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How to Import 3ds max file into Blender?
I received the scene from a friend but cant seem to make it work properly in 3ds max
and when exporting as fbx into Blender it seems to lose all its materials and lights?

Importing files from other software is complicated. Actually you should see lights, cameras and basic material information, somtimes even textures. But this options have to be set in the 3DS Max FBX exporter. Maybe this is the reason.
Another reason can be: not all objects types are supported by FBX.
Hard to say what is the actual reason without knowing your content.

Heres the file
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BEVAa8uSq5OTLu8G5EzeELz8iB3hBL2w/view
Do you think you could try loading it and show a screenshot of what it would look like on your end?

Sorry, but I'm not able to read MAX files. See the answer by @JachymMichal . Maybe it helps. Ask your friend using other FBX settings or file types, like OBJ, DAE or GLTF.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/14808/how-to-import-a-max-model-into-blender


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Prevent mesh from going below the grid?
Hey all is there a way to prevent meshes from moving in the z axis below the grid?
I want to have a solid floor to work on Quickly without always needing to check the transform to 0 on Z

Hello :). You can simply lock the Z position in the transform panel (click the little lock icon)

You could create a plane on Z = 0 (an empty will do, too, but you might want to hide what's below), then apply a Mirror modifier along Z around that plane, with Clipping enabled:

This will effectively clamp vertex positions:

If you leave a vertex at the plane, it will stick to it, and you will have to temporarily disable Clipping to be able to move it away:

If it's just a flat floor, you can simply lock the Z location in the Transform panel.
No matter how you'll move it, it'll stay at the same Z coordinates.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

sort: votes


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Quick way to import a 6f mesh to use as scale throughout a scene?
Is there a Quick way to import a 6f mesh to use as scale throughout a scene?
Its hard to tell what the scale is when theres not measurements around
and the option to see mesurement in Edit mode is just so limiting,
I just want to know that my mesh is 6ft
or how to make it 6ft so I get a rough idea at a glance

I would also like to know how I could scale a model to 6ft, that could work eQually as well

Please edit your A instead of adding a comment. Thank you

Select model, press N key to see properties side panel, Item tab, and check Dimension values. Also check Scene properties, there you can set units.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


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HDR images are very toned down in blender?
Do you know why imported HDR images get their HIghlights and midtones flattened down so much?
Heres what I mean
https://ibb.co/D14F8zS

I mean in the world settings tab you could increase the strength to make it brighter

You should connect your Environment Texture through a Background Node (Add > Shader > Background) before connecting to the World Output.

The previews on HDRI Haven are tone-mapped. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Prasoon-Ambalathankandy/publication/339786805/figure/fig2/AS:867020207816705@1583725134968/Deformation-of-tone-mapping-space-a-Global-Tone-Mapping-b-Global-and-Local-Tone.png

Instead of having users go through links and external sites please use the builtin tools to embed images in your post. See How to upload an image to a post?

I dont see an insert iamge button like it says in the linked post you gave, could you explain how to do it?

The hdris are not like regular image textures, they must be fed through Environment texture rather than Image texture into background node like in the image above.
The difference between Image texture and Environment Texture is:
Image Texture: They apply on geometry.
Environment Texture: It's self explanatory. They apply and affect the scene's world.

I did use Environment texture following this tutorial
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6VBkj_I-ONk&ab_channel=CGMatter
And I did open the file in PS to check that it is in fact duller than HDRI haven preview, so I corrected it in PS
But even so, there this weird tint or something applied to the image when in Blender, whats going on here?
I also tried inputting the same nodes you did but it didnt change anything

I tried implementing a method to add image to forum but it didnt work and ende dup being that mess you see up
Heres the basic link to the image
https://ibb.co/MnpGWLn

Another reason could be the tweaking you did in the PS. HDRI images comes with different level of information like in uncompressed .exr extensions. If it's converted to jpg or png it will lose those information because of compression. It could also be that bit depth of the image was affetcnd which might have dull out the tone.
Try downloading the same image from HDRI haven and with out tweaking try the node setup. Also check the color management in the render settings. Make sure it set to filmic and the contrast level is normal.


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How to make the pop-up box in the bottom left of the 3D viewport appear immediately when activating a Transform tool?
So many times I want to use the options in the bot left panel (Operator panel) when using a transform tool
but it doesnt pop up unless I use the tool even tho i have it selected....
This is a problem because I want for example for Inset tool to check Individual faces
but I cant unless I go and do it first....
Also cant use the transform and then Ctrl Z because the moment I undo it also goes away
This is just one of many examples, but how can I get the box to pop up when I enter the tool rather than just when i use it?

You cannot. The box is called the Operator Adjustment panel, aka the tweak-that-operation panel.
The fact that you want to do this makes me think you need to know that the tools themselves can be accessed without the gizmos, and will act on all selected faces generally.
Edit: gizmos are pretty much anything that shows in the 3D view that is not an object, particularly as a control.


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Is there a way to view from the lights perspective like in Daz?
Is there a way to view from the lights perspective like in Daz?
I would like to be able to then lock view to camera so I can control the light that way

I'm not sure how that works in DAZ, you need to explain a bit more and show some screenshots. But to use an object as camera, you need to selec the object and press Ctrl + Numbpad 0. example

"YES"....https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYEPTZEOWp0 (Blender Secrets - Camera and Light Tip)...#b3d #blender #secrets

You can:

Select the light, press Ctrl0, and in the N panel > View > View Lock > enable Camera to View:

You can also select the light in the Properties panel > Scene > Camera:

Is there anyway to make it so that the perspective isnt so warped?
When I do this it becomes like a very low foca length type of look as opposed to the default 50mm look
and the camera in the scene is 50mm so i dont think thats the reason

I can't find any way to play with the focal length, except with the Spot, if you play with its Size value

dang, is this the only method to do such a thing then?

well it's not very common to use a light as camera, do you need it to correctly place your lights?


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Can camera show perspective VP lines?
Hey all is it possible to have blender not only show the grid
but the persp lines of the VP in the camera view
like this
https://i2.wp.com/www.thedrawingwebsite.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Two-Point-perspective-grid.jpg

Does this answer your question? How to make a two-point perspective render?

check this https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/5183/how-to-make-a-two-point-perspective-render

No thats not what i mean, I want to see the guidelines like in the photo i posted

Any ideas guys?


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How can I speed up my file?
so Ive imported alot of assets into my file to place it around the scene and noticed that my scene is becoming slow.
This should be obvious but are there any ways to speed up the file?
For example joining things Ive done
But even so theres so many assets, and once I join a row of trees I cant move them individually anymore so i try not to join EVERYTHING
Just stuff like if the tree is split into 3 parts Ill join it

Hello :). Collection Instances are meant for this. Instead of importing assets directly, link them as collection instances from their original files. This will keep your scene performance in check.

For example what are these lines?
I imported an asset and it has a ton of these and a ton of groups so I cant even figure out what it is
https://ibb.co/6BfMj4t

Thanks Jachym...but is it too late for me to do that now?
I would have to redo all my work of placement, rotation, scaling, etc right?

Hey :). 1. These are relationship lines - all of the objects are parented to an object so they move together.

You can easily copy the location/rotation to the new Collection Instances. (RMB > Copy rotation to selected) :)

I guess you need to use several strategies like lighten your assets (make them as low-poly as possible), use linked-duplications, etc...

Hey Jachym does this parenting slow down a scene? If so how can I find and remove it?

Well thats what I mean, if I already dupicated and moved 30 assets, then i would need to manually copy paste the xyz location, rotation and scale of each asset individually right?

@moonboots, is linked duplications basically a linked original asset and then you duplicate that asset = linked = duplication?

@JachymMichal, yeah I think its parented because when i select it, it selects my duplicated assets that Ive moved around,
Why is it gray?
And if I delete it, it deletes the assets too…even tho the duplicated meshes are seperate objects…
https://ibb.co/dP8XQ7j

you link-duplicate an object with Alt D, the objects will share the exact same mesh, if you change the mesh of the original it will also change the mesh of the copy and vice-versa, while simple duplicate (Shift D) will duplicate the mesh but it is a new mesh that is not linked, any change won't be replicated. In my opinion linked-duplications and low-poly objects are the first things you need to think about if you want to keep your scene as light as possible. To keep an object low-poly, think about normal maps for example.

@moonboots thank you very much kind sir, in the future i will def work like this


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Why is Blender not saving my render after I already set the output location?
Why is Blender not saving my render after I already set the output location
This seems to be themost common problem I see in all the forums Ive read so far, yet after doing it, its still not saving anything?
I do Render>Render image and see the render in blender but its not in the folder I specified

Because path is for animation. If you want to save still image render you can enable addon Auto Save Render that save it automatically or you can set animation as one frame or you can enable Compositor and add "File Output" node or you have to go to Image editor and save render manually. BTW if you visited so many forum no answer on the way?

Is that the official name? Cant seem to find this add on

And yes I tried the animation but that only renders the current view layer, I have multiple view layers and that doesnt work

I edited linked answer addon is in Experimental (daily) builds. For official release you have to download from here https://developer.blender.org/F9922136 and install

@jin098 Multiple view layers? You didn’t mention that in the question. That’s a separate issue altogether.


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Group visibility doesnt toggle inside visibility?
how come turnign off visibility on a group doesnt turn off visbility for the things inside it?
This happens often and is really annoying

it does, but maybe your object is part of several collections?

Perhaps they consider it useless,as collection icon already does it.


