Render's shadow always looks pixelated with Blender Render i am fairly new to using blender, so i am sorry if this was a really simple error on my part.
as you can see (hopefully) its rendered at 200% because thats what other people did when asked similar questions, yet the end product is still pixelated in the shadowed areas.

EDIT: thank you Duarte Farrajota Ramos, turning the "raytraced" option on smoothed out the shadows perfectly
for anyone interested the render with the raytraced on looks like this:

You are probably using Shadow Maps type of shadow in your lamp object.

Shadow maps are good for real time rendering, but not really necessary for "offline rendering". Switch to other "true" raytraced shadow type.

You are also possibly in Game Engine mode, switch the active render engine at the top of the screen


How to show image after import I recently started blender days before the 2.80 update and now i feel a bit clueless with all. I wanted to add a image as a reference plane to make my sword object but i dont know where do i activate to show it. I imported the image as a plane( .png).

In 2.79, you would have had to switch the view to Textured mode to see the image on the plane in the viewport. The equivalent in 2.8 would be to switch to LookDev.

The option is there, now, to see a reference image in Solid or Wireframe mode as well, by creating an Image Empty object, which is altogether more flexible.

You can create it manually, with ShiftA > Empty > Image, and adjusting the settings in its Data tab, or simply by dragging an image from your filesystem into a 3D View.


Where are some places to get reference images for modeling? I'm a newbie.  I've gone through a number of tutorials and want to get some actual experience with modeling. But, I don't know where to go to get good reference images for modeling with front/sides views.

Can anyone recommend the best places to find such images?

You can find some at the-blueprints, high resolution vectors are paid and need registration for download.


How to execute an operator from an EnumProperty? I have a simple EnumProperty with let's say two buttons. Now i want to create a primitive with one of the buttons. But a click at the button does nothing. There is a bit missing. The operator needs to be executed. And i cannot find a code example how to do so.

How do i execute an operator from an EnumProperty? How do i give those buttons a functionality now?

import bpy

class LayoutDemoPanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_space_type = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'UI'

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

        layout.label(text="Enum prop")

        scene = context.scene
        layout.prop(scene, "my_enum", expand=True)

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

    bpy.types.Scene.my_enum = bpy.props.EnumProperty(
            name = "My enum",
            description = "My enum description",
            items = [
                ("mesh.primitive_cube_add", "Cube", "Create a cube"),
                ("mesh.primitive_shpere_add", "Sphere", "Create a Sphere"),
            ]
        )

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

    bpy.types.Scene.my_enum

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

Try this
The following script basically does what you want, although I stick to my recommendation to NOT add primitives based on changes of enumerations. Those changes are also tracked when you set the enum value through python, so you might run into real nightmare further down the road. This is only one possible reason for using a dedicated operator with a button that runs it, but in the end it's up to you.
The script here is only modified in three details compared to your's:

I've added the update_enum method at the beginning, calling the operator
I've corrected a spelling mistake for the operator call to the uv_sphere_add function
I've added the call to the update_enum() function in your EnumProperty

Besides that, the code is the same as yours. Note that in case of the update_enum function, self is already the current scene, so I can happily access the current enum value using self.my_enum.
import bpy

def update_enum(self, context):
    # self = current scene in an EnumProperty callback!
    print(self.my_enum)
    eval('bpy.ops.%s()' % self.my_enum)

class LayoutDemoPanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "Test"
    bl_space_type = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'UI'

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

        layout.label(text="Enum prop")

        scene = context.scene
        layout.prop(scene, "my_enum", expand=True)

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

    bpy.types.Scene.my_enum = bpy.props.EnumProperty(
            name = "My enum",
            description = "My enum description",
            items = [
                ("mesh.primitive_cube_add", "Cube", "Create a cube"),
                ("mesh.primitive_uv_sphere_add", "Sphere", "Create a Sphere"),
            ],
            update=update_enum
        )

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

    del bpy.types.Scene.my_enum

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


The color of my object changes when I use Shadow Catcher So, I was playing around with the principaled shader and I noticed that when I included a shadow catcher to my scene, it changed the color/texture of my object. How do I fix it or is it a bug?

So, I figure the answer. It's because the first picture there is no plane under the head but the one with the shadow catcher has a plane which I guess reflects the light which brighten the head. My nodes setup is simple, it's principled shader to the material output.


Where is the Pipe joint addon in Blender 2.7.3? Hi i'm searching this option at User preferences - Addons, but i can't find it in the new version, even making a search. Has been deleted form blender 2.7.3? I want to turn it on as in older versions.

This is now located under Extra Objects in the Add Mesh category.

Once you enable it, you can access the custom primitive types with ShiftA > Pipe Joints.

EDIT:

On version 2.79 Pipe Joints are on Add>Mesh>Mechanical>Pipe Joints


The skin modifier is incorrectly applied to the skeleton I'm new to Blender and I ran into this problem, when I trying to skin my handrail skeleton (a screenshot of the skeleton is attached below)

But after applying the skin and trying to reduce it(by pressing the keys CtrlA), a certain part of my handrail becomes much thinner than the rest, even at this stage it is clear that the part that is closer to the top is much smaller than all the others (the screenshot is again below)

Select vertex and check Radius in Properties side panel.
Your issue looks differently, probably two vertices (or split).


How do I create a new object using Python in Blender 2.80? As part of an existing add-on, I'm trying to create an object and add it to the scene using Python. I followed a Blender Cookbook tutorial found here: Three ways to create objects. I use the following code to do so:

emptyMesh = bpy.data.meshes.new('emptyMesh')
theObj = bpy.data.objects.new("object_name", emptyMesh)
bpy.context.scene.objects.link(theObj)

But I get the following error when I try to link theObj to the scene objects:

AttributeError: 'bpy_prop_collection' object has no attribute 'link'

This works just fine in Blender 2.76-2.79, but doesn't work in the 2.80 test build I downloaded. Was there a change to the Python API? Or is this maybe a bug in the test build?

In 2.8 Blender API, this is still not documented yet. After dir() inspection I've found a temporary solution, where you can replace the scene with the collection, as below:

bpy.context.collection.objects.link(theObj)


How to simulate lowpoly hair motion in wind all the tutorials I found were just flags

For low poly hairs object ...

go to Weight Paint mode and draw Gradient (from red on top)
Physics Properties enable Cloth

add Wind effector Strength 1000

select Head go to Physics Properties enable Collision
(better result with Self Collision enabled)


In BGE, can you make an objects animation only play when that object is in motion? How can I make an object's animation only play when that object is moving?
I do not need it to play on mouse press, only when's it's moving.

Well, make a Mouse sensor, and controller and action actuator and connect them together. Set the mouse sensor to what you need(for example, left button with true level triggering) and action actuator to your action! So simple!;)


Composite glare overlayed by alpha transparency of other material? I know the discription is a bit weird, but hear me out: Look at the image. I put a glare filter on the 2 red eyes, but it doesn't shine through the part of the shiny triangle that's supposed to be transparent. How can I fix this? I hope I explained myself well enough xD[

Solution 1:

You might want to switch the blending mode from 'add to 'screen'

Solution 2:

Instread of a mix node you can use an 'alpha over'. to my experience this works better for more complex overlays with multiple colours. make sure you add the alpha channel to the 'alpha over' node or it won't work
(in your case you would take the alpha from one of the 'ID masks', not the alpha from the image)


Model Deforms after applied the Mirror modifier I just applied the mirror modifire to move forward to the shapekeys but everytime when i try to move the mesh then the applied side from the mirror modifire deforms without selecting it.

It looks like you have the x mirror option enabled in the options tab of the toolbar. My guess would also be that to have the option behave that way your rotation should be applied as well, but just disabling the x mirror should fix it.


Armature and Mesh not working together as intended I'm new to blender and trying to rig a model for animation later. I have made the model, and attached bones to the mesh. However, for some reason, the bones that control the right side of the mesh (right arm and legs) don't do anything, but the left side bones work but what they do is mirrored.

Actually, I think I know how to fix. I still have the mirror modifier on the mesh, as in I haven't applied it. Would that be the issue?


Get the selected median point in python? During edit mode, how do I get the coordinates of the median pivot point (position of the transform manipulator) using python?

This information is shown in the Transform panel of the properties sidebar in  the 3d view.

You can calculate it quite easy:

import bpy
from mathutils import Vector

ob = bpy.context.object
ob.update_from_editmode()

me = ob.data
verts_sel = [v.co for v in me.vertices if v.select]

pivot = sum(verts_sel, Vector()) / len(verts_sel)

print("Local:", pivot)
print("Global:", ob.matrix_world * pivot)

You could also use the bmesh module, but the standard API appears to be faster despite the update operation:

import bpy
import bmesh
from mathutils import Vector

ob = bpy.context.object
me = ob.data

bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(me)
verts_sel = [v.co for v in bm.verts if v.select]

pivot = sum(verts_sel, Vector()) / len(verts_sel)

print("Local:", pivot)
print("Global:", ob.matrix_world * pivot)


How do I grab the active texture on a face in python? So I'm pretty much done with designing a script to export meshes I (or others within my group) make in Blender for use in another piece of software (VoxelStudio).

Everything has been slow going due to a serious lack of documentation/examples, but I have to say these forums have been a god send, thank you people.

The one last part that's really stopping me from actually finishing the script is working out how to get the ID number of the Texture that's applied to a given material on a given Face.

I can get the active material easily enough.... though that took trawling everywhere to work out how. How do I get the active materials active texture for the current face?

For example:

for i in context.selected_objects:
        i.update_from_editmode( )
        tempmesh = bmesh.new( )
        tempmesh.from_mesh( i.data )
        for f in tempmesh.faces:
            mat = i.material_slots[f.material_index].material
            writeString ( file, '%i\r\n' % ( f.material_index ) )
        tempmesh.free

You can see that I've got the material index easily enough, and the material itself is held in 'mat' within the 'for f' loop. However, the method of working out what the texture index of the current face is still eludes me.

