text:
Does Blender support any form of collaborative editing?
I remember there was once a project called Verse, which allowed (or at least was supposed to) collaborative editing in Blender, even using Blender collaboratively with other applications.
Is anything along these lines (I.E. collaborative editing across a network) supported in the current version?

In short: no.
But I imagine that one could work on such functionality again. There is a Verse 2 being developed, with a better Python API. This could be a good next candidate, unfortunately this version is far from complete yet. Certainly an effort on the current version of Verse could be started again.

I tried the verse 2 version couple of months back (compiled verse2 from git).. it was in a very early stage.. Will try it out again sometime soon.

@satishgoda, it still is in a rather early stage. The main developer Jiri Hnidek has been busy I think. Looks like no commit activity for several months.

Yeah. I actually commented on a commit in his git repository and at that time he was adding some Verse Avatar features to the Blender Python addon.

Not exactly collaborative editing as in what the OP was looking for, but there is a related (and recent) addon for real time editing between blender and gimp/photoshop

Blender does not provide a way for multiple uses to edit the same blend file at exactly the same time. *
However typically you can manage this by splitting your assets into separate blend files and linking from one file to another.
Blender supports recursive linking so a scene, node-groups, animation, models, materials etc can all have their own files.
Here is the documentation for the linking structure use by the open movie; Tears of Steel
Some projects do this more fine grained, where the material, armature, mesh, action are all stored in 4 separate blend files and they are combined in a 5th, and composited in a 6th. But inter-linking complexity needs to be managed or you have a mess too, where you load a blend file and 100's of megabytes are loaded because files are interlinking in situations that might be avoided.
I have found the best way to manage linking is to only go in one direction.
So for example:
Materials/Nodes -> Models/Rigs/Environments -> Animation -> Compositing
But never link an animation into a material file for eg.
This way its predictable and you can manage what loads in a more controlled way.
Update: since 2.78 its now possible to reload libraries without re-opening the file, see: Datablock and Library Management.

*Blender used to have Verse integration, but it was removed due to not being very practical to use for real projects.

If multiple people aren't working on the same object, you could separate one bit and Link it into the original file. So one guy works on the main file, and other people work on the Linked files.
Or you could separate everything and have a master-file that is not edited directly, but simply has all the separate pieces linked in and placed correctly.
As far as I know there is no native way for multiple people to work on the same file simultaneously

Yes, now we have a plugin called "multi-user" that allows real-time collaboration on Blender projects over the network. You can think of it as Google Docs for Blender where multiple people connected to the same network either through LAN or the internet can work on a common scene in real-time, with changes visible to each other.
It already has good documentation that should cover most of your questions on using it.
It's being maintained by a guy named Swann Martinez as his research project as far as I know. Since it's in the development phase, it might not be stable over all the aspects.
You can check out this video for a better understanding of the concept of the plugin.
Hope this helps :)


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Is there an addon for todo management?
Like something that hooks into the text editor, or maybe the node editor?
I'd like an addon that allows me to keep track of things I'd like to do (or have done) on a model.

Okay, this is one of my more reluctant calls, but I'm thinking that this is off topic? I'm saying this because it's more about something that would be done with an external program rather than Blender, and it's not really about CG. Again, I'm not 100% sure about this, but I though I'd put out my opinion anyway.

@TARDISMaker IMO it's fine. Even if the answer is "no, there is no addon. Use XYZ program instead", the question is asking if there is an existing way to do this in blender.

The text editor works fine for that, you can setup a small text editor at the bottom of the properties or to one side of the timeline and add/remove things as you go. For more features use an external app.

@gandalf3 is correct. I'm asking if this is possible in Blender because I'm actually tracking my progress on a weapon model that is rather complicated, and do not want to store the info about what ideas I plan to implement in another program. I've been using the text editor so far but it has been feeling a little limited as it isn't designed for this purpose (if you use todo lists often you'll know what I mean). The suggestion in the accepted answer looks like it should do almost exactly what I mean.

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/-Z0OOs8IG5OU/Vq5wlg7eAVI/AAAAAAAAtgg/G5JOK_v1GJ0/w525-h382-p-rw/HybridRifle11.png
A screenshot for the curious among us.

You can use Generic Note Add-on which allows to create some kind of sticky note in the Compositor. In this case I'd suggest re-using a text file from the Text Editor:

In addition there is a nice Comment Node Add-on by @CoDEmanX, which allows creating a list:

Since Blender 2.74, you can use the built-in Frame Node to display text blocks in the Node Editor:

Further information: Is there a way to make comments in the node editor?

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


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Is there a build of Blender that only has the video editor enabled?
Seeing as the video editor has become as powerful as it is, it would be great to use it as a stand alone video editor.
Does such a build exist?

Keep in mind that apart from the game engine, the other parts of Blender are tied closely together. I don't think it is possible to have such a build.

In Short, No.
You can make blender builds without many features (collada, game-engine, freestyle, smoke etc). But you can't make a video only version of Blender.

What you could do is provide a startup.blend that has only screen layouts geared towards video editing, but the user still could access all the other parts.

I'm almost completely sure there are no builds with just the video editor, but if you wanted to use it primarily as a video editor, you could set the video editor as the default view when blender is loaded up.

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


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How to remove aliasing from two images displayed on top of each other in the video sequence editor?
I have two images that are displayed one on top of the other in the video sequence editor:

Each image has an accompanying transform to apply scale and rotation:

On closer inspection of the rendered output of the first frame, I discovered a lot of aliasing where the two images overlap:

The Blend property of the top two strips is set to Alpha over and the other two strips have the value set to Replace.
How do I remove the aliasing so that there isn't such a visible seam when the images are blended together?

This seems to be a precision problem, when you check Convert to float in the filter tab of your image strips, the issue disappears.

I wonder why this isn't the default? I am maintaining an addon for transforming strips in the VSE and I wonder if I should make my addon ensure this box is checked whenever a transform strip is added


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How to ensure that two objects do not intersect before collision?
I am dropping an object on top of another and I'm noticing some odd behavior. The object that falls intersects the object that it falls on top of:

It then proceeds to "wobble":

I have the following properties set for the objects:

What causes this to occur and how can I prevent the two objects from intersecting at all?
Here's a link to the .blend that demonstrates the problem:

Increase simulation precision and number of steps

@DuarteFarrajotaRamos how would one go about that?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/99027/how-can-i-get-physics-objects-to-for-a-tight-container

I would be careful with increasing the simulation quality unless absolutely necessary, as it can often 'mask' other issues and also slow down the simulation significantly. See my answer below for some options to get a better result.

Short Answer: Switch the collision shape on each object to Box, and you're good to go.
Long Answer:
Poor collisions are generally due to a combination of a few things:
First is the precision of the simulation. Increasing the quality of the simulation should help, but this will slow down the simulation considerably. Usually you can get away without increasing the simulation precision.
Second is the density of the colliding meshes. A subdivided plane has more geometry to work with, and will collide better than a plane. In your file, adding 3 edge loops on the X and Y axes of the floor object gave the simulation enough geometry to run perfectly. This isn't always the best solution of course, as often times dense meshes are undesirable.
Final thing is how the collisions are being calculated. Blender has a number of different collision shapes that can be used. The geometric shapes (box, sphere, etc.) will always be the most stable as they are the most simple. In your case, both your objects are boxes of some form, so using box collisions will be best. Testing this confirms this, as switching both to Box fixes the collisions and the simulation is very stable as well.
The other types of collisions can work as well, and using the Mesh option (which uses the actual shape of the mesh as the collision object) on each object did give decent collisions, but they were far from perfect. Adding some more geometry to the floor object did help significantly though when using Mesh. Convex Hull (which uses a collision object that is always convex while still fitting the object as best it can) doesn't appear to work at all in your case, as it seems to do a poor job of determining a good collision shape for a box like object. Adding a bit of geometry and changing the shape to be slightly rounded made it work great though.
More information on the collision types can be found here (about halfway down).
It is almost always the best case to keep the simulation as simple as possible, and to use the simplest collision shapes possible so that Blender has to do the fewest calculations, which will also keep your simulation nice and fast.


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How to extrude the selected faces of a cylinder symmetrically outwards?
There is some way of extruding all the selected faces toward outside
 so that the extrusion is symmetrical in the object, using blender. Thanks for answer my question.

The I want is to do this in a symmetrical way, an extrusion outwards,
I maked this selecting the faces indeviduously and extruding them outwards.

Also https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/38877/how-to-extrude-equally-in-all-directions

Thanks for the information, I will review the links, thanks for answering my question. Greetings

If you want to extrude all the selected faces out the same distance along their individual normals simultaneously, press Alt-E instead of E.  Hope that helps!

Thank you very much for replying, I've already got it. with the information, that I was offered the Mr Zak. Thank you very much for you, for you reply too.


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Rendered View port and PNG output color difference
I am performing a render on a scene through the viewport using f12 option and saving the rendered image but when viewing the two images side by side I've noticed that the colors are much sharper in the view port with higher contrast. This is especially noticeable on red and green objects.
I am using the default color management options and sRGB color space.
Is this difference in color caused by some interpolation when converting the rendered view port image to a png format?
I am on Linux Ubuntu 16.04 and opening the image on Gnome Image viewer.

