I need help trying to create piping that goes along a curved surface for half of it, then curves out away from the surface Not sure if my explanation makes sense. I'm making a 3D model of the Titanic, and for most of the Smokestack piping I've been using the shrinkwrap modifier to attach curves to the smokestack, but the No. 3 Smokestack has piping that juts out to the Tank Room.

If I use the shrinkwrap modifier, the parts of the pipe that jut out will just stick to the smokestack. I could have the piping in two pieces (one shrinkwrapped the other not) but I was wondering if there was any way to have it all in one piece (maybe even learn a new way to have the piping sit on the curved surface).

Perhaps an alternative approach to shrinkwrapping is as follows: (It's not easy to make illustrations for this one, so I'll just try to decscribe it)

Duplicate your smokestack and tanks
Enlarge the duplicate appropriately, scaling (S) or fattening (AltS). This object is going to be the 'Form' for your pipes (they lie slightly outside the objects they are aligned to.)
Simply select edges from the 'Form', where you want the pipes on the cylinder. Don't worry about the right-angle corners, we'll get to that. If the edges don't exist, subdivide, or cut using the Knife (K) tool.
Duplicate (ShiftD) those edges, and extrude the end vertices of the duplicate sections to create the splaying straight pipes. If your model is up in Z, that will be - Select vertex, EShiftZ for the horizontal sections, and EZ for the plunge into the tank.
Separate the selection of edges (P) into a new 'Pipes' object - and bevel (CtrlShiftB) its right-angle corner vertices to give them the curve you're looking for.
Convert the 'Pipes' mesh into a Curve, and in its'Shape' and 'Geometry' panels give it a Full Bevel profile with enough resolution to make the pipes round.
If you've kept the resolutions reasonable , and dissolved out vertices in straight sections which are not contributing to the shape, you might want convert back to mesh, and put a subdivision surface modifier on the result.

I short, the method takes the vertices from existing geometry, rather than creating shapes from scratch.


Modeling a pointy mesh I want to model a pointy mesh but I don't know what the right method is, because I have tried multiple of them and they doesn't seem right.

I tried to do it by linking every vertex to a single vertex at the tip.
The problem with that is that I won't be able to use a loop cut to sharpen the edges if I want to use a subsurf modifier after that, since I believe it doesn't work with triangles.

Then, I tried to do it with four vertex linked in a same position and individually linked to the four others vertex of the mesh.
I'm wondering if this is a clean way to do it because those four vertex are not really necessary, if it is to place the loop cut.

The problem with that tho is that when I work with a mirror modifier on the X and Y axis, there will always be a hole in the middle (invisible when shrinked) since I can only link three vertex. Is that a problem ?

Thanks for the help!

Sharpen with Crease edges values

If is suitable with your geometry, you can use a high value of Crease Edge amount to the edges that start from the vertex you want pointy.

Pick the vertices, extend selection with Ctrl++ and than Ctrl+E to set the Crease to 1

More purple the edge is, higer the Crease value result.

If you are not interest on the sharp edges but only to create a spiky geometery, you can loopcut the piramid with a loopcut that lay in the plane that has the same normal of the base.

To opbtain this you can use the kinfe tool, or by extruding, or subdividing.

Double press G key to slide the loop near the vertex.


Setting constraints causes the location of the constrained objects/bodies not be accessible I set up 2 bodies manually & assigned Copy Location constraint to one with respect to another body. Then I set up the keyframe for the guiding body & then I started to view the change in the location of the constrained body. What I noticed in the 3D viewport was the constrained object moves, but when I look into its real position the values are stagnant. Why is that? I was unable to find my answer in previously asked questions by other people !!

object.location will never give the "correct" position for a object that has a constraint on it (or a parented object).
That comes from the way parenting and constraints mess with the global coordinates (their effect gets calculated after the object.location).

To get the world position of the a child object (or an object governed by a constraint) you should use object.matrix_world.translation.
matrix_world returns a matrix for the object's transformations in world space. The .translation part will convert the matrix to a location vector (just like .location).

The blender wiki has a good read for further explanation about the coordinates for parented objects (same principals for constraints).


Color/image to alpha in Blender I want Blender to compare two images and subtract the one image from the other and create an alpha. So far, it turns it white... but I need it to be alpha. I can't just turn white into alpha as there are some times where I want white to be a color left behind on the final image.

Using the compositor, you can use an Alpha Over node with the top socket set to 0 alpha and plug your main image into the bottom socket. This puts the 0 alpha under the image, and then using the image with the white in it as a mix factor for the alpha over node. To get the result I think you wanted, I inverted the color of the image used as a mask. Notice that since the image I used had a slight gradient of white in it, the black was not pure and so the image left has a slight transparency to it.
I also wanted to point out I saved the image result from the 'Viewer' output in the UV Image Editor, and then brought it back in as an image node to confirm that it had a definite alpha. Might need some cleanup with a dilate/erode node, but this gets you there.


making an intersecting curve manifold i am using blender to make files for digital fabrication , 3D printing and CNC milling . i am working a little project where i have been sketching with beveled curve , my problem is that when the curve intersects the mesh also interects and i need it as a solid object with no interal vertex . does anyone know a good solution to this problem . i have been just trying to stitch it back together myself but it is time consuming and not great results .

many thanks

You can try to keep only a quarter of it so that you can clean it "by inside" and then apply a mirror in order to obtain the whole shape again.

The blend here : http://www.pasteall.org/blend/42115


Boolean on cycles rays, not on mesh Given a scene with objects and light sources, I want to add a box somewhere in the scene that surrounds some objects and collisions with some others. A camera looks at the box from outside.

Now I would like that Cycles only shows stuff inside the box. The result is that the box will act like a slicing volume, not at the mesh level but at the ray level.

Is it possible to do this kind of boolean operation on the light ray with materials ?

Mask with "Coordinates from object"

You can make a pass-trough node that is able to mask with a transparent shader all the geometry outside box object.

Basically you pick up the box coordinates, take the part outside the (-1,1) range (which actually depends on the box scale factors) of each components, sum all the contributes and assign to that a full-trasparent shader. The pass-trough masking node must be assigned to every material of the scene.

Notice that you can even scale the cube in different axis and it will still work as expected (never apply scale to the cube, or you'll lose this property).

The only limitation is that the proces is based on math, not geometry. The cube only help to better see the cutting boundaries, but there is not a true dependency (it would work even with an empty, what really matter are the object's coordinates and scale).

In this case  the math behind the clamping is quite simple: it will consider only the object's bounding box. With some effort you should probably be able to build  fror example a sphere/ellipsoid mask, a torus mask,... and even more complex shapes (you can sum the contributes of several individual masking objects).

If you would like to smooth out to the boundaries of the selection, just substitute the "Greather than" math node with a color ramp for each channel.

Almost infinite implementations could follow, as far as your math knowledge can support you

Here's another example with a spherical falloff:


Copy Physics to multiple objects in Blender 2.8 I'm trying to convert a number of objects to have 'Rigid Body' Physics at the same time rather than having to do it one by one.

I know in 2.79 you could use the left hand toolbar to select "add active" as seen in this thread: Copy Physics To Multiple Objects

But I can't seem to find that option in 2.8

Select your objects to copy to and then the object to copy from.

Then search F3 and enter the search string as "Copy Rigid Body Settings"

Or from the Object menu Rigid Body->Copy From Active

You can also right click this menu and Assign Shortcut to assign the action a key press of your choice.


How do you import SVG without a fill? I've looked for an answer, and have seen that there should be an option on the import dialog. This is not the case for me. Blender 2.77, SVG 1.1 from Illustrator. Thank you.

The SVG importer has no options.

SVGs are imported as curves.

2D curves can be filled or not. The fill settings are here:

If fill it's set to none, your curve will only be an outline.

Note that the outline will need some extrusion or bevel to be visible/renderable.


Smart find a vertices Hi and thanks in advance.
I am trying to find a reference point on a 3d scanned arm model in Blender, so I can know its current position and rotation. A phyton script to find a certain vertices, let's say the one on middle finger's tip, would help me a lot. Can someone lead me in the right direction, please? (With no opencv involvement)

I see that it is not something you can do in blender. I will have to use OpenCV feature recognition for such a purpose. Thanks for responses.


Python: Assign selected faces to vertex group I have a script that selects some random faces and splits them. I would like to add the selection to a vertex group. I can't get my script to assign the selection to a vertex group. Thank you for the help.

            sub2 = 0
            bpy.ops.mesh.select_all(action='SELECT')
            bpy.ops.mesh.select_random(percent=55, seed=10, action='DESELECT')
            bpy.ops.mesh.split()
            group = context.object.vertex_groups.new()
            group.name = ("Island" + str(sub2))
            #group.add(bpy.data.objects.data.verts, 1.0, 'ADD')
            bpy.ops.object.vertex_group_assign()

You have missing "bpy" on line 4, so it should be:
group = bpy.context.object.vertex_groups.new()

Don't forget to import bpy:
import bpy

Whole script:
import bpy
sub2 = 0
bpy.ops.mesh.select_all(action='SELECT')
bpy.ops.mesh.select_random(percent=55, seed=10, action='DESELECT')
bpy.ops.mesh.split()
group = bpy.context.object.vertex_groups.new()
group.name = ("Island" + str(sub2))
#group.add(bpy.data.objects.data.verts, 1.0, 'ADD')
bpy.ops.object.vertex_group_assign()


Subdivide a square into 9 smaller squares? How can I subdivide a square into 9 smaller squares?

Never mind, I found out that you can click subdivide and then increase the number of cuts on the left sidebar.


my wrist controller is angled odly I want the controller to be more aligned with the hand.
Anyone know how to fix it?

here is a

using the cutting edge software update

I don't know why your hand controller is rotated, because your metarig doesn't produce that. You might have done something we don't know to get that. Fixing it manually might take some time.

However, since you're using Rigify and that your metarig seem to be correct, it will be quite simple: regenerate your rig from your metarig and it will be fixed.

