Blender Eevee reflection plane gives warped reflection I want my ground to have a nice reflection, but the reflection plane is acting very strangely (See photo below). What's also weird is that the reflection plane works for most of the scene. When I add the plane I can click around the timeline and it seems like it is work, but when I play the animation through from start to finish the reflection breaks 2/3 through.

I've tried to solve it a few ways, which don't work:Restarting Blender; Downloading latest version of Blender; Deleting plane and creating a new one.

There was a problem with my material. I had an image sequence that was input into a normal map. For some reason a few frames of my image sequence were empty (it looked like a missing image) which would through off my normal map and give a weird reflection.

Specifically the problem came because my image sequence started at frame 31 and went to frame 220. The offset was set to 31 so and it ended up adding frames that I never had.


Floating plastic bag I tried searching everywhere but I can't seem to find any tutorials about how to make a floating transparent-white thin plastic bag that would move a bit as if it was floating in the sea. I found this which I like very much, but I don't know how to do it (and the movement is way too fast and complicated, I need just a simple rotating floating movement)

I want it to look something like this
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xs0Mg0GZ03E&frags=pl%2Cwn

You can achieve this using Soft Body or Cloth physics with gravity disabled or turned right down. I prefer Soft Body since it's more controllable and more suited to this.

Start by creating your bag mesh. It doesn't need to be complicated - just needs to capture the general geometry of the bag :

Now enable Soft Body physics on the bad. You'll need to make some changes to the default settings. Start by disabling the Soft Body Goal since we want it to be free floating. In Soft Body Edges increase Pull since we don't want the back to stretch too much. You might also want to increase Friction in the main Soft Body properties to damp down the motion (as if it's moving in water rather than fluttering in air). To make the bag puff out a bit you can enable Soft Body Self Collision and increase the Ball Size nearer to '1' (this will make the vertices push apart) but also decrease the Stiffness so that they only slightly push apart. Finally, in the Soft Body Field Weights turn the Gravity right down so that the bag 'floats'.

Add some fields - such as Turbulance and Vortex to generate some interesting movement and you should have something like this :

Blend file included


Proper way to remove unused linked Group data-blocks In the outliner i have a local library called "Current File" and a linked library called "//foo.blend". Is this the proper way to remove all unused group-datablock-links from the "//foo.blend"-library?

import bpy

groups = bpy.data.groups
for group in groups:
    if group.library and group.library.filepath == "//foo.blend":
        if group.users == 1 and len(group.users_dupli_group) == 0: # EDIT
            group.user_clear()
            groups.remove(group)  # <- crash warning, don't use this part of the example.

Groups are intentionally not garbage collected, (so they have to be removed manually). Only a few kinds of data-blocks behave this way, Scene's are another example.

As a user, you can select them in the outliner and unlink them, but there is no way to remove single user groups other then to script this as you have done.

For details see the reference manual.


AN: scale a grid in world axis without scaling objects I did a grid of spheres with distribute matrix and add it a rotation.
Next I want to scale the grid in the Z axis of the world (not the height of the grid).
But I don't want to scale de spheres with it.
I show you that what I tried and faild.

As you see the spheres are egg shaped and I want they stay round.

Use Offset Matrix with scale mode Translation Only. This option is available in advanced node settings.


What am I doing incorrectly with the Boolean modifier? *Video attached* I have two objects that are planes and when I attempt to apply the Boolean, the modifier simply does not work.
I have been racking my brain and searching the internet to try and figure out why the Boolean modifier is not working for me.
I have applied rotation, scale, and location.
I also was able to have the modifier work with two simple planes.
Any and all help is welcome, thank you!
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Wo0kxsovobzij0gBlMff8IOa41fKfwHA/view?usp=sharing
Edit
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1F3Z020GwRJ8jEBpgRR_YtysTRJ_KOgFF/view?usp=sharing
Edit*
My scene is very basic, I haven't tweaked any settings. I am attempting to build a cleaning cart. The first photo is a reference image of what I am shooting for. The second photo shows my first draft of the cart and the new one I am working on.

the problem is in the face orientation of your parts. Blue is ok, red is wrong.
Repair the face orientation and it will work.
you can check your (wrong) face orientation by tapping


Transparent Mesh when rendering I am using camera tracking to make a short film and in render viewport you can see what I am trying to add (yes, those are butterflies).
After rendering the scene the butterflies appeared transparent

As you can see in the first image my material is very basic on the butterfly.

Here are my compositing nodes:
They are the default camera tracking nodes... in blender internal.

I am using blender v2.77 on windows 10 with the cycles render engine.

A similar, yet, unanswered question: Why won't objects appear in motion tracking?

You have a foreground and a background render layers. The background layer is setup to multiply shadows over the video layer (that's why the butteflies look like... shadows). The foreground is set up as alpha over and it should be the one that combines your scene color information over the background using an alpha channel. The issue is that your foreground layer is empty! You are rendering the contents of an empty layer and using the only layer that contains information as a mask!

Instead of an empty layer, use the layer that contains your scene.


Group Node Socket Type in this tutorial about a Specular Workflow at about 14:10 min a Reflection Node Group is shown. You can see a socket named Specular and you can see that yo can change the value of this socket

Looking at the Node Group in detail you can see that the Specular socket of the Group Input node is connected to the Color1 socket of the Mix node. Clearly the Specular socket is a color field.

Question I don't understand how it is possible that while the Specular socket is a color socket it is possible to enter values in the Specular socket. If I create this node group this is my Reflection Node Group. In my Specular socket you can only enter a color and not a number.How can I change the Specular socket from a color socket to a "value" socket ?

I now understand that you can create a value socket in the Group Input node. This can be done in two different ways:

1) create a Value node and connect it to a Group input socket. Then you can reconnect that Group Input socket (with color grey) to a Color socket in your node group

2) you can duplicate an existing Group Input socket (value socket), rename it and connect this value socket to a color socket in your node group


Model does not move after I put a rig I recently put my first rig to a model with rigify, the problem is that when I go to pose mode some parts of the model do not move as you can see:

Any help?

Thanks

You need to add weight painting to this part of the mesh as well. First click on the mesh (model) then keep holding the shift button and click on the rig then hit ctrl+P then select parent with Automatic weighting, this should fix this.


Material emitting one way for interior scene? I'm doing an interior scene seen from the outside through a big wall of glass. It's just after sunset, so there is still some light from the HDRI image. I want the light to flow to the outside.

I don't know how many solutions that I have tested with emitting materials. If I use a plane that are located close to the celing I get too much light upwards and to solve that I use another plane between the emitting material and the celing to stop the light. Both planes are invisible for the camera and casting no shadow, but still I get a dark och almost black celing. I guess it's because I stop the light from reaching the cealing. If I lower the emitting plane, I get shadows from the side of the plane. Nothing looks nice! :(

I have made some spotlights in the celing and given them some emitting light, but not to much, because if there are too much light, they look unreal. I have six spotlights and if I increase the value to light to interior, I get a lot of strange noise on the walls.

I have also used spheres and I have to use a plane above the sphere also to stop the light.

Any other solutions or tricks to light up an interior scene? Help is preciated? Most tutorials about interior lightning is about daylight.

If I got your question right you can achieve it using a Backfacing output of a Geometry node.

Set the nodes as pictured below. Use Backfacing as a factor for mixing between Emission and Transparent nodes.

To make each side emit different light values and colors set the nodes in similar way.


How to blend(gradient effect) two different 3D materials, in cycles blender How to create a gradient texture from two different 3D materials, for example this post:

(How to create a gradient texture from one material to another (opaque to clear)?)
 shows how to do this exactly but WITHOUT a 3D texture, my question is how to do this with a 3D texture, where each of the two textures has a different normal map, how would you combine them using a gradient(or fade or merging effect) of two different 3D textures, is this even possible?

I ask this because I'm trying to make a beach using two different textures with each there own different bump map and normal map, here is an example of what i have thus far:

Final result:

Overview:

You can use Gradient Texture as a mask for your textures.

Prepare you textures as usual with needed normals/bumps and mix them trough Gradient Texture or which ever you need.

Edit:

If you are using Image Textures don't forget you need proper Texture Coordinates no matter if they are form UV mapping or using Generated/Object texture space.

Blend file:


How to do a Hockney style with Blender? How can I do a Hockney style with Blender like ones in the video below ?

example on youtube

This is an example of the Hockney Style I'm looking to create:

Summary
This is easily done with the camera or window texture coordinate in cycles, but you could also easily do it with uv project instead.
Final result:

1. Modeling
Modeling this is obviously very straightforward. Add a plane, then go into edit mode and add a bunch more! Vary the heights of the planes so that they occlude each other, and spread them out in a visually pleasing manner. This shouldn't take more than 2-3 minutes to finish.
In the GIF, after I finish this modeling (which I skipped most of to save time), I unwrap it using "project from view" while in an overhead view. Depending on the image you are projecting onto, you may need to scale it to make it more square in the UV/Image Editor.

2. Material Setup
The material setup is likewise simple. Add an image texture node that uses a UV map node to provide the color input of a diffuse shader.
UVMap --> Image Texture --> Diffuse --> Material Output

3. Lighting
a. Setup sun lamp
Add a sun lamp and rotate it to get the nice shadows you would expect. In the GIF, I also change the world color to something close to white for increased ambient light (this is more personal preference).

b. Setup backdrop for those shadows
Add a plane behind the model that can receive the shadows from the planes that are in the model.


Rendering and compositing shadows only with Cycles I need a Cycles render of only shadows cast by objects.

The compositor node setup shown in the screenshot works with a simple test scene in which light is provided by the World Background and the render layer delivers a shadow pass. The result is acceptable in the test- but in a scene with a lot of mesh geometry, the same setup delivers a completely black image. Is this caused by some limitation of computing capacity- can there be too much geometry in a scene, or can lighting be too complicated, for Cycles to deliver a separate shadow pass?

Select the object you want to use for shadow data, go to the Object Settings tab, scroll down and enable the Shadow Catcher. Then, if you want it to overlay it on another scene, make a second Render Layer and select the scenes you want to use by pressing shift+LMB. Go to compositing and add an Alpha Over node and two RenderLayer nodes. Plug the first layer's Alpha channel into the Alpha channel of the Alpha Over node, plug its color into the bottom socket and the second layer's color into the top color socket.


