All in one, Free and Open Source 3D creation

Because the work on Bforartists GUI is streamlined, cleaner, organized, customizable, has consistent colored iconography, left aligned text, and many more details that make day to day work easier. Bforartists  also is 100% compatible with Blender. The files are transferable.

Give it a whirl and see! You’ve got nothing to loose.

For a deeper description of the differences have a look at our comparison page: The differences to Blender

In short, the main differences between Bforartists and Blender are:

• An new default keymap, reduced to a minimal and necessary hotkey layout with 3D navigation that can be exclusively done by mouse.
• Cleaned up User Interface. Lots of unnecessary double, triple or even more identical menu entries are combined, removed and/or exposed.
• Extended User Interface. Many tools that were formerly hotkey only have a menu entry now.
• Rearranged User Interface. Some things are better accessible now, some less frequent operators are no-longer in the way anymore.
• Improved default settings.
• Colored Iconography with silhuette, color coding, form and detail consistently placed everywhere.
• A configurable toolbar with icon buttons.
• A pinnable tool shelf with the header based tools, exposed at a top-level in panels.
• Tabs in the toolshelf.
• A node add toolshelf for quick point and click
• Improved default workspace layouts.
• Left aligned checkboxes and text where possible.
• Indented titles for properties.
• Better and more tooltips.
• Better contrast on a readable standard theme.
• Some extra add-ons to improve usability, like the reset 3D View add-on, Brush Panels or the Set Dimensions add-on with which you can scale in world coordinates in edit mode.
• And lots of extra small details: like not so many delete confirm dialogs, quick editor toggles, scene management in the outliner, and more.

A detailed list of the changes can be found in the release notes: www.bforartists.de/wiki/release-notes

But the code is just half of the show. Another important bit are the non code things.

• The target audience for Bforartists are hobbyists and indie developers coming in from other software. Blender tries to target Blender professionals. That’s a completely different audience and development target.
• We also have an extended GUI reference manual. The Blender manual is unsearchable in big parts, has an odd structure mixing user experience with GUI, and still relies heavily on the Blender keymap to name a few flaws. This makes it nearly unusable as a reference for users. And that’s why we have rewritten it. With the tools, editors and operators in mind, not only the hotkeys. We also removed UX tips and tricks to keep it minimal and GUI orientated.