The model is set up with different Materials having multiple textures assigned, each for different purposes. Just no idea how to ask, what texture is showing on this material on that face.

This script will print the names of the the textures assigned to the various materials on the selected objects:

import bpy, bmesh

C = bpy.context
for o in C.selected_objects:
        bm = bmesh.new()
        bm.from_mesh( o.data )
        for f in bm.faces:
            mat = o.material_slots[ f.material_index ].material
            if C.scene.render.engine == 'BLENDER_RENDER':
                for textureName in [ ts.texture.name for ts in mat.texture_slots if ts ]:
                    print( "material_index_{mi}.texture_name_{tn}".format(
                        mi = f.material_index,
                        tn = textureName
                    ) )
            if C.scene.render.engine == 'CYCLES':
                for textureName in [ n.name for n in mat.node_tree.nodes if 'TEX' in n.type ]:
                    print( "material_index_{mi}.texture_name_{tn}".format(
                        mi = f.material_index,
                        tn = textureName
                    ) )
        bm.free

It will print it in the format of "material_index_X.texture_name_Y" (where X is the material index, and Y is the texture name).

You can of course use the texture slot index, rather than the texture name. Or what might be even more intersting, the image path assigned to the image texture you might be using (accessible through texture.image.filepath).


When rendering hair, it doesn't follow the particle edit path I have Blender 2.69.

I have been following this on Youtube.

The .blend file on google drive.

This is what it does...

The Size settings on the material are set too large, try setting the Root and Tip sizes in Material Settings > Strand > Size to smaller values:

Result:


Annotate Tool: Visible Every Frame? I'm having a problem where I want the annotate tool strokes to be visible every frame.  However, it appears that it is only being visible for the frame I drew it on.  How can I make it visible every frame?

I found the answer.  The top tab of the 3D view has Annotation tool information, and if you hit the "Note" drop-down, it has a field that says what frame the annotation was drawn on, and says either "locked" or "unlocked."
If you click on the field you can set it to "locked," and the drawing will now appear every frame.


Shadows settings not showing on my light So I'm watching Blender Guru on the donut stuff on Blender 2.8 and he clicks on his light but my settings aren't the same as his.

You're using Cycles Render Engine.
Switch to Eevee and all the options will be there.

Render Tab > Render Engine > Eevee


Unexpected result from "bm.faces.new(verts)" I'm trying to use "faces.new()" to fill a hole in mesh, Strangely when I use the function the newly create face looks like this:

Code:

import bpy, bmesh

obj = bpy.context.object.data
bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(bpy.context.active_object.data)

v = [v for v in bm.verts if v.select]

bm.faces.new(v)
bmesh.update_edit_mesh(obj)

Thanks in advance.

The contextual create operator.

Rather than calculate the winding order to create face with bm.faces.new(verts) let the operator do it for you.

bmesh.ops.contextual_create

  Contextual Create.

  This is basically F-key, it creates new faces from vertices, makes
  stuff from edge nets, makes wire edges, etc. It also dissolves faces.

  Three verts become a triangle, four become a quad. Two become a wire
  edge.

import bpy
import bmesh

ob = bpy.context.edit_object
me = ob.data
bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(me)

verts = [v for v in bm.verts if v.select]
bmesh.ops.contextual_create(bm, geom=verts)

bmesh.update_edit_mesh(me)


What is meant exactly by 'Deformable Mesh Area'? (context: Was Reading when/when not to use triangles) I have been learning basic modelling and texturing using Maya. I read many times to avoid using Tris and I can see why sometimes I get pinches or the edge flow breaks down.
But I was reading this thread: https://blenderartists.org/t/why-tris-are-bad/547399
The top answer says:

"Tris have their purpose and place. Those what blindly repeat never ever use tris probably can’t even tell you why.
They don’t deform well, can cause pinching artifacts, don’t play nice with subdivision surfaces, and kill the holy edge loop.
You can use tris. Just not on deformable areas and are best avoided on large planar areas as well. They work very well tucked away behind the ears though…"

It seems this guy knows what he is talking about and I understand that I should only use them in hidden areas. But what exactly does he mean by 'They don't deform well' and 'not in deformable areas'?
I googled it, it seems like any curved area is 'deformed' (https://catlikecoding.com/unity/tutorials/mesh-deformation/#:~:text=The%20mesh%20is%20deformed%20because%20a%20force%20is,entire%20object%20would%20move%20without%20changing%20its%20shape.). But is the answerer meaning deforming as in animation or live movement?

Think of an ocean surface, various sizes of waves.
where all verticles move (try it in blender with ocean modifier).
You don't get strange artifacts with simulating that with quads
Not even if you later to decide to subdivide it.
Clean topology makes life easier, but there can be exceptions to the quads rule.
In some cases a tris might bend better, depending on the shape you might need a quad to have some bending angle divinding it into 2 tris.


Bezier Point Radius - Set Multiple by Absolute vs Mean Value I'm a bit of a noob to blender, but for Bezier curve point radii, how can I assign a specific value to all selected points, vs the unintuitive "Mean Radius"? E.g., I don't want to preserve the proportions - I just want all points to have a radius of 1.

You can control curve radius proportionally with Alt+S or the Curve Shrink Flatten operator as you already know. This will proportionally scale all vertex.

So set an absolute value for all selected vertex use the operator Set Curve Radius either from the tool shelf, or the space bar search menu, and enter the desired value.


Is there a way to vertex paint occluded vertices? Is there a way to vertex-paint-brush vertices that are behind the faces? Kind of like x-ray select, but x-ray paint? There is an option "Front Faces Only", but even if it's off, it doesn't seem to do this (actually I can still paint on backfaces even if this option is on, but not on vertices that are behind faces). Also, enabling x-ray view-through (or wireframe) doesn't seem to do anything to the brush tool.

I would really like this option because I use vertex color in my game as a sort of a "weight" for a shader, so being able to paint a smooth brush over some layered pieces is a must

(working in 2.8)

You need to have 2D Falloff option checked in Brush options and Show X ray view set(not necessary, just to see the occluded vertex) (both highlighted in the image below) It works the same for Weight painting. In all new 2.8 tutorials everybody seams to totally forgot about using this feature and I was so frustrated, when one by one everybody was just painting around objects. Finally found the answer and am happy again :)


Nothing is unwraping in the UV window. As you can see below, i have everything selected and when i then select "unwrap" nothing happens I dont know what´s happening. When i did it a cupple of minutes ago i at least got a map. (it was wrong and wierd looking though). Im following a tutorial (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPoxqOcUzNQ) and i marked the exact seams they did and it looked sooo wrong. idk, everyting layed on top of eatchother and i couldn´t see what whas what. Then i deselected everyting and started ofer and now nothing works.
please help!
!!Update!!
It was the "show overlay" that was the problem. However it stil looks wierd to me. Why does it look like this? (it didn´t in the tutorial)


Animation Nodes Loop Performance I'm using static parameters in Loop Subprograms.

Setting up these parameters let's me modify the node tree easily, but I noticed, that I never change the inputs. I would like to move unnecessary input into the loop subprogram.

This seems like a bad idea, if an extra instance is created each time the loop is run. (I am already having poor performance.)

Does having more instances created inside the loop (versus as input parameters) affect the performance negatively?

An example of how my node setup looks like.

It depends. If most of the time is spend in the inner loop there should not be a noticeable performance drop. Also it depends on which nodes you use. If you only use simple nodes like Object Input or Time Info, you should not get any problems.


required amount of light is not coming inside the room I have a bedroom scene in which there are two doors and two windows. Even Using portals doesn't give me results what is in my mind. I need illuminated inside scene. When both of the windows are open and doors are closed light should come inside the room and illuminate the scene. but, It's not happening even using the portals. in fact portal is not affecting the scene pretty much. first one is without portals
this one is with portals..

hdri I have used is having 27EV. and I have set strength of 20 and still light is not coming inside the room. Link for hdri. and I am attaching screenshot of my blender screen where you can see strength as well you can see that outside wall is totally white.
EDIT :: By mentioning that outside wall is totally white I want to say that If I increase the strength It is lighting up the room but it makes outside wall totally white. In last I am going to make an animation in which outside walls will be there so If walls are total white there will be no meaning of that. I am attaching a screenshot of original color of my walls too. This one is with the HDRI strength 1. This one is having HDRI strength 20 where outside wall is complete white.  here is the link for my blender file click here...
EDIT :: One more thing if I am increasing exposure then It makes outside walls white too. This is a base model of my bedroom. SO In reality with these window enough light is coming inside. SO i am trying to achieve the look I see everyday in my bedroom.

You can use whatever strength value for the environment that works for you, so if 20 is too dark, you can use 200, if 200 is too dark, you can use 2000, so if there is not enough of light, just add more light.
One thing to keep in mind is that if you have glass windows, whatever light comes through them, becomes refractive caustics, and they are terribly slow to calculate and not accurate at all in Cycles. You should consider using fake glass shader with transparent shader mixed with glossy for reflections by amount determined by Fresnel node. It might be a good idea to avoid calculating shadows from the glass at all, because they practically do not contribute to the realism of the render at all in vast majority of cases, so you can have the glass of all the windows as a separate object and disable it's visibility for all rays except camera rays:

What's important in lighting is not the numerical values, you use, but their proportions compared to each other. The light of the sun on a clear day might illuminate the ground with 120 000 lux while artificial lighting on a desk in an office is required to be(and often is) around 200 lux(at least where I am). So that's the difference between a light bulb and the sun in reality... Keep that in mind. In a dark painted room like yours the difference between the inside and the outside would be huge as well. No need to be afraid of that. If you have the values their relationships in the scene set up the way it is not convenient for you to adjust the strength of the environment and keep the ratios, you can also adjust exposure here:

... or here:

Both are OK, the first multiplies the values in the rendered result, the second multiplies the values of all the lights in the scene if I am not mistaken.
You should use portals to speed up the render - the noise clears up faster if you use portals, but they should not have any influence on the looks of the render.
Note that you definitely do not need any add-ons whatsoever to have nice light in your scene. They might make it more convenient for you to set things up, but are completely optional.
Here is an example of how I usually set it all up(.blend file (134.03MB)). I hope that might be useful to have a look. Feel free to use all assets in the file under CC0 license if you wish.