Not enough information. Platform and image viewer required here.

EyeOfGnome shows a color-corrected image according to the default system color profile; I don't think what you see within Blender undergoes the same process

I have encountered this as well. I would still need to further investigate, so this is merely an assumption: I found Blender doesn't assign color sync profiles to the png files that you save. You could use Gimp to assign the sRGB profile manually and try again. Also, the color profile of your display should match that.

Again, this question requires more information. Everything is speculation until we know what platform the individual is on and the image viewer in question to start. This is very likely a system colour management issue unrelated to Blender.


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Combining parts to a single stl for cheaper printing
I am trying to compine parts for 3 raspberry pi cases so I can print them as a single image and avoid paying a setup fee for every single one
I have stl files
When I import them to blender they float around in different sizes and locations
I'm just trying to get them all to fit on a 12 by 12 inch floor and have no clue how to do it
Googling didn't help much since I am a total newbie and don't even understand some of the jargon
If anyone can hep I'd really appreciate it

Welcome to the wonderful (and often confusing) world of Blender!
So, the first thing you'll need to do is right-click the default cube to select it.*

Hit S6 to scale the cube up by 6. Hit ↩ Return to finish. (You'll see Dimensions in the right panel go to 12 in each direction. We're pretending the units are inches.)
Set the cube's maximum draw type to Wire, this will avoid it getting in the way:

Ignore the cube for now.

Now, do you have a number pad? If not, you should probably go into the preferences (⌘, on a mac, ⌃ Ctrl+⌥ Alt+U elsewhere) and turn on Emulate Numpad in the Input tab. Be sure to hit the Save User Settings button, or you'll get a surprise when you restart Blender!
Hit 1 on the numpad, or the regular key if you've got Emulate Numpad turned on. This will align your view so you're looking straight on sideways. Then hit 5 on the numpad to switch to "orthographic mode"; this makes your view flat, like an architectural drawing. (There is no perspective; things that are far away look just as big as things that are up close.)
Turn on snapping with Shift+Tab. If it gives you trouble later, you can turn it off again.
For each case (I'm assuming they're all one piece here, please tell me if not):

Select it by right-clicking.
Hit G to Grab it, and then Z to only move it along the Z axis (up/down).
Move your mouse up/down until the bottom of the case is aligned with the floor, which is that red horizontal line going across your viewport.

Now you need that cube again.

Select it by right-clicking on its wire.
Press GZ and move it up 6 to align it with the floor.
Hit Numpad 7 to switch to top view.
Grab each case, like before except without the Z locking, and make sure it's inside the cube's walls.
If you want them to all be one piece, join them with Ctrl+J.
Delete the default cube with X. Now you're done! You can find STL export under the File menu.

Please note that I used A+B to mean "press B while holding A", and AB to mean "press A, then B".

*Yes, it's weird, but you get used to it. If you absolutely hate it, you can change it in the preferences. Just make sure to hit "save user settings" afterward.

thank you so much for your quick reply I appreciate it I am trying to do that but the problem is that the files I am importing are so much bigger than the cube and I don't know what their dimentions should be (I assume the stl.is supposed to contain that information)like so can't scale them down and they don't fit in the cube. Each case is made of a few independent part but each stl file contains a single  part so no connections are necessary Ican send you the files if you want to see them my email is bialostozky2822   At gmail if you'd like send me an email and I'll send you the files

So, you can't scale them down? Is it because they're made of separate parts?

Also, according to Wikipedia, STL doesn't contain scale information. Blender's units are arbitrary, so you can pretend they're anything you like. (BTW, some things like rendering engines often assume they're in meters, but since you're not using rendering, that doesn't matter.)

Thank you so much for answering I appreciate your time   I can scale down but I need them to fit the raspberry pi zero so I don't know to what size to scale them down since I don't have the dimensions they're supposed to be I assumed when I downloaded them from thingiverse that they're in a specific size and yes some cases are made of 2 parts or more

Well, does the page where you got them say anything about dimensions? If so, you could use that to figure out how big they need to be. If not, you could try finding the dimensions online. Also, if you want to print the pieces (of one case) separately, you can just use the same scale on all of them and align them with the floor independently.

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


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Encountering a problem with Camera Tracking
I'm new to Blender
I'm trying to do some camera tracking on my 2013 MacBook Air (4GB RAM, 256GB SSD) running Blender 2.79.
I'm following BlenderGuru's tutorial. After setting around nine tracking points in high-contrast areas, when I hit Ctrl+T, the progress bar shows up, but even after 30 minutes it simply lingers at 0 percent without changing. When I cancel the job, Blender freezes and I have to force quit the program.
What am I doing wrong, or is my computer unable handle the load?
Thanks in advance.
PS In order to cache the video, I have allocated 2.4GB of my RAM. Here's a screenshot of my other settings:

How long is your input sequence? Do you load in a video, or an image sequence? Did you try tracking the points one by one? I'd suggest you set your trackers to Location, Perspective is slow and a bit wonky.

My input sequence is actually over 300 frames long; I just shortened it by setting the start frame to 100 and the end frame to 210. I load a video recorded on a camera (In case it's important, it's a .MOV file). I tried tracking one-by-one, but the same problem arose, even after deleting the perspective markers and replacing them with location.

300 frames should be no problem. I would suggest to make an image sequence (PNG or similar) from your mov. Some codecs compress by comparing beween several frames, those codecs cause problems for applications that don't necessarily treat videos linearly.


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Export Premiere Pro Camera Track Data to Blender?
I'm new to Premiere Pro, but I understand that it has a camera tracking capability. Is it possible to extract this data and feed it into Blender, as can be done in After Effects?

Since Premiere Pro is closed-source, you'd have to find documentation on its API or its data format first. Just use Blender's camera motion tracking features instead.

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


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Is it possible to produce a model for this shadow-play character?
From all the tutorial videos I have seen so far, we will need at least a front view and a side view to properly model a character. For example, like shown in this tutorial (please fast forward to 12:43ish):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QT1GNMevfc
What I want to achieve is:

Model a character that is from a traditional Chinese shadow-play. A character like this one shown below:

Technically, those models are almost two-dimensional. If I model those shadow-play characters in 2D, it will not be possible to have this kind of turning effect (please refer to the following video, please freeze it at exactly 0:33).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcYdgudn83M
I am thinking:

is it possible to model those shadow-play characters as if they are made of thick papers, e.g. almost 2D but there is a bit thickness in them. Then this turning effect can be achieved.

Please feel free to suggest otherwise.

I've seen the video, imho you just need to use orthographic camera, and place (even flat) 2d objects onb different depth levels, as you would do with paper...

You can right-click on a Youtube video and copy a link at the current time. That way you can provide links to people without telling them to go to a certain time.

Create the model flat (so as a 2D model), then apply the Solidify Modifier to give it thickness. That'll make it easy to have a uniform thickness without having to extrude all surfaces manually.


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How use spaces instead of underscores in file names?
I'm referring to this "feature" https://developer.blender.org/T45900
It was not happening before, but it is now, and it is messing up the structure of some folders I previously created. Is there a way to disable it?

If it's a regression that's braking things then it sounds rather bugish to me. Even if it's intended as a "feature", afaik most programs don't do this.

What version appears to be doing this? I can't reproduce this in 2.76 RC1 on archlinux (or any other previous version I've tried)

I'm getting this in a git build of 2.76 (not update for a few days). I use a PPA to provide the builds but otherwise should be nothing different.

This bug was fixed (at 2015-10-15), so the easiest solution is to download nightly build of Blender: https://builder.blender.org/download/ . I have tried it and now I finally can save my files as usually. The fix also will be available in 2.76a and later releases. Alternatively, you can build Blender yourself. The bug was fixed by this patch: https://developer.blender.org/rB767d3f23b7efb4e993574c29ebbbe0a4d90f5e50 .


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How to enable GPU rendering on older Nvidia GPUs?
I have an older Nvidia graphics card that I would like to use for GPU rendering with cycles. However, I am having difficulty enabling this feature. If I open up User Preferences, I see the following:

The only available option is "CPU". I don't see GPU listed anywhere. What do I need to do to enable GPU rendering on my machine?
Software:

Ubuntu 13.04 64-bit
Nvidia binary driver version 304.88
Blender 2.66a

Hardware:

Intel Core 2 Duo @ 1.6GHz
Nvidia GeForce 8400M GS

As of Blender 2.67, r54706, support was dropped for older nVidia GPUs as they were difficult to maintain and feature incomplete. So some older GPUs won't work anymore. It is possible however to compile kernels at runtime for linux for cards that are not officially supported. GeForce 8xxx, 9xxx and 2xx cards are not included in official release, but they might work by enabling experimental features. Read more on the wiki

Note that your video card has only 16 cores, thus will be slower than you CPU.

@iKlsR - Note that he's using Blender 2.66a.

Look here: http://www.graphicall.org/bat3a

As iKlsR said in the comments to your question, we discarded the sm_13 cycles kernel... This is exactly the one needed for your series of cards. Please take my advice when I talk to you as a developer - you don't want to enable this for your card.
First of all it's a hassle to setup nowadays! We don't care for this cards anymore, we don't even check if the code still compiles for it (and it certainly won't with our latest speed improvements for Cycles).
Second, it's slower than rendering with CPU in your case.
Third and foremost you are missing some important features with your kind of card:
There is no support for:

Render-passes,
Ambient Occlusion,
Many Cycles multi closures
Hairs
Motion blur ...