How can I get rid of these two vertices without faces being deleted I am trying to delete these two vertices because I do not need them:

However, when I remove them, it's like the faces of the mesh are deleted:

I am not sure how I can remove the two vertices without the faces of the mesh being deleted.

Welcome to Blender Stack Exchange!

When you choose to delete vertices, it will not only delete the points themselves, but also any faces or edges that the vertices are part of. That's why part of the mesh disappears. Any face that the vertices were part of are now deleted.

Because of this, Blender has a number of dissolve options, that will delete your selection but keep everything connected.

The option in the delete menu that you'll want is dissolve edges or limited dissolve. Since two connected vertices form a edge, dissolving that edge will remove the vertices too. Limited dissolve will remove vertices, edges, and faces, but only if removing them won't change any angles in your object by a certain angle (5 degrees by default).

I highly recommend testing out the different options so you know what they each do, so that when you have a task to do, you know what tools are available to use.


Archimesh, properties? In relation blender 2.79 and the archimesh tool shelf missing, which was answered in Archimesh is not displayed in the Tool shelf

The properties panel is disabled. For example when i add a column i cannot change top or base or add an arch. What do i need to do to enable it?

I posted a follow up there, apologies for that.

Go to User preferences -> Editing-> (check mark on) undo

Do not forget to save user setting below


Why do normal map ridges become grooves in mirrored object? My model has a pair of objects, one a mirror image of the other, like bookends or a pair of wheels.  They use the same cycles nodes material involving a normal map.  Ridges on the one object appear as grooves in the other.  It looks as if the normal-x component and the mesh x coordinates aren't in sync.

Note that I prefer to use normals, rather than the Displacement input of the Material Output, due the nature of the work, fine details. I don't care about seeing bumps or groove profiles along the edges of the objects.  But I did try Displacement anyway, and got the same result.   The attached images might not be the perfect example, but shows the problem.

I thought maybe "Apply Transform" might fix it, so each object has points in the same world coordinates, but nope, this didn't fix it.

Added note: experimenting on a new scene, it seems that applying the transform causes the problem. For the example shown, I had already applied the transform a few weeks ago when starting the project.  So the question is: how to have ridges not grooves for an already-applied-transform mirrored object?

I think the negative scaling is getting applied, flipping the normals inside out. Try going into edit mode on the object where the normals are incorrect, selecting everything and doing CtrlF > Flip normals.


2.9 dirty shading on model in object mode when subdividing? This is my first time creating something like this so it could just be bad modeling, but for some reason when I add a subdivision modifier the shading becomes strange on the model.
I checked the normals and the autosmooth but it didn't fix anything.

Does anyone know how to fix this? And if not, will it show up in renders/other programs?
EDIT: Here's the .blend: https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/b/eZpLwDyo/

There are several problems. Here a short summary ;-)

apply the scale in Object Mode (Ctrl+A) as recommended by JacksonPro in the comments.

disable Normals → Auto Smooth in object data properties

remove/disable the modifiers

delete half of the mesh and add a Mirror Modifier

Fix the oral cavity. There went something wrong. The bottom of the cavity is connected to the upper lip and vice versa. I've added a seam, selected the cavity with L up to the seam, and separated the mesh to get an overview. It's twisted.

Fix the toplogy/edge flow. (Especially the mouth needs a horizontal edge loop to separate the lips. I've added an edge loop (Ctrl+R) to the corner of the mouth, and used the knife (k) to connect it to the next pole. Then I've done a lot of dissolve edges (X) and knife cuts to create a clean topology. It might be not perfect but to give you an idea. You can add a few more edge loops to the eyes (Ctrl+R) around the eyes if you want to animate the eye lids.

Smooth out the mesh in Sculpt move with the Smooth brush at low strength (~0.18)

Apply the mirror modifier. Then you can start work on the eye. This should be fairly easily done with the Deformation or Grab brush in Sculpt mode. Have fun!


Preview pose mode when making change to armature in edit mode Is there any way preview how my pose will look like when I apply some changes to bones in edit mode, without switching back to pose mode ? I'm re-targeting some animations to different skeletons and sometimes I need to make adjustments to bone positions / rotations in edit mode. However when I make them in edit mode I don't have any way to preview what impact will it have on a final pose so right now I'm making small adjustment, switch back to pose mode to see how it looks like, and then back to edit mode again. This is driving me crazy.

Unfortunately there is no way to view the same object in two different modes at the same time. I've never really had a problem with how blender handles this though, as tabbing between modes is quite quick. If you have to adjust your viewport every time you switch modes you could try having two viewports open with two different angles. Being able to view an animation while also being able to edit the skeleton would definitely be handy though.


Twist like SimplerDeform but with bones? I want to create the same sort of twist that you get from the SimpleDeform modifier, but by using an armature so that I can have more control of it. I want to get at least 360degrees of twist, maybe up to 720. The object is basically a cylinder.

If I use just a couple of bones, then when they twist, they pinch to no thickness in the middle. What is the proper setup with bones to get the amount of twist I want?

I would try to use a bendy bone with controllers (see here), then add a bone at the base of the bendy bone (I'll call it "rotator" from now on). The opposite bendy bone's controller will be parented to the rotator, and its rotations will also be driven by the rotator.

In theory, this will make the opposite controller rotate arround the bendy bone base and rotate it twice the amount of the rotator's rotation. The bendy bone would form a perfect half-circle shape, without any wrong deformation.

Duplicate the whole thing and invert it to get the other half, and you have your simple-deform-like rig.

I did a test, you can download and retro-engineer it.


Rigging a ball type character for a game I built a very simple character that will be used in a game i am trying out. What is the best way to rig this so that it is playable in Unity? Below is a list of what I am trying to achieve.

The base of the ball needs to move in all directions. Forwards, backwards, left and right.
The Head needs to rotate left and right
The Canons Up and Down.

I don't know if this is playable in unity, but I'll give it a shot anyways.

I would recommend using basic keyboard controls for the main movement, and mouse-look for both the cannons and the head.

Here are the settings for the body movement.

Also, if you want the head to stay with the body, parent it to the body, and the cannons to the head.

Here are the settings for rotating the head.

If the head's rotation isn't working, click on the "Use X axis" button and click on the "Use Y axis" to disable the incorrect rotation.

Use the same settings for the cannons, but inverted (Click on the "Use X/Y axis" until the settings are opposite of the head settings).


UV mesh is distorted, not a reliable representation of the model? Im working on a face model, trying to create a single 2d printable image of the face's texture.
I created the desireable uv layout, used the texture paint tool- stencil brush in order to create the texture.
Now, after printing the result, I realised that the UV layout that the Blender created does not represent the model in the correct way. I know that after realising that the both parts of the same seams are significantly not in the same size, although these lines are the line in the 3D model.
I realised that there are two kinds of UV unwrapping methods, but I couldn't find any information on the subject, not in stackexchage and not on different manuals on the net.
What is the cause of this distortion? Can the UV unwrap setting fix it?
Thank you in advance

Look at the paper model export add-on, it seems to be exactly what you're looking for.


Need help with modelling a helmet Blender File: https://drive.google.com/file/d/14Y9j3ABEq0XOu63Fr3aPSiCehDvm49Cu/view?usp=sharing
I need help with starting this model. Below is my situation and current approach. Would be grateful to anyone who helps!

:

I suggest not to start from a sphere, but from a cube (apply a subdivision modifier of 2 or 3).
The box/sphere is better cause you can have better loops:


How do I parent a single bone from a rigify metarig to a cube without it parenting the whole metarig? I'd like to parent a single bone within a Rigify human full skeleton metarig to a corresponding cube [which contains animation information], however I can't select a single bone for parenting without selecting the whole skeleton. Is it not possible to parent individual bones within a metarig?

Yes, I don't think you can parent an individual bone to a mesh object. You can constrain it tho, so maybe that could solve your problem.


2.83 Grease pencil: No anti-aliasing All strokes made with Grease Pencil (Blender 2.83) have jagged edges. Both in the view port and in the render (Cycles and Eevee).
I've increased smooth, iterations, subdivision steps etc for the grease pencil, and I've tried various settings of anti-aliasing threshold in the render settings (0 - 2.000) without any luck

The only option I've found is to add a Blur effect, but that's not the same effect as anti-aliasing.

At my wits end. Any pointers?

Setup

Blender: 2.83
OS: Win10
Pen: Wacom Intuos Pro (small)
GPU: Nvidia RTX 2080 ti
Laptop: Acer Predator Triton 500

I had this issue too. Seems to be a 2.83 bug. I would recommend downloading the 2.9 Beta. My strokes are now much smoother without any subdivision and my scenes run far better (much lower load on the GPU). Of course this version isn't "stable" so use at your own risk.


How to color individual polygons in a low poly model? So I have been working on this low poly project and have most of the modeling done. So, I have begun texturing and ran into a problem. I can't figure out how to color each individual polygon of my model. Here let me explain.

Notice how this image(that I found in a google search) has polygons in the model and it transition from blue to red and even in the blue and red the saturation and brightness changes to achieve a more natural look. Now I understand this effect can be achieved with lighting, but I'm doing a landscape so one solid color will not look good. I'm looking for natural variations in color and can't figure how to color them individually.

That looks like it was done using vertex colors.

Go into Vertex Paint mode and apply your colors.  Note that faces will blend colors in a gradient based on their vertices' colors.

Then, in your Blender Render material, select the Vertex Color Paint option.


Export FBX to Blender fist things first I'm using Blender 2.81a and Unreal Engine 2.24.2 as well as the 1.0(beta?) of the gltf importer plugin in Unreal.

When importing the gltf file unreal strait up refuses to import animations because of "invalid joint weights". Mesh and materials are imported just fine:

When importing the fbx file with these settings:

The import seems to work fine, but the imported animations are empty at first sight:

If you look closer you may see a tiny cube at the bottom of the thumbnail. So the animation somehow scales the imported mesh way down.
Does anybody know what to do? The mesh itself does have the correct scaling just the animations are messed up.

All the files used in this example can be found here: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1q1PBeQfHW_PPNW9b7DyK5Jiivc9sFvms?usp=sharing

I found out that the scaling problem does direct relate to the apply scaling export settings in blender:

However no matter which settings I choose, I won't get a result in which the scaling is correct. Any idea if this is a Blender or Unreal Problem?