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Is there anyway to keep bounce lights of scene when rendering in separate view layers?
Is there anyway to keep bounce lights of scene when rendering in separate view layers?
As such I have a ceiling, 2 walls, and assets within
The assets within are affected by the bouncing of light on the walls, but in PS I want option to be able to toggle the walls, assets, etc
But in seperating them into their own view layers for render, the bounce light is no longer calculated because well, it renders them as if they are in their own void

You may have to do one full render to bake the lighting to the surfaces and then you could separate into view layers for individual renders.  You may also look into using cryptomatte in blender's compositor

How can I bake the lighting to the surfaces for use in cycles?
So far I only know of doing that with eevee

You can put objects in separate collections and use the Indirect Only option in the outliner.

This setting will make the collection only influence the view layer through indirect light bounces.


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6.6.23_Add on & Pose Mode arent showing up in viewport?
ive used 3 red boxes to show what im talking about in the attached image.
https://i.ibb.co/0yYhVxq/2023-06-06-14h15-59.jpg
I downloaded and enable auto rig pro, but it isnt showing up in the "n" hotkey tool bar any ideas?
Also when clicking on an object> I cant find Pose mode anymore whats going on?

Hello and welcome. Instead of having users go through links and external sites please use the builtin tools to embed images in your post. See How to upload an image to a post? or GIF

That's a pretty old Blender version that you're using (3.1.2). Are you sure that the addon version is compatible with that Blender version?

For your second question, Why would you expect to see Pose mode when you just have default cube in your scene?

@JohnEason
hey i noticed it was for 2.9.3 haha, thanks for that
Edit) After trying it in 2.9.3 its still not showing up on the toolbar.. yeah im stumped

You'll need to ask that question on the addon's web site in that case. This Q&A site only helps with problems using Blender and its built-in addons. Questions about third-party addons are off-topic here.


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a way to rotate a spotlight around a specific point?
Hey everyone is there a way to rotate a spotlight around a specific point/axis?
i want to see the model being light from different angles and easily rotate the spotlight around the model without moving the model itself. Is this possible?

you can parent a light to an empty and rotate the empty, if the empty is at the same location as the model the light will turn around

... or give the light a Track To constraint on the target

is it possible for you guys to show me how this is done? maybe a screenshot or something visual?

Start with your model and a Spotlight looking at it.
Add an "Empty: Plain Axes" to the center of the scene (this will be your light pivot). I renamed it to LightPivot to help remember in the outliner

Select the Light then the Empty (pivot), and press Ctrl + P (parent) and select object.

Keyframe the rotation of the Empty at the first frame by selecting it and pressing I and selecting Rotation.

Keyframe the rotation at your desired end frame (I picked 360 degree rotation at frame 250).

Looks like this:

dam chris, thanks so much ill get to this as soon as i can, youre so cool man!


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Quickly selecting all edges from a cut out face from knife tool?
is there a way to quickly select all the verticles after cutting it out with kniife tool? instead of 1 vertex at a time selection

I don't understand the question. When you hit enter to accept the cut, all of the vertices made during the cut are already selected.  Do you you mean you want to select that set of vertices again later?

yeah this is what I mean, because if i move the selection and then later find i want to move it again, how can i do the selection quickly?

immediately after you make the knife cut, go to your object's Data Properties (the tab with the triangle) click the + under Vertex Groups and then click assign.  You'll get a new vertex group with the selected vertices in it.  Change the name so you'll remember it.  Later, in edit mode you can click that group and then the Select button to select that set of vertices.


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Turn knife cut into a lasso knife cut?
is there a way to to turn knife cut into a lasso knife cut?
So far its just point clicks but ive seen ppl do a lasso version before, just without explaining how they do it

Do you have an example video or image? so someone can help you

this reddit thread indicates that the lasso-like knife cut was removed from blender some time before 2.75

i think this is it https://www.reddit.com/r/blender/comments/4nmuig/how_to_do_this_lasso_knife_cut/
Yeah seems to be the same thing marty linked to, i guess they removed it then? why would they do that -_-


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Can you make emissive planes have sharper shadows?
Can you make emissive planes have sharper shadows?
I know that its known for making soft lights but Im just wondering if theres a way to control how sharp its shadow is
So far, bringing it closer to the object or increasing intensity = replicate IRL lights,
Isnt doing the trick

The sharpness of your shadows is going to depend on the size of your light source and distance from the object.  Changing either of these may require a change to the strength of the light.
Given this you might think a sun lamp would give you the sharpest shadows, since it is infinitely far away, but it appears the sun lamp tries to do some atmospheric scattering OR it is not of size 0.

A point light will give you the sharpest shadow since it is emitting light from a single point in the scene.

Area lights can be dialed in by scaling them, but again you'll probably want to adjust the lighting strength afterward.

The same is true for emissive planes, but emission scatters light in all directions.  Area lights are directional, and can be adjusted further with the new Spread setting.


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Move around a selection of edges without horizontal or vertical movement?
is there a way to move around a selection of vertices on the planes surface without moving it up or down?
I just want to quickly slide it around the plane
For example after cutting out a square in a plane i want to quickly select the edges of that square to move it around without up or down movement just snapped on the same level of the plane, esp when i just use G to move

Pressing G to move, then Shift+Z will allow you to move your selection on all axes _except for) the Z (moves on X and Y only).

@ChristopherBennett approach only works if the plane is perpendicular to an axis. If you want to move it on a plane that has been tilted you need to hit shif+Z twice before moving.


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How to get bounce light to work in Eevee already ahve SSGI on
Anyone know how to get bounce lighting in Eevee to work properly?
I set a basic plane next to a model and in Eevee with SSG turned on theres no bounce
And to confirm it was bouncing I went in cycles and it worked
https://ibb.co/t3GnkRz

Hello and welcome. Instead of having users go through links and external sites please use the builtin tools to embed images in your post. See How to upload an image to a post? or GIFs

Have you tried Irradiance volume and Bake Indirect Light method? Perhaps this tutorial will help https://youtu.be/9SD0of-mOHo

@sirrus
Wasnt SSGI supposed to take care of this being the next big thing?

SSGI, I assume you mean addon? If so, Yes, it could take care of it, I believe this is great addon. Since its not offical Blender's builds, What would you do when developer decide to stop support this addon? What would you do if this addon encounters bugs when upgrade into new Blender version? Its always best to learn vanilla.


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Where is Blender 3.01 SSGI?
I want to get SSGI to work in Eevee Blender 3.01 but I dont see the option
only Screen Space Reflections?
It was to my understanding that Screen Space Raytracing/ SSGI addon was coming built in
in Blender 3.0?
(Dont have 3.1 installed because certain models arent working properly in it)

Blender 3.0+ doesn't yet have SSGI. It was not implemented, though it was announced.


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How can i apply two different curve guides to two different emitters?
First of all, I'm an absolute rookie as it comes to Blender but I'm trying to make a simple project for my dad's company. It's didn't seem hard at first but I've been stuck for ages now so here I am.
I want to have a stream of blue and red balls which eventually seperate in a specific area (blue goes right, red goes left). I think i need to use two emitters as the particles need to split up halfway. But when i apply two curve guides nothing seems to happen (maybe they cancel eachother out) or just some glitch effect eventually appears on my screen. I've tried parenting the curved guides to their specific emitter but this doesn't seem to work as well.
Anyone knows how to solve this? Thanks in advance!


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moving 3D object using csv file
I am new to blender and I'm trying to move the cube using XYZ csv file. How can I merge the file with the object and make it moving using that file. Can someone help me. Thank you

What exactly is in the CSV files? Is this a set of points for animation?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/87374/keyframed-animation-from-csv-using-animation-nodes might also be useful to you


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Black and grey clouds in Texture Paint
I am trying to use the Texture Paint feature in Blender, but for some reason, the Clouds texture has black too, I'm following blender guru's tutorial, but cant get only white clouds. How do I fix this?

yes it doesn't work as it should, maybe pack your image and share your file? https://pasteall.org/blend/

oh ok, I have never used that before so should I just paste it? https://pasteall.org/blend/a0880b13903e463eb51545f4eab367f1

could you please pack the images before sharing? (File > External Data > Pack All Into .blend)

in the file you shared the Texture was enabled, not the Texture Mask, it looks like what you want is Texture Mask, maybe you confused the 2, it would explain your problem, even though in your screenshot you've enable Texture Mask, so what did you use?

i used texture mask. i just tried texture to see what will happen

please share pack the image and share the file at the exact same step as the one you are before painting

hey I changed some stuff and now it's working properly. i used my backup donut. it was working fine then. thanks though.

Ok maybe it was what i was talking about? Anyway...   ;)

On your brush settings click on the Blend options, its probably on Mix, set it to Overlay and that should fix it.


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Why am I getting this weird clipping/incorrect vertices on my model?
I checked the model for extra vertices but it appears there are none. For some reason when I try to add the solidify modifier (to add a character outline) it gets all funny and makes it like this. It pretends like the vertices on the cheek line are absolutely set in stone, since I had the same issue when trying to do a subdivision surface modifier. It treated it as a hard line and made the subdivision look funny.

Solidify modifier extends the faces in the direction of their normal. If two adjacent faces have inverted normals, this can cause artifacts. In edit mode select everything then mesh >  Recalculate (SHIFT N)

@Gorgious Thank you, this worked for the most part for fixing the weird artifacts.


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Applying texture to a specific colour
I just started using Blender.
I have a png file used as texture, and I would like to apply a glossy finish only to one colour of the image. Is there any way I can do it?
Thank you in advance!

you need to create a b&w mask and use it as a factor in the Glossy socket (or as a factor in a Mix Shader between the Diffuse and the Glossy)

I think this shader setup should work. Color2 on the Difference node is the color you want to be glossy.


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Shift+Select a edges of a mesh after applying array modifier
here's my problem, I made a curve from a mesh outline, this mesh was itself created from the array modifier.
When using the array modifier, the command for shift+select only selects the piece of the original mesh used in the array.
Ex:

So my question is, is there any way for blender to recalculate what is a selectable line, even if I have to do it by juntion, this could sabe a lot of time in the future.
My objective here would be to convert this edge into a new curve, and so create a rail from an array.

