How do I rotate a bone without effecting the connected bones? I've been looking for answers to this problem, but I'm too much of a newbie with rigging to understand some of your answers.

So here's the thing: I'm trying to modelize and animate steelix:

Considering his snake-like shape, he's not so hard to rig and animate, and this is what I made:

But here's the problem: Steelix's spiked boulders can rotate on themselves, and with this rigging, whenever I rotate a bone, the whole body parts connected to this bone also rotates.

What should I do to make that the boulders rotate only on themselves?

Go into Bone Edit Mode of the Armature. Tab
Select the spiked_boulder bone and duplicate it. ShiftD
For further convenience, let's scale this bone down, so we can discern it later on. Let's name it spiked_boulder_rotation.
Parent spiked_boulder_rotation to spiked_boulder. CtrlP
Assign/Parent the spiked boulder mesh to the spiked_boulder_rotation bone.

Now you can animate the movement of the spine in a standard fashion. The child spiked_boulder_rotation will rotate along its parent moving the geometry. Now animated the Y Rotation of the spiked_boulder_rotation if you want to additionally rotate the spike geo.


How to access an objects DupliGroup instances from Python? I'm improving my AC3D exporter. Right now, a linked group (displayed and treated as an empty) will not have any children (unless I parent a local object to them) despite holding many objects (from the linked file). Is there a way to get a list of children from a linked group?

You need to create a dupli-list. eg:

def object_derived_get(ob, scene):
    if ob.dupli_type != 'NONE'
        ob.dupli_list_create(scene)
        ob_matrix_pairs = [(dob.object, dob.matrix.copy()) for dob in ob.dupli_list]
        ob.dupli_list_clear()
    else:
        ob_matrix_pairs = [(ob, ob.matrix_world.copy())]

    return ob_matrix_pairs

# example
import bpy
from bpy import context
for ob, matrix in dupli_list_create(context.object, context.scene):
    print(ob, matrix)

Seealso:

http://www.blender.org/api/blender_python_api_2_74_release/bpy.types.DupliObject.html
http://www.blender.org/api/blender_python_api_2_74_release/bpy.types.Object.html#bpy.types.Object.dupli_list


Array Modifier duplicating in wrong direction I'm working on this tutorial and when I get to around 45:45 when he starts array modifying the floor with the desks, I got the floors to go up and line up correctly but when I try to array the desks they go down and they're on the X axis instead of the Z. Here's a picture of what's happening.  My median point dots are also all over the place and it makes them hard to follow, if there's any info on how to fix of prevent that I would greatly appreciate the help.

All you should have to do is apply the rotation. The hotkey to do this is CTRL + A -> Rotation.

An alternate method (that you probably shouldn't use if you want it duplicated on the x) is to put the value of one in some of the other value boxes (make the current on 0 first).


No File Menu in blender 2.78a I have Blender 2.78 and I'm trying to save my project however I don't see the file tab or add tab in the top menu bar. I see create to add mesh so that's solved but no file tab.

Click on the current editor

What ever you have it will drop down a big menu and select
(i) icon i.e info

And you will find your file menu


Smooth shaded model has odd shading I'm currently working on a model of an X-wing that I'm intending for use in a game and running into a bit of trouble with the shading of the mesh. The upper nose is rounded off where the sensor cone attaches, but at the point it reaches the canopy frame it flattens out and meets at a corner.

Everything is fine and dandy when the sides are modeled:

but once I close it off and add the top of the nose, the shading goes to hell:

As you can see, the smoothing gets confused at the lip of the cockpit.

I've tried a couple different means of getting around this, none of which looks right while maintaining the correct shape. The transition from the rounded to flat is a fairly important part of the ship's character, so I don't want to discard the contours, either.

Any tips or suggestions on modeling this area?

Addendum:

If I eliminate that second angle where the canopy frame meets the fuselage as marked in red:

this also fixes the smoothing. However this is not a solution, as the angle is a part of the design. It DOES give me another thought on fixing, but I won't be able to test it until I get home.

This is because your mesh edges change direction sharply. It's unavoidable by default unless you add supporting geometry to make the transition smoother.

The image below shows 3 similar cylinders that were smooth shaded. The first has a ngon capping the top, the second is capped with triangles and the last has a ngon cap but has a bevel around the edge. Notice that the 3rd cylinder doesn't have any weird shading since we eliminated the sharp edge.

So to fix, add supporting geometry by beveling your edges to avoid sharp curves and turns.

Another fix is to just add an Edge Split modifier. The cylinder on the left is the default one shaded smooth, the other one has the modifier. This won't always just work out of the box though for more complicated shapes and might require some tweaking.


I don't have any keymap for "view selected" I am following a tutorial and they are teaching how to configure the hotkey for "view selected" but when I try to find the actual configuration I don't see any hotkey already created:

I just installed the program, I also tried to "Load factory preferences" but still not any hotkey found for this functionality
Is it normal that I don't have these hotkeys? I know I can add this hotkey manually but I am worried my configuration has a bigger mess

I believe that "View Selected" in the keymap has been renamed to "Frame Selected."


fac value in bmesh.utils.edge_split Not massively familiar with blender and looking at:
https://docs.blender.org/api/blender_python_api_current/bmesh.utils.html?highlight=edge_split#bmesh.utils.edge_split

It's not clear what the value of the 'fac' argument is supposed to be?
Is it a 3d coord? (x, y, z) or something else, like a fraction of the total length of the edge?

What's a good way to calculate it? As examples there's this:
https://github.com/lijenstina/mesh_extra_tools/blob/c90634a024ab8d531751df873d33dbe905d0ca13/mesh_extrude_and_reshape.py#L217

But want to confirm calculating the distance between the edge's two vertices is necessary.

'fac' is a percent of the edge length, considered from the vertex indicated in the call.

For instance, if you run the code below on an edge suite, you'll see the growing percents applied on a length of 2 meters:

import bpy, bmesh

obj = bpy.context.object

if obj is not None:

    prevMode = obj.mode

    try:
        bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode='EDIT', toggle=False)

        bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh( obj.data )

        edgeCount = len(bm.edges)

        for i, e in zip( range(edgeCount), sorted( bm.edges, key=lambda e: e.verts[0].co[2] ) ): #Indexes and sorted edges from bottom to top
            fac = (i+1) / 10
            print(fac)
            ne, nv = bmesh.utils.edge_split( e, e.verts[0], fac)
            print(ne,nv)

    finally:
        bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode=prevMode, toggle=False)


How to remove dark spot from render How would I go about removing these dark spots from the final rendered image? Currently, I use GIMP to remove it but it takes a while. Any ideas why this is happening? I am rendering at 1000 samples.

The result of render is physically OK. If you want to avoid darker parts in the background, then you will have to change your setup of lights. If you do not want to add more global lights, then you can add lights to groups and background material can be influenced only by lights in selected group:

There are probably other possible options how to fix it; e.g.: you can render background in separate render layer and tweak it in compositor


Blender always adds a .blend extension to my image, and can't be opened I saved my project as .png, then as .jpeg but Blender always adds a .blend extension on it. I saved it in its own folder and in my documents.  Regardless Blender opens showing me an empty gray screen. How can I get Blender to show me what I saved?

.png and .jpg (or .jpeg) are formats for 2D images, not for blender projects.

To save the 3D project use Ctl S or File Save or Save As

Doing this you are saving the whole project: 3d models, all of the 3D environment and the work session (cameras, modifiers, meshes, animation, screens, etc). All of that information gets stored using blender's unique format that uses a .blend extension, that can only be opened in blender.

Note that Rendered images will not be saved within the blender file, unless they are saved as external files and packed into the .blendd Unsaved/unpacked images will otherwise be lost for ever once the file is closed.

If you want to export an image using .png or .jpg (or any of the supported image formats) you have to render your scene into an image first.  Use F12, and then save it using F3 (or save as image).

Then you'll be presented with an option for the format you want to save your image in.

A png or jpg file will be just a rendered image, IT WILL NOT CONTAIN THE 3D MODEL, NOR YOUR BLENDER SESSION.

For more info please read:

https://www.blender.org/manual/data_system/files/save.html?highlight=save

and

https://www.blender.org/manual/render/output/display.html?highlight=save%20image


Fire Animation from Particle System Does Not Render My question is about final rendering. After finally finding what I thought to be the correct node set-up to get my particle system-based smoke and fire animation to work properly, my final hurdle is this:

I can see the flames just fine in the preview render, but, alas! It refuses to render out when I hit that magic Animation render button.

Un-checking the "Transparent" box did not solve the issue (and I really would like to have my image frames on a transparent background).

To achieve the effect, I utilized the "Quick smoke" option with a simple circle mesh that emits particles for the fire effect; I just downloaded v2.79b, and am using Cycles Render for this project. Any solutions? Thanks in advance for any insights.

I'm not sure exactly what I did, but I opened a new Blender file and built the fire animation from scratch—using what I think are the same settings as the previous project—and it renders out just fine now.


How to select with an "xray" sort of effect? I would like to press RMB and select not only the vertices/edge/faces on the front side, but the back side as well. I'm convinced this effect must be implemented, but I've been unable to find it or google for the answer.

You can disable Limit Selection to visible in 3D view > Header:


Blender Sculpt Mask bush is not showing the masked area In my Blender sculpt mode the masked area is not showing up (expected it to show up in black). I don't have any modifier at all (screenshot attached). Can anyone suggest me anything please?

In the top right of the 3D view, there is the Show Overlays button with a down arrow next to it. Click the down arrow and make sure that the mask overlay is turned on. That was the issue I had.


How to snap edges to some other edges? Consider the following:

I want to snap the edges of that smaller part to the edges of the bigger part:

Using the snapping tool will let me do this, but will change the shape of the whole part. I could also just move the part into position, yes, but I am hoping for a better solution. I can also use the proportional editing tool to move the whole part by moving a single vertex, however then the snapping tool does not work.

Is there perhaps a way to move the whole part when only moving one edge/vertex, and still be able to snap to other edges, or some other way to do this?

Thanks.

I figured out a way to do it (Not sure if it's the best way).

