Leftover vertices after parenting to bone - mouth/eyeballs not rigged I took a humanoid mesh off the internet to use as a character model. I also have a custom humanoid skeleton. I lined up the skeleton to the mesh, then I parented the mesh to the bones. The rig looks fine, except for some leftover vertices that are exactly from:

The character's eyeballs/eyelashes
The character's lips
Some buttons on the character's jacket

These vertices stay in place while the rest of the mesh poses perfectly fine.

As far as I know, the humanoid mesh is 1 Blender "object" - the same mesh. So I'm surprised that those specific vertices aren't weighing to any bone at all. Any ideas as to why these very specific pieces of the mesh aren't parenting? I tried cleaning the mesh up with Remove Doubles for vertices, but that didn't fix my problem.

Thanks in advance.

You often need to make some corrections once you've parented, typically with independent meshes like eyes, button, etc...

The classic way to fix this is to switch your armature to Pose mode and switch your object to Weight Paint mode then to select the bone to which you want to assign the button/eye, and paint this zone with the brush. Don't forget to deactivate the Limit Selection To Visible option, button on the right of the header menu.

You can also assign the vertices you want to the vertex group they are supposed to be part of in the Properties panel > Data > Vertex Group... When you've parented With Automatic Weights it has automatically created vertex groups and given them the name of the bone that controls them. If you want to add some vertices to a group, select those vertices in your mesh, select the group in the list and press the Assign button.


How to key out an object in a video? I've keyed out the green screen in my video although I have an object in the background (circled in red) that I would like to 'key out' also. How do I achieve this? I want to add a background to the video without the furniture in the way.
I've looked at other similar questions here but I don't understand how the nodes work due to a mixture of it not being up to date with the current blender and also my lack of understanding.
--I'm using the Composition workspace.

This video helped me with rotoscoping:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hppbUi2i74


Method to animate a stroke along a curve I am trying to create an effect like the moving map in Indiana Jones or the trace of a CRT oscilloscope.   I would like to set up a few curves and have a stroke appear along the curve at a constant rate relative to the length of the curve.  If I could lock an object to the head of the curve that would be optimal.

Add a Bezier Curve and set it to the required path using subdivide to add points as required. Click the green curve (1) on the properties panel and then the Geometry drop down (2).
In the Bevel section leave the type at Round then increase the Depth (3) slightly. Click to open Start & End Mapping (4) and set both Factor Start and End to 0.
Go to the first frame in the timeline. Right-click on Factor Start and select 'Insert Keyframe'. The dot after the Factor Start entry (6) will change to a diamond shape.
Go to your required end frame on the timeline, set Frame Start to 1 and click the diamond to add a key frame. Run the animation.


Very odd geometry when using solidify modifier I made half of this NES cartridge shell and as you can see from the screenshot it has created all kinds of odd shapes that do not reflect my mesh.  I tried remove doubles, triangulate, and flip normals but nothing seems to work.  How can I fix it to look like the mesh?

Here's the look in object mode:

Here's the mesh:

I have attached the .blend

Ok, so I looked at your model and everything seems to be plain wrong:

you add triangulate modifier at the end of the modifier stack, that does literally nothing to help the situation - order of execution is important
topology is just wrong - overlapping vertex and faces

two solidify modifiers, two boolean modifiers (one unused)
ngons that just can't solidify properly
also boxes inside that cut have inverted normals (that doesn't affect the solidifiy modifier, but just so you know)

This is how your topoly looks like with your modifier stack:

One important note: solidify modifier after boolean is very likely to give you weird results.

You need to learn how to model simple shapes like this without booleans, I'm guessing it would take you less time than you spent trying to fix this solidify result.

You generally took the right path: simple shapes, then add (but not apply!) modifiers (like solidify, bevel, subsurface etc.) is a good way to model things like that - it really helps with quick modeling and further editing. But you must start off with clean topology.


How to properly export into .obj and .mtl file I'm writing a very simple program in OpenGL, and thus I'm not a blender expert.

I found  nice 3d model here : http://tf3dm.com/3d-model/crysis-2-nanosuit-2-97837.html
and I'd like to export it as .obj  file with proper .mtl mapping (map_Kd, map_Bump,  map_Ks)

So I want it to be looking somehow like this .mtl file http://learnopengl.com/data/models/nanosuit.rar

The second link is taken from the tutorial, where the Tutorial-Writer already made some exporting but hadn't tell what kind of (how to do it).

Thank you in advance for help, links and all the advice :)

Are you having trouble exporting in general, or exporting that specific material?

In general with Blender, the .mtl export settings are in the .obj exporter. Check the Write Materials box to have Blender generate an .mtl with your .obj.


How to make a "reflective tape" material in cycles? How can I make a cycles material that gets very bright when a light is shown on it, yet still has normal colors?
I'm talking about the "Retroreflective sheeting" that can be seen on road signs, the tape on big trucks (like in the image below), traffic barricades and clothing.

Image by TollGroup on  wikimedia commons

This reflective stuff has a interesting property where the colors show up perfectly well, but when exposed to a light source they seem to reflect much more light the normal. This site has lots of good reference images.

I have tried different combinations of glossy and diffuse shaders, but none work as I have yet to get the super bright reflections.

How can cycles make a material that reflects so much light, and keeps the colors correct?

Such a material works by reflecting the incoming light back towards the direction it originated - since your car headlights are very close to your own line of sight, you see a strong reflection of your own lights. You can replicate this behaviour in a material by simply manipulating the surface Normal in a Glossy shader that can then be mixed into any other shaders on the material - as shown :

The key here is to connect the Geometry Incoming socket to the Normal of the Glossy shader so that any reflections occur back towards the source. You can manipulate the Roughness to control how sharp the reflection is (ie, roughness of zero would reflect all light direct back to the source but a slight roughness will spread it out, to allow it to be visible (but fainter) at wider viewing angles) - and so how close to the light souce line of sight the viewer must be to allow them to see its reflection.

Any light source close to the line of sight of the camera will now strongly reflect back and make the material appear to 'glow' with respect to other (non-reflective) materials. You can vary the Color of the Glossy node to affect the color of the reflection.

Example showing one reflective cube and one 'normal' cube :


Sphere with curved faces or sphere of spheres I'm very new to Blender, so I think this should be an easy question to answer, but after a few hours of Googling and experimenting, I'm no closer to a solution.

I'm trying to model a blastula for 3D printing. You can google "blastula" if you're unfamiliar, but essentially I need to create a hollow ball of cells, or more simply, a sphere made of spheres. I've been able to approximate this using the methods described under "Creating a spherical array," but I can't figure out how to join the individual spheres and/or remove the overlapping vertices on the inside (for printing). I've had success using BoolTool to merge a few individual spheres, but I can't figure out how to create the blastula as a whole.

Alternatively, if there's a way to simply curve/extrude each face on a sphere such that it resembles a partial sphere itself, that may be easier, but I have no idea how to go about that. Sorry in advance if this is poorly phrased, like I said I'm very new to Blender and still learning the terminology. Thanks!

Metaballs?

An Icosphere and a Metaball..

Icosphere Object Properties > 'Instancing' > set to 'Vertex'
Metaball parented to Icosphere

Icosphere (search) > 'Make Instances Real'

Metaball ..  Object menu > 'Convert To' .. mesh
An outside face selected, Ctrl L all outside selected
Ctrl I all inside selected, and deleted

The result is manifold, and printable. It can be tweaked to a reasonable degree .. eg Alt S fattened.. and/or Ctrl V > Vertex Smoothed..

You might need to poke a hole in it somewhere, and give it a Solidify modifier to make it hollow and drainable,it depends on your printing method..

EDIT: The above example, was only adjusting the radius and stiffness of the metaball instances. Thanks to @GTD.. an improvement.

For more flexibility, after making the instances real, before conversion to a mesh, in Object Mode, you can add another metaball with a larger radius in the same family. Left to right: the original family-base  metaball, 'Mball', its instances, and the new, larger metaball, 'Mball.xxx' The new metaball is not an instance of 'Mball', so can be edited independently, but is a member of the family.

After placing it at the same location as the instances, you can adjust it to fill any gaps between them, and after conversion to a mesh, the interior is clean.


Why does the X rotation on my shape key driver go negative when I'm rotating on the Z axis? As the title says, when I rotate the bone on the Z axis, there is a certain point where the X rotation in my driver for said bone goes from a 100 degrees to -79 degrees.

This is a very strange issue that can be easily recreated in both blender 2.80 and 2.79.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Here is a link to the blend file - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1k0ILPeLmbjhEMrdR95M9O262BYOqDPxk/view?usp=sharing

Your confusion derives by two different axis orientations: you did rotate the whole armature (an object which contains only one bone, but they could be more), while the expected result should be achieved rotating only one bone (in pose mode, not in object mode).

In my picture I turned on axis rapresentations, the big ones are referred to the object (the whole armature, that should not be rotated); the little ones are thoose of the single bone. As the two axis system are not aligned, you can see that a rotation on the Z axis of the whole object while it's tilted even on X and Y axis causes a negative rotation on the X axis of the bone.

I also find this system a little confusing, but this is how it works, start rotating bones in pose mode and keep bones axis turned on in viewport display properties to get used to it; drivers are a great resource once you master them!


Texture mapping landscape I have a landscape, with roads, hills, mountains, rivers and lots of little details, everything is modelled by hand.

Is there an easy way to produce UV maps for such landscape? I've tried different kinds of unwrapping, but all of them produce severely skewed UVs.

The easiest way I found is to use Project from View, but I have to manually scale and adjust texture maps, which is very tedious.

Here is an example: I have to manually move vertex UVs to make them line up with the road texture.

You can use the 3d View combined with the already unwrapped UV to paint the texture. The relevant part is:

  Paint the mesh in the 3D View, and let Blender use the currently selected UV map to update the UV Texture ("Projection Painting")

To do that, you first need to unwrap your object which you have done. Nice!

Second, you need to switch into texture paint mode

You will see on the right panel a message that says "Missing Data" You don't have anything to paint on yet! Select "Add Paint Slot" and choose Diffuse Color

From here you will be prompted to choose a size of the canvas, and to name it. I suggest you start with 2048 as it is easier to scale down than scale up. If you need to get up close and personal with your road, use a higher resolution.