If you hadn't enabled the Merge option in the Array Modifier, although they are in a single object, each duplicate of the mesh created by the array will be separate. To be able to select the entire line of edges, they need to be a single mesh. To join them, select all with A > press M to merge > click on By Distance. This will merge all the duplicate vertices together, giving you one single, continuous mesh. You can also specify a distance threshold.

Many thanks, this is exactly what I needed


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Would 1 million faces/vertices be too much for Blender?
I am working on an interior design which might end up with having 1 millions faces. I already have about 40k faces/vertices so far. While loading Blender in solid mode only takes seconds, it takes about 70s to render the whole scene in Material preview mode, which greatly slow down the efficiency of doing texturing. My strategy is doing the modeling and texturing for each single object in a separate blender project and append it once the object is complete but manipulating the whole scene is still inevitable, plus that I've only done about 1/20 of the whole work, I am just worried that the performance won't be acceptable then. The machine I am using is Microsoft Surface Book 2, below is the specs:
Intel Core i7-8650U CPU 1.90GHz
CPU cores: 4
16GB RAM
Intel® HD Graphics 620 integrated GPU (on Intel® i5-8350U model)
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 discrete GPU w/6GB GDDR5 graphics memory
I am wondering if I need to get a better machine considering the fact that I might have 1 million faces/vertices in the end. Do you have any recommendation for the machine based on this requirement (or a better strategy)?

you should really think a bit about your scene and whether you really need that much faces. e.g. things in the background don't need a lot of subdivision (which results in less faces). Every machine will slow down if you just increase subdivision because you think you need them although in the most case you won't need it at all. It is a typical beginners mistake to think the higher the subdivisions the better - which isn't.

1 000 000 faces shouldn't be a problem.
High facecount by itself won't slow down renders very much, this isn't the 90s.
Viewport is slowed down by high memory - face count, high-res textures and complex shaders
Render is slowed down by high light-bounces, HDRIs, and complex shaders (glass, SSS)
To keep memory low (and viewport fast):

link objects, don't append them when building a scene
use lower Subdivision levels for Viewport
use Simplify in Rendertab to lower texture resolution for viewport


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Texturing issue with extruded parts
I am making a mug where I generated the handle with extrusion (ctrl + E). While everything looks fine in solid display, the handle looks weird in Material preview display once I apply the texture. Please see below screenshot. The edges between each faces are so obvious and the faces are just alternating with very similar colors, which is so artificial.

I attached all the .blend and texture files: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Gn7SL3unDlbgAjpGWleE2wZ9O6pNGUXu?usp=sharing
Not sure if the modeling is wrong in the first place or I need to do a different UV mapping, or anything else? Any help would be appreciated!

weird, it looks like it has to do with the unwrap and the normal map? maybe first try to unwrap this part again

Looking at your blend file I see you have a lot of duplicated geometry, Merge by Distance removes 2240 verts.  You also have a lot of faces with the Normals facing the wrong way -- in Edit mode click the Show Overlays drop-down and check the Face Orientation box to see them easily, then select some of the red faces and Mesh > Normals > Flip, continue until all outside faces show blue.

After that you probably do want to check your UV map, the islands are not well-positioned over the image.

Thanks! I didn't realized that there are lots of duplicated faces. Good to know that! It looks the issue on the handle is because I removed the inner surface (surface facing the mug) to make it hollow. As a result, the texture looks strange.


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Lights not casting shadows/UV mapped images dark
I am trying to simulate a small setting in a casino in Blender. I have a cube that has a green felt texture mapped to it (it's my table) and I have some playing cards on top of it (they are also textured with an image).
A couple of problems that I think are likely related:
So far I have been setting the textured surface on all the objects as Background Why? Because they show up nice and bright. If I use the default surface mode, I think Diffuse BSDF or Principled, the textures show up very dark.
I started playing around with some objects here because I’d like a realistic-looking scene with lighting directly overhead and my table or cards with textures aren’t getting lighter/darker nor casting any shadows.
I see people talk about a cast shadow or shadow option. I don’t see it. I see something called, contact shadows. I have a feeling that’s not it.
Stumbling around some forums I saw someone posted about “World lighting?” So I clicked on the down arrow under options for Viewport Shading. I unchecked Scene Lights and Scene World - doesn’t seem to help.
What else can I be checking for to figure out why…

Shadows aren’t showing
Texture mapped images aren’t getting lighter or darker depending on the light location
Why initially are the texture-mapped images are always dark unless in background mode.

Thanks.

It sounds like you need more/better lighting in your scene. Without light sources in the scene, the only lighting is the very dark world background which doesn't emit much light so everything looks very dark.
Additionally, shadows are very weak as what little light there is is coming evenly from all directions. Background shaders actually emit light (as you want the background to do, it simulates light coming from things outside your scene) which is why that makes the objects brighter, but I am guessing you don't really want all the objects in your scene to be emitting lights.
Try adding lamps (or emission materials on appropriate objects) in logical places in your scene.  If you could include some screenshots of your setup then we would be able to help your case more specifically.


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Help with placing an image on 3D text
I've been trying to add an image to some 3D Text for a while now but unfortunately, it always comes out lopsided and uneven. UV Editing doesn't seem to work with text even after it's converted into a mesh. YouTube videos aren't helping either.
Here is the image I'm trying to put on the text

Here is the 3D text (selected), notice the lopsided image reflections
Thank you

Hello :). UV maps absolutely do work with text converted to mesh. You just need to properly unwrap. Perhaps UV > Project from view in this case.

Have you UV unwrapped the mesh?

Convert the text to a mesh. It's going to have a lot of tris.
Select all in edit mode and clck on 'Mesh' at the header of the 3D viewport and click on ''Clean Up'.
Select 'Limited Dissolve' which will drastically reduce the number of tris appearing while retaining form of the text mesh.
You can further increase the value of the limited Dissolve' from it's adjustment pop up bar that appears at the bottom left immediately you click on it hence reducing the mesh's noisy face Tris but do this slighty as giving an high value input will make the mesh to loose form.
At this point you should be able to use the 'Smart UV Project' which will project something quite relatable then go ahead texturing. Should work out fine now.


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Complications With Shading
I am trying to create face and hair textures. While I was messing with the shader nodes I realized that I have no idea what I am doing and am in need of your assistance. What I am trying to do is have the face not cut into itself (yes I turned down the clipping as far as it could go) and successfully create hair textures. Here is the problem:
Here are the hair nodes:

And here are the face nodes:

This is not a clipping issue

This is not a clipping issue. Clipping error would make it look like you had sliced off the front or back of the mesh in a plane perfectly parallel with the screen, not making things look like they were in front of other things.
The node setup is incorrect:

The texture coordinates for that hair thing should NEVER be reflection. Disconnect that, and leave it (it will default to the UV map, which is what you want). Reflection texture coronets make it look as if the mesh is reflecting whatever the texture is.
Emission has nothing to do with things being shaped differently, which is why I think you connected to it. Emission is for things that glow.
You have an extra copy of the Head’s diffuse color texture, which can be deleted.

It also looks as if you may be using alpha blend for your material alpha settings. Use alpha hashed instead, as alpha blend can have sorting issues which would make things appear in front of other things arbitrarily.


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Complications with rendering and compositing nodes
I'm trying to create a bloom in the Cycles render engine,  I believe I have successfully created it but unfortunately, I'm having some trouble rendering the new nodes:

Here are the nodes (notice the lack of the HDR)
Here is the rendered image (notice the lack of bloom)
Thank you

Maybe in the Properties panel > Output > Post Processing, you have disabled Compositing?

Doesn't seem to be the problem, I have it checked

please provide your blend file

you have added some nodes just for the viewer, but not for the composite node (which is responsible for render output)

Yes I've just realized  ;)

i was quicker than moonboots...OMG...i will celebrate the whole week!!! :D

"I was quicker than moonboots" Bless you, probably won't happen again for like... ever :D

@Chris aargh you got me this time you got me, but don't celebrate too much

It's cool, but the HDR doesn't appear in the final render. Why is that?

don't know - can u provide your blend file, so i can check it out?


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HDRI Not Appearing In Final Render
I am having issues with the final render and HDRIs. Whenever I render in the Cycles Engine, my HDRI disappears and replaces itself with the default background.
Here is the image (note the lack of an HDRI)

Hello. please add more inffo about your node settiings, also some screenshots about that could help.

i would recommend download and install Easy HDRI add-on (no, unfortunately i don't get money from them for this advertising), but with just a few clicks you will get HDRI in your scene (and you can choose which one) and it works, in render too

If the given answer doesn't resolve your problem, screenshots of your nodes as Emir suggests might be helpful, like world node settings and the compositor nodes. Usually I just plug an HDRI into an Environment Texture in the World material and then it's there... no need for add-ons or complex node setups. So screenshots or the file would be good to investigate further...

you can use this setup (which is essentially just a copy of what Easy HDRI just does for you automatically):

the good news: you made the node setup right.
the bad news: you have to change some parameters so that you can really see your background through your camera.
So first change to camera view and then zoom out. If you are zooming out far enough you will see the background image.
If you then "play" with the values (yours can differ) you can "push" your background image to the right place behind your camera.
my settings to "see" it were:

result: (after i changed your composite nodes to this:)

UPDATE ----
you can do it like this:
BUT...the more you glare (with fac) the less you will see the background.