Having all of the faces of the part selected,

but making sure the snap tool is set to vertex snap mode (NOT face snap):

and pressing G and moving the part to the appropriate position, will work:


One-material Gradient between two objects? (Object Node/Manifold complications) TL;DR AT BOTTOM
(To preface, I know I made a similar question in the past, though this one is much different in required execution.)
Hey all, I found myself in quite a bind this time as I'm attempting to have a seamless gradient between two separate objects.
The main idea is to get the fur pictured here to have a consistent gradient effect with the torso:

Though either I can't achieve the effect I want through a single material or end up with manifold problems when merging the objects in an attempt to unionize the gradient effect.
Below is what happens when I merge the fur and the torso together (Its worth noting that both the "top" fur and "bottom" fur are separate objects from one another)

It seems that trying to merge at all is not going to work since recalculating normals of any manner yields no results, and there is no chance at all I'm deleting any part of my meshes, which also eliminates the need for trying to boolean. (I tried too)
That leaves a gradient that I can't seem to use as seamlessly as I thought.
The goal is to have a non-disjointed gradient along the entire torso. Below is an example of how the gradient begins darker in two different areas on the Torso.

For reference, the entire torso region would share one gradient, and the entire leg region would have it's own as well.

My current node setup would be fine if it weren't for the fur being disjointed of course, so I hope at this point to use the object node in some fashion to refer to origin points as where 'new' gradient stretches begin.
I saw this video -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmUfNw6luWI
which I thought instantly solved my issue though the gradient effect demonstrated is applied overall to an object, not 'linearly' or how one expects a gradient to work.
*I left my gradient setup at the bottom.
***So after ALL that context, I ask now if I can use the Object Info node or another setup to achieve shared gradients and separate gradients based on object's origins? ***
TL;DR: 1. Need a seamless gradient between a torso and "arm-piece".
2. Legs must have separate gradient at the same time.
3. Must all be in one material.
Object Node might lead to what I need after watching -> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmUfNw6luWI

I found out what I needed not even ten minutes later lol.
What I did was set the origin points in the same places of objects I wanted to have a shared gradient, and where exactly it was set would be the start of a gradient.
Then I used the "Object" output from the Texture Coordinate node instead of "generated" in my setup to actually refer to the aforementioned origin points.

You can't even tell the fur is a different object!


Why do objects move around separately even after parenting? I was following the good ol' doughnut tutorial on Youtube and came across a quick problem.

After assigning Child & Parent connections from the 'Icing' and 'Bun' I found that when grabbing the object, the icing moves around on it's own even though the two are now connected.

Pressing Ctrl+J makes them both one shape, but in this instance I would like to keep the objects separate.

In the tutorial after setting the Child and Parent, he is able to move both around and fixed together. I will attach a link to the video.

https://youtu.be/ZTxBrjN1ugA?t=210

I have attached an image also detailing the problem, any help is appreciated!

Make sure proportional editing (hotkey O) is turned off.


my mesh got spikes and idk how to fix it soo.. im working with blender for the first time with a tutorial, and after i did some sculpturing, my whole mesh started to do this.. i thought it was a visual error from reloading the view or so but after reopening the software i had the same problem.. does someone know a fix to this?

I'm quite new to Blender as well, but my first thought is that you need to recalculate your faces. Have you tried that?


How to get rid of triangulation in STL glass I've imported an STL file from a CAD program the the object in Blender is to be a smooth glass item. Unfortunately, when I render, it comes out very jagged.

After importing, I implemented an Edge Split and Smooth shading. Despite these additions, the object looks like what is attached. Considering that it's basically a modified disk, it should be smooth through the object. Any suggestions on how to rectify this issue? Thank you!

The STL from a cad program is not going to have good topology. Topology is important for smooth shading and even more so for a glass shader.

It is kind of hard to tell from that one picture, but your mesh may have more issues then just bad topology.

A quick and easy way to possibly fix your mesh is to add a Remesh modifier.

That modifier will make a completely new mesh (out of evenly sized quads) that closely matches the shape of the original.


What is the difference between IK and FK in animation on blender I am in the final phase of my project. I want to do animation using model imported from MakeHuman. I remark in the properties of the model there is two mode FK (forward kinematic) (default mode) and IK (inverse Kinematic) to move our model. What is the difference between both modes. I could use easily the FK mode but in the IK mode some lines are added (see figure 2)and when  I try to move it in order to move leg or arms of a person, i get nothing!!

With inverse kinematics (IK) the hands and feet will keep their position when the body is moved. When you switch from FK to IK you need to enable the layers for IK also.

FK and IK have different control bones (custom shapes) for both modes. With IK you control the pose with the large plate shaped widgets at the hands and feet.
The lines you see are pole targets and allow to control the position of the knee or elbow.
IK example

With forward kinematics (FK) each bone from shoulder to wrist needs to be adjusted. This is exactly how bones can be moved right after creation.
FK example

Movement with arms still set to IK but leg to FK
Rigs like Makehuman or MHX allow you to switch from IK to FK separately for the legs and arms. You can even control the influence of the FK/IK controls.

The snap buttons allow copying from the IK position to FK and vice versa.

Here Rigify

MHX


What is a good way to make large stylized caverns/caves? I am working on a game, with a stylized, sort of 'flat' art style. The entire game takes place inside caves. As such I need to make a lot of, well... caves.

I didn't want to just do 'flat' meshs, sense that seems a bit bland.
I tried modeling some rocks, then stretching and rotating them. But that started looking very messy. And taking a very long time.

Any ideas of a good way to make large, interesting looking cavern walls in a timely fashion (Also, can't require too much in the way of texturing.)?

I have looked for any ways to do it online, but was unable to find anything. The lack of direct light makes it harder as well because none of the faces of the model show up really.
Same Model, with and without direct light.

And here is what I was trying that was no looking great.

I was thinking of using rounder rocks (As shown in the comparison image). But as shown, they don't show up well in the lighting.

Edit: Here are some picture of what I mean when I say "Interesting". Hope this helps.

And here is a picture of a 'box out' of one of the caves. (Small brown square is 1x1x1 meters)

A possibility could be to use the cell fracture add-on for Blender.

Basically, the cell fracture tool can destruct an object into multiple ones,  fracturing it into lots of pieces.

My idea: use it on a cube, and make the pieces fairly small. Run the simulation for a few frames, then delete all the chunks you wanted, leaving a nice cavernous interior.  After that, use the Randomize Transform tool to add some more variation.

Once that's finished, all that's left is textures, materials, and lighting!

Good luck. ;-P


Rendering produces a completely transparent image with no objects I have a scene with animated objects. In 3d view and camera view i can see them perfectly with material and textures

but every time i render (F12) i get this result

just a transperent screen
i tried to put the objects into another scene/project but they didn't appear
also it once said there aren't any objects in there...

Start with pycoder's comment (I can't comment because I'm new to Stack Exchange).

Also check the camera's clipping settings. Select the camera, Properties Window > Camera Tab > Lens > Clipping. The values are blender's units and the default is 100 (way too short in many cases).


Viewport is showing faces that should be hidden behind other faces I'm very new to blender, I'm following a tutorial to create a building. The viewport is set to shading, however it's showing the faces that should be out of view. I couldn't find a setting for this, mainly because I don't know what it is called. I tried Googling but I didn't know how to explain it.

How can I hide the faces that shouldn't be visible?
See below:

My viewport:

The viewport in the tutorial:

Version 2.82.7

You probably have blend mode (in material settings) turned to alpha blend. It is used in Eevee for transparency, alpha blend mode tells blender that it will use alpha channel from texture to calculate transparency.

However even without texture with alpha you will see this overlaying faces effect when this setting is chosen.


Emission shader on large object is black in Cycles? Starting with a new scene, I inserted a UV sphere with a 5028' radius (1 mile). In edit mode, I removed the bottom half making it a dome, then flipped the normals inside.

Then I added an emission shader. In cycles, it's just black, no matter how much I turn up the light/emission power. It works OK in Eevee. I also can't get point lights bright enough to hit the dome.

It works fine if the dome is 100', so this has something to do with the scale. I changed camera clipping to 30k feet, and I also set clamping in cycles to 0 for both. I wonder if there is a "light clip" setting somewhere? I also tried using the light falloff node with constant and the maximum strength it would allow.

I'd post a picture, but it's just black....

How do I get an emission shader to work on a giant object and/or from a great distance?

2.82a

UPDATE:

Here is a test file:

There is no scene camera, just the viewport camera with cycles enabled. the camera is position inside the dome.

As for your... uh... missing(?) light

The default world shader, and an example object;

Your file when first opened;

Disconnecting... whatever you were trying to do there;

Adding a default cube;

Decreasing the strength of your dome's emission... significantly;

As for the point light question

I disconnected the emission (which generates light) and replaced it with a diffuse;

Then I added a point light at a minimally affecting strength (for the size of the dome;

Something a little stronger;

And especially stronger;

Conclusion

I honestly have no idea what your goal is, or if I've answered your question properly. Please let me know.


Why is the current scene linked to the Screen view? Let's say I have three scenes, A, B and C. In A and B, I use the Default screen layout because I am modelling something and the Compositor for the render. In C, I only use the Compositor where I combine the results of A and B.

I now used the compositor in scene C for a while and switch to A to adjust something. When I hit Ctrl+Left to switch to the Compositor, I suddenly land in scene C - it was stored with the screen layout.

This is incredibly annoying in larger projects, so: Why does it behave this way and how do I fix it / avoid it?

In 'User Preferences', under 'Interface', check the box next to 'Global Scene' which forces the current scene to be shown in all windows.


"Overload" class execute method I already learned that you can't and don't need to overload in Python, but I didn't know how to call it otherwise.

(all pseudo code)

I have a button:

myBox = layout.box()
myBox.operator(my_Button.bl_idname, text = "Move it")

And want to add a non-obligatory parameter to the execute method:

class my_Button(bpy.types.Operator):
   bl_idname = "object.my_button"
   def execute(self, context, calledByButton=True):

So I can call the method by using the button, or somewhere in the script:

bpy.ops.object.my_button(False)

But I get an error on registering it (strangly for the next class)

  ValueError: expected Operator, my_NextButton class "execute" function to
  have 2 args , found 3

How would I do that correctly?