We're almost at the fun part!

if you go to your properties window, you can see that a new material has been added to your object. Great! But, its all black. Not so great. To fix that we need to navigate one more tab to the right and see the Textures Tab.

Cool! I have renamed this base texture (the Canvas) as DiffuseRoad because we are building a road. However, we need another texture to paint ON to our canvas. To do this, select the texture box below and choose "New Texture". Open your road texture image in this texture and name it something useful: In my case, I only have assets of wood so I chose my wood texture and named it "PaintTexture" because thats what we will be doing with it!

From here, return to your side bar and select the "texture" red/white checker icon. Choose your texture, in my case "PaintTexture"

Now paint directly onto your 3d model! You should probably adjust the strength to 1 instead of .5, unless you do plan on mixing with a few textures. If you do need more textures, just go back to your Textures tab and add some more the same way as previously and select them.

Now select the DiffuseRoad texture that was created for us and choose it to be our UV Background, that way as you paint your model you can see in real time how your UV will look.

Once you are happy with how you have painted your model, be sure to save the UV as a separate image so you don`t lose it!


How to view object in edit mode without global transformation? I am new to blender here. I have a mesh object that is globally transformed (rotate, scale, translate). I want to manipulate the object in a mode such that I can see it in its default form (0 rotation, 0 translation, and 1 scale). I wonder if I can view an object in its default form in edit mode while keeping the global transformation?

The only way that comes to mind is to not transform the object directly, but through another object (eg: an empty), using a "copy transform" constraint.

Disabling/enabling the constraint shows the object in its initial state (disabled), or in the transformed state (enabled)


Can you stop the shadow from fading? I applied transparent because I wanted the roof to be transparent.
But even the shadows fade.
I want the roof shadow to be the same as the column shadow.

To make the roof transparent (or semi-transparent as you have it) but opaque in the shadows you can use the Ray Depth output of the Light Path node.
But, this gives you a value of 0 or 1 which in your case means your roof will be completely invisible but have a shadow, because for the camera the Mix Shader is using a factor of 0 (fully transparent) and for the shadow 1, so the Toon BSDF is only used to create the shadow.
So in order to keep it semi-transparent when the Ray Depth is 0, you can take a Math node to add the desired mix factor to this result, for example 0.6 as you are using here. Then to the camera the Mix Shader is set to 0.6 (semi-transparent) and 1.6 for the shadow (a value larger 1 is fully opaque). To avoid out-of-range values you could enable Clamp in the Math node but it's not necessary in this case.
My example (I just used a simple Diffuse instead of Toon):


Modeling a cylindrical object to resemble an image reference I'm trying un-successfuly to model the cylinderical shape in the reference image. I tried simple deform, But that results in pinching artifacts. unlike basic circle model. Please how can I make it the right way? With right workflow. Thanks

1- Model the main object and the shape to use for Boolean modifier.

2- Select the main object, in Modifiers panel, add a Boolean modifier, assign the object you want to extract under (Object) in Boolean modifier.

3- Choose Difference as the Method, then Apply the modifier.
4- Delete the extraction object or move it to another layer.

The disadvantage of this method is that it'll create Ngons, yet since this a radial symmetrical object, you can model 1/8th of the object first, use the Boolean modifier and apply it, fix the Ngons by connecting vertices using J or using knife tool K, then copy rotate it 45 degrees, in order to get the whole object.


How can I scale a set of vertices to the size of another set of vertices? I have a mesh that is shaped like a frame. Basically I cut a hole in a plane by selecting knife project in edit mode.

Now I would like to animate this mesh with the help of shape keys. I want to take the four inner vertices and scale them up so they are in the exact same position as the outer ones (effectively making the frame disappear). Scaling itself is not the problem but I cannot figure out a way to scale it just the right amount. Unfortunately I can only manipulate the position values individually (in the pane to the right) but not the scaling. Does anyone know of a way to do this?

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

In the begining, create shape keys you'll use for animation (as NoviceInDisguise suggested, thanks):

Then, in Edit mode you select the vertices you'd like to scale. To not mess up pivot center, select only vertices located on one plane. Turn on snap during transform with Shift + Tab, set the Pivot Point to the median with Ctrl+<:

In this case you don't need to remove doubles, and now it's possible to use shape key, created before. In Object mode drag the slider and test how it works:


Using Animation Node to get modified mesh I'm currently using Animation Nodes to check a mesh and see if any vertices lie within that mesh. This all works well. However if I am doing an animation and modify an object using armatures only the original mesh is seen by Animation Nodes, not the modified mesh. The original object is parented to the armatures using "Armature Deform with Automatic Weights" . Is there a way in Animation Nodes to get the modified mesh into Animation Nodes rather than the original mesh.

Check "use modifiers" in the "mesh object input" node:


Smooth vertices with snapping I'm trying my first ever retopology of a high-poly triangle mesh to a low-poly quad mesh. I'm using a combination of of Bsurfaces and snap-to-face on my target mesh:

As a tidying step, I'd like to smooth the vertices of my new low-poly mesh. The "Smooth Vertex" tool doesn't honor the snap-to-face setting, so gives results like this:

Is there a tool that can smooth vertices, while staying snapped to the source mesh?

It would be easier for You to use Shrinkwrap modifier on the lower poly mesh and make high poly mesh its target. This way no matter what you do, vertices will stick to high poly mesh surface. I usually also check "keep above the surface" option and make Offset something higher then 0, but it's not crucial.


Is a smaller object better for the framerate I was wondering if having a smaller object would cause the frames to drop less when animating and if so what are the drawbacks.
I have a background that is really big so i decided to ask this to know how to keep the frame rate from dropping too low.

i am using blender render to do this and i am using a castle as the background.
i just used the scale button to make the background bigger so i would not have to constantly scale down the characters that go in it.
i have used a few methods of making the frame rate higher such as using simplify and turning off shadows.

Having a large mesh zoomed out would be almost exactly the same as a scaled down mesh zoomed in. The scaling usually doesn't effect framerate, the complexity of the objects and amount of objects on screen are the two big things that effect the playback rate. If you're having trouble with playing back at the framerate you want, try putting things in different layers and working on each piece separately, then render them all together.


How to extrude inside mesh while keeping relative proportions from edges I can select the mesh letter I, extrude it on the X axis and scale it inward to create an edge around it.

When I do the same process with the mesh letter O, the result is this:

I would like to be able to create an identical inward edge that is inside the larger object, not only on the letter O but on any other mesh object.

How can I do this?

And how can I get rid of the face behind the newly extruded edge?

EDIT: I tried insetting but the mesh letter O looks like this:

Select all internal Edges and delete them.

Select whats left (two circles should left) and press Ctrl+E and choose Bridge Edge Loops.

Press I and Inset is working fine also you will have neat topology.


Single image texture is not rendering correctly The problem is that when I render the image, the single image view texture seems like it getting scaled on the Z axis. It looks fine in the Cycles render preview. I UV unwrapped the cup and it seems to work fine up until the final render.

I am not sure what I am doing wrong.

Oh I found it! It was because I was applying a Subdivision Surface Modifier to the render, but not in the preview


How do I make the cubes up and down on the y axis following the curve and without rotating? How do I make the cubes up and  down on the y axis following the curve and without rotating with the same space distribuition?

I used beziercurve and clamp to do this.


Rendering multiple objects in the same environment This is a basic (beginner) scene management question.
I'd like to produce a series of renders. Each contains a different set of objects, but they are all made out of the same set of materials and should all be lit and shot in exactly the same way.
I think the way to do this is to create multiple scenes in the same blend file. (Though if I'm wrong, and that's not the best way, please tell me.)
What I want to achieve is that certain things are the same across every scene (e.g. the lights and camera, the materials, objects that are part of the background, the compositing nodes, etc.), and if I change any of those things it will update all of the scenes automatically. But other things (the actual objects I'm modelling) should be unique to a single scene and not affect the others.
I guessed that the way to do this would be to create an "environment" scene, and then create linked copies of that for every object I want to model. I imagined I would then be able to add new objects to these linked copies without affecting the original, and that I would still be able to change the lighting, background etc. by editing the 'environment' scene.
However, it seems not to work like that. If I add an object to one of the linked copies, that object appears in the environment scene as well, and hence in all the other scenes. I don't seem to be able to add or delete an object from one scene without also affecting it in the others.
This leaves me a bit puzzled. It seems odd to be able to create linked copies of scenes if there isn't also some way to partially unlink them. Is there a way to add an object to the new scene only, without also changing the original? Or is there a better way to achieve what I'm trying to do? I imagine it's quite a common thing to do, but the documentation for scenes is rather sparse, and good explanations of the system are hard to find.

Not sure if this is what you're trying to get but can't you put each set of objects as a collection and have the environment on a separate collection then you can just disable rendering of all collections but keep the environment and the set that you want to be rendered .


How would I unwrap this? So I'm new to Blender and have created an old tv. Its looking pretty good but I'm having trouble turning it into a net so I can texture it. I'm not sure which parts I need to mark as seams. I've attached some images so if you guys could help me, that' d be great.

http://imgur.com/a/7PdfI

Tutorials are outside the scope of this site. There are lots of good tutorials on YouTube. Just search for "Blender UV Mapping" or "UV unwrap" or "Blender mark seams" and you'll find lots of good information.

To avoid being pedantic, I'll try to give you some kind of answer.

Think of it like a papercraft TV or like you're unfolding a cardboard box. The things you should mark as seams are those places where you'd have two different edges coming together, instead of a fold. You could theoretically mark everything as a seam, and have lots of individual components to texture, but it's typically better to have as few separate pieces as you can manage. Or at least to separate it into pieces that make sense (glass, plastic, etc.).

I hope that at least gets you started.


doing animation in one laptop and render it in another is this possible? I had made a big animation in my laptop but now the problem is the process of rendering, I can't render in my laptop because it is 2GB RAM. So is it possible to copy it in another laptop and render it?

Of course, if you use image textures make sure to also copy them in a folder, or even simpler: pack them all into your blend file with File > External Data > Pack All Into Blend.


Extruding surface while keeping the shape here is the picture of what I would like to get(example nr. 2). I need the edge frame to be same in width and length. Also the extrusion is on surface (without depth) I tried extruding region, but it did not give me the result I wanted.
 I know I could just adjust the scale and do it manually, but that would be eyeballing without achievign accuracy. I would like to know if it is possible to extrude or inset while keeping the shape (even edge space)

Inset the face

Go into edit mode. Select the face. right-click
Press I to inset the face.

