Blender Internal -> Rendering: Stopping surface materials of background objects from affecting volumetric materials of objects in the foreground

Part I: Seperating Objects in the Scene w/ Volumetric Materials in question

The solution to this problem starts by assigning the volumetric objects (electron light trails) their own "Scene Layer" and corresponding "Render Layer" then using the "Mask Layer" to mask out the other "Scene Layers" containing any other objects, such as the nucleus, in the scene which you might want to include... like when the electron's orbit through or behind them which would naturally obscure the view of the trails.
Then in the "Object Properties Window" turn off the rendering of the offending surface objects (in this case the atom shells) that are causing the problems with the volumetric materials of the electron light trails.

Next in the "Render Settings Tab" under "Shading"  change the "Alpha Setting" from "Sky" to "Transparent". Then under "Output" make sure to set the "file format" as "PNG"; and, of coarse, it's always a good idea to save these files in their own folder, especially if you expect to have a bunch of files. And, don't forget to select "RGBA" so you have an alpha channel in your images, because you'll need to use alpha over in Blender's VSE in a separate blender file later. It's also a good idea to save this as its own file because you might want to use various compositing nodes, such as blur on your electrons and light trails.

You're now ready to render and save these images.

Part II: The rest of the atom (nucleus and shells)

Once you've completed rendering the electrons and light trails "Save As" to create a separate file for the rest of the atom. Then go back to the "Object Properties" window and turn on the Rendering of the shells.

Next under the "Render Layers" tab select all the other "Scene Layers" and "Render Layers" and uncheck any "Mask Layers"... In my case I also chose to select the Render Layer containing the electron light trails and turned off rendering of the electrons and the light trails in the "Object Properties" Window.
In the "Render Settings" Tab under "Shading" change the Alpha Setting" from "Transparent" back to "Sky". Keep the "file format" as "PNG" with "RGBA" under "Output". And, don't forget to save these files in their own folder.

Part III: Composite Both Image sets in Blender's VSE

Finally, its merely a matter of compositing both images in yet another Blender file. Add image set of the atom (shells & nucleus) to channel 1 and the electrons and light trails to channel 2 using Alpha Over as your "Blend Type" for the light trails. Select your favorite movie format, render and, your done. Beautiful!

Final Note: I noticed a lot of buzz concerning the new render engine "EEVEE" that's in the final phases beta development. For what ever reason... the gist I've gotten is that the developers are deciding to drop the original "Blender Render" from the Render Engine selection list... (via Blender Nation et. al). If that is indeed the case... What a tragedy! Why? It's a reaction rooted in my practical experience with both Cycles compared to Blender Internal. Sure, Cycles has much more power and a greater choice of options when it comes to materials than Blender Render. Even a knuckle draggin luddite, such as myself, who's still a relative Blender Newbee, can't argue against that. But, if the above project (this query on the above atom blend-file) is any evidence, albeit tenuous; my first few attempts to get the right look and feel of the materials began with using Blender Cycles. In short, I didn't like it. I just couldn't get the materials and their reaction to the ambient lights to "pop". So, I decided to try Blender Internal... After a few tries, I got what I was looking for. It came alive... It "popped". Granted, this may be because of my lack of experience with Blender... But, regardless of that, I suspect there are probably some things that would still come out looking better, when done in Blender Render. So, futile as it may be, I would ask those who's influence may be felt, to implore serious reconsideration of dropping Blender Internal as an option.

Consider this as an analogy: My electricity recently went out. Like some of you that may still have landlines, most if not all of these phones are VOIP. But, with no electricity you ain't got phone service because, VOIP's tied to the electrical grid. Old timers who still remember POTS, may recall that if your electricity blacked-out, you could still rely on plain ole telephone service to get through to the electrical company, because it wasn't tied to the grid... See where I'm goin with this?

Anyway, I figured I'd make a case for keeping Blender Internal, not just because of nostalgia but, because there's probably still a lot more we can still get out of this grand ole render engine, even if it hasn't been updated in more than half a decade.

Regardless of that, I still look forward to trying out Blender eevee upon its official release.


Ok so I found the addon. It was in the 2.78 RC2 files like you said Timaroberts thank you. I was hoping I wasnt going to have to use the whole 3d pie menu thing because I dont really like it. The menu I got from the RC2 2.78 is a pie version- of it but oh well its only that one pie menu and not all the other ones. Heres the link if anyone wants it:
https://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Extensions:2.6/Py/Scripts/3D_interaction/Manipulator_Menu
If anyone needs the file lmk I know I can stand going back and fourth with the manipulator lol so now I just have to hit crtl space and it works kind of like how the other one did expect this one has the pie radial thing and not just the menu but thats not a problem because thats the only pie menu =P.

Again thanks for the help. Hope someone looking for that addon from 2.77 can find this so it will help someone else to. Well thanks again =)


How do I make a UV unwapped image visible on only one side of the object

Jaroslav Jerryno Novotn answered my question in the comments section. I did indeed have a solidify modifier on the object and as suggested, I enabled the Only Rim option in the solidify modifiers panel. This worked for me.


How to give an image or video a TV screen effect?

Create an object that has the basic shape of your pixels and assign 3 materials to it using emission shaders. I named the materials for clarity:

For each of the materials use the same image texture and a separate RGB node to control the brightness of an emission shader, change the color of the emitter to mach that of each channel. Here's the setup for the red material for example:

Note that I'm using an empty to control the texture coordinates.

Then by creating arrays of your base object, and controlling the size and placement of your texture (using the empty) you can easily get the effect you are after:


Texture Paint: No brush on UV map (Left)

I think that the solution is in the headed - I assume that the top is what you have set to 'View' and the bottom is what you need set to 'Paint'


Python: is it possible to import another text block?

Yes it is possible. Name your text block (with .py on the end, otherwise you can't import it). You can import a text block using the text block's name without it's extension:

import mypythonfile

Then to run a function use:

mypythonfile.functionname()


Can't jump while using View Navigation Walk

In Preferences, search shortcuts by name and look in 3D View > 3D View (Global) > (scroll way down) View3D Walk Modal

It's odd that it doesn't appear in search results when typing "walk" or "jump".
The default jump key is V, but can of course be reassigned.
It may also be worth mentioning that once in the Walk Modal, Tab toggles gravity, Esc resets the camera to its original position, and Enter commits the new camera position.


I use blener 2.7a. I had the same problem. but only if I use "Image Crop" function and sRGB as "Input Color". The thin line you referring to is 2 pixels in height, one pixel above bottom, so the last line of pixel remains sound, right? Checking "Convert Float" under "Filter" resolved the problem for the above settings on my system! Although I do not really know, what it does. Hope this helps...
Besides, my input-file is MTS from Lumix GH2.


Using the compositor to adjust an image that is displayed in the viewport on a mesh

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.


How do i create low lying smoke (similar to Zootopia), in blender

I've tried really simple smoke in Blender and here is what I've got:

Gif with sample

You just need to play with smoke temperature and domain height.
Sphere is nothing more but smoke collision.

UPDATE:

Here it is how to make it:

Gif steps

If you need more info just specify what you want.

Sorry that I didn't cover timeline for sphere animation.

UPDATE 2

Smoke.

Create a simple plane. Shift+A > Mesh > Plane
With still selected plane go to Physics tab then select Smoke and set smoke type to Flow. Next change the Temp. Diff. to -0.01. It will keep smoke near the ground and even after collision smoke will very slowly descend.

Create cube Shift + A Mesh > Cube and position it as you can see in picture below. It must be a little wider then our plane. So scale it a little S. This cube will be our smoke domain.

Having selected cube go to Physics tab, select Smoke then smoke type Domain.

First thing you want to change is Resolution, I've set it to 64. Higher values gives more detailes to our smoke.
Secondly you need to check Smoke Adaptive Domain, this will only calculate domain where smoke actually is.
Next check Smoke High Resolution. This will add more details to smoke. Set Resolution to 2 and Noise Method Strenght to 1. Lowering Strenght gives us smooth smoke.

Now save your file and go to Smoke Cache in Domain options. Choose File Format > OpenVDB (this is optional).
Now you can Bake or just hit Alt+A to start animation. Second option will be slow trough te first loop.

As you can see nothing happend which in this case is good :) Now let's make some...

Noise.

We will create collision object and little bit of turbulance to give this smoke a life.

Create Turbulance - Shift+A > Force field > Turbulance and set Strenght to about 0.5. This option is totally up to you. you can even skip it. What it does is it create some air movements in our domain and based on location (room, outdoor etc.) you will want to adjust position of it and strenght.
Create UV Sphere - Shift+A > Mesh > UV Sphere. In Tools tab select Shading as Smooth. Position sphere in a corner of our domain and right above plane. Check on your timeline if you are on frame 0.

In Top ortho view (sphere selected) hit I and choose Location. Now you can go to frame 50, move your sphere and again hit I and choose Location, and repeat this step. You can also select Automatic keyframe insertion (red dot under the timeline) and do this little faster. See gif below.

With selected sphere go to Physics tab then select Smoke and set smoke type to Collision and Collision type > Animated.

That's it! You can now bake it and play it. Should look like this:

There is still many to do. Smoke texture, lighting, correct density and so on.
If you want I could try to make it but I'm not really good at it.

Here is the blend file:

UPDATE 3

Here I've changed Turbulance to Wind. You can adjust wind speed and noise.
If you want to make it fluffy try higher resolutions. I don't have render farm and 64 is max usable/testing for me.


Rigged model deforms horribly when doing anything in edit mode

I have learned that if you have shape keys and one of the shape keys is selected other than the basis, it will do as I described in this post. If you simply click the basis on your shape keys panel and you will be able to edit your mesh/model at will.


Vertices deforming although ungrouped (weight painting)

I checked the file: nothing is wrong in the hand bones, but remember that if mesh deforms something else must have weights for it.

In this case is (at least) another bone - maybe you selected it inadvertently while assigning weights to the hand mesh.