You do this correctly like this:

import bpy

class MyButton(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "object.my_button"
    bl_label = "My Button"
    flag = bpy.props.BoolProperty(default=True)

    def execute(self, context):
        if self.flag:
            print('Called by button')
        else:
            print('Not called by button')

 bpy.utils.register_class(MyButton)

 #usage:
 myBox.operator("object.my_button").flag = True
 bpy.ops.object.my_button(flag=False)


Where did the tool bar go in object mode? Blender 2.8 I am adding a torus and in previous versions of Blender, when you added the torus, there was a tool bar on the left hand side where you could add or subtract segments.

I have moved to Blender 2.8 and I can no longer find this tool bar.

Probably this is what you are looking for

Every time you create an object you will see it.

Good Luck.


How can i rip a circle open and turn it into a straight line? I'm learning Blender so i can use it to do math animation videos, I've been trying to turn a circle into a line so i can measure the circumstance for a long time, and it didn't work sadly :(

One way to do it is to animate the Bevel Factor of a bezier curve that consists of the circle and the flattened line extending at one end.

You start with a bezier circle and turn off Cyclic in the properties panel.

In edit mode, rotate the handles by 45 degrees so that the circle shape is restored. One end of the arc is extruded to the bottom (with its handles rotated horizontally), the other end gets extruded along a line with the length of the circle's circumfence.

Add another curve – either a NURBS or bezier – to act as a Bevel Object. In the example I used a NURBS path with 0.05 length. In the properties of the “circle” select the new curve as bevel object and set the bevel factor mapping to Spline

Add a driver to both Start and End of the bevel factor by right clicking on it and selecting Add Driver > Manually Create Later (Single)

In the F-Curve editor (Graph Editor panel > Drivers mode > Drivers tab) set the drivers variable to the X Location of the circle.

The scripted expression for the Start should be var / (2*pi) / 2 (as the driver should run from $0$ to $0.5$ as the circle moves from $0$ to $2\pi$. The End expression is var / (2*pi) / 2 + .5 (running from $0.5$ to $1$).

Finally, you can animate the X location of the circle.

Another approach could be to animate the control points individually. If you go that route, you might want to look into an addon called Animation Nodes. A similar animation using a 3D rope unwinding has been explained in this answer by Omar Ahmad.


Make The Camera Focus On A Rotating Cube On A Path In A Loop Animation How Do I Make The Camera Focus On A Rotating Cube On A Path In A Loop Animation ?

With Camera Constraints, The Camera Fails To Focus On the cube & Gets Lost As It Moves Along The Path. With Camera Parented to the cube, I Can make the camera focus on the cube but I can't rotate the cube (When I rotate the cube, the background rotates but not the cube!

The Basic Idea is to have an animation where the cube rotates & moves along a path while the environment in the background changes through out the Loop Animation.

I hope the question is not too large!
Thank you!

Blend File : https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KNZ9XNxvlqjS3VRpWC1GGCEz0kr6M6FI/view?usp=sharing

Never animate any object without a controler.

In your case I would give a hierarchy that goes this way : A locator called MainCtrl => A locator called RotCtrl=> The Cube.
MainCtrl would be the one constrained to the path and RotCtrl the one that would rotate the cube. The Cam could be the child of the MainCtrl.
Then the camera could also have a Target (made with another locator) so that you could control how it looks to your cube during animation...

Whatever, NEVER animate directly your mesh, always use a control (rig) so you'll be able to change any geometry afterward without loosing animation


Creating renders from Image Stacking using different sampling levels I read through the conversation on this question: Is there a way to render a single frame using network rendering in cycles. I tried the image stacking method that was suggested and got pretty good results. I rendered my image five times, each with 150 samples and a different sampling seed. I then rendered the same image with 750 samples to compare. (In case you're curious, the 150*5 stack had slightly more noise than the straight 750 image, so you are sacrificing some quality by splitting up the work in this way)

Then I wondered how much of a quality increase I could get if I added the 750 image to the stack, which brings me to my question. How can I reduce noise by image stacking if the images don't have the same number of samples?

So my first five layers have opacity 100%, 50%, 33%, 25%, 20%, respectively. These are the layers with 150 samples. If I wanted to add my 750 sample image to the top of the stack, what would be its opacity?

Short answer:

My guess is that it should be 50%. The combined samples of the images above it is ~750, which is the same as the number of samples in the rendered image. Since the rendered image and the combined images are more or less equivalent, They should be combined with a 50/50 mix.

Long answer:

Each image's opacity is based on how many samples it has compared to the image above it.

E.g. if you render 5 images with 10 samples each, the second image should be mixed with the first with a factor of .5 (or an alpha of 50%). This will effectively result in a 20 sample image (as you pointed out, it's not quite the same as 20 rendered samples, but it's reasonably close), so the second image should be mixed with a factor of .33 (alpha of 33%) and so on.

Since the resulting combined image is basically a 750 sample render, it's the same number of samples as your 750 sample render. You can just tack it on top with a transparency of 50%.


How can I speed up multiple object joining (Python)? Context:
I am working on a tree generation script and I am pretty happy with how it turned out, but I encountered an issue when adding leaves to my tree. The leaves themselves have no modifiers and for for the sake of this question could be replaced with the default cube(their vertice number does not exceed 30).
The Problem:
Initially I thought that the coping and placing the leaves to their respective branches on the tree took the longest to complete, but after I ran some tests it turns out that actually joining the leaves to the tree is what took the longest. (Almost 3 or 4 times more than copying and moving them around)
I used the below function to join my leaves to the tree:
def JoinTreeObjectsWithTree(tree):
    global treeObjects
    #join leaf with Trunk
    tree.select_set(True)
    bpy.context.view_layer.objects.active = tree
    for treeObject in treeObjects:
        treeObject.select_set(True)

    bpy.ops.object.join()
    bpy.ops.object.select_all(action='DESELECT')
    treeObjects = []

The tree objects array is the actual array where the leaves reside and the tree is well the main body of the tree as an object.
Is there a way to speed this up?

I've been using this, which has featured on stack before.
def merge_objects(name, ob_list):
    ctx = context.copy()
    ob_list[0].name = name
    ctx["active_object"] = ob_list[0]
    ctx["selected_editable_objects"] = ob_list
    bpy.ops.object.join(ctx)
    return data.objects[name]

Naming is optional, but requires the tree as the first object in the list to keep its name.
def JoinTreeObjectsWithTree(tree, treeObjects):
    name = tree.name
    treeObjects.insert(0, tree)
    ctx = context.copy()
    ctx["active_object"] = treeObjects[0]
    ctx["selected_editable_objects"] = treeObjects
    bpy.ops.object.join(ctx)
    return data.objects[name]

finalOb = JoinTreeObjectsWithTree(tree, treeObjects)


Cycles render on combination of AMD & Nvidia GPUs in one system System Spec:

Intel i5-3470
AMD R9 290
Nvidia GTX 460

Blender 2.76 (and tested on 2.77 RC2) does not support smoke & fire rendering on AMD GPU. Rendering the animation on my CPU takes too much time.

My proposed solution is to install an existing Nvidia GTX 460, then hack both GPUs with Hybrid Physx.

Does anyone tried this method or would it work?
What are your feedback and suggestions?

I am not be able to upgrade my PC in the near future.

Blend file: 2.7x Cycles benchmark (Updated BMW)

Forum post

Testing Methodology:

Load up the .blend file.
Set the "Compute Device" to "OpenCL".
Render twice on AMD R9 290. Record the lowest value.
Set the "Compute Device" to "CUDA".
Render twice on NVidia GTX 460. Record the lowest value.

Results:

AMD R9 290 (OpenCL): 1:43:57
NVidia GTX 460 (CUDA): 3:33:95

Blender cannot use both OpenCL and CUDA simultaneously.


Render a wireframe with equal thickness in Cycles? Is there a way to make a render with freestyle in cycles and use it as a wireframe?

No matter what technique I use, blender always gives me a stretched wireframe. And by that I mean the wireframe is not equal because the thickness of the wires depends on the scaling of the polygons (if you use the image editor for example).

Is there a way to make a render with equal wires like freestyle in the blender internal render engine does?

Update

As of this commit (will be in 2.72), freestyle is now natively supported in cycles.

This means that you can set up the freestyle lines how you would in BI, then render them straight in cycles:

Select your object and enter edit mode (Tab)
Mark everything as a freestyle edge by selecting everything (A) and pressing CtrlE> Mark Freestyle edge:

Enable Freestyle in Properties editor > Render settings:

Enable Edge marks in Properties editor > Render layers:

Render.

Original answer:

You can use two scenes, one which will render the lines in freestyle, and one which will render the scene in cycles.

Create a linked copy of the new scene by pressing the + icon in the info header and selecting Link Objects:

This way moving objects around in one scene will update them in the other scene too.
Enable freestyle in Render settings > Freestyle, and adjust the line thickness as desired.
For each object, enter edit mode (Tab), select all (A), and press CtrlE>Mark Freestyle Edge:

Disable everything except Freestyle in Properties > Render layers > Layer:

In the compositor (be aware that nodes added to the compositor are scene-specific), add a new renderlayer node and set the scene to your BI scene:

Combine with an alpha over node:

When you render, both scenes will be automatically rendered and combined.

Example .blend


How do I mirror the faces of a cube (edit all of them when I edit one)? I'm trying to create a design for a retro-futuristic computer and I need the faces of a cube to look the same and see the results as I edit them, to see how the edges of the cube interact. Furthermore, if I want to one day be a professional at Blender, it will be a good skill to have. How do I do this? Thank you for any help. :)

Use one or more mirror modifiers with a mirror object.
Use the array modifier with an object offset.
Use duplifaces displaying another object.

The third option suits your problem best, here is a step by step solution.

Add a plane ad duplicate it Shift + D.

Make sure both planes point to the same mesh datablock. If necessary, set the duplicated datablock to the same mesh. The mesh
datablock in the object properties panel should display a 2 at the
end.

Editing one plane now affects both, because they point to the same datablock.

Parent a plane to the cube Ctrl + P, both should have the same location.

Set the duplication property of the cube to Faces (in the object properties panel).