I don't get what the last Mix Shader node is supposed to do. I've used mixing backgrounds by camera ray before, too - but the Is Camera Ray goes into a Multiply with 0. This means, if it's not a camera ray, you'll get 0 * 0 = 0, the top background shader. If it is a camera ray, you'll get 1 * 0 = 0, the top shader again. The Mix Shader and/or the bottom Background Shader are useless. Or do I miss something?

i have no idea :D i just copied the setup which Easy HDRI gave me...and it worked for me. I never tried to understand it ;) i am sorry....

i just can guess...why it is that way. If you change manually some settings in the Add-on, maybe the addon then just changes the value in the multiplier... just a guess

I'm not familiar with the add-on, so this might well be the case. But since you give him this setup without using the add-on, it might not be obvious for everybody which node creates which result - so he might still be stuck with a problem.

i don't hope so, but if he is stuck, hopefully he will write it and i will try to help him.

I'm just thinking of people who might come here much later to find a solution.

I wrote it out myself because I'm totally unfamiliar with the plug-in. I got it right but unfortunately, the HDRI still isn't there. Why is that?

Ok, then please provide your blend file - I will check it

Actually, I have the file, but how do I upload it here?

Go to https://blend-exchange.com and follow instructions

https://blend-exchange.com/b/Q2y7JGvD

i updated my answer

I mean, it looks nice, but I'm missing that glow/glare that should emit from the neon. I'm using Cycles render btw

In Cycles there is no glow around light emitting materials, neither in 3D Viewport nor Render, that's just Eevee. In Cycles you have to composite it in afterwards.

@Micah: i updated my answer

Thank you, I completely understand. I made your answer the correct answer.

thank you! you are welcome


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Problems With Hair Particles
So I'm working with my model and I decided it should probably have some hair on the side. So I do the whole weight paint thing and added hair in that area, so then I created the hair and combed it down shown here:

Alright, so that's ok. But when I go to Object Mode:

I don't want to have to redo the whole thing but if it must happen it must, any suggestions?

Does it also look that messed up without children?

Yes, it has children and it looks like that.

@MicahVera I think you didn't understand Blunder's question right...please read again

Sorry, when I remove Children it calms down but the hair doesn't appear in the correct areas. It protrudes in any area it wants to around the model.

Looks like particle settings are ok and there is something wrong with the mesh geometry then. Are there modifiers on the emitter object/head? Subdivision, armature?

I did some subdivisions. Yes

Well, I discovered that the reason why the hair looked significantly different than the particle editor was that when I went to solid view I was later in the timeline and I had Hair Dynamics enabled. Therefore the hair went all over the place. Just make sure your timeline is at 0 or 1 when you work with this stuff, OK?


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Make specific color an emission
I am trying to make the blue color on my model an emission so that it creates light and looks like it was just fired.
Here is the model:

Here is the node setup:

This seems rather easy from the node setup, though I’m not sure how the node setup given produces that result. But anyway…

On the first color ramp (with the blue in it), change the alpha for the non-blue stops to zero. Then, pipe the output color into Emission Color, and the output alpha into Emission Strength.
Edit: Like this.

Well, that's cool and all...but I want there to still be white and black too. Unless I'm still not getting it right?

If you’re node set up is the material that is hooked to that brick and there’s not some really strange thing I don’t know about, what I did should leave white and black not glowing because alpha would be controlling the emission strength and turning it off when the part wasn’t blue.

Would you show me a picture of your node setup?

@MicahVera Ok, let me materialize it…

@MicahVera done. Sorry the pipes are so tight there, should’ve spread them out . Color and Alpha are respectively connected to Emission and Emission Strength.

@MicahVera The Alpha setting in the color has absolutely no effect when you plug it in the Base Color input, because it only uses RGB values, no matter how transparent you've set the color. So Zargul's setup works just fine. And you can multiply the Alpha value to get stronger emission, just like vklidu suggested in his answer (which is basically the same like this, only the Alpha is switched which makes an Invert node necessary).

@GordonBrinkmann Ha :) Right ... my fault. How could I skip such obvious thing?

@vklidu happens to me all the time when I'm trying to figure something out :D

Great! Guys! Thanks!


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Blender Opens With Only Gray Screen
So I'm using Blender, and then all of a sudden I zoom out and there's nothing but a gray screen. I've tried hitting the / . , keys but . and , only open up orientation menus and / will only zoom on one object (not the whole render)
Shown Here:

If you click “n” it will open the 3D view properties tab, you can adjust the “start” and “end” value. And if you change the end value to something big like “10^10”, you should be able to see everything and you might also need to select an active object and click “.” again.


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How To Apply New UV Edit to Model
So I'm UV Editing when suddenly I discovered that the edits I was making weren't applying to the model in the Layout tab. I was confused and went back to the UV Editing tab and discovered that the edits were being made there. Why is that? Do I have to apply somehow to the material?
Here is the image of the Layout tab

Here is the image of the UV Editing tab (what I want to appear in the Layout tab)

Yes you have to apply the texture. To do this in the Shader Editor add an Image Texture Node and a UV Map node. And then it will apply your mapped texture.
The set up looks like this.

I hope that helps, it took me a long time to get my head around UV mapping, and how everything interacts. Especially using multiple maps on an object and assigning vertex groups etc. I can elaborate further and edit my answer if you still don't understand. Good luck!

Thank you so much! I'm still trying to wrap my head around this and this will really help in the future!


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How to make a spiral staircase wrap around a cylinder that gets narrower as it gets higher
I have made a spiral staircase and I am trying to get it to wrap around a cylinder that gets narrower as it gets higher.

I've tried to use the shrinkwrap tool but I am getting some really weird results.
Does anybody know of a good method to acheive this?
Any help would be greatly appreciated!

A python script might be the most straightforward way to tackle this.

you could try a screw modifier

I might use a lattice deform to shrink the top of the stairs, though that may not provide exactly the results you’re looking for.

If you don't mind that the stairs lose a little width towards the top due to scaling, you can use the modifier Simple Deform for this.


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how to stop armature from deforming certain parts of mesh
I'm making a robot character where the model is just some blocks connected to what are supposed to be spring-like joints as the arms, and so I want to make it so that the block parts don't deform but are still affected by the armatures. how do I do this?

for objects like machines, robots, etc, instead of parenting With Automatic Weight, parent With Empty Groups, then switch your object to Edit mode, select each part and assign it to the group it is supposed to be part of (with the name of the bone that is supposed to control). Is it what you want?

yes, thank you!


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How to do you make the verticles to make the triangle curved?

Im quite new to blender and I am wondering on how to make these triangles look curved?

Select the vertices at the tip of the triangles (or the pits if you want) and press Ctrl + Shift + B (vertex bevel) and drag the mouse to change the size. Scroll the mouse wheel to increase/decrease the number of segments. Or you could add a subdivision surface modifier to round out the mesh, but this would likely require supporting geometry to give the mesh a proper shape.

Thanks! It worked as intended


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How do you create procedural bubbles on a surface?
I'm trying to achieve the answer in How to create procedurally generated surface bubbles on a liquid I'm unsure on how to do this in 2.9.

I think this should still work, though I might mention that actual displacement only works in Cycles when such is set to “Displacement only” or “Displacement and bump” and not “Bump only,” and what’s more it does not generate new geometry: The plane in question has to be deeply subdivided for this to work correctly.

On the other hand, geometry nodes might be a better way to do this whole idea fluently and with less unused vertices.

Oh I see, thanks for the help

The linked answer doesn't need much subdivision since it's working with microdisplacement... actually it works on a plane with only 4 vertices. However, I would really like to achieve that look but as others there are pointing out in the comments, a little more info would have been useful. With the node setup pictured there somehow translated to an updated version I get something that looks (kind of) the top image, but I don't know how to get to the bottom result from there. It's a pity the original respondent never answered that.

@Gordon The setup seems to still work. The Voronoi node changed a bit, you need to add a Multiply node to get the same output :)

Here's a setup for both large and tiny bubbles :-)

Create a plane or a subdivided circle
Enable Adaptive Subdivision to use microdisplacement
Set Material Displacement > Displacement (only works in Cycles)

"Minor tweaks", that's good... you're funny :D Multiplying the Voronoi textures with themselves, then subtracting one from the other, no power node, combining with Musgrave texture... that's almost a completely different setup ;) Or at least, from what is shown in the original setup which only needs to be "duplicated a couple of times" as stated there, I would have never come to your node setup. Thanks! I'll try that.

I now realize it's actually quite more complex :). Anyways, it works and that's the point.

That's really cool. The only thing I changed from this setup: some bubbles (especially visible on the larger ones) have quite sharp ridges or at least the shading isn't so smooth in some parts because of the Musgrave texture's Color Ramp. So I've set the white slider completely back to the right end. And if I want to increase the gaps between the bubbles I multiply the ramp output by a factor > 1. This makes the bubbles look smoother.

Good idea, that bothered me a bit too, thx :)


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How To Fix Pixelated Cycles 3D Viewport Editor
When I use Cycles in the Viewport editor, the model is super pixelated. When watching tutorials, other people don't have that. My computer is high end enough to be able to handle it. What other settings could  I be missing?

My Computer Specs:

GeForce GTX1070
Intel Core i7-3770K CPU @ 3.5GHz
16GB RAM

My Blender Settings:

Edit > Preferences > System > CUDA > GeForce GTX1070 CHECKED
Edit > Preferences > System > CUDA > Intel Core i7-3770K CPU @ 3.5GHz UNCHECKED
Edit > Preferences > System > Video Sequencer > Memory Cache Limit > 10,000
Edit > Preferences > System > Video Sequencer > Cache Limit > 3,000
Editor > Render Properties > Render Engine > Cycles
Editor > Render Properties > Feature Set > Supported
Editor > Render Properties > Device > GPU Compute
Editor > Render Properties > Sampling > Viewport > 8 (Samples)
Editor > Render Properties > Light Paths > Max Bounces > Total > 6

Just bump up the samples to 500+ and/or enable denoising.