Thank you guys.

Cheers Edregol

I've managed to solve the issue over at the Unreal forum.

I did add a simple Armature and did not change the default name. That was the problem.

Change that name to anything but "Armature" and everything works fine.


Destroying any object into cubes I’m trying to figure out how to destroy any object into cube shards. As in small cubes. Similar to the derez effect seen in tron legacy when the identity disc is thrown through the player. Ive looked for tutorials but none of them show how to do it. They all show how to destroy just a cube into smaller cubes or how to destroy an object into random shards. Say you were destroying a sphere in the way im describing. The outer cubes would have one curved surface matching the curve of the sphere and the inner faces would just be flat, cube like.

One possible way to replace your exact mesh profile with cubes (with only outer ones matching the mesh surface) could be cutting the mesh shape from a 3d array of cubes using booleans. Then, you could maybe make it explode, fall, whatever.

A simplified example:

I started with a sphere, which I wish to replace ("destroy") with cubes:

Then I add another object a little cube, then add 3 array modifiers for each axis (X, Y, Z) with fixed count suitable to "contain" the target sphere (here array modifiers are disabled - eye icon)

Here is a detail of the first (enabled) array modifier on X: note that I leaved a little space between cubes using 1.05 as relative spacing.

which seen in perspective appears as

then you enable also Y and Z

Of course the sphere is now inside this big 3d array of cubes

Now if you enable a further modifier on the cube array, a boolean that intersects the target sphere, you get this resulting shape:

as you see the cubes are a little spaced as planned.

Now you can apply all modifiers: since boolean is quite slow, I suggest to first disable it temporary (eye icon), then apply all 3 array modifiers. Only then enable again the boolean and apply it.

After getting the resulting shape, identical to the image above but a real object, you need to make each cube a single object, to let it later explode, fall, etc.

So you enter edit mode, select all, and press P to get the "separate" menu, and choose "by loose parts":

beware this is very slow since geometry is quite complex here, blender will seem to freeze but it's not, let it finish (when the "separate"menu disappears, it's done)

After a few (minutes in my case - crappy old notebook) you get something like this (I've just hidden half of the "cubespheres" to let you see the inside and the outside)

Each of the cubes is an object independent that will fall, explode, move as you expect...

As an example, here is after setting all cubes as active (mesh) rigid bodies, and letting them fall onto a passive (mesh) rigid body plane:


Eevee disable receiving light for an object Im currently working on a Wormhole tunnel effect like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K2WTH016rfk
Problem is in my scene I got objects which are flying through it and those emit light too. So if they fly through it, the tunnel gets lightened up.
The Wormhole in itself is more of a special effect and its own shadermaterial emits light already, but I dont want it to accept other lights... any ideas how to disable this in eevee?

I think in blender you have to use the compositor to do that. Blender doesn't have a light excluder see this tut.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PByGtB_ahmw


poll failed for delete info lines I have written a function delete_info() which clears the info screen, this works fine when executed from text block. But now I want this function to be called every x seconds. So I am using threading.Timer() function for the same.

import os,bpy
import threading,datetime

def delete_info():
    for window in bpy.context.window_manager.windows:
        screen = window.screen
        for area in screen.areas:
            if area.type == 'INFO':
                info = area

    context = bpy.context
    c = context.copy()
    c["area"] = info

    # # test call
    bpy.ops.info.select_all_toggle(c)
    bpy.ops.info.report_delete(c)

for thing in threading.enumerate():
    if isinstance(thing, threading.Timer):
        thing.cancel()

def set_timer():
  threading.Timer(5.0, set_timer).start()
  delete_info()

set_timer()
#delete_info()

this is the error I get

Exception in thread Thread-248:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/Users/nitish/Downloads/blender-2.76b-OSX_10.6-x86_64/blender.app/Contents/Resources/2.76/python/lib/python3.4/threading.py", line 921, in _bootstrap_inner
    self.run()
  File "/Users/nitish/Downloads/blender-2.76b-OSX_10.6-x86_64/blender.app/Contents/Resources/2.76/python/lib/python3.4/threading.py", line 1187, in run
    self.function(*self.args, **self.kwargs)
  File "/Users/nitish/Desktop/timer.blend/Text", line 26, in set_timer
  File "/Users/nitish/Desktop/timer.blend/Text", line 17, in delete_info
  File "/Users/nitish/Downloads/blender-2.76b-OSX_10.6-x86_64/blender.app/Contents/MacOS/../Resources/2.76/scripts/modules/bpy/ops.py", line 187, in __call__
    ret = op_call(self.idname_py(), C_dict, kw, C_exec, C_undo)
RuntimeError: Operator bpy.ops.info.select_all_toggle.poll() failed, context is incorrect

Threading does not go well with context. Instead use modal timer operator.

def delete_info():
    for window in bpy.context.window_manager.windows:
        screen = window.screen
        for area in screen.areas:
            if area.type == 'INFO':
                info = area

    context = bpy.context
    c = context.copy()
    c["area"] = info

    # # test call
    bpy.ops.info.select_all_toggle(c)
    bpy.ops.info.report_delete(c)

class LoggingTimer(bpy.types.Operator):
    """Tooltip"""
    bl_idname = "myops.logging_timer"
    bl_label = "OPERATOR_LABEL"

    _timer = None

    def modal(self, context, event):

        if event.type == 'TIMER':
            delete_info()

        return {'PASS_THROUGH'}

    def execute(self, context):
        wm = context.window_manager
        self._timer = wm.event_timer_add(300, context.window)
        wm.modal_handler_add(self)
        return {'RUNNING_MODAL'}

    def cancel(self, context):
        wm = context.window_manager
        wm.event_timer_remove(self._timer)

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

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

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


Toggle wireframe mode with hotkey How do I toggle in and out of wireframe mode with my keyboard? Is there a hotkey for this?

I'm a beginner (obviously). I thought I could find this in the "view" menu, but it either doesn't exist or I have horrendous eyesight. Thanks!

In any mode, if you want to switch between wireframe and solid use Z.
You can also use Alt+Z for toggling x-ray.
Alternatively, you can use the viewport header.
Take a look at the manual.


How to fill up every part of a geometry with a fluid? While fiddling around getting the letter F filled up by a fluid for an animation, I don't get the fluid to reach the horizontal parts of the F.
So far I´ve tried:

Domain resolutions: 32-128
Effector thickness: 0.2 (it leaks!) to 1.5 (its so thick the fluid runs over the entire letter)
Varying the size of the flow source

Tried it now it just leaves me with no visible fluid after baking at all.
Pretty much the same way as if I´m adding a new fluid simulation to any existing work. Don´t know if this is a bug or what not because whenever I apply a fluid simulation during a work it doesn't show any fluid. But when I do the same in a new project (so that the fluid simulation is alone) it works.
Switching from All to Replay on the cache displays the fluid but it doesn't behave the right way.

Q: How to fill up every part of the letter with a fluid?

Select your 'F'

add solidify modifier

move solidify modifier before fluid

bake fluid again (by the way, i use 80 as resolution (much quicker to bake))

and you get:


Graphic card not detected when installing from flatpack or .deb hey guys im having a bit of problem, im on pop_os! 20.04 LTS, and the blender from pop shop (both .deb and flatpack) didn't detect my graphic card, strangely, tar xz downloaded from official blender page detect them, any solution?, thanks in advance ,left is from tar xz file the right one is from store

Flatpack, Repositories, SnapInstall versions are created by third parties, not by the blender developers. It is common that there are outdated, missing libraries or dependencies, or other errors depending on the specific OS.
Unless you have a very good reason not to, use the official version from blender.org


Spine003 keeps stretching book in undesirable way I'm trying to fix this rig so that it all bends together, but for some reason the vertices selected below keep stretching in undesirable ways. I've tried a couple different things to no avail. Can anyone help?

If you grab the spine.003 and rotate it in any direction, you will see what I mean.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1neePPk9PlKjhpp8AIbUOF94m1KHws7hX/view?usp=sharing

If you look at it in edit mode and show the item properties, you'll see that the vertices are linked to several groups and two of them corresponds to two bones.

Depending on what you want to do, you may remove the unwanted bones influences from all the vertices of the book.

If the book is not supposed to be bent maybe you should keep only one bone influence for it (all its vertices).


How do I create a custom-keying set based on a built-in keying set? While creating actions I noticed that I sometimes forgot to keyframe the IK/FK sliders separately. Therefore I decided to create a custom keying-set. The question is can I copy the setup from say LocRot into my customized keying set or do I have add each location and rotation for all bone layers separately?

Properties can't be added to a built-in keying-set, which isn't necessary. The keying-set Whole Character also includes ik/fk switch (among others).

Note that for walk cycles the keys for the root bone should be removed.

Related:

Coding your own "Builtin Keying Set"


Image alpha to black-and-white I'd like to know how my image texture (which possesses an alpha channel) can use said alpha channel to validly affect the transparency node (which primarily works in black and white values).

A more "boiled to the basics" version of this question would probably be the following:

Using the node editor, how can I take the alpha channel of an image and convert that to black-and-white?

Add an "RGB to BW" node and plug the alpha channel of your image into it. You can then feed that value into whatever other node you desire.


What influences the visibility of the layer selection in the view port header? For some reason the layer selection and the Lock to Scene button disappeared in 3D View / Object Mode. I can't find an option to toggle the visibility.

As it is supposed to look like

How it currently looks like

File / New restores the visibility therefore it must be a setting within the .blend file.
How can the layer selection be restored?

Local and Global View

From the Blender wiki:

  You can toggle between Local and Global view by selecting the option
  from the View Menu or using the shortcut NumPad /. Local view isolates
  the selected object or objects, so that they are the only ones visible
  in the viewport. This is useful for working on objects that are
  obscured by other ones, or have heavy geometry. Press NumPad / to
  return to Global View.

As user2859 pointed out, when you are in Local View, the Layers buttons are not visible, but will return when you go back to Global view.


How can I add sharp edges at the end of semicircle's vertices? blender beginner here. I'm modelling a cap, and after doing a semicircle shaped hole, I couldn't find a way to make the lower corners of the hole sharp looking. Can anyone suggest a solution? Thank you.