Editing one of the planes will now affects all faces of the cube. The plane parented to the cube will not be rendered. I duplicated the plane to make the edits to it easier, since the other plane is hidden in the cube.


Extra Objects in Object Mode I have a mesh, which in edit mode looks as follows

But when I go to object mode, it becomes this

Could someone help me with this? Here's the .blend file

Your object has Shape Keys (Properties / Data / Shape Keys). One of them, "mouth_U" has a value of 1.00, which mean it is fully "active". Set it's value to 0.00 to resolve your problem.

I guess you've used as a base, a mesh with an armature and a complete facial rig. It's probably safer to remove all Shape Keys and Vertex Groups, before running into other problems.


Missing Mesh. How to recover? Suppose to be there is a dress shirt/vest there that serves as the body but it went missing after I saved, closed, and when I reopen its not there anymore. The mesh names and elements is still there as you can see on the side panel its named "VEST" but the mesh itself is what's missing. I tried UV Map and it has. I don't know what's happeneing. Can anyone help me? Thank you so much

check if it's not hidden.

check if it's in the same scene.

check your blender file to see if it's there.

if the object is not there but the mesh data is, try this:
make a cube and change the mesh to your mesh:


Tau weapon. Can't get a proper circle on the weapon I'm trying to obtain a perfect circular shape. On the right I'm just adding 2 edges around the middle, but it gives me an imperfectly circular shape, where I am trying to obtain a result equal to the one on the left. It is perfectly rounded but that will change when I do the same thing, as I did on the right.

Any ideas on how to fix this issue?

Two methods. Method 1 is to make the two elements comprising the weapon as separate meshes neither of which affects the other.  Method 2 is to create Tse circular mesh, and choose two points on the circumference from which to extrude the horizontal element.


How can I put a custom property into my pie menu? I'm playing around with pie menus in blender. I used the default pie menu template and customized it to suit. But now I have four custom properties on a model and I want to edit them with the pie menu. I followed along one of Sebastians Konig's tutorials but he only used very basic tools like smooth shading etc. He simply right clicked > edit source, but doing that on my custom shaders takes me to this:

row.prop(rna_item, '["%s"]' % escape_identifier(key), text="")

And doing that to any of my custom properties leads me to the same place. How can I access the custom properties and put them into my pie menu?

Here is my code:

import bpy
from bpy.types import Menu

# spawn an edit mode selection pie (run while object is in edit mode to get a valid output)

class VIEW3D_PIE_template(Menu):
    # label is displayed at the center of the pie menu.
    bl_label = "Macbook Controller"
    bl_idname = "Object Mode.mc_pie_menu"

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout

        pie = layout.menu_pie()
        # operator_enum will just spread all available options
        # for the type enum of the operator on the pie
        pie.prop(context.object.data, '["00_iSight Camera Indicator"]', text="iSight Camera Indicator Toggle")

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_class(VIEW3D_PIE_template)

    wm = bpy.context.window_manager
    km = wm.keyconfigs.addon.keymaps.new(name = "Object Mode")
    kmi = km.keymap_items.new("wm.call_menu_pie", "E", "PRESS").properties.name = "Object Mode.mc_pie_menu"

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_class(VIEW3D_PIE_template)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

    #bpy.ops.wm.call_menu_pie(name="VIEW3D_PIE_template")

It appears you are right clicking view source in the custom property in the UI.  Copy data_path will give you the path,  eg. ["prop"] where the property name is prop.  In the material properties panel the rna_item will be the active material, in the object, the context.object, in the data context.object.data, in the scene context.scene etc.

The code you are seeing is setup to handle the different object types that can have a custom property.  escape_identifier most likely handles garbage property names.

The pie menu template.  A custom property "prop" has been added to the scene.  The 'rna_item' equates to context.scene, the key to "prop":

class VIEW3D_PIE_template(Menu):
    # label is displayed at the center of the pie menu.
    bl_label = "Select Mode"

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout

        pie = layout.menu_pie()
        pie.prop(context.scene, '["prop"]')
        # operator_enum will just spread all available options
        # for the type enum of the operator on the pie
        pie.operator_enum("mesh.select_mode", "type")


Depth map obtained from orthographic camera has no white pixels even when there is no object before the far clipping plane I'd like to generate a height map from my scene that goes from -50m to +50m (the idea is to use that height map to flatten out ocean waves as they get nearer to the shore, and possibly more advanced effects later).

My problem is that my height map values are not in the expected range. I get near-black, but no white, even in parts where there is nothing in front of the camera (actually, this only happens in the center of the depth image, where the near clipping plane "cuts off" the top of the terrain; that terrain actually has a square base that is somewhat higher up than -50m - see the attached screenshot - so I do not expect white pixels anywhere except in the clipped-off area).

The camera is orthographic, looking straight down from a height of 51m, with the near clipping plane at 1m and the far clipping plane at 101m. I was expecting this to cover the range from +50m to -50m I mentioned above.

In the compositor, I use the Depth output of the Render Layers node, which I plug into a Map range that maps the range 1..101 to 0..1. And that's my output.

But like I said, there is no white on it. The brightest pixel that I get is a CECECE.

Can someone tell me what I'm doing wrong?

In order to save a render as image, the scene linear values have to be transformed into the chosen display color space. This is what the Display Device and View Transform settings are for in the Color Management panel. However depth information are non-color data that shouldn't be transformed (except for mapping to the value range the image format can store). Therefore you either need to save the image as OpenEXR, which will store the scene linear values or you can choose another format, but then you will have to set the View Transform to Raw. You can find more information about the color management settings in Blender's manual.

Since you don't want to store the actual depth values, but rather normalized values in the range $\left[0,1\right]$ (or $\left[0,255\right]$) you will have to normalize the depth pass. Switch to the compositor and enable Use nodes. Add a Normalize node (Add > Vector > Normalize) and connect the Depth socket with its input Value socket. Connect the output Value socket to the Image socket of the Composite node.

With these settings you should get the expected values in your saved image.


Visible seams after using Subdivision Surface I'm new to Blender and just modeled my first object, a vial.
Now after applying Subdivision Surface I've got this ugly seams and I have no idea why.
Is it a problem of my mesh or what can I do about it?

I downloaded the file and found the issue. You had extruded faces but not moved them after that, and then having tiny redundant geometry and holes that messed with the subdivision surface modifier.

What I did to fix the problem was to select everything, press W and select "Remove Doubles", which should fix your issue.


Morphing from text to shape I am trying to morph text into shape. Is there a convenient way to do this in Blender? For example, how would I morph the text "CH3" into a sphere? Please help if you know how to do this. Thank you!

Can use shrinkwrap modifier and some transparency animation to do that:

We can keep the text as it is: just give it a little extrusion (text property panel), and convert it to mesh (menu "object/convert to") as we'll need a vertex group.
Then add a support sphere that is around the text. This sphere will not be rendered and is just here to be projected on.
Add a vertex group to the text and add it this modifiers:

Vertex weight proximity onto the geometry of the support sphere and using the vertex group. We'll animate "global influence" parameter from 0 to 1, so that the text vertex group progressively go to 1.
Subdivsion surface which helps to get rid of artifacts
Shrinkwrap to the support sphere, using the same vertex group and with the parameter shown above

The text shader is directly a color to get rid of normal issues (see blend file).
Now use a second sphere, which will be visible at the end, as its alpha/transparency is animated.
This sphere is itself projected on the text using another shrinkwrap modifier, with the following parameters:

This sphere is fully shaded (see blend file) and adds the color transition.


Animated Deep Zoom-in. (Drone style) New guy here,
My question is of a workflow nature. I am trying to animate a "fly-in" zoom shot (similar to the shot in Sintel) that zooms in from the air over a landscape ultimately down to a close up of the character's face, much like a shot from a drone.
 Would a good workflow be to do it in several .blends getting more detail in each one progressively while deleting more and more geometry as well, or, to try and do it in one .blend file?

To reduce the render time of a large scale scene like that there is a nice new option for object camera culling (Cycles only).

It will remove the visibility of objects from the scene as they move outside of the camera's view, saving rendering computation. If the object moves back in frame the object comes back. It only does this for rendering. The objects will not actually be removed in your .blend file or 3D viewport.

Switch to the Cycles render engine
In the Properties panel go to the Scene tab.
Check the box for Simplify

Then select an individual object:

Go to the object properties panel
Expand the Cycles Settings section
Check Use Camera Cull

Warning: You will have to deal with problems like having shadows and reflections suddenly disappear from the camera's view, because the culling only detects the actual object in the camera's view; not any of its influence (shadows, reflections, etc) on the rest of the scene. Some of this could be fixed using the "Camera Cull Margin" option near the "Use Camera Cull" option in the scene properties (Image 1). The rest will have to be fixed by just being selective about which object you check the cull option on.


How to straighten out multiple selected edges to one axis? I was just wondering if there was a way to get all selected edges completely straight. For example how to get something like this

so that the edges circled in red are all completely straight along the X axis, like all the edges turn into one straight line.

Thanks

I missed the last vertex but anyway.

Just select all the vertices and then hit S to scale then tap the direction you want to scale. In my case Y. Then tap  0 on the number pad.


Using Plane as Object transform "final" output I have simple scene with wiggle falloff of some cubes.
I would like them to move, but i'd like to place this cube "matrix" on the plane, and have movement taking into account bending of this plane. It can be spline, but i use plane to better visualize effect i want to achive

If you want the grid of cubes to follow the angle of the faces of the plane, you can use the plane itself to define the grid locations and angles.

In this example, I created a plane, subdivided it into 32 polygons (4x8), then applied the Simple Deform modifier to the plane to create a curve.

In Animation Nodes, you can use the Object Mesh Data node to get the locations of the polygons making up the plane, as well as the normal angles of their faces.

Then, just instance the cubes at the locations of the polygon centers, and apply the angle of rotation using the face normal.

I also used the normal angle to constrain the wiggle, so the cube moves perpendicular to the face of the curve.