To echo @brockmann (who commented), eight samples is very, very, very low. If your graphics card is working with cycles render, I would at least use 512 samples and work from there.
Edit: I was unable to find questions on what samples are, so I guess I’ll explain it myself. A “sample” is one shot of data for rendering, and more shots mean better looking renders, just like more signal flares with more wind conditions will give you a better idea of where the ship is. In Cycles, a sample is a single ray of light, traced backwards out of a camera, through a pixel, hitting what it may until it gets to a light source, thus defining what color that pixel of the image should be. An “importance map” is made just before the rest of the rendering which maps out where lights are in the scene, so the backwards-traced rays will be more likely to go towards them and not oblivion. The blender manual at docs.blender.org explains it better, but basically, a light ray will bounce in an arbitrary direction if it hits a rough surface, and a more predictable direction if it hits a smooth one. Few samples will then return a lot of fuzz on rough objects. “Caustics” is another place where fuzz can be created, where light being bounced around by mirrors or glass can have a hard time finding a light source from the “importance map.” Thus, there is a lot of fuzz in your cube as only eight rays work on each pixel: it’s like calling eight random people in a country to find out how popular a TV show is. One set of eight might indicate no popularity, while another is more correct, while still another indicates that everyone watches that TV show. Lots of samples means lots of rays, lots of tested directions light could be coming from, and lots more actual representation of what kind of light is hitting that spot. More samples also means more computing time, but if you’ve got time for how long your computer (or GPU) takes, go ahead and do it.
NVidia is the best, so you can probably do a lot of samples

Low quality answer IMHO. At least a simple explanation why this is relevant, what path tracing actually is or a few supplementary links to previous Q&A's are needed to make this a good answer.

@brockmann Well, I could do those things, but I am kind of hoping that he already knows some of that. If he does ask further comment-questions on those subjects, I will indeed answer them, but I don’t want to over answer the question if he’s got what he needed (wear myself out).

I don't know what those are. Please make it an amazing answer for future noobies :)

@wongz oh, okay.  gotta do some other stuff right now, but will explain, and BGL do better next time.

@wongz I hope that helps. You can also search for, “samples” or “denoising” or “caustics” or “raytracing” for more information. Check out the manual at docs.blender.org

@ZargulTheWizard Thanks! Appreciate it!


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How do you get second window in Texture Paint Mode
I'm using Blender 2.92 and whenever I go to Texture Paint mode, I'm only seeing the flat texture. How can I create a second window and see the model as well?
Apologies for the noob question, but no answers are online.

I figured it out.

Go to Texture Paint mode
Copy a new window by mousing over the top right of the window and then dragging left to create another window on the right
Change that window to show your model by click Editor Type in the very top left corner of the window and select 3D Viewport. Then to the right of that select Texture Paint


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Cant export correctly from blender to unity because of the mirror modyfier
I've been working on my own game in unity and I modelled some cars in blender. I tried to export it without applied modyfiers and unjoined objects and it worked just fine. But when I applied the mirror modyfier and joined the parts of every cars together, its not exported correctly to unity. Is there something I can do?

It's a little hard to tell what's going on in your screenshots and what you see as being incorrect.  Please crop your screenshots to show only the relevant parts and add a little explanation of what is wrong.

From the appearance of the backwards car in unity, I would say your normals are oriented backwards and thus only viewing faces from the inside causes them to appear. Recalculate the normals outside.

thanks. worked perfectly.


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How to make 2 objects of one?
I want to slice an object in Blender into two pieces, but I can not get it done. If I use the Mesh tool Bisect it doesn't slice it rightly where I want it slices how i don't want it. I want to slice all the object to get two pieces. Please give me some information how I can do it rightly or how I can use knife tool to slice it. I don't know how I can merge all the object to one object and then slice it.
Here is what I have now

and I what to slice it to get two objects something like this

So I can move half of the dog up and half of the dog down.
When I use Bisect it doesn't slice it correctly how I want.

Hi. Can you post a screenshot of the object that you are trying to split?

@satishgoda , I made edit with screenshoot of object ... Idk how to slice it correctly.

@cegaton .
If i am right if i place cube that will cut only cube not my dog object.. I need to cut my dog object not the new object of cube.. please help me , thank you :))

I still didnt got the right answer how i can do it to get to objects from one. I dont know how to use boolean..

You can slice the object in two by using the Boolean modifier.
Here's how to use it do to this:
Step 1-Add a cube and scale it down on the Y axis until it bisects your object in the middle where you want two objects.
Step 2-Add a Boolean modifier to the object you are splitting, and make sure that the operation is set to difference.
Step 3-Make the object that modifier affects to your cube. Now you should notice in wireframe view that the object looks like it has a small breakage on both sides of the cube.
Step 4-apply the boolean modifier and delete the cube.
There should be a break in the object that separates it into two parts.
Now, select the object and go into edit mode.
Press 'P' on your computer keyboard, and select the option "separate by loose parts".
Blender has now separated the object into two individual meshes, and that should solve your problem.

You can also just select the things that you want to be divided into 1 part and just separate them by parts/ by selected parts. Boolean can also be used, since it allows you to have a reference of what faces would be in either parts.

That's why I use boolean.

Yup. Does the work anyways.


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i cant solve camera motion

I can't solve camera motion after tracking my footage.
I don't know what happened, if I messed up with tracking.
I don't understand some data failed to reconstruct meaning.

It basically means the trackers aren’t staying on stationary points, or the camera set up is wrong. Blender basically ended up with inconsistent equations.

It also says "see console for details".   Use the menu: Window :: System Console, to display the console


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When is it necessary to have a continuous mesh over separate pieces?
Everywhere I look people say that animated models need to be one continuous mesh with quads. A lot of tutorials of people who are doing hard surface modeling via poly modeling vs sculpting often model there final object with several different pieces. Like if it was a helmet with rivets they'll model the rivets separate and just leave them on top. If you want to animated the helmet on a figures head do you have to join all of it into a solid mesh? if you do that do you re-topology it the same approach as a sculpt?
I ask in reference to a medieval great helm I'm modeling. it would be easier to model the rivets, and the cross (separate pieces that is riveted around the eyes and seams. I want to be able to 3d print it and but it on a character to be animated. Does the entire helmet need to be one solid mesh? I don't want to sculpt it.

Related: Is this good practice? Joining two objects after subdivision

if the parts are distinct in real life, like rivets and cross on your helmet, it makes more sense to use different meshes, even though you could all do in one unique mesh if you see it as a kind of challenge. It will perfectly works for animation. I'm not sure it will work find for 3D print though, I think it needs one unique mesh.

To be clear: First you say

Everywhere I look people say that animated models need to be one continuous mesh with quads.

Then you say

A lot of tutorials of people who are doing hard surface modeling via poly modeling vs sculpting often model there final object with several different pieces.

Simply understand that it's not necessarily a contradiction for people to be saying these two different things, because not all modeling projects have the same goal. I suspect that many of those you've been hearing are simply making assumptions about what other people are going to be doing with their models, and so maybe they are not entirely clear about their own goals when explaining their methods, so that others will understand what those methods are best suited to accomplish. Sometimes we take too much for granted.
Hard surface modeling can use various separated parts, just as you say--and even boolean them together without worry--because the end result will not need deformations. When you hear people say that models need to be one continuous mesh with quads, they are likely assuming the goal of organic modeling, such as for characters.
Once this is understood, the course becomes rather clear, and there's no need for concern. For a helmet, you could probably do whatever you wanted. The only real issue I can foresee might arise from the fact that you want this model for 3D printing. That is going to require you to take more care than might otherwise be necessary, but I can't say in exactly what way, as I am not an expert on modeling for printing purposes. It might be a good idea to research this topic specifically, since the cost of physical material is at stake.

This was a big issue for me too, since the beginning. Still I'm not sure but what I understood is that if you want to just render something you dont care to join,if you want to print a model as it is you want to join and have perfectly smooth face without using shade smooth from object mode.
If you want to make a mould of a model to be printed I think its ok not to be joined.
For games also need to be joined as much as possible,there you export/use fbx.for animation you need to join the body for example and then parent other objs like helmet, eyes, particles etc., but parts like body, needs attention. The mesh should be detailed, with many verts, because when you animate something like a movement, you use weight paint and uvs etc,if don't pay attention it will be just a disaster.

Games - joined for organic shapes. Non-joined for stuff like robot's arms. Try to join everything that is supposed to be one object and separate pieces that logically would be separated.
3D print - everything perfectly joined no intersections
Image/Animation, do what you want tbh. Intersect, don't intersect, your chair is clipping trough a wall? No problem!


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Scene Management Linked Copy can't make Local Objects Issue
I would like to use the Scene Management tool in Blender associated with the Powerful Video Sequence Editor in order to create a pre visualization Sequence.
The idea is simply to have data that will remain linked from one scene to another, like the set, ground, materials and most of the lighting. Then, having the option to make a few assets local to do different camera/characters/props movement or even change the intensity of specific lighting from one scene to another. This mixed with the Video Sequence Editor where we can call each scene separately to reorder them or create a great editorial would make it similar to the Unreal Sequencer.
It seems that all the options are there but the make local seems to not be working properly once a scene is linked? It seems to keep the link between scenes no matter what I try.

Right click make local
Ctrl A Make Instance Real
Relations Make Local or Make Single users object data/object animation

I have a Basic scene showing what I would like to achieve
Also just referencing that other post


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Move multiple objects to new vertices in animation, assign automatically
During animation from keyframe A to keyframe B, I would like to move many objects from their starting positions to the location of vertices in an object.
Example:
Start:

End:
Is there a way to assign them automatically, getting the shortest path for all and avoiding collisions / keeping a minimum distance?
I would need to do this for dozens or hundreds of similar objects and several times, so manual is not an option.