See how: you start with this

but moving "UpperLeg.R" bone, you see how hand fingers deform

so while you move the "intended bone" (Hand.R), the distance form "UpperLeg.R" changes and thus the deform influcence, so you get those strange deforms...

hth


Can i access Object ID's properties using keys (like in dictionary)?

Yes, using getattr: https://docs.python.org/3.5/library/functions.html#getattr

location = getattr(object, "location")


Mesh's material_index is an index into what?

I am desperately looking for a scene-wide collections of materials, but I can't find it.

You want scene-wide materials?:

>>> bpy.data.materials[:]
[bpy.data.materials['Material'], bpy.data.materials['Material.001']]

this shows the materials for one object:

>>> bpy.data.objects['Circle'].material_slots[:]
[bpy.data.objects['Circle'].material_slots[0], bpy.data.objects['Circle'].material_slots[1]]

or

>>> [m.name for m in bpy.data.objects['Circle'].material_slots[:]]
['Material.001', 'Material.002']

For completeness then

bpy.data.materials indices

For sake of argument I have a scene with 4 materials

>>> bpy.data.materials[:]
[bpy.data.materials['MAT A'], bpy.data.materials['MAT B'], bpy.data.materials['MAT C'], bpy.data.materials['MAT D']]

We don't often need to get the material index in the materials collection, because we can use the name (a string) directly to get the reference.

>>> my_material = bpy.data.materials['MAT D']
>>> my_material.name
'MAT D'

If you really wanted to find the index of 'MAT A' in .data.materials, you could do a .find() because material names are always unique.

>>> bpy.data.materials.find('MAT A')
0

data.materials is an indexed collection.

>>> bpy.data.materials[0]
bpy.data.materials['MAT A']

material slot indices

The material_slots indices refer to the order in which your materials appear in the object's 'material stack'.

>>> obj = bpy.data.objects['Icosphere']
>>> obj.material_slots[:]
[bpy.data.objects['Icosphere'].material_slots[0], bpy.data.objects['Icosphere'].material_slots[1]]

If you want a direct reference to the material in a slot:

>>> obj.material_slots[:][0].material
bpy.data.materials['MAT A']

No need to get the name first, but if you wanted to:

>>> obj.material_slots[:][0].name
'MAT A'

If the material_index is 1, and the object references two materials  (MAT D and MAT C), then 1 refers to MAT C and globally MAT C is index 2. It may be a point of some confusion that the term index is used to talk about the location of an item in two different types of collections.

Different Materials assigned to different faces (directly on mesh)

>>> bpy.data.meshes['Icosphere.001'].polygons[42].material_index
0

this zero refers to the material slot index.

>>> ico_mesh = bpy.data.meshes['Icosphere.001']
>>> idx = ico_mesh.polygons[12].material_index
>>> ico_mesh.materials[idx]   # get the reference
bpy.data.materials['MAT D']


Why do my vehicle's wheels appear to rotate backwards?

Motion Blur would be my answer for a good reason! If you blur something it will appear moving. Also Its like in real photography, if you are using cycles you can set a value for the shutter. set it to something around 0.8 to achieve best results. In real movies the wheels actually also appear moving backwards. You could do a slow motion. Or you could try to higher the framerate.


How can I make transparant objects with a png texture

(This answer is for Blender Render, not Cycles, as you seem to have that renderer enabled in your screenshot).

First, on the texture settings panel, look for "Influence" and put a checkmark on "Alpha":

Then, back on the material settings panel, put a checkmark on "Transparency".

Finally, and this is a key step, set "Alpha" to zero here on the material transparency panel.  Think of this as a kind of minimum alpha for the material: The provided texture can make it more opaque, not less.

The results should work in the Material and Rendered viewport shading modes, and if you've selected the same image as the active image in the UV editor, it can work in the "Textured" viewport mode as well.


Leverage the collection

Collections in 2.8 have a hierarchy, well at least a children collection.

Result of running test script

Can add custom properties to the collection.
Collections do not have a parent property, since they do not follow
the single parent rule.  Have added one.
Tagged the collection as "node" by adding an instance only custom
property node["node"]
Set the root node parent to scene collection for visibility sake,
similarly if the parent attribute is set to None

Test script.

import bpy
from bpy.props import FloatProperty, PointerProperty

# clean to test
for c in bpy.data.collections:
    if "node" in c.keys():
        bpy.data.collections.remove(c)

def link_children(self, context):
    if self.parent == self:
        self.parent = None
    if self.parent:
        print(self.name in self.parent.children)
        if self.name not in self.parent.children:
            self.parent.children.link(self)
    else:
        self.parent = context.scene.collection

    mynodes = [n for n in bpy.data.collections if "node" in n.keys()]
    for n in mynodes:

        for c in n.children:
            if c.parent is not n:
                n.children.unlink(c)
        # TODO remove any "dead roots" in scene collection
    return None

float_prop = FloatProperty()
bpy.types.Collection.float_prop = float_prop
bpy.types.Collection.parent = PointerProperty(type=bpy.types.Collection, update=link_children)

def mynode(name, scene=bpy.context.scene):
    node = bpy.data.collections.new(name)
    node["node"] = True
    return node

scene = bpy.context.scene
my_root = mynode("My Root")
my_root.parent = scene.collection
my_root.float_prop = 1

for i in range(2):
    my_trunk = mynode(f"My Trunk {i}")
    my_trunk.float_prop = 2
    my_trunk.parent = my_root
    for j in range(2):
        my_leaf = mynode(f"My Leaf {i}.{j}")
        my_leaf.float_prop = 3
        my_leaf.parent = my_trunk

def draw_node(self, context):
    col = context.collection
    if col and "node" in col.keys():
        layout.prop(col, "float_prop")

Drawing in the UI.

Unfortunately the outliner doesn't currently have a way to display properties.  Can draw in UI with something like this, here I've used the context.collection and if it is a "node" display the float property

def draw_node(self, context):
    col = context.collection
    if col and "node" in col.keys():
        layout.prop(col, "float_prop")

Extending:

Using old fashioned properties, or getters setters with bpy.props can extend this to have what appears to be its own API, for example

Creating an API with a similar feel

from collections.abc import Mapping
import bpy

class MyTreeNodes(Mapping):
    @property
    def _storage(self):
        return {n.name : MyTreeItem(n) for n in bpy.data.collections if "node" in n.keys()}

    def new(self, name):
        node = bpy.data.collections.new(name)
        node["node"] = True
        node.parent = self.id_data.collection
        return MyTreeItem(node)

    def __init__(self,  scene, *args, **kw):
        self.id_data = scene
        self._liststorage = list()
        #self._storage = dict(*args, **kw)

    def __getitem__(self, key):
        if isinstance(key, int):
            return list(self._storage.values())[key]
        return self._storage[key]

    def __iter__(self):
        return iter(self._storage)

    def __len__(self):
        return len(self._storage)

class MyTreeItem(bpy.types.Collection):
    def insert(self, name):
        pass

    def __init__(self, coll):
        self.is_node = "node" in self.keys()

def getnodes(self):
    return MyTreeNodes(self.id_data)

class NodeTree(bpy.types.PropertyGroup):
    nodes = property(getnodes)

bpy.utils.register_class(NodeTree)
bpy.types.Scene.mytree = bpy.props.PointerProperty(type=NodeTree)

Code below pasted into python console, shown in image above

coll = C.collection
coll
mytree = C.scene.mytree
mytree
nodes = mytree.nodes
foo = nodes.new("foobar")
foo.parent = coll
nodes[0]
nodes['


I am not sure if this works in your project but if I would create a landscape I would use seamless textures for every material that you want to use, then paint a mask where witch material should be.

You can paint the mask in a very low resolution but the actual environment uses sharp textures.


When I move the character's body, the movement is like an alien

this model is rigged. control by using pose mode and moving the bones, they control the limbs.
some bones may point the elbows, hopefully, IK is set up, where you move a bone and the limb bends instead of you having to rotate
just control with the little gray knobs for that foot
each one corresponds to a moveable limb and/or jointthank Aoradon for https://docs.blender.org/manual/ko/dev/rigging/index.html


I guess the answer is yes, if you don't mind having a solidify modifier on the square to create a thin square plate.  The idea is to use a Glass BSDF with a network of nodes to calculate normals mimicking the curved surfaces of a real lens.

Specifically, if you have a solidified x-y plane and the camera is looking from the positive z-axis, the normal of the close face is pointing at (0,0,1), and the normal of the far face is pointing at (0,0,-1).  If you adjust the normal at each (x,y) point so that it points outward from the lens center on the close face, in the direction (c*x,c*y,1) and also outward from the lens center on the far face, in the direction (c*x,c*y,-1) for some value c (possibly depending on x and y), that should mimic a convex lens.

While it's far from obvious, it turns out that using a fixed value for c for all (x,y) gives a good approximation for a thin spherical lens that isn't too big relative to its focal length.  In fact, I think this "approximation" has less spherical aberration than a real spherical lens.  For glass with IOR=1.5, we will have approximately c=1/f for f the focal length.

The node network is a little more complex than this would suggest, because the "Normal" output of the "Geometry" node and the "Normal" input of the "Glass BSDF" node are in world coordinates, and we need to do our calculations in object coordinates.  Also, for the far face, the normal that the shader sees is not the usual normal pointing away from the viewer, but rather the flipped normal on the back surface of the face, so we have to consult Geometry->Backfacing to make sure we are adding the correction in the right direction to make both faces convex.

The full node network looks like this:

Some important notes on using it:

It should be applied to a solid object with two flat parallel faces placed close together, like a plane with the Solidify modifier.
The plates must be in the x-y plane.  If the object is rotated, the rotation should not be applied.  The lens won't work unless the normals of the lens faces lie along the object z-axis.
The input focal length (where 0.15 = 150mm)  will be scale-correct only if the scale of the object is 1, so you should apply the object scale.  As an alternative to creating a new material for every focal length, you can use object scale to adjust the actual focal length relative to the focal length in the material.
To adjust the actual size of the lens without changing its focal length --i.e., to set the f-stop-- just scale the lens in edit mode.