I created this in Blender 2.79 / AN 2.0.4, but equivalent nodes are available in later versions of AN and Blender as well.


convert sverchok script node to script node lite After updating blender I cant use a script node (SN) from someone else that I was using before. Now sverchok has script node lite (SNL). I dont know what I need to change for it to work, and cant find documentation on the changes either. (at the time of writing there's no documentation on the existence of SNL, just SN)
Can anyone point me to information about this?
[edit]
Somewhat related questions:
Is there a way to use Sverchok's ScriptNode without defining in_sockets? (links to SNL doc in a github issue)
Custom NodeTree and NodeCustomGroup and bpy.ops.node.tree_path_parent()
Has anyone started a project similar to Grasshopper (Rhino) for blender?
How do I build an object using Python and predetermined coordinates?
Can custom nodes be written for the compositor?

I found conversions other users have performed, and diffed the two versions to check the changes they made. They only seem to change the syntax of the input/output in such a way that sv_main is no longer used:

every item in the lists in_sockets and out_sockets is now defined at the start inside bracketed (""") comments with the commands in and out
after the in / out command the variable name is given, followed by the variable type
the in variables also get a d default value, which was in sv_main before, and an n value of 1 or 2
if the default value is [] then n=1 otherwise n=2 (I dont know the meaning of this)
all code in sv_main is just executed at the end of the script and the def and return lines are just deleted

For instance
in_sockets = [
    ['s', 'maximum branches', npoints],
    ['s', 'branch length', dist],
    ['s', 'minimum distance', min_dist],
    ['s', 'maximum distance', max_dist],
    ['s', 'tip radius', tip_radius],
    ['v', 'tropism', trop],
    ['v', 'End Vertices',  verts_in],
    ['v', 'Start Vertices', verts_start]
]

def sv_main(npoints=100 , dist=0.05, min_dist=0.05, max_dist=2.0, tip_radius=0.01, trop=[], verts_in=[], verts_start=[]):
    out_sockets = [
        ['v', 'Vertices', [verts_out]],
        ['s', 'Edges', [edges_out]],
        ['s', 'Branch radii', [rad_out]],
        ['s', 'Ends mask', [ends_out]],
        ['m', 'Leaf matrices', mats_out],
    ]
    #some code
return in_sockets, out_sockets

Is converted to
"""
in npoints s d=100 n=2
in dist s d=0.05 n=2
in min_dist s d=0.05 n=2
in max_dist s d=2.0 n=2
in tip_radius s d=0.01 n=2
in tropism v d=[] n=1
in verts_in v d=[] n=1
in verts_start v d=[] n=1
out verts_out v
out edges_out s
out rad_out s
out ends_out s
out leaf_mats m
"""
#some code

I took these code snippets from a sverchok script by elfnor, so thanks to her for the example!


Is it possible to animate textures? How can I animate a texture?

I don't want to animate an object with a texture on it, but instead, animate the texture itself and have the UV move. If the UV moves, the texture will change live. This is what I am going for.

Almost any value in blender can be animated. Most of the values that can't be animated are global to the scene like render resolution that make no sense to animate.

With the cursor over a value press I to add a keyframe or right click  RMB and choose Insert Keyframe, even values in the node editor and colours can be animated.


How can I unsubdivide regions of flat faces with Python? First: I have a very detailed mesh (16M tris) but there are many regions where lots of faces have the same height and angle.

An optimization approach (real time rendering is the goal) is to select a region's face, go to select linked flat faces, and unsubdivide a bunch.

That's all fine but there are hundreds of regions like this and I'd really love to lose about 5M++ tris WITHOUT doing it by hand (mind you this won't be the only mesh).

So... I really not new to programming (but to Python, which shouldn't be a problem.........) and I came up with a VERY simple, brute force algorithm to do it for me, which's pseudo-code looks like this(sorry if I use C-like syntax):

for(int i = 0; i < mesh.faces.count; i++)
{
    List<face> linkedFaces = mesh.faces[i].SelectLinkedFaces(0.02f);
    linkedFaces.UnSubdivide(10);
}

Well... OBVIOUSLY I don't know anything about the blender-python API. I just want to select every single face, execute the "Select linked faces" option with an angle of 0.02 degrees and then un-subdivide all faces selected that way ten times.
Can anyone help me out, even if it's just a guide? Thank you!

Edit Mode bmesh script.

Tested on subdivided and poked cube.

Tags all edges that have a face angle > EPS
Gets all triangular faces made up of only edges not tagged and joins them. (To Quad)
Feeds all verts that have no linked edges tagged into bmesh unsubdivide operator.

Can edit properties of both to quads, eg max face angle, and iterations for unsubdivide

Test script, run in edit mode. Needs no selection.

import bmesh
import bpy
from math import radians

EPS = 1e-5 # edge angle
ITER = 10 # unsubdiv iters
AST = radians(40)
AFT = radians(40)

me = bpy.context.object.data
bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(me)

for e in bm.edges:
    if len(e.link_faces) < 2:
        e.tag = True
    else:
        e.tag = e.calc_face_angle() > EPS

ret = bmesh.ops.join_triangles(
        bm,
        faces=[f for f in bm.faces if all(not e.tag for e in f.edges)],
        angle_face_threshold=AFT,
        angle_shape_threshold=AST,
        )

bmesh.ops.unsubdivide(bm,
        verts=[v for v in bm.verts if not any(e.tag for e in v.link_edges)],
        iterations=ITER,
        )

bmesh.update_edit_mesh(me)

Alternatively Dissolve edges with 0 face angle.

In edge select mode select an edge with no face angle, then select similar by face angle

Hit X

and dissolve edges.

A script

A quick edit mode bmesh script to do this.

import bmesh
import bpy

EPS = 1e-5

me = bpy.context.object.data
bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(me)

bmesh.ops.dissolve_edges(bm,
        edges = [e for e in bm.edges if e.calc_face_angle() < EPS],
        )

bmesh.update_edit_mesh(me)

Not sure how it will go on 5M ++ faces.  Could change slightly to work on selection.

        edges = [e for e in bm.edges if e.calc_face_angle() < EPS and e.select]

This will ofcourse create a number of ngons, that can be grid filled, and fed into the unsubdivided.


How do I get this character to follow its walking path? The character walks in place. There is a path in front of it, but the character does not walk along it. How do I resolve this? I am using version 2.79 currently but will switch as soon as the semester is over. Thanks in advance.

You've confused Object Constraints with Bone Constraints.

If you want your armature to follow a path you need to give your armature a Follow Path constraint. If I check the Properties panel > Object Constraints tab, I don't see any Follow Path. Actually you've assigned a Follow Path to one of your bones, Ankle.L, you will see it if you switch to Pose mode, select this bone and click on the Bone Constraints tab.

So delete the bone's Follow Path constraint and give a Follow Path constraint to your armature. After that press AltG to make your armature stick to the beginning of the path.


Blender BGE slow motion problem first sorry for my bad english.
logic.setTimeScale(0.1) is only slowing the gravity and Animations down,
but not the Actuators, so i can press "w" and im fast as normal.
I tested it with logic bricks and python - same result, not slowing down.
I want a slow motion for the hole game.

How can i fix it? Thanks.

This is probably because you are using the "loc" tab on the actuator (red). You should use the Linear Velocity tab instead (purple).

The loc section works by teleporting the object a certain distance per frame whereas the Linear Velocity tab actually takes time into account.


Mirrored Object Not being Mirrored when i press the mirror modifer nothing happens to my shape im a noob at blender so could someone please help? i've tried all other solutions that related to my post but none of them worked.

The axis of symmetry used by the mirror modifier is the object's origin (orange dot).

If  your object has the origin at the center of the object the mirror modifier's effect will not be visible.

Go into edit mode, displace the geometry on the desired axis to one side of the origin, and the mirror modifier's effect will be noticeable.

Pay attention also to the which axis the modifier is acting on.


video sequence editor- how to render video with reversed picture order? How can I reverse the picture-order (like the rendered video plays from end to beggining) in VSE? is there a quicker way than to render it as individual pictures and renameing them so that the order switches?

Select your strip and on the filter tab select Backwards


Real world scale size? I am working on a project that's a bathroom, it's supposed to fit real world scale, the size of the bathroom should be 2,50х1,5 and the height 2,2. How am I supposed to use these numbers in Blender in order to get the size right?

Start with a cube, enable the measurement overlay so that you can see the dimensions of the object.

Scale the object to the size you need.


wrap mesh around other meshes (like a skin) I have a imported character and its fairly detailed and I am using fluid sims and fluid anomaly happen when body moves,
I have tested the fluid sim on spheres and icos and no problems...

Can someone give me ideas of how I should seal all gaps/holes(blanket the mesh)
I have tried the following,
Using constraint location of character head, adding a sphere in areas that fluid disappears or leaks..
its alot of work but it does the job

I am looking for a simple way to create a skin tight blanket around the entire mesh for the fluid to better simulate. I can do this manually by moving mesh around but its difficult.

Skin Modifier does not work, maybe object is too detailed to skin, it does nothing and appears to freeze blender.. im sure if I leave it for hours it might complete?!

Cheers

Blender does not have automated skinning tools to make a wrapped mesh around other (intersecting/non-manifold/etc..) meshes.

You want to voxelize such meshes, add all the volumes together and turn the volume back to a mesh. You will find this functionality in programs like Zbrush or Houdini.

In Blender there are 2 workarounds:

use metaballs as dupliverts for the mesh vertices. This will create an inflated representation of the mesh (based on the metaball size) that is a single water-tight surface (if the metaballs are big enough so there are no holes). The denser the geometry, the smaller the metaballs can be and the smaller the inflation. Convert metaballs to mesh and then you can shrink the mesh to maintain the original volume. However this results in the surface being smoothed.
use CubeSurfer addon - similar functionality as metaballs. Since metaballs were optimized performance-wise, this is in most cases slower to compute.

There is also the possibility to manually retopologize all the meshes together. A shrinkwrap modifier can help with wrapping this created skin mesh around surfaces.

You can also edit all the pieces to be water-tight and manifold and then use Blender's booleans to unify them together.


glass shader not working with normal map in cycles 1.-I am making some low poly objects with normal maps in cycles. All of them are working correctly but when I plug a normal map in a object with a glass shader it becomes opaque with some reflections on the surface.
Is there an additional step to make normal maps work with a glass shader?