As you can see, this is by no means the optimal way to go! I understand when someone doesn't want to upgrade a system, but in this case you should upgrade for sure!

Thanks for explaining why it would not be a good idea to try to get GPU rendering working. I didn't want to go through a lot of trouble for little benefit, which seems to be the case here. My CPU will work fine for smaller scenes and I'll have to render the larger ones elsewhere.


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Where can I download the production files for Big Buck Bunny?
I would like to download the production files for Big Buck Bunny (one of the most famous movies created with Blender) but I am having difficulty finding the files.
This page on the Blender website contains a link to a .torrent file titled "Production Repository from DVD". However, the tracker is offline. The page also includes an "Entire Studio Backup", but the website hosting it (http://blender-mirror.kino3d.org/) is offline.
The Web Archive only seems to have a copy of the video, not the production files. This website offers some files but none of them seem to include the models for the characters or the textures.
Where can I find these files?

https://cloud.blender.org/

@lbalazscs the files available for download there require a subscription.

Yes, this stuff is not supposed to be free as in free beer. Blender Institute also needs money.

@lbalazscs yes, but these files were obviously available for free at some point.

@lbalazscs the files are still creative commons, open for everyone, and freely available. The subscriptions is just a revenue model, nothing stops anyone from redistributing the files freely, although apparently no one does anymore out of respect for the Blender foundation

Interestingly the torrent worked for me.

@Robert The reason why it works for some and not for others is because the tracker server is The Pirate Bay so uhh most countries would block that. Unless you are behind a VPN, of course.


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Fluid does not reach the bottom of the domain - why not?
I am attempting to create a fluid simulation and I have created a cube for the domain (currently selected):

The other cube has its type set to "fluid" and the angled rectangle is set to "obstacle".
I clicked the "Bake" button to bake the simulation and everything seems to go well for the first few frames. However, the fluid never reaches the bottom of the domain - rather it "hovers" just above it:

related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/82919/how-can-i-fix-this-gap-in-my-fluid-domain


text:
How can I place vertices on the very center of the uv image?

I am trying to move the selected vertices to slap onto the very center of the image, the resolution is 1000x1000 so I want it on the 500px mark. When I tried to center it myself I noticed that the black color on the right was starting to "leak" on to the edge as shown here, kind of hard to see but it's those black spots

I would pop that image into the Gimp and crop it to the exact size you need. There will be workarounds that others have mentioned, but setting up your textures to what you need is always easiest and cleanest. Then from a set view choose UV Mapping-->Project from view(bounds), and let Blender do all the hard work for you.

Ron Proctor's solution, but just set 0.5 0.5 instead of 500 for selected vertices,
Shouldn't that work as well?

In 3d-view in edit mode select your plane and set view in front of your plane  Shift+Numpad 7 or any standard view if your plane isn't rotated in 3d-space
Then press U -> Project from view (bounds)
It will create UV-layout that fits perfectly of image bounds.

There might be a better way, but here's a quick and dirty method:

In the UV/Image editor, select all vertices.
In the UV/Image editor's N-panel, set the UV vertex position to X: 500; Y: 500.
With all vertices still selected, scale 50% in the x-direction by tapping S, X, then typing ".5", Return.
In the N-panel, set the UV vertex position to X: 250.


text:
Prioritizing modifiers between different objects
I know I can prioritize modifiers in an object to decide which modifier will be computed before of another and viceversa, but can I prioritize modifiers between multiple objects?
For example, imagine we have two objects called A and B, they both have 2 modifiers, Am1; Am2; Bm1; Bm2. Can I prioritize them so that the computation order is the following: Am1 - Bm1 - Am2 - Bm2 ?
If not, can I at least prioritize one object on another, so that all the modifiers of an object are computed before of the other?

Not directly.
If a modifier (e.g. Am1) takes another object (B) as input, it will use the result of all modifiers applied to that object (i.e. it will depend on Bm1 and Bm2).
If you need a modifier on one object that only uses some of the modifiers on another (e.g B + Bm1) then you need to make a copy of that object with only the modifiers you need.
If you make the copy using Alt+D rather than Shift+D then both objects will share the same mesh, so any edits on one will update the other.

Modifiers cannot be applied onto linked objects tho, I guess there's no way to make it animate, unless using Python.

Why would you need to apply the modifier to animate? Normally modifiers used in animation arent applied. Only when used for modelling is it common to apply them

Yes but if I would need to do a copy of the object to split the modifiers, I would need to apply it frame by frame no?
Example:
A has the modifier "Boolean" with Difference on C. B is a moving cube which overlaps A and moves away from A, having the modifiers "Boolean" with 'Intersect' on A, and "Wireframe". Then I have C which moves at the same position of A.

"I guess there's no way to make it animate" - to make what? You should describe in detail exactly what you want to do if you want to get an answer for your specific situation. Don't forget you can use all sorts of constraints and parenting, so you can have multiple objects interacting that are generated from the same linked geometry and you can have hidden copies just for use in modifiers belonging to other objects.


text:
Whenever i insert a obj file, it's placed somewhere and idk how to get it normal
Whenever i import a .obj file into blender, it gets placed as a orange dot. When i press numpad period, i see the object but i can't find the grid anymore?
I tried to move the camera to the orange dot but it didn't visible. I also tried to scale the object, nothing happend...
I would like to get the object on the middle of the screen. (where the cube is at the beginning)
Thank you for your reply!
regards,
Jonas

with it selected press Alt + G.

As far as I know, OBJs are imported relative to their own coordinate systems. So try to set it to (0,0,0) in its own environment before exporting.
Another aproach would be to hit Shift+S > Cursor To Center, and after that Shift+S > Selection To Cursor – after that, your object is centered.


text:
Artifacts using denoise
I did this tutorial, and when I render there is an artifact like in the image below.
I'm using the last macOS with an AMD 560, and if I don't include denoising everything is fine. Can someone tell me how to solve this problem? If I render on the processor with denoising then everything is in order. How does the problem relate to the graphics card?
Or how could I set up denoising so that there would not be such an artifact?

Could you show us the rest of the scene and settings? It is hard to tell from that little bit of image alone. Probably a denoiser bug

I have seen artifacts with using the Denoiser with the Glossy Direct Pass so I usually turn that pass off.


text:
Hook and curve transformation
I do not know English very well and write via Google translator, but I need your help.
I need that bezier would retain its shape of a semicircle when I bind the last and the first vertex to different objects.
You can do it manually, but I would like some kind of automatic process, and it will be more accurate than me, thanks in advance :)

Make one curve, then copy it with hooks selected

I can not correctly describe the problem, it is necessary that the attached form of the biseuser maintains the clear form of the semicircle, but thanks for the help :)
 The problem is not solved yet :(

To clarify, can it be assumed Z is up for the semicircle and both ends are at Z=0?  If so a hook in middle driven such that its z location is half the distance that the other two are apart (eg circle diameter) should do it.


text:
Blender 2.8 more gizmo!
I like the new gizmos in Blender 2.8!
I would like to see them more often while working. But I’ve been using Blender for a long time and I use shortcuts. For example, “R” key for rotating and “G” key for moving. When I use shortcuts, gizmos don’t work. I tried to configure shortcuts for gizmos, but nothing changed.
So now: I choose Cube - press “R”, “Z” - rotate the mouse or choose the needed figure - confirm the operation.
What I want: I choose Cube - press “R”, “Z” - rotate the mouse or choose the needed figure and here the needed gizmo appears from the T-board from the left (if I press “G”, the gizmo of moving appears) - with all this going on when I’m rotating the mouse, the gizmo is changing after the mouse or figures I press.
I would be thankful for your support and I’m waiting for your help :)

Hi. Please don't ask the same question twice. If you need to edit a question you can use the [edit] link below it. Seeing as you have corrected the grammatical issues in this one I have voted to close your previous question instead of this one.

From what I understand, yes it would make sense to make the gizmo appear when you press G, R or S, but it doesn't seem to be the case, you need to click on the Move, Rotate and Scale button on the Tools panel, which is a bit tedious.
One thing that is useful to know though is that you can choose to have the gizmo always displayed when you click on the gizmo's options on the bottom. In my opinion it's much more natural to keep it anytime like it was the case in 2.7.

I think there are also a lot of people, myself included, who prefer to work without the gizmos visible ever... But it would make sense to leave them on during operations if they are turned on. As well as the axis indicator in the corner, that for some reason now disappears the only moment someone might actually want to see it - after pressing G/R/S during the transform operation, when it's often time to constrain some axis and one forgets what axis is what direction in relation to the view...

Yes I agree, the second part of my comment is just a non perfect solution

Since we are on the subject, I would like to invite everybody to tell the devs about our struggles with the disappearing axis :) https://devtalk.blender.org/t/disappearing-3d-viewport-axis-when-using-transform-hotkeys-2-8/2355/14

You could right-click the items in the toolbar, and change their shortcuts to g,r,and s.  Then when you flip between g,r,s the manipulator will always show.