How to setup custom expression in Blender? I have two custom sliders; A and B.
How can I  B refer to A every time I past his name "Duration" on the input B?

In this case B should be 76 in output.

If you want both A and B to be completely dynamic, without having a constant relationship between them, this requires a bit of work (otherwise a simple driver would suffice).

To get this to work, you need to define both properties in a propertyGroup, so that you'll be able to assign "B" with an "update function" - a function that is called whenever B's value changes.

That function then needs to parse your expression and assign the correct value back to B.

Here's the code for getting this to work:

bl_info = {
    "name"        : "Test",
    "author"      : "TLousky",
    "blender"     : (2, 74, 0),
    "version"     : (0, 0, 0, 1),
    "location"    : "3D View > Toolbox",
    "description" : "Test 123",
    "category"    : "Test"
}

import bpy
import re

class samplePropertyGroup( bpy.types.PropertyGroup ):
    def update_b( self, context ):
        ''' Update function for property "B". This function is called whenever B's value is altered '''

        # Regular expression pattern for parsing the typed in expression:
        # (?:duration)? --> The word "duration", which might or might not appear
        # (?:\s+)?(?:\+)?(?:\s+)? --> The plus sign, which might exist or not, with or without spaces before or after
        # ([\d\.]+) --> the actual numerical value in the expression, which could have a decimal point or not
        pat = "(?:duration)?(?:\s+)?(?:\+)?(?:\s+)?([\d\.]+)"

        if "duration" in self.b:                # If the word "duration" exists in the manually assigned value
            m = re.match( pat, self.b )         # Then parse the string to extract the numerical value out of it
            if m:                               # And if parsing was successful
                numVal = float( m.groups()[0] ) # Get the value from the regex match object's capturing group
                self.b = str( self.duration + numVal ) # Then assign the value plus the duration prop's value back to "b"

    duration = bpy.props.FloatProperty(
        description = "This property is a simple float prop that doesn't support expressions",
        name = "duration" # Recommended not to use caps at the beginning of var names as a habit
    )

    # This one needs to be a string to be able to accept strings such as the other prop's name
    b = bpy.props.StringProperty(
        description = "This property also accepts strings and might actually use them",
        name        = "b",
        update      = update_b # This is the important bit here, a reference to the update function
    )

class samplePanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    ''' Sample Panel '''
    bl_label       = "Sample Panel"
    bl_idname      = "sample_panel"
    bl_category    = "Test"
    bl_space_type  = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'TOOLS'

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

        P = context.scene.sample_props

        col.prop( P, "duration"      )
        col.prop( P, "b" )

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_module(__name__)
    bpy.types.Scene.sample_props = bpy.props.PointerProperty(
        type = samplePropertyGroup
    )

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_module(__name__)

You'll need to install this as an addon to test it, as it creates a new tab in the tools panel called "Test", where you will find both your properties.


Python Implementation of Track-to/aim constraint I'm writing a python script that creates a large number of objects and I'd like them all to point at a certain point in 3d space.

(left is what I've got, right is what I want)

Pretty much exactly like the 'Track-to' constraint, but I don't need it to update interactively or be animated, I just need to rotate each object when they are created. I also don't care about the up-direction at all, since the objects are cylindrically symmetrical.

I know how to create the objects, but I don't know how to aim them. I'm not good at maths, so I don't even know where to begin with this other than that it'll probably involve vectors and matrices (which I don't really understand).

The reason I don't want to use the existing constraint system is because it's a bit slow when dealing with a lot of objects, and I'd like to learn a bit about this sort of maths.

I can't explain the math to do it manually, but you can use python to create a constraint that will do the rotation for you. You can then apply the visual transform and delete the constraint if you don't want to leave it there.

targetobj = bpy.data.objects['Sphere']
pointyobj = bpy.data.objects['Cone']

ttc = pointyobj.constraints.new(type='TRACK_TO')
ttc.target = targetobj
ttc.track_axis = 'TRACK_Z'
# we don't care about the up_axis
# but default is Z and it needs to be different that track_axis
ttc.up_axis = 'UP_X'

bpy.ops.object.select_all(action='DESELECT')
pointyobj.select = True
bpy.ops.object.visual_transform_apply()

pointyobj.constraints.remove(ttc)

Not sure if it will help but I believe the trackto_evaluate function currently on line 965 of constraint.c is the math behind the constraint.


How to use a weight to check if an object is stable? Let's say that you have a table with randomly generated legs, and that you want to check if the table is stable enough to stand with a weights placed, one at a time, in four different spots on the board.

Question 1: How do you get the coordinates for these 4 different spots?

The best way would to be able to refer to each position as positions on the board rather than numbers , so that future scaling of the board doesn't affect the weights positions in relation to the board.

So let's say that you are able to identify the 4 locations. You create 4 cubes based on those postions:

bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=0.1, location=(location1))
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=0.1, location=(location2))
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=0.1, location=(location3))
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=0.1, location=(location3))

However, you want to test if the table stands one cube at the time. You want to be able to unlink all cubes, then link back cube 1 to check, unlink and link back cube 2 and so on, till all four cubes are tested.
How do you unlink and link back the cubes?

Ok, so I think I found a solution

def create_cubes():
#board=table without the legs
h=board_height
d=board.dimensions
l=board.location
r=0.3
#First cube
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=r, location=(l.x-d.x/2+3*r, l.y+d.y/2-3*r, h+d.z+r))
add_rigidbody()
cube1=bpy.context.active_object
cube1.name = "Cube" + str(1)
validation_cubes.append(cube1)
bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].objects.unlink(bpy.data.objects["Cube" + str(1)])
#Second cube
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=r, location=(l.x, l.y+d.y/2-2*r, h+d.z+r))
add_rigidbody()
cube2=bpy.context.active_object
cube2.name = "Cube" + str(2)
validation_cubes.append(cube2)
bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].objects.unlink(bpy.data.objects["Cube" + str(2)])
#Third cube
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cube_add(radius=r, location=(l.x+d.x/4, l.y-d.y/2+3*r, h+d.z+r))
add_rigidbody()
cube3=bpy.context.active_object
cube3.name = "Cube" + str(3)
validation_cubes.append(cube3)
bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].objects.unlink(bpy.data.objects["Cube" + str(3)])

Now you have defined the locations for three cubes. These locations will be the same, no matter how you scale the board or the radius of the cube.The cubes are named and placed in the list validation_cubes, unliked from the mesh

Then you simply need to create a loop that links back each cube, one at a time, so that the cubes don't affect eachother

def validate_table():
create_cubes()
for x in range(0,3):
    bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].objects.link(bpy.data.objects[validation_cubes[x].name])
    append_physics()


Blender 2.77 Mac Installation-Python 3.5 files could not be opened When unzipping the Blender 2.77 download file (blender-2.77-OSX_10.6-x86_64.zip) I get an error message "Could not extract the file 'blender.app/Contents/Resources/2.77/python/lib/python3.5/pycache/future.cpython-35.pyc': The file could not be opened".

If I click 'continue' I get a series of 'could not be opened' errors for what I assume is every file in the python 3.5 library.

I've not been able to find any information on this and don't see anywhere to ask about this at blender.org. I've not had this problem with previous installations of Blender.

I'm using a 2008 iMac running OSX Yosemite (10.10.5). Any thoughts?

I learned that my problem was due to using an outdated version of The Unarchiver (version 1.0.1) to unzip the Blender 2.77a zip file. Upgrading OSX over the years did not upgrade this utility. Installing the most recent version of The Unarchiver from the App Store allowed me to unzip the Blender file normally with no error messages.


Noisy, risograph-style gradients and textures How can I make a some sort of like... a gradient like this?

https://medium.com/@stefanhrlemann/how-to-create-noisy-risograph-style-gradients-and-textures-in-photoshop-in-3-ways-394d6012a93a

Final:

Overview:

You can do this by firstly create Gradient based on chosen axis (Y in this example) and mix it with some noise (Voronoi > Noise). You can control base gradient driven by top Color Ramp and Noise distribution with bottom Color Ramp.


Need help modeling precise irregular torus Noob here, tried so many tutorials but could not get the result.
Need a high-resolution torus (donut) shape except the outer diameter is an ellipse but the hole is a perfect circle.
But the ellipse needs to be a precise size difference to the center:  Narrow diameter of ellipse is 1.29x the diameter of the hole.  Wider diameter of ellipse is 1.28x the diameter of the narrow side of the ellipse or 1.64x the diameter of the perfect circle hole.
Hope someone can help.  Thanks!

Bevel a curve.
Using method similar to Shrinking tube or bending a cone will make one quarter of torus using this technique and mirror to make rest.
Add two bezier circles,
Select one as The inner radius circle. In edit mode make the spline non cylic and remove and edit such that end up with a quarter circle.
Setting the radius of the each of the end points of this curve gives us the big an small torus radii.

The other will make up the rings of the torus.
In edit mode move the origin of circle from centre to "left side"
Select All
A and shift -1 in x direction
GX-1
This will ensure that when used as a bevel object for another curve (without offset) the origin point will always be on curve, thus ensuring our torus hole matches that of curve.

Now set this as the bevel object of inner circle

Add two Mirror modifiers one in X and one in Y to produce a standard torus
Set the bevel interpolation type to ease, now can adjust the radius of end points.

Note: without going into the maths of this, there will be a point where an ellipse cannot be maintained and will collapse into a cardiod or inflate to an oval.


Is there a Snap option in the Graph Editor? I want to move my vertice #2 up to the Y position of my vertice #1.

Is there a Snap option that would allow me to do it? I can't see it on the horizontal menu bar, perhaps I'm blind...

Thanks in advance!