This solution seems to work fine, with almost no pinching:


Can someone explain how to fix this visibility issue In the first pic I have two objects in a scene, same layer, and side by side, they look fine, but when I move my view so one is in front of the other, the one in front becomes invisible where it overlaps the one behind it

It sounds like you have switched on 'In Front' for the blue object.

That's located on the right column (Properties Editor), on the Object Context tab (orange square icon) in the 'Viewport Display' category. There is a checkbox option for 'In Front'.


how to vertex parent an object to a quad face and not a tri? theres a way to parent objects to vertex which only works two ways 1 vertex and 3 vertex, the problem is that my meshes usually consist of quads, why is this?
is there a way to parent to a face without the need of making tris?
just one vertex is not enough because i need my objects to rotate

You don't have to "make tris" (if you meant divide your quad), you just need to parent to 3 of the 4 vertices of your quad. Your object will rotate, but it will only follow 3 vertices.


Issues with combining meshes So I have been joining meshes and for some reason when I join a mesh and a hand mesh. The hand mesh gets all messes up as you can see in the second picture. But when I combined other meshes together in the same project it worked just fine even with armature but not with the hand mesh I made for some reason...

To join meshes ideally they should have the same scale (set to 1:1:1 with Ctrl+A -> Apply Scale) and there should be no modifiers active (under the Wrench symbol on the right). Maybe one of these is causing issues?


Render Failure - Image is smokey I am new to using blender and I am working on rendering a scene that uses portal lighting, but I am having some render issues and I don't know why. Is there anything I can try to fix this issue?

Denoising didn't seem to make a difference on the picture cloudiness one way or another. Adding more samples helped a lot, but I still have that issue some.

Here's a link to my blender file https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uNfl7msr-o_v0AR5WSfbMFfdvP_zo2Ly/view?usp=sharing

Thanks everyone, the advice was very helpful! For anyone else having this problem, try the advice below and primarily lower the number of your light sources in the scene.

first of all, in the archive you've sent i haven't found any portals.. to set them properly you shoud get an area lamp and not a sun one.

like this:

second, i recommend you to reduce the light bounces, its better for performance and i think it may help with some of the noise:

the denoiser effect may be too strong, i'd leave it in the default settings, besides 8 radius costs a lot of performance..

A big part of the problem can be because there is too many light sources.. i don't know how you could fix this.. but from what i already said im pretty sure you'll get better results


How to "stick" two faces of two objects? I'm totally lost and you are my last hope. I spent my day trying to stick these two faces with the magnet. I followed all the tutorials I found about to snap an object to the face of another object. I missed something but what?. Here the two faces.
Thanks.

I forgot the other face I want to snap, sorry

You need to enable the snap option (little red magnet icon) in order to do so. Right now you have it disabled. Then you need to choose the Snap Element you desire, in this case Face or Point.


How can I create a fuzzy fur like this? (see image) Im trying to replicate this fur on this character (domo) to a model I made but I couldn't figure out how to do it with particle system or with images.I couldn't find useful tutorials on youtube so I came here.
Thank you in advance for the help

Heres my results

Enable Interpolated Children and use a Kink type of Curl with a small distance for the Amplitude.


Interpreting a formula for Blender Python I'm pretty poor at maths but managed to get someone who is decent at it to come up with a linear algebraic formula for the control over the distribution of points along a straight line.
The formula is:
$$f(x) = \left(\frac xL\right)^{\frac 1c}L$$
Would anyone be kind enough and help me translate that into a function I can write within Blender python?
Thanks in advance.

With numpy
An ideal candidate for using numpy  For example, can define a sequence
>>> x = np.arange(5)
>>> x
array([0, 1, 2, 3, 4])

and run a function quickly over all items, simple example squaring them.
>>> np.power(x, 2)
array([ 0,  1,  4,  9, 16])

Halving and squaring
>>> np.power(x / 2, 2)
array([0.  , 0.25, 1.  , 2.25, 4.  ])

The question equation.
Test script, defines a function of $x$ with scalars (assume they're scalars) $L$ and $c$
import bpy
import numpy as np

def distribute(x, L, c):
    return L * np.power(x / L, 1 / c)

# test run

x = np.arange(20)
for d in distribute(x, 10, 2):
    bpy.ops.object.empty_add(location=(d, 0, 0))

Empties placed as result of test run.
Related.
Create curve from Numpy Array using Python


Sculpting Symetry X Issue I have started sculpting in Blender and Im not the biggest expert. I have a little issue now. When I started sculping Symetry X was on and it is still on. It worked all perfectly, it did mirror each side as it should. But now I started working on hands and as you can see in the pictures on one hand its fine but on the other hand at the finger tips there is "extra mass" and I do not know where it comes from. I did not turn off X Symetry or anything. I was just normally working. X Symetry still works at all but the fingers are an issue for that, and I do not know why. Please help me! Thx!

1: https://i.stack.imgur.com/ze1V9.jpg

[2: https://i.stack.imgur.com/ze1V9.jpg

[3: https://i.stack.imgur.com/643Xk.jpg

Try this, go into edit mode (where you can manipulate verts manually), you can try pressing tab to jump over. Tap 'A' should select all verts, then go to the Mesh menu, select symmetrize. Go back to sculpt mode, I think this should fix your issue.


Vertex normals incorrect, but face normals look correct? I recently imported an FBX from a Max export and about 90% of the model looks fine but for some parts, the vertex normals are 'twisted' even though the face normals look correct. As far as I can tell the parts are all manifold and the bad mesh in the image below is just a simple cylinder so I don't think its possible for that to be non-manifold, right? Also when I tried to select non-manifold, nothing selected.

I added a new cylinder for reference and those verts look fine. How can i 'reset' the weird verts without remodelling these parts?

Those are probably custom normal data imported from 3Ds MAX

Try the Clear Custom Split Normals Data button in the Properties Window > Object Data Tab > Geometry Data Panel (It will only be visible if there is any actual custom normal data stored)


How to make a beveled cutout in a sphere? This is hard to explain so I'm hoping the pictures will help.

I'm trying to make a half sphere with a cutout shape. In this case, a crescent.

Here's the look I'm trying to achieve:

Here's the look I'm getting using extruding and scaling:

I want the cutout to scale inwards smoothly and gently, looking more beveled than punched through, but still be able to make it decently deep.

Here's another look from the side:

It looks like garbage. I'm trying to go for a very natural, organic indentation that doesn't have a huge overhang like that.

I hope this makes sense.

For natural and smooth indentation you could use Displace modifier with a texture. Here we have a rotated UV sphere that has UV coordinates projected from view. The white parts of the texture are moved along the surface normal by the specified amount, negative numbers making an indentation.

Steps to recreate this:

Add an UV sphere, enable smooth shading and rotate it 90 degrees around y-axis
Enter edit mode and select all
Enter orthogonal top down view and press U > Project from view
Exit edit mode and add subsurface modifier, set it to 4 view and render
Add a displace modifier, set the strength to -0.05 and click to create new texture
Go to Texture tab, select you newly created texture from the drop-down and set its type to image or movie
Create and paint new image, open one from file or browser the drop-down for existing image to be used with the texture. Note the image should have soft gradient from white areas to black areas, this will affect the displace strength accordingly.
If you need to edit the placement of the displace texture, go into edit mode and find the UV layout in an image editor window. In the image editor window you can select all your UVs and move, rotate or scale them to align the texture.

This approach often requires a high number of vertices for non-jagged results but it's faster than trying to make the appropriate geometry especially if the shape of the indentation is a bit uncertain.

Alternative approach might be to model the shape on a flat surface geometry and curve the flat surface on a sphere using shrinkwrap or lattice.


projecting onto a mirror and back? Here's an illustration of what needs to be done:

A texture has to be projected from a point in space to a mirror (1 in the image) which will bounce the projection to a surface (2).

Here is the texture that is going to be projected although a real video file is going to be used.

The tricky thing is the mirror (the surface marked as 1 in the illustration) is not flat but curved as illustrated below:

The point is to see how the projected image or video will appear on the final surface (2) given a projection angle (fov) and a curved bounce mirror.
This is for a video for a project where I need to illustrate how a curved mirror deforms a projection from a video projector, laser projector and such and in the animation the shape of the mirror gradually changes (via shapekeys) which in turn changes the size and deformation of the projected image/video.

If Blender can do this somewhat accurately I can use it for simulations as well which is a plus because of the superior render quality compared to specialized CAD programs.

Also if this is possible with Blender and we have an answer then it makes Blender a powerful tool for people working with video projectors.

As has been said, Cycles isn't capable of this.  Luxrender, however, is.  You can read about it on this forum and elsewhere.  However, I'll say here that it integrates into Blender (previewing is even possible with the experimental API enabled as demonstrated below), and it handles refractive and reflective caustics very well.  It is a bit slower but the versatility is worth it for much more accurate physics than Cycles.

I have reproduced your scene by creating a Projector Spot Lamp (using your image) and a Mirror material on the reflector.  The reflector mesh has Subsurf and has Smooth Shading enabled.  The "screen" has the default Matte material:

Here I am morphing the plane from flat, to convex, to concave:

You must install Luxrender before opening the .blend:


Strange relations between objects In my scene there are some objects that are somehow connected to each other. E.g. if I transpose one object called 'Body' it also moves the object 'Border'.

The movement of 'Border' is not linear to 'Body'.
I removed all groups, constraints, parenting etc. of all objects. So I can not see any relationship between the objects. Any ideas?

Ok.. there was no relation in the scene. The problem was that I somehow enabled the 'Proportional editing object mode' (Shortcut: O). I did not know this option in object mode. Thank you for the answers and sorry wasting your time.
It still do not get why objects that are closer to 'Body' did not move but only 'Border'...


How can I write something on an object? I've tried to use curve method and also have tried to add texture on it. But my ways didn't work or I did something wrong.

How can I write for example "Aceton Box" on this object ?

Here's what you can do with the Curve modifier.
For 2.7#
Add your desired text, Shift + A  > Text, then press Tab  to go into edit mode and type in your new text, press Tab again to exit edit mode. Now move your cursor to the center of the bottle mesh you have.
Press Shift + S  and choose cursor to selected. Now add in a circle (Shift + A) under the Curves. Scale it to match the outside of your bottle. Now click back onto the text and convert it to a mesh Alt + C  choose convert to mesh.
Now go under the modifiers tab and choose the curve modifier, select the circle you just created as the Object. You will then have to rotate your text 90 on the x-axis and change the scale of the circle to -1. You may have to mess around with the scale a bit.
For 2.8+
] Everything above will remain the same, though there is no Alt + C shortcut in Blender 2.8, you will have to either use Fn + F3  to search for it or go under the Object Tab -> Convert.