For that, select your metarig object. Then in the object data tab, head over to the Rigify Buttons panel, usually located at the very bottom. You will just need to change the target object in your meshes's Armature Deform modifiers for them to be deformed by your new rig. The skinning should remain intact.
If you want to generate a new rig, simply hit the Generate Rig button.
If you want to override your already existing rig, hit the Advanced Options button first, set it up like the following and then hit the Generate Rig button:

No need for modifiers retargeting this time.


Modify the label of a predefined property Python I'm using the location property as shown below but I wonder how I can change the label of it to be "New Location" instead of "Location"?

ob = bpy.data.objects['Rock']
row = layout.row()
row.column().prop(ob, "location")

This is what appears:

You just have to add in the text argument when adding the property, e.g.:

row.column().prop(ob, "location", text="New Location")

This overrides the default label. You can see the additional options for UI properties in the API documentation.


Mathutils Vector Raycast I have an object I wish to cast a ray from, casting using a mathutils direction vector.

The only problem is that I cannot seem to figure out how to find the 3D position (needed for the rayCast function) from the vector.

If anybody could help, I'd be terribly grateful for it. Thanks :)

I know this is old but had to work on a similar situation tonight.

All you need to do is add the vector to your 3D point A(which should also be a vector pointing from your object to the origin point of the scene). This should give you a target point in 3D space.

target_point = point_A.worldPosition + vector

If you want to change the distance away from your point_A origin, you need only alter the magnitude of your vector:

vector.magnitude *= 5 # 5 times the vector length

or

vector.magnitude += 30 # 30 Blender units greater than your original vector


When using Flip Fluids and enable whitewater any Foam Spray or bubble appear as these icospheres I have a problem when enabling the whitewater in the Flip Fluids addon. I get these big icospheres that I don't know how to fix. I've changed a lot of domain settings and it doesn't make any difference when rendering. Can someone help?

In the domain FLIP Fluid Display Settings panel, you can set the scale of the whitewater particles used for rendering.


Creating a model for Garrys mod. How can I copy/paste my model in the edit mode to create a phys model? I'm following this youtube tutorial but the teacher copy/pasted and continued on like nothing. I've looked around and I guess theres shift-d to duplicate but I'm really just trying to make a copy of this model to rename it with _phys at the end.

Here's the tutorial and its time stamped at the part I'm stuck at.
https://youtu.be/LWvAkJryAhI?t=180

one way is (the tutorial one):

select the object (be sure you are in "object mode" and not in "edit mode")
control c to copy
control v to paste
g (move), x (move only on X axis - so you can position better your object), move the mouse, left click when you want to drop the copied object

the other is:

select the object you need to copy (be sure you are in "object mode" and not in "edit mode")
shift d (duplicate)
x (move only on X axis - so you can position better your object)
left click to position the object

otherwise you can do your copy stuff directly inside "scene collection"
right click, copy, bla bla - see gif -->


Child object doesn't stay relative to parent in BGE I'm making (another) plane game but the propeller, which is parented to the plane, keeps moving weirdly.
Here is an image of the whole plane, before I go into the game:

Then, when I go into the game, it looks like this:

Which is OK, so far. But now, when I move the mouse to rotate the plane, the propeller detaches from the plane:

Is there a way to keep the propeller attached in the same position on the plane?

If it helps, here is the blend file.

This was a simple case of unapplied scale and rotation. The odd thing is blender handles parents with different transforms just fine, but the game engine does not.
As a general rule everything in the BGE should have a scale of one, and no rotation.

All I did is apply the scale and rotation on both the plane and the propeller, then the normal object parent worked as expected in the BGE.

Here is your fixed blend with parent working, plus you had the normals on your plane reversed.

If you haven't seen my explanation on the parenting settings, go read it here.


Can I add random viewport colours in 2.79 like in 2.8? I was wondering if I can add random viewport colors for better visibility like the new feature added in 2.8, but in 2.79 (maybe an add-on) since my PC doesn't support 2.8 due to my hardware limitations. I know that I can add materials to individual objects and change their viewport colours manually, but it's too much of work and unfeasible for large scenes.
Thanks.

The following add-on randomizes the viewport color. It works for both Cycles and Blender Internal. Save the file into 2.79\scripts\addons and activate if through the preferences. The add-on creates panel in the 3D View properties (N) titled Randomize Viewport Color.

In order for the viewport material to be applied for Cycles you need to have a material applied that uses nodes. This is a safety feature, because otherwise changing the viewport color would also change the material color. A limitation for Cycles in 2.79b is that the viewport color is tied to the material. Every object with the same material will have the same color.

Please keep in mind that this is a quickly written add-on and may have some areas that could be improved.

bl_info = {
    "name": "Randomize Viewport Colors",
    "author": "Robert Guetzkow",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 79, 0),
    "location": "View3D > Properties",
    "description": "Randomizes the viewport colors of all objects",
    "warning": "",
    "wiki_url": "",
    "category": "3D View",
}

import bpy
import random

class RandomColorSettings(bpy.types.PropertyGroup):
    use_viewport_color = bpy.props.BoolProperty(
        name="Enable Viewport Color",
        description="When checked and update is pressed the viewport coloring will be enabled for all materials.",
        default=True)

class RANDOMIZE_VIEWPORT_COLORS_OT_update(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "randomize_viewport_colors.update"
    bl_label = "Update"
    bl_options = {'REGISTER', 'UNDO'}

    def execute(self, context):
        if context.scene.render.engine == "CYCLES":
            for mat in bpy.data.materials:
                # Make sure that nodes are used, otherwise this will change the actual material color
                if mat.use_nodes:
                    if context.scene.use_viewport_color:
                        mat.diffuse_color = (random.uniform(0.0, 1.0),
                                             random.uniform(0.0, 1.0),
                                             random.uniform(0.0, 1.0))
                    else:
                        mat.diffuse_color = (1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
        else:
            for obj in bpy.data.objects:
                obj.color = (random.uniform(0.0, 1.0), random.uniform(0.0, 1.0), random.uniform(0.0, 1.0), 1.0)

            for mat in bpy.data.materials:
                mat.use_object_color = context.scene.use_viewport_color

        return {'FINISHED'}

class VIEW3D_PT_randomize_viewport_colors(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_space_type = 'VIEW_3D'
    bl_region_type = 'UI'
    bl_label = "Randomize Viewport Colors"

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        layout.prop(context.scene, "use_viewport_color")
        layout.operator("randomize_viewport_colors.update")

classes = (
    RANDOMIZE_VIEWPORT_COLORS_OT_update,
    VIEW3D_PT_randomize_viewport_colors
)

def register():
    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.register_class(cls)
    bpy.types.Scene.use_viewport_color = bpy.props.BoolProperty(
        name="Enable Viewport Color",
        description="When checked and update is pressed the viewport coloring will be enabled for all materials.",
        default=True)

def unregister():
    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.unregister_class(cls)
    del bpy.types.Scene.use_viewport_color

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


Can I make a smoke emission only be affected by a specific force field? I'd like to animate a scene where two different smoke emissions are in the same vicinity but are affected by different force fields. Can this be done?

Right now both emitters are in the same smoke domain, in case that's important.

You can specify a group of force fields which can affect the domain.

So by putting each force field in a separate group (⎈ CtrlG), you can have them influence some domains but not others:


How to simulate a lamp shade in the game engine I am trying to make a lamp in the blender game engine, however, I am having a lot of trouble making the light go through the lampshade in a diffuse type of illumination, how can I do this? I have tried with the modifier "cloth" and playing around with textures, but nothing seems to work.

Something like this: (http://feelgrafix.com/838711-lamp.html)

Actually it is translucency, it doesn't have anything common with cloth simulation. Most close and simple you could make - bake Translucent shader from Cycles into texture, but result actually would be good only for one point of view, so I think it would be better but much harder to write own fragment shader.


Why does mesh behave like mirrored in Edit mode without Mirror modifier? This is probably a very simple question, but the Mirror modifier keeps mirroring my model though i've applied/deleted it.

I read somewhere that I have to disable symmetry lock, but I'm assuming that only works in Sculpt mode which I'm not using because I'm trying to make a low-poly model. I'm not entirely sure why this is happening because I've done it before and I didn't face any problems.

If i can get some help that would be great!

That could be this "X mirror":

You find that in Edit mode, on the Toolshelf (press T to toggle visibility), under the Options tab.


How do I import a custom icon set in the theme options? I'm trying to load a custom icon set, however Blender will not load it despite the fact that it's a modified version of the original SVG.

Currently, you can't.
In 2.67 there is a button in the theme preferences, but since this is non-functional its been removed for 2.68.

Note that you can of course build your own blender from source with modified icons and fonts but this is outside the scope of stack-exchange.


Limiting precision level in Animation Nodes? Is there a perfomance wise way to limit decimal numbers for all values inside NodeTree?

Sometimes I don't need that many decimal numbers, especially for comparing values to get desired boolean result. Limiting values like Vectors, Eulers is a waste of resources as they need to be separated to floats and recombined after. Any tips are welcome.

Non list types are represented using python objects, so you can't really change the precision.

Vectors types lists in Animation Nodes (i.e. Vector3DList, Vector2DList, EulerList,...) are composed of float typed numbers, which is the smallest possible type, so you can't have smaller precision than that.

A float list in Animation Nodes is actually composed of doubles, so you can reduce the precision by using a FloatList instead.

An integer type in Animation Nodes is a long, so you can reduce the precision by using a ShortList, a CharList, or an IntegerList. Though I believe two of them might have the same precision on some systems/compilers.

Finally, I think it is unlikely to get a performance boost out of this, at least in the context of AN. So I think you are better off optimizing your node tree somewhere else.


Transparent backround in GE? I am taking some screenshots in the game engine, but I wondered about something. Is there a way you can have your background of your scene be transparent? I can take the picture into a paint program and give a transparent background, but I've wondered if I can do this in the GE. Any help is appreciated, thanks!

As far as I know screenshots do not know transparency.

As a workaround you can use a chroma-key technique to determine the background. This means you use a background color that is not used somewhere else in the picture and use it as transparency. This way you can easily remove that portions in your image editor.


Object became a like a grid, how to turn it back solid? I was creating an object and a rig when suddenly the object turned into a grid instead of showing off the default grey material.