Ok so Mr Zak suggested me the best method to do it:

Select the vertice #1 which is the Y position reference.
ctrl G to make the cursor move to the vertice position.
Select the 2D Cursor as the Pivot Point.
Select all the vertices you want to snap to the Y position.
Scale down to zero with S Y 0

and a quite similar way:

Select the vertice #1, which is your Y reference, ctrl G to move your green cursor up to this vertice.
Select the vertices you want to align on the same Y position
shift S > Cursor Value, and again shift S > Flatten Handles, if necessary.


Which view/panel will let me see and set an object's position? I'm a noob. While following a tutorial on using Spin, starting by creating vertices in Edit Mode, somehow my object's verts got offset from the Z axis. I had a devil of a time moving them back because I couldn't simply find anywhere to type in numbers to tell Blender to move the object's origin to 0,0,0. Where can I see and set any object's exact, absolute position?

In the 3D Viewer, press n to bring up the side-menu with panels you can use to edit the position, scale, and rotation of vertices and objects. Also, a quick fix to your problem would be to press A to select all the vertices, then press s, z, then 0.


How to import fbx image to an existing project I have a 'project' consisting of a number of smaller objects which will eventually be integrated into a single object. I have found a great 3D (fbx) object and when I import it I have noticed that when I drag it around over my existing objects it appears on top of some and behind others.
How do I 'mark' this imported object so that appears 'above all my existing objects? See following screen shot (imported object is the car tire/tyre)where the tire is hidden by the large object but not by the smaller ones. I eventually want to use the tire in an array to be added to the edge face of the large object. Also I can use the 'rotate' tool to orient the tire to face 90 degrees from where it currently is but what is the method to 'snap' it 90 degrees rather than try and manually do that?

This is two questions, but I will answer both.
First, your description sounded like you are thinking of the tire as a 2D rendering of a 3D object, being moved about in a 2D space. It is in a 3D space. If you already understood that, I am sorry. But anyway, to fake it and make the tire render in front of everything all the time even if it is positionally behind it, you can use the render engine specific solution, or a permanent one that works with all engines. I will describe the latter.

Place the tire in its own collection, and place everything else except the lights and camera in their own collection together.
Create a new View Layer.
In that new layer, uncheck the collection without the tire.
If you do not want the tire to cast shadows on anything, uncheck its collection from the first view layer.
In Properties editor -> Rendering tab -> Film panel, enable Transparent.
In the Compositing screen, enable Use Nodes, then add both view layers, and use Alpha Over to put the tire over the other view layer.

About the rotation transform question, look at the top of the 3D view for a magnet icon. Check that the setting next to it is “Increment” and not something like “Vertex,” and enable Rotation and Scale (Location is enabled by default). Then, click the magnet to turn on snapping. Rotation will now snap to 5 degree increments.


How to align an object by one or two edges to xyz axes? How can I align object edge to one of the axis? For example, if I have a cube rotated 'freely' in the scene with applied rotation -- how can I realign it along x y and z axes again?

using physics engine comes to mind, but it also sounds like an overkill

I think you can do it by tricks like parenting, constraint, snapping, addon, and scripting.

Method 1 (parenting):

Select the edge you want to align;
ShiftNumpad 7 to align view to selected edge;
ShiftS > Cursor to Selected;
Switch to Object mode, ShiftA to add an empty, F6, toggle Align to View, set it as parent to that object;
Select the empty, AltR;
Select your object, AltP > Clear and Keep Transformation. Then delete the empty.

Method 2 (constraint):

(as method 1)
(as method 1)
(as method 1)
(as method 1)
Add another empty, add a Copy Rotation constraint to it, select the first empty as Target, leave other settings as default;
CtrlA > Apply visual Transform, then delete the other two empties.

Method 3 (snapping):

Select one vertex on the edge you want to align;
ShiftS > Cursor to Selected;
Switch to Object mode, ShiftA to add a new empty, then move it for a certain distance along the expected axis;
Select all vertices of your object in Edit mode, with another vertex on that edge active (NOT the one in Step 1). Enable Snap mode on 3D View header, set Snap Element to Vertex, and make sure the Snap Target is set to Active;
CtrlAltQ to toggle Quad View, switch Pivot Point to 3D Cursor, snap the active vertex to the empty in two of the three Ortho views individually (it may depends on the actual case). Then delete that empty.

Method 4 (addon):

Luckily there is an addon called Precise Align (the latest version is 1.1), which can well handle this:

Select one face that includes the edge you want to align;
Find Precise Align tool panel in the toolbar, click Create Empty button, click Swap Empty Origin if it is not aligned with the expected edge. Make sure Parent to Object is toggled;
Back to Object mode, select that empty, AltR;
Select your object, AltP > Clear and Keep Transformation. Then delete the empty.

Method 5 (scripting):

Actually, I'm not good at scripting, but I'm sure it can be done. Welcome anyone that can complement with the scripting solution here. :)


Blank render, and result not saving I am rendering an image, and the render is set up to save as a .png file. The location path is set fine and I have my normal render settings. What am I doing wrong? Also, I can't even see the render result in Blender (After I click render, the result is just a grey grid, and I know there is nothing of the sort in the scene).
Thanks!

Not saying this is the solution but this happened to me and it was because I had been in the composite mode and hadn't gone back to main viewport


error: "No objects or images to bake" I am trying to bake my AO map and every time I click bake, I get the error: "No objects or images to bake".

Could someone explain why this is happening?

Your mesh is the active object, but not currently selected in object mode. Switch to object mode and select the object, then click bake. It should work fine now.


Missing OpenAL32.dll After installing 2.79 I had 2.76 which I was using an hour before downloading the installer for 2.7.9.0 11/09/2017
It seems to have deleted 2.76, but I still have 2.73 folders but no exe

When clicking the on desktop new icon the missing dll message comes up.

W10, Nvidia Quadro K2000

Don't know if I should find a Open32AL32.dll to download into the blender foundation/blender folder or do something else.

There are two exe - blender.exe and blednderplayer.exe

Any suggestions?

Solved I have downloaded the .zip version of blender. Opening the folder I found an OpenAL32.dll Copy and pasted into the blenderfoundation/Blender folder (where the blender.exe file is) Now clicking the exe icon runs the program Only problem is that it doesn't know the user preferences or start file Found those in the old Blender version folder in Configs Copied and pasted UserPref and Startup to the config folder of new version All seems okay now


Edge Angle as Cycles Shader input I am practicing with the creation of various procedurally generated materials and a unique problem has come up for me.

I have looked at a number of tutorials on shader creation and have been searching online for a while now with regards to this specific issue, having found some questions with only tangentially related topics.

I am trying to determine how I can pass the "edge angle" to a shader in cycles.

For example, when one is using the edge split modifier they can specifiy an edge angle that allows them to force the renderer to treat an edge as a non smoothed edge.

What I want to acheive:

I want to find areas of interest with respect to the way that the edge split has chosen these areas. The mesh pictured is smooth shaded, the left is without the edge split modifier applied and the right side has the edge split applied. Red areas show really distinctly, where edge split created a hard edge. The green area highlights where the bevel that was present on this material tester object becomes a much more prominent feature as aresult of the edge split angle.

I want to find a shader input that would allow me to say, take places where the edge angle is high as inputs, sortof like you can do with fresnel or other black and white input nodes

I want to do this procedureally, or at very last, I want to avoid using map textures because I want to be able to apply this material to objects that may not have a UV map.

Things I have trie as inputs (Using node wrangler to view the mask):

Fresnel / Layerweight: These options apply to whole geometry and ignore specific areas. Furthermore, fresnel is dependant on the viewing angle, not the geometry. That makes the fresnel simply move around the edges at any viewing angle.

Geometry > Pointiness: This does not work on something that has smooth curves. I have seen it used before in material tutorials but I understand that it relies on point density, something which a test ball (and presumeably many meshes) will not have in great amounts.

Every option I can think of in most input nodes : I have seen wild techniques about the angling of faces for use in topology like this for example but that only works for meshes where mesh is concave with respect to positive Z (likely would not work with purely vertical faces either)

Things I have not tried but seen as (non optimal) options:

Vertex painting a mask: While this is not ideal it would work. Id prefer not doing this because then one has to manually paint each mesh that they intend to use the materials on. I have also seen that most explaining this technique view it as requiring a fairly high detail mesh.

Is there a way I can get the edge angle out of the geometry and use it as an input for cycles shaders?

This solution doesn't give you a perfect angle based control but it is sort of a better version of the pointiness value map.

You will have to download a daily 2.79 build from https://builder.blender.org/download/ to get access to the bevel node.

The viewer node is just an emission shader to view the value map.

You can tweak this map even further with a colorramp node of course.


Connecting body parts or clothes problem I need help guys, I kind of need this for a project or something.
First picture is when I haven't connect everything but when I press " Ctr + J " the result is the next picture. I'm really a noob in blender so what seems to be the problem or are there other ways to connect all the body parts / the clothes?
The problem is the eyes and the goggles.

you could parent them. I would add an empty and place it in the center of the object. Then select all the parts of the object and clothes, select the empty last. Then ctrl + P --> object. If you select the empty and move it, the rest will follow.


controlling speed of an action by driver or scripting I'm scripting some crowd animation. I was searching about a way to control action speed by a driver or keys.
Is there is some attribute for action speed that can be controlled? Something I can access through Python?

I found some related scripts in the game engine which is not what I needed.

The NLA editor.

Action Strip Scale.

Halving or Doubling, (for instance),  the strip scale, doubles or halves the action speed.

Animated Strip Time.

The frame at which the fcurve is evaluated can be animated here, with keyframes, AFAIK not with drivers.

Some examples from python console on how to access with script

>>> strip = C.object.animation_data.nla_tracks['NlaTrack'].strips['CubeAction']
>>> strip.use_animated_time
True
>>> strip.strip_time = 100
>>> strip.keyframe_insert('strip_time', frame=200)
True


Bevel tool doesn't work with this model B4 its been working fine, sort of. But this time it won't bevel this particular part. It basically adds something like a loop cut to the face.