You can also add a Solidify modifier to your text as well to help it stand out a little.


Transferring mirrored UV map I have two objects [A] and [B].

[A] is a simple geometric form and [B] is same as [A] but mirored.

Both Meshes are made in Sketchup.

What I want is to create UV map for [A] and then transfer it to [B]. However the result is that the uv map for [B] is messed up.

What is interesting is that if in Blender I delete [B] then copy [A] and mirror it then I can transfer the UV map without a problem.

That might be a somewhat of a solution but I would like to see if anyone knows some decent way of transferring UV`s in this situation.

Ok I figured it out. I will leave the answer here if anyone else has the same problem in the future.

1.Select the model you want the UVs copied to, then the model you will copy them from.

2.Press Control+Shift+T to transfer mesh data.

3.Select Vertex Group and click the Auto transform checkbox.

4.Press Control+Shift+T and choose UVs


Rotation Axis trouble so weird issue, when I rotate the object using the gizmo, the object rotates fine. But when adjust the rotation in the transform panel, the rotation is all wrong. Any clue why this might happen? I've tried to fix it using copy rotation constraint but that didn't work. Please see gif and image for help ^^

https://imgur.com/gallery/dKYGMHt

The object's axis is probably not aligned with the world's axis any more, you must apply the rotation: CtrlA > Rotation


Change grid size in blender 2.80 beta? In older versions the way is the
following

But in 2.80 beta by default there is no even option "Display" which should contain "Scale".

So how to find it?

You will find the grid scale options in the Overlay panel.


Blender and three.js recent versions December 1, 2018 I am struggling with adding Blender export to three.js because my Googling is showing older tutorials on both.

My goal is to export a model from Blender to three.js or at least I think that's the correct wording. I have a .fbx file but really need to learn .json file or whatever exported from Blender.

I have tried going to the addons but three is not showing up with three.js as an option. I think it must be a directory issue.

I am using the absolute latest of both as of December 1, 2018.

Any advice? Thanks in advance for your time.

I'm not sure why the three.js exporter would have disappeared from the specific folder in your screenshot (did you download it from somewhere particular? was it already on your computer?) but the three.js (JSON) Blender exporter has been removed from recent versions of the three.js library.

Instead, I would suggest one of the following:

Load your FBX (.fbx) file directly with THREE.FBXLoader.
Export to glTF (.gltf or .glb) and load with THREE.GLTFLoader.

A glTF exporter is included in Blender 2.80+. For older versions of Blender, you can download the importer/exporter here: https://github.com/KhronosGroup/glTF-Blender-IO.

Per three.js documentation, using glTF is recommended where possible.


Using rigid body physics to set objects' initial positions I have a problem where I used physics to position a bunch of meshes in Blender and when I try to set the current frame to 0 it resets the position of the meshes that have been positioned with the use of physics.

Here is the blend file.

Here is what the positioning looks like (Frame 300):

Here is what the positioning looks like after I try to set to frame 0 (Frame 0):

Apply Visual Transform
Another way to solve this problem without the need to bake is to use Apply Visual Transform like this:

Go to frame 300 and select all the mesh pieces

CTRLA -> Visual Transform

Applying Visual Transform will set the Location, Rotation and Scale of all the selected objects to what they are on frame 300.
With this method, you don't need to bake the simulation and you also don't loose the rigid body settings.
Credit for this answer goes to sergof here on StackExchange.


Cycles rendering objects all black I added a texture to the bowl, and it came out rendered black. I unwrapped it, and I did a little node editing, to make the plane glossy and B&W. It looks fine in the preview, as well as in material view, and in rendered view, but not in the render.

Another weird part is that Suzanne is also black in the render, even though she just has the default light gray material and no node editing at all. If I render without the bowl, it's just Suzanne in black. I have no idea why this is happening.

Here's my bowl's nodes:

And here's rendered view

And here's the render

There's definitely a light in the scene.

I think what happened here was just a misclick in your render layer settings. It looks like you accidentally added a layer as a mask layer.

What is a mask layer

A mask layer is a layer that is used as a mask to turn parts of a renderlayer transparent depending on if anything (that appears in the render) is infront of something from that renderlayer.

What's the issue?

Your issue, is that you have your first layer (the one that has all your objects on it), set to be a mask layer, so essentially what is happening, is that instead of rendering the objects, there shape is filled with transparency. I just doesn't appear transparent because you don't have film transparent checked.

To fix this, simply uncheck that layer from the mask layers.


is it possible to cycle only some keyframes in the graph editor? I am creating an animation with lots of cycles and it would be nice to use the cycles modifier in the graph editor but to only affect some keyframes and not the whole thing because I have different patterns

Is there a way to do it?

No, not in the graph editor, you should use NLA editor for this.

in the graph editor you can setup repeating all bunch of keyframes, not part of it.

First, set up cycles in action editor, each cycle in different action:

Then use Push Down in action editor or Shift+A in NLA Editor to add actions in NLA:

Then in NLA editor's N-panel (properties panel) you can set up any count of cycles using repeat property:


Python - Assigning vertex weights is extremely slow Current very slow method (code reduced):
    obj = bpy.context.active_object
    vgroups = obj.vertex_groups.new(name="test_layer")

    for loop in obj.data.loops:
        vindex = obj.data.loops[loop.index].vertex_index
        vgroups.add([vindex], value, "REPLACE")

Performance is tested on 1024 x 1024 grid and takes minutes to complete for several weight layers.
My goal is not to assign the same weight value, but different values for each vertex.
I believe I am looking for something like below, which does not exist.
active_object.vertex_groups[group_name].foreach_set()

Usage of loops here is not clear.
You can:
import bpy

obj = bpy.context.active_object
vgroup = obj.vertex_groups.new(name="test_layer")

value = 0.5

for i in range(len(obj.data.vertices)):
    vgroup.add( [i], value, 'REPLACE')

We add vertices to a group, using their indexes.
The documentation is here:

add(index, weight, type)
Add vertices to the group

Parameters
        index (int array of 1 items in [-inf, inf]) – Index List
        weight (float in [0, 1]) – Vertex weight
        type (enum in ['REPLACE', 'ADD', 'SUBTRACT']) –
        Vertex assign mode
            REPLACE Replace, Replace.
            ADD Add, Add.
            SUBTRACT Subtract, Subtract.


Blender won't open, only flashes command prompt I was working on a project, but decided to install a windows update, specifically the January 3, 2018 update. Now when I try to open Blender, only a command prompt flashes and nothing happens.

I tried installing, reinstalling as well as running through the system files instead of the desktop icon. I've looked all over the web, but can't find a solution.

If you have a second graphics card, try to update that as well as update your firmware. Instead of going to windows and searching for an update there, go to Windows Drivers and manually update everything you can.


Is it possible to get render time per tile? Is it possible to ask blender when each render tile starts/finishes rendering?

e.g. for a render time estimator

This used to be somewhat possible from the command line:

For example in blender 2.65a the elapsed time was printed, along with what tile was being traced:

Fra:1 Mem:12.59M (9.89M, peak 27.51M) | Mem: 6.82M, Peak: 6.96M | Scene, RenderLayer | Elapsed: 00:04.28 | Rendering | Path Tracing Tile 10/135
Fra:1 Mem:12.59M (9.89M, peak 27.51M) | Mem: 6.82M, Peak: 6.96M | Scene, RenderLayer | Elapsed: 00:04.41 | Rendering | Path Tracing Tile 11/135
Fra:1 Mem:12.59M (9.89M, peak 27.51M) | Mem: 6.96M, Peak: 6.96M | Scene, RenderLayer | Elapsed: 00:04.56 | Rendering | Path Tracing Tile 12/135
Fra:1 Mem:12.59M (9.89M, peak 27.51M) | Mem: 6.82M, Peak: 6.96M | Scene, RenderLayer | Elapsed: 00:05.99 | Rendering | Path Tracing Tile 13/135

though now with later versions of blender the elapsed time is no longer printed.
while you might be able to read blender's output with a script and get the time, is this possible with python?

Is there any way to get similar information to what is printed in the terminal with python?

from datetime import datetime
from bpy.app import handlers

TIMER = None

def start_timer(scene):
    global TIMER
    TIMER = datetime.now()

def elapsed(dummy):
    print("Elapsed:", datetime.now() - TIMER)

handlers.render_pre.append(start_timer)
handlers.render_stats.append(elapsed)

Example output:

Elapsed: 0:00:10.819869
Fra:1 Mem:7.10M (9.89M, Peak 17.07M) | Mem:1.21M, Peak:1.29M | Scene, RenderLayer | Path Tracing Tile 133/135
Elapsed: 0:00:10.863458
Fra:1 Mem:7.10M (9.89M, Peak 17.07M) | Mem:1.29M, Peak:1.29M | Scene, RenderLayer | Path Tracing Tile 134/135
Elapsed: 0:00:10.931486
Fra:1 Mem:7.10M (9.89M, Peak 17.07M) | Mem:1.21M, Peak:1.29M | Scene, RenderLayer | Path Tracing Tile 135/135
Elapsed: 0:00:11.466759
Fra:1 Mem:7.10M (9.89M, Peak 17.07M) | Mem:0.02M, Peak:1.29M | Scene, RenderLayer | Finished
Elapsed: 0:00:11.467813
Fra:1 Mem:7.08M (9.89M, Peak 17.07M) Sce: Scene Ve:0 Fa:0 La:0
Elapsed: 0:00:11.841684
Saved: /tmp/0001.png Time: 00:11.84 (Saving: 00:00.37)


Windows update freeze blender After updates windows 10, it broke many feature, apps and fps drop. And blender now have weird behaviour. After long idle while blender is still open, my laptop will freeze. While the mouse is still moveable and there's loading indicator on it, no button or mouse click is do-able, force me to shut it down. Usually there will be only icon glitch when it left idle. I haven't found the solution. Any clues to solve this?