Getting the shortest path while avoiding collisions sounds like a very hard math problem to solve  Of course if you don't want to be very rigorous about that requirement, you could use Python to iterate over all objects and all vertices, use machine learning to get an optimal solution which you would describe as let's say the set of paths resulting in the shortest animation (so minimizing the longest of all paths). All in all, sounds off-topic and more related to the fields I printed bold.

Oh and in the non-rigourous approach the balls would just wait or move slower if they would otherwise collide.

This definitely seems like a fairly involved Python task.  It's a pretty particular goal so there are unlikely to be any existing tools to just do it for you.

I did a bit more trials and research now. I feel a good framework to get the objects from A to vertices of B are animation nodes and I got that working. But the assignment is not optimized for shortest paths. The mathematical theory behind the optimal assignment seems to be the Hungarian algorithm. https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/hungarian-algorithm-assignment-problem-set-1-introduction/, which is also implemented in python https://docs.scipy.org/doc/scipy-0.18.1/reference/generated/scipy.optimize.linear_sum_assignment.html Since I am neither a Python nor Blender pro, it will take me some time..

If you represent each salesperson by a ball, and each city by a vertex, yes it works - if you drop the collision requirement. Keep in mind that sending a salesperson to a given city doesn't change the fares of other salespeople to other cities, whereas in your case it does, and moreover that change depends who was sent (so not only a distance to a vertex is specific for a given ball, but also it's path and therefore taken space).

Another problem: Hungarian algorithm https://i.imgur.com/viXd4ul will move each yellow ball (salesperson) to the closest green ball (city) but red ball will move to the green ball that is left out (I didn't test it, the idea is that you can find a case where a distance difference of any yellow ball to its closest green ball A, and 2nd closest green ball B is bigger, than the distance difference between red ball to A and red ball to B). So question is, do you want it to be the case, even though the animation could be half as long in this case? https://i.imgur.com/KqsInij

You may be able to use particle systems to do this. The Harmonic force-field can set up a one-to one correspondence between particles in source and target systems. With damping set to 1, source particles stop at their target-partners locations.

On the target, set up a particle system with no physics,
[vertex-count] particles emitted from vertices, all at frame 1.
In 'Force Field Settings', set the target system to generate a Harmonic field, with quite a high strength, and Damping of 1:

Set up a  source particle system, set the emission as for the target, this time from the source object, and in its 'Field Weights' set it to respond to the Harmonic field of the target.

So far, so good. The source system will be attracted to, and land on the target system (which you will be hide, in any render)
The remaining question is how to avoid collisions between the source particles on their journey to the target..

Here, in the 'Force Field Settings' of the source system, I've given the particles a 'Charge'. This does, at least, seem to cause enough repulsion between particles to avoid interpenetration:

Options might include giving the source system 'Boid' rather than 'Newtonian' Physics, with an 'Avoid' rule, and plenty of 'Personal Space'. If the worst comes to the worst, you could have a third particle system with 'Keyed' physics, which would let you mix-and-match between other particle systems, picking the parts of their behaviours which work for you.

Have a play, anyway, it might be a starting-point.

Thanks, that looks neat. I am not familiar with particles, need to see if they also do the trick for what I need. Will report back later.


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Set world origin to cursor - how to?
How can I set the world origin to the 3D cursor?
I created a quite complex animation with many objects and somehow moved far off the world origin. Now I would like to have to whole animation centered around the world origin again. I don`t want to (i.e. don´t know how to efficiently) move all the keyframe locations closer to the world origin.

Hello, have you tried using Delta transforms ? If all your objects are offset by the same value, you can add the same delta transform to all of them. It won't affect the regular keyframes

You can also try to parent everything to an empty and then moving the empty to the origin. It can be tricky if the scene is complex and already has many small objects parented to other objects, but if it's a relatively simple set up it usually does the trick.


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Animation nodes "object attribute input" color is not updating
I want to get the color of an object on animation nodes via the "object attribute input" and "color" as attribute.
However, when I change the color of the object, the output of the node remains at the old value (which was white 1,1,1,1 in my example pick below).
Which settings do I need to change to get the color output updated?

You're looking at the wrong color. The object.color attribute refers to the object's viewport display color :

If you want to get the particular value of an input socket of a particular node in the node tree of a particular material, you need to use :
material.node_tree.nodes.get("Principled BSDF").inputs[0].default_value
I suggest using an Expression node to do it. Example :

Result :

Another way to do it, is to link the object viewport color to your principled bsdf. Then you can keep your AN tree :

You made my day!!! I am using the Expression node and "obj.active_material.node_tree.nodes.get("Principled BSDF").inputs[0].default_value", and it works like a breeze! Thanks!

Glad to see it worked :) Have fun


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Animation nodes color output - how to bake to keyframes as base color
I am creating colors for objects in animation nodes and want to write these colors to keyframes as base colors.
In my example the color of the 3 cubes is created by a random color node in animation nodes. Now I want to bake these colors to frames 1-30.
Then stop the animation nodes and manually keyframe colors (R, G, B Diffuse Color in the dope sheet) for the rest of the animation for the same cubes. (or use other animation nodes output)
How could I achieve that?
(The cube with "manual" material is for reference, how I want to set the colors in manual mode)

You need to use the Set Keyframes node. Link to the docs.
It is designed to keyframe transforms (Loc, Rot, Scale), but you can keyframe other properties by choosing Custom in the first dropdown.
Click on the + icon to add a new field, and type color (implied object.color, that is to say the object viewport color) because that's the property you want to bake the keyframes to.
Check Enable to, well, enable the node's behavior.

Now if you play the animation, it will bake the keyframes to ALL frames.
How to restrict the baking to a certain frame range :
Add a Time Info node and a Compare boolean node.

Result :

This answer works perfect! Thanks!

@ChrisM Glad it helped :) By the way, if say you just want to bake the red channel of the color, instead of -1 beside the field where you type color, you can set it to 0 (1 for green, 2 for blue, and 3 for alpha) cheers

Good to know, thanks. By the way, if I select the cubes and check material - viewport display, the color is still white for all cubes, in all keyframes, and the small dot also shows it is not keyframed. Same is the case for materials - surface, if I turn off "use nodes", the base color is still white and not keyframed. I can see the dots in the dopesheet, but not in the graph editor. Where/how can I see to color in these displays?

@ChrisM You'll have to use a different setup for that, the object viewport color and the material viewport color are 2 different properties, they belong respectively to an object and a material. One material can be shared by multiple objects, and one object can have multiple materials. As you noticed, the material viewport color is used for the diffuse color of the default material when use nodes is unchecked

Nice name! ;)
To change the colors "without" AN you can adapt your shading nodes like this (see picture).
In the value field enter "#frame" and then you can ask which frame it is with the math node (less than). With the mix node Blender decides which color it will take.
The RGB node can be keyframed as you know with hovering with the mouse over it and press "I".

Thanks Chris, that works, too. But I do more stuff in animation nodes and avoid to jump between node systems.


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Copy animated viewport color to another object
I have animated (set keyframes) for the viewport color of an object (cube). Now I would like to copy the animation / keyframes of the color channels to another object (cube.001). But I don`t want to copy other channels (like transform,...). How to do that?

You can do this by either copying the keyframes themselves or by sharing Action data in an NLA strip. Using NLAs means that changes made to the shared Action on one object will also be reflected in the behaviour of the other object.

Method 1, Duplicate Keyframes:

Select only the Viewport Color keyframes from your source object in the Dope Sheet.

CTRL+C to "Copy".

Notice that the Transform keyframes/channels are not selected.

Add a single dummy keyframe to Viewport Color on your destination object.

Select only the Viewport Color keyframes from your destination object in the Dope Sheet.

CTRL+V to "Copy".

Delete the dummy keyframes if they're still there.

Method 2, Shared Actions:

Place the keyframes for Viewport Color specially in their own Action datablock, and then push that Action onto an NLA track for both of the objects:

You can now add another NLA track or active action to keyframe the other properties of either object.

Thanks for your answers!! Method 1 works. Previously, I tried copy paste without adding a color keyframe first (your step 3). Then the color values (RGB 0-1) were actually written into the existing transform values (xyz) (felt like a bug somehow). Any suggestion how I can make this process efficient for 20+ objects without manually adding keyframes etc? I haven`t tried method 2, as I am not familiar with the NLA, but will do so soon.

@ChrisM It seems like if you select all the objects, you can copy and paste just once on the Dope Sheet to get all of them, but I think you still need the dummy keyframes/channels. If any of those objects don't have other keyframes yet, you could [CTRL]+[L] to link "Animation Data" and then maybe "Make Single User > Animation Data" to dissociate them. I'd recommend the NLA method, unless you want to later manually update all 20+ of the objects.


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What's the difference between shader editor and compositor
I started learning blender about a year ago and I started learning nodes this month. Does anybody know what is the difference between the Shader Editor and the Compositor? I've seen tutorials about using the shader editor and sometimes the compositor but I mostly use the shader editor. I currently don't understand what the compositor is used for.
thanks to anyone who can help

Hello :). All editors are explained in the Blender manual: Blender Manual - Compositing

Shader editor is for editing backgrounds and materials, and it has a large viewport so you can see what you're doing. Compositor is for compositing, or combining images, and this requires more nodes (most of the time), hence the larger node area

I came here for the answer, but I will contribute what I think it is.
Shading acts over a 3d space (2d u,v mapping to 3d) before rendering. Here are 3d effects, like displacement and bump. material lighting (which requires 3d calculations for shadows, reflections, etc...)
Compositing is post-production rendered processing, it is over image format (2d pixels) like png. Here are image processing like filters.
I could be wrong, but this is my impression.


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Rotating an image in a scene
After looking at other solutions on this, I'm not sure how to proceed, as I'm just new to Blender. I have an image mapped onto a picture frame asset and I'm changing a parameter but it's not the correct one. The Displacement angle value (bottom right) doesn't seem to do it. How might I adjust it to display in the correct orientation? Thanks for any help.

