Blender

"PBRT 2: Creating and Working with Large Scenes" by Gustaf Waldemarson at Blender Conference 2026

Today, Blender is undeniably one of the best tools out there for a large swathe of graphics related tasks. However, some work can be done to make it even more useful when working with the complex scenes that are often used in graphics research.

During BCON24, I demonstrated how to create basic importers and exporters with the Python API using the PBRT format as a basis. In this talk, I will present various improvements to the importer that allows PBRT scenes to be rendered with Cycles at a comparable image quality, and by extension, leverage the existing Blender ecosystem to export these scenes to other systems via other formats, such as glTF.

Additionally, as some of these scenes contain numerous, or complex objects, techniques for working with them in a way that maintains user-interface responsiveness are highlighted.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"Mathemagics: Building Assets for Realtime Effects" by John Einselen at Blender Conference 2026

How does a technical artist approach realtime effects? Using examples from an immersive XR headset experience, industry veteran John Einselen (motion design and technical director at Launch) will walk through some of his approaches; from prototyping within Blender to building final assets and integrating them in realtime game engines.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"From Vertex to T. Rex: 3D Printing My Own Hall of Dinosaurs" by Alex Chamberlain at Blender Conference 2026

As billionaire collectors edge out public institutions for the ownership of priceless fossils, Blender and 3D printing can play an important role in proliferating public access to these spectacular finds. I've printed life-sized Dinosaur skeletons using my own sculpts and 3D scan data to make stunning and inspiring public displays.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"How Blender Changed Theatre" by Marcus Möller at Blender Conference 2026

In this talk, Marcus Möller, a Stage Design student at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna, explores how modern 3D tools establish an innovative workflow in the theatre world. He will guide you through his journey—from building and rendering initial concept designs to his most recent project, where he developed a real-time animation playback tied to real-life parameters like motor rotation speed.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"Imposter Syndrome" by Thomas R Murphy at Blender Conference 2026

While optimizing EEVEE Next for the UP Blender Game Engine, Tom developed an imposter-card shader and add-on to streamline asset creation and boost real-time performance.

Only after creating the add-on for his personal use, did he realize that it could help almost all artists seeking to reduce render times, expedite asset production and improve real-time performance.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"GN-to-UV: Hacking Coordinates with Geometry Nodes" by Jindřich Olšar at Blender Conference 2026

This classroom talk demonstrates how to weaponize Geometry Nodes as a non-destructive data-processing layer for complex production fixes. Moving beyond basic asset creation, we dissect two real-world case studies from Mangoshake’s pipeline. First, we explore how we manufactured custom UV data on live, simulated cloth for our client RIM using stored attributes. Second, we break down a procedural path generator that calculates directional gradients along a curve. Attendees will learn how to route complex data directly into the Shader Editor for advanced material mixing.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"Headless Heads: Calibrated Digital Human Pipelines with Cycles" by Patrick Anderson at Blender Conference 2026

This presentation will look at how Electronic Arts’ applied research team use their experimental head scanning and processing pipeline to deliver reliable, accurate data to game teams.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"Building Procedural Simulation Environments" by Felipe Oliveira Ribas at Blender Conference 2026

Ray-tracing simulations are becoming faster and more accessible through modern graphics processing units and improved algorithms. However, the 3D environments used in these simulations are still often static, simplified, and manually prepared for a single scenario. This talk explores how Blender can become a procedural scene-generation layer for simulation. Geometry Nodes and Python can create controlled scene variations, expose geometric assumptions, and generate different levels of detail for different computational budgets. Electromagnetic propagation is presented as one practical example of this broader workflow.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"OpenPBR: Road to Expressive and Interoperable Material Models" by Sebastian Herholz, Weizhen Huang at Blender Conference 2026

Introducing OpenPBR, Blender’s upcoming surface shading model aiming at keeping a consistent appearance when material assets are shared across different applications, simplifying the process of teaming-up and collaborating with other people.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/

"Practical XR Bridge to Blender Spatial Workflows" by Ruoya Sheng, Junfeng She at Blender Conference 2026

This presentation highlights the past year's progress in Blender XR and introduces a frictionless PCVR workflow on PICO devices that transforms the headset into a complete spatial workstation. By showcasing seamless virtual desktop switching and in-VR peripheral controls, we will explore how eliminating the physical barrier between VR and desktop environments unlocks a truly uninterrupted iteration loop for 3D creators.

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Learn more about Blender Conference 2026 at https://conference.blender.org/2026/