Change red spot value to 0 that may help you.


Is there a cloud rendering service for baking in Cycles? Id like to cloud bake multiple 8K textures.
Is there an add on that allows me to do this on a render farm?

Maybe this might be something for you:
https://render.st/blender-render-farm/

There is also a plugin for Blender:
https://render.st/faq/

You can try it for (free) one day and 1$ and it supports baking of physics and bake caches.


Right way to stop export operator from saving with empty filename? If I have a basic save/export operator like this:
class SaveData(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "my.save"
    bl_label = "Save"
    filepath: bpy.props.StringProperty(subtype="FILE_PATH")

    def execute(self, context):
        do_save(ensure_ext(self.filepath, ".mytype"))
        return {"FINISHED"}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        context.window_manager.fileselect_add(self)
        return {"RUNNING_MODAL"}

What is the right/idiomatic way to prevent that that from saving a file named .mytype if the user just hits Save without supplying a filename? This bad behavior appears to be common behavior among many Blender plugins (whether they give a Python traceback or save a .ext file just depends on whether they happen to call ensure_ext() or something similar)
What I have tried:

The check method is not clearly documented, but it appears to be for checking parameters before invoke, not after.
The execute method could check for empty self.filepath but I've found zero examples of that. This would occur after the file selector has closed, so it would require popping another modal to warn the user that nothing happened.
The native Save/Save As for .blend files aggressively puts .blend into the filepath if you try to clear it, so I guess technically you can't save with no filename, but it will happily write a file named .blend. There also doesn't seem to be any way to turn on that behavior for other file selectors.
The FILE_OT_execute (which is the operator for the Save or Load button in the file selector) has a promising property named need_active which looks (from reading the C source) like it makes the button do nothing in case no file is selected. But I don't understand how I would set that property because that is used internally by fileselect_add(). This behavior would match other Windows programs I've tested.

Check out the ImportHelper and ExportHelper code.
If you look at either the import or export operator templates in the text editor will see they use the helper mixin classes ImportHelper and ExportHelper
Here is the code for export helper from bpy_extras.io_utils  find it in the scripts/modules folder of your blender installation.
class ExportHelper:
    filepath: StringProperty(
        name="File Path",
        description="Filepath used for exporting the file",
        maxlen=1024,
        subtype='FILE_PATH',
    )
    check_existing: BoolProperty(
        name="Check Existing",
        description="Check and warn on overwriting existing files",
        default=True,
        options={'HIDDEN'},
    )

    # subclasses can override with decorator
    # True == use ext, False == no ext, None == do nothing.
    check_extension = True

    def invoke(self, context, _event):
        import os
        if not self.filepath:
            blend_filepath = context.blend_data.filepath
            if not blend_filepath:
                blend_filepath = "untitled"
            else:
                blend_filepath = os.path.splitext(blend_filepath)[0]

            self.filepath = blend_filepath + self.filename_ext

        context.window_manager.fileselect_add(self)
        return {'RUNNING_MODAL'}

    def check(self, _context):
        import os
        change_ext = False
        change_axis = _check_axis_conversion(self)

        check_extension = self.check_extension

        if check_extension is not None:
            filepath = self.filepath
            if os.path.basename(filepath):
                filepath = bpy.path.ensure_ext(
                    filepath,
                    self.filename_ext
                    if check_extension
                    else "",
                )

                if filepath != self.filepath:
                    self.filepath = filepath
                    change_ext = True

        return (change_ext or change_axis)

which as you can see sets the name to "untitled." if not set.
Check out the templates to see other properties that are used to extend this
# ExportHelper mixin class uses this
filename_ext = ".txt"

filter_glob: StringProperty(
    default="*.txt",
    options={'HIDDEN'},
    maxlen=255,

Also a files collection bpy/file browser: get selected file names where directory is used to designate the folder the files reside in.
Set custom location for import/export helper


How to even out/scale this material? I have this PBR set up and working, but I'm getting different results on different objects. I have UV unwrapped the objects (using smart unwrap). The texture itself is working. I have applied rotation and scale.

Per another thread, I added a UV Map node fed through a mapping node in order to scale, but it is not working. I am wondering if the color node and the mapping nodes need to be mixed somehow?

I tried just scaling the UVs in the UV Editor window, but it seemed to have no effect at all.

I also realize that the UV map has a specific UV group specified, so I am not sure how I can apply a material like this to multiple objects (perhaps name the UVs all the same?)

You can see on the cab how pronounced the material is, but on other objects it looks very flat and smaller.

You can look at the blend file here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4n7aqyfuik4oy6t/cab.blend?dl=0

UPDATED NODE SETUP

You don't need to specify the Uv channel if there is only one per object, so leave that empty. Also remember to connect your mapping node to the vector input of each of your texture nodes.


Eyes and rig problems when exporting to .fbx I have a mesh with 2 eyes parented to the head bone. Their rig is one bone that they track using a Track To constraint. When I export to .fbx and re-import the .fbx to Blender the following problems appear:

The eyes unparent from the bone, get teleported in a weird position behind the character and their constraint disappears.
The rig adds a "[bone name]_end" to the end of every bone that doesn't have both tips connected to something. Also, some of my bones, like the deform ones disappear.

When I export, I select "mesh" and "armature" and don't bake the animation, because I just need the rigged model for Unity.

I think it's not possible to export constraints via FBX or any other format, i am not 100% sure but it's probably the case, and i think it's for all 3D softwares not just Blender


Importing Brushes in 2.79 on Mac I have tried to look at other posts on how to do this. I don't seem to have an import brushes option in User Preferences>Add Ons. I see where others have had a similar problem and it was suggested a python script was offered to fix this. I am not quite knowledgeable with coding and such. No idea how to add script. Would love to have some of these free brushes for Blender I've seen posted. Any help would be appreciated.
Blender 2.79, MacOS versoin 10.14.6 (18G87), Intel Core i5, Graphics Radeon Pro 580 8 GB

Brushes are considered the same as any other part of Blender comparable to objects and materials - they are 'imported' through the Append function. If you have a brush(es) stored in a file, you press Append under File and then navigate to the file containing them. Select the ones you want, and confirm to append into your scene - then you should be able to find them in your current file. Check them to be Fake User if you want them to stay in the file after close and reopen.


deleting a fraction of vertices from a point cloud mesh I have an object in my scene which is basically a point cloud, i.e. all vertices, no edges or faces. I'm trying to select a random fraction of this point cloud. Here is what the data looks like.

>>> bpy.data.objects[2].data.vertices[:]
[bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[0], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[1], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[2], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[3], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[4], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[5], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[6], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[7], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[8], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[9], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[10], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[11], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[12], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[13], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[14], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[15], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[16], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[17], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[18], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[19], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[20], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[21], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[22], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[23], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[24], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[25], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[26], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[27], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[28], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[29], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[30], bpy.data.meshes['vertsMesh'].vertices[31]]

I'm thinking of a script that would resemble the following

count = int(vertices.length*fraction): # where fraction is a float generated by another function
for i in count:
    rand = random number generated % vertices.length
    delete vertices[rand]

I'm just not sure how this would be implemented in blender

This script will remove random vertices on the active object in Object Mode.

import bpy, bmesh
from random import randint

bm = bmesh.new()
bm.from_mesh( bpy.context.object.data )

fraction = 0.5
count    = int( len( bm.verts ) * fraction )

removeIndices = []

# Add more unique indices until list is as big as $count
while len( removeIndices ) < count:
    randIdx = randint( 0, len( bm.verts ) - 1 )
    if randIdx not in removeIndices:
        removeIndices.append( randIdx )

bm.verts.ensure_lookup_table()
randVerts = [ bm.verts[ i ] for i in removeIndices ]
for v in randVerts:
    bm.verts.remove( v )

bm.to_mesh( bpy.context.object.data )


Cloud Effect In Blender to Unity Hi I'm trying to create 3D clouds in Blender to be used in Unity. Imagine the bubbly-like fx of the flying nimbus in Dragon Ball.  Not really sure what the best approach is.  I've tried using displacement modifiers and get decent results in Blender.  But exporting to Unity is a no go.  Are shape keys my only option? If so, what's a good way to achieve what I'm after using shape keys?

You could create a cube, subdivide and smooth it:

Give it several shapekeys:

In Object mode, select a shapekey, push its Value up to 1 and sculpt:

Sculpt the other shapekeys, animate them:

Or you could create your mesh with metaballs that you convert to mesh:

Then give it a Displace modifier with a Cloud texture and an empty as Object:

In the Displace modifier, save several versions As Shapekeys:

Now you can animate the shapekeys, also sometimes do some Shrink/Fatten to inflate the cloud a bit:


Sunset sky for background I was looking for ways to make a sunset background like this one https://i.imgur.com/CNN2R4B.jpg and was wondering if you had any tips for this kinda stuff. I tried using regular gradiants but it doesn't look like that at all.

One thought: use the "Sky" texture through a Color Ramp populated with colors that meet your desired aesthetic


Why is the color information lost when image data is multiplied by and ellipse mask? Trying to get an Lomography Look I first tried to create a Vignette but the color information gets lost.

A Mix-Node set to multiply must instead of a multiplying Math-Node be used to achieve the vignette effect.

Thats because a Math-Node's input is a scalar value and the color vector seems (I couldn't find a reference for that) to be converted to a single grayscale value. The Mix-Node is designed to process color data.


UV Unwrap model as multiple flat straight strips I'm trying to create tank tracks for my own game engine. I want to scroll the UVs so that it looks like the track is moving. I used 'Follow Active Quads' as a start. This helped immensely for the tops and bottoms of the tracks. They only needed a little bit of editing (mirroring/scaling). Unfortunately the sides of the tracks are still curved. As you can see here:

After a lot of manual editing I got them straightened out:

However doing so I made the faces of the sides no longer correspond to the area of the faces in the model. Now I'm starting to think there has to be a faster/less manual way to do this. But after a lot of searching I have not yet struck the right keyword. Does anybody know a good technique to do this?

For reference, here is my 3D model, complete with seams.

Still some manual editing ............

Remove the outer edge seams so that those sides will be attached to the outer face UV islands when unwrapped.
Select those outer faces and sides and unwrap using the Conformal method.

Select only the inner faces and unwrap.
In the UV editor move these new UV islands to the right so that they will not be overlapping the outer faces UV's.

