Blender is a complete 3D creation suite: it lets you model, texture, light, animate and render still images or video, all inside a single free application.

The main areas of the screen

The first time you open it, the interface can look busy. Rest assured: it breaks down into a handful of clear areas that never move.

• The 3D viewport — the large central area where your scene lives.
• The toolbar on the left (shortcut: the T key).
• The Properties panel on the right: render, materials, modifiers and more.
• The Outliner at the top right: the list of every object in the scene.
• The Timeline at the bottom, used for animation.

Blender is organised into workspaces (the tabs along the top: Layout, Modeling, Shading and so on) that rearrange the screen to suit the task at hand.

Key takeaway: do not try to understand everything at once. The 3D viewport in the middle is your starting point.