How it looks right now:

How do I make it solid again?

Key Z. This will toggle between Wireframe (what you are in) and Solid view.


Mesh of a single twist Yarn in Blender I am new at Blender, I want to design a mesh of a single twisted yarn, which is the best strategy to design this mesh. Sorry if my question sounds dumb.

I am attaching the picture
![enter image description here

I foud a tutorial in youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cP1pY14fVC4&list=LLuORS2hOBqsUJEgE645iWDQ&index=2&t=1026s, however, I dont know how to merge the mesh.

EDIT
Is this mesh true, I am going to use it for physical simulation

Create a 12 vertices circle.

Enable the Snap option (Vertex mode), or just press ctrl when you'll need it, enable the Auto-Merge option.

Duplicate your circle, with Snap and Auto-Merge it will snap and merge the vertices. Delete the inner vertices, bevel the 3 central vertices with a shiftctrlB.

Extrude up, create horizontal edge loops with ctrlR. To make sure you don't have flipped normals, press shiftctrlN. Back in Object mode, move the origin to the geometry.

Give your object a Simple Deform modifier, Angle 120°, Axis Z.

Give it an Array modifier, enable the Merge and First Last options.

Give it a Subdivision Surface modifier, and also smooth it: Object > Shade Smooth.

To make it follow a curve, give it a Curve modifier. Make sure that the curve's origin is at its beginning, put the object at the same point.


what is causing my armature to warp the model so badly when rotating it's arm, how can i fix this? i've just finished setting up an armature for my model, i used automatic weighting which may be the cause of the problem, but whenever i try to rotate the arms or legs of the model, it causes catastrophic effects on the model's proportions.
if the solution has to do with manually painting the weights, is there a more precise way of editing the weights? i would like things to be symmetrical and that, instead of just doing it by eye.

i would rather the shoulder stay in place when raising the arm, instead of putting it halfway down the torso

thank you

Yes, your weight painting is off, you'll have to use envelopes (not the best solution) or manually adjust the weights, so that the upper arm does not effect the chest anymore.
Select the armature, then the guy.
CRTL + TAB -> choose weight paint.
Use the brush tools to adjust your weights.


Is Blender a good solution for bringing hand drawn illustrations to 3D life? I'm completely unfamiliar with animation, but I'm considering learning blender for use in producing educational (physics) content as it was suggested to me that it can be used to do what Henry Reich does in the following MinutePhysics video from 00:53-00:58:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmNXKqeUtJM

Would "bringing hand drawn animation to 3D life" in the particular way illustrated by this video be relatively straightforward in Blender?  Is Blender a good solution for attempting to recreate that sort of thing?

You certainly could. Import your "hand drawn" textures on to planes. Then just position them in 3D space. Animate the camera moving around and your effect is about done. Depending on how much movement you may want to add a Track To Constraint to each of your planes, set the constraint to the camera. That will make the planes always point at the camera.


Ocean modifier (animated) with small waves I can't solve a problem I'm having with the ocean modifier. It's the last major thing before I can start to render the animation. I have a boat moving through waves with equipment being towed coming to a standstill. At the standstill equipment is deployed over the side. With these I'm quite zoomed into the side of the boat and need detailed waves at the moment they're horrible!

I can sort the foam out later and general choppyness / scale of the big waves, just need a decent detailed ocean to work on

I can't seem to get detailed waves no mater how high I put the resolution, I've adjusted the spatial size etc. I know I'm missing something simple!!

My settings are:
generate
Repeat X 2 Y 4
Resolution 25
Depth 200
Size 1
Spatial size 25
Choppiness 3
Scales 0.250
Smallest wave 1mm
Wind &m/s

Any help would be much appreciated

You can't modify the scale of the texture internally displacing the mesh, like you would do with a procedural texture like Noise...

I think one good way to get more details on the waves here is to increase the repeat X Y, and decrease the (spatial) Size...

This will work fine working with tiny waves like you have on your screenshot, but as soon as you are working with big waves, it gets uggly because you immediately spot the repetitive pattern:

To make the ocean feel more realistic you can increase the random amount so you don't have this uggly thing you see above. Although, this will not remove the "pattern" of the water completely, it will just change the way it looks until it's good for you.

An other solution consists in using procedural textures in top of the actual displaced geometry.

We can use textures as normal maps without uv unwrapping the plane because they are procedural, and work with generated uv map.

I'm not going to go into the process of creating ocean textures proceduraly because the community already did this messy work for us. For oceans, I'm using the ocean shader available in the Blendermada addon.

This addon is great if you don't want to get into the mess of creating realistic materials yourself.
Here you can find a link to the download of the addon.
If you don't need the addon and just need the extra waves, here's the ocean material in a blend file. (use Shift+F1 to append and go into the node tree of the blend file to append all of the node groups)

You can experiment with the shader. It's a bit complicated if you go inside it, but if you don't want all of the extra things it provides, you can try to steel some generated normal textures and append them into your original material.

I think the shader looks fine though, here is a simple plane with no displacement. It's unbelievable what you can do with 4 vertices and generated textures:

If you get a grey result, use a hdr environnement texture to light the scene, because by default the light comes at even strength and color from every direction. Your sky texture will do the job as well but you will get less of the glossiness I got in my render.

By combining these two methods you can get some really interesting results.


Animation nodes > Mesh Object Output > Use function The docs doesn't contain info about the use function:

Does anybode know what the function is?
When I enable this then my "Target" output object jumps to another place...
Thx!

That is socket Enable/Disable switch. When it is disabled data in the socket is not used. You need to enable that for writing data to target mesh. So that it always rewrites new data on the mesh.


How to bend one side of a planar mesh fade the bending effect towards the other side I couldn't figure out how to bend one side of a planar mesh like the edges on that side follow a circle. I also want this bending effect to fade smoothly towards the other edge. It is like square(projected) piece cut out from a sphere but I want to control the fading effect and I also want one side of the piece to be a line. I thought, this is a primitive thing, it cannot be considered as "do the modeling for me" request. I'm sorry, If I'm not in the right place to ask such a question. I tried different modifiers but I couldn't converge to what I was willing to see. What is the easiest way of doing this in blender?

Edit: I tried to sketch it:
In this sketch, side view shows that from B to C it is bended. This is the final thing that I want to model. Then, I will repeat this round a cylinder. That part is easy. But, initially, I have to figure out how to bend one side of the mesh from B to C like in the first figure. The edges connected to the corner A are just lines. And the shape is symmetrical.

Here is how to do it. Doing it with modifiers isn't possible as far as I know. If you need more control, comment.

Start by adding a circle.
rotate the circle by 90 degrees on the X axis(RX90).
Delete the bottom half of it.
Take the bottom to vertices and duplicate the by 2 units on the y axis (Shift-DY2).

fill the two vertices.
hit (Ctrl-R).
add 1 less loop cuts then half the number of vertices in your circle you can use the scroll wheel to do this.
Join up all the faces (Ctrl-E>Bridge Edgeloops).
add some loop cuts until your faces are about square.
tweak the shape using proportional editing.


How do you add an object from another scene in the BGE? I have several scenes that will be using the same objects over and over. So I created a directory scene so I can pull objects to their places (while the game is runing) with no problems. But I don't know how to add objects from another scene. Can someone tell me the code for this or if it is even possible.

This is in the game engine and I would like to know if there is a way to add an object in game, while the original is in an entirely different scene. For instance if I wanted to add a character model called "Bob". "Bob" is in scene "directory" I want him to be added at the location marked by object "point".

Scene dependencies

You can't copy game objects across scenes. All template objects have to reside in the scene you want to add them to.

Linked objects

Blender allows to link objects (and object data) across scenes. The BGE will load them as individual copies. This allows you to get a single (Blender) object as copies within your BGE scenes.

Ensure they are still placed within hidden layers that you can use them as temple object on add object.

Scenes interaction

These objects are individual Objects and have no relation to each other (beside they look equal). This means when you want to transfer any "manipulation" from one scene to the other you apply a similar manipulation to this other object.

Example 1:

In scene A you show object cube. When clicking on it you want to create such a cube in scene B.

So you need to tell scene B, that it should create a cube at a certain location.

I suggest you send a message from scene A to an "object builder" object in scene B. This object builder creates the desired cube at the desired location. You should provide enough information that this will be successful. So you need to tell that it should be a cube and not a sphere. You should tell what location the cube should get and so on.

Example 2:

You moved the copy of a sphere from (0,0,0) to (10,0,0) in your scene A.
Now you need to apply a matching operation to the according sphere of scene B.

So you tell the other scene to "move sphere" to an according position. Be aware it does not need to be the same position as in scene A.

Conclusion

I'm not sure if that explains enough.

Each single scene is responsible for itself. It should know the templates it can use and it adds the copies by itself.

Avoid trying to add objects from other scenes. This creates unnecessary dependencies. Better tell objects of the other scene what you want. This way the scene can care of it self.

Messages are a good way of inter-scene communication. They do not establish strong dependencies (means it does not matter if the other scenes exist). It works well even with multiple listening objects in any number of active scenes.

You can still access complex data from a custom python module. This way you get scene independent shared data that can be used as long as your game runs.


animation play is very slow I have a wind field and cloth animation set up created, but when I hit the play button the animation is so slow. I can hardly tell the animation going.
How to set this to real time?
Blender 2.81

Two things. 1) Your CPU is probably lagging because cloth simulations take up a lot of processing power. 2) A way to fix this would be to set the playback of the animation to Frame-dropping. You can do this by going to the "playback" tab in the lower left side of Blender, and setting that to Frame-Dropping.


How to get consistent lamp strengths in cycles? This has bugged me for a while now.

Each lamp type seems to have it's own scale for brightness.
Here's a test scene of four lamp types. Each lamp is one BU with a strength of 100:

You'll notice that the mesh lamp is much brighter and the spot lamp is much dimmer.

Why is there such a disparity between the spot lamp and the other lamps? Is there a way to convert "point lamp energy units" into "spot lamp energy units" (besides just eyeballing it)?