In the UV editor straighten out edges where necessary.

If you need to separate the sides UV's from the outer faces UV's.......

In the UV Editor, select two edges that make up one of the sides and hit the  Y  (to separate)  X  (to confine in the X axis)  G  to move and drag the new island away to clear space on the UV square.
Repeat for the other 3 sides.


I have some strange noisy places in render When i render I'm getting strange places which are grainy, only on the right side of the picture. Would appreciate help.

I can see this grainy fields also on the left side of the picture, only maybe not that obvious. Are you using Cycles? => more samples should help.

Could also happen in the image compression for example if you save as .jpeg => try an uncompressed image format

EDIT: 200 samples are still not very much. You get clean image at this size from about 500 samples. Especially for renderings with very small or weak lightning, transparencies and reflections Cycles gets very noisy.

Anywhay you should read this article where further omptimzing possibilities are explained


how to loop cut a mesh that doesn't have clear edge flow i have mesh like this

and i need to cut it like this

but i can't because as you can see the mesh have a crazy topology

In Edit mode with your entire mesh selected, under the Mesh menu  go to "Clean Up" and click "Limited Dissolve" this should remove the triangulation on the quads and make edge loop cutting work as expected.


No CUDA option in repository version of Blender I know there are a lot of threads concerning CUDA and GPU-rendering in Blender, but I haven't figured out yet why my installed Blender(2.70) from the repository offers no choice of the rendering-hardware but the bundle you get from blender.org does?

I'm currently using Linux Mint 16 64bit but I observed that fact on Ubuntu 12.04 as well. But on Ubuntu 14.04 the CUDA-option is active on both versions of Blender.

So my system has the necessary drivers to go on with the GPU, the question is, where do I start to fix the repository version, cause I'd like to link the blend-files..

I've just made an install of Linux Mint 16 64bit (with the Mate window manager) and have Blender3D working with CUDA.

Here is what did:
1: After installation of Linux Mint 16 64bit I did an update (many files)
2: Reboot.
3: Enabled the proprietary Nvidia-driver
4: With the Software Manager I installed the CUDA Toolkit (nvidia-cuda-toolkit)
5: Reboot.
6: Install Blender 3D
7: In Blender 3D CUDA was now available.

I'm not sure if nr.4 and nr.6 can be switched ... but you can try.


Where is particle edit radius in Blender 2.8? Ok Im trying to do hair here in latest 2.8 and can't figure out how to change radius/strength. Where are these tools?

In 2.80 the tool settings that you previously found in the toolbar region can be found at the top of the 3D Viewport. As there is limited space only the common options are visible with others in a menu to the right.

You can also find the same options in the properties editor.


How to randomly (with a checkered pattern) select a number of faces in a mesh? I have an isosphere with 4k polygon. How do I delete only 2000 random polygons but not deleting adjacent of deleted polygon?

EDIT -- clarification

Imagine a chessboard, let say white = stay, black = to be deleted. The minimum distance between 2 nearest black is white (which is same distance of black). As @DavidS. puts it, "checkered pattern selection"

However, out of 4k, I'd like to delete half of it.

Go to the icosphere's Edit mode with Face selection, execute Select > Random, set Percent to 50%:

It won't select exactly 50% of the faces, but close enough that only a few additional manual (de)selection is needed. Then execute Delete X > Only Faces.

You can see exactly how many faces were selected by looking at the Info view header

Non-Adjacent Selection

I use this occasion to learn BMesh, and come up with this script:

import bpy
import bmesh

obj = bpy.context.object
prev_mode = obj.mode
bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode='OBJECT')
bm = bmesh.new()
bm.from_mesh(obj.data)

bm.faces[0].select = True
selected_edges = list(bm.faces[0].edges)
for face in bm.faces:
    sl = [(edge in selected_edges) for edge in face.edges]
    if any(sl):
        continue
    selected_edges.extend(face.edges)

    face.select = True
print('*' * 10)

bm.to_mesh(obj.data)
bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode=prev_mode)

Unlike Checker Deselect mentioned by @CoDEmanX, it only selects less than half of the faces in an icosphere. I think those strips can't be selected without breaking the non-adjacency requirement:


How to use masking to hide an object I need help creating an eyeball for my steve.
How do I go about hiding the part of the eyeball that went out of the white area?
I had a guess it's about masks, but I have no idea how to implement it.

Thanks

You can give your eye cube a Boolean modifier. Create a second cube with a hole in it that is as big as your eye white area, make it invisible in the viewport and in render (Properties panel > Viewport Display > Dsiplay As > Wire and disable the camera icon in the Outliner), give your eye cube a Boolean modifier, mode > Difference, with the hole cube as Object. Now when you move your eyecube, the part that crosses the hole cube will be invisible:


shortest_path_select() does not work I have a List (verts_index_list) of 2 numbers that represents the index of 2 vertices. My goal is to collapse all vertices that are on the shortest path between those 2 Vertices. I looked in the blender api and saw that there is a function shortest_path_select() that should do what I want. So I wrote :

for v in verts_index_list:
    mesh.vertices[v].select = True
bpy.ops.mesh.shortest_path_select()
bpy.ops.mesh.edge_collapse()

but it does not work. The terminal prints the following warning :

  Warning: Path selection requires two matching elements to be selected

I don't understand... I selected exactly 2 vertices ([v for v in mesh.vertices if v.select] gives me 2 Elements). So my question is: Do I have to update something before calling shortest_path_select?

It works when I uses a BMesh instead of a Mesh type. When I uses the select_set(True) from BMVerts, the shortest_path_select() works fine.


How to implement custom icons for my script/addon? Is it possible to use different icons other than the default set and how?

Since 2.75 the python API allows for custom icons.
You can store custom icons and load them with bpy.utils.previews.ImagePreviewCollection class, which works like a dictionary.
First let's create such icon dictionary:
import bpy.utils.previews
icons_dict = bpy.utils.previews.new()

Next, we need to find path to our icons. Its best to put them inside a folder named 'icons' next to the script file:
import os
# this will work for addons
icons_dir = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), "icons")
# but it won't give you usefull path when you opened a file in text editor and hit run.
# this will work in that case:
script_path = bpy.context.space_data.text.filepath
icons_dir = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(script_path), "icons")

Finally load icon.png into the dictionary. Blender uses 32x32 icons in UI:
icons_dict.load("custom_icon", os.path.join(icons_dir, "icon.png"), 'IMAGE')

Reference the icon by it's ID, use like this inside UI elements:
icon_value=icons_dict["custom_icon"].icon_id

It's best to handle loading of icons in the register function, clearing the icons in unregister function, and storing them in a global variable.
If enabled as an addon the filepath of __init__.py is the module variable __file__ in __init__.py and as shown can be converted to a directory path using os.path.dirname(__file__) to get the path to my_addon
Make an add-on with multiple python files to keep our addon's icons neatly contained in our addon's folder.
my_addon/
    __init__.py
    icons/
        icon.png

To test when running from text editor can  add an icons folder to some known path, for example the Desktop folder
Desktop/
    icons/
        icon.png

and change the code below accordingly to be its absolute path (in this example case /home/user/Desktop/), or  the saved path of the text file, or that of the blend file.
bl_info = {
    "name": "Custom Icon Test",
    "author": "Your Name Here",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 80, 0),
    "location": "View3D > UI > Tools",
    "description": "Test custom icons",
    "warning": "",
    "doc_url": "",
    "category": "Testing",
}

import os
import bpy
import bpy.utils.previews

class CUSTOM_PT_myPanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "My Icon Panel"
    bl_idname = "OBJECT_PT_custom_panel"
    bl_space_type = "VIEW_3D"
    bl_region_type = "UI"
    bl_category = "Tools"

    def draw(self, context):
        global custom_icons
        self.layout.label(text="Blender SE", icon_value=custom_icons["custom_icon"].icon_id)

# global variable to store icons in
custom_icons = None

def register():
    global custom_icons
    custom_icons = bpy.utils.previews.new()
    addon_path =  os.path.dirname(__file__)
    icons_dir = os.path.join(addon_path, "icons")

    custom_icons.load("custom_icon", os.path.join(icons_dir, "icon.png"), 'IMAGE')
    bpy.utils.register_class(CUSTOM_PT_myPanel)

def unregister():
    global custom_icons
    bpy.utils.previews.remove(custom_icons)
    bpy.utils.unregister_class(CUSTOM_PT_myPanel)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    # Test run
    # edit to folder containing your icons folder
    __file__ = "/home/user/Desktop/"
    # The path of this text (if saved)
    #__file__ = bpy.context.space_data.text.filepath
    # The path of this blend file (if saved)
    #__file__ = bpy.data.filepath
    register()

Result:


Ivygen Error when I add ivy I get the error

Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:\Users\Stephen\AppData\Roaming\Blender   Foundation\Blender\2.77\scripts\addons\add_curve_ivygen.py", line 583, in execute
IVY.grow(ob)
File "C:\Users\Stephen\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.77\scripts\addons\add_curve_ivygen.py", line 322, in grow
self.maxAdhesionDistance)
File "C:\Users\Stephen\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.77\scripts\addons\add_curve_ivygen.py", line 408, in adhesion
adhesion_vector = ob.matrix_world * nearest_result[0] - loc
TypeError: Matrix subtraction: (Matrix - Vector) invalid type for this operation

location: <unknown location>:-1

Any help?

Old question. I'm using Blender 2.79, but I had the same issue. I also didn't realize IvyGen comes pre-installed with blender; and after installing it I got this issue.

Blender doesn't overwrite plugins (at least this version - I can't vouch for 2.77, but I'd doubt it). Instead, it stores plugins in the AppData directory. I got this error, which clarifies:

After deleting the copy of the plugin from my AppData, then restarting Blender, I'm able to enable the correct copy of the plugin, and it now runs fine.

Note that, adding an ivy curve to a Blender default startup file with a cube may not appear to work immediately. This happened to me because my cursor was inside the cube, since the ivy (as when any other objects are added via Shift+A) grows from the 3D cursor's location.