I've had this issue before, I'm not sure if this will work for you but ctrl+a -> apply scale works for me


How can I discover the author of a blendfile? I know how to set the "Author" attribute for the blendfiles that I create, using Blender User Preferences > File.  However, I have not found out how to view the author of a blendfile.  How can I do this?

You can't, This author field is only ever used in exporters. In the COLLADA export to be precise, where the COLLADA format can have an author tag, and I wanted it to be possible for users to have a configurable content for this, so I added the author field to user preferences.

Not everybody will have this set, either, so best not to rely on this for 'correct' user data.


What is the easiest way to have a material randomize the Image textures it uses? I have 100 book cover textures and I'd like to condense them into one material and have it randomly assign the textures to the books. I tried the random output found in the Object Info node but this only recognizes two of the textures. Any ideas?

As long as all the books are separate objects, we can use the Random output of the Object Info node.

That gives us a random value (per object) ranging from 0 to 1 (black to white):

All we need to do then is tell it to use different materials for different value ranges. I'm sure there are many ways to do this, but here's the first I could think of:

We can add two math nodes with the operations on Greater Than and Less Than, setting the bottom socket values to encapsulate a certain range (e.g: between 0.1 and 0.3) and plugging the Random output into the top sockets. Then multiply the two math nodes and you'll have a mask showing white on the books where the random value is between that range:

Then we can connect that mask to the Fac of a MixRGB node, and thus the first socket of the mix node would be the original colour, and the second socket would be whatever colour/texture you want to show in the value range.

Since you'll be using that same node set-up over and over again for each texture, it's a good place to turn it into a node group:

And thus by chaining a few of these groups together, you can easily randomise the colours/textures of objects with that material:


Working around Blender's color management problems & General Confusion So, I'm writing this in part because I'm still confused myself, and in part because getting a verified answer in a public place would be a good thing.

Blender 2.79b has incorporated some of Sobotka's Github original version filmic color management, but apparently not enough of it, therefore some people (myself included) are still using that package. The explanations I've found when researching what the problem did not really tell me much more than that there's a problem, though.

I just got into this from Andrew Price's tutorial which was basically "do this simple thing and all your stuff will look better forever" -- and it did, and I haven't had any reason to dig into it more until now.

The Sheepit Render Farm used to provide support for , but doesn't with 2.79b, probably assuming that it actually was functioning properly in base blender. The result is that people still using github's version get stuffed into generic sRGB sadlands when submitting a file. So I'm trying to figure out how to make due with standard blender at least for now.

(I'm still a little confused as to why this is all necessary, why we can't just simulate photons around, record their wavelengths, and call it a day, too... maybe that's better as it's own question....)

So using stock 2.79b with no scripts or plugins what's the best way to get the most amount of useful image data out of blender? What's the best way to replicate the Github's version log encoding + base contrast I got used to? Can that be done with the color management tools in the compositor? We still don't have a LUT input in there...

And for the confusion... how do the Display Device, Render View, Look, and Color Space even interact? And how can I learn what they're for? I mean I can go look up what an XYZ color space is but I don't know where to go to find out why someone would pick that. What are the dozens of film types listed in look for?

Blender has incorporated some of Filmic Blender but...

Information on this topic can be found here:

Are there significant differences between filmic shipped with blender and its development version?

  Guru says "Do this simple thing and all your stuff will look better forever"

Instead of relying on dogma, edicts and magic formulas from gurus or priests, it's laudable that you want to take the time to understand how the tools work, and how you can use them for your own purposes. That way you'll get the results you are after, and don't have to settle for whatever you get using unknown parameters.

Read:
Render with a wider dynamic range in cycles to produce photorealistic looking images

  So I'm trying to figure out how to make due with standard blender at least for now.

A quick and painless solution is to render your images as EXRs. When you render as EXRs, the final result does not have any color transforms applied to it. That way you can keep all of your scene referred information as linear and undistorted, and then you can import the images into blender (or other apps) and apply the display transforms that you want (including the filmic transforms) before saving them to display referred images (tif, jpg, png or video endoding).

  Why we can't just simulate photons around, record their wavelengths, and call it a day

Because image making requires interpretation. There is no universal or "correct" way of determining what should be black or what should be white, or how to interpret all of the tones in between. The same scene can look totally different if you choose to prioritize different brightness levels, or if the scene is visualized through a filter. It all depends on the intentions of the person making the image.

A render engine determines the values for each pixel based on the light reaching the object and the qualities of the materials that make the object. But how those values are represented in the final image, depends on the view transforms through which the image is processed.

In other words: The render engine generates scene referred data, and the values can be in a scale that is linear and infinite, as in real life. In order to represent those values in an image they have to be converted to the limited values that a monitor or projector or paper can display. The values are usually modified in a way that is no longer linear and looks "correct" or "pleasing" (as our brain does not perceive brightess linearly). The data is converted thus to display referred. The tools to convert from scene referred to display referred are the display transforms, which are a series of rules based on LUTs (Look Up Tables) and other algorithms to convert values.

  how do the Display Device, Render View, Look, and Color Space even interact?

The way to combine or compound different transforms is by using the Display, View and Looks options in the color management settings.

Display Device will be sRGB If you are using a regular monitor. No need to use any other option (and if you are using a monitor with a wider color space, like a DCIP3 retina display or a HDR monitor you are in for a new set of problems...) The rule of thumb is not to use any setting that you do not know how to use... Do you have a compelling reason to display XYZ? If you don't, then don't use it.

Render View Select Filmic or sRGB to render finished images, Non-Colour data for normal maps or bump maps.

Looks Are meant as additional transforms to control contrast within the log encoded images created by filmic blender.

  What are the dozens of film types listed in look for?

They come from configurations for other software that somehow made its way to blender. They are largely useless and can safely be ignored. Read: What is the actual film manufacturer reference for the film response data?

How to learn more? There are plenty of posts on this site. And if you get stuck ask for help in a concise way.


How could I model a realistic broken pillar (concrete)? Something like this:

Of course I'm not pretending to achieve that level of detail, but is there any other way of obtaining similar results without having to spend so much time sculpting?

Basically, how do you model broken concrete? I tried with displacement modifier, but the results were too noisy and sharp, probably because I chose a bad texture but still I don't think I can achieve good results that way.

If you plan to texture this, read through all the steps once before beginning. There is a UV mapping tip at the end that requires planning in advance.

Now let's get on with it...

Start with a cube, make it tall

Add a plane and fractal subdivide it

Fractal subdivide it again

This time a little more "fractally".

(If by any chance this is going to be a game asset go with a lower number of subdivisions.)

Extrude your subdivided plane to give it thickness

Set up a boolean (Optional: Subdivide the column too)

For the boolean, set the Operation to "Difference" because you're carving out of your column.

Subdivide the column (non-fractal) if you want the two meshes to be of similar density. Having a denser mesh would be better if you plan to do something like mutires sculpting on this. Having a less dense mesh would be better if this will be used as a game asset.

Apply the boolean, delete any leftover unneeded geometry

Apply the Boolean Modifier from Object Mode.

Then you can move your plane object to another layer or even delete it. After moving it you can see the subtractive boolean result.

To clean up stray geometry you don't need, select any part of those pieces in Edit Mode, press CtrlL to Select Linked geometry, then Delete (X) it.

Note that this is just a start. You can further sculpt this of course.

Bonus Tip: UV Mapping

Since your reference image has textures I will mention a texturing tip. If you plan ahead you can UV map this whole thing neatly. Booleans respect and will combine UV data.

UV unwrap your plane before you subdivide it. From the top, "Project from view (Bounds)".
UV unwrap your column before subdividing and before applying the boolean. "Smart UV Project" with an Island Margin of 0.1.
To place the fractal-subdivided UV island: Select the five flat faces of the column (may need to Select Similar (ShiftG) > "Co-Planar" if you've subdivided the column too). Invert the selection (CtrlI). In the UV/Image Editor Box Select (B) the rest of the visible vertices and scale/grab to position as desired.

An example of the sort of UV layout you can create:

Note: In the screen shot above the column was not subdivided before doing the boolean. It is a different .blend file from that of the preceding screen shots.


Why does the same material looks brighter/darker on another object? I have applied all transforms, recalculated normals, unwrapped every piece. While trying to maintain pixel density (first ever modkit so correct me if I'm wrong but it is the faces' size on the UV map).

Still, the two corner piece on the left are brighter. Driving me crazy...!
Edit: tried both eevee, cycles
Any idea as well as comments, critiques are welcome! Thanks a lot!

The problem seemed to come from the orientation of the UV unwrapped faces.

I didn't have the same textures, but replaced the missing 2 textures with concrete and stone wall textures to check. First i could not find the problem, as shading, normals and even custom normals did not help. Then i unwrapped the 2 parts from scratch and gave them more seams to have a clean unwrap, not the "Smart UV Project".

I then made sure the selected areas were given each the materials to have a similar result as was shown in the question:

Using a sun light to check the shadowing of the wall sections, the smaller one always seemed to be reacting exactly the opposite way then the big one. When i pointed the sun on the walls the smaller one became dark, and when i directed the light away it became bright.

As of that moment, considering that i tried all the other options mentioned, i had only one other idea: UV map.

I selected the UV map of the small corner wall and rotated it by 90° by selecting all with A and then pressing R followed by typing in 90 and confirmed it with Enter, the process shown below:

The result was this:

Also regarding the pixel density, i believe the easiest way would be to select all involved objects after they are unwrapped, go in UV Editing and select all elements A, to then use the "Average Islands Scale" function in the UV menu:

Happy Blending


Interpolate motion between motion track keyframes I'm trying to get a simple 2d track from points on a finger. Sometimes the finger moves quickly and the tracker loses it for a few frames. Once the finger settles, I'll manually move the track back into place, so I'll essentially have 2 keyframes; before and after the blurry motion. Since I'll be constraining an empty to the tracking point, I'd like that motion in between interpolated. Just like any animation in blender using keyframes. Currently I've had to go frame by frame to add those points back in, even though the motion is directly vertical and a normal keyframe animation would do the trick.