OR

Press W to open the Specials menu.
From the Specials menu, choose Inset Faces. I

OR

PressCtrl+F to open the Faces menu.
From the Faces menu, choose Inset Faces. I

OR

Choose Mesh > Faces > Inset Faces from the edit mode menu.


How can I sharpen the light fall off for a rotating earth animation with 2 materials? Intermediate level question. I have been following Andrew Price's excellent tutorial on "How to make Earth". I have managed to "create" earth, and render as a static image. I have returned to this tutorial and am now producing an animation where the earth rotates, and then as the earth faces the sun the night time material falls away sharply revealing day-time earth. I'm not sure if this is still the right approach to rendering animations vs static image renders.

I have been trying to use vector normals in the node editor which allows me to, sort of, produce the effect. The problem is that the fall off is not sharp enough. Here is the nodes setup for the "Earth" sphere. I have added a vector normal to the night time material to create fall off but this is not working as I thought it would. The effect is half way there, but still not right.

The node setup for earth looks like this. (It's in the blender file to).

The challenge is to setup nodes, so that as the earth spins, the night time material falls off sharply on the horizon, and the day time material becomes visible as light hits the sphere. The outliner shows the basic structure of concentric spheres named : earth, atmosphere, and clouds.

You will need to download the image textures and install them in your own local location and re-connect in the node editor for "earth". Some pointers from the blender experts out there would help a lot in my understanding of nodes, especially the vector normals and if it's applicable here, so please "have at it!".

Earth Blender file here.

In the tutorial, the "earth" has a lighter falloff. I think what might be allowable is to add a couple more lights in the scene, one a low-brightness hemisphere, and one a sort of blueish light. This, if applied right, could produce a similar result in an animation.


Any way to use the timeline markers as input list? Basically, I have a phrase and want to add a letter every time a marker is met.

i.e. every time a letter is hit while writing a message.

Is It possible to do something like this using the animation nodes?

I found out that the path for them is bpy.context.scene.timeline_markers but don't know how to mix the things together.. ^^"

First, we should get the frames at which the markers are set, to do this, we can use this list comprehension:

[marker.frame for marker in bpy.context.scene.timeline_markers]

Which returns the frames at which the markers were set:

Next, I am going to subtract the current frame from this list, now all the markers that have frame values less than the current frame will have negative values. If I max the output with zero, all the values that were negative will become zero. If I "not" (Invert) the result, all zeros becomes ones and non zeros becomes zeros. If I sum all the values of the output, I will get the number of markers that are before or at the current frame. I can now use this output in a Trim Text Node to show the characters:

Which results in:


I am having issues subsurf-ing my object, part of it is deformed This is my object:

As you can see, the right side has a weird protrusion, and where the project meets the mirror, it seems to kind of go up rather than remain flat.

Which version of blender are you using?  I downloaded your blend file to 2.78c, and it does not show the problem.  Having just finished that tutorial myself, as far as I can tell, your mesh is correct.


How can I extrude two faces? How can i make the hole in the letter

Add a mesh of the cutout(orange piece), enter it in the place want to be cut out, add a boolean modifier to the main mesh(letter),(its already at difference from default), click the eyedropper and select the mesh cutout(orange), apply the modifier and move away the mesh cutout(orange) to get a result you want.


Improving / increasing the quality of line-art of SVG file (blend file included) My goal is to export the image as an SVG then convert it to an EPS using Inkscape.  But the SVG line-art isn't well defined and the SVG file is blank how can I improve / fix this?  I included the blend file below.

I also tried saving it as a PNG file and doing a trace bitmap within Inkscpe but I had the problem of the lines not being well defined.

PS: I'm using Blender 2.82a.  I'm also willing to try a different process if someone knows of one.

Also this is how I made it.
https://youtu.be/rTVzdthjE5Q

  Update:1
  I made the changes Jachym Michal suggested in the comments and made the Crease Angle 180.  see attached image below.  The edge lines still aren't "sensitive / isn't what I expected" they don't follow the edges of the image.

You can mark edges manually to render them using Freestyle.
But the 'mosaic parts' still needs to be image traced outside of Blender.

Select Edges you want drawn in Freestyle
Go Edge > Mark Freestyle Edge
enable Edge Marks in Freestyle Line Set.


Stop rendering each time camera is moved or anything else is modified For some reason I managed to make the camera render every time I move it to a new position, move an object, modeling or whatever. I want the camera to ONLY render when I hit F12. What have I done wrong?

Well, it sounds like you have your 3DView set to display rendered

try changing it to one of the other settings and see if that fixes the issue.

The only other place I can think of to check is the 'autorender' button in the compositor.
try unchecking-that and see if it then only updates the render layer when you hit F12.


Can't edit beziercurve, handles are not visible Using blender 2.90.1 i'm trying to make a knot using a bezier curve.
Suddenly I can no longer edit my bezier curve. In edit mode the handles are not shown (see screenshot).
My overlays are turned on and I restarted blender multiple times without a succes. I also tried copy pasting in a new blender file but this also didn't help.
Can someone please tell me what I'm doing wrong?
Edit: here is the blend file:

As John Eason and Nathan said in the comments: unhiding in selection mode solves the problem.
In case others have the same problem here is how to solve it:
first select your bezier curve, then go to edit mode and press A to select everything. To unhide press Alt + H


How can I simplify or resample a Bezier curve? When I use the Grease Pencil to draw out quick curves in the 3D Viewport, and then convert the pencil to a Bezier curve, the result is always consisting of very dense geometry and handles which are not aligned very well:

too many control points:

strange concept of handle alignment

Is there a Tool / Addon which can simplify these curves, so they become more smooth, and easier to control afterwards?

You can simplify the curves with an addon called Simplify Curves that can be found and enabled in the settings.

When the addon is enabled you need to select the curve that you want to simplify, then hit Space bar button and type simplify curves in the search field.

Once you selected the function, by bringing operator menu with F6 button or in the operator panel you will be able to change the amount of smoothing.

Once you get the desired result, change the Shape of the curve to 3D in the Curve Settings panel.

Original:

Result:


Linking a Hi-Res & Low Res Version of a character, and controlling both with a single armature Consider a character that has a hi-res & low-res version.

How does one go about LINKING both of these versions of the character into a project, and have both controlled by a single armature.

The problem that I am having is when the make proxy function is executed, only the selected collection gets an armature, and if that is done for each collection, then there are 2 separate armatures.

If I put both resolutions into a single collection, then there is no way to switch between them once they are linked, hence defeating the purpose of having a low-res version.

Thankyou for any help, I have not been able to find an answer for this anywhere. Perhaps I am missing something or going about this the entirely wrong way =P

John

If all the objects you link to the scene are from the same project, all you have to do is go File -> Link... , browse for your project, enter it, find "Object" folder, select all the objects you need to link and press "Link" button. After that you can put each linked object to any collection by selecting it in the 3D viewport and pressing "m" button on the keyboard, or by directly dragging them to the collections in the outliner. Objects don't have to stay in the same collection with the armature to stay linked and parented to it. More to say - one object can be linked to several collections at the same time.

If your two mesh-objects are linked to the scene from the several different project files, inside those files they both have to be parented to the same armature. This means in one of those files (e.g. with high-res mesh) the armature has to be be a linked copy of the armature from another (with low-res mesh): not a separate object with the same name, bones and animation as in the first one - it has to be exactly the same armature-object, linked to the second project in the way I described in the first paragraph. To perform this you can link the armature-object from the first project to the second project, in the second project select your objects and this linked copy of armature, make sure the last one is an active object, press Ctrl+P and choose "Armature Deform".

After that you can link to the new project your low-res object and the armature from the first project and high-res object from the second project - it will be automatically linked to the armature. Then you can create collections and arrange everything as you want.

And if you want to be able to control the armature animation directly from the main project with your linked meshes from other projects parented to it, inside their projects you have to parent them to the linked copy of the armature from the main project. Hope it makes sense.


Is it possible to hide the origin's display dot of the object(the black dot) from the viewport display ? i was wondering this question. Here's the picture about that. It is that little black dot in the center. As far as i have learned it is just for displaying the center of mass. It often draws my attention and i need to hide it.

EDIT: Now possible in 2.8 and above: view Is there a way to hide all the origins in the 3D view?
In 2.7x and below it is not possible to hide only the center points. But if you need a clear view, you can activate Only Render in the Display Panel of the Properties Bar in the 3D View.

By the way the dot is not the center of mass, it is the center of transforms. (if you eg rotate the object, it will rotate around this point.) You can set the origin point to wherever you want with the weird shortcut ShiftCtrlAltC.


comparing z axis of normals I would like to sort objects faces with the Python API based on their normals, and more specifically, the orientation of the Z axis of the normals.
What would be the easiest way to do so? Comparing the normals directly does not work because I want to overlook the rotation about the z axis (that is to say, I am only interested in whether the face normal has its z axis parallel or perpendicular to the z axis of the world frame).

Thank you for helping

Here's an example that shows you what normal is parallel or perpendicular.

(I'm not sorting the list, cause you say sorting, but then only care for parallel/ perp. ?)

check the object type and if has faces
list normals, including obj world rotation + scale
compare with vector.dot so that 1/-1 are parallel, 0 is perpendicular

Note the > < 0.0001 comparison rather than == cause of the float precision issues.

from mathutils import Vector

orientZ = []

if Object is not None and getattr(Object, 'type', '') == 'MESH':
    if Object.data.polygons:
        worldZ = Vector([0, 0, 1])

        mat = Object.matrix_world
        loc = mat.to_translation()
        normals = [(mat * p.normal - loc).normalized() for p in Object.data.polygons]

        # if dot is 0, is perpendicular, 1/-1 are up, down
        for n in normals:
            dotN = n.dot(worldZ)

            if   abs(dotN) > 0.9999: orientZ.append(1)
            elif abs(dotN) < 0.0001: orientZ.append(0)
            else:
                orientZ.append(-1)

and gives a list of 1, 0, -1 for Z, perp, others

Another example is this
How can I compare normals in AN with python, doing the same, by distance compare to world XYZ axes.