I'm not completely sure why the spot lamp is generally darker than the rest of them, and the point lamp slightly darker, but if you level the playing field a bit, they aren't all that different:

Set all sizes to the same value, 0.5 as well as the dimensions of the mesh light
Set the spot lamp's shape size (the cone) to 180 degrees

Now you can see that the mesh and area lamps are nearly identical, except for the area lamp being slightly brighter in the middle on the back wall.

The dimensions of the mesh light was an arbitrary guess, changing it will change the brightness since light is emitted from the surface of the mesh and more surface area means more light. This is different from the other lamps, where the size is purely to control the softness of the shadows and doesn't affect the brightness at all.


Create cylinder with different bases I need to create cyllinder with 16 vertices on top but only 4 vertices on bottom plane. Im trying to merge faces and dissolve edges, but the resulting object looks deformed, cut out.

My approach would be to use a circle with 16 vertices, and one with 4 vertices.
Add both in while in edit mode so they are part of the same object,and then use bridge edge loops operator  with Ctrl+E then L
You can then quad cap the 16 vert side with grid fill , ( Ctrl+F then G )and fill the quad with F


bones on the right side affect the left side ok, so i was creating a character in blender for my game but when i parented the mesh to the bones with automatic weights, i quickly found that when i moved bones on the left side of the body it affected the right side but the right side had no affect on the left. when i redid it the same thing happened so i applied the mirror modifier and did it again and it work perfectly but then when i was doing the weight painting the weight painting wouldnt affect both sides because i didnt have the mirror modifier. can anyone explain what could have happened if you can understand what i am trying to say? thanks.

I guess what you want is to create symmetric vertex groups so you don't have to repaint for the left what you've already painted for the right? Once you have finished the weight paint on a side, stay in Weight Paint mode, go to the Properties > Data menu, then click on the button on the right of the Vertex Groups list, choose Copy Vertex Group, a new vertex group is created, then click Mirror Vertex Group, the group has been mirrored. But this method only works on a real symmetric object.


Split blocks in block-based mesh I have a 3D CAD design that I remeshed into blocks. I would like to be able to export or convert the voxelated object in such a way that it is composed of distinct cubes that I can edit etc. individually. My end goal is to have a CAD file that is made up of loads of cubes and nothing else, not one complex shape made of cubes.

Remeshing creates no subdivision of volume, just a sampled surface.

There is a 'Grid' option in particle systems, that enables you to set a resolution of the grid intersections, and the size of the objects placed on them.

If, rather than re-meshing, you make your object into a particle emitter from volume,  and set a cube as the particle dupli-object, you can voxelize it.

In the example here, (we're on frame 1 in the timeline)  Suzanne is the emitter, and a cube is duplicated to the particle system. All the other particle settings are at their defaults.

If you go to Suzanne's modifier stack, and hit 'Convert' on the particle system, the particles become real instances of the cube. Here I've scaled out all the positions of the cubes so you can see the inside ones...

In the Particles > Emission panel, the 'Resolution' setting divides the longest side of the bounding box of the emitter, and the 'Size' field of the Particles > Render panel will scale the cube-dupli.. (probably best set to 1).

So to make your voxels exactly fill an emitter whose bounding-box longest side is 3.5, with Resolution set to 10, and Size set to 1, your cube would have to be 0.35 on the side.


Fluid Sim Liquid Domain is bigger then the area I dedicated to it I´m currently doing a little fluid sim and the area of my domain is bigger then the object itself. Anyone know how to fix it?

A fluid domain will always enlarge around the mesh to be a world-space referenced bounding box (@Gorgious commented), so what you could do to avoid extra voxels is:

Rotate the fluid sim with the domain in the same orientation as the world.
Run and bake the fluid sim to mesh.
Re-rotate the sim back into the desired position.


Displacement map creates gaps on the corners of a wall I'm able to create this bump effect using a brick texture on a plane with a displacement map, but when I tried to apply it on my current model it creates gaps or "holes" on the corner.

What I want is that on the corner the texture connect like it should be in real life, if that makes sense.

I already tried to add bevel on the corner but it didn't solve the problem, there's still a hole in it.

Here is screenshot for the node and uv unwrapping.

I can confirm that enabling "Auto-Smooth" fixes it.

Before:

After:


Remove background colour from material I want to have my material base colour a transparent to let the image below show through. At the moment highlited with pink circles the colour is black.
I am adding an image texture to the material which i want to be visible.
Is this possible?

To get rid of the background color, you can set up your nodes like this:

This will work if you have an alpha channel in your png. Otherwise, you can do something like this to remove the black from the image:

This will make everything with a value of less than 0.001 (in other words black) transparent. If you are using eevee, you will have to change the blend mode to alpha blend and uncheck "Show Backface" in the material settings to make things actually transparent:

Hope this helps!


Can you render a PNG animation with smoke and a transparent background? I'm trying to make a title animation with smoke simulations and I want to overlay it on video in after effects. Can I render it with transparency or is there an alternative?
Blender 2.78
Computer specs: good enough

Yes, you can render to .png as an image sequence - the first part is already set as default for you in the output panel. The next step is to change form 'sky' to 'transparent' if you are in blender render, and if in Cycles you need to set 'transparent' under the Film tab.


can't see mesh in camera view First I have a huge scene

Then I addea a camera and I chose that given view and pressed clt+Alt+numpad 0
then it shows like this

I tried increasing decreasing focal length,size of camera,shift+f to move my camera but nothing worked anyone got a idea??please share if you know,, your answer is highly apprecited

The Problem is that the camera is too far away for the default camera to see.

To fix this, change the clipping under the camera settings to something higher until you can see the object you are looking for. Depending on how far away the object is, you might have to set it quite high.


why extrude or move move not moving fluid when I try to move or extrude part in my modeling is not moving fluid is just jump to the next position how I do to rester like before fluid?

If it's happening when you move or extrude, it may be that you have Snapping turned on accidentally.  Check in your header bar and make sure you've got it turned off.

It's easy to accidentally turn it on with the hotkey Shift+Tab.


Can you make particles affect a rigid body? I am trying to crumble a block like in the gif below. Is there a way to have particles act like bullets and crumble the block? - Here I have just animated some spheres to try and do the same thing.

I have only been able to make the particles bounce off surfaces but the actual rigid body object's are never affected. i.e they stay put.

I am using cell fracture and bullet constraints for the block in the top image.

If it's not possible then is there a way to have a block 'crumble' away using forces rather than particles?

Thanks

Normally, no - particles do not impart any force on a Rigid Body. However, I'm currently working on a patch to Blender to do just this. It's only experimental at the moment but I've made some good progress. Also trying to get interaction with Soft Body and Cloth and looking to improve the collision between Rigid Body and Soft Body/Cloth as that's also currently lacking. I'll add more when I've anything to add but for now here's a little teaser :


how can i make one object copy form of another object? i'm new to blender so i'm hoping there's an easy solution for this)) i have these two objects with different vertex count. can i make the one with fewer vertices repeat the form of the one with more vertices without changing the vertex count of the first one? so basically i need one to mimic the other without combining anything.. thanks!

I think the ShrinkWrap modifier could the job you are looking for.
It allows you to shrink vertices of one object to the closest vertices of the other one.

Steps:

Place the objects to the same position
Select the low-detail one
Go to modifiers tab and select ShrinkWrap

Pick the high-detailed object as a Target

There are some useful options available in the modifier so you can look at the ShrinkWrap Modifier overview in the Blender Manual.


Cycles Netrender Returning Black I have a 2 node netrender setup that is fully functional with Blender render engine but not Cycles. When I do this it is rendering because it takes some time for it to return the blank images but it is not rendering the animation. If you need more information just ask nicely please :)

I don't know how to fix your problem with netrender, but a possible alternative method you could use is to tell each server to write to a shared directory, enable Placeholders and disable Overwrite.

With Overwrite disabled, each server will check to see if a file already exists where it would otherwise write the next frame. If it does, it checks the next frame, and the next, and the next, until it finds a frame where no file exists. Then it will render that frame and write it.

Enabling Placeholders makes the server write a "dummy" file when it starts rendering to "reserve" that filename for the render when is complete. This ensures that one server doesn't start rendering the same frame another server is already rendering but hasn't written yet.


Is there a way to display only a certain view in the viewport? What I want to do is to only display an object, or a part of an object in a specific view, and then to be able to move around the 3D workspace, with everything else hidden.

Basically, I want to display only a what a camera can see, no matter the position or perspective in the viewport.

SOLVED: Go to the desired position in the 3D viewport, press Alt+B, and box select around the desired area. This will make everything outside of that ray hidden:

Press Alt+B again to return to the normal 3D viewport display

Note: This can not be animated, and does not render.


Mantaflow Sim Not Showing up in Final Render [2.83 Alpha] I've spent a few hours on google/stack exchange/reddit and somehow can't figure out how to get my mantaflow sim to show up in my final render.

I've baked the data and mesh, set the sim to replay, and everything is set as visible to renderer. When I play the simulation in the viewport renderer it works fine and looks great. But when I try to render and output the image or animation it only shows the fluid emitter - the actual simulation just doesn't appear. When I apply the fluid sim in the modifier stack it appears in the final render, but it just bakes the mesh where it's at with no animation.

I've tried moving my cache to a different folder, starting over with a new simulation, and even tested it on my laptop. I just can't get the fluid to show up. Any help would be appreciated - I'm sure it's a stupid easy fix, but I've spent a few hours on it and just can't figure it out.

Here's the blend file for reference: https://pasteall.org/blend/4a093bb431944141bbda50ed875f1f38

Thanks!

This rendered for me, see attached zip file.
Only changes l made:

changed cycles from experimental
rendered a frame past frame 141 - increased the animation frames to 250 as it seemed at 75, 141 much wasnt coming out of the effector mesh holes , thus increasing the simulation .
increased the point light strength.
changed the fluid material to Glass  [ie water look]

File:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1vuo8yEqGqUA4-DrVcNGuQoPjvgYsHEjg/view?usp=sharing


Trying to Move 1 Selected Object in Blender Drags Other Faces It's Touching If I create or duplicate an object that's touching other faces on objects in edit mode, it drags the faces it's touching with it. This just started happening in the middle of me making a haunted house model. Here's a video with the problem:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsuNEOsiB40&feature=youtu.be

Any help would be appreciated.