So far the closest solution I've found is after linking my track to an empty, I click 'Constraint to F-curve', then clean up the keyframes in the graph editor. This isn't practical though for a long track.

I'm aware I could make my track settings better, which I'm working on, but would love to know if it's possible for blender to tween motion tracking points. I often 2d track in other software this way, and it saves a lot of time for simple tracks where only a few frames here and there are lost.

Thanks!

Tracking is an art. Perfect automatic tracking is hardly ever possible and will require some manual supervision and/or interpretation.

For a few frames you can manually move the tracking points in the tracking graph (that green and red graph that gives you the speed at which the trackcers are moving in the horizontal (red) and vertical (green) axis)

Other things to try: animate the settings for weight and stab weight. Or bring down the coorelation when tracking fast moving objects and bringing it up again when the motion slows down. And of course you can always use the clean-up tools in the solve tab.


How do you re-unwrap an object and have it be the same scale? In this tutorial by Blender Guru, Andrew re-unwraps his plane (because he changes the UV to be a 2*1 aspect ratio and so it stretched his UV). He also mentions that with cycles, it won't re-unwrap it. You have to be in blender internal to re-unwrap it.

In Blender 2.8, there is no  blender internal anymore. (and with EEVEE and Workbench it doesn't sucessfully re-unwrap it either)

How do you re-unwrap an object and have it be the same scale?

Well, this is a fun one.

What is going on
It seems, unwrapping depends on your shader's image texture, not the texture in the UV editor.
Again.  It's not about the UV editor, it's about the shader editor.

I have three textures with different aspect ratios. 1:1, 2:1, 3:1.
But the UV map ratio is always based on the image selected in the shader editor.

So, in some cases, there's no way to match the correct aspect ratio.

Example:
2:1 in UV editor, 3:1 in shader editor.  And no way to match the correct ratio.
Correct aspect ✔ doesn't work either - it only switches to 1:1 ratio.

Solution
Check what image is selected in the shader editor. That's what drives the UV map aspect ratio.
And then match it to the image in your UV editor.

Note
The above is a reason why it sometimes works, and sometimes doesn't.
Still not sure if it's a bug or not, but either way it's pretty messed up :).


I can't color some parts of my model I am sorry if someone already asked for this question, I wasn't able to find it anywhere..I googled lots of things and didn't satisfied my needs so I hope you can help me out :) :P.
When I try to hand texture my model, some parts are being unable to be textured.
I hope you understand what I mean, here is a screenshot so I can explain you.

The blue line is showing where I can't texture it as you can see it's white.
I had to "Fill" to get the white color even though some places got still black as on the picture you can see black texture on the fore-end/near barrel.

Sometimes it's hard to paint some areas in the 3D Window. You may try going to UV Editor, change the mode from View to Paint and paint these areas there.


Add object constraint to a number of selected objects I have a large number of objects, and I wish to add a Track to constraint to each object.  When I select the group of them and then add the constraint, it is added to only the active object, of course.  How can I add the constraint to all selected objects?

With the objects selected, add the desired constraint to the active object.
From the 3D View header menu choose Object > Constraints > Copy Constraints to Selected Objects.

All the objects will now have the same constraint.

This method doesn't require an add-on to work.


Imported Texture only on one side of Object I am new to Blender and have started making a teddy bear from Blender Guru on YT.

I downloaded the texture for the wool needed from the video, but the wool texture is only displayed on the front side of the teddy bear, instead of the whole teddy bear.

I am not sure what I did wrong.

Ok, Solved the problem by unwrapping the back half of the mesh(the part were their is no texture), which is when the texture applied to the half that it was not before!


How can I get Freestyle lines to show around two objects where they intersect each other? In this simple example, I have a cube and a sphere. I want Freestyle to show lines around the sphere (or the cube) where the two shapes are intersecting each other.

Does anyone know how I can accomplish this?

The current set-up.

The cube and sphere are intersecting.

The Freestyle lines don't go all the way around the red sphere. How can I make the lines go all the way around?

Unfortunately, no. Blender does not support that. There has to be a physical edge there. More information (possible workaround) at this question.


3d vertex.index equivalent in UV 2d actually I know how to take the 3d and 2d (UV) vertex data.... I'm using this code with a little modifications

Now I'm trying to find the 3d vertex.index equivalent in UV 2d. that in order to know the uv vertex cordinates of especific 3d vertex index.

I have the same len(3d vertices) and the len(uv 2d vertices), and the 3d vertex only have 1 representation in UV 2d view.

but after run the code I have this:

in the example image I have  3d vertex.index #11 selected  and only one UV 2d vertex selected too with his 2d vertex cordinates (366,839)

in order to know that specific cordinates  I have:

if ob.data.uv_layers.active.data[v.index].select:
                     print("vertice selected: ", v.index, " cor: ", uv[0]*x, uv[1]*y)

but as you see in console I have crazy results

UPDATE
I have the same result without UV synch

UPDATE:
if I select all the verts and in UV editor select 1 point... the result is crazy too...   but I want to know the index relation between 3d vertice index and 2d point index and with this method is imposible:

do you have some ideas please?

thanks to @Chebhou here the answer:

for v in ob.data.vertices :
            for p in ob.data.loops :

                if v.index == p.vertex_index  and v.select:

                    x = ob.data.uv_layers.active.data[p.index].uv[0]
                    y = ob.data.uv_layers.active.data[p.index].uv[1]

                    print(v.index, " 3d co: ", v.co, " UV co: ", x,",",y)


I used bezier curves and circles to make a shape, how do i transform it in to an editable object? I used a bezier curve and a circle to make a claw shaped thingy around the bezier curve, I want to be able to edit the geometry of this shape, but don't know how to transform it in to an object.

menu bar > Object > Convert To > Mesh From Curve.


My rig does not move I made a crude dinosaur model and added a rig to it and got the bones to move with the mesh. I went back to an earlier save and improved the dinosaur and followed the same procedure but now neither the bones or the mesh will move. Any ideas?

It's generally a very bad idea to rig something and then go back and change it. New vertices you create will not be assigned to any particular vertex group and new bones you create will not modify any new vertex groups, you'd have to take care of that using the weight paint tool or selecting "assign" in the vertex groups panel, or both. Do you have a blender file we can look at?


How to write a simple OBJ exporter with Python?(With Normals and UV) So i've been trying to write an OBJ exporter, to learn how Python and scripting for Blender in general works, i'm pretty new to Python scripting. I successfully managed to export vertices and polygons, but i can't export normals. Here is my code, i wrote it on top of the Template Exporter that comes with Blender, this is the exporting part of the code:

import bpy
def write_some_data(context, filepath, use_some_setting):
print("running write_some_data...")
f = open(filepath, 'w', encoding='utf-8')
sce = bpy.context.scene
for ob in sce.objects:
{
    if ob.type == 'MESH':
    {
            dats = ob.data
            c = 0
            for vert in dats.vertices:
            {
                f.write( 'v %f %f %f\n' % (vert.co.x, vert.co.y, vert.co.z))
            }
            for face in dats.polygons:
            {
                for vert in face.vertices:
                {
                    c += 1
                    vnor = dats.vertices[vert].normal
                    f.write( 'vn %f %f %f\n' % (vnor.x, vnor.y, vnor.z) )
                }
                f.write('f')
                cuv = 0
                for vert in face.vertices:
                {
                    f.write( ' %i//%i' % (vert + 1, c + cuv) )
                    cuv += 1
                }
                f.write('\n')
            }
    }
}
f.close()
return {'FINISHED'}

The normals are all in random order when importing and i can't fix it.

Okay, thanks to lemon for this answer:

  If I remember well, vertex normals are not at the "face level" but at the "vertex level" in OBJ. So you should export them the same way you did for 'v', outside of the polygons loop

I added this code in the vertex loop:

f.write( 'vn %f %f %f\n' % (vert.normal.x,vert.normal.y,vert.normal.z))

And used the same index for both the vertices and normals in the face definitions and it imports correctly!


Yet another smoothing question - still too many facets This may be a subject that is over-hashed, but I can't seem to get this nailed on a particular model I'm doing which as a some rather complex curves in it.  A rather silly thing (that I can't get it right), but, there it is. Maybe I've over-thunk it.
Caveat:  still quite the Blender noob.
I simply can't get rid of the faceting that occurs with this particular piece.
I've done:

tris-to-quads.
subsurf, using simple (catmul-clark destroys the piece), which doesn't go quite far enough.
edge split modifiers.

I built the triskele's using bezier curves which I then changed to a mesh in order to build the solid.  I'm not too familiar with the bezier functions and whether then can be used (in this case) to make the proper solid (I've saved them so can revert to them).
The ring & triangle are also bezier parts (the triangle made via the cutouts), and also converted to a mesh.
I'm open to suggestions.  Two images attached to show the faceting problem.
Thanks!!!
Sincerely,
//s// Jon C. Munson II

wireframe:

Here's some further things to try:

Autosmooth checkbox under Object Data (right above vertex groups.) This will make edges Sharp based on the specified angle. It is the same effect as Edgesplit, but doesn't actually split your edges.

Use a small amount of of Decimate set to Collapse to merge together nearby points, and/or Planar to fix overlapping faces.

Convert to mesh so that you can properly mark edges with Crease (to control subsurf) or Sharp (to control edge sharpness.)

Use the Intersect (Boolean) command under the Faces menu in edit mode to resolve intersections. Note that this will create some dirty topology that will need to be cleaned up by hand, or with small amounts of Decimate as mentioned above.


Solidify thickness doesn't correspond to specified scale I'm Having trouble with setting the thickness applied by solidify. The selected block is 15 by 28 cm (single mesh sides) and the thickness of solidify is set to 3mm (pointing inwards). Checking off even thickness makes it even worse. I was using the function in a different object earlier today and it worked just fine. Is there something I'm missing or is this just a bug?