How do I prevent overhangs when using subdivision modifier? I'm new to Blender so please forgive me if the question has been asked somewhere else and I have missed it on this forum. I'm trying to extrude an indent into an object and for some reason whenever I apply the subdivision modifier it gives the indent an overhang partially covering the indent. I have used loop cut and slide where I can, but some surfaces near the indent will not loop cut. What am I doing wrong, please?

Cheers
Dave

The problem is due to ngons (again), probably because of the use of a boolean modifier (again).

The faces which overlap the hole are these one, two ngons around the hole:

The aim will be to organize quad around the hole. That could be done all over the discus, but, as the other part may stay flat this is not absolutely mandatory.

These quad will be "subdivision surface" modifier resistant!

You have also added many loops around the hole, I remove it for now.

So first cleanup:

Opening the ngons
Remake the border (which is not the same as the others)
Removing the doubled vertices

Creating vertices to obtain quad in the wanted part. I only do it here in the hole concerned part... So that will create ngons around, and that's not visible so long these faces stay flat and convex.

Subdividing the edges around
Grabbing vertices along the edges to the wanted location
Connecting quads

Now when we show the modifier:

As you want it squared, we'll add some bevel in order to maintain the subdivision effect. Use CtrlB to bevel and Numpad + and Numpad - to set the amount of edges.


How do you un-triangulate a mesh? I know that you can triangulate a selected portion of a mesh in Edit Mode by hitting CtrlT. This converts all quads and n-gons into tris. How how can this be reversed, combining coplanar triangles into quads and n-gons?

You can untriangulate the selected portion of a mesh by hitting AltJ. This will only create quads so some manual cleanup may be necessary if you need n-gons. You can do this by selecting the leftover edges and hitting X and clicking Dissolve Edges.


Understanding Fluid dynamics - ridiculously large tmp folder Recently, I've received access to a high-performance PC; I wanted to check on its capability with Blender's fluid dynamics. First, I set simple system of fluid domain, fluid inflow, etc., with Final Resolution: 200, time from 0.000 to 4.000, and 1000 frames of animation. Blender told me, that it will get 770 Mb of space. After this, I made a script to run by the CLI through SSH:

import bpy
bpy.ops.fluid.bake()
bpy.ops.render.render(animation=True)

Then I ran a command:

nohup ./blender -b ../u3.blend --python script.py &

After 48 hours of computing, I received this from my tmp folder:

179G    /tmp/blender_lFkZps/

Animation looked great, though - below I present single frame:

Now for the questions.

Why the /tmp/blender_*** took so much space?
Why, even if fluid simulation had only 4 seconds - which gives 4*24=96 frames - it lasts for all 1000 frames? Does it mean that if I would change setting to 2000 frames it would be 2x slower?

Cache size

Fluid cashes are BIG. Blender must store the entire mesh (which is considerably dense at higher resolutions) for every frame.

If your fluid mesh comes out to an average of say 500K verts, well, you've seen for yourself what happens when you need to store 1000 versions of a mesh of that density.
 It only gets worse if you want to store additional data such as velocity vectors.

Instead of putting all of it in /tmp you probably want to configure this to go somewhere else by setting the path in Properties > Physics > Fluid:

Simulation time

The way blender's current fluid simulator works with time is rather confusing.

Based on my tests, it seems the fluid simulation always goes from frame 0 to the scene end frame (set in the timeline or in Properties > Render > Dimensions > Frame Range)

The start and end time settings in the fluid panel influence the speed of the simulation. If you want the fluid to move in "real time", you'll have to manually calculate how long the range from frame 0 to the scene end frame is in seconds, at the desired framerate (you can change the scene framerate in Properties > Render > Dimensions).
For 251 frames (counting from 0) at 24 frames/second, that works out to 251/24 ≅ 10.46. So, set the start time to 0 and the end time to 10.46.

Setting the start time to something other than 0 simulates up to that point, but discards prior frames and sets the fluid frame at that time to the scene frame 0. In other words, with a start time of 1 the simulation will appear to "start" one second in, but in order to do this the previous second must still be simulated behind the scenes.

All of this is made even sillier by the fact that you can also adjust the speed of the simulation much more easily with the fluid speed factor, just below the start and end time settings.

This is admittedly a spectacularly messy example of one of the darker sides of Blender's UI. The good news is that the current (ancient) fluid simulator is being replaced in one of the upcoming GSoC 2016 projects (hopefully the UI will be going too).


Why is my armature not showing in animation layout, but it shows in the default layout? How can i solve the problem caused by switching from default layout to animation layout?

Here you can see my default screen, where the armature is showing along with the sculpture of a human body.

And Here you can see my animation layout, but the armature is not showing.

Is there a setting I need to change to make it visible? if I try to unhide the pose mode, in the right side of my screen, blender tell me not yet implemented what do I have to do to solve this?

It looks like you are using Rigify and haven't created the actual rig yet. Your Blender also looks strange as there are not Layers on the header for the 3d View. With your mouse cursor over the 3d view press the ` key (above Tab) to hide/show all layers. As this may also be the case.

Go to your user settings (ctrl+alt+u) and select the File tab. Then make sure Auto Run Python Scripts is check marked.


Render not showing UV texture I have added a texture to a cube in the UV editor and it shows up fine in textured view
But when I render it there is no texture

What have I done wrong?

You need to add a material to your mesh to have it show in the render. Also, after adding a material, go to the Properties panel > Textures tab and add the texture. Don't forget to assign the UV map in Textures tab > Mapping dropdown.

See this screenshot for more details:


How to create an Edge extrusion? Is there an easy and efficient way to create an edge extrusion in a hard surface like this:

I like keeping things procedural, and as much non-destructive as possible.

If you strive for the same goals, then you can use these techniques.

Draw a curve or mesh object in the shape of the cuts you want to make, select it, then Shift-Select the mesh object and enter Edit Mode.

Under Edit Mode select all faces and use the Knife Project modifier to cut the shape into the object.

Now in your mesh mark all edges you want to use as "edge extrusions" as sharp. Ctrl+E > Mark Sharp including the ones you cut and any other you may want.

Then just use a combination of Edge Split modifier > Solifdify modifier > Bevel modifier, and you have an easy to edit object with only the desired edges with indents.


Realistic aquarium water? Does anyone have any idea on how I can create a realistic shader to emulate clear water? I am struggling because while clear water looks clear it also tends to change the color temperature of the water and there still tends to be a small amount of fine debris in the water. If anyone has any tips that would be great, I am using cycles rendering engine!
(I can share the file with anyone if you want to get a better idea)

Let's start with the water, then we'll talk about mixing in the particles.

Water

It's typical to use the glass shader for water.  This gives you the transparency, reflection, and refraction needed, but has some issues.  First, it renders too dark and too noisy, and second, setting the color ends up looking too uniform (I guess that's how I'd describe it...).

Fast Glass

To fix the first problem, I suggest using a "fast glass" shader.  It's the regular glass shader, but we make it fully transparent to any rays that we don't care about by mixing it with a transparent shader using only a few light paths as our factor.  We only want it to look like the glass shader to shadow, diffuse, and glossy rays.  This will render much faster since the water will now be invisible to any other rays (basically, invisible to most rays).

Admittedly, I don't fully understand this technique, but it has something to do with refraction being time consuming to calculate.

Colored Glass/Water

Now for color.  If you look at water, it's color gets darker as you look at deeper water.  This is because the water is absorbing light as it passes through.  This is what the volume absorption shader was made for.  Plug one into the volume input of your material output and pick a color and a density to see the light get absorbed and colored more in deeper areas than in thinner ones.

There are a few "gotchas" with the cycles volumetrics at the moment.  First, they don't work on AMD GPUs.  I think (but am not certain) that they finally work on Nvidia GPUs, and they should work on all CPUs now.  Also, they're computationally expensive, so they increase render time noticeably.  If you need to speed up renders and can't bear to cut volumetrics, google for tutorials on how to fake them.  There are a couple of good workarounds out there.

Particulate

As for the particles, you can mix your water with your particles' material using a noise texture as the factor.  Running the texture through a greater/less than node allows you to select out just some of the noise.  You'll have more control, however, if you run it through a color ramp node instead.  Basically, sliding the black level up will choose your particle density just like a greater/less than node's factor and sliding the white level closer to the black level will control how fuzzy the particles are which is something you can't do with a greater/less than node.

The only issue with this technique is that I'm not sure if the particles are distributed throughout the water, or if they're just stuck on the surface.

Demo!

Here's a screenshot of all three techniques in action!

UPDATE: Particle System

The factor mixing from above can never cause particles to show up inside a mesh in a render that uses surface rendering.  Blender and Cycles would expect you to do that by adding a particle system to the mesh.  See below for a quick one.


Curve vs. Mesh modeling I am working on a tree-like structure that could be created by either a mesh object or a series of bezier curves. Assuming that I can create the object either way, what are the pros and cons of modeling with curves vs. a mesh with respect to routine things like shading, texturing, uv mapping, rendering, etc.?

Can you please share the picture of the object you are trying to model?

One of the cons of using curves that i experienced is you cannot make the thickness randomized or uneven.. like in branches of a tree they are not the same thickness throughout. so by using curves you cannot achieve the same thing..


Baking two textures into one I need to do the following - import two different Collada-files, join them into one and combine their textures to one texture. So, the output should be one Collada file with just one texture.
I am trying to bake textures like here: How to combine two different textures into one
but get some strange result in the baked texture.
Just for example - here is the joined object with two materials (and two textures):

When i try to bake the textures I switch to the Edit mode, select everything with A, push Bake in the render menu and get the following strange baked texture:

What approach should I choose to make the correct texture and material?

I will describe the way I worked step-by-step:

Load the first and the second model
Position the models side-by-side (just like on the first screenshot)
Created a new UV Map
Created a new image in UV Image Editor with default size (1024x1024)
Created a new material for the baked textures
Went to the Texture tab with the material selected and in the material textures tab created a new texture
In the texture selected the image created in step 4
Went to the Render Tab
Switched to the Edit Mode, selected everything with A in 3D View.
In the UV Image Editor switched to the image to which I want everything to bake
Push the Bake button in the Render Tab
Got this strange result.

What I have missed?

Thanks in advance!