.. UV'd, but I wouldn't personally choose to do that. Something quicker than the default Shift-Spacebar + xxx, maybe, but I wouldn't want to cover the basic transforms.


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Bone heat weighting failed to find solution!
I keep getting the "Bone heat weighting failed to find solution"-error when I try to parent a mesh to an armature.
I've deleted doubles, fixed normals, added and removed various modifiers. I'm pretty sure it's because the mesh is asymmetrical, but that's on purpose and it needs to be this way.
I've also tried all Parenting options; the only one that gives the error message is "With Automatic Weights", but the rest just deform the mesh (bones only move parts of the mesh and weight paint doesn't seem to be an option).
Is there some way to get around this?could anyone please link to a way to parent an asymmetrical mesh to an armature?
PLEASE HELP I´M DESPERATE!!

Can you link your file? Could help a lot

I can't post .blend files for copyright reasons :(

mmmmm it's diffciult to understand without any file. Can i download it from any site?

sorry but it´s not possible :(

Ok i'll try to answer as generally as i can :) tell me if could help

The Automatic weight feature doesn't always work.... especially on detailed meshes (Like a character with a complex belt or complex hat), sometimes you just have to do it manually

Follow this instruction

Have your mesh/armature as two objects (not parented and with no vertex groups on mesh)
Select mesh (object mode). Separate > Loose Parts.
Shift-select Armature (do shift-LMB in Outliner if you keep selecting mesh by accident).
Parent > Automatic Weights. This gives your meshes vertex groups.
Outliner - click "white arrow" of Armature to Restrict Viewport Selection.
(Important!) Select any obect that isn't Armature (so its name in Outliner is no longer highlighted white).
Select all. Join.
Outliner - Unrestrict viewport selection of Armature.

Tell me if it works ;)
Or try with this link
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?130935-Bone-heat-weighting-failed-to-find-solution-for-one-or-more-bones

thanks for your help but it´s still saying bone heat weighting failed to... :(

i edit with another link

thanks but i,ve tried everithing possible.Maybe the problem is that it´s nott possible to use automatic weight with an assymetrical mesh.I really appreciated your effort!! :)

Have you tired:  crtl + p and then "with empty groups"? It doesn't give the weight paint but generates vertex groups at least. Then you have to assign your bones to vertex gorups

Thanks for your help Fuboski,I finally achieved it by remodelling the mesh again.Now automatic weighting works perfectly.Thanks a lot.

GREAT MAN!! I'm glad to know it ;)


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Rigify not working at all
Blender ver 4.76.
Rigify is enabled. Does python scripting auto have to be on?
Imported a model but When selecting Armature, Human Meta Rig, no rig shows up. Nothing appears.

Did you activate the addon in the user preferences?

yes for rigify you need to either have auto-python script, or you might need to "reload trusted" it per .blend file when you open it. see http://www.pasteall.org/pic/show.php?id=99752


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Denoising in viewport?
Is it possible to enable the new (2.79b) denoising feature in the viewport? It works great for me in renders, but I can't find a way to apply it in the viewport.

Denoiser works with algorithms done via feature passes and final image data. It's currently not implemented for the viewport nor for progressively refined renders.
Official Documentation


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How can I create procedural textures in code and fill in individual pixels one by one?
When I say procedural textures I mean create a texture in code and fill in individual pixels one by one. I was curious if I could do this in BGE because I am creating procedual terrain and need to generate textures along with it.
Cheers, Keegan.


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How to attach eye armature to rigify armature?
Im creating a character, and Im using a rigify armature for the body. and a normal armature for the eyes, I used a Keep offset setting to parent the eye´s armature to the rigify armature, but when I move the head bone the eyes blows up!

Hi David you mind posting a .blend?  You can use pasteall.org/blend for a quick place to upload.

Rigify armature is really confusing with all those names so what I always do to parent head with new bones for the eyes is to select head bone in edit mode, add a new bone and then add other bone that is going to move one eye and then do the same for the other eye.
After that select the bone that is in the middle connecting eyes with head and delete it. You will have eyes parented with the correct bone head.
I know there are probably other way to do that


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How do I animate a facial animation sprite sheet?
I made a face animation sprite sheet like this,
with multiple faces on one texture sprite sheet.
I've tried animate it by moving its UV, but it stays the same whenever I play the animation.
What should I do to animate them?

Here is the node setup it works as expected I've tested it the past week. Be sure to apply the sprite sheet to a plane with the correct dimension.


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How do I save an object in a blender file separate from the blend file?
I want to gather a folder of objects to use in blender, but I don't know how to separate it from the blend file, or how I would put it back in.

What is the problem you can't solve? It's possible save object in another blend and then link or append object from there. It's possible to export it as fbx, obj, dae etc. and then import it into scene. Or you can save certain object into startup file and have it into Shift+A menu. What is not suiting what you're after from mentioned above?

@MrZak The OP might be referring to browsing datablocks inside a blender file whose UI is presented as browsing a system folder. Not sure,though

@Gregory You can't really save a bunch of datablocks as discrete system folder, they are an integral part of the .blend file and can't be "detached". You can however append a group of desired objects into an empty clean .blend file and then use said file as a library. Search for "append file"

If you are looking to make separate .blend files of particular objects you will use later on in different scenes, there are a few things you must consider.
Actually Making Separate .blends:
If you have an object in a scene that you want to keep for later use but you don't want it in that particular scene, you can simply press ctrl+c in Object Mode with that object selected and it will bring up a menu and it will ask you to copy to buffer... Select that.
Now open up a brand new blender and delete everything in the new blender scene except the lamp and camera. (that is if you need to)
Press ctrl+v to paste the object that you copied to buffer from the other blend and it will appear with all the file paths and textures just like in the original blend. If you do not want to have the object in its original .blend file (not the one you copied to) you can delete it because you copied it to a new file.
Always save your progress.
The Things You Need to Consider:
When making separate .blends for individual objects you computer gets full fast. I have had experience. When you computer is full, blender becomes very slow. I have found that putting packs of objects in a .blend file that are related is very helpful and you can find objects you are looking for faster.
EX: You have household items like plates and you have different models for each plate. Put them all in the same .blend but move each different model to different layers.
Another way to have them separate in the same .blend file is to have the objects in separate groups, with this method you will need to have everything in the .blend file visible to the camera because when linking object groups into a new scene it can get frustrating when you try to render things and cannot see them. You can learn about grouping, linking and appending here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOgOKp7fGko
Also when making separate .blends for an object/objects you need to think about your file structure because when you build up a repository of .blends it can get really confusing when you are trying to find something. Good, organized file structure is so much better than having files all over your computer.
An example of good file structure can be found here http://artstorm.net/journal/2011/08/filmmaking-file-structure/
I hoped this helped in some way.

One solution is to create a file that acts as the folder in which you place the objects. Then you can append them into a scene (File>Append) by navigating to that file and opening the object folder in it.
There is an addon called SenseiFormat that includes a feature called Pocket that is exactly what you are talking about, but the addon has a large number of other things and changes to Blender that you may not want. The addon is free though, so it may be worth a try. You can find it here: https://blendersensei.com/


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During Edit Mode, Circle selection goes wild
I encountered strange behavior of circle selection with Blender 2.79a...

I press C and try to select something, like left foot.

When you take a close look at second screen shot, not only inside of circle but even outside, two from left knee, one from below the belly button, and several others also get selected.
why??? How can I fix this strange behavior???

Can you try doing the same thing in ortho mode Numpad 5 to toggle.

thx for advice! I pressed num5 but result is exact same, additional selections here and there.

The only other thing that seems to fix this for me is to do the selection in wireframe mode z key to toggle, but that is not ideal, when you don't want to select the stuff in the back.

thx again Rick! I didn't know wireframe mode and this is very useful! Regarding selection problem, I am installing 2.8 and will see how it goes...

After submitting Bug Report to Blender Dev Team, they hinted the graphic driver might not compatible with current version of Blender. So I downloaded little older driver from nVidia then works fine again!

I have contacted Blender Dev team and they suggested my graphic driver might cause of this problem.
What I installed combination were:
Blender version : 2.79a &
GeForce Game Ready Driver version : 391.01
This combination was not good. I upgraded/downgraded Blender but selection problem won't disappear. Then I downgraded nVidia driver from 391.01 to 388.71. Then the problem has solved, back to normal behavior.
nVidia driver consists more than 10 components and looks like newer version of component(s) from 391.01 is still in my system. So, I am not sure which component was the reason of problem but downgrading graphic driver certainly help, if you encounter similar problems.


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How to make female's stocking as tight fit
I would like to make tightly fit stocking on female's legs but just like fisherman's boots right now...

Those stockings have slight thickness so it won't shrink(Alt + S) properly. There are small faces on the edge of stockings.

I tried to resize one by one because not huge polys but don't know how to snap to legs... Each corner of stocking have four to five edges. How can I move them as group then snap to nearest leg???
Please throw your thoughts any small ideas could be solutions.
Thanks!

Have you tried using snapping and setting it to face?

Hi, thanks for your advice! I tried snap function but too many options and not quite sure what should I do with the function...