I have a 2.81-compatible .blend file attached at the bottom; sorry, but it just crashes on 2.80 or earlier.  The "FakeLens" material is a cleaned up version of the node network above.  Switch on the rendered view, and you should see three lenses like this:

The circular lens on the right is a true curved lens made from two slices of a sphere and using a pure Glass BSDF material.  The lens in the middle is a square with a Solidify modifier using FakeLens, and the lens on the left is a thin cube using FakeLens.

Here's the 2.81-only file:


Geometry behind glass material appears slanted in render

It almost appears like it's index of refraction hitting the hard normals of triangulated geometry. Have you tried rendering with glass set to auto smooth (Object Data Properties>Normals>Auto Smooth)? Turn the glass object off during render and see if distortion occurs. Give the glass a shiny reflective MatCap material and check if normals reflect oddly. Some modifiers that can help (depending on if you want sharp or smooth glass): 1. Weighted Normal 2. Edge Split. You typically use them separately.


How to create an underwater scene in cycles?

I use a plain cube for a water body since I do not animate these underwater scenes, only the camera movement above and underwater. The hardest thing was to get the water to look good underwater. I create technical presentations above and underwater and used these settings for the water material. This material is good for Fluid simulations as well. Underwater visibility is about 40m or ~44 yards in a clean water and tropical environment. For ocean floor you can use the terrain creator or a Mesh>Plane with surface and displacement modifiers and put it within your water cube.

At node with the mark 1 adjust the water colour.
At nodes with the mark 2 set the underwater visibility with the Value
node and colour with the RGB node. This setting will also determine
the colour of the water based on its depth when viewed from above.
See effects of these settings on the images further below
demonstrating this.
At nodes with the mark 3 set the roughness of the surface of the
water. Demo images further below.

Tweak the settings to your needs at those node sections.

Here is the water material broken into 2 sections, left and right, so you can see the nodes clearly

With the water node settings on the images, here is a sample image which is a small marina and on the top left you can see the entrance.

The image below is exactly the same camera position but underwater. Note that you cannot see the entrance very well because of the limited visibility underwater. If you SCUBA dive then you know what I am talking about. This is a sunny scene in tropical, high visibility water with rather clear shadows on the sea floor.

I use the same nodes in Blender V2.79b and V2.80.
I forgot to mention that this does not deal with sun rays penetrating the water.

To demonstrate the volume or the underwater visibility control at nodes 2, that are connected to the Volume input of the Material Output node, here are the following images. In this scene the sea floor starts to come up at more than 300 meters or 330 yards from the camera. A shiny red sphere is placed under water nearly 300 meters away. Camera depth of field is not setup so the effects can be observed better.

Underwater with the camera about 30 m or 33 yards away from the catamaran hulls and the volume control nodes are connected. Note: you cannot see the red sphere in the distance between the hulls, which is located there with this camera view, and that is how it is supposed to be.

Below is the same camera view but the volume control nodes are disconnected from the Material Output node. The red sphere and all the rocks on the sea floor are not supposed to be visible at this distance, ~300m.

Below is the same cove viewed from above, but without the boat, volume control nodes are connected. Towards the left of the image the depth gets bigger, but gradually, hence it is getting a darker shade of water.

The same camera view but with the volume control nodes disconnected. The rocks on the sea floor are clearly visible. It makes it look as the water is really shallow when it is not, hence we use those volume control nodes.


Freestyle Wireframe SVG Export Workaround?

I was able to get what I wanted by changing the visibility setting on the FreeStyle Line Set section of the Render Layers panel from "Visible" to "QI Range"

which apparently stands for "Quantitative Invisibility Range".
I don't really know what this means but it worked, would appreciate if someone could clarify!


How do you get xcftools or an alternitave to work in windows?

Is the file in a .tar.gz format by any chance?

If so,I know your answer.

Simply go to a free online file converter,then change it to a .zip format and finally import it into Blender using the "Install File" button on the User Preferences.


blender is painting only in black in texture painting mode

here is the snapshot. I don't know if it was supposed to happen. I am new and most of times blender doesn't work how tutorials describe it's working. It took me whole day to figure it out. :D


GPU compute not working for Blender 2.78c with EVGA GTX1070 on Ubuntu Mate 17.04

I ran Blender as root and then started blender normally and now GPU render works! Resolved


How can I linear increase to Location Value

You only need two keyframes to animate a value with a constant linear variance.

By default an fcurve uses a constant extrapolation, that is it stays at the last animated value. You can change this in the Graph Editor or the Dopesheet in the Channel->Extrapolation Mode menu or ⇧ ShiftE.

If you want it to stop after a certain time, you can go to that frame and insert a new keyframe, then reset the extrapolation back to constant.


How do I rotate the 3D cursor to match the rotation of a camera?

You can also do this without any addon :)

Select Camera
Object > Snap > Cursor to selected (Shift+S)
Look through your camera (View > Active Camera) (Numpad 0)
Add your spotlight and choose Align > View


Import freestyle line style from other .blend file

Yes we can import/append /link the freestyle
save the file with freestyle
When import / append with the with the other folder of texture lamp mesh object you get the folder of Freestylelinestyle

Open the folder and append/link

In the Render -> activate the freestyle option

After import/append under Render Layer in properties panel -> Under Freestyle Line style select the line from the drop down.


UV mapping for exporting blender textures to unity

You have to export your model again once you UV mapped it, because unity will not be able to get the UV data as your model don't have them.


Can Image textures be mapped to empty object like procederual textures?

Yes

Build a setup where the image is mapped with Object coordinates and poin to the Empty object.

What you are probably missing is that, while a procedural texture has usually variable colors in the 3D space, an image has only 2D informations, so the texture is projected onto the XY plane of the Empty. The Z values are all the same, it's the same texture thet is being reproduced, that's why you see those streaks.

By rotating the empty you can project the texture on other sides of susanne, but along the Z axis of the empty you will never get a texture variance without adding something (noise texture, ...)


How to resize an ellipse into a circle (or a rectangle into a square)?

In short, you should only care about the dimensions, and not really about the scale. After you get the dimensions right (which would make your elliptical cylinder perfectly circular - with equal Z and X dims), you can Apply the Scale via the shortcut CtrlA > Scale.

Or, if you like menus better, through the Object > Apply > Scale menu.

This will reset the scale to 1.0 in all axes without affecting the dimensions.

Explanation for this behavior:

This behavior is due to the fact that an object is an instance of geometrical data, that has a location in 3D space, scale (multiplication of the original geometry's size) and rotation.

In other words, scale is a relative property, which is a multiplication of the "base" scale (of 1, i.e. 100%) - represented by the geometry being instanced. This is why you can have different copies (instances) of the same base geometry that each have a different location, rotation and scale, but all share the same set of vertices, edges and faces in the same basic arrangement in space.

To see this in action try creating instances (AltD) of an object instead of ordinary duplicates (ShiftD). When you go to edit mode and edit one instance, all other instances are updated.

So in summary, even if you have just one instance of a geometry (such as in your case), it can still have a scale that differs greatly from the base geometry.


How to create a moving reflection on a glass surface?

Use an object that is reflected on the surface.

Step 1: use a glossy material on the surface that you want to be reflective.

Step 2: create one or more planes with the shape you need, use an emissive material for them, and place them in a way that are visible as reflections on the surface of the reflective object.

Step 3: animate the position of the emissive plane so that it does what you need.

Read these related posts:

https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/91173/1853

and

Why does an object with a glossy shader render in black?


How to access projected 3d tracks of the camera solver?

Copy matrix_world uninfluenced by "Camera Solver" constraint, ie set constraint influence to 0, set the frame to the first frame of the simulation,  save a matrix_world copy, then reset the influence.

The track positions are mworldcopy * Track.bundle

Camera tracking points in red, object tracking points in green, resultant object tracking points in yellow.

import bpy

from sound_drivers.BGL_draw_visualiser import BGLWidget

context = bpy.context
scene = context.scene
scene.frame_set(1)
camera = cam = scene.camera
cam_const = cam.constraints[0]
cam_const.influence = 0
mw = cam.matrix_world.copy()
cam_const.influence = 1

class ShowTracks(BGLWidget):
    def draw_region(self, context):
        clip = context.scene.active_clip
        tracking = clip.tracking
        tracking_object = clip.tracking.objects.active

        # match to object tracking
        # from bl_operators/clip.py
        if camera:
            reconstruction = tracking_object.reconstruction
            framenr = scene.frame_current - clip.frame_start + 1
            reconstructed_matrix = reconstruction.cameras.matrix_from_frame(framenr)
            matrix = camera.matrix_world * reconstructed_matrix.inverted()

        else:
            return

        tracks = tracking.objects

        # track points in global space current frame
        pts = [matrix  * t.bundle for t in tracks['Object'].tracks]
        pts = self.points3d_points2d(context, pts)
        self.draw_points(pts, lw=2, color=(1, 1, 0, 1))

        # tracking data
        pts = [mw * t.bundle for t in tracks['Camera'].tracks]
        pts = self.points3d_points2d(context, pts)
        self.draw_points(pts, lw=1, color=(1, 0, 0, 1))

        pts = [mw * t.bundle for t in tracks['Object'].tracks]
        pts = self.points3d_points2d(context, pts)
        self.draw_points(pts, lw=1, color=(0, 1, 0, 1))

v = ShowTracks(None, bpy.context, bpy.types.SpaceView3D)


I can't find the Master Jaw vertex group using the Rigify addon

Rigify is a quite complicated rig, in which a lot of bones are "control" or "machinary" bones, so they don't deform the mesh (they don't have the "deform" option activated, so no associated vertex group is created when parenting).

All and the only bones who deform the mesh are stored into a generally hidden bone layer, and have the "DEF" suffix on their names.

So, probably the vertex group you're looking for is called "DEF-jaw".

Of course, after generating the rig, if you know what you are doing you can modify all of theese properties.


object particle system not transfering with object

You have to use a special modifier called "Particle Instance" in order to use nested particles. I'll link the blender docs :

https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/modeling/modifiers/simulate/particle_instance.html

And an up-to-date tutorial on Youtube :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpvNJvsq-FU&


i want to create a light that cycles through all colours in the rgb range, how would i do so?