It's not quite clear what exactly you're trying to accomplish or what's going on in your screenshot.  Do you think you could explain your goal in a little more detail please?  Thanks!

The image is oriented incorrectly as seen in the rendered area. In the Picture-canvas -> canvas_Mat (circled top-right) I'm trying to find a parameter that will rotate it -90 degrees. I'm not able to find the right parameter apparently. How can I do this?

Displacement is entirely the wrong place! Displacement is for elevating or lowering the surface (like if you wanted to emboss something).
What you want to do is alter the texture coordinates somehow.
In this case, probably just rotating the UV map 90 degrees will do the trick. You can do this in the UV Editing screen.


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Joined Object to Mesh Separates when Moved
So for this mesh, I decided to add a little rose to the shirt. The rose is made from grease pencil and turned into a mesh. So I joined the two objects first and then added an armature modifier and then parented with automatic weights to the armature. The rose will move with the shirt, but it won't move with the bones. I have tried weight painting the rose to a bone while connected to the shirt, but then it moves with the bone and changes places on the shirt. I have also tried parenting the rose to the shirt, but the bones still only move the shirt.
Here the rose and shirt are joined and moving as expected

Here it is still joined but does not move with the armature

Is there any way to get it to move with the shirt?

Maybe, in the Properties panel > Object Data > Vertex Groups, remove the rose from all groups (down arrow dropdown menu > Remove from All Groups) then assign it to the vertex group you want.
Another way to fix this is to remove the rose vertices from all vertex groups, to separate it as a second object, then, in Object mode, select the rose, shift select the shirt, switch to Edit mode, select one or 3 vertices of the shirt and press CtrlP > Make Vertex Parent, it will make the rose follow these vertices.


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How to remove shadows appearing inside material?
I've been following a tutorial on geometry nodes, which uses gumdrops and sugar for context. The geometry node set up for the gum drop is:

For the material of the gum drop I used the following shader set up:

The problem I have is on the render. If you look at the image below, You'll be able to see little shadows appearing inside of the gumdrop material. I want to be able to control these, either removing them completely or reducing the strength of them.

I've tried a few different things to alter them, but I've not been able to work out what is causing them.
I've tried removing Shadows in the Ray Visibility section, from the sugar cube objects, used within a collection in the geometry node setup. Specifically the collection is used in Point Instance Node.

I've tried increasing the Density in the Volume Absorption node in the gumdrop material Shader Node Setup, but it just darkens the colour, so the shadows blend in, and I would like to keep the brightness of the gumdrops if possible.
The last idea I had was to apply 'backface culling', but the option only appears in the Viewport Display settings, so doesn't affect the render. (I figured maybe the shadows are caused by sugar on the back of the gum drop.)
I'm not sure what's causing the shadows, and I've only been using 3D modelling software about 2 months, so I have no idea what else to try.
Any ideas or solutions?

Moments after writing up this question, I found an answer. The way to do it is to alter the Roughness value in the Refraction BSDF node of the shader set up.


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3d paint effect in Blender
I'm quite new to Blender so I appreciate any and all help. I would like to know if it is possible to create something similar to this pictures in Blender. Thanks

The best way would be to use a series of curves with a custom bevel. Create your paint patterns as a texture (with transparency enabled), and apply them to the curves.
It should take (except for the textures) just a few minutes.
Make your curve(s), adjust them using both handles and vertex weight and tilt, then in the curve tab apply bevel (half) (rounded) or whatever profile you want.
I did this with a very simple paint smear.

This is the node setup for the transparency

And this is the png I used. I had to adjust the z rotation to make the stripes the long way.
To get brush texture--not shown here--you can just run the image into a bump node for height and throw that into normal on the principaled BSDF shader.

Wow, I didn't think it was possible to do it in such a short time! Thank you so much for your help, this is the first time I’m going to use Blender, but I think that by following the steps you’ve described I’ll be able to do it :)

Good luck. It can be a little confusing at first, learning how to manipulate curves, but they're really easy (and fun) once you get to know them. This is a great intro to custom curve bevels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJsxKWxAhMk

thank you again for your kindness!

Hi Modeler101,
I've already managed to learn a little more about curves and bevel. But the end result was very different from yours. I followed the same setup as you, but I couldn't get it to be transparent: https://imgur.com/a/MPhUcFg/
Could you give me one more help please? I really want to learn how to do it.

Hi Taylor, I can't tell what's going on from the images. You seem to have created some geometry in the bevel, so it looks like a solid. This could be a setting in a newer version--I'm running 2.91. I'm trying to figure out the best way to send you my model so you can see if it works for you.

Hi Modeler101, I don't know what i did wrong, your model looks so much better! Thank you so much for sending me your model, this way i can understand and learn how to do it :)


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Round the end of shape (mesh)
I have created a bezier curve, applied a bevel and then converted it to a mesh. Is there a way to round the end of the shape? I have tried the bevel modifier but it didn't work as i hoped.
It is like this:

I want it to end like this:

Thanks

Instead of a bevel modifier you might be better off going into edit mode and doing a bevel with Ctrl+B just on the ring of edges at the very end

Have you tried editing the mesh in proportional editing mode?  You could select vertices near the end, set the influence circle to an appropriate size and then use the shrink/fatten tool (ALT-S) to shrink the curve.

@person123 Hi, I tried to make the bevel on the ring edges but the result is very similar to what i had before.. Do you mind if i send you the file to see if you can help me please?

Hi @MartyFouts. I tried to shrink the curve but it always ends like this: https://imgur.com/a/QT0khFj
Do you mind if i send you the file to see if you can help me please?

i'm about to head out for the day but if you post the file here i'm sure someone can help.  otherwise i'll take a look at it tomorrow.

@MartyFouts Thank you very much! Here is the file: https://www.dropbox.com/s/m74y0ea4thjmdv8/blenderfile_test.blend?dl=0  It has the original image behind the 3d one, which is what i am trying to achieve.

The bevel of a curve can be given a Taper Object in its 'Data' tab > 'Geometry' panel:

The radius of the bevelled curve is varied according to the Y of the taper curve in the taper-curve's  own object-space.
As shown, the bevel can be mapped to less than the full extent of the curve, and there are various settings for the interpolation of the mapping from point to
point.
But, adjusting the number of subdivisions in the bevelled curve to capture, not only the curvature along its length, but also the variation in its radius, can be a bit fiddly.

Thank you so much for your help! I already have the all shape with the desired radius.. I only wanted to change the terminals.. That means I have to make the shape all again right?

@Taylor Yes, but..  I'll check it out for relatively simple ways to do that? No guarantee.

Thank you :) I put the file in the post if it is easier for you to see. (https://www.dropbox.com/s/m74y0ea4thjmdv8/blenderfile_test.blend?dl=0)

@Taylor.. I maybe misunderstood your question. My approach has been to model with fewer vertices, and after conversion to mesh, repair the tips by filling the holes with  ngons, insetting those, and dragging them out along their normals, before applying a Subdivision Surface modifier to make them round.  File here.

Thank you very much for your help! This is exactly what I needed! It took me a while to understand all the steps you took since I'm new to Blender, but I managed to do everything as you said :)


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Animate diurnal movement of the sun for an evelation map
I am really sorry for this super basic question. I am completely new to blender. And while I should do many other things I really felt in love playing around with it.
My very simple question is now the following:
I created a hillshade using an elevation map in an image texture. Now I'd like to animate the movement of the sun in one day. So I just have one plane, that gets displaced, and I'd like to cast the shadows depending on the location of the sun.
I don't really know where to start looking for hints on how to start animating certain parameters (the position of the sun in this case), so I just asked here:)

There used to be a Sun Position add-on shipped with blender to do exactly that with handy parameters. What version are you using?

Thank you very much! I'm using version 2.9 and I found that plugin too:) I also can get the sun moving, but my camera also moves with it:/ I'd like to have it fixed over my elevation map


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Rig pose keeps resetting after saving
Every time I pose a rig(originally a T-pose .fbx from Mixamo), after saving and re-opening the blend file again, the rig pose is reset to the T-pose.
I have no idea what the problem is and how to fix it.

are you sure you're creating keyframes ("i")? Please share your file so that we can test: https://pasteall.org/blend/

You should still be able to retain the pose through saves without a keyframe.  Are you relying on the pose library to set your pose?


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How to fade / scatter sand on the floor around?
I am trying to scatter sand so it fades out better onto the floor around it.
This is what I have know:

And this is what I want it to kind look like:

Any help or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

You can use particle hairs and weight paint the amount to increase or decrease in a gradient.

on top of what @NascentSpace said I would also add a displacement modifier and apply the weight paint to it especially if you were making it on a larger scale because you would  want the sand to be ontop of itself

You could use the image you show as a stencil to create a black and white image texture:

Then use this image texture as a mask in a material that mixes your background with a noisy material:


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Subsurface scattering always gives red glow
I am trying to create a wax type material with subsurface scattering for a set of hands but whatever I do, the scattering produces a red glow (see attached image), making the wax hands look like actual (weirdly white) hands. Is this physically correct or did I make a mistake somewhere? I tried adjusting the SSS color, background color, and light color, none of these got rid of the red tint. Turning SSS off completely does make it go away.
I am using Blender 2.92

Thank you for your help!

did yout weak the Subsurface Radius values? they set the RGB subsurface rays...

Hello :). Your SSS depth is too high - 100-300mm. Human skin SSS is only ~5 mm deep.

You need to tweak the Subsurface Radius values. They will determine the RGB coloration.
As the manual says, this value corresponds to the average length the light travels between each bounce. The longer the path length is, the further the light is allowed to scatter. This is the main source of a material’s perceived « scatter color. » A material like skin will have a higher red radius than green and blue. Subsurface scattering is the diffusion of light beneath the surface.

Perfect, that indeed fixed it. Thank you for your quick response!


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Slimy translucent material help?
I want to create a material that is transparent but also has a "wet" or slimy look, like the bug in MiB 1 or the demogorgon from Stranger Things. I don't know if you could achieve this with a principled bsdf or what. Any suggestions are appreciated.

You can use a principled BSDF and make it translucent or transparent with the transmission settings. You can also use the clearcoat settings and clearcoat normal input to make it look different outside.


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My rigid body animation freezes after second frame
My animation records frames but the rigid bodies don't work after the second frame. Does anyone know how to solve this problem?

Have you baked your animation or are you using the live calculation?

I've tried both.


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export animation for gltf
I've created a simple model with animation following this tuto: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hqJK4JxOZJs
but when I exported this into gltf + bin + texture, I can't find the animations field in the .gltf file.
when I exported the model the animations is already checked and i checked the Apply Modifiers.
am I missing something?
I want a gltf file that contains something like that but generated with blender
"animations": [
    {
      "channels": [
        {
          "sampler": 0,
          "target": {
            "node": 0,
            "path": "weights"
          }
        }
      ],
      "samplers": [
        {
          "input": 10,
          "interpolation": "LINEAR",
          "output": 11
        }
      ],
      "name": "Square"
    }
  ]

thank you

Can this link help you? https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/2.80/addons/io_scene_gltf2.html  See if  "glTF Separate (.gltf + .bin + textures)" help you in the link above.

Try selecting to sphere and picking Object > Animation > Bake Action from the 3D View.

@8NFilms, yes i've already took a look but can't help me to extract the animations

@scurest I did it


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Export object with modifier animation as gltf file
Is it possible to export object with modifier animation as gltf file? I have a pie chart animated with screw modifier and I wanna export it as gltf. How can I archive it?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/57531/fbx-export-why-there-are-no-materials-or-textures

You'd have to "bake" it: create a different mesh for each frame, and turn each of these meshes on and off by animating the scale between 1 (when it should be visible) and 0 (when it should be invisible).

@scurest Ah so let's say it's 30 frames and I have to create 30 meshes and animate its visible. It can be done in blender but how about exporting gltf? I don't know how to bake these animations.

@DuarteFarrajotaRamos I wanna export Modifier animation as gltf. I know that gltf can't support modifiers but how can I fake it? Is there a way to do that?


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I am trying to create 2 cubes, with one mirroring the other. Instead it appears to create one cube that is always connected to the center!
This is my first attempt at creating a character using blender. I am finished with the body, and now I am trying to add hands. I put my cursor where I want the origin to be and then pressing Shift+A to create a cube, which I would hope would also create an identical cube mirrored across the center. Instead, it seems as though these two cubes always have to be connected in the center. Any suggestions? This is my first day using blender so forgive me for not knowing the terminology.

You are in front view looking at the XZ plane. The mirror is the YZ plane going thru 0. Currently one face of the cube is on the mirror plane, as answered below, select all verts and  move away from the mirror to have 2 distinct mirrored cubes.

You most probably have clipping turned on in modifier settings which causes shapes to merge at the center. Just uncheck The Clipping Checkbox and it should be fine.

With Clipping

Without Clipping

Note:You Have To Turn Off Clipping Before you move the cube in editmode otherwise it will retain its stretched shape

Hi, thanks for the post. This site is not a regular forum, answers should be substantial and thoroughly explain the solution and required workflow. One liners and short tips rarely make for a good answer. If you can [edit] your post and provide some more details about the procedure and why it works feel free to restore it, otherwise it may be deleted or converted into a comment. Perhaps add a few images illustrating the workflow and final results. See How do I write a good answer?

Shift A amd create a cube. move it to right along x axis beyond the center line. Make sure 3d cursor is at world origin by pressing shift + s and select cursor to world origin. With your cube still selected in object mode press F3 and search for set origin and select origin to 3d cursor. Select mirror modifier and make sure your axis is x going by your picture

If he is setting the 3D cursor where he wants the center of the mirror to be, it's not necessarily the world origin he's talking about. So it would be much easier (like he already does) to place the cursor where he wants to add the cube, then go into edit mode and move the cube there. This way the origin stays where it is and where he wanted it to be (to maybe add more objects right at the same position) and he doesn't need to reset cursor, reset origin etc.


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Make points out of faces instead of vertices in geometry nodes
Geometry nodes uses vertices as points by default so when i feed the mesh to Point Instance it instances the selected object across the vertices. How do you switch to the centers of faces?

Blender 3.0
For the future googlers. The answers are outdated. For version 3.0 you can use Mesh to Points Node with Faces option.

Getting normals for rotation is still a little tricky, though. You have to use capture attribute to get the normals from faces and use Align Euler to Vector to convert normal to rotation:

What is the radius 0.05 for?

Edit: This workaround is no longer necessary, see other answers
There is a pure GeoNodes workaround..
Please see below for GN (Fields) update.
Compare the original mesh to a 1-level subdivision of itself. Points on the subdivided version which are sufficiently distant from the edges of the original are in the middle of the original's faces, and can be separated out:

There has to be a tiny Epsilon in the Greater Than node to account for floating-point errors.. in this case, 0.0001.
GN(Fields) Update:
Just in case some have found some of this as counter-intuitive as I have, here is a route to one instance per face, aligned to normal:

..here shown with GN-modified mesh and instances together:

(Blender 3.0b)

This is a pretty smart sollution! GeoNodes still don't let us do it so ellegantly but your method will work about 100% of the time so it's alright.

Re: update.. I'm finding it very difficult to work out which branch of geometry callbacks like 'Position' are being called on... :(

The normals works only as if the obj is spherical. If you put a subbed cube you get skewed (spherically) pointing instances.
Any thought on that issue?

Another option is to use a Dual Mesh Node. My only question is: is it more efficient? I don't know.


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Light object is NOT seen on the viewport
In Blender 3.0, when I add any new light object it is NOT seen on the viewport, as if it does not exist at all. It is only shown in the Outliner. There is no problem with all the other objects. What is wrong with my settings?

Make sure that you have enabled the Display Overlays button (double sphere icon button on the top right), or that you haven't disabled the lights in the Object Types Visibility panel (also top right, eye icon button)

Moonboots thank you so much. Long ago I disabled the Light Object Visibility eye icon button and completely forgot it. Thanks to you the issue is resolved. Again, many thanks.

Make sure that you have enabled the Display Overlays button (double sphere icon button on the top right), or that you haven't disabled the lights in the Object Types Visibility panel (also top right, eye icon button):

If the viewport objects representing your lights, cameras, or other empty or wire objects are not displaying, you may have disabled the "extras" overlays under your viewport overlays! Let's re-enable this setting:

Make sure that the box labeled "Extras" is checked!

Voila! Your "extra" overlays have been enabled!


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Rendering with studio light setup in World
I have built a perfect setup on the Viewport with only studiolight, in my case sunset.exr, rotation 69 degrees and strength 0.4. When I switch the Viewport to Render mode (I work with 2.90 and Cycles) I see a perfect image. I have configured the World with the same sunset.exr image in order to get the same result on the rendered image, but I don’t know how to tweak the 69 degrees and therefore when I click F12 the resulting rendered image is different from the one on the Viewport. What should I do in order to get a rendered image result that is identical to the one on the viewport? BTW, clicking on View>Viewport Render Image does not work. Thank you for your kind advice.

You can use the Mapping node for that.

Add a Texture Coordinate node and a Mapping node before your HDRI
Rotate around Z axis
Done

Jachym Michal, thank you so much for your detailed reply which fully solves my problem. Thank you for that.


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Adding shiny gold material to a slice of bread
I have a slice of bread inside a crusty loaf. Enclosed is the image (the outside crusty loaf is not shown) and the node editor.
The outside crusty loaf is completed. The problem lies only with the slice of bread, to which I wish to add shiny gold material, so that it looks as a slice of bread made of shiny gold.
I’d appreciate any advice, showing me how to do that.
Thank you,

try adding a Mix Shader and using your existing Diffuse BSDF as one input and add Glossy Shader as the other setting the colour appropriately. To get a good reflection set your background to an HDR

rob, thank you for your comment. Unfortunately, it doesn't do the job.

As a rough first shot:

Use a tool like Materialize to generate a pseudo-height map from
your diffuse image of the bread
Having UV unwrapped your slice you can use the height map to bump-map the surface of the slice using a simple set of shader nodes something like this...

Here, if the height is less than a threshold, a fully transparent material is substituted for the gold, so as to poke  holes in the bread. You might feel you need actually to displace the surface of the slice in shading, too, if your shot is close-up, or at a raking angle.
Once you've provided an HDR environment to reflect from the metal surface, you get this sort of result.

As for the metal itself, you could substitute this principled shader for something more sophisticated: from approximating physically accurate to quite convincing.

Robin Betts, thanks a lot for your detailed and enlightening answer, which I followed and which yielded an excellent result. Thank you.


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How to force an object into the render border?
I made a glass smashed by a bullet animation, with smoke simulation. I have 100 frames in the simulation but wish to render only one frame no. 61, where the smoke cloud is the most beautiful. Unfortunately, the bullet and a few other nice shards are already outside the render border, and they must be part of the rendering. I move them into the border but when rendering, they jump back to their previous place. How can I force them to be part of the rendering?

Make sure your smoke animation is baked.
Go to your selected frame and delete all keyframes from the objects animation. Afterwards, you will be able to move your object freely.
(This will obviously delete the animation, so only do this if you are sure that you don't need it anymore.)

Tom, thank you for your kind help. On top of the keyframes, I deleted also the rigid body physics.