When objects were separate, they had their own UV maps as they should have been textured. Let's assume these are called "UVmap" as by default.
Objects had their materials, I assume they were called "Material_1" and "Material_2"; let's call the new material created esspecially for the bake as "Material_Bake".

After joining objects create new UV map and call it "UVmap_For Bake".
Make some arrangements on that new UV map so faces not overlap there (the easiest way is to press Ctrl + P with everything selected that you'd like to rearrange while in UV/Image Editor).

For "Material_1" and "Material_2" in Texture tab, Mapping scroll set Map option to "UVMap", so that the original images are mapped using original map.
For "Material_Bake" choose in Texture > Mapping > Map your new UV map "UVmap_For Bake" so that baked texture to be mapped on the both objects with arranged map:

It seems in your file "BakedMaterial" was assigned to all the model's faces, therefore others didn't affect on the final result.
The original materials should be assigned to those parts of mesh which they were created for.
After joining, you create that new material, but don't assign it to anything or you'll get circular reference in texture stack, empty result, rewritten images etc. Just create it and proceed to the next steps. You can look at 2 ways of how materials were assigned below.

It's most likely that you won't get expected result of baking in the second case.

The file below is the one with the result of incorrect baking, slightly edited. Open it, press Bake and enjoy. It'll bake generated images of one color (unfortunately your files weren't packed) into "Texture_For_Baking" texture.


How to keep a custom gizmo at the same place while changing is value? I'm using a custom gizmo with a prop, but I need it to stay at the same place.
For this, I'm trying to use the matrix_offset with a translation and the inverse value of the prop. But my problem is that it changes the scale of the gizmo.

For exemple, add a point light and run this script based on the gizmo template, and change the value of the power of the lamp :

# Example of a group that edits a single property
# using the predefined gizmo arrow.
#
# Usage: Select a light in the 3D view and drag the arrow at it's rear
# to change it's energy value.
#
import bpy
from bpy.types import (
    GizmoGroup,
)
from mathutils import (
    Matrix,
    Vector,
    )

class MyLightWidgetGroup(GizmoGroup):
    bl_idname = "OBJECT_GGT_light_test"
    bl_label = "Test Light Widget"
    bl_space_type = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'WINDOW'
    bl_options = {'3D', 'PERSISTENT'}

    @classmethod
    def poll(cls, context):
        ob = context.object
        return (ob and ob.type == 'LIGHT')

    def setup(self, context):
        # Arrow gizmo has one 'offset' property we can assign to the light energy.
        ob = context.object
        mpr = self.gizmos.new("GIZMO_GT_arrow_3d")
        mpr.target_set_prop("offset", ob.data, "energy")
        #mpr.matrix_basis = ob.matrix_world.normalized()
        mpr.draw_style = 'BOX'

        mpr.color = 1.0, 0.5, 0.0
        mpr.alpha = 0.5

        mpr.color_highlight = 1.0, 0.5, 1.0
        mpr.alpha_highlight = 0.5

        self.energy_widget = mpr

    def refresh(self, context):
        ob = context.object
        mpr = self.energy_widget
        #mpr.matrix_basis = ob.matrix_world.normalized()
        mpr.matrix_offset = Matrix.Translation(Vector((0, 0, -ob.data.energy+1 )))
        #print("mpr.scale: ", mpr.matrix_world.to_scale())

bpy.utils.register_class(MyLightWidgetGroup)

As you can see, the gizmo stay at the same place but the scale is changed and I don't know why. Is there another way to do this ?

Thanks for your help.

Find my answer. Now the gizmo is comming back it's origin:

# Example of a group that edits a single property
# using the predefined gizmo arrow.
#
# Usage: Select a light in the 3D view and drag the arrow at it's rear
# to change it's energy value.
#
import bpy
from bpy.types import (
    GizmoGroup,
)
from mathutils import (
    Matrix,
    Vector,
    )

class MyLightWidgetGroup(GizmoGroup):
    bl_idname = "OBJECT_GGT_light_test"
    bl_label = "Test Light Widget"
    bl_space_type = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'WINDOW'
    bl_options = {'3D', 'PERSISTENT'}

    @classmethod
    def poll(cls, context):
        ob = context.object
        return (ob and ob.type == 'LIGHT')

    def setup(self, context):
        # Arrow gizmo has one 'offset' property we can assign to the light energy.
        ob = context.object
        mpr = self.gizmos.new("GIZMO_GT_arrow_3d")
        mpr.target_set_prop("offset", ob.data, "energy")
        mpr.matrix_basis = ob.matrix_world.normalized()
        mpr.draw_style = 'BOX'

        mpr.color = 1.0, 0.5, 0.0
        mpr.alpha = 0.5

        mpr.color_highlight = 1.0, 0.5, 1.0
        mpr.alpha_highlight = 0.5

        self.energy_widget = mpr

    def refresh(self, context):
        ob = context.object
        mpr = self.energy_widget
        mpr.matrix_basis = ob.matrix_world.normalized()
        mpr.matrix_basis.col[3][2] = -mpr.target_get_value("offset")

bpy.utils.register_class(MyLightWidgetGroup)


How do I create this shape at the top of a violin (the scroll?) I am trying to model a violin, but I am unsure how to make the coiled thingy at the top above the pegs:

You could begin with a Curve > Curve Spiral > Archemedian (with the addon Add Curve: Extra Objects). Reduce its Radius Growth:

Covert to mesh, extrude down:

Fill the faces along the spiral:

Flatten the top on the Z axis:

Continue to model:

Then at one point select all and Mesh > Symmetrize on the Z axis:


How to make a circular array with a fixed radius. whose elements gradually scale? I used an array modifier with a scaled and rotated empty offset object. but there is no option for a fixed radius.

Then I tried dupliverts on an edge with a fixed radius, but don't know how to scale the duplicate gradually.

For this, you can use DupliFrames.

Create a Curve Circle at the desired radius.

In the object to be duplicated, Object tab >'Duplication' panel, choose 'Frames', set the number of frames to the number of duplicates, and uncheck 'Speed', as shown.
You can also set which axis of the duplicate which follows the path, in
the 'Relations Extras' panel. Here, it's the default.

In the circle's Data tab, check 'Path Animation' with the 'Frames' also set to the number of duplicates, and 'Follow'.if you want the rotation of the duplicates to align to the curve.

CtrlP Parent the duplicate to the circle, with
the 'Follow Path' option. You may have to use AltO on the duplicate to clear its origin to get it to sit on the path.
In a timeline, set up an animation of your duplicated object, and
keyframe its scale at frames 1 and 12, by right-clicking in the Transform > Scale panel of the properties region of the 3D View and selecting 'Set Keyframes' . Here, the scale was 1 on frame
1, and 2 on frame 12.

As indicated in the manual, you can use ShiftCtrlA to make the duplicates real.


Is it useful to paint the seams with smear tool? I have some problems with seams on my model. When I export it to a game engine, some seams are visible, not bad, but I prefer to know if I can paint on "texture paint" to make them less visible?

Is the "smear" tool useful or do I have to restart my texturing work?

It depends on how detailed your texture is. The "Smear" tool is a possibility, if you have a low-detail texture. On higher detailed texture maps it would blur out the details which in your case would be for example the hard lines between the red and the brown area on the barrel.

I prefer the Clone Brush. Use Ctrl+Leftclick to select the are to be copied from, then simply draw with Leftclick over the seam.


How find objects in the 3D view? I was using the fly settings and I got too fast. I left the fly mode and i don't know how to get back. I cannot find my project as I am to far away. How can I locate my project?

There are many ways to fix this.
If you select an object in your project, you can do do View > Frame Selected to center your viewport on that object.
Alternatively, View > Frame All Will move your viewport to be centered looking at all the objects in your scene.


how to make a parking ground model I am new to making the blender model, I want to build a blender model like the one show below, instead of making a whole parking image, would it possible to make a single parking spot with the cube, and make cube's texture material like the parking spot, at last creating many cube like parking spots sequentially to make it as a real parking spot?

Procedurally generated parking spots.

I've made this one just for fun. It probably would be easier just to make mask in some vector app like Inkscape or Illustrator then mix materials by it, but lets stick to pure Blender Cycles solution. This method is from an artist approach, there is a better solution for this shapes for sure but I don't know Node-fu as good to generate them by math.

Final:

Setup:

Breakdown:

Stripes.

Mask.

Final thoughts:

Even if it is looking complicated it is just stacking simple things like Gradient texture and Wave texture on top of each other and using this mix as a Mask for textures. I really don't know how to be more precise with it so any questions are welcome and I will extend this answer as needed.


I can't go into pose mode or object mode at all I'm pretty new to blender and I just started getting into animation. I downloaded the fully rigged character "Hugo" from BlenderKit but I can't seem to be able to go into pose mode or object mode at all and it doesn't even show up in the dropdown menu. Just Object Mode. Any help would be great!

I think the problem is you haven't selected an object yet. Make sure to click and select the rig then clicking this button and it should appear.


Get the angle of an edge I need to know the angle of an edge using bpy. I need this angle in the x-y plane so if the edge is aligned with the Y axis the angle will be 1.57 radiants (90 degree) and if the edge is aligned with the X axis the angle will be 0. Thanks

The raw answer is

import bpy
from mathutils import *
from math import *

v1 = Vector([3,2,0])
v2 = Vector([3,2,1])
C = v2-v1

theta = atan2(C[1], C[0])

print(theta)

If you need to be able to compute this from the currently selected edge of a mesh, let me know and I can upgrade the python.


Why can't I delete this face? I'm trying to clean up the letter "k" here and can't delete the faces where I've circled.  I tried selecting the vertices and holding shift, but it just won't select all of them.  How can I do this?  Thanks

Convert the text to mesh using Alt+C
Switch to Face Selection as shown below

Select the face you want to remove, and choose the Knife tool to cut the part you don't want as shown below and then hit Enter:

Select the part you want to delete then hit x and choose delete Faces as shown below:

Do the same with the other faces and you will get the desired look as shown below:

Updated .blend file can be found here:


Making edge loops flat I was following a tutorial and I had to extrude the character's arms but the edge loop wasn't flat and the Instructor flattened the edge loop by scaling it on y by 0. I tried doing the same but it doesn't work and intuitively doesn't make sense. Basically I'm looking for how to make a edge loop look like it's parallel to a plane

Instead of scaling the loop in the properties menu, just press s to scale, z to scale it along z and then type zero. This will make the edge loop flat in xy axis.