Select HSL color mode for interpolation.
Choose Clockwise method.
Select pure red color - R: 1, G: 0, B: 0.
Select pure red color and add a bit of blue - R: 1, G: 0, B: 0.01.
Animate Factor - press I over it to put keyframe on selected time frame.


Can the mesh select mode menu converted to a pie menu in Blender 2.72?

Some Basics are documented in the Blender Wiki, see:

Creating Pie Menus
Coding Pie Menus

Below you find a complete, briefly commented and fully working mini example addon. Just place the code below into a file named

whatever_name_you_like.py

and then Install/Enable this python file as a regular Addon.

Notes:

The name of the file is not important, however the appendix '.py' is essential to mark this as a python file.
You do not need to enable the "Pie Menus Official" Addon in order to get your own Pie menus to work properly!

Begin of the code:

bl_info = {
    "name": "My Pies",
    "author": "My Name",
    "version": (1, 1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 72, 0),
    "description": "My Pie menu",
    "category": "Object" }

import bpy
from bpy.types import Menu

# Implements an edit mode selection pie

class VIEW3D_PIE_template(Menu):
    # label is displayed at the center of the pie menu.
    bl_label  = "Select Mode" # Appears as Pie title
    bl_idname = "mesh.mypie"  # Used to refer (see below)

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

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

addon_keymaps = [] # Store keymaps to use in unregister()

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

    # Define a keyboard shortcut (for Mesh Edit mode)
    wm = bpy.context.window_manager
    km = wm.keyconfigs.addon.keymaps.new(name="Mesh")

    # Open the pie when you press CTRL SHIFT E:
    kmi = km.keymap_items.new("wm.call_menu_pie", 'E', 'PRESS', shift=True, ctrl=True)
    kmi.properties.name="mesh.mypie"
    addon_keymaps.append((km,kmi)) # Store keymap

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

    #use stored keymaps to unregister
    for km, kmi in addon_keymaps:
        km.keymap_items.remove(kmi)
    addon_keymaps.clear()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


How to recalculate bone transforms/constraints to originate from armature origin point?

I found a solution for myself. However, it regrettably does use bpy.ops. If anyone has a solution which does not use bpy.ops I'd gladly take a look at that answer.
Here is the blend file for anyone who wants to take a look.


My instinct is that you either want a particle simulation (for droplets) or a smoke simulation (for a fog).

Neither of these is trivial to pull off.  I can imagine that getting the "smoke" to flow down will require some tweaks.


You could set the path to Krita or any other external image procesing application in Blender's User Preferences accessible from the file menu.

From the image editor you can launch Krita with the image loaded by chosing Edit Externally. When returned to Blender refresh the image with Reload Image or Alt-R.


Here's my results, although not tuned perfectly, I feel they are reasonable.
For me the trick is in setting the Smoke High Resolution and bumping up the divisions.

There is some other things in here like smoke texture, and other minor things for you to look at to fit, so I've included a blend file as well.


What's the difference between Normals and Face orientation?

The normals come out of the blue faces:

But if two blue faces are facing and close to each other, showing red faces to the outside, you may have the impression that normals come out from the red faces. Simply because normal indicators (blue segments) go through the mesh:

Here on left something close to what you show in your question and on right the back face is shifted so that we can see the normals doesn't come from the center of the red face anymore:


How to scale two UV islands of different sizes to be an identical size?

If you just have 2 islands and you don't care how they are oriented, just choose the Normalize option in the UV's menu. That is what it's for.

But let's say you took your time manually unwrapping and arranging several islands and need to match the scale of both groups but don't want to ruin the work you already did.

select only the relevant faces in the model (faces you need to
normalize). Make sure the option in the upper-left to link the model
select to the UV layout is OFF.
You will see in the UV editor that only the selected faces are
visible. This also means that operations in the UV editor will not affect hidden UVs.
Choose from the menu in the UV editor to Normalize the UVs. Now all of those UVs are the same size. This WILL reposition and CAN (unless you uncheck the option) rotate the islands though, so if that is a problem you will need to rotate them back into position now.
Drag those faces over someplace where they will be together, but not intersect other UVs. Select all the faces on your model. You will see that all UVs are visible in the UV editor now. Manually scale the islands you just normalized to make sure all islands are perceptually the same size.

This way, you don't have to touch islands that are already the right size and in the right position.


Does installing/running Blender tamper in any way with my system/settings or install additional software/required components?

No it doesn't modify your system, provided you are using the self-contained .zip version.

The self-contained .zip version is just that, self-contained. It will - of course - put data where-ever you tell it to. Animation output or other temporary files will be written where you tell Blender to put them. Temporary files (in C:\tmp\ by default) are deleted every so often.

In addition to the outputs mentioned above, the Blender Windows Installer will also make a link in you start menu, (possibly) on you desktop and will associate .blend files with the Blender executable. This file association is done via the registry but should be harmless.


Blender Lamp not illuminating or reflecting in viewport

(Do note this is for the Blender Internal renderer.)

You absolutely can see lighting and shadows in the viewport. Your issue is you have the Viewport Shading set to Solid. In Solid you do not get lighting or shadows.

Switch the Viewport Shading to either Textured, or Material. (Rendered will show the lighting too, but that is not what you want.)
Now in the properties panel under the Shading section set the Material Mode to GLSL.


Explosion/fire not showing up after bake in viewport or rendered

I was having this issue even after baking the data. And It finally started rendering after I baked the noise as well.


Texture Paint gives off a checkboard color

You have an image texture set as your brush - remove that, and then you will be able to paint.


How can I automate this kind of Blender 2D animations?

Blender can do many of the effects seen in this video, but the drawing and colouring in effect is  screen capture.
Having said that you can sort of fake it by capturing a drawn frame, using Grease Pencil in the VSE preview window. Grab it by rendering with the OpenGL render button. Thats the little camera button highlighted in yellow.

You can re-import this frame and wipe it on over the clean frame. Remember to turn off the Grease Pencil layer.


Measurement of the "Straightened" length of a path

In the Animation Nodes addon there is a node to do just that: Get Spline Length.

The example usage is what you need.


Extrude curved surfaced by a constant distance

See Properties (N) > Transform > Scale XYZ is not 1 in all axis.
Since Modifier transformation is applied first on Object Data and Object Transformation after means Solidifier extrudes thickness and Object Transform squeeze that result.

To solve your issue Apply Scale Transformation (Ctrl+A)

What Object Transform is see this answer or check Manual.


what are the things that can be done with python and cannot be done manually?

You can't without a code select all object shearing different instances of the same material (f.ex. material, material.001, material.002 and so on). You can't remove custom shapes from all selected bones at once.So in general it's easy to perform actions on many objects at once and automate some actions, you perform a lot with python. I don't think it's absolutely essential to learn python to be a great Blender artist though. There are tons of people, who will gladly drop you some snippets of code to help you achieve stuff you can't without it.


Batch-Process Video Watermarks in Blender

I use Blender, Imagemagick and FFMPEG for this kind of work. Command line FFMPEG is much faster and straight forward tool for your job, although a linux blender command line would likely compare in speed, but might be more complex to implement.

However, you will have a lot more support with FFMPEG for this kind of common work, and the command line is simple (inputs, overlay location, output):

ffmpeg -i input-video.mp4 -i watermark.png -filter_complex "overlay=0:0" watermarked-video-output.mp4

Which would be easily looped in linux to operate on a batch of videos.


pyNode with button: any way to find which node the button pressed was on?

It's possible, but you need to set a property or two on your operator so that it can find the value. Eg:

class MyOperator(bpy.types.Operator):
    tree: bpy.props.StringProperty()
    node: bpy.props.StringProperty()
    ...

Then where ever you draw it, set those properties. Eg:

def draw_buttons(self, context, layout):
    op = layout.operator("myoperator.operator")
    op.tree = self.id_data.name
    op.node = self.name
    ...

You can then use those values in the operator to find out where it was called from.


Rigging this mechanical claw. Could do with some help

I'm not a very sophisticated rigger, but this looks to me like a 2-bone IK Chain, like an upper and lower arm.

This is a single armature

B_Susp, B_Pole and B_IK_Tgt are parented to Root
B_Grab has an IK Constraint, target B_IK_Tgt, Pole B_Pole, Length 2, so as to include its immediate parent, B_Susp.
B_IK_Tgt has a Limit Location Bone Constraint in its Local (i.e Root's) space, so it can only move up and down Root's axis, with stops to prevent it from going too far.

Hunks of mesh are directly (Bone-Parent) parented to the bones:

The Cylinder to Root, its Piston to B_IK_Tgt, The Suspension Arm to B_Susp, and the actual Claw to B_Grab.

Once one arm of the claw is working, B_Grab, B_Susp, and B_Pole can be duplicated and rotated 120 degrees around the Root Axis in (Armature) Edit Mode. This may throw their roll .. ShiftN Recalculate Roll on X-tangent fixed it for me. My first arm was constructed Z-up, in front view.

The meshes can be AltD instanced round to follow, and re-parented to their respective bones.

I'm sure someone knows a way of taking the bones and meshes round together.. maybe they can suggest that, or an altogether better way.

As I said, I'm no expert in the bureaucracy of locking rigs down properly, creating good interfaces for animators, etc, but perhaps this is enough for a mechanism that works.


Shader artifacts rendering in some spots of the mesh

Those artifacts are showing up for a number of reasons.  The first is that you have polygons that are very non-planar and this will usually cause artifacts for lighting.

Here is an example that shows a quad but it's folded sharply and two distinct triangles can be seen when viewed along the plane of the quad.  Try and make sure to keep quads as flat as possible.  Non-planer quads will also give you problems with texture mapping so it's something to always look for and repair.

Another problem you are having is that you are rendering with a very low polygon model.  Cycles has difficulty dealing with models which are not subdivided at least a couple times.  It's best to use a subdivision surface (subsurf) modifier to handle this since it can be removed without affecting the base model or it can be applied so the model will be permanently sub-divided.
Here is a sequence of images that show the effect that various levels of subdivision can have on rendering artifacts.