The way to get the one mesh to snap to the other is to use Blenders snapping tools. The controls for this are located at the bottom of the 3D view on the right side of the row of icons just before the OpenGL render buttons.
There is a magnet icon, a small menu with a few options, and then numerous other options based on your menu choice. You will want to set the menu to face instead of increment. All of the other settings should be fine.
Now, when you select a section of your mesh and move it, if you hold Ctrl while you move it it will snap to whatever face from another object is under your mouse. The little magnet icon can be clicked to automatically snap without holding Ctrl if that is easier for you. Snapping also works when you move something on a single axis only or two axes. I your case you may want to try pressing Shift+Z while moving the vertices so that you don't mess up the vertical placement while snapping.

Note that taking solidified geometry into account snapping should be done carefully to not snap outer part to inner part or making it partially sunk into the mesh to snap to (legs in this case). One workaround is removing solidified geometry

That is a good point. However if a vertical section of the top band is selected (both outer and inner geometry) and snapping used it won't go through the leg.


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Any function to morph to very similar mesh?
I have two meshes by different authors for one particular character of video game. Those are pretty same shape but different number of vertices/faces.
My attempt is trying to reshape A.mech as same as B.mesh, much closer to another one while keep number of vertices/faces.
Attached image is displaying A.mesh and B.mesh same time.

All I know is proportional edit/scaling/moving. Is there any other ways to morph to reference mesh(with different number of vertices/faces)?
Thanks for your thoughts and advices!

Use a shrinkwrap modifier on the mesh to be modified targeting the other one.

Thx! It works perfectly!!!


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The materials tab appears different than the usual material tab
when i open my blender a material is applied automatically and i am unable to use the material node editor. The materials tab also appears different than the usual material tab. I am having trouble applying the usual gloss, mix, and other shaders

The question is not so clear to me. Which renderer do you want to use? Cycles or Blender Internal. The pictures in your question are for Blender Internal, but you're also talking about several shaders in the text of your question that are for Cycles

Nodes are used to create materials using cycles renderer. You can see "Blender render" selected on top of your Blender window (which is old Blender render and soon is said to be removed with next version), click on it and switch to Cycles to get nodes to work.

You just have to change the render engine for Blender Render to Cycles Render

Mariusz beat me to it by 4 minutes, but he's right. I ~guess~ you want Cycles. Change your renderer here:

yeah thanx, you're right. It skipped my mind that the active renderer affects the materials and textures. thanx again


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Vertex snapping with axis constraint (like in 3ds Max)
In 3ds Max there is an option for snapping with axis constraint so I can snap like in the image on the right side. Can I do this in Blender? In this case custom orientation isn't working, only way I can solve this case is cutting with Knife Tool and angle constraint enabled.
Also is there an option for snapping to the edge, constrained to one axis (with snapping enabled it's always sliding along edge so I can't get precise results)?

I am not not sure if I understand correctly what you need - try selecting vertex and then pressing g twice. Does that help?

@MariuszKubiński no I guess he needs also to snap the slided vertex, and that's impossible, imho. Snapping is stull much limited in blender, apart during simple trasforms...

@MariuszKubiński that what m.ardito said: I need to move that active vertex on the edge but with snapping (it not possible with slide). With custom orientation it's also impossible.

Snapping system in Blender leaves a lot to be desired in terms of precision modelling at the moment, unfortunately.
One possible solution is to use the Tiny CAD addon (bundled with Blender by default) that has some CAD like intersection tools to create vertex at desired edge intersections.
Here is a workaround for your specific illustrated case without resorting to addons.
Move the vertex vertically until it lines up with the desired snap target, regardless of edge direction, then move it to the side so it forms a convex shape in relation to the two end vertex from said edge.
Select both ends and press J to create a straight edge running between them.
You can now either delete the extraneous vertex, or use the merge tool at Alt + M > At Last to merge the undesired vertex into place.

Probably worth to mention that TinyCAD comes with blender since 2.79.


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Is glass in Cycles just broken or am I doing something wrong
OK So I've been trying to make a simple scene of my room as a bit of practice but I've run into trouble while doing the windows. Whenever I place glass in them it just doesn't act right, to the point that even leaving the widow "open" gives a better result.
I decided to do a little test on how the deafult glass behaves (Principled BSDF with Transmission on 1)
First I made a reference render with no glass. My scene is just a narrow spot light pointing down. I added a volumetric cube as well to help visualize it.

As expected the "Laser" makes a dot of light on the ground.
Now here is where things get wierd. When you point a light at glass what do you expect to happen? You expect for it to show up on the opposite side as glass is seethrough, perhaps with a bit of a reflection on the glass it self.
Well, here is what happens in Blender Cycles:

Nothing comes through to the other side!!!?!
Not only that but look at that harsh shadow dropped by the glass, that's something that just wouldn't happen in real life. There should be some shadow where the edges are but other than that considering this is an unrealistically 100% pure glass there should be no shadow in the centre at all.
The only thing that's there is the desired reflection.
This is the problem I was having when making my scene. I would put the glass in the windows and suddenly
the scene would get really dark and you wouldn't see those squares of lights that windows often produce...
What the hell is going on there. Isn't Cycles supposed to be a physically based renderer!? How can it fail to render glass so hard. Room windows are one thing but this would entirely screw up so many other renders with more complex glass shapes...
Or am I just incredibly stupid and doing something wrong here.

Rendering engine is supposed to act like rendering equation. But when it comes to some complicate thing (volume, glass), the equation need some specified algorithm to reduce the computation work to make it render-able in current hardware.

That makes no sense tbh. Cycles is an offline renderer, performance is nice but ultimately what matters more is its realism. Optimization options that reduce realism should be something you can enable not something that's enabled by default or hardcoded. Besides it's not like I'm asking for somthing impossible here, we've been able to render glass properly with other render engines for at least a decade if not more. The fact that the base glass model in Cycles doesn't let light pass through and acts like a solid wall is a bit ridiculous if you ask me.

Yes, and what if you change the threshold inside the render panel with all those bounces and caustic value? I do encounter the same problem that Cycles Glass is hard to make light go through it, and tweaking those parameter kind of make the issue more severe.

The thing is that Cycles use probability distribution to "simulate" that render equation. When a glass came in, the complexity of the distribution was changed and it might surprisingly not able to calculate it with the hardware structure. Not only because time but also precision, memory space and maybe algorithm/user setting. Take the example of fireflies, those white dot is not realism at all and can not be fully eliminated by rendering time. This is rendering system limitation IMO.

If you want glass with caustics, there are renderers using methods like Metropolis Light Transport that are tuned to these situations.  Suggest LuxCoreRender.  Renderers have to pick their battles, and performance is a major consideration.  See Disney's physically "plausible" renderer

@Geth270 I wrote an answer here that explains glass interactions a bit more in-depth - https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/219957/110840

A bit late, but it works fine for me

Absolutely. The key is the 10000 samples and light caustics. The original example had far fewer samples (can tell from the very spotty scatter of the ray) and probably had caustics disabled. That’s a really nice example of it working as can see the reflection, transmission, and roughness scattering.

Yeah, no. The default glass shader in Blender is just fucked and I can't believe it still hasn't been rectified after so many years (it's been like that long before I posted that question and still is). Results like you showed are possible but this is not the default settings. Really for anyone who finds this I recommend watching this video on how to deal with glass in Blender - https://youtu.be/Sv2wqwsvx-8 It's no silver bullet but at least it explains the idiocy of Cycles glass and how to work around it. Physically based renderer shouldn't take mental gymnastics to render glass, IMO.

I can't really speak to this laser situation, but if you want no shadow at all you can do something like this:

You can decrease the Color value of the Transparent BSDF to control the amount of shadow.

also - https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/204802/spotty-lighting-showing-from-sun-light/204810#204810
and I recommend this youtube video - https://youtu.be/Sv2wqwsvx-8
the volume mix is very low and he can be hard to understand, but there's some good info here

I've already tried something similar but this messes up situations where the shadow should be there due to caustics.


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How to render a model with pixel art/sprite textures and have it not be blurry?
I've made a model that's PS1-eqse in the vain of games like Mega Man Legends, but whenever I try to render it in Blender, it looks absolutely atrocious.
I've disabled Anti-Aliasing, turned off MipMaps in Blender Preferences, which DID make the pixel textures clearer, but only in viewport.
But it still looks awful.
Anything else I can do to make the render show the pixel textures clearer?

Turning of mipmaps is just a performance setting for the viewport, you need to change the interpolation method for each image texture.
In the image node on the second pull down menu change to Closest

Yes, switch to cycles, and instead of diffuse with a lamp in your scene, use your image texture plugged into an emission shader with it's strength set to 0.5


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How to remove / revert blender object centre view?
Using blender v2.76 for a while, I’ve managed to accidentally lock the camera onto an object (The default cube). This causes the zooming to slow down logarithmically once passing the object / space on a certain plain. I’ve tried Numpad + “.” But this only zooms out of the object. Is there any way to remove this centre view?

http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/644/why-does-the-zoom-sometimes-stop-at-a-point

Does walk/ fly mode help? (Shift + F)

You might consult this question, or the question of which it is a duplicate to see if this helps.

Did you try Shift+C or Home button?


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Why is part of the object a different color than everything else?