Disable the Proportional Editing button on the bottom horizontal menu bar (a blue sphere icon)


Material that only renders direct or bounce light? Is it possible to make a material that totally ignores indirect light, or direct light? In other words, could you render a material that looks only like the Direct Pass or the Indirect pass?

You can do it in the compositor, assigning to your mesh an object index different than 0.


Blender NET_RENDER using command line I want to net render my project without GUI.
I know
blender command line.
I also know blender -E help
and tried the command
blender -b file.blend -E NET_RENDER -s 10 -e 50 -t 2 –a
but before running this command we need to set parameters like a master server, port etc. by GUI
Can you guide me on how to set Address(master) while net rendering through command-line?

You can do it like this:

blender -b -y -P master.py -noaudio --addons netrender file.blend

Contents of master.py:

import bpy
bpy.ops.wm.addon_enable(module="netrender")
bpy.context.scene.render.engine="NET_RENDER"
bpy.context.scene.network_render.mode = 'RENDER_MASTER'
bpy.context.scene.network_render.path = "/tmp/"
bpy.context.scene.network_render.server_address = "[default]"
bpy.context.scene.network_render.server_port = 8200
bpy.ops.render.netclientstart()

For the slave you can use the same blender command with a second python script. Create a copy of master.py, name it slave.py or something and change the according line for the mode to:

[...]

bpy.context.scene.network_render.mode = 'RENDER_SLAVE'

[...]

Tested in blender 2.79a.

Note: this is currently broken in the latest daily builds of blender 2.80 (refer here) I'm currently searching for a workarround, to get the new gpu / host memory feature working with automated network rendering, but they'll probably fix it anyways when blender 2.80 comes out.


Using the compositor to adjust an image that is displayed in the viewport on a mesh Alright I will try to describe the scene setup that I like to use in order to clear up what I'd like to do here.

Normally once I've baked a texture I like to continue working on the model with the texture displayed while using the Solid Viewport Shading Mode combined with GLSL Textured Solid Shading.(I've circled them in the attached image).  Usually I drop and drag the image(from the HD) onto the UV coords to set texture in the display.

Now what I'd like to be able to do is adjust the image using compositor nodes while maintaining this display setup.
So far, I can only do this if I add a material and load the texture in through there.  This also requires that I set the display mode to Rendered.  This method is slow, and requires more setup time

In the attached image you can see that I've added several different Output Nodes to see if any would affect the texture displayed in the 3D Viewport, but none do.

Does anyone know how this can be done using the more efficient Viewport Shading modes?
(btw. the selected object in the image is shaded but normally it would be in Shadeless mode while this is being done, it was a quick test.)

There is no existing internal solution for this.

However, there are still a few ways to try:

Plan A:

If you just want to adjust something like RGB Curve or Brightness/Satuation/Contrast and so on, you may consider using non-compositing adjustment directly from the Texture tab:

Plan B:

I think the closest way to serve such need is:

Use File Output node;
F12 to render(to output composite result);
Load that output image into UV/Image Editor, have it displayed on object (just for 3D View);
From now on, each time you want to update the composite result to 3D view, hit F12, after finishing render, hovering mouse cursor within UV/Image Editor, and press AltR to reload it (or access via Image > Reload Image).

Now, you can then see it displayed in solid/textured solid view, etc. I think this screenshot may demostrate all you need:

Tip: Delete the Render Layer node will ignore scene rendering, which will speed up the file output.

I'm sure the workflow above can be made to a single button or shortcut by scripting a bit. You just need someone that can help in trying this in coding way. (not me, yet :P) All in all, I believe anyone who knows scripts can provide a one-stop solution.


Why is glossy shader adding pink in cycles? All my shaders using gloss are mysteriously adding pink, textures are not missing, and the glossy shaders without textures have the pink issue as well. When I disconnect the gloss shader, the pink goes away. Anyone seen this before? I included an image of one of the materials, silver below. (I reduced the setup see what was causing pink and narrowed it down to glossy) When glossy, is disconnected, pink goes away.
Also, noticed in the preview window, the material shows as it should, unfortunately, the pink shows in the render.

Nevermind! so I checked/unchecked "Use Nodes" and the pink went away.


Inputting amount of zoom manually Is is possible to input the amount of zoom manually in Blender, instead of using the Mouse Scroll or Ctrl + Mouse Scroll, as that does not seem measurable?

A convenient way to do this doesn't seem to be available. But you can lock the camera to the view and then change the camera's position.

Press Num0 to view the scene from the active camera
(optional) Press Home to maximize the camera region in the viewport
In the 3D View's properties shelf select View > Lock Camera to View

Zooming with the mouse does not change the camera's focal length but its position. You should be able manually change the “zoom level” by scaling the camera towards / from the object that you're looking at.

As far as I can tell the camera scale is not considered for the values of Depth of Field, but as a precaution one can enable transformation lock for the scale value of the camera.


How can I limit frame count by counting a text list? I have a list of names in a Text Block that are separated by line. There will be different amounts of names. I am using the list to generate titles but want to render one title per frame. I want to render each frame using the current name from the list.
So I need to :

Read the list for number of lines
Change the scene length to total number of lines
Copy and Enter the current name in the "file output" field
Render frame

I am using Animation Nodes to generate the changing text, perhaps I can get number of lines from Text Block List Length?
Also I could get the current "Name" from Split Text reader to enter in the File Output?

Can I send Values (frame total) and Strings (file names) from Animation Nodes to Blender?

You may use an Expression node. The two properties you want to edit a scene properties. You can know their path from their python tool-tip (Hover over the property). So the expression node can be as follows:


Why is blender exporting face normals instead of vertex normals? According to this question: Why OBJ export writes face normals instead of vertex normals

Whether the final obj uses vertex normals or face normals depends on the choice of shading.

However I always get the face normals.

I am switching between the 2 to see if there's a difference but there's none.
These are my normals:

vn 0.0000 1.0000 0.0000
vn 0.0000 -0.0000 1.0000
vn -1.0000 -0.0000 0.0000
vn 0.0000 -1.0000 -0.0000
vn 1.0000 -0.0000 0.0000
vn 0.0000 0.0000 -1.0000


Is there a way to get a unique value per dupli group instance? Given a number of dupligroups, is there a way to get a unique random value for each one in a cycles shader?

Using the object info node won't work, as each instance consists of multiple objects. I'd like the value to be the same for all objects in the group (in this example, the pedestals ought to be the same as the corresponding Suzanne).

Here's a demo file:

If possible, I'd like to do this without joining objects or de-instantiating the dupligroups.

Using Particles as host for DupliGroup

Thus we can use cool feature of mesh-emitter called From Dupli. This means duplis will inherit location of corresponding space on UV map.

Create emitter mesh and unwrap all faces of emitter as separate islands (avoid overlapping in order to have unique values)
Add PS system, so amount of particles is equal to face count (disable
emit random, even distribution and set particle/face ratio to 1)
Choose Whole group as source for duplicating


Screw Modifier On Top of Shape Key I was trying out the shape key addon using this demo SVG. The morphing works fine, but when I apply the screw modifier the normals look reversed for both the shapes. How can this be fixed?

You probably need to set the 'Flip' checkbox in the Screw Modifier. ;)


How to apply a soft body simulator on a certain part of an object? I am currently trying to make a jellyfish animation and I want to make it so that the 4 big tentacles slowly flop around, as if they're in water. In order to accomplish this, I'm attempting to create a vertex group for the tentacles and apply a soft body simulator to it. The goal is to make it so that the tentacles flop around like the moon jellys in this video
, while, at the same time, the main body keeps its consistency. Unfortunately, I'm having problems with the soft body simulator. Whenever I apply it, the whole thing distorts like this:

I've spent the whole day trying to figure this out, and haven't had any luck whatsoever. I read another forum somewhere that said to apply a rigid body with the soft body, but I haven't had any luck with that either.

Does anyone know how to apply the soft body simulator on a certain part of your mesh???

Here's a copy of my project.

Cloth simulation Pin Group should do the trick. Just assign the non moving vertices to a specific group and use it in the Shape/Pin Group field of the cloth simulation settings panel.


Which VR headset works smoothly with Blender? I'm about to buy a VR headset. My choices are: Valve Index, Oculus Rift-S and Vive. Which one of them is 100% Blender compatible? I must say I'm leaning towards Valve.

Thank-you very much !

Actually, SteamVR (which also means Valve Index) is now OpenXR compatible.
All you need to do is to select the current Beta of SteamVR (in Steam ..)
Works flawlessly with Blender - no other setup required.


How do i add a transparent texture over my material? I am trying to add this rust texture that I found over my brick texture cube. The rust is transparent, and i am selecting a specific area of the cube to have the rust over. I separated the specific faces i wanted the rust on by material, and i added the rust image texture, then plugged it to the roughness node. All that appears is a white square. I tried to texture paint but it doesn't give me the result i want. I followed other tutorials where it said to put both the image textures for (in this case brick and rust) through a mixRGB node, but then the rust appears everywhere on the cube. I tried a different method, this time doing what i mentioned again but in it's own material, (separating the faces, giving it its own material, then adding two images textures, brick and rust, then going through the mixRGB node) which did a bit better, but the brick texture was being stretched whenever i tried to adjust the image in the UV editor. What other solutions are there that i can try out?
(I got the idea of putting the rust on the roughness node from Blender Guru's video on making a subway in 20 mins, but i did not get the same results. The Color Ramp did not change much for me.)

Here - This is a common setup for mixing 2 textures (especially rust, as the noise texture works well to create random "rusty patches, however I used concrete here). You can also use your own texture (if it has a built in alpha, connect as shown). Sometimes as well, texture packs come with alpha "masks" that are their own separate texture. You connect these as a factor the same way. Ultimately, any B&W image can be used as a mix factor. Play around to get what you like. See below:
This is all done on one plane with only one face.

Also, it's a bit hard to follow what you were doing with the roughness thing, however, if you have a roughness map, and want to apply it "correctly", mix the maps together with the same mix factor.