2.-I discover something weird. The fact is that I am using a tangent space normal map(purple map), but if I change the setting in the normal node from tangent to object space(blue and yellow map) it seems to work fine.

I uploaded a zip folder with the blend file and the normal map here:
https://copy.com/ADi3bvAGpR9o

I SOLVED IT !!! I did another object and again I ran into the same problem. But this time the mesh looked fine from above but completely black from below. I switched from object space to tangent space and after a few hours I decided to play around with the normal map strength and it seems that glass shader doesn´t like normal map values greater than 0.4 and After 0.46 the mesh starts looking completely black.

this values are for my particular project.


how to track rotation? I am in was working on a project to track a boot model to live-action footage however when I try to track the rotation it is not accurate and it wobbles all around the place.
one idea I had to track rotation was to find the different angle of two location tracks and then to use that to then track the rotation.

How would I do this, and is there another way?

So I figured out how to do this for me, instead of tracking rotation with the trackers, I did it manually by creating and x in the 3d world than making it to the boots X then parented it to the boot, this worked for me but was time-consuming

I may also try to color them in the real world as a reference for the 3d object tracker.


"With Automatic Weights" not correctly putting weight in my model's clothing For some reason whenever I press Ctrl+P and choose the option "With Automatic Weights" so I can weight my model's meshes, Blender in some areas only weighs the body (leg bone only moving the leg but not the dress), while in others it weights more than it should (arm bone moves the whole shirt).
What is causing this?

From the images you've provided it shows, that the body and cloths are different meshes. Bones would have to be close to/touching/pertruding cloth meshes to provide correct-ish automatic weights. I don't recommend this approach though, cause it will never give totally satisfactory outcome. To get it done properly you have to join parts of the body (hends, neck, feet) with the cloths. In my opinion though, better solution is to separate cloths and shoes meshes from the model and parent them separately to the same armature as body, then add mask modifier to the body to hide parts of it, that are hidden by the cloth, but can protrude during animation.


Render View Problem on fire rendering So i was following a "How to make a fire" tutorial on youtube and i have a render view problem now.

An when i change to render view it looks like this

How can i fix it?

You can set a transparent material to the domain object (or whatever blocks the light!)


Use skinning and cloth simulation at the same time I created a skinned animation, but I have no idea how to make use physic simulation and skinning for the cloth at the same time. When I use skinning, physics doesn't work, when I use physics, animations make cloth drops.
Here is the link to the blender file

Link

Screenshot :

For the cloth I recommend using the cloth simulation instead of rigging it.

The problem you might have encountered when trying cloth simulation ("cloth drops") is the wrong order in which two modifiers are: For the human body the collision modifier comes before the armature modifier. This is a problem because the movement and also the location of the objects collision isn't affected by the rig.

Here is how to fix it:


Make a tube from a straight line I found this great guide for creating tubes from Bezier curves, but I am working with an imported set of straight lines that came from a shapefile (geographic data format). I would like to render these as 3D pipes, but this guide seems to only work with Bezier curves.  I do not have the option to change the "Bevel Object" on these straight lines.

Is there a similar way to just transform all of my straight lines into 3d tubes? I'm not worried about it looking perfect, I just need to see a 3d approximation of them.

You can simply convert the straight lines into a curve then give them the bevel you want.

To convert the straight lines :
Press Alt + C (Select Curve).

By this step the straight lines is converted to curve , so you can easily give it the bevel and control it also as a curve.

To give it bevel - When it is a curve - :


How to a create a slate roof tile with rough edges? I'm looking for the best way to achieve a slate roof tile effect in cycles like the attached photo. I'm not looking to create a roof like this just a single panel/tile.
To create the rough edges, I've tried subdividing a plane, selecting the outer faces, and applying a Voronoi texture displacement modifier, but I don't seem to be getting anywhere close!
My attempt so far:

What I'm looking to achieve!

I would solve the problem with microdisplacement.  I think you're in the ballpark.
My model is a cube that I scaled down on the Z axis and gave some loop cuts to.

Then I grabbed the top and bottom outer edge (in edge select mode) and beveled with a couple divisions.

And that's it, slap some adaptive subdivision on there and head to the node editor.  Set your object's material to Displacement and Bump.

In the shader editor, you can use a Vector Math node to multiply the object coordinates by itself a couple of times and then run that output through a Gradient Texture set to Spherical to generate this interesting output.

You can use a Color Ramp here to define the cutoff between the jagged edge and the smooth plane.  For whatever reason I used an Invert node here, but you can just flip the Color Ramp around.

This is the scale input of your Displacement node.  Multiply it by a value that makes sense(0.04?), plug it in, and put all of this aside except for the Displacement node.

Now grab some fresh coordinates and start with a Voronoi texture as you first suspected.  I've used a Mapping node to squish it on the Z axis which I think is more accurate to the reference.  If you plug this into the height input, and plug the Displacement node into the Material Output we get immediate results because we've already set up our scale.

With some adjustment to the Color Ramp from before, the scale of the texture, and the Midlevel of the Displacement node, maybe this is enough for what you need.
The thing to know to actually use this is that since we're using Object Coordinates if you need to scale the object and Apply Scale, you have to go into the shader editor and make an inverse change to the Mapping nodes.  This is kind of an annoyance and a failing on my end because I gave up on making this work with generated coordinates.
For example, if you've scaled this model on the X axis, you also need to decrease the scale of the X axis on the bottom Mapping node.  Here's a view of how our change in the Mapping node is represented in rendered view.  (This does get fiddly and again I apologize.)

You can, of course, go much further than this.
...And I have...
Around here you start getting some good results.

Just kidding, here's the blend file.

This is what this crazy graph looks like set to Bump Only.

And here's a showcase with displacement and RTX ON.

Every instance of the object is slightly different.

Microtexture in the Bump layer.


How can I connect two edge loops with different numbers of vertices? I can't use the F function because the number of vertices in each circle is not same.
The big one has 48 and the small one has 32 vertices.

You have two options, which will both provide similar result here.

Edge > Bridge Edge loops
Face > Fill, Alt+F

As @vklidu pointed out, Face > Fill gives different results in many cases, notably  when some faces are flipped.


game-engine : error totblock : 1. Memory Leak? I've got this error when running the blender game-engine:
Error Totblock: 1

(The scene is running, but very slow, and this message appears a the end)

Apparently, it is due to a memory leak.

I've got a quite big scene probably : it's a game level with 8 rooms, and a total of 1408 verts, 1066 faces, 2132 Tris, and Mem of 1882.78M.
(The size may be due to jpeg that I use in each room)

Is this message the way for Blender to tell me that this scene is too big for it... or has this scene some particular problems in memory management? If it is so, could anyone give me a clue how to search the memory leak?

EDIT:

I've made a test with another blend. This one has a size of 14M only and I still see the error message. Apparently, it's due to objects that I have linked to my current blend. Still don't know what the problem with the particular object linked

Blender uses a memory management system that keeps track of the number of memory allocations it has made. When blender finishes it reports the number of remaining memory allocations. A small number is of little concern but a large number indicates that memory is being allocated and not released, meaning a memory leak.

If you start blender from a terminal (or show the windows console) you will see a similar message as blender quits Error: Not freed memory blocks: xx while blenderplayer gives the more cryptic Error Totblock: xx

This is related to blenders source code and not likely from anything you have done in your game creation. If you do see large numbers it might be worth reporting or talking with a developer on irc to help find a cause.

Personally I think this should be disabled for normal user usage. Only blender developers would have any interest in this information.


Why can't I insert a keyframe into the prop from the operator panel? In this code example, I try to call an operator popup, in which I put a "location" property of the active object, I'd like to right-click to insert or remove keyframes from these properties, but that doesn't seem to work. I wonder if it's a bug, or my problem, It would be really interesting to understand why, and possibly, how I can fix this?
import bpy

class MYPANEL_PT_Panel(bpy.types.Panel):

    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_idname = "MYPANEL_PT_Panel"
    bl_space_type = "VIEW_3D"
    bl_region_type = "UI"
    bl_category = "Test"

    def draw(self, context):

        layout = self.layout
        layout.operator("mypanelop.test", text = "Test")

class MYPANELOP_OT_Test(bpy.types.Operator):
    """ """
    bl_idname = "mypanelop.test"
    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_options = {'INTERNAL'}

    def execute(self,context):
        return{'FINISHED'}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        return context.window_manager.invoke_props_dialog(self,width=300)

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        ob = context.object
        if ob:
            layout.prop(ob,'location')

classes = (MYPANEL_PT_Panel, MYPANELOP_OT_Test)

def register():

    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.register_class(cls)

def unregister():

    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.unregister_class(cls)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

The layout.prop that you're using is not in a Panel, but in the Operator dialog, which serves as an UI to an operation itself, and skips UI events that call for other operators (like the bound key to call 'anim.keyframe_insert', or to invoke another dialog for 'buttons.context_menu' that you mention)..
So if the function of the operator is to also insert a keyframe, you need to do that in the execution call.
import bpy

class MYPANEL_PT_Panel(bpy.types.Panel):

    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_idname = "MYPANEL_PT_Panel"
    bl_space_type = "VIEW_3D"
    bl_region_type = "UI"
    bl_category = "Test"

    def draw(self, context):

        layout = self.layout
        layout.operator("mypanelop.test", text = "Test")

class MYPANELOP_OT_Test(bpy.types.Operator):
    """ """
    bl_idname = "mypanelop.test"
    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_options = {'INTERNAL'}

    def execute(self,context):
        # INSERTING KEYFRAME
        context.object.keyframe_insert(data_path='location')
        return{'FINISHED'}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        return context.window_manager.invoke_props_dialog(self,width=300)

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        ob = context.object
        if ob:
            layout.prop(ob,'location')

classes = (MYPANEL_PT_Panel, MYPANELOP_OT_Test)

def register():

    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.register_class(cls)

def unregister():

    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.unregister_class(cls)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


Blender equivalent to “select similar” in Max I'm 3Ds Max user trying to make a move to Blender. I use "select similar" function in Max a lot when I need to group similar objects/ polygons into a layer or group for viewport management result and usually get a satisfying results in Max, but NOT in Blender using Shift+G or Shift+L to achieve the same intention.  Is there any method I did not know I should learn in Blender to achieve the same result like "select similar" in Max?