Another way to deal with these rendering issues is to use more lights.  Global Illumination will also help since these areas will receive indirect light that will also help smooth things out.
The following image shows the effect of changing the angle of a single light source in order to show how the area is affected by direct illumination.

For the final image here, I did not alter the mesh at all but instead only relied on the Sub-Division Modifier at 1 iteration and also there are 3 lights as well as an environment map.  The ground also adds a bit of indirect light that helps to fill in the lighting for areas that the other lighting is not reaching.
This all adds up to a mesh that looks pretty decent even though the bash mesh is low poly and it has some fairly substantial non-planer errors.  If the Sub-D modifier is increased to use 2 iterations; the few problem areas that are still showing should no longer be perceptible.


Doubles are one thing, but topology is bad as well. Make it look like the other one and dissolve diagonal edges and their verts on this imperfect circle. These vertices are obsolete. To have a perfect bevel circle you must have exactly four vertices, or a pure square. Also check Clamp Overlap option.In the example I used a plane with edges 4m in length.


2.90.1 Vertices Keep Hiding, Unable to Weight Paint Mask

After going into sculpting mode and pressing Alt + H, it seems to have fixed the issue.
I did this because sculpt and weight paint had the same issue. Wouldn't let me touch the coat. I could sculpt and paint the sleeves, but only the sleeves.
It works now after that. I don't know why that fixed it, but it did.
For now.


You have to set the crease not only on the outer edges but on one additional edge at the vertice with the kink. It doesnt matter if it is this one or the other edge.


You want ShiftA> Add > Converter > Vector math instead:


The face indicator "dot" is displayed in Wireframe Shading or Solid Viewport Shading while Textured Solid is disabled in Properties panel Shading section.


You could use the Inset tool (I):

  This tool takes the currently selected faces and creates an inset of
  them, with adjustable thickness and depth. The tool is modal, such
  that when you activate it, you may adjust the thickness with your
  mouse position. You may also adjust the depth of the inset during the
  modal operation by holding Ctrl.

Select the faces to inset:

Press I to inset:


Offer animation - Blender or some other program

Blender is good for this type of presentations.

You can make video like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L__2suWPk9s

or interactive 3D-presentations like this (using addon blend4web): https://www.blend4web.com/apps/dairy_plant/dairy_plant.html?v=9e5dd2c40ed17b48ebd949bf7f8d9d0c


Select all the edges you want to rotate.
Change pivot point to Individual Origins.
Change Transform Orientation to Normal

Press R button to rotate and Z button twice to rotate around the Z Normal axis of individual edges.


How is adaptive subdivision different from dynamic topology?

The difference between Adaptive subdivision and Dynamic topology is the way the surface gets subdivided. Both triangulate the mesh but use different algorithms.

Adaptive subdivision:

each polygon is divided into a number of micro-polygons based on camera distance and screen pixel size
these micro-polygons are displaced at render-time with texture
the subdivision algorithm makes it easy to increase/decrease the density
resulting triangles are nice (a quad results in smaller quads that form 2 triangles each)

Dynamic topology:

the division algorithm divides the mesh based on brush size while sculpting the mesh
the created vertices are created at their final destination
decreasing/increasing resolution is done by collapsing/subdividing edges locally with brushes and globally in tool panel under Dyntopo settings
local subdivision and collapsing of edges usually create nasty geometry with long thin triangles and triangle fans.


Does it help if you switch the shading of the 3d view to GLSL? You can switch between "Multitexture" and "GLSL" in the properties panel (open with N key in the 3d view), under the "shading" group. Material alpha should be 0, and texture alpha influence > 0 (texture transparency shows transparent in the material) or <0 (the inverse of the texture transparency   shows transparent in the material)

See this example:


Is there a way to smooth a surface cleanly without subsurf?

Try settings as follows:

One level of subsurf or as many as you can comfortably handle.
A Laplacian Smooth modifier with a couple of repeats (be careful!); adjust λfactor as desired.
Smooth shading enabled.

The Laplacian Smooth modifier is a really nice way to smooth out your model without adding a ton of verts. From the wiki:

  The Laplacian Smooth and Shape Enhanced modifier allows you to reduce noise on a mesh's surface with minimal changes to its shape, and exaggerates a shape using a Laplacian smoothing modifier in the reverse direction using a single parameter, factor.

If this doesn't work out well you could try just a normal Smooth modifier instead.


Pretty much just start your bones at the edge of the mouth and work your way in, leaving a gap in the middle for size difference when the edges of the mouth move out.

I recommend using some sort of mouth animation reference sheet and choosing which shapes the mouth will be taking on most often, especially if your creature doesn't speak a human language where mouth movements are fairly non-caricatured and straight forward. This rigging system, however should do for a basis of most things, and with a little tweaking and weight-painting can be made much less scabby, however the immediate results aren't terrible :)

Obviously include more bones around areas that will need greater control over their deformation and do not forget about that gap in the middle of the lip.


You can still do the same thing in the compositor with View Layers. You need to create collections for the objects you want to render in front / behind, as well as new view layers (all buttons for this are located at the upper right by default). You can then go through each view layer, right click the collections you DONT want to see with it, "View layer > Disable from View Layer". View layers should work the same way as render layers prior.


Some things you could try, go into object mode and apply the scale using Ctrl+A > [Scale], before doing the bevel operation, or if that doesn't work you could try using the bevel modifier with a vertex group including the two vertices that make up your edge.


How to prevent selection of other objects while in edit mode

Select linked (Ctrl>+L) to select vertices/edges/faces linked in the current object and then press Shift+H to hide the unselected vertices.

Hidden geometry cannot be selected or edited.

When you are done editing press Alt+H to Unhide.

Consider also creating Vertex Groups to simplify the selection/hinding process of different parts of your objects.


Is it possible to set material of one face only in Blender 2.45 (old version)?

Yes, from the Editing Panel

In Blender 2.45 the button to assign a material to faces can't be found in the Shading Panel under the Material section like depicted in your image.

It is instead disjoined from the Material's editor (where you edit material's parameters) but linked to the the mesh itself, and so grouped with the sections that are about face's properties like shading, editing tools...

You can see the section in the lower left of the following image.

You can find more information in the official documentation.


How would I make the material for these LED headlights in Eevee?

Here. Try something like this. EEVEE doesn't really play nicely with the Glass BSDF all the time, so you often have to find workarounds for good looking "shiny transparencies". In the shader below, I omitted the Glass shader, in lieu of a combination of shaders (many of which make up the glass shader anyway). I angled my screenshot so you can see reflection from my HDRI of the surface, showing it is indeed "shiny". Make sure to pay attention to the Blend Mode options I have highlighted on the right:


Map an image file to a UV dome post-version 2.8

I have seen the pic you have provided and it is pretty clear that you haven't set the material to Image texture. Please change it to image texture and then try UV mapping it, then it should work.


Is it Possible to Create an Opalescence Shader in Cycles?

The Problem here is that you have to use two different shaders that both use refraction rays. That makes it difficult to find a separation that lets the one shader cast rays on other objects after doing refraction and the other rays casting rays into the camera after refraction but not cast rays onto other objects.

I found this node setup to work:

Result:

Of course this is not physically correct and somewhat a hack. But with a little extra work you should be able to simulate a rather good looking opalescent shader.


As suggested by Gorgious you should use Subsurface Scattering. Here I've tried with a Subsurface value of 1 and with a Radius setting of R = 2.5, G = 1.3 and B = 1. It's probably easier to get the desired effect in Cycles but in Eevee I cheated with a bit of Emission, otherwise it would have looked a bit too dull. Also, give it a bit of bump:


Extrude multiple faces, stopping at intersection

While in Edit Mode, if you go into an orthographic side view, you can box select all faces for either the upper or the lower story (it doesn't matter which one you choose, but the one you choose will be the one you extrude). With all faces selected, press e to extrude, and after you drag, press right-click to cancel the operation. The extrude still takes place, but the faces you created have now ended up back at their starting position, making them essentially invisible, by virtue of the fact that they are now perfectly intersecting with the faces they were originally extruded from. But they are still selected. While still in the orthographic side view, activate edge snapping (This choice may not seem to make sense in this context, but I believe this option works better than face snapping). Press g to grab the selected faces, z to constrain the grab to the vertical axis, and drag upward until your cursor reaches the next story of faces You should now have the two stories in contact (but not merged).
If you want the newly contacted plane to get etched by the intersection, as you indicate you would prefer, you may need extra steps. One option is to use knife project, but this tool is tricky. Select the entire object that you extruded the new faces from, and in Edit Mode, select the entire edge ring which defines its outer perimeter (Shift + select any of its edges to select them all). Press Shift + d to duplicate this edge loop, then press p to bring up the Separate menu, and choose Selection. Now go into Object Mode, and hide the original object that this edge ring was made from. Select the new edge ring object, then Shift + select the object to be etched, tab into Edit Mode (in 2.8, both objects will go into Edit Mode together if they are selected together), press Numpad 7 to force your view to top orthographic (this is important for the next step) and from the Mesh menu at the top of the screen, choose Knife Project. This will etch your plane with the outline of the new object (but make no hole). Delete the new object. It was only needed as a cookie cutter.


Origin point different in editmode / objectmode

As said in the comments by Serge L and Mr Zak, if you want the vertices to rotate around the origin in edit mode, you have to set the cursor to the origin (Shift+S cursor to selected, if the object is selected) and then set the cursor as pivot point, so that every rotation and scaling will use the cursor location as pivot point.

Turning on or off the manipulators is only a visual utility, which doesn't affect the rotation behaviours.

The logic behind this is the fact that the default pivot point is the median point: in object mode you have only one object selected so the median point (pivot point) is the object origin. In edit mode you select all vertices of the mesh, and the middle point will be a location which will have the average coordinates of all vertices, and this (often empty) location will act as pivot point.


I figured out the solution, but I don't quite understand the problem. I needed to decimate the character before the issue resolved itself, so I guess the issue was that I just had too many vertices.