Pulling armature from hierarchy? So i'm new to rigging... or attempting to rig in blender and I seemed to have somehow created a hierarchy for my armature including it, and its poses. I cannot delete the poses, I cannot remove the armature from its grouping. For some reason I cannot apply my group to my model via parenting like I've been doing and I'd rather not remake the rig. Any help? If further explanation is needed please just say so- again i'm new so i'm not sure i'm using proper terms or just speaking gibberish.

Edit: Image of question added

Edit 2: I mean, if it can work this way that's fine too. I can't seem to get the armature to be applied to the model with automatic weights this way though.

Every armature looks like that in the outliner. An armature is a little different from other objects - the bones show up twice, the Armature item holds the bone data used in edit mode, while the Pose data is what you animate in pose mode.

To deform a character mesh with an armature ensure you have selected your mesh and your armature and that your armature is the active object, that is the one that is highlighted in yellow rather than orange (if your armature is in pose mode it will be blue if it is active) this answer includes pictures. Automatic weights will only work if the armature is positioned within the mesh.

If you do have trouble setting up the armature you can also add an armature modifier to the mesh object and setup vertex weights using weight painting or manually assigning weights to a selection of vertices.


GPU load (far) bigger than memory peak I am working on a scene that is about 500Mb memory peak on GPU rendering (Cycles Render). However the GPU load is about 2Go just for blender (and it's about 30mB when I don't render), as you can see on the picture below. So where does this vram leak come from ?

If I go in CPU rendering, my RAM consumption increases of about 600Mb, which is quite normal I think. Thus there seems to be a problem with GPU rendering.

It becomes even worse if I enable the experimental feature set (I need to render SSS): I get an "out of memory" error because blender fills all my 4Gb vram.

Does anyone have an idea of the origin of this problem, and how to solve it, that is to say how to have about 600Mb GPU load ?

Regards.

PS 1: I don't think this is a texture size problem since I only have a peak of 500Mb. The memory used for the textures is included in those 500Mb, or am I wrong ?

PS 2: I have all latest proprietary drivers installed

--

Setup:
Intel® Core™ i7-6700K CPU @ 4.00GHz × 8
GeForce GTX 980/PCIe/SSE2
RAM 15,6 Gio
Ubuntu 16.04.1 LTS 64 bits

The GTX 970 and GTX 980 seem to have massive VRAM leaks in Blender 2.77.
The problem is greatly reduced in the 2.78 Test Build.

https://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/2.78


Blender 2.82 - Objects are not visible in solid/wireframe shading suddenly I have this problem. In the main window in 3D Viewport all objects (excl. ref images) are not visible while viewport shading is solid or wireframe, even the outlines. In material or rendered is everything as it should be.
In my secondary window it's ok and I can see them. When I select an object in the second window I can transform it in the main window. I just don't see it there, only in the main window. And in the main window is this weird "shadow" wich is formed like a pyramid. The settings for the viewport (at least the screenshots below) are the same for both windows.
Does someone know where I can switch that off?

I use Blender 2.82

 main window

 second window

I know this is a late answer, but I found it by accident. I had the same problems and suspected it might be something to to with clipping. So I tried this and it worked. In the 3d viewport there are some menues. Click on the view menu ..

Choose "View Regions" and then choose "Clipping Region"
Voila!


How to create a good topology from SVG for 2D animation? I have only the outline drawn as a vector in svg file. Click here to view. I import it to blender. It becomes a path. I convert it to a mesh.
Now, I would like to subdivide it and have it in a good topology (square faces or quads) so that I can animate it.
I tried many things but they  don't work such as: Right Click and subdivide > Adding subdiv surface modifier....etc.
How can I do it, please?
Why do I want to do this? Because I have a colorful png image and I want to simply animate it with bones. Just like what happens in After Effects.

What is good topology for 2D anim depends on how this animation should looks like. There is many technique and styles so for example you can try
CutOut animation
model cut into several parts driven manually or armature. For this kind there is awesome addon Cut-Out Animation Tools, that make it very easy to work with (includes script to generate parts from Photoshop or Inkscape layers in proper position and ready to import to blender with click to generate armature).
Grease Pencil
Very powerful anim tool set with many options of creation and animation, frame by frame, using sculpt mode , or armature as well ... example one of many
Delaunay Triangulation
For some kind of animation could be helpful to use triangulated topology. There was a script for Blender 2.49 that I can't even find. But similar feature is a part of great BlenderGIS addon, but it doesn't generate point cloud for triangulation (as the old one) it just connects the points. So to get Delaunay work you have to generate a point cloud first.
I'm sure there has to be a simple script that can do this in a one click, but in meantime here is one solution ...

Download, install, enable BlenderGIS addon

Select SVG curve convert to mesh like Ctrl+A Visual Geometry to Mesh

In Geometry Node editor add New, add Point Distribution node type Poisson Disk and merge original mesh with points by Join Geometry node as shown bellow

Apply Geometry Node modifier under Properties editor > Modifiers
Search for GIS Delaunay (or go to 3D view editor top row menu > GIS > Mesh > Delaunay)

Notes:

Poison Disk can be generated also by addon Point Cloud Visualizer
Delaunay can be generated also by Archipack addon under Terrain
or there was a Point Cloud Skinner addon, but v0.18 works only for blender 2.83 not 2.9x
I saw some technique of delaunay triangulation based on Voronoi pattern (out of blender)


How to fix single face mesh? The model in Blender shows the mesh double faced and good looking but when exported into game looks like this. How can I fix it?

It looks to me as though you have backface culling enabled in your game engine.  Are you using blender game engine?

You can either add a solidify modifier as gandalf3 said in the comments.  Or, if this is the only direction you will be viewing the curtains from you can flip the normals on the curtains.


How can I change the items of an EnumProperty dynamically through draw? I have those two EnumProperty:
fu3dm_model_gender : bpy.props.EnumProperty(name="Gender", description="Choose model's gender.", items= [('OP1', "Male", ""), ('OP2', "Female", "")])
fu3dm_model_head : bpy.props.EnumProperty(name="Head", description="Choose model's head.", items= [('OP1', "Generic Male", ""), ('OP2', "Something", "")])

And I want to do this:
If fu3dm_model_gender is OP1 then fu3dm_model_head items to be like this items= [('OP1', "Generic Male", ""), ('OP2', "Something", "")]. Else if fu3dm_model_gender is OP2 then fu3dm_model_head items to be like this items= [('OP1', "Generic Female", ""), ('OP2', "Something Else", "")].
Here is my code:
class fu3dm_WM_OT_Model_Prefs_Operator(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "wm.fu3dm_model_prefs"
    bl_label = "Model Preferences"
    bl_description = "Sets model's preferences"

    fu3dm_model_gender : bpy.props.EnumProperty(name="Gender", description="Choose model's gender.", items= [('OP1', "Male", ""), ('OP2', "Female", "")])
    fu3dm_model_head : bpy.props.EnumProperty(name="Head", description="Choose model's head.", items= [('OP1', "Generic Male", ""), ('OP2', "Something", "")])

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        return context.window_manager.invoke_props_dialog(self)
        bpy.ops.wm.fu3dm_model_prefs('INVOKE_DEFAULT')

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        layout.prop(self, "fu3dm_model_gender")
        if self.fu3dm_model_gender == 'OP1':
            # Change "fu3dm_model_head" to "Generic Male" and "Something"
        elif self.fu3dm_model_gender == 'OP2':
            # Change "fu3dm_model_head" to "Generic Female" and "Something Else"
        layout.prop(self, "fu3dm_model_head")

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

Use EnumProperty callback:
Property Definitions (bpy.props) — Blender Python API
Basically blender will call the function in following way:
list_tuple_callback(scene, context)

The return of your function should look similar with the original item List[(identifier, name, description, icon, number), ...].


Light Rendering Problem - Cycles Was modelling a lamp yesterday,rendered it (one on the left), then saved and closed Blender. I then came back to the file today, added some objects to the scene, then rendered it again (right), somehow the lighting has gone wrong. Afaik no settings were changed, can anyone help how to revert to the one on the left?

Those look like artifacts created by the denoiser. Use more samples to render and lower values for denoiser.

Or you might want to try the Intel Open Image Denoiser instead of the built in one.

Related links:

Type of Denoiser built into Blender

How to avoid noisy renders in Cycles?


Problem with displacement maps I'm not so familiar with Blender and have a problem with displacement map.
I use software called "CrazyBump" and it generates specularity, displacement, occlusion, color and normal maps itself.

My intention is to make plaster material which is the material of the wall look more realistic. That' s why I want to use displacement map to change the look of the wall. However, it somehow won't work like this. The material of the wall is not changing its' shape, it's the wall itself..

The displacement map is right under this text:

I really tend to think that something is really wrong with my displacement map and doesn' t work right.

So here's the house with displacement map.

I am clueless what to do next as I have tried fixing this problem on my own for whole day already and nothing seems to be working. Maybe some of you have encountered this problem earlier and could suggest any solutions..

The source for the displacement map in this case has to be an image or procedural texture, not the model itself. One way to do what you want would be to get or create tileable plaster texture first (look for "tile plaster texture bump" on a search engine), then create a material just for the walls, assign it and unwrapp the walls as you see fit.


File format changes from MPEG to .DVD I have an issue with rendering an animation. I set the file format to mpeg but when it finishes rendering the output file that it gives me is '.dvd'. How do I solve this problem?

Here some steps that you can follow:

Set the video format to FFMPEG
Go in the Encoding drop-down just below the color settings in the bottom-left corner of the drop-down
In the Video drop-down, in the Video Codec settings, choose the H.264 settings
( I think your problem is that there might be a default setting in Blender)
Just to be safe Double-Check the Steps.
Check if there is any bug, or consult a video tutorial on how to report one


I'm trying to create a fuse simulation I am trying to simulate a fuse burning up to a bomb then do an explosion with the bomb. But I can get only so far with the fuse. I am having brain freeze when it comes to getting the sparks off the fuse end to show along with the object used to simulate the fuse before burning to go away after it has been "burned".