What shortcut to open Node Wrangler menu in 2.8? I need the shortcut that will open the Node Wrangler menu in 2.8. I found this thread: Shortcut list txt for node wrangler from 2017. It says Ctrl+Shift+Alt+wm.call_menu. But what is wm.call_menu?? Anyway, I need a shortcut valid for Blender 2.8.

Shortcut for the Node Wrangler's Quick access menu in 2.8 is Shift+W.
Shortcut for Node Wrangler's Quick access menu in 2.79 is Ctrl+Spacebar.

You can also press T to open Properties shelf on the right in 2.8 or N to open Toolshelf on the left in 2.79 and prior and open Node Wrangler addon's tab; there you will find all the tools it provides with shortcuts shown if you hover over them as well as the Quick Access shortcut  written in the top.

I don't have any idea what Ctrl+Shift+Alt+wm.call_menu actually is; wm.call_menu is a command entered into RNA field in the user prefs shortcut dialog and has nothing to do with a shortcut itself, it's a way to tell Blender menu with some choices should appear. The source for the choices is then pointed out in the Name field.


Blender Game Engine Rendering Problem I am working on a game and this happened.
I have a Cube with an array modifier.
When i view my level in the viewport it looks ok but when i press "p" it looks like the Normals are inverted(which is not the case).

Does someone know what the problem could be?

Left: Viewport ____  Right: Blender Game Engine Render

Never mind
I found the solution
You just have to set the Alpha Blend to Alpha Clip in the Material Options.


2.80 nla.bake - returns 'Nothing to bake' - when selecting bones through script I'm trying to write a script that bakes constraints to bones. However if I select a bone via script the bpy.ops.nla.bake() operations won't run, it just returns "Nothing to bake" in the system console.

If I select a bone via the view port and then run bpy.ops.nla.bake() the bake operations works.

Both of these tests are being run in POSE mode.

Am I doing this wrong?
Is there something fundamentally
different under the hood in mouse click selection?
Perhaps this is
a bug?

To repro, create a two bone armature. (Optionally a constraint also)
If anyone can help with this that would be great :)

import bpy

obj = bpy.context.object
m_bone = obj.data.bones['Bone.001']

m_bone.select = True
obj.data.bones.active = m_bone

bpy.ops.nla.bake(frame_start=0, frame_end=10, step=1, only_selected=True,
                    visual_keying=True, clear_constraints=True, clear_parents=False,
                    use_current_action=True, bake_types={'POSE'})

(Question duplicated from blenderartists.org. I answered it there, and am copying my answer here.)

I’ve seen that “Nothing to bake” error in 2.80 when another object is selected in addition to the armature. Try deselecting everything in Object mode, selecting the armature, re-entering Pose mode, then baking. Here is a code snippet that works for me:

scene = bpy.data.scenes[0]
arm   = bpy.data.objects['metarig']

# ensure that only the armature is selected in Object mode
bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode='OBJECT')
bpy.ops.object.select_all(action='DESELECT')
arm.select_set(True)
scene.view_layers[0].objects.active = arm