About merging vertex edges of different materials namely plane and cylinder

Select all and press Shift N (recalculate Normals, outside).


When rendering, Cycles and Eevee only renders some materials

I’m not sure the materials go missing. Are you talking about what look like reflections of the surroundings on the sword? I have repeatedly thought something was wrong with my metallic materials when that happened in material preview but disappeared in render, but it turns out that’s just because the world background in the material preview is automatically an HDR texture, and in cycles or EEVEE render it defaults to flat gray which makes no reflections.
Just change the World background to something interesting (an environment texture from blender’s own data files works great) and metallic materials should look much better .
As for the glow effect, this is likely because you enabled bloom while using EEVEE, but then switched to cycles render. The bloom will still appear in material preview. You can create a bloom like effect for cycles using the glare node in the compositor .


your driver is not compatible.

You need the dump file to determine the error, but maybe if you update your driver you can solve the problem. It is worth saying that if you use Windows, this brings a generic driver, so it is recommended to use the driver provided by the manufacturer of the peripheral you are using, otherwise you would have to see your dump file as I have already mentioned.

Do a Google search with this line and you will get a sea of information about your problem:

"dcp_watchdog_violation o driver_power_state_failure."


Trying to add text to video, and the ouput only shows the final text, video never plays

In the project scene settings called Properties panel, make sure that you have Post Production > Sequencer active. Otherwise the VSE will not be rendered.


How to Reposition an Empty Without Moving the Instances inside it?

Thank you - I achieved the desired outcome by unparenting the instances with keep transformations, to reposition the empty, then reparenting the instances with keep transformations.


Blender not rendering specified dimensions

The stretched height comes from you having an 3:2 aspect ratio.

You would normally only want to adjust the aspect ratio when rendering video that is intended for older tv's with non-square pixels.

The reason you are seeing the distortion is that the uv image editor displays images in 1:1 aspect by default, you can adjust this to match your render settings in the Display panel of the UV/Image Editors properties region N.


You mirror in the X direction (along the X axis). From your screenshot, the center of your object is in the middle of the 'left' side, which means that the original and generated (mirrored) points overlap.
Selecting the Y axis as mirror axis probably does what you want.

If you already applied the mirror modifier, you might also want to 'remove doubles' to get rid of superfluous vertices (which can give strange effects with e.g. subdivision or bevel modifiers)


Where is the Alpha Convert Node in python?

CompositorNodePremulKey
You can find a complete list of available compositor node types here: https://docs.blender.org/api/current/bpy.types.CompositorNode.html.
alpha_convert = tree.nodes.new(type='CompositorNodePremulKey')
alpha_convert.mapping = 'PREMUL_TO_STRAIGHT'

However, sometimes it's pretty hard to figure out since the names doesn't really match. I'd suggest create the node in the compositor by hand and print its type to the console to get an idea:
import bpy

class NodeOperator(bpy.types.Operator):
    """Tooltip"""
    bl_idname = "node.simple_operator"
    bl_label = "Simple Node Operator"

    @classmethod
    def poll(cls, context):
        space = context.space_data
        return space.type == 'NODE_EDITOR'

    def execute(self, context):
        space = context.space_data
        node_tree = space.node_tree
        node_active = context.active_node

        print (node_active.type)
        return {'FINISHED'}

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

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

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

Or use Node.bl_rna attribute which returns the actual struct (to copy the name from):
>>> node_active.bl_rna
<bpy_struct, Struct("CompositorNodePremulKey")>

Related: Controling compositor by python


Go into orthogonal view
Go to the front view
Select the front faces
Go to UV and choose project from view
Rinse and repeat for the back and if necessary sides.
Remember you can select the individual UVs and move and scale them on the uv map.


How to determine whether my bm.select_history.active is a BMVert, BMFace or a BMEdge?

bm.select_history.active actually gives you the object of type of the selected element of the mesh. So actually, type(bm.select_history.active).__name__ will give you the strings 'BMEdge', 'BMVert', 'BMFace' etc. based on the type of selection. You can use this in the condition, which could be something like:

activElem = bm.select_history.active
if (activElem != None and type(activElem).__name__ == 'BMEdge'):
    #The logic to process the edge (activElem.index etc.)

There may be a better way to do this. So maybe, you can wait for a while for a better answer :)


Snap all vertices to their closest grid intersection

Yes, you can select all the vertices and choose Selection to Grid (Shift-S, 6).
helpful question because I didn't know this until now and it's useful.


Stop hair from falling through emitter mesh

Enabling collision on the emitter doesn't work on the hair system, yet (2.77).
To achieve collision, you have to do a workaround with a collision mesh:
1. You have to duplicate your model.
2. remove the hair particle system on the duplicated Mesh.
3. Exclude the duplicated mesh from rendering (uncheck rendering in the outliner). 4. Enable collision on the duplicated mesh.

You may need to tweak the settings a bit though.


how to change the value of various custom properties at the same time?

Have a look at the operator simple template in the text editor. Replace main(context) with this

def main(context):
    #active pose bone
    pb = context.active_pose_bone
    # all custom properties on bone
    for key in pb.keys():
        #ignore _RNA_UI
        if key == '_RNA_UI':
            continue
        pb[key] = 1
        # insert a keyframe
        pb.keyframe_insert('["%s"]' % key)

and the poll method to

def poll(cls, context):
    return context.active_pose_bone is not None

to  make sure that there is an active pose bone selected.

and change the idname from  object.simple_operator to something meaningful like posebone.set

Then have a look at the panel simple template and

row.operator("posebone.set")

will give you a UI button.


How do you make a movie loop in the sequencer?

Work Fine 2.79
https://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Extensions:2.6/Py/Scripts/Sequencer/Loop_Media

"Pick a Scene, Image, or Movie strip in the Video Sequence Editor, and use the Strip menu to find the Loop Media operator. A speed effect strip will be created to accomplish the looping effect"

Excelent Script


Create a "global" value for multiple settings

Well, you need to know about Drivers.

Drivers are scripts which main purpose is to control properties with other properties. In example the rotation of one object is controlled with the location of another object.

Drivers can use properties, numbers, transformations, and scripts, to control the values of properties.

Using a F-Curve, the driver reads the value of the Driver Value and sets the value of the selected property it was added to.
So for example, if the Driver Value is 2.0 the property can be 0.5.

https://docs.blender.org/manual/ru/dev/animation/drivers/introduction.html


Blender 2.76b Depth of Field doesn't work

Make sure the camera at the top of window containing the Depth of Field tab is actually set to your active camera. I had the exact same problem.


import video strip VSE into the 3d image plane

Elements from the VSE or from the Compositor cannot be used as textures on the 3D environment directly.

You would need to export them as Video or Image Sequences and then re-import them to be used as textures on planes (or other geometry).


How do I parent these two bones in the hip the same way they are at the shoulder? Can I?

Your bone is correctly parented, when a bone is parented (child), there's a dotted line that goes from its head to the tail of its parent. So maybe I haven't understood your question correctly but it looks like you're good.


How to control the force of the fluid onto object?

Rather than using Geometry or Inflow behaviour and allowing gravity to give the fluid momentum you can set the Initial Velocity of the fluid as it enters the simulation to give the fluid more of a 'punch' as it hits the obstacle. Simply enable Initial Velocity and adjust the Initial X,Y,Z components to give it more push in the required direction.


How to get cloth + wind simulation in 2.80?

Ok, I figured it out. The field should be added through Add->Force Field->Wind and not through the physics pane of the cloth itself. That enables rotation. When I do that and set the strength to something like 5000 it works as expected.


Can i Render a specific region in blender with specific resolution?

You can simply use another camera.

Duplicate your camera, and keep it in the same place
Lower the Sensor size to "crop" the image
Use Shift X and Y to "move around"

Because you're not changing focal length, the lens distortion doesn't change.
It's as if you cropped the image in photoshop.


Auto-Resizing objects in BGE when I press play? How do I fix this

Select the parent and hit CTRL + A and select "Scale"

EDIT: An explanation: This only happens when using a a vertex parent.

An ordinary parenting causes the child to follow scale translation and rotation of the parent's Origin point.

A vertex parent in blender game engine copies the same information, but from a vertex, not the objects origin point. For reasons i do not know, if you edit the location of the vertex in edit mode, the child doesn't appear to notice while when you press play, and only appears to update when you apply the location of the parent. That is a best of an explanation i can give, if you know more, then please edit this post and add your knowledge.


Can people using different computers edit the same .blend file at once?

Currently this isn't possible and would require major changes to Blender.

Typically larger projects divide assets into many files so people can work on different parts simultaneously, this can be done so assets can be re-used in many places using Blender's library linking system.

Its also common to use a version control system, such as Git, Subversion, Mercurial... (or many others), to manage files for larger projects.

For reference, Mango Open Movie used this structure.


Because Blender caches textures, they won't appear missing right away, showing pink color. To become pink, they should be reloaded. Like when you reopen the .blend file or append/link their texture data blocks to another .blend file.
Before packing, you have to find all missing textures in the original file.
When you use Find Missing Files, you have to choose the folder with missing files. Blender will search in the folder's subfolders also. To find files on your computer use something like Everything.
In Blender, there is no such concept as a project or a project folder.
There are no requirements for strict directory management like in Unreal Engine.
You may also want to disable using relative paths so you can move a .blend file freely.

Some methods of importing, like with some add-ons, may ignore this setting, so you have to make path absolute manually.


Glass rendering incorrectly with dark areas

The dark areas are normals facing the wrong direction. Fix these by selecting everything A in edit mode and pressing Ctrl+N.

To fix refraction issues, add a solidify modifier to the mesh. You might have to adjust the thicker part on the top. The glass shader is trying to guess where the glass is solid, so you should use it on closed meshes  only for the refraction to work correctly.

For tinting glass, use a volume shader in the volume material output instead of mixing the surface with a diffuse shader.


One solution is to uses plain Python to write out the PNG file.

Another solution is to extend render.makescreenshot(filename) to accept additional optional argument in the form of render.makescreenshot(filename, x, y, width, height)
The work-in-progress patch is here:
http://www.pasteall.org/47215/diff

Note: The patch currently does not work correctly in Blender, it only works in BlenderPlayer.