I am thinking of using a curve type to have the fuse follow it (but have not implemented that yet. nor do I know if I really need to yet, I haven't gotten that far yet.)

I have the sparks set up and working but the object pieces being used to simulate the fuse are too big when the particle system explodes them.

Wondering how do I decrease the size of the object particles?

file included to give you a better idea of what I am talking about that I am in this post.

oh I had a baked cache on that particle system file so you might want to look at that before running it.

I've gotten this far so far, still trying to work out an longated object to look like a fuse then have it looking like it is actually burning away as the fuse sparks move down towards the bomb.

the cure does not allow keyframes on its x,y,z dimensions so I can srink it as it goes along the path . having given it a shape, or using the curve modifier.

One technique for eroding the fuse would be to keyframe the Bevel Factor of a bezier curve.

The reverse of Animate Extending a Curve .


How to change Transform Orientation with keyboard in Ubuntu How I can change Transform Orientation with the keyboard in Ubuntu? In some linux systems (and many others) Alt + Space are a system combination to show application menu and are captured by the OS.

Personally I'd change the desktop manager binding from alt to super, but in Blender you can change it by going into User Preferences > Input. Then type in the search box "Orientation". You can click on the "Alt Spacebar" field, after which you can give the wanted key combination for Orientation Selection.


How to texture paint on a different layer? I want to know if its possible to have layers in blender when texture painting an object. Like in photoshop for example.

Not exactly like that, but you could combine different textures by using nodes, mix them all with the Mix RGB to have things like multiply, screen, add, color Burn and so on and you will see your textures over the "texture slot"


Why I dont's see colors in object mode? Why I don’t see colors in object mode on my donut? If I take for example render mode or shading mode, I see them. Moreover if I turn new file blender on and paint cube, I see colors in object mode normally. What’s the matter?

You are in solid viewport shading mode.

Look at the header of the 3D View and locate the four spheres. There you can change the viewport shading mode.

When you are in Solid shading mode, the color in the 3D viewport is from the materials Viewport Display > Color. When you are not using nodes (as with your red cube), then the material's Base Color is the same as the Viewport Display > Color.

However, when you activate nodes, the rendering settings (defined in the nodes) and the Viewport Display settings are not synchronized anymore.

To preview the material settings and material nodes, switch the viewport to material preview by clicking on the third sphere in the header of the 3D viewport.


How to make a rope in the BGE? I'm pretty sure this has been asked before, but for the life-o'-me I couldn't find it.

How would one setup the physics for rope in Blender Game Engine?

I tried soft-body; didn't work
Incremented/decremented the properties in different ways; didn't work
tried writing my own; fell on it's face

So how would I make a long object move like a rope. I was planning on using it for 'dreadlocks' like the wookies from Battlefront-2 so it needs to be able to sustain being moved constantly by animations.

other uses include

rope (dur)
vines
ziplines

Thanks!

The are two main ways to make a rope in the BGE. Soft bodies, and ridged body constraints.

The ridged body constraint method.
This is the method Phymec uses in videos like this. I have not gotten good results with soft bodies, so I will focus on the ridged body constraint method.
This is very easy to set up, just add a sphere, model it in to a capsule and add a Rigid Body Joint constraint.

Then string many of the capsules in to a rope, with the next always having the target of the one before it. Set the Pivot to be in the middle of the two capsules (turn on Display Pivot to see where the pivot point is).  Also important turn on Linked Collision; if not on the rope will try to break apart where ever it is intersecting.


How can I turn this into a perfect cylinder During modeling, I often find myself having this problem. How can I turn the following face loop into a perfect cylinder?

The easiest way is to use the LoopTools > Circle. Enable the LoopTools addon, select the bottom and top edges (or as you say, simply select the face loop), right click > LoopTools > Circle:


How to introduce an edge where two faces intersect I'm looking for a way to introduce a cut to a plane where it is intersected by another plane.

The plane is a single face for simplicity.

Here's the setup:

Add a plane
Add another plane and rotate it by 90 degrees at X or Y so it is not coplanar

Join the two meshes together using Ctrl + J and enter edit mode
Notice that in edit mode face select allows selecting one or the other face
Notice that no edge has been introduced where the two planes intersect

The first solution I came up with was to just use two loop cuts, one on each plane. In this setup the plane dimensions were left unchanged as was their location so it just so happens that the intersection edge coincides with what you get if you loop cut both the planes.

The second solution I found was to use a boolean modifier on both planes, selecting the other plane as the object for the boolean operation in both cases. This correctly introduces an edge where the planes intersect. The can be joined after both boolean operations have been applied, giving a single mesh with four faces as desired.

I am wondering about the general case, though. What if one plane was twice the size of the other, or shifted by half the size?

My solutions do not work in those cases. Loop cut needs to share origin in order for the cut offset (half the face size) to coincide with the intersection edge. Boolean doesn't work if the faces are different sizes or shifted against one another so that their edges do not connect anymore.

Is there a general purpose tool in Blender for selecting two faces which may or may not intersect and saying "introduce edges where they do"? Obviously some sort of logic needs to be applied when the faces are shifted so that their edges do not connect with each other, my thinking is in that case both faces should be cut as if the other face was infinite in size and not finite? Or some other logical fallback behavior.

Is there such a tool? This question is primarily for Blender 2.8.

The simplest solution would be to select one of the planes and use Intersect(knife) that can be called from the search menu(F3/space) or Face menu(ctrl+f):


Shortcut to toggle a specific combination of layers? Is there some way to toggle a specific combination of layers (instead of all layers, or one layer at a time)?

For example, let's say I have objects in layers 1 to 5, and I occasionally want to hide layers 2, 3 and 4 (or maybe sometimes I want to see 2, 3 and 4, and hide 1 and 5). How can I toggle 2, 3 and 4 together with one shortcut?

Ideally, a way to set multiple combinations instead of just one combination.

I know the ` key toggles all layers, and the number row keys can toggle individual layers.

The only way possible would be Shift+2+3+4, I think.


Bend flat, circular object into half sphere I have a flat circle(1). I want to bend it down into a half sphere non-destructively. I have tried using two Simple Deform (bend) modifiers as described here: How to animate morphing a rectangular plane into a sphere

That works, but it is distorted (2). I'm trying to get it even, like the top half of an icosphere (3). Is this possible?

EDIT: I am trying to find a method to use on a more complex shape. I want to model it flat, and then bend it to a sphere as it will be very difficult to model as a sphere itself.

Use a Cast Modifier.

For some reason you will have to move all you circle vertex up in local Z axis for it to work for some reason, then have to eye-ball the value to reach an aproximate half sphere.

In my case, move the circle [2] units in local Z axis in edit mode, then add a Cast modifier set to Sphere. Adjust tge Factor value.

Alternatively use the Control Object option, set it to an empty object to control the deformation center and move it down in Z axis as necessary, if you don't want to move the circle object center.


Blender render very slow - use 40% cpu only I found the following issue with Blender render.

When I render an image after a fresh restart, it uses 100% CPU and finish in about 5-7 minutes.

But after a few renders, the same image will render in 43 minutes and use only 40% CPU

I think it is caused if I open more than 1 blender instance.

The only solution I found is a restart.

I have win 10.

NOTE:

After much research I found this is a win 10 issue, that is happening not only when running blender, I install MAC and the problem is solved.

This isn't really a problem with Blender that could be fixed, most likely it's just that the computer, after being used for a while, heats up. It also depends on how many things you are running at the same time.


Where did "Free unused nodes" checkbox go? Recently run into some memory lack while I was composing and remembered about this option. Unfortunately, it is not present in Blender since 2.77 release. Was it implemented by default in modern builds or gone away forever?

It was removed because, according to Sergey Sharybin:

  It was basically doing nothing, for ages.

I presume he means that it wasn't having much of an effect as opposed to people not using it.


Not showing full model in rendered view and camera view after a certain distance In my view port full model is showing, but in camera view and also in render view the full view of model is not showing.

You probably have two different settings for your view port clipping and your rendering camera clipping.

To check the one in your view port (in Blender 2.8+): press
N , select View and you have Clip Start and Clip
End.
To check the one used by your camera select the camera object, go to
green Object Data Properties and in the panel Lens.

By default, they do not have the same value


Is there a function that is able to cut a sound depending on the volume? In Video sequencer,
I would like to have a automatized transformation of my sounds. When i'm doing a video with recorded spitch. I have to cut all the silences . It's a very stupid work and it's take a long time.

The VSE can't do detections and auto removing silence like that, but ffmpeg can do this: https://stackoverflow.com/a/29411973


How to download and install an add-on hosted on github properly? I have downloaded an add-on hosted on github today using this green 'Download/Clone' button. However, when I try to install it via User Preferences > Addons > Install it does not appear in the Add-on list, no matter what I do.

Q: How to download and install add-ons hosted on github properly? What am I doing wrong?

Option 1 - Release version
Before downloading the entire repository using the 'Clone or download' button, make sure there is no actual release (In most cases there is, to keep development organized):

If so, click on Releases Tab and download the latest release (zip or single py file):

Option 2 - init.py folder (Clone or download)
There are lazy authors so in some rare cases the 'Clone or download' is the only option. Search for __init__.py in the repository and copy the folder containing this file to your Add-on directory:

Linux: $HOME/.config/blender/<version>/
OSX: /Library/Application Support/Blender/<version>/
Windows: %USERPROFILE%\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\<version>\

You can get also get the folder per machine using the python console: bpy.utils.script_path_user() and / or bpy.utils.script_paths("addons")
Further reading: Addons: Only some .zips will install


how to delete duplicated brushes in sculpting mode if i save the object as blender file it will contain the brushes i added by mistake so how to remove it from the list , btw how to keep one duplicated brushes to default-reload (close blender and reopen a new project),and are there anyway to load different brushes download from web as default? much more thx!!!!

Click on the Brush you wish to delete. In the tool panel and Shift click the X to delete. You will see a zero appears before the brush name in the pop-out tool-shelf. If you save and re-open or Revert - the brush will be gone...

You can find a link to an Add-on with more brushes on Blendernation
Brushes are essentially just textures that use the alpha cancel. You can use textures from other programs like these at Pixologic or just create your own in your favorite drawing program...