Rigged hand composed of multiple meshes Very new to Blender!
I have a hand and lower arm (made in Rhino) which is composed of multiple meshes (objects).
I applied bones as shown in the image below

But, when I use the automated weight it turns out like this:

After searching around I think it might be due to the multiple meshes and possible overlaps of meshes so that Blender cant automatically weight it.
My question is then:
Would it be easier to make a hand in one big mesh, or is there a workaround for this? The fingers has cracks and holes e.g. at the joints where they are connected by screws. I guess that's what is messing up the automated weighting?
EDIT: Uploaded the .blend file if anyone wants to have a go at it.

Thanks in advance.

You need to fix the armature bones to pivot in the center of the arm's ball joints:

Select the mesh and in Edit mode (Tab) select vertices such that the 3d gizmo (the center of selection) is in center of the ball joint:

Snap the 3D Cursor to the selection: Shift S > To Selected

Select the armature object and enter Edit mode, select corresponding joint and snap it to 3D Cursor with Shift S > Selection to Cursor

Do it for every joint. You can also set the bones Roll to align bones rotation axes - place the 3D Cursor to the direction you want the bone to be aligned and Ctrl N > Cursor:

Select the mesh, then shift-select the armature and parent it with Empty bone weights(Ctrl P > With Empty Groups). Now you should see a vertex group for every bone inside mesh data properties tab.

Assign every mesh piece to it's corresponding vertex group. You can select a connected component with Ctrl L:

You are ready to animate.


Say I irreversibly deleted my camera in my scene. Could I solve for its position, given a prior 2d render of the scene? Given a still capture of a mesh, is it possible to solve for the position of the camera?

I know the camera's FoV, I just need its position and rotation.

Well you can import the previous render as a reference image and add a new camera, flatten them both out using (ctrl+R and then ctrl+G), then hop inside of your camera and raise it above your image until it fills out the camera borders correctly, and then lastly parent the image to the camera and turn down it's opacity.

All you would need to do from there is fly around a bit with shift+` and find your previous location. It would basically serve as an overlay guide to help you find your old position.


Render Layer showing through other Layers I have a question about render layers.
When I use the compositor to connect the layers together my first layer is always seen-through. For instance I can still see it in rendering even if the object is behind a wall and such. I'm pretty sure it is something simple that I'm missing so any help would be well appreciated

Screenshot of compositor:

I've tried fiddling around with different nodes but nothing seems to work

Screenshot showing issue:

Apparently after fiddling with the scene properties I somehow got it to work, by giving the layer that the object was on a mask layer and then ticking 'all Z' the objects stopped showing through other things. Thank you all for your help on this


Preferences Shuts Down Blender I am trying to simply change some preferences, but each time I click on "User Preferences", Blender just turns itself off. I can't make any adjustments, and am missing out on functionality as a result. Could you help me understand why this is happening and what to do, as I have attempted to uninstall and reinstall Blender several times to avoid this problem, but have been unsuccessful.

Sincerely,

Cole

You probably have outdated drivers, please try updating your drivers, or you could try going into user preferences by changing 3d view-port window to user preferences


How do I make the ends shorter? I was following this tutorial, up to the part where I had to make the bottom end shorter, but the faces keep overlapping when I'm trying to shorten them. Am I doing something wrong or is that how it's supposed to be?

your faces may keep overlapping if you're moving geometry by extruding, E to extrude when you want to CREATE new geometry but use G (optional: and then an axis (x,y,z)) to only move the geometry you currently have (and have selcted).
I hope you found this helpful :) and good luck on your project!
Blender can be confusing at first but it's well worth the struggle, don't give up!


Render layers added back in order after applying glow in compositor I've just had my first attempt at applying glow in the compositor using different render layers.

When I try and apply the layers back together however there is a drastic effect happening that I have no idea how to correct.

As you can see, the eyes are now popping out from behind the eye sockets.

I have been following Andrew Price's Introduction to Blender's Compositor tutorial but cannot seem to get the eyes to sit inside the sockets where they are supposed to be.

As it turns out, It seems looking back at this that the whole way I went about adding the glow to the eyes only was ineffective.

This question Highlights a much better solution to give the material a separate index pass and using ID Mask then apply the glow directly to the eyes.


Wrong fps when importing footage I use blender as my main video editor but I haven't used it since last summer, during which I was very pleased with it. Lately I tried using it again but it seems like it is not detecting that my footage (recorded with OBS in NVENC) is 60 frames per second. It instead shows 1000 fps with a .010 framerate base (idk what that means). Here's a screenshot of the situation

What does it mean? What could be causing this?

Thanks a whole bunch

I tried importing some footage .. and assigning them to proxy when i tried playing back the footage with the proxy enabled it freezed on first frame .. the only way i could make it work is to use full render no proxy setting .. which basically defeated the purpose of creating a proxy in the first place.. Now i don't know if they have totally changed the way the VSE handles proxies in 2.79 as opposed to how it WORKED in 2.78.. but i would be bold enough to make a general statement that in 2.78 VSE works great.. in 2.79 its effectively broken..


Parenting bones to character mesh Hi everyone ,
      I am having trouble parenting my armature to my actual character mesh. I select the mesh, shift right click on any bone in the armature and hit Ctrl P and add with automatic weights. My whole mesh is mirrored and only stretches and deforms on the mirrored side Hand but everything else is completely fine and functional. Any help would be appreciated thanks.

Blend:

The problem is that your rest pose is different from your pose position. To fix this:

Switch to Pose Mode
Select all Bones with A
Hit Space bar
Select Apply Pose as Rest Pose
Switch to object Mode
Select Your mesh first then select the armature using Shift+Right Mouse Click
Hit Ctrl+P then choose Automatic Weighting and this will fix your problem as shown below


How can I move separate edges towards each other at the same time? I know I can move each edge separately pressing the G and then the Y keys but how can I move
the edges toward each other at the same time?

After the edge move it would look something like this.

They seem to be aligned along the world x axis, so with the selection shown, hit S, Y and move the mouse. Pressing 0  will make them form one line through their exact center, which should be the x-axis.
If they are not aligned to a world axis, switch the transform orientation to normal first, edges have normals, too, they are not as reliable as the ones of faces, but more often than not, they get the job done.


Why does the right leg's bone in my rig move when I move the left? For some reason, when I moved the left leg's bone, the right leg has also moved and the bone of the right leg doesn't control anything at all.

I think this is because I used Mirror to make the model, but I'm not sure I'm a complete beginner.

Most likely, this is a Weight Painting issue.
You may have some spill-over weight that reaches to the other side of your model.

To check for this, go into Weight Paint Mode and go through the Vertex Groups on one side, one by one. Check for weights on the other side of the symmetry line. You can make this visually easier, by choosing Show Active Weights > Active. With this, vertices that are not in the selected Vertex Group are shown in black.

I would suggest Normalizing your weight beforehand so that the colors you see correspond to the actual weights on the vertices.

If you don't know exactly why there would be a difference, watch this rigging tutorial. He goes into detail on the hows and whys: DanPro Skinning Basics on Youtube The series is very good.

After taking a look at your file, I discovered that your bone-naming is incorrect. However you mirrored your weights over, you ended up with one empty set (no weights at all) and one that has the weighting of both sides.

A tip for the future: if you use a Mirror-Modifier on your mesh while building it, you can leave that on through the weight painting phase and it will transfer your weight groups over automatically. That saves a lot of work. The only caveat is that vertex paint will only work on the side that has the actual geometry, not the one with the virtual vertices.

If you take a look at your bones or vertex groups, there is a series of .R leg bones. These should, of course, have their corresponding .L bones.

To fix this, I would suggest removing one half of the rig and mirroring the remaining half over a second time.

If your character was aligned head to tail with the Y-Axis, you could use the symmetrize function, since it is not, you need to do a bit more manual work.

To achieve this, you can do the following:

Go through your right side Vertex Groups and make sure the weight in them is only influencing the right side. Remove all other weight. If you have Show Active Weight on (see above) then the rest of the mesh should be black.
Delete the bones with the number suffix.
Put the 3D-Cursor on the X-Axis (Shift + S > Snap Cursor to Center)
Make sure your transformation origin is at the 3D-Cursor-
Select the bones you need to mirror, for the dinosaur those would be the arms and legs.
Hit Ctrl + M followed by Y to mirror along the Y-Axis
Correct your bone naming from .R to .L
With your bones in place, all that is left is to mirror the existing Vertex Groups over to the other side. There is a detailed guide to do this.

Here is a link to your file, I mirrored your weights over


How to overlap between centers of edges while maintaining the uv shapes? I want to overlap the center of the bottom edge of the rectangle uv with the center of the top edge of the square uv.
How can I achieve this using Blender's uv editing tools?

I came up with a way to use the faces of scale 0.


Why aren't my driver values updating? I am currently in the process of retouching an older character of mine with a new rig i made, however, mid-way through attaching the old parts onto the new rig, the drivers on the new rig that controll the IK/FK switching stopped updating their driver values. How do i fix it?

Never mind, I just needed to raise the value a little bit...


Paint particles from texture I have black-white image which I use to generate particles and now I want to make particle colors similar to the original image (3). So in the end where should be some particles in color blue, some in green etc.. Is it possible to do this?

You can do this in cycles also, when using the UV coordinate texture node, make sure to click 'from dupli'


How to grid-fill a spiral In my newest project I've made a line spiraling downwards in the shape of a sphere, as seen below:

You can also see how I started to fill the gaps with faces, this was done by manually picking every edge and adding a face.

So I was wondering: is there any other way to quickly fill all the gaps?

Thanks for reading!

There is an addon called F2 (comes bundled with Blender by default) which could speed this up.

To enable the addon go to File > User Preferences > Addons (or Ctrl+Alt+U) and search for F2 and enable it.

Once enabled, this addon adds two new functions to the F key, one of which should speed up your workflow considerably (the other is described here).  Just create the first face of the spiral, then select the inside edge of the new face and hit F to create a new face along the spiral.  Then keep pressing F until you have filled the spiral.


Modify object's geometry after animation has been applied I have just made some animation on object (applied some Rot, Scale, Transform keys on different frames so object is performing motion) and suddenly it is understood that object must have some other proportions (a little bit more). The question is: how to change geometry of such an object without affecting (remove, change or other actions) all animation keys?

One trick you can use is to parent it to an Empty object. Any transformation to an object will affect any other object parented to it, compounding their own transformation without needing to change any single keyframe. And an Empty is the simplest to setup as the parent, for such purpose.