So today I got on blender for the first time in a long time and decided that if I was every going to get better I would need to start practicing modeling and such. I decided I would model a Pagani Zonda to see what I could do. One of the mirrors on the car is a different color from everything else and I would like to know why. I haven't started texturing yet (though I'm not sure if I will because the model isn't that good). I wish I could describe it better. Is there a way I can post the file? I don't know how to do that sorry. I'm pretty bad at computers. Thanks in advance!
Update I figure out how to add an image at least. It's kind of hard to see but the left mirror is a weird color and I don't know why.

You can upload your file to http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/ and edit the resulting link into your question. Have you tried recalculating your normals? Ctrl + N with the mesh selected in edit mode.

The normals are inside out. You need to flip normals. Press CtrlN in edit mode.


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Why can´t Blender open my STL file?
I am trying to open this STL file https://www.cgtrader.com/free-3d-models/architectural-exterior/street-infrastructure/flag-and-animated#
But when I import it to blender, it just loads an orange dot. What is happening?

I gave it a try and that works.. Can you share a picture of what you obtain ? ... edit : it is big in dimension, that can be a clipping problem : have a look to 'N' panel on the right, then 'view' section then grow up the 'end' clip parameter

You need to know that the STL file format has been designed as a unit-less format. This means, the vertex coordinates will be stored as plain numbers without unit information, and the target system which does the import interprets them using the current scene units. In Blenders case, the scene units are meters. If the source system was set to centimeters or millimeters, the scale will be off by a factor of 100 or 1.000. The site you pointed out offers .fbx and .obj, those formats are superior anyways, as they also are able to transfer textures for instance.

reference here: http://www.fabbers.com/tech/STL_Format  "The object represented must be located in the all-positive octant. In other words, all vertex coordinates must be positive-definite (nonnegative and nonzero) numbers. The StL file does not contain any scale information; the coordinates are in arbitrary units."


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Export an individual object for every frame of animation
I am creating simple animations and need to know if I can export the individual frames as individual files to be rendered in a secondary rendering program?
So I would need individual .obj or .3ds to import into Maxwell Render.

I think it would be more convenient to export these models with their animation together and render what desired. This may not work if accessible file format for import/export can't handle with armatures.

You can export individual frame as individual obj files.
Goto>>File>>Export>>Wavefront (.obj)
Select a folder and then check animation checkmark on the left.then click Export OBJ

Whatever is displayed in the 3D View is what will be exported.
Choose the frame you want to export via the timeline view, or with the Left and Right arrow keys, and whatever pose the model is in will be how it will be exported.


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Blender - non-weighted tangents in graph editor
I know this feature is not implemented in Blender but it's really annoying when animating primarily in Graph Editor without non-weighted tangents. Are there any scripts or plugins that give a similar effect? Thanks in advance!

Can you provide an explanation or link as to what non-weighted tangents are, and / or how they are used in maya?

Hi, this is the link to explanation images :) thank you for your time https://imgur.com/a/ZGqRh


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How to cancel circle select mode by 'X' key instead of ESC key?
I noticed I use left sided keys frequently and did some customized but one remains.
1. Remove Delete function from X key because pressed accidentally many times.
2. And I want to assign 'Canceling Circle Select mode' by press X key instead of distanced ESC key.
I done step.1 but couldn't find how to do step.2, remap X key as cancel circle select mode. Initially I remapped by AutoHotKey but soon I noticed I couldn't type X character(when renaming/creating object &file)...
Thanks in advance.

You know you can exit circle select using the (even less distanced) right mouse button?

oh i didn't know that. what a convenient way... Huge Thanks!!!

I believe you can't change the Escape keybinding, which is also used by many other operators.
But there are other (quicker) methods to exit circle selection.
From the manual:

To cancel the selection use  RMB or key Esc or ⏎ Enter.

Press the  RMB.
If you're right-handed, awkwardly swivel your right thumb onto Numpad Enter.
If you have a programmable mouse, assign any of its buttons to ⏎ Enter or Escape, this would be a useful keybind anyway which is not wasted.


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Cant get my compositing to layer my objects quite right
I got this render where i am attempting to get multiple renderlayers to play nice, im trying to get the water and the ships to appear in front of the stars, but for somereason the star-particles wants to be in front of the objects, i have unsuccessfully tried mask-layers and obj-index, but im quite new to this. if anyone has any tips on how to simply ad my 2 new layers to my compositing tree that be tight :)if images are too dark, or if my question isnt understadable ill be happy to explain more :)

Your node setup is barely visible. You seem to be adding both layers when in fact it sounds like you should be using an Alpha Over instead.

The cause of this issue is the add node just before the final composite node. The node is simply adding the values of the pixels regardless of which is on top. A better way to do it would be to use the Alpha over node, although it's unclear from the images you posted if the render layers with the ships and water have any alpha information. Alternatively, you could set the node to mix instead of add, and then use the object index passes as the factor for the mix node.

thanks man, ill try that as soon as i get home, do u have any links for a good composition nodes tutorials ? i really cant rap my head around the basics :)


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Can't see weight paint heatmap in blender 2.8 release candidate. What should I do to toggle it?
I am trying to weight paint a terrain to adjust the amount of stones in some spots, but when I go in weight paint mode the heatmap is not showing, even if there are changes on the stones distribution when I paint.
Is there an option to toggle or another way to show it?
Thank you

You can now pick weight painting heat map opacity, but for some reason it defaults to zero with some previously saved projects (probably because the category didn't exist before now).

Hope this fixes your problem.


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extrude and animate a polygon along path

Hello I have to make an animation with this shape, but i cant find out any tutorial to explain me the method to achieve the result I'm looking for.
I would like to extrude and animate a square shaped polygon that follows the yellow arrow path so that it builds up the entire shape in red.
Thank you very much for your time.

It is difficult to understand what you would like to accomplish. Could you draw some sketches of the animation?

hello cegaton , i tryed that but it not what i need i need the shape to build up with a square form polygon and follow the yellow arrows on my drawing. when i tryed to animate the curves they was all moving in the same time and i would like to have the logo building shape after shape if you see what i neam , for aexample 1 the I 2 the N 3 the N etc

thank you cegaton for your help , anyway i  still cant achieve what i need with the  curve and bevel , indeed its very usefull to animate a scriptural writing  but i really need to keep the shape of the logo wich is square basicaly. i am very new to blender i must precise i may have not yet memorize all the functions , but i thought that it should have a way to build up this logo keeping it sharp ;

cegaton that worked thank you very much  !!


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Object to move and change with bone
I'm trying to make an object get bigger when I move a bone forward without using the timeline how can I do this? I want to use this to make a gun with a flash when I shoot but I can't figure out how to make the flash get bigger when I move the bone forward

When you are talking about the "bone" do you mean a locator with a parent constraint? Just trying to get a better picture, of what you are trying to accomplish. I do know that you can animate a light source, on the timeline. Still fairly new to blender. But, it could have the same principles as Maya.

What I need is to be able to move a bone in a direction the when I move it in pose mode and as I move it an item can change its size or a lamp could get brighter as I move the bone forward

You could use drivers or a transformation constraint.


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Color problem in Filmic Log Encoding base
I'm quite new in Blender and I saw Filmic light render in some tutorials.
I installed it but I have a problem with colors. Then absolutely don't match with those I input in material. Do you know how to resolve that ?

With Filmic

With RGB

Why should they match?

Please consider that with Filmic Log there is an option for "Look", you may find that if you adjust it to "Base Contrast" or another setting the scene will look similar to what you have before, if you leave it at "None" you can have undesirable results with your scenes.

@NickBosse Thank you very much, that exactly what I searched. :)
cegaton I know but here I was in the exactly same configuration. But It's solved now. Thank you ;)


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How can i disconnect part of mesh, reconnect it to another part and make it a part of different UV island?
I was modifying a boot model consisting of several meshes and ran into a big problem. I have two main mesh parts: the sock (top image on the left) and the boot (top image on the right). I need to disconnect a part of sock (bottom image on the left) and reconnect it to the boot mesh. I tried doing this by hitting the Y short key but this creates additional vertices which messes with the export script. So i need to disconnect and reconnect without changing the total vertex/edge/face count.. I also need the repositioned bit to become a part of a different UV island (bottom image on the right - i sort of drag-and-point where i want the piece to move to). Again, i can't unwrap because blender creates a totally different layout.. I'm almost positive that it's just impossible to do all that but maybe i'm missing something. I've spent 6 hours modifying the model before i realized there was a problem...

This is old question but I'd figure I'll post possible answer anyways because someone else might google this.
I'd just pin (select these verts and press p) the vertices in uv editor that need to stay put. Leave all seams unpinned. Then just press u and do basic uvunwrap the whole mesh. Only those vertices that you wanted to move should move. If you get weird result then you probably have a missing seam, wrong vertice pinned, hidden geometry in edit mode or something else. After the uvunwrap press alt-p in uv editor to get rid of the pin tool.


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Is it possible to transfer coordinates of every vertex from one object to another?
Is there some way to transfer coordinates of every single vertex from one object to another? maybe an addon or something.. i tried Oscurart Copy Vertex Location but couldn't get it to work as shown in tutorial.