Ben Simmonds has also got a few .Blend files with brushes that are worth exploring - like this one on Blendswap. And to answer your last question I can quote him " ...you can append these brushes into your default blendfile to have them permanently avaliable. Just load the default blend file, then hit File>Append, select the brush blend file, select brushes, and shift-select the two Trim brushes inside. Click Link/Append from Library, and the brushes will now be avaliable. Then just save your startup file (Ctrl-U) to update the default .blend file."


How can I create an animation with a transparent background in the Material viewport? Sorry if this is a repeat. I've had a lot of trouble explaining or putting this into words.
Basically, I want to make an animation with a transparent background, but I want it to render with the appearance of the Material Viewport.
I've been told that OpenGL is the best way to go about this, but I can't find any options for transparency in cycles for OpenGL.

I was able to create a transparent background in the typical Rendered view, but not in OpenGL. If there's a way I can replicate the "Material" appearance in the default rendered view, that also works!

Thank you so so so much in advance, this has had me puzzled!

There are three ways to render images or animations with a transparent background.

Using OpenGL render :

Make sure that you set the Alpha mode to Transparent in the Render > OpenGL Render Options > Alpha Mode which is located in the info header.

Using Blender Render :

Make sure that you have set the Alpha to Transparent in the Shading option under the Render tab in the Properties panel.

Using Cycles render :

Make sure that you the Transparency ticked on in the Film option under the Render tab.


Api throws context error when adding UI tool to sculpt or particle mode I have a problem with adding a workspace tool to particles.

import bpy
from bpy.types import WorkSpaceTool

bl_info = {
    "name" : "ToolX",
    "author" : "Author",
    "description" : "",
    "blender" : (2, 80, 0),
    "location" : "",
    "warning" : "",
    "category" : "Generic"
}

class MyTool(WorkSpaceTool):
    bl_space_type='VIEW_3D'
    bl_context_mode='PARTICLE'

    # The prefix of the idname should be your add-on name.
    bl_idname = "my_template.my_circle_select"
    bl_label = "My Circle Select2"
    bl_description = (
        "This is a tooltip\n"
        "with multiple lines"
    )
    bl_icon = "ops.generic.select_circle"

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_tool(MyTool)

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_tool(MyTool)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

I get the following error:

RuntimeError: Error: Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/janez/Software/blender/2.80/scripts/modules/addon_utils.py", line 384, in enable
    mod.register()
  File "/home/janez/.config/blender/2.80/scripts/addons/temp_scripts/__init__.py", line 63, in register
    bpy.utils.register_tool(MyTool)
  File "/home/janez/Software/blender/2.80/scripts/modules/bpy/utils/__init__.py", line 755, in register_tool
    item.idname for item in ToolSelectPanelHelper._tools_flatten(tools)
  File "/home/janez/Software/blender/2.80/scripts/modules/bpy/utils/__init__.py", line 754, in <setcomp>
    tools_id = {
  File "/home/janez/Software/blender/2.80/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_toolsystem_common.py", line 219, in _tools_flatten
    yield from item(context)
NameError: name 'context' is not defined

This code works fine if I change bl_context_mode with "OBJECT" or "EDIT_MESH", but this is not the result I want.
However it fails for "PARTICLE" and "SCULPT".

Am I supposed to call things differently?

The goal here is to add a button into "T" side menu in "PARTICLE" mode.

I am using the latest version of blender 2.80

I had the same issue and figured out that there are a few issues in the python code. The problem is that context is not being passed into the methods for sculpt, but it is for all the rest. If you are up to it, you can edit the python scripts to fix this. There are 4 locations in space_toolsystem_common.py, 1 in keymap_from_toolbar.py, and 1 in _ _init__.py.

space_toolsystem_common.py:

Line 219 @staticmethod
Line 220     def _tools_flatten(**context**, tools):
.........
Line 241 @staticmethod
Line 242     def _tools_flatten_with_tool_index(**context**, tools):
.........
Line 274     for item in ToolSelectPanelHelper._tools_flatten(**context**, cls.tools_from_context(context, mode)):
.........
Line 291     for item, index in ToolSelectPanelHelper._tools_flatten_with_tool_index(**context**, cls.tools_from_context(context)):

keymap_from_toolbar.py:

Line 59     for item in ToolSelectPanelHelper._tools_flatten(**context**, cls.tools_from_context(context))

scripts/modules/bpy/utils/_ _init__.py

Line 769    item.idname for item in ToolSelectPanelHelper._tools_flatten(**_bpy.context**, tools)

That should fix it.


Create cloud texture using python As part of a larger script, I am using the following to add a displacement modifier to each object:

displace_modifier = obj.modifiers.new(name="Displace.01", type='DISPLACE')
displace_modifier.strength = 10.0
tex = bpy.ops.texture.new("Displace.01", 'CLOUDS')
displace_modifier.texture = tex

and getting the following errors:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\addons\make_stone_wall.py", line 267, in execute
    main(self, context)
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\addons\make_stone_wall.py", line 131, in main
    tex = bpy.ops.texture.new("Displace.01", 'CLOUDS')
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py", line 186, in __call__
    C_dict, C_exec, C_undo = BPyOpsSubModOp._parse_args(args)
  File "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\modules\bpy\ops.py", line 143, in _parse_args
    raise ValueError("1-3 args execution context is supported")
ValueError: 1-3 args execution context is supported

location: <unknown location>:-1

location: <unknown location>:-1

I am pretty sure I am missing some of the arguments for bpy.ops.texture.new(...), but I haven't been able to find anything online to help me figure it out.

Does anyone know what I'm missing, here?

Rookie mistake. I was calling bpy.ops.texture... instead of bpy.data.texture...


IES-like lights in Cycles I have been consistently trying and failing to recreate the techniques described in the links to create an IES like textured light effect with Cycles Spotlight lamps using a Color Ramp node.

http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?264052-IES-Like-Lights-in-Cycles-Architectural-Lighting or

http://www.elysiun.com/forum/showthread.php?264052-IES-Like-Lights-in-Cycles-Architectural-Lighting/page2

According to the images you need the Dot Product between the Normal with Incoming connected to a Color Ramp node; however recreating the described node setup does not yield the same desired effect as shown bellow.

Using Add instead of Dot Product seems to show some effect, but it's not the expected result.

Those images seem to be from older versions of Blender, using 2.65 and above I have never been able to achieve that effect.
Did something change internally that broke these techniques, or is there a new workflow to achieve the effect currently?

Did I miss something obvious? Hopefully someone with better math knowledge can solve this.

I did miss something obvious, thanks to Carlos comment I solved what was wrong with my scene.

The problem was not with the node setup itself, but with the object data. Light type must be an Area Light, not a Spot Lamp.

Using the correct area light type now yields expected results.


How to track a scene properly? I've recorded this scene in 1080p60fps, and I cannot for the life of me get a solve error of below 2. I've got the focal length set to auto, so I'm not sure what's going on. I've done motion tracking in Blender before and it worked out well, but I seem to be getting a bad track.

I was pretty easily getting a solve error of 0.81, so there's nothing wrong with your footage:

So I bet you don't use your tracking properly. I just use a defined range of frames for the Solve as you can see in my screenshot which has lots of camera perspective shift. Then I used the "Detect Features" function to let Blender automatically track some points and I only erased those with erratic spikes in the Graph editor view. I added a few more markers manually to align the floor and origin as well as the axises. After I let Blender redefine Focal Length and K1 once I already got a pretty decently low Error. In the end it adjusted the Focal length to 32.6210899.

Just follow the great Track, Match, Blend! tutorial to understand the common way of how to achieve a good result.


How I can add a control to a hand rig for easy hand poses? like as subject I would add a control to my hand rig to easy animate a flat hand to a fist. For example a bone that when scaled, all fingers make a fist.

Edit: This is what I would like to achieve:

You may do it using a Copy Rotation bone constraints and drivers.

I'll show you how to do it using one finger and then you may implement it to the whole hand. Add the Copy Rotation constraint to last two bones, so the lower bone copies the middle bone rotation and then middle bone copies the top bone rotation.

Set the constraint's spaces to Local<-->Local for each constrained bone. Now, when you rotate the upper bone the other ones follow to create a fist.

Add a circle (it may be a bone with a custom shape or other object). It'll be your controller. Select the top bone (the one without the constraint), go to the Transform panel and add a driver to the rotation value (in my case a Z axis rotation). Hover the cursor over the value, press the RMB-->Add Single Driver. Go to the Graph Editor and set its mode to Drivers. Press N to open the properties panel. In Drivers panel choose the Transform Channel and Average Value options, set the circle as a controller in the Object/Bone window. Change the space to Local and type to Scale. Use Generator modifier to adjust things. Press Update Dependencies button at the end. Now scaling the circle affects the rotation of the bones.


Can someone explain how I can make this corner flat and flow into an incline? I'm trying to build a track for Assetto Corsa for the first time and I'm having trouble making the corner flat and curve into an incline.

To fix that you need to tilt original curve. Open the curve in edit mode, select points, that you want to tilt, and press Ctrl+T. Then rotate it like in a rotation tool.


Emission material is not rendered. When I try to render the emission material I just got the black screen, what could be the problem ??

Download Blender File

It appears you might have unintentionally set your sampling settings really low. Go to: Properties>Sampling>Settings>Clamp Dir: and set it to 0 (off) or a much higher setting than 0.01.

Please see this answer for more details: What is Clamp Direct/Indirect?


Can't fill staircase sides I need to fill this side and then other side of staircase, but tools I used don't work. Tools like Bridge Edge Loops, Grid Fill and Fill always make nosense mess like if there wasn't the same amount of verteces, but I checked it and there should be right number.
I use Blender 2.80.

My thought is the problem do that pointing verteces on every step of starcase, but still don't know how to do that.
With Edge Loops, when I unselect edges on sides.

I'm not sure there would be any automatic way to fill the side, you could do it this way: enable the Snap (Vertex mode) and the Auto-merge options, select the vertical raw of vertices and then make successive extrusions on the Y axis, it will automatically snap and merge.