My blender game is not rendering properly, some faces not showing and materias don't show up correctly I am new to blender and I am doing a school project with it and run into some issues.
How do I fix this? I have heard about a material mode but I don't know how to enable that

So, you have a model in your game. Some of it's faces seem to have disappeared:

This is probably due to the normals of the model having been scrambled somehow. To check if this is indeed the case, you need to enable the normals display of your faces in edit-mode. To do this, hit N on your keyboard to open up the properties tab on the right of the viewport. Scroll down to 'Mesh Display' and under 'Normals', tick the symbol that displays a face on it:

If you now look at your model, you should see little blue lines stick out of its faces. All lines that are on the outside of the model are attached to faces that have its normals on the outside of the model. This is good. All lines that are on the inside of the model are of course wrong normals. These will display as basically nothing in your game because you are looking at the back of the face.

To fix this, make sure to be in edit-mode and select everything by pressing A until the whole mesh is selected. Then, go to the bottom of your viewport, hit 'Mesh', then 'Normals' and choose 'Recalculate outside'. You can also do this by hitting Ctrl+N:

This handy tool will recalculate your mesh to make every selected face face outwards. You should see all the lines stick outwards now:

Now, of course your last step is to get out of edit-mode and run your game:


Is it possible for light sources in Cycles to have nonphysical falloff like in BI? In BI, we have the traditional OpenGL choices of constant, linear and 1⁄distance2 falloff, along with some parameters to tweak the falloff formula.  This allowed for a variety of artistic styles, and getting even illumination from lamps that couldn't be put far away.

Cycles is more physically realistic.  What about 3D works in which we don't want such great realism?  Is there a way to make all the light paths between two objects, or between one object and all others, obey alternative laws of radiation physics?

Yes. There is a node called Light Falloff
you can plug in to the Emission shader strength.
It has three outputs: quadratic or Linear
or Constant You my even do some math with the ray
length and plug the result in the Light Falloff
node strength and use the Constant output.
The example is only a demonstration nothing useful.


How to copy weights from one bone to another? I was manually weight painting some bones on one side of a character, I then named them properly using ".L" for left side and then I used symmetry to copy them to the right side.

It copied them, along with the constraints, but not the weights. How can I copy them across?

Nevermind, I'm silly.

The way to copy bone weights to other bones is by making a copy of a vertex group that belongs to the bone you wish to mirror. Let's say "Hand.L" and then clicking on the black arrow in the vertex group panel and selecting "Mirror Vertex Group", then change the name to "Hand.R" and if you now move that bone that is "Hand.R" it will deform the mesh just like on the left side.


Joining several splines I try to use points from an import as a spline to make curves as paths to follow for an animation.

These curves share some points at the ends and beginning when I import them via Python.

For example
s1: A-a-b-B
s2: C--D
s3: B-c-C
s4: D-d-E

which in the viewport look like
A-a-b-B-c-C--D-d-E

I want to join them together, so that I'll have one single spline
s5: A-a-b-B-c-C--D-d-E

I could use CtrlJ to join them, but they are still not merged at their shared points, which makes the rest of the spline not used for the following.
If I join them it looks like:
s1: A-a-b-BB-c-CC--DD-d-E

Also, another part of the problem is that the order of the splines from the import is not given, that s1 and s2 may not have shared nodes, and are only connected to each other via others like s3 and s4.

Is there a way to merge them? via commands or scripting

Select the two ends you want to join in editmode and press F. If the shared ends are in the same place, you might want to delete one of them before connecting the curves.


How can I align two faces in edit mode I have two triangular faces that are connected with one edge (one object, in edit mode). I would like to move the second triangle into the plane of the first triangular face. This means that the third not connected point will have to move.

This would be easy if the plane would be x,y or z by using the scale trick, but I would like for it to work in any given plane. How could I do this?

I think the answer is: yes you can.

Select the connecting edge and snap the 3D cursor to it
Set the pivot point to 3D Cursor
The connecting edge still selected, add a custom transformation orientation and keep it as orientation

Now

Select the first triangle (the target)
Use ShiftNumpad 1 or ShiftNumpad 3 to be in orthographic view aligned with this triangle and so that the connecting edge is aligned to the view. This is useful in order to snap as we want later.

To snap:

Enable snapping, set it to vertex, snap with closest, project onto self and enable it for rotation

To rotate:

Select the opposite vertex (the one of the other triangle)
Rotate R, hit Y to rotate around the connecting edge
Set the mouse cursor onto the opposite vertex of the target triangle

To rotate to the opposite:

Rotate R, hit Y, then hit 180 on the numpad


Cloth simulation appears corrupt in render I am having problem with a cycles render.  My cloth simulation for a flag bakes just fine and seems to work.  When I render the image gets fractured (it looks like broken glass instead of cloth).  See attached images.

Someone said to post the blender file.  I can't figure out how to do that.
OK, here is the link to the file:
http://www.pasteall.org/blend/31495

I can't figure out which setting to change in the render settings to get rid of the "z fighting"

This is because the cloth simulation is baked using the viewport settings of the modifier(s) above it.
As the subserf modifier above it has a viewport subdivision level of 1, but a render subdivision level of 2, the vertex locations stored in the cache are nonsensical when rendering.
To fix this, just set the render subserf value to 1:

If you still want to use two subserf levels, you have two options:

Re-bake, with the viewport subdivisions set to 2

Add another subserf modifier below the cloth modifier. These subdivisions won't be taken into account with the simulation, but they will smooth the result out a little bit (though a smooth modifier could probably get you comparable results with a lot less vertices), and you won't have to rebake.


Can You Convert Hair Made From a Mesh Into a Particle System I have been scouring the internet for an answer to this, but I can't seem to find one. I extracted a couple characters from Overwatch, these being: Mcree, Soldier: 76, Torbjörn, and Junkrat. In the cinematics for the game, their hair is a lot more detailed and realistic then it is in the game, for example: This is the cinematic
 and this is the game

What I want to do is make their hair from the game look exactly, if not very, very, very, close to the cinematic, and I really don't want to have to manually shape it. Is there anyway I can possibly convert their hair from the game into a particle system. I would include the Blend file of Junkrat, since he is the one I am currently working on, but I am unsure on how to that.I have seen other people succeed with this task, for example: I would really appreciate any help with this.

P.S. Junkrat seems to be only one with a full head, all the characters head's seem to stop at the hairline. Also the other people who manage to do this seem to use vertex groups, and some with interpolated hair.

I would imagine if you bake maps from the solid hair, you can use those same masks for effects. I haven't done this before but that's where I'd start, especially baking a world position map.


equirectangular rendering for Blender Internal? Can such frames/videos be rendered in Blender Internal as well?
If not, how indirectly?

EDIT: The below solution is great as long as you can write your own Python script and only render solid objects. When you need things like particles/hair, it won't work as those won't be reflected.

First create a sphere and in edit mode select the triangular fans on the poles of the sphere and inset to very small size using I button and delete the triangular fans leaving very small holes on the poles.

Then unwrap the sphere using follow active quads, position and scale the UVs to fit the UV/Image editor window.
Once the sphere is unwrapped add a new texture with video resolution you want (1920x1080)

Then add a material to the sphere, enable Shadeless, Mirror and set Reflectivity to 1

Then scale the sphere to small size and position it where the camera should be and add Subsurf modifier with at least 2 subdivisions to reduce texture distortion.

Once all the steps are finished you can use  the python script to bake the textures for each frame in a sequence.


Array modifier offset variation Is it possible to add variation to the offset between instances of an array?

If you give an array an Object Offset, then whatever transform there is between array-element 0 and the offset-object, will be applied recursively to each subsequent element, in the object-space of the previous element.
So, for example, if the array is in X, and the offset-object is scaled down in X, each element will be smaller than the last, and closer to it, in X. This way, you can achieve geometric progressions in intervals between elements. There are 2 obvious drawbacks.

The elements themselves are scaled down, along with the intervals between them.
Intervals limited to geometric progressions, or, by giving the array a Constant offset, too, a 'Multiply Add' relation between each interval and the next.

You can overcome drawback 1 by making an array of a single vertex, setting its 'Instancing' Object Property to 'Vertices', and parenting the desired array element to the vertex array:

The Empty, 'Array_Xform', is scaled down in its X, so each X interval is .882 times the size of the last. A constant has been added to those intervals by the Constant offset in the array modifier.
To overcome drawback 2, I think you would have to deform the vertex array using another modifier, for example, Displace.
However, in 2.93+, a Geometry Nodes modifier below the Array will give you complete control over the distribution of elements, in all axes, using anything you can express mathematically, or by texture, or proximity of another object, or... well... anything.

Above, that's just a random amount added to each interval of the array. The only nodes out of shot are the Group Input and Output.


Keep divided edge straight when dragging it's end point I don't know how to really describe this so I hope it'll make sense.
What I am trying to find out is how do I make vertices, that are dividing an edge, move with the edge as if it was whole and the vertices weren't even there, by draggin the end vertex of that edge.

To give you a simplified example with just three vertices I made these screenshots:

I know that I could just dissolve the vertex and divide the edge again after the transform, but this is just a simple example and I want to do this for an already detailed mesh. Proportional editing isn't optimal either for this, I tried.

As an another example, I saw someone do this in this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e2EU-alJa-Q&t=3m16s at around 3:16. See how the middle edge loop moves along with the lower edge loop scale as if it weren't there? That's what I am looking for basically.

You may not be able to move other than the active one the way you want by dragging, but you might get closer to what you want to achieve, by using, in addition to the grab tool—G, the rotate tool—R, and the scale tool—S. If I were wanting to do what you want, I'd select all three vertices, with the grab tool, and move the active vertex to where you want it to end up. Then I'd use the rotate tool to adjust the location of the end vertex furthest from the active vertex, so that it is located on a line from the the new location of the active vertex and the location at which you want the furthest vertex to line up. Then, I'd use the scale too to actually set the location of the furthest vertex.

Note that in doing it this way, it is important to select the vertices in the correct order. First select the vertex furthest from the vertex you want to be the active vertex, then select any intermediate vertices, and finally select what you want to be the active vertex.

