke – Billowing smoke with flames and scene interaction.
Hair – Beautiful wafts of hair that blows in the wind and interacts with collisions.
Cloth – Amazingly realistic cloth simulations for clothing and environments
Rigid Body Physics – Makes any object destructable and collidable
Particles – For creating things like rain, sparks and shrapnel
463e785104
Blender Game Engine Screenshot
Game Creation
Included in Blender is a complete game engine, allowing you to create a fully featured 3d game right inside Blender.

The game engine includes:

Ability to port your models to any third-party game engine
Create or code your own game logic
Full Bullet Physics integration
Python scripting API for advanced control and AI
Support for all OpenGLTM dynamic lighting, toon shading, animated materials as well as Normal and Parallax Mapping
Playback of games inside Blender without compiling or preprocessing
3D spatial audio using OpenAL
Camera and Object tracking
Blender now includes production ready camera and object tracking. Allowing you to import raw footage, track the footage, mask areas and see the camera movements live in your 3d scene. Eliminating the need to switch between programs.

The Camera and Object Tracker includes:

Auto and manual tracking
Powerful camera reconstruction
Real-time preview of your tracked footage and 3d scene
Support for Planar tracking and Tripod solvers
Camera tracking in Blender
3057383d1a
Library of Extensions
With a large community of enthusiasts and developers, Blender comes loaded with a vast array of extensions that you can turn on or off easily.

Some existing extensions include:

Generators for trees, terrain, ivy and clouds.
Fracture Objects.
3D Printing Toolbox.
Rigify meta-rigging system.
Import and Export format support for AfterEffects, DirectX, Unreal Game Engine and more!
Plus many more that you can download here

Video Editing
Blender even comes with a built-in Video Editor.

The Video Editor allows you to perform basic actions like video cuts and splicing, as well as more complex tasks like video masking.

The Video Editor includes:

Live preview, luma waveform, chroma vectorscope and histogram displays
Audio mixing, syncing, scrubbing and waveform visualization
Up to 32 slots for adding video, images, audio, scenes, masks and effects
Speed control, adjustment layers, transitions, keyframes, filters and more.
caminandes_edit_final
Exporting in Blender
File Formats
Blender comes packed with import/export support for many different programs.

Including:

Image
JPEG, JPEG2000, PNG, TARGA, OpenEXR, DPX, Cineon, Radiance HDR, SGI Iris, TIFF
Video
AVI, MPEG and Quicktime (on OSX).
3D
Alembic, 3D Studio (3DS), COLLADA (DAE), Filmbox (FBX), Autodesk (DXF), Wavefront (OBJ), DirectX (x), Lightwave (LWO), Motion Capture (BVH), SVG, Stanford PLY, STL, VRML, VRML97, X3D.
Flexible Interface
Novice and advanced users will love the ability to customize their layout completely. From simply splitting their viewport, to fully customizing it with python scripting, blender works for you.

Blender’s interface also offers:

Consistency across all platforms
No disruptive pop-up windows
Crisp text (support for retina on OSX)