Feel free to treat me like an idiot, I've literally started using blender yesterday :)

Your object has uneven scale

Apply the scale to your object with Ctrl + A > Scale


Quick way to remove thousands of materials from an object? I've put in about 3 days of work manually editing a mesh (with lots of copying and pasting) to get around the issues of junk vertices with boolean operations in Blender and noticed something troubling.  I started with a single material but after all the edits that single material has multiplied into approximately 20,000 duplicates of the same material, all assigned to separate parts of the same mesh.  I've been clicking away at the - button for awhile and am only up to ~700 deleted materials - is there a way to clear all materials from an object then simply reapply the one I want?

This method takes time under one second if you have 20k materials object.
Select first your multimaterial object then object which has one material.
Click in material panel black arrow > "Copy material to Others".


RNA warning on EnumProperty I create some lists using EnumProperty. The lists may be empty, because nothing in the lists. Therefore, I get some warning in the console.
"RNA Warning: Current value "0" matches no enum in......."
How to get rid of the warning in the console?
I don't want to add some "NONE" in the lists when the lists are empty.

I avoid this problem by filling one value in the list which I call e.g. ('NONE','','Use this when theres nothing for the list') This way I can detect if the list should actually be drawn in the UI or used.


How to fix streched texture areas after unwraping UVs? I just UV unwrapped my first model and I have a problem with the texture. The UV unwrap looks fine (all blue), but in the 3d model it's not that good. The texture stretches and I'm not sure why. I'm using Blender 2.80.

Ok, i found the solution by myself, i added a loop cut (ctrl + r) where the texture stretches.


Why cant i zoom in anymore into a mesh? creating a scene in the beginning was easy because i could zoom in all i wanted in order to do model the mesh, but after i place more objects i reach a point where it is hard to move around in the model space because it would slow down to a stop, also i cant just rotate my view and zoom into an object. I was wondering if i can change this. I've seen that by pressing "." i can zoom into the mesh, yet i would like to know if theirs another way so that i wouldn't  have to do this every time. I've also tried changing the navigation auto depth on and off in preferences. (currently using Blender 2.8)

Hei

You can disable selection from all the things in scene. It will be easier to generally zoom in and out after this.


Mirrored object is textured incorrectly While making the eyes for a character I was creating, I came across an issue where when I mirrored the first eyeball, the result was textured incorrectly.

As you can see in the picture above, the original eyeball (on the right) has sort of a gradient on the iris where the outer rim is a darker brown than the inner rim. But then, if you look at the mirrored eyeball (on the left), it completely loses the effect and just becomes what looks like a solid color. I have tried applying the mirror modifier but it does nothing.

This effect was 100% procedural and achieved through a node setup I found in a tutorial. I'll also share it here for convenience. If anyone is wondering, the ColorRamp actually has two colors except they are extremely close to each other. I can share the file as well if anyone needs it. The white and the pupil of the eyeball are separate materials.

i think this is a better approach, since setting the texture coordinate node to object will take that object's origin as the center point for the gradient to start, i also used a linear gradient and rotated it with a mapping node since its easier to handle, setting it to generated will set the center of the gradient to the mesh and not the object's origin


How to apply a loop cut on a specific area on a big object? I am trying to put a loop cut on the rectangle in the middle of the screen, but it's trying to put a loop cut on the whole thing.

And that's not what I want.

I would recommend selecting all the faces of the object you want to put details on and hitting "P" to separate it as another object.
This will help you with 2 things:
1) It will allow you to duplicate this object across the scene
2) And it will keep your large mesh clean and separate from the small details.

Ideally, you want your scene to have no unnecessary loop cuts or geometry.

Select faces, Hit P

Now you can create a loop cut for your small object, but there is also a new object in your collection.


How can check UV problem? I am new in Blender,

How can I understand normal of UV are correct or not?
In maya, we can understand, by color either UV is correct or not but in blender I didn't find any tool,

Thanks

While UVs are seldom "right" or "wrong" you can visualize distortion compared to 3D model geometry by enabling "Stretch" in the UV editor Properties panel under Display:

With hard surface modeling this makes the out of place vertices pop but the biggest usage is perhaps with organic modeling where you have complex unwrap shapes and you want to tweak out the hard to spot local stretches.


Is there a way to move the sculpt tools (grab tool for example) away or towards the user? I am sculpting some features and I want to make some precise sculpting moves. With the grab tool, I would like to grab a part of the mesh and move it "away" from me, without any lateral movement of mesh. Is there a way to do this?

Consider

Quad View so you are seeing both front and side views.  Or you can open 2 edit windows to get the exact views you need by rotation of view.
Sculpt Draw Brush with Add selected as depicted in the image above.
Click in the same place on mesh.  No lateral movement is needed.
To emphasize you are only clicking an area with no movement of cursor.  The area grows toward you the viewer, which is difficult to see.  You see the growth in the profile view. You are creating a protrusion directly growing towards you.  You may click in Top Ortho and see growth in Right Ortho.  Create change in one view and see it in another view.


Multi Cams at the same time in the same Scene I really would like to set a Scene on which I have 2 or more Views that represent 2 or more Cameras at the same time but I'm not able to reach my targert.

Each time that I select a different cam, all the views are updated to the last one. :

Is it possible to have 2 or more views aligned with 2 or more cams at the same time in the same Scene?

Again, is it possible to have:

View 1 aligned with Camera 1 even if I select Camera 2

and

View 2 aligned with Camera 2 even if I select Camera 1

at the same time?

Ps.
I'm not in an animation,
I do not want to render,
I want only to setup the environmet

Many thanks.

In Blender 2.8 you can now select a "Local Camera" to look through per window. Use the 3D view properties panel N-Key. Select a camera that isn't the Scene camera and turn on "Use Local Camera".

This can be useful if you are rendering 2 concurrent views of the same animation.


I am having trouble with the Meadow scene tutorial on Blender guru I got the grass essentials pack, and followed the tutorial, but every time I put the grass in as the tutorial shows, it is a grey color and does not change.  I also cannot change the density, it seems like there is very little grass there that is all grey.  Am I missing some button or something from the tutorial? The link for the tutorial in question is: http://www.blenderguru.com/tutorials/make-grassy-meadow-scene/

Please let me know if I have something wrong here. I have tried going through the tutorial several times and it continues putting the grass part in as grey.  If I just add the grass in to blender by itself, it appears as expected, and multi-green color.

If you look at the very top of the screen for the tutorial in question, you'll see that is made with blender cycles and you are trying to do it in blender internal. Change it here:


Normal map not aligned in Cycles I'm a beginner at blender and while doing the anvil from blender guru's video I had a problem.
I baked the normal map and it won't align to my uv map in Cycles.
In eevee everything is fine and it's displayed according to the uv map but in cycles I have this

While in eevee I have this (working fine except the jagged edges on top) :

My material :

My uv and normal map :

I only have one uv map in my data objects. Any help would be greatly appreciated, thanks :)

I think.. not sure.. but you need to connect the image node to a texture coordinate (UV) and also don't forget the Mapping node between them

also worth checking is that your normal image is set to color, change it to non-color data when using normal maps.

hope it helps.


Viewport shading option "shadow" not displaying shadow I'm trying to get the viewport to render shadows to help visualize depth when working in an orthogrpahic view. I toggle the shadows option in the viewport shading menu, but it seems like the only thing that happens is the objects are shaded a little darker. I've tried messing around with all of the parameters with no success. I've included a screen cap of objects with and without shadows switched on. I'm sure its something simple that I'm overlooking but I haven't been able to figure it out. Thanks!

I'm looking for it to display hard shadows in the solid viewport shading mode to illustrate depth as seen in this image
here is a screen recording of what happens now when I turn on shadows, and change the shadow options parameters.

The option works fine in 2.92. Maybe take a look at the options (little gear icon):


Blender scene being ruined for no reason? I've been having this really odd problem lately and haven't seen anything like it before and am getting very frustrated. It might just be a simple fix, but I've been animating water flowing through and every time I save the file to render it later, it just ruins itself. I check the save multiple times and everything is fine but when I close blender and come back later it's just messed up and I don't know how to fix it. The domain box become visible like the pipe, it also become very small and the animation I had for the water is gone. I've tried also to re-bake everything but with no luck found. I would attach the blender file but honestly don't know how, so here's a screenshot instead.

You probably need to set up a proper location for the baked cache, within your project folder, preferably with a relative path, so that the fluid data is correctly saved in a safe place, and available next time you open your project file.

It may be getting deleted in the temp folder or unintentionally lost.

Use the path box visible in your screenshot under the Properties Window > Physics > Fluid > Cache path and point it to a safe location, possibly within your current project folder, or next to the blend file.

After that optionally you may manually move the cache files from the previous temp location if you do not want to rebake, or simply  just bake again to the new folder.


How to cut a mesh at the edge? Is there a way I can cut by continuing an edge?

So I want a cut at the red line, possibility using the knife tool, but I can't use the angle snap, since its not on any particular angle, so is there a way to rotate the camera so its on the same angle as that edge?

Clarification: Where the red line is, it's just grey space. I want an edge there

If you have a face on the edge perpendicular to the front face, then you can select the face and move the view with ShiftNumPad 1. That will rotate the view so that the edge is alined, then the angle constraint in the knife tool will work.


How to make paper page material? What is the best way to create real looking paper page?

I can make sides easy with textures, but can get result with that page base.

Looking at your question, the first thing that popped into mind is the need for Subsurface Scattering, so light is able to pass through the pages.

First of all, make the "Diffuse" shader a slightly yellow color, and then connect the shader output to an "Add Shader." Create a "Subsurface Scattering" shader and connect it to the other input slot o the "Add Shader" node. Try to pick a slightly yellow, slightly grey color for the "Subsurface Scattering" shader. Thyis will let yellowish light from other light sources seep through the pages, making it appear translucent. Make sure to crank up the samples when you do this, because this shader can cause a lot of fireflies.