# enter pose mode and bake
bpy.ops.object.mode_set(mode='POSE')
bpy.ops.pose.select_all(action='SELECT')
bpy.ops.nla.bake(frame_start=0, frame_end=10, step=1, only_selected=True,
                    visual_keying=True, clear_constraints=True, clear_parents=False,
                    use_current_action=True, bake_types={'POSE'})
```


How to make transparent material in cycles? Is it possible to make a transparent Material in cycles render? How is it accomplished?

An image texture with alpha(transparency) data can be used to make transparent materials. Do note that in order for alpha textures to work the image file format requires an alpha channel or be a grayscale mask.

  UPDATE

  Though my original answer is still applicable and functions. There have been many updates and enhancements since then. One of them being the inclusion of a PBR shaders, Principled BSDF hese specifically. Which, as of v2.8, now also has an Alpha input. Simplifying transparency in many ways.

The following examples utilize a 2px by 2px checker pattern with full black and full alpha transparency.
Blender 2.8
Node setup using 'Alpha Channel' with Principled shader:

Master opacity scale is from -1 to +1
Positive values decreases opacity
Negative values increases opacity of masked (transparent) area.

Blender 2.7
In this example; the Transparent Shader is set to white #FFFFFF which produces full transparency. This is then connected to the top input of 2 Mix Shaders.

Alpha from Image Texture is connected to the factor input of first Mix Shader. This takes the alpha data from the image and essentially applies it as a mask.

The color data from the image is not used in this case. Though, when applicable, can be connected to the color input of a shader. Such as mesh based hair and eyelashes for example.

The first Mix Shader connects to the bottom of the second. This allows control of the overall opacity.
Alpha node setup/example:

A black and white and/or grayscale image can be substituted.
Black being fully transparent and white being fully opaque.
Use color output instead of alpha.

Grayscale node setup/example:>Note:

  Some raster formats that support alpha are:

  OpenEXROpen Source format released by ILM.Designed with CGI workflow in mind.Your image editor may lack support out-of-box.
  JPEG 2000 - Not original JPEGLossy formatSupport may potentially be limited.
  GIFLimited to 256 colorsCan be animated
  PNGIndexed color has faulty alpha handling. Be sure to use RGB/A mode.

  I would suggest use of OpenEXR when working with raster images containing an alpha channel. For Photoshop users I recommend the exr-io plugin.
  For those using vector images. To my knowledge SVG is the prime candidate.

  Note 2:
  The shader used for color can be changed as desired and/or needed. This will also work with volumetric shaders as well. However do understand that volumetrics work a little differently than surface shaders. Any further detail on that would be getting a little too far off topic.

Special thanks to Mr Zak and troy_S for their insights in the comments.
Happy Blending!


parametric fillets or chambers I want to make a fillet parametric in the corner with a s I know it has been done.
I have seen an example but cannot repreduce it.

Looking forward towards your reply,

Rik

So let say you have your shape.

In Edit mode, select an edge and bevel it.

Back to Object mode, create one shapekey (Basis) then a second one.

Keep the second shapekey selected. Back to Edit mode, select the corner and scale it down with SShiftX so that it doesn't scale on the X axis.

Enable the Snap tool, Vertex mode. Move the bevel on the Z axis (GZ), use the snap to align to the right level. Then move the bevel on the Y axis (GZ), use the snap to align to the right level.

Now back to Object mode, when you select the second shapekey and play with the Value, the bevel shrinks to its new radius.


Script to copy all materials from one object to another, slot for slot. Looking for a way to copy materials from one object to another. so I have an object that I imported. a daz character to be specific. I have made shader for all of the materials. This character is now setup and ready to go.
Now I have to import him multiple times into blender in different poses etc. so i am looking for a way to apply all the materials I have already made to the new import. Since the new import has the same material names as the old blender appends everything .001 so  I now have torso and torso.001 as available materials. So Im looking for a script which will go through all the material slots on the character and set the active material from the .001 to the original one. can anyone help me out here?

This is what I came up with. Select the object with the "wrong" materials first (like 'torso.001',...) and the object with the "original" materials last (like 'torso',...). Then run the script. It compares all material names and if one of the "wrong" materials starts with the name of one of the "right" materials, it will be replaced by this mat. (So the material 'torso.001' would be replaced by the material 'torso').

The script does not update the 3dView, so be sure to do some action (like zoom in, etc.) to update the viewport after you run the script!

Also this might not work correctly, if some names are combined of other names. E.g. if you have two materials 'torsoUpper' and 'torso'. If that is a problem, I can edit the script.

Hope this helps.

import bpy

c = bpy.context

# Select multiple objects.
# The last selected should be the object with the "original" colors
# The script loops through all materials of the other objects and compares
# them to the materials of the "original" object. If their names start with the same
# letters, the material is replaced with the original.
# HINT: The script does not update the 3dView!

print("---RUNNING SCRIPT---")
src = c.active_object

for i in c.selected_objects:
    if (i == src):
        continue
    for src_id in range(len(src.data.materials)):
        for replace_id in range(len(i.data.materials)):
            src_name = src.data.materials[src_id].name
            rep_name = i.data.materials[replace_id].name

            if (rep_name.startswith(src_name)):
                i.data.materials[replace_id] = src.data.materials[src_id]
                print("Replaced "+rep_name+" by "+src_name)
                break


Having an issue with textures and UV mapping So I have been following this video in order to UV map my Arcade Box.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=scPSP_U858k

I manage to unwrap and make sure nothing is stretched out as shown.

Now I try to put an image and place the needed faces to match the picture, not only does it not show anything even in textured view but it is also stretching my uv maps?

Is there any advice to first:
Be able to see the demo version of what I am putting on as a texture?
Keep the UV_wrapping from stretching out?

I know there is probably a simple solution for this but I don't think I am typing the right key words to find the solution :(.

Your texture is distorted, because your image texture is in 2:1 aspect ratio, and your original UV map in 1:1 aspect ratio.

Either manually scale the UV map to half it's width.
Or use the Mapping node's Scale panel to correct for the distortion.


Change modifier key from Alt to Super/windows key I'm running Blender on a fairly customized linux distribution and Alt is already taken by another program. I therefore wonder if there's an easy way to change to modifier key Alt to Super key globally?

There is! This is for Blender v2.8-rc1.

Open Edit -> Preferences... from the menu bar, select Keymap from the left sidebar, and then Export... in the top right to export your current keymap. In the dialogue that opens, check the Export Key Configuration -> All Keymaps box.

Save the keymap somewhere. In the keymap file, replace every instance of "alt" (including the quotes) with "oskey". Go back to the Keymap pane in the Blender preferences and import your changed keymap. Whenever this keymap is selected, all the shortcuts in your previous keymap that used Alt will now use Super.

Of course, if you're already using OSkey for some shortcuts, this solution may cause collisions. The default keymap for Blender under Linux doesn't use it at all, though, and I assume based on your question that you haven't modified it to.

As a side note, there isn't actually a way to tell Blender to use Super in place of Alt  globally below the keymap level, as far as I can tell, short of patching it to do so. Blender only understands four modifier keys, Shift , Ctrl, Alt , and OSkey. OSkey represents a different key depending on the OS: Super under Linux, ⊞ Win under Windows, and ⌘ Command under macOS.

Shortcuts consist of a single key other than those four plus some combination of them. All keycodes are hardcoded with no way to change them in Blender's configuration; the raw keycodes seem to be in source/blender/windowmanager/wm_event_types.h but I'm not sure how they correspond to keycodes outside of Blender.

However, you might be able to patch source/blender/makesrna/intern/rna_wm.c, changing the item(s) for the key(s) you want to use in place of Alt in rna_enum_event_type_items[] (OSKEY, in this case) to use the values in the items for LEFTALTKEY or RIGHTALTKEY. I haven't actually tried this, so I'm not positive it would work; it would be a hacky solution if it did, but I'm not sure there's a better way without making big changes to Blender.


rendering objects in a scene separately I know that it is possible to render diffrent parts of a scene in different layers but if the object that i am rendering on a specific layer is occluded by an object from another layer will the silhouette of the object still be visible since that part of my object is not visible in the render from the cameras perspective? If yes, is there any way to get around this?

You can use the Exclude Layer to remove a corresponding silhouette


How to handle absent textures procedurally? First time poster, long time lurker here.

I'm using a script in a vector drawing program that separates color fields into greyscale bitmaps, that can then be interpreted as areas with different shaders in a Blender material. These shaders can be metal, glitter, flip flop paint, so just using a texture doesn't work. I'm dealing with 1000s of designs, each needing different shaders from a limited but huge set. Automation to the rescue!

I've neatly lined up all the nodes, so the data can flow without obstruction, but I've run into a problem:

Every design only utilizes a few of the total amount of defined shaders, so at the moment I need to generate fully black 2x2 pixel textures for the unused shaders, otherwise the missing texture gets interpreted as being mid-grey all over.

Is there a more elegant solution to handle this problem procedurally, from within the nodes system? That way I can render Blender's output from the command line without having to edit every single node tree by hand, or generate about 50 bitmaps for each design (instead of only the ones actually used).

Thanks in advance,
Ron

The image below the result of CreeDorofl's offered solution.
This trick just moves the problem one node further upstream, but when I use "linear light" instead of "add" mode it almost works. Almost, because it shrinks the shader area - it seems to influence the way the mask is interpreted, and when using a blurred texture, it becomes clear that it chops of the darker tones, turning them all black.
Zooming in shows the way it shrinks the green shader area, and it means I can't use gradients in the mask.
[

The solution would be to automate creating the material nodes, that way you add the number of colours you want and then add the black filler at the end.

import bpy

obj = bpy.context.object
if obj.active_material is None:
    obj.active_material = bpy.data.materials.new('Material')

mat = obj.active_material
mat.use_nodes = True

mat_nodes = mat.node_tree.nodes
node_links = mat.node_tree.links
# remove everything except the output node
for n in mat_nodes:
    if n.type != 'OUTPUT_MATERIAL':
        mat_nodes.remove(n)

#  RGBA           red       green      blue
colour_list = [(1,0,0,1), (0,1,0,1), (0,0,1,1)]
data_imgs = bpy.data.images
# length should not be less than colour_list
img_list = [data_imgs['img.001'], data_imgs['img.002'],data_imgs['img.003']]

out_node = mat_nodes[0]
col_space = 200
padding = 40
prev_mix = None

for x in range(len(colour_list)):
    mix_node = mat_nodes.new('ShaderNodeMixShader')
    mix_node.location = (out_node.location.x - (mix_node.width+padding) - (col_space*x),
                        out_node.location.y)
    if x == 0:
        node_links.new(mix_node.outputs['Shader'], out_node.inputs['Surface'])
    else:
        node_links.new(mix_node.outputs['Shader'], prev_mix.inputs[1])
    prev_mix = mix_node

    img_node = mat_nodes.new('ShaderNodeTexImage')
    img_node.image = img_list[x]
    img_node.location = (mix_node.location.x - (img_node.width+padding),
                        mix_node.location.y + (img_node.height+padding+150))
    node_links.new(img_node.outputs['Color'], mix_node.inputs['Fac'])

    dif_node = mat_nodes.new('ShaderNodeBsdfDiffuse')
    dif_node.inputs['Color'].default_value = colour_list[x]
    dif_node.location = (mix_node.location.x - (dif_node.width+padding),
                        mix_node.location.y - (dif_node.height+padding))
    node_links.new(dif_node.outputs['BSDF'], mix_node.inputs[2])

fillin = mat_nodes.new('ShaderNodeBsdfDiffuse')
fillin.inputs['Color'].default_value = (0,0,0,1) # black
fillin.location = (prev_mix.location.x - (fillin.width+padding),
                    prev_mix.location.y)
node_links.new(fillin.outputs['BSDF'], prev_mix.inputs[1])


How can I set a parent of an object in the BGE using python? I have two objects

A a box

and

B a sphere.

I want to make B A's child.

how can this be done in the BGE, using python?

Simple:

import bge

cont = bge.logic.getCurrentController()
own = cont.owner
scene = own.scene

objA = scene.objects["objA"]
objB = scene.objects["objB"]

objB.setParent(objA)

setParent(parent, compound=True, ghost=True)

Sets this object’s parent. Control the shape status with the optional
compound and ghost parameters. In that case you can control if it should be ghost or not.

parent (KX_GameObject) – new parent object.
compound (boolean) – whether the shape should be added to the parent compound shape.

True: the object shape should be added to the parent compound shape.
False: the object should keep its individual shape.

ghost (boolean) – whether the object should be ghost while parented.

True: if the object should be made ghost while parented.
False: if the object should be solid while parented.

Source: Blender 2.79 API Documentation, bge.types.KX_GameObject section


Why does adding a curve modifier move my object to the center of the curve? I'm using a curve modifier and an array modifier. My object is at one end of the curve but as soon as I choose the curve for the curve modifier it moves to the center. How can I fix the problem so that I can have the array going from one end of the curve to the other?

Make sure both your object center and curve center positions in the scene are exactly the same before using the modifier.
Also helps some times if the first curve vertex is exactly at the curve center (local coordinate [0,0,0] ), or ideally ata the start vertex of the curve.
Make sure both your object and curve have applied scales [1,1,1] in every axis. If it is not and you apply the scale make sure afterwards the curve radius is reset to zero. Do so by entering Edit Mode, selecting all vertex, right-clicking and pressing Set Curve Radius.
Also ensure both objects have matching rotations.
If you still get unexpected results try inverting the curve direction in Edit Mode by selecting one of its vertex and pressing the Revert button in the 3DView Tool shelf, or right-clicking it and pressing Switch Direction from the context menu.


Shadow baking on long roads/environment I could find a proper explanation of how people bake their shadows for racing games? All baking examples and tutorials are about interior lightning or some small area etc. I really don't even know where to start on achieving this. Do I create a very long road/grass texture, and just bake on top of that? But wouldn't that be extremely memory heavy? Then how did old games do it?

In most modern driving or open world games, the shadows are actually dynamic/realtime, otherwise the texture size required to have sharp shadows across a large area is going to be huge.

What most games do is make the shadow-casting lamp follow the location of the camera, this way, you always see shadows all around you, but it doesn't have have to render a huge shadow map for the entire map.

Static shadow maps (using a different set of UV) is still a huge part of most games with a high percentage of indoor space, as it gives softer appearances and potentially bounced lights as well.


Objects tracked to camera track to the viewport camera at current frame instead of camera location at the frame it should be rendering I've created some text objects and to make sure they are always facing the camera I have them tracked to the camera with some constraints. I've tweaked the constraints until it looks fine in the Viewport and used individual renders here and there to double check the final product and it all looks fine. But when rendering the whole animation the text is suddenly in a different orientation.
e.g. this is same frame, on the left individually rendered, on the right the frame created whilst rendering animation:

The text is angled slightly differently and therefore the lighting is different as well.
In other cases the orientation is so different the text is barely even visible:

The text in my first image using the following constraints:

The text in my second image using the following constraints:

With some further fiddling I've figured out what seems to be happening. The constraints are locking to the location of the camera at the current frame selected in the viewport and are not updating to the new location of the camera during render animation. In the following blendfile if you set the Start to 930 and the Current to 930 and Render Animation (CTRL + F12) it will look normal. If you change the current frame to 450, but keep everything else the same you will see the text is twisted to face back toward where the camera is at frame 450.

On the left is with the current frame set to 930, on the right with the current frame set to 450:

It seems to defeat the purpose of constraints if they don't actually move with the constrained object whilst rendering the animation.
How do I make sure the constraints are actually updating as different frames are rendered?
Or is there just a better way to make sure the text aligns properly with the camera?

I've found a solution to get the text to show up correctly with relatively little effort. By going to correct frame, and using Object > Rigid Body > Apply Transformation like so:

After doing that I could remove the problematic constraints but keep most of the effect I wanted, it did mean that for one shot the text doesn't follow the camera, but at least it wasn't completely reversed anymore, so I counted that as a win.
Since this doesn't actually solve the constraints not updating properly whilst rendering the animation I won't accept this answer, but as a temporary fix I thought it worth mentioning.


Blender won't import my custom module, ImportError: No module named mymodule My addon is in /home/usr/.config/blender/2.68/scripts/addons/foldername, has an __init__.py and cannot somehow import parts, that exist in the same folder. It says,
no module named mymodule but from text editor it runs and work properly

What could be wrong here?

You can place your module into the folder blender_directory/2.68/scripts/modules/ (so Blender can found it automatically), while your addon can stay in the scripts/addons/foldername folder with its __init__.py (and not __index__.py, by the way).

Or, you can go to User Preferences, tab File, and specify a custom extra folder for scripts, in the scripts input.
Note that this custom folder must contain 3 sub-directories : addons, modules, and startup.

In this example, your addon will of course be placed in :
/home/user/scripts/blender/addons/yourAddon/,
and the module(s) you want to import will be into :
/home/user/scripts/blender/modules/.

This way, no need to use sys.path.append()!


Blend Saves 2 Files? Just wondering what is the purpose of the other file that is created with blender. It takes up the same disk space. Is it ok to delete it? Is it like an autosave file similar to ones Nuke produces?

You don't show the extensions for the file, that would help explain.
Depending on the settings you are using to save, blender renames the previously saved file as .blend1 and the new saved file as .blend.
So the other file is kind of a backup, it is the last saved version of your project.


Scaling a set of objects I am trying to create a shelf that scales properly. Each board in the shelf must be 1/2" thick and ideally I would be able to scale the depth, height and or length without affecting the 1/2" thickness of the boards. I have been able to achieve my goals by having separate objects for each board, selecting them together and scaling them (with the 1/2 dimension locked).

My question is: can I have a mesh that scales as desired? Or can I link these objects to scale as desired?

I have tried parent/child relationships, but they seem to ignore the 1/2 dimension lock. Also groups just seem to help you select the items within the group.

Are there any other suggestions?
Thanks

If I got it right, what you could do is using hook to move one side of the shelf, like this

In edit mode, select all vertices of one side of the shelf, then, hook (CTRL+H) them to an empty like this

then you can select the empty

and moving it (here on Y) will "scale horizontally" your shelf like this:

Other setups are possible, this is just to give you the idea


How to extrude curves without changing thickness? This should be a simple question. I have always been bothered when making curves because the thickness always changes as the object curves. Here is an example of the problem:

As you can see, the curve gets thinner. I know how to fix this, but it is a bad process. What would be the easiest way to make curves and edges that are always the same thickness?

Draw the desired squiggly curve, e.g. by Add | Curve | Bezier

Add a flat path object of the desired width, e.g. by Add | Curve | Path

Select the curve, click the object Data context, click the Bevel Object dropdown, and choose the flat path object, e.g. "NurbsPath" -- this will sweep the flat path object along the squiggly curve.

If you want a mesh object instead of a curve object, use Object | Convert To (Alt-C)


How to convert an HDR Image created / rendered on Blender to a format acceptable on social media and websites? I rendered a HDRi on Blender from my ambient - to look like real state presentation - and I want to convert this HDRi file into a format acceptable on Facebook and / or other media as they doesn't open HDRi's.
I don't even know what is the format of 360 (equirectangular, spherical actually) photos generated from cameras and phones, otherwise I could do my research on it :(
Any help is appreciated! Thanks!!

Sorry for the links only answer, but this is too long for comments.

You are mixing two different concepts:
1. HDRi
stands for High Dynamic Range image, that has larger colour values than those that can be displayed by any screen. They are used mostly as environment textures to light scenes.
2. 360 images
concept of environment projection https://wiki.panotools.org/Projections
Watch https://www.coursera.org/lecture/360-vr-video-production/equirectangular-projection-cubemaps-uTv8r
Most HDRi is mapped used in 3D and VR is using equirectangular projection, but is not mandatory.
As to how to do this in blender, it has been asked before:
Blender panoramic render
Is it possible to render a panorama in perspectives other than full 360°x180°?
equirectangular rendering for Blender Internal?
how do I bake an animated sky box using cycles?


Random Text Grid Generator in Animation Node? Is it possible to create a random text object for each vertex of a grid mesh?

Generate a list of all possible texts. (We can skip this if the texts are completely random)
Create a random list of the same length as the vertices in the grid.
Instance n number of text objects where n is the length of the vertices list.
Set the texts to the text objects.
Position the objects.


Objects moving together in object mode Im having a noob problem about moving objects together.
To be specific, i have a character , which the body and eyes are in seperate object, i want to move them together in object mode, so i shift select them and G to move, the problem appears which is the eye comes out from the body, the further i put the body away from the original location the distance between the eyes and the body are more seperate. Not sure if its about the origin point, the body’s origin point is at the world center, the eyes are at the geometry, when i set the body origin to geometry, the eyes fly away to some random place, couldnt figure out whats wrong, thanks for any help
Ps: i dont have the proportional edit on

It sounds like you probably have at least one (or maybe more) unwanted mirror modifiers on your eyes, at least one of which is set up to mirror using another object in your scene.  When you select the body and the eyes and try to move them, you're seeing the mirror reflection of the eyes move away from the body because they're mirrored across some other object that isn't being moved.  The original eyes might even be inside the body where you don't realize they're (correctly) moving with the body.

I'd suggest that you check the set of modifiers on your eyes and delete any mirrors.  If your eyes go missing entirely, you might want to select your body and "h" to hide it, to see if the eyes are actually inside.  (Afterwards, Alt-h will unhide anything you've hidden.)

If you end up with only one eye and want it mirrored, there are a few ways to do it right.  One way is:

Set the origins of both the body and the single eye to their respective geometries.
Position the eye in one socket.
Add a Mirror modifier with "Mirror Object" set to the body (so it's mirroring across the body origin), and check a single, appropriate axis (e.g., just "X") to mirror the eye in the right direction.

Then, shift-selecting both the eye(s) and the body should allow you to move them together.  You can also parent the eye(s) to the body and moving the body should automatically move the eyes.


Reproduce the exact 2D image from 3D? I took photos of an object with a real camera. I then used computer vision techniques to 3D-reconstruct the object and in the meanwhile estimated the camera pose (locations, pointing direction, etc.). With everything in hand, I imported everything into Blender, and my goal is to reproduce the exact real-world photo with Blender.

There are of course errors in my 3D reconstruction, so by "exact" I mean I shouldn't get "zoomed-in" or "zoomed-out" version of the real image from Blender. Given the fact that the 3D reconstruction of the object is pretty good, I expect to see my 3D model "overlaid" on top of the real object if I align the Blender-output image and my real photo.

During my 3D reconstruction, I set my focal length to 5000, whose actual unit doesn't really matter, as the 3D reconstructed object will just have the same unit.

How should I set my camera parameters, e.g., focal length (how to convert 5000 to Python-Blender's space), sensor size, etc.?

Here is the image whose view (not sure if this is the correct word?) I want to reproduce exactly.

Here is the 3D scene.

Rendering the scene above gives this.

So you see, it's a zoomed version of the real image. This is unsurprising because I don't know how to set the parameters of the camera... Focal length may be easy -- just needs a unit conversion? What about all the other parameters like sensor size, etc.

Set Focal length to the same value as your actual camera.

5000 sounds way off.  Maybe you missed a decimal and it was 50.00?
Most point-and-shoot cameras are between 35 to 50.
Wide angle is lower, 18 - 30.  Zoom is 80 - 200.
Just looking at it, I would guess 50.

Scoot your Blender camera to the same distance
from your object as it was in the real world.

After looking at the scene...

File > User Preferences:

Add-ons tab > Import-Export tab

enable Import Images as Planes

N to bring up right-panel

right-click on the 3D Cursor Location
and Reset All to Default Values

Add > Mesh > Images as Planes

select the image you are trying to replicate

then scale it up on the X and Y by 5

go down to the Viewport Shading button
(bottom-center)  click Material
so you can see the image.

Be sure to click the Photo-icon
in the top-right panel
so it won't render in your final image.

Click on the Render tab, and under Dimensions,
Resolution:
X:    1800 px
Y:    1000 px

this should give you the proper aspect-ratio
use the Percentage Scale for test renders

select camera, press 0 on your numpad
to go into camera view

set Focal Length to 50

reset camera X rotation to 0
and set Z location to 14

select human.001

Location:
X:   1.0
Y:  -0.3
Z:   9.0

Rotation:
X:     0
Y:   180
Z:   180

Material > Add
Surface:   Toon BSDF
Size:      1
Smooth:    1

Add > Lamp > Sun
Strength 3

Location:
X:     5
Y:     5

Rotation:
X:    -5
Y:     5

Add > Lamp > Sun
Strength 5

Location:
X:    -5
Y:     5

Rotation:
X:    -5
Y:    -5

Click on the light properties

Size:          5
Samples:       8
Max Bounces:  12

Render tab >
Sampling:
Branched Path Tracing    - uncheck square
Clamp Direct:     10
Clamp Indirect:   10
Light Sampling:  0.5

AA Samples:
Render:       25
Preview:       0

Samples:
Glossy:       50
rest of 'em:   1

x  Sample All Direct
x  Sample All Indirect

Pattern:        Correlated Multi Jitter


Color management in blender 2.8 Color Management used to be in the "Scene" tab. But now it's gone. Where did it go?


Tutorial on Wall Borders? There are no tutorials anywhere on how to build Wall Borders, I have a picture here that I posted, I hope someone can help and guide me through the process on how to make this on Blender 2.8.

A typical way would be simply to duplicate the bottom edge of the wall, and convert it to a curve, down which you can sweep a profile of the molding.

ShiftD Duplicate the bottom edge of the wall
P separate it into its own object, and Header > Object Menu > Convert it to a curve. (The 'Path'). Make the path a 2D curve, to ensure clean miters.
Construct a profile for the molding, either as a mesh which you convert to a curve, or as a curve in the first place. (The 'Profile')

Note the orientation of the profile curve with respect to its object axes, and the position of its origin at its bottom left corner (shown with the 3D Cursor). All this can be adjusted in Edit Mode.

Now just assign the 'Profile' curve as the Bevel Object of the 'Path' curve.

You might want to convert the 'Path' curve back to a mesh when you're done, to make Auto Smooth available for it. That way, you can keep the poly count down.


My smoke is not animating at all I'm trying to learn how to animate smoke and I found this nice tutorial. I tried to apply the tecnique to my specific situation. Infact I've created a 2D animation with a man that brings his hand/lighter to the mouth/cigarette and he lights it up. Towards the end of the tutorial,the author wants to animate the smoke. Go to minute 7:52 to see what he does. It seems that he puts a keyframe at frame 1 of the timeline and the rotation values on the mapping tab on the node editor become yellow. I did the same,but in my case the X values inside the mapping tab did not become yellow. Now go to the minute 8.19 and you will see that he skips to frame 250 and he changes the X rotation value on the mapping tab to -130.4 and then he puts another keyframe there. This is the result that he gets. His smoke is moving. But I don't get the same result. In my case the smoke texture remains the same ! So,there is something that does not work in my scenario. Here you can see what I did. So,where I did something wrong ?

The problem is the adding of the keyframe - what it appears that you are doing is moving the mouse up into the 3D View and pressing I. This is adding a keyframe to the selected object in the scene. What you should actually be doing is hovering the mouse over the rotation value in the Mapping node (the value you just changed) and pressing I - this will set the keyframe on the node value (and make it turn yellow) so that it becomes animated.