Also, if precise placement of the intermediate vertices is desired, I sometimes find it useful to count the number of intermediate vertices, delete them, place the two endpoints, create the edge, and then subdivide the edge into the required number of vertices. If there is other geometry incorporating those intermediate vertices, sometimes I don't delete them, but rather merge them into the intermediate vertices of the edge I created and subdivided.


Is Volume distribution for Geometry Nodes available at the moment? If it is, how can I achieve the effect?

well, it is a really easy setup:

grid is this:

the object with the geometry node itself is just a cube, from which you delete all vertices. That's it.
and you will get:


Why does the shape differ when importing an SVG file? Consider:

I have made a sword shape in CorelDraw and exported it in the SVG format. The shape when imported in Blender looks compressed. The original image attached with the Blend file is:

Why is it compressed?

You can get the SVG file from https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwiTD4qoMzsZWmxSMjZFSzVzQWM.

To increase the resolution of the Curve Object see this panel. There's a setting for Preview and Render resolution.

The SVG itself is also stretched in the width, internally it's showing a non-proportional viewbox property. Each coordinate is transformed according to the viewbox ratio.

viewBox="0 0 1 1.41379"

save it again from CorelDraw with proportional dimensions (can't help you with that) or edit the .svg manually (easy). Look for the line with viewBox="0 0 1 1.41379" and change it to viewBox="0 0 1.41379 1.41379", or "0 0 1 1"


Force specific model to be drawn in "texture" mode I am using a 3D model that I mapped a texture onto as a reference image. (I find this workflow easier than using background images.) However, I cannot switch into wireframe mode and see the images at the same time, since the render mode is changed for all objects at once, meaning I will be constantly switching between wireframe and texture modes (with Z and alt+Z) to take a look at the reference image.

Long story short, I want an object to be rendered in texture mode, regardless of the current display mode for other objects. Is there a built-in way of doing that? I'm also open to solutions involving Python scripting.

I often use a workaround: instead of changing the general view mode i leave it as "textured" and change into wireframe the object I'm working on. Hope it helps.


Add object constraint follow path I have an object which is following a path using (Add object constraint). My main animation is fine, but when I want to duplicate the same object with the path animation the object is going astray. The main object animation in the middle which has the cursor to the selected position is fine, but everything else goes odd when I move them around the scene.

Because Follow Path will take into account the location of the object relatively to the world origin, so when you move the curve AND the planet object, the planet object moves twice as it is attached to the curve, and as it changes its location relatively to the world origin.
To fix that, you can either:

Duplicate the curve and planet and only move the curve, the planet will move along, or
Move both, then select each planet and press AltG (to bring back to world origin)


A different kind of mouselook script? Is there a mouselook script that's exactly the same as the classic one except it moves left and right, not up and down. If there isn't one then can you show a property hook script that enables/disables up and down rotation.

The mouse move script allows cutomization. In order to restrict up/down rotation you could add the properties as shown in the image.


Why can't i click on "Draw Curve" in Blender 2.78 i recently installed blender 2.78, and when i tried to use the newly added feature "Draw Curve" i can't, i can't click on it, it appears to be in grey.
Does anyone knows why, and thanks in advanced.

I tried some stuff and it and it seems like it doesn't generate a new object (a curve).

It did work after i added a Bezier curve myself. After adding a curve i just went to the toolshlef and was ready to use it to align the curve with my drawn curve


I just rebuilt the mesh for this character. Smooth shading creates odd eye shadows I just started modeling in blender a few days ago- I did a high res model and realized that it was a bit too high poly- so I re-meshed my character and everything looked great. In flat shading, it looks great, in smooth shading, it kills my soul. I don't really know what to do to fix this.

I think your normals are not facing the same direction as @moonboots said.
You can check them by using two buttons in the viewport overlay panel
The "Face orientations" button and the "face normals" button (at the bottom, see screen)
both of them will allow you to check in which direction your normals are facing.
Don't forget to set an appropriate size when you're using the "face normals" option.
You can also recompute them by going into : (when in edit mode)
Mesh -> Normal -> Recalculate outside


Animate curves by changing spline data using a python script I generated a curve using the following python code

curve = bpy.data.curves.new("Curve", type='CURVE')
polyline = curve.splines.new(type='POLY')
polyline.points.add(n - 1) # The polyline has one point when created
polyline.points.foreach_set('co', data) # data is the array of coordinates

This works perfectly in generating the data I want. And now I want to create an animation for this curve by using pre-calculated data stored in a file.

Thus I am trying to use in a different script the following:

curve= bpy.data.objects["Curve"]
# for i ...
    # get new data
    curve.data.splines.foreach_set("location", data)
    curve.keyframe_insert(data_path="location", frame=i)

I tried different variations of the above segment to find a way to get to the points in the splines but no attributes exist for that.

Any suggestions?

Apparently the answer is simple to this, I had to choose splines[0]

curve = bpy.data.objects["Curve"]
points = cable.data.splines[0].points
# for i ...
    # get new data
    points.foreach_set("co", data)
    for point in points:
        point.keyframe_insert(data_path="co", frame = i)


Attach geometry to other geometry without duplicating it I have this mesh:

I'd like to copy the highlighted vertex group to the other end of the mesh, here:

I've duplicated (shift-D) the selected vertices and moved them to the other side by grabbing, until I got what I wanted:

Anyway, the resulting object is made by 2 different objects which can be separated with separate by loose parts.
How can I attach the object to the final point so that they're only a single object and cannot be separated (one single geometry)?
Thank you

EDIT: the underling vertex geometry to both top and bottom is the same

You hit on the first one which is using separate.

Once you move the separated object into place (you can control this with extreme accuracy if you are using snapping methods for vertices / edges in this particular case), you can use JOIN.

To use the command:

Select the pyramid textured cross.
While holding SHIFT select the extruded cross shape.
Finally CTRL + J will perform the join operation.

To clean up the operation:

TAB To enter into Edit Mode.
A To Select all Vertices.

a. NOTE: CTRL + TAB >> V if your selection mode is NOT set to Vertex.
W >> R to remove redundant vertices.


How can I select edge loops with Magic Mouse on a Mac? I’m on an iMac with a Magic Mouse (no scroll wheel or RMB). I use RMB selection, via ⌘ command LMB. I have enabled Emulate 3 Button Mouse.

I'm trying to figure out how to select edge loops. The usual method is Alt LMB, so for me that would be Alt ⌘ Command LMB, but that does nothing.

I tried adding this preference (and tried all the mouse action types: Any, Press, etc.), but still nothing.

How can I select edge loops with Alt ⌘ Command LMB?

Figured it out! Whoo hoo. Turns out this is what I had to do:

Select an edge (using CommandLMB)
Open the Select menu.
ControlLMB (right-click) "Edge Loops".
Select "Add Shortcut".
Press Alt Command LMB, which Blender interprets as Cmd Middle Mouse.

It seems that Alt LMB emulates the Middle Mouse Button. Not only that, mesh.loop_multi_select was the input I wanted, not mesh.loop_select, as I'd originally thought.

After I added that shortcut, this new input setting appeared in my user preferences:

All is not lost for Magic Mouse users.


Is it possible to move the view with holding spacebar? So right now when I want to move the view I use shift middle mouse button and move. But is it possible to move the view with spacebar and moving the mouse?

In Blender 2.79 (and maybe 2.8, but I haven't seen that) go to File/User Settings, click on the Input tab at the top, and there you have the different areas with their commands and hotkeys.  At the top is a field where "Name" is written - click on that and change it to "key binding" then you can type in the known hotkey in the Search field, (where there's a magnifying glass) to find the command you want, and then you can change it..  I typed "shift" and "middle" and before I typed "mouse button" the command was shown underneath with the hotkeys next to it - you can click on "mouse" and change it to keyboard, then in the field beside it and press on the spacebar

Edit -  I just reread your question and you want it to be Spacebar plus Mouse - so try clicking around and finding out what your options are - that's the place to do it anyway.


3D manipulator to middle of selection How do I set the 3D manipulator to the middle of my selection?
I am new to Blender and have no idea how it is done. In a tutorial I was looking at, it happens automatically when you do the selection, but in my 2.76b it does not.
I found how the center point of the whole object can be set to the middle of geometry but I do not mean that.

You simply need to press , that is a comma. That will change the Pivot Point to Bounding Box Center.

Both Median Point and Bounding Box Center will place the 3D manipulator in the center of your selection.


Making video strip end at its last frame after speed modifier is applied? I have 60 fps video and I want to scale it down to 30 fps:

I add Speed Control strip
Uncheck Stretch to input strip length
Change Speed factor to 2
Now I have a strip, which plays my video at the right 30 fps speed.

Obvious part: strip is 2x longer because video play 2x faster.

Hard part:

Imagine that I have a 120s video (60 fps) imported to the 30 fps project (7200 frames that is) and I'm only interested in 20-30 sec.

Normally I would just set the Trim Duration (hard) - Start to 600 frames, and then Length to 300 frames, but not this time... After applying the speed modifier strip's Length remains 7200 frames, but it really ends somewhere at 3600 frames. So I believe I should set Trim Duration (hard) - Start at 300 frames and Length to 150 frames. I feel like I'm calculating in the dark and I'm not even sure my math is correct.

Any tip / trick would be greatly appreciated.

There's very similar question and the answer which has been accepted but it doesn't really answer the question, but rather explains what's going, which is obvious anyway.

BTW: Blender v2.78

EDIT: added real world example.

In the image above you can see that I have one short video strip (30 fps) at the beginning, and then this 60 fps video strip, which is 36302 frames long.

I've applied Speed factor 2, hence now my video is twice as fast and therefore it ends at frame 18151 (half the length of the original).

36302 / 2 + 265 (of the first video) = 18416 (on the image)

But note, what is Blender showing to me? Original strip remains 36302 frames long, even though half of the frames are just blank!

I can of course adjust strip length manually by moving its right end to where the actual video ends, but that is very counter productive.

My understanding is that you'll have to select the video strip and then either change the "Length" parameter to half its original value, or, as you said, adjust the strip length manually by dragging its right end to where the video stops. Once you do this, the "speed control" effect strip will also automatically match the length of the video strip.