For added realism, you can connect a simple "Noise Texture" node directly to the displacement, which will give the page a nice texture. In the end material set-up should look something like this:

Finally, here's the material in all its glory:

Just about every organic or living object has this property, so I hope I helped you out. Let me know if you have any questions. Happy Blendering! Cheers,
Graves Broderick


Edge selection does not result in highlighted edge for one object in scene I have an object in my scene where selecting an edge does not display the edge with a different color.

Why?

Here is an object, in the same scene, where edge selection highlights as expected.

When I had removed doubles, I got the selection highlighting back.

Now, why would that change anything?


Export Blender Particle System Hair To Three.Js After several months of casual research on three.js as I worked on a model in Blender 2.7 I have yet to locate a method for exporting the blender particle system hair? By chance would anyone have any ideas how would I go about achieving this feat, would I need to perhaps export to OBJ or some other format? I have yet to see any three.js imported particle systems from any 3d system?..Any ideas would greatly appreciated !!

You could convert the hair particles to a mesh in the modifier tab in the properties panel.

This would only create and object with only edges and vertices:

If you need meshes with faces you could emit low poly cylinders from the hair particles before converting them to a mesh.


Seperate a border/frame from an object using offset i Blender? I'm trying to separate/split the border/edge of this object using an offset edge. Like shown in the first image (done in fusion). The object is curved.
Image 1 is sort of what I'm trying to do. But I need the to parts to follow each others form and have equal thickness around the whole body

select the outer face ring

select more and repeat as long as you need it

seperate -> Selection

delete unwanted part

tutorial:
https://youtu.be/PuGHyzvwhWk


Adding holes simultaneously within mesh Im trying to add multiple holes within my mesh, so I divided it up, and then used cylinders shapes to make the holes. On the top image I used the Boolean operation.
And on the bottom image, I subdivided one of the rectangles and used the looptool method with the circle. Once I add a subdivision modifier I am getting weird result with the Boolean but the operation holes, but the bottom Hole looks more acceptable once cleaned up. Is one or the other method the correct way?

Select the face you want holes on
Inset all faces by pressing "i"
Extrude all faces by pressing "e"
Extrude all faces by pressing "e", press "g" and drag them down
Extrude all faces by pressing "e"

(3. and 5. sharpen the edges, so you don't have to add Loopcuts/Edge Creases)


Assigning different wire or halo materials to different parts of a mesh This is a follow-up question to Stephen's Add different materials to different parts of a mesh? As explained there, it is possible to assign different surface materials to different faces of a mesh.  However, the same method does not seem to work when the materials involved are not surface materials.
For example, suppose a cube mesh has two materials and both are wire materials.  If I assign the second material to everything (enter the Edit Mode, select all vertices [A], select the second material in the Properties panel > Materials tab, and click the Assign button), the cube is still rendered with the first material.  I have the same problem with two halo materials.

How do you assign different wire materials to different edges of a mesh? How do you assign different halo materials to different vertices of a mesh?

It's not possible, you can only use a single wire or halo material and this will be applied to the entire mesh.

Part of the reason is that materials are set per face, and wires and halos are for edges and vertices so there is no exact way to map them. But it's mostly just something that was never implemented.


Does scale of camera have an effect on camera tracking a scene? I am doing a camera match/track (markers on the floor and walls, they are scaled differently and key frames on necessary frames when something passes in front of the tracked point).  Sorry if this doesn't make sense.

I click the "solve camera motion" and then "set up tracking scene", and then I noticed the focal length of the camera is set to 4 mm, which looks extremely wide angled.  So I manually put the focal length to 35 mm, which looks right; then I look at the scale of the camera and the "empties" in the scene and it's scaled to like 0.1 instead of 1.0.

Anyone know what is causing the scale to adjust like that?
And can it still be used, or should the scale be 1?

Not sure how to edit this:  It appears the "Camera Solver" constraint is what is setting the camera scale, can anyone shed light on that, in layman's terms?

Any input is greatly appreciated.

The scale of the camera is irrelevant. The scale of the scene is not.
The scale for the 3d reconstruction of the scene based on tracking information is arbitrary.
If you happen to know what the distance is in the real world between two  of the elements being tracked, you can use that to inform blender to scale the tracked scene based on that distance. Select the trackers and set and apply the scale.

Read: Camera tracking reference scene to match different shots in a common space
But even if you don't set the scale when you solve the scene, you can scale and reposition all empties and camera with ease. If you move any of the elements of the tracking constraint, all of the elements will move as they all depend on the camera. It is here that you can scale the camera to make the reconstruction be the scale you want.

For a comprehensive post on motion tracking read:
How can I get better results when doing camera motion tracking?


Sculpted object turns into a cube when I enter edit mode I have just recently sculpted a Mesh Helmet model and I am needing it to export it for another program. When I switch the mesh into edit mode it turns into its original starting cube. Going into sculpt mode again returns it to my helmet. I didn't think it was an issue, but when I exported it into a .dae file it came out as the cube instead of the helmet. How do I make the helmet show up correctly in Edit mode and the .dae file instead of the cube?

You more than likely have a Multiresoultion modifier on your object. You can switch to the Modifiers tab and press Apply on the modifier to apply this and see how your object looks in edit mode but if you apply it now, you will lose the ability to adjust any settings on the modifier and you might be left with a really high poly object which is undesirable if you decide to tweak the sculpt later (reduce view levels etc to reduce the load on the viewport).

If you still decide to apply the modifier, I would recommend making a copy of the sculpt just in case.

To keep the modifier and export the sculpt, when using the Collada exporter, look in the properties to the left and tick Apply modifiers.


Is there a fast way to make lamp brighter? I found it too long to go into the lamp's object data every time I want to make it brighter.
Light sources have the empty property "scale". If usual "scaling" hotkey ("S") could make the lamp a bit lighter, tons of my time would be saved.

As suggested by @JachymMichal, Just keep the lamp section open on the properties window.
There is a good reason to keep intensity of the light as a completely separate control.
Intensity and lamp size are two very different qualities.
Scaling the light it will just change the quality of the shadow. A very smalll light source will give a very defined sharp shadow. A large source will yield softer less defined shadows.


Colored matt glass shade for lamp in cycles I'm trying to create (using Blender 2.72) a realistic model of a lamp shade (which shape can be roughly represented as a cylinder with no caps and non-zero thickness of the walls) made of a colored matt glass that would do the following (having a small sphere with a white "Emission" shader placed in the center of it):

Attenuate the light coming through it.
Change the color of the light coming through it.
Reflect the light off its internal surface for the rays falling at low angles and leaving the shade through its upper/lower aperture (optional).

My current knowledge of Cycles materials (or, the lack of it) is not letting me properly "wrapping" my head around this task successfully.

Any hints on what should the graph look like are appreciated!

I think all you need is a rough glass shader:

Or perhaps something like this:

Filtering out certain colors is a fairly simple matter:


Painting one part of my model causes another part to get painted as well I have a problem here.
When i'm painting the foot of my character, the blur that appears on the foot is, somehow, mirrored on the leg too, and the same thing happens when i try the inverse. I didn't use any mirror property while working on the model, and none of axes symmetry is active.

What could possibly be causing this?

I believe TARDIS Maker is correct in your UV it appears that the painted parts do overlap:


How to recenter an object's origin? So, I'm working creating a lamp... yes, newbie here.

After modeling for a bit, I noticed that my point of origin was no longer the center of my object:

How to I reset an object origin point to the center of it's geometry?

Press Shift + Ctrl + Alt + C (perhaps the longest shortcut in Blender) and select Origin to Geometry. Or, instead, open the Toolshelf by pressing T and press the Set Origin button in the Tools tab, subsection Edit.

Depending on how you imagine the 'Center' of your object, you might instead want to choose Origin to Center of Mass. The difference is that it calculates the center point based on the volume of the mesh, rather than the average location of vertices as Origin to Geometry does.

Visually, the difference is this (blue dot is the new origin point):

UPDATE for Blender 2.8

Press the Object button at the bottom of the 3D view and see the Set Origin... sub-menu:

Here you can find both the Origin to Geometry and two similar Origin to Center of Mass options.


Why is automatic weights missing from ctrl+p? I tried it on a fresh project and there I was able to successfully apply automatic weights. Here if I try to do it with empty weights I can't select bones in weight paint mode, so that's not an option. I tried searching for answer but couldn't find any. Any help is greatly appreciated :)

I noticed that when I select Armature it highlights all my bones and when I press ctrl + p it seems that the automatic weights is missing as well.

If you're in Object Mode and you hit "a" to select everything, and then hit ctrl + p it shows the automatic weights in the context menu. Hope that helps :)


Array not looking smooth in render along a path I have an array modifier attached to a curve with a curve modifier. I want to make the crease in between each cube smooth but it's not working. I've applied the array modifier and smoothed the faces, verts, and edges and that didn't do anything. I've also applied a subsurf modifier with smoothing on which also didn't work. There is are 650 arrayed cubes scaled down on the z to make it as smooth as possible. The curve also has hundreds of vertices so that's very smooth too. I've searched everywhere for a solution and couldn't manage to find one. Any suggestions?

Edit: I just scaled the arrayed object down on the z axis making it really small then making the array count 5000 and the creases stayed the same. So the path needs more verts. I don't want to increase the verts on the curve, because it's already hard to edit and adding more verts will make it sooo much worse.

Project File: stackexchange.blend

(BTW I know the subsurf modifier is set to 0 in this picture I did try it with 3 subdivisions. Obviously didn't work.)

I think that:

Your curve has way too many vertices, so I guess it cuts your shape in small slices and annihilates the smoothing. You need to simplify it a lot: Convert it to mesh, delete most of the vertices with the Checker Deselect tool and Dissolve Vertices, come back to a curve, now in Edit mode, in the Tools panel, Set Spline Type to Bezier, and Set Handle Type to Automatic then Aligned.
Or simply redo a spirale with less vertices.
In the Properties panel > Data > Shape, give more Resolution to your curve. It has 12 by default but as it is a long curve you must increase the Resolution to 48.
Add some horizontal edge loops to your object so that its arrays can bend along the curve.