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How can i update the uv map after modifying the object?
Similar questions have been asked but i couldn't find one fitting my situation. So i've reshaped a boot model to be used with a new series of textures. Every single vertex has been moved. How do i correctly update the uv map? i've tried unwrapping the mesh again but it repositions the islands (in picture: left - original, right - unwrapped). how do i get it to respect the original layout or update the map without unwrapping?
thank you

You can bake all textures from old mesh to new UV map. Choose old mesh with right textures, select new mesh (adjusted) and bake textures in "from selected" mode.

could you please provide a step-by-step?

ALT + RMB to select Original mesh
ALT + SHIFT + RMB to select New mesh

TAB to enter Edit mode
A to select all
Open UV Editor menu
Press + button to add new image, you may want to increase default resolution or leave as is, then click OK

In Render Tab find Bake menu and click Bake

i did as instructed and all it got me was a black UV map screen with the same unchanged mapping layout.

It is hard to tell what is wrong without actual .blend file. Also this method is more suited for objects with similar shape, because baking depends on distance and it will go bad, if there is some inersecting geometry between meshes.


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

Atl+D  (will duplicate same vertex) with same effect if one is affected changes to all

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

Steps:

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

Pick the high-detailed object as a Target

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

thanks Jan! you've made my day)) it will have to be fine-tuned though. the target object has more verts but is smaller. so during the transformation instead of redistributing "extra" verts where they could actually be useful the algorythm bundles them up in some weird places)) my thinking is that i'll have to learn how to cut them out and increase the vertex count exactly by the amount lost in the cut.


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Moving object while following it with camera
I'm looking for a shortcut to lock camera (3D view, not the object: "Camera") temporarily onto an object while moving it (object). For example if I move a cube in x-axis and it leaves the visible area in viewport, I could press a shortcut to follow the object without the need the disencage from the action of moving the cube (and scrolling back etc..). This is a feature I found really helpful in Unreal Engine 4 and I've been trying to find a way to do it in Blender, without success.
Also, I know this is pretty lazy, but aren't that what shortcuts are made for :)
Thanks!

Recentering on the object is done with Numpad period without any locking. You can use Lock to Object feature on the Properties shelf > View rollout, but that will affect viewport much more.

You could try using a camera object and locking the camera object to the view in the side panel settings when selecting a camera object (under view).
When you go into camera view (numberpad 0) it will move with the 3d camera.
Edit* You can setup multiple cameras this way and scroll through them by setting markers in the time line.

I guess that works, thank you for taking the time to reply. I'm suprised that Blender doesn't have a shortcut for such useful feature!


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Blender + ctypes = segmentation fault
I'd like to use Blender as a modeling environment for engineering stuff.
Blender = python - that is obvious, however I have plenty of functionality for my modeling written in c++ but exported as a c with extern "C".
In order to use my c++ functionality in python, I wrap it using ctypes, which works well with python2.7 and python3.5.
Generally I use my c++ (with extern "C") functionality with python and ctypes with no problems, but in Blender I have a big problem - it simply crashes when I try to get any value from my c++ shared object.
The following two pieces of code recreate the problem:
==== ==== c++ functionality (compiled as libblTest.so) ==== ====
#include <stdio.h>

class KBlenderTest
{
public:
   KBlenderTest(double initVal)
   {
       _val = initVal;
       printf("obj created: initVal: %g\n", _val);  // print to prove that object was created
   }

   ~KBlenderTest()
   {
       printf("obj deleted\n");
   }

  /** function that crashes Blender, but not other instances of python interpreter */
  double get_val()
   {
       return _val;
   }
private:
   double _val;
};

extern "C"
{
    KBlenderTest *KBlenderTest_init(double initVal)
    {
        return new KBlenderTest(initVal);
    }

    void KBlenderTest_del(KBlenderTest *obj)
    {
        delete obj;
    }

    double KBlenderTest_get_val(KBlenderTest *obj)
    {
        return obj->get_val();
    }
}

==== ==== python wrapper for ctypes (blTest.py) ==== ====
import ctypes as ctp

cpp = ctp.cdll.LoadLibrary("path_to_shared_lib/libblTest.so")

cpp.KBlenderTest_get_val.restype = ctp.c_double

class KBlTest(object):
    def __init__(self, initVal):
        self.obj = cpp.KBlenderTest_init(ctp.c_double(initVal))

    def get_val(self):
        return cpp.KBlenderTest_get_val(self.obj)

    def __del__(self):
        cpp.KBlenderTest_del(self.obj)

def test(initVal):
    test = KBlTest(initVal)
    print("test=", test.get_val())

In linux shell python I run the test with:
import sys
sys.path.append("path_to_python_wrapper/")
import blTest

blTest.test(1.23)

which gives the following output:
obj created: initVal: 1.23
test= 1.23
obj deleted

Exactly the same action in Blender's python console, crashes Blender with segmentation fault. Currently I use Blender 2.79, but the situation was exactly the same with a few versions back.
Has anyone had similar problem?
The functionality I have in mind is much more complex, but I've tracked it  down to a relatively simple case.
I would be grateful for some clues how deal with this.
Best wishes,
Jerzy

Instant upvote for having made a minimal example! Have you tried building a debug build of Blender yourself, so you can see what's going on?

No, I haven't done so yet. I was hoping, that there is someone, who has successfully struggled with a case like this. I'll try do the debugging soon, but my problem is that I really need to model something soon.

You also need to specify the arg types, e.g.
cpp.KBlenderTest_get_val.argtypes = (ctp.c_void_p,)

otherwise I think they default to int, which is the wrong size for a pointer on 64-bit architectures.
Also, I would recommend opening the .so file with its full name including version number, e.g.
cpp = ctp.cdll.LoadLibrary("path_to_shared_lib/libblTest.so.1")

This is because it is usual to increment the version suffix if/when the ABI changes in some backward-incompatible way, so you want to make sure you stay with the right version, at least until your Python wrapper gets updated to the newer version in future.


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How do you texture multiple objects with a single image?
I have a jigsaw puzzle with 4 pieces.  Each piece is a different object in the scene.  I have an image that I want to span across the top face of each jigsaw piece.  How do you texture multiple objects with a single image?
https://drive.brainsick.com/blender/texturing/multipleobjects/2x2puzzle.blend
https://drive.brainsick.com/blender/texturing/multipleobjects/apple.jpg
Looking for a technique that will scale across 1000+ piece puzzles.

Can't you simply UV unwrap each object onto the image? I mean, I know it would be hard, but, isn't that the simple way?

Use built-in tools to include images and blend-exchange to post files please, it's quite hard to open that link and it very likely can become obsolete. In your case you could use Object texture coordinates from adjacent node

USING TEXTURE ATLAS ADD ON

Instal an add on in User Preferences (Ctrl+Alt+U).

Select all objects in Object mode then press '+' button in the Texture Atlas panel.

Press Start Manual Unwrap button.

Go to the Edit Mode, select all meshes (A) and unwrap it as you like (in my case U-->Project from View (Bounds)), then press Finish Manual Unwrap button.

It will create one UV map for all the pieces.

JOINING, UNWRAPPING, SEPARATING MESHES

Remove doubles for all your pieces (in Edit Mode press W-->Remove Doubles) and join all objects in Object Mode with Ctrl+J. Unwrap it in Edit mode, then separate meshes with P-->By Loose Parts.

Thank you.  I had been trying the join/unwrap/separate technique myself.  I kept ending up with more objects than I started with; a single piece would become three - a top, bottom, and edge.  So I had dismissed it as non-viable.  Removing doubles before joining keeps the objects in tact when I later separate them again.

I am glad you like it :). About your issue- maybe you do it in a wrong order. At the beginning you have four separated pieces. You select one of them in Object Mode, go to Edit Mode, select all the vertices with A, then press W--> Remove Doubles. Then you repeat the same process for the other pieces. When you're done with it you join them, select all vertices again and finally separate.

It wasn't an order problem so much as I simply didn't know 'remove doubles' needed to be done.  I understand the technique now, thanks to your screencast / visual aids.


text:
Keep Offset keeps doesn't work as planned
I have been following this tutorial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGvalWG8HBU
And I reached the part where he assigned 2 bones and kept it as offset. The problem that I am facing is that whenever I do Keep Offset, the Foot keeps disconnecting from the Leg and joins up with the Leg IK. Any Ideas for solution???

You have to go to pose mode after "Keep Offset".


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Strange lines appearing in model texture
Im making a model for a game and I handpainted the texture but in the render appear some strange lines in the texture (Like in the back of the character that is in the picture down below) does anyone have a idea what is causing this?
That texture part is represented on the right side of the character.

Try increasing the "bleed" parameter while painting.

Also, try zooming in closer - artifacts like this often happen from the way the projection paint works, and I zoom in and can then cover those problems


text:
Beveling one edge more than another

I'm trying to bevel the front edge (the edge closest to the camera) a different amount to the already beveled edge. How do I do this?

Bevel one at a time introducing different values for each


text:
colored shadows for transparent objects with shadow catcher
I'm rendering a scene in cycles with partially transparent objects and I would like to use shadow catcher to composite the objects and their shadows onto a perfectly white background.
Normally these transparent objects cast colored shadows.