Changing orientation of armature in edit mode without breaking animations

I found out I can do this by just going into object mode, rotating the armature and applying the rotation


How to make the panel detect that the operator has been executed correctly?

The add-on below demonstrates how to solves this by using a PropertyGroup that stores the state of the execution. The operator SCENE_OT_example toggles the value stored in bpy.context.scene.example_settings.success. In EXAMPLE_PT_panel  the draw() method is used to display a label depending on the value of bpy.context.scene.example_settings.success.

bl_info = {
    "name": "Example Report Operator Success",
    "author": "Robert Guetzkow",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 80, 0),
    "location": "View3D > Sidebar > Example tab",
    "description": "Example Report Operator Success",
    "warning": "",
    "wiki_url": "",
    "category": "3D View"}

import bpy

class ExampleSettings(bpy.types.PropertyGroup):
    success: bpy.props.BoolProperty(description='Operator executed successfully.', default=False)
    executed: bpy.props.BoolProperty(description='Operator has been executed.', default=False)

class SCENE_OT_example(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "scene.example"
    bl_label = "Example Operator"
    bl_description = "Sets the success variable."
    bl_options = {"REGISTER", "UNDO"}

    def execute(self, context):
        context.scene.example_settings.executed = True

        # Dummy function that toggles the value (True => False, False => True)
        context.scene.example_settings.success = not context.scene.example_settings.success
        return {"FINISHED"}

class EXAMPLE_PT_panel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "Panel 1"
    bl_category = "Example tab"
    bl_space_type = "VIEW_3D"
    bl_region_type = "UI"
    bl_options = {"DEFAULT_CLOSED"}

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        layout.operator(SCENE_OT_example.bl_idname)

        if context.scene.example_settings.executed:
            if context.scene.example_settings.success:
                layout.label(text="Operator execution successful.")
            else:
                layout.label(text="Operator execution failed.")

classes = (ExampleSettings, SCENE_OT_example, EXAMPLE_PT_panel)

def register():
    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.register_class(cls)
    bpy.types.Scene.example_settings = bpy.props.PointerProperty(type=ExampleSettings)

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

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()


My mesh deforms while moving a armature in object mode


How to disable scene shading and view Vertex Colors only?

Yes, enable Shadeless in 3D view > Tool Shelf (N) > Shading while in textured view (⎇ AltZ):


Read the filename from imported SVG via python

Using a python script you can specify the svg file to import. After the import you can identify the curves added and adjust their names and properties to match the filename used.

As importing an svg file can create multiple curve objects I would start by making a copy of the existing objects list, then import, then compare the current objects list to the starting list to find what was added during the import.

import bpy
import os

svg_files = [f for f in os.listdir('svgtest') if f.endswith('.svg')]

for f in svg_files:
    start_objs = bpy.data.objects[:]
    bpy.ops.import_curve.svg(filepath=os.path.join('svgtest',f))
    new_curves = [o for o in bpy.data.objects if o not in start_objs]

    n = f[:-8] # the start of the filename
    s = float(f[-6:-4]) # the scale factor as in the 99 from name_S99.svg
    for obj in new_curves:
        obj.name = n
        obj.scale = (s,s,s)


You can add the rocks hightmap to your Main hightmap, with a mix node (set to add, factor of 1), or a silmple math add node. Plug the output of the add node into the displacement socket. To control the strength of your displacement use a multiply node inbetween. (Values below 1 will reduce terrain hight, values above 1 will grow it.)
The slope information is only used for color, don't add that to the displacement. It will give you wrong results.


Should I append the armarture before binding it to the mesh?

if you want to join armatures, do it before binding meshes to them (because many problems occur after joining armatures)
but if you want to have a mesh to be affected by multiple armatures and you don't want to join them just :

take care of names of bones to be unique in either armature
set an armature modifier for each of your armatures


If you look at tooltip, you will see "unlimited if 0":

So it will render until you stop it.


You created a second camera, but you didn't assign it to be the camera for the scene:

--- /var/tmp/se1.py     2015-06-22 16:37:30.703514909 -0400
+++ /var/tmp/se2.py     2015-06-22 16:41:47.687236739 -0400
@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@
 bpy.context.object.data.cycles.fisheye_fov = 3.14159
 bpy.context.object.data.sensor_width = 8.8
 bpy.context.object.data.sensor_height = 6.6
+bpy.context.scene.camera = bpy.context.object
 #Add a lamp.
 bpy.ops.object.lamp_add(type='POINT', radius=1, view_align=False, location=(0, 1.5, 2.5),
 layers=(True, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False, False))

You might also want to set your frame_end=1 instead of 2.

Another strange thing about this script is that it keeps creating new objects, so you can't run it repeatedly in the same scene without weirdness (probably some Z fighting) as objects and lamps accumulate.


Why do I have problems with unwrapping and AO baking?

Two questions here :

Concerning the UV map it is normal that you obtain "pieces all over the place" when you choose to unwrap with "smart uv project". Some simple explanation are given in this answer : How to UV unwrap complex models?

For the ambient occlusion, it is also normal that AO checked here in your tutorial
makes your shadows lowered or inexistant.

AO will illuminate the environment and make so cavities are darker but also the parts most exposed to the environment lighter. Think about it as if the environment light was stronger than your lamp light.

As Second Life shading works differently from Blender shading, I suggest that you mix your textures (shadow, AO and diffuse) in an image editor tool (like Gimp or equivalent) and import the combined result directly to SL as a diffuse texture.


How do I bring back the orbit gizmo in the top right of the viewport?

The Navigate gizmo can be enabled in the overlay menu.
And all gizmos can be (accidentally) disabled through Ctrl + `


It appears that every vertex of the curve has a double that isn't connected. Go into edit mode on the curve, select one of the connected vertices(not the handle) and press Ctrl+L to select the linked ones, then Ctrl+I to invert the selection to get the disconnected vertices, and then delete them.

For some reason the array modifier still doesn't work with the fit curve option, but the simple alternative is to add an array modifier with fixed count and then a curve modifier below that.

You may also want to make the rna mesh object contain only a small number of nucleotides so that you can make the rna fit the length of the curve better.


Export from Blender to Maya preserving Materials and Crease

Unfortunately, FBX is the only serious option currently (maybe with Collada, but that format is not much supported/developed nowadays…).

FBX can support edge crease (LayerElementCrease node), just never had time/reasons to implement that in Blender. And I'd need a simple FBX file exported e.g. from Maya, with a dummy cube and various levels of crease on its edges, to be reasonably sure we do handle it correctly…

Besides that, afaik FBX does not support/have notion of groups of objects.

It should support reasonably simple rigging, but do not expect advanced stuff (like drivers, constraints, etc.) to survive, only basic bones skinned with basic vgroups.


How can I higlight an object so that it won`t affect other nearby objects?

If the object is metal, then its brightness doesn't depend on how much it's lit. It depends on how much the environment it's reflecting is lit.
You could place some white 'cards' or some such in the environment, strategically placed to be reflected by the metal. You could even use a Light Path node in their material to make them invisible to the camera.


Mist Pass differences between Render Layer and Viewer

Passing it through the viewer like that causes it to be treated an output color instead of a data pass, so Blender starts gamma correcting it. When you view a pass directly, it is not corrected and you just see the raw data. You can verify this by checking values in a particular region on the raw pass, and comparing them to linear values shown on the viewer (not the ones labeled "CM"). They'll be the same.


What I think it could have happened is that you have simply disabled the File Extensions checkbox, under the Output Section in the Render Settings. Just reenable it and from the next render, the images will have the right extension.

If you want to be able to see the images you render, insert the extension that you selected in the rendering in the file name. For example with the render settings in the photo, you would have to insert ".PNG" in the rendered image file names.


Have these values been set in the Render Properties tab?


My rig performance is so slow! Hide Geometry in a referenced rig?

this is something i experimented with a while ago:
i have a really high-poly character rig that posing any bone takes about 1 frame per second

so, i created 2 versions of the rig, 1 final render, and the other, low poly. same armature, same rig, but different meshes placed in separated collections

for this one, i duplicated the base meshes/ the ones that make the rig understandable, and decimate them with the decimate modifier to the bare minimum to understand what im animating and what the character is doing. i also found out that disabling collections give you a performance boost than just hiding stuff, you just gotta remember to re-enable them by the time youre rendering those.
and if youre really up for it, you can make drivers for all the modifiers you have on all meshes, so that when u disable the collection, you also disable the viewport visibility of modifiers for background objects, that with simplify its the luxury peak of performance, no frame dropping at all, annnnd! since its the same rig you dont have to transfer over the keyframes.
im using this trick on all my animatable character models ever since i started using it, the concept behind it was thanks to the Tangent Animation's Next Gen movie conference. where they used different rig versions to save on performance in heavy scenes.https://youtu.be/iZn3kCsw5D8?t=1436
soooo quick review!

high res version
low res version (both in their own collection)
drive viewport visibility of modifiers to turn them off when in background / not needed
simplify!
solid view
playback set to AV-Sync (this will force for animation to play at a consistant rate regardless of FPS, it can be a bit unstable on eevee)
last but not least, disable any unecesary things youre not using in the scene, you can also make a low res version of the environment youre animating the character in and do the same thing you do with characters. PERFORMANCE AHOY!

now.. i dont know much about proxy objects, but about anything inside a disabled collection pretty much doesnt exist so it should still apply.


Activate the builtin F2 add-on from Blender by searching "F2" in the user preferences.

After that convert the curve to a mesh (⎇ AltC).

Then make a face out of the beginning of the loop (F) and select the new edge.

Now press F repeatedly until it closes the loop.


You can do this by modifying a simple plane.

Add a plane: Shift A -> Mesh -> Plane
Go into edit mode: Tab
Go into vertices mode: Ctrl Tab -> 1
Select all vertices: A
Bevel vertices: Ctrl Shift B

This will create an ngon, ideally we would only like quads (faces with only four vertices)

If you want to fix this you can easily connect two vertices.

Select two opposing vertices and connect them by J
Repeat until all ngons are gone


How to bake a Bent Map (Object Space Normal) correctly with Cycles?

You have to fix the axis of the baking option in the swizzle line because Blender uses different axis in the 3D viewport than other software. So you must use +X +Z -Y.

Also don't forget to reset the orientation by doing an "Apply" with the shortcut Ctrl + a then Apply Rotation.


How do I make a curve in the shape of a simple wave form (sine)?

Animation Node can be used here, a simple sine wave spline can be generated as follows:

Animating an object along the wave can be done by evaluating it at some point as follows:

Where the divide controls the speed of the motion.

To align the rotation of the object, you can compute the angle that the tangent to the curve makes with the x axis, the tangent is equal to the derivative which is dy/dt(sin(t)) = cos(t) so the angle is equal to arctan(cos(t)), and the node tree becomes as follows:


Using Clear Seam unwrapped my entire mesh again instead of the face i selected

Solved!

Apparently this option appears in more than one place.  It turns out Live Unwrap was enabled in the options menu.  Turned it off and it started behaving like i wanted.  This option does look useful though.  Will have to remember it later if manually unwrapping uv's in the future.


Can i change the User an Action is associated with?

You link an action to an object not the other way around. You do this by selecting the object then choosing the action in the action editor.

While an action can be used by any number of objects, you can only have one action linked to an object at one time. To have an object use more than one action for an animation you use the NLA editor to mix the actions together.


How can I see two objects' keyframes at the same time on the dope sheet/action editor?

You can limit the displayed channels in Dopesheet to selected object, by selecting the little arrow icon:


Try F9 to get this window back, this can be done before another command


The texture Coordinate node has an output called 'Window'. That means a texture is mapped according to the four corners of your rendered image.

Just create a texture that has the same aspect ration as your picture and you are done.

Tvtropes puts it nicely: It's as if the clothing the character is wearing isn't so much patterned as it is a cloth-based wormhole to a similarly patterned universe (unmoving plaid).

And this is how it looks:


How do I smooth a low-poly mesh without shrinking its volume?

There is actually no need to subdivide mesh before you sculpt.  If you go into sculpt mode with your character selected, you can then select Dyntopo > Enable Dyntopo on the toolbar.

This will automatically subdivide you mesh as needed while you are sculpting.  You can change the Detail Size to a lower number for more detail.

Here is what Dyntopo with a detail size of 3px does to a cube that only had six faces before I started sculpting:

As you can see, with dyntopo enabled, Blender only subdivides the area that is being sculpted, instead of subdividing the whole mesh.


How to get nodes from one .blend file into another?

You could give a cube the material with a node setup, then open both blend files and copy/paste (CtrlC / CtrlV) the cube between documents.


Step-by-step execution of BGE mainloop for debugging?

A simple way to go would be enable the console and to add a Always actuator somewhere with pulse mode enabled, linked to a Python controller using the following "script" :

input("Next step ")

Then at each step the python script will be blocking the whole execution until you press enter for the input to return.


What are the advantage and disadvantages of Project From View unwrap method?

You might have a photo of an object in real life that you want to map onto a 3-D object.

So you align the 3-D object to be in the same angle/scale as in the photo and project from view it so that the photo gets a bit more depth than simply flat image being manipulated.

If you have a persons head photoed from different angles, you can stitch together the face using this method.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZDMFkj8GqA


At the top right corner, you have a topdown menu called "Symmetry/Lock". In that menu you should have three options called Radial X Y Z like on that picture

From what I can see on your screencap, you should have Radial X set to 5 like on the picture, try setting it back to 1 and you should be able to sculpt normally

Hope this helped


Should I use Triangles to Model a Triangle?

You should definitely not put an edge where you do not need one. We model in quads not just for the sake of it but for many reasons like, for example, loops that form while modelling this way and the ease to select and work with them. If there is no reason to have a quad, there is just no reason to have a quad. There is no need to be afraid of triangles or even n-gons. N-gons for example may even produce nicer bevels in some situations then a mesh with loads of unnecessary edges with sharp corners. They can also be a huge pain and a source of rendering errors in other situations same as triangles can be a nightmare if you need to adjust a complex model but in other situations there is just no point to be avoiding them. If you know which situation is which it's perfectly fine to act accordingly.


Problem: Armature deforms mesh opposite of bone positions

You needed to apply the scale. Select the affected meshes and Ctrl+A > Scale. Now tab into editmode and recalculate all the normals.

You now need to reparent the meshes to the armature


How can I determine the coordinations of the deepest point of a pit located on a 3D object?

Local minima

Calculus is full of finding maxima and minima of equations.  Numerical methods , generally iterative, can be employed to find turning points based from  Newton's Method or Gradient Descent to name a couple.

Turning points occur where the derivative (tangent) is zero.  Inconveniently the mesh isn't defined as an equation.  For every vertex there is a normal, that is perpendicular to the tangent.

Vertex selected in "ding" in icosphere test

As a simple test case, for each vertex:

Create an imaginary plane from coordinate and normal.
For all vertices of neighbouring faces if the distance to plane is greater than or equal to zero then it is "below" all neighbours and considered a local minimum
The test is looking at all neighbouring verts being above, for a really rough mesh this may need to be relaxed slightly.

Simple edit mode test script.

import bpy
import bmesh

from mathutils.geometry import distance_point_to_plane as dp2p
context = bpy.context
context.tool_settings.mesh_select_mode = (True, False, False)
ob = context.edit_object
me = ob.data
bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(me)
bm.select_flush(True)

for v in bm.verts:
    # define "vertex" plane
    p_no = v.normal
    p_co = v.co
    # neighbouring verts
    nvs = set(nv for f in v.link_faces for nv in f.verts)
    v.select = all(
            dp2p(nv.co,p_co,p_no) <= 0
            for nv in nvs)

bmesh.update_edit_mesh(me)

Result of reversal of test. dp2p(nv.co,p_co,p_no) <= 0 as a useful way to find concavities

Once a point is selected its local depth (depth from surface) could be calculated (estimated) by selecting out from point until distance from plane stops increasing, and choose the max.

As mentioned this is a very simple test. Once a vicinity is known a more robust method like raycasting could be employed.


I get an error with a object when I try to make it transparent

I'm not quite sure whats happening here, but i might know a work around. Instead of making it transparent you could just stop it from rendering. You do this by hovering over the render button and pressing I.

This will place a key frame (it should light up when one is placed). Now just click it while on the keyframe you placed and place another key frame where you want it to render.

Hope this helps


Telugu fonts are not recognized by Blender 2.8

It seems that your font file is missing the file extension. While Windows knows that it's a TrueType font, Blender simply filters files by their file extension. Since this particular file doesn't have one, it isn't displayed in the file browser. Add the .ttf file extension to the file name and it should work properly.

Alternatively you can temporarily disable the file extension filter in Blender and the file will be visible as well.

Blender 2.80:

Blender 2.81 and later:

There may be another reason why you don't find your font file in C:\Windows\Fonts.
There are two option for installing fonts, you can either Install it (only for your user) or Install for all users. In the latter case it installs the file as expected into C:\Windows\Fonts, however in the former case it will be placed into C:\Users\[your username]\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Fonts.

Image source: Announcing Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 17704

The Windows Explorer will list all fonts when looking at C:\Windows\Fonts, including those that were installed for your user only. Therefore it's necessary to check where the file is actually stored. The easiest way to find the path is by opening the file's properties. With the file selected, right-click on it to open the context menu and select Properties. The General tab contains the Location property, which is the path to the file.


Object constraints don't handle local space correctly when they don't have a parent.
But, that's a problem with an easy fix, because objects that are unparented exist in world space.  So for your unparented object, you can change the space in which the Limit Rotation acts from local space to world space.
You specifically ask how to limit in local space, although it's not clear what your end goal or actual problem is-- this looks like an idealized situation.  And it would be easy to imagine some misunderstanding of what limited local space rotation would look like.  If you want an explicit answer to how to limit rotation in local space, then make an empty at the world origin and parent your object to it.  Now, you can limit rotation in local space if you want.  It's just, that's exactly the same as limiting rotation in world space.


The closest I can get:

Make sure the particle object is a plane and has a good amount of subdivisions

Name it with a unique name, like 'stick'
Make a duplicate of Suzanne, remove the ParticleSystem from it (this is if you want to have the Subsurf modifier eventually on for Suzanne)
Apply the Subsurf modifier of the temporary particle-Suzanne, which leaves only the ParticleSystem to the modifier panel
(You may need to update the ParticleSystem by clicking the 'Seed' value to 1, for example)
Click the 'Convert' button in the ParticleSystem modifier

A whole lot of stick objects are created to the scene
Delete the particle-Suzanne
In Outliner, search for 'stick.'
Still in Outliner, select them all with A, then right-click one of them and click 'Select'
Press U to make them unique, select 'Object & Data'
Press Ctrl+J to join them as one
Add 'Shrinkwrap' and 'Solidify' modifiers to it

Maybe also 'Subsurf' modifier as well
There you have it

Hope this helps!


I want to texture paint but it says "Missing texture, detected!"

Blender Guru's video helps explain it. https://youtu.be/nht2RoYBUfA?t=212
I know 10 images may seem excessive, but I know a lot of new people may get lost and would need it.

First, create a new image or open an old one. (I will create a new one)

Create the image. (mine's name will be "Untitled")

You would get a black image.

But you still can't paint. That's because the image isn't connected to the texture of the model.

Go to "Shading" from the top bar.

Add a new image texture. (Add>Texture>Image Texture)

Connect the nodes. (Color-Base Color)

Press the Image button and choose the image you created or opened before. ("Untitled" in my case)

Selected.

Now you can paint!


What does “Use the pinned node tree” do?

The pinned node tree feature enables you to stick a node tree (pin it) to one instance of the node editor, so that you can open another node editor displaying another node tree.

This feature is really useful when you need to simultaneously compare and edit Node Trees belonging to different data blocks (materials for instance).

Reference: http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/2.67/Node_Editor