However, when I make the plane they are sitting on a shadow catcher the shadows are just grey.

Is there any way to keep the colored shadows when using the shadow catcher?

I do not believe this is possible at this point with just the shadow catcher function added in v2.79.
The function is imperfect for compositing, it also does not catch light or refraction/reflections for example.
Its just a quick way to composite your scene for mock-up purposes.
I would suggest to use the compositor and render passes to achieve the desired effect, which is much more involved and exceeds the answer to this question.


text:
Viewport not going to camera when I click numpad 0
When I click Numpad 0, The view port normally goes to the camera's perspective
In this picture you can clearly see where the camera is

but when I click Numpad 0 to go to the camera's perspective it goes to the center of the skeleton for my model

If anyone has a way to fix this, that would be greatly appreciated.

Check your input preferences for View Numpad. Maybe you changed it sometime?

In case anyone else encounters this problem, well, there is a bug i think that makes an armature become the camera. Removing the armature and appending it back from a backup file will stop the issue from happening.

Your camera is not active anymore, select it and press ctrl 0, or in the Properties panel > Scene > Camera > choose the camera you want.

If this is the right answer you should mark it as “right” with the green check mark.

The camera in my setting was active but had the same problem. The solution was to move the camera from a nested collection to the "Scene Collection"


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Blender 2.8 Freestyle SVG exporter broken?
I'm trying to create line drawings from my model (which I have done many, MANY times before), but the new version is not working how I'm used to. Yesterday it was creating the freestyle lines in the render, but exporting blank SVG files. Today, it's gotten worse, and is not rendering any freestyle lines nor outputting any usable SVG files (all blank with a size of 1KB).
I have tried Cycles and Eevee, both with no luck. I've moved my objects to a new Blender file, restarted my computer, reinstalled Blender, all with no luck.
Also, the freestyle calculations are taking much MUCH longer than I'm used to, just to give me nothing in the end. Each time I render it takes 30-45 minutes to output a blank render window and a blank SVG file.
I can't post photos of my objects because of non-disclosure agreements, but if it helps, they are simple flat surfaces in various shapes, with holes for screws and such as well as freestyle edge marks for a few interior lines. I also have a plain cube which does the same: nada.
I've gone through all of the freestyle and SVG export options, and cannot identify a single one that could be causing this. I'm using all the same settings that I used in 2.79, and have also been playing with the settings to see if they change anything but no luck at all with anything.
So what changed? I know its a difficult question to ask when I can't post any images, but are there any newer settings I need to mess with to make this work again? I can't find any other posts with this issue and I need this to work ASAP.
I know this community loves its screenshots, but I hope I've provided enough information for suggestions. Let me know what you guys think is going on here. Thank you for your help!

Have you used Blender 2.8 before and it worked properly (or did it only work in 2.79)? Have you tried a simple scene like the default cube in Blender 2.8 and what were the results?

It has only worked in 2.79, since updating to 2.8 it does not work. Yes, I have tried the default cube, and it did not do anything differently. I would really like to make it work in 2.8 rather than reverting, I'm very interested in trying the new curvature computation.

So even with the default cube no freestyle lines in the render and also an empty svg export? You're using the official release of Blender 2.8?

Yes, that's correct. I've even tried reinstalling and it didn't help. :(

Do you get any render results at all without having freestyle active (Render Tab > Freestyle) since you're saying that with freestyle the render is blank? Are there any errors written on the console?

Yes, when I have environment and surfaces turned on all of those things render properly. With or without freestyle on. SVG is still blank though. I have freestyle enabled in render settings, filter settings in layers tab, and Freestyle SVG export enabled in scene settings. But weird thing that just happened, I just had to reenable the SVG export addon in user preferences and noticed that it keeps disabling itself. Is there a way to set default user settings in 2.8, or is that supposed to happen automatically? Still doesn't explain why it would be exporting blank SVG files though.

Update: Just tried it on a different work computer, which was working normally for the most part, until I enabled face marks. Then it started doing the same things that happen on my work computer. I tried disabling face marks on my computer so after its finished doing its thing we'll see if it worked. The render itself is finished but its still taking a ridiculous amount of time to calculate the freestyle lines, so I sort of doubt it helped.

Can't reproduce the issue on my end, it works both with and without Mark Freestyle Edge. I know that the SVG exporter has an error that prevents it from showing what used to be the render layer options in Blender 2.79 because the bl_context wasn't updated (https://developer.blender.org/rBA9e0dc9b9d3c4c83eee207324ea9df0bf6e619617). That shouldn't be the cause though, especially if you're experiencing this with the default cube (and not just with old projects from 2.79).

If you find a reliable way to reproduce the issue on both computers, please write a bug report (Help > Report a bug in Blender and watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTD0OJq_rF4) and include step by step instructions how to create a project where this problem occurs.

I'm using 2.82 now and I also cannot get the Freestyle SVG Exporter to produce anything.

I have been having the same issue with Freestyle SVG exporter. I thought I was getting empty SVG file each time I was rendering. I tried on Cube scene with almost default setting and it worked, but after importing a mesh from FBX file Freestyle seems to be creating just an empty file. After few days of playing around with different settings still no results.
Then one day, I noticed that my CPU usage is not high but it was not equal to 0% when the render was already done - at least it seems like it was done.

Then I noticed that there is a small information from freestyle that in renderer window:

It seems that the SVG pass was still working in the background. After some time around 1 hour it produced the SVG output correctly. I think the plugin could use a little bit better way of communicating that it is still processing the SVG, especially that when closing the Rendered window it is aborting the process. I almost lost my hair over this.
TIP 1: Selecting option to cache the View Map can save a lot of time if you trying out different output styling, but I would recommend working out the Line Style on a very simple object first before going into rendering the complex mesh, or a scene.
TIP 2: Selecting "Select by Image Border" also saves a lot of time if we have a complex scene and what we have actually in the camera view is just a part of all.
I know it is an old post, but maybe will save time for many people in the future. Best regards.


text:
My circular arrays don't array
My Array Modifier seems to make fine arrays in Constant Offset or Relative Offset. However when I try to use Object Offset nothing gets arrayed.  I have followed every tutorial I can find to see if I am missing a step; no luck.  I have tried on several machines; they all behave the same.  When I rotate the Empty it spins all day long while the object remains still and never produces any meshes. The object and the Empty have the same Location, Rotation, and Scale, but do not seem to be associating with each other. Using 2.79b on a Windows 10 platform.

From the information provided, it's hard to provide any help other than a bunch of guesses of what's going on. Could you please provide either a screenshot of the scene&modifier settings or a .blend file with the problem?

You can upload your file on Blend-Exchange

Thank you, thibsert! Had everything right EXCEPT the checkbox.

Please make sure that :

Object Offset is checked
Under Object Offset, the Empty is selected (either via the object list, or via the picker)
Count isn't set to 1.


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why left mouse select doesn't work
When i chose to have left mouse as my select function it should work yet it doesn't it just rotates the camera around the right mouse select works fine but why doesn't the left one?

I assume you already set the user preferences to have the selection on left click instead of right click?

im just an idiot i guess my some of my camera controls were bound incorrectly

You can add your own answer to this question, explaining what you had done wrong - in case someone else has the same problem in the future :)

If you do have this issue go to your user preferences and change your camera controls mine was interfering with the left click select so I set it back to the normal middle mouse click

Minimize then maximize fixes it for me.

Hi, thanks for the post. This site is not a regular forum, answers should be substantial, stand on their own, and thoroughly explain the solution and required steps. 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 how it works, perhaps add a few images illustrating some steps and final result. See How to write a good answer?, otherwise it may be converted to a comment.


text:
How to bake multiple audio sounds to f curve?
I want to add three different audio clips to same character's mouth using bake sound to f curve. But I am able to add only one sound clip. when i try to add second clip, it replaces the first one. Please help me.

Bake to custom properties to drive from.

As an example I've made 3 custom properties on the default cube.
Add a keyframe and bake to sound for each.

Image. Baked prop, added keyframe to prop2.
Now let's say we want to drive the cube's x location by these props.
Add a driver to the location.x field. Hover over with mouse, right click, add drivers > manually create later single.  Put the graph editor in Drivers mode, select the location.x driver, hit N and choose drivers tab.

with scripted expression chosen (default) and the "use self" option checked, can type (or paste) in an expression, where self is the Cube object, adnd self["prop"] is the value of baked property "prop".
The following sums the three.
self["prop"] + self["prop1"] + self["prop2]"

or another way using sum
sum([self["prop"], self["prop1"], self["prop2]"])

average
sum([self["prop"], self["prop1"], self["prop2]"]) / 3

the maximum.
max([self["prop"], self["prop1"], self["prop2]"])

Or if you cannot add the properties to what you are animating, can set up the drivers the old fashioned way  with variables.  Add a single property type variable for each, select the Cube as the target object and the datapath is ["prop"] for "prop"

The expression uses the variable names, I've used p0 , p1, p2.  Similarly to above, the sum would be.
sum([p0, p1, p2])

or by choosing 'SUM' as the driver type.


text:
How can I tie the Display Face Orientation to a Toggleable hotkey?
I already have the... thing:

bpy.context.space_data.overlay.show_face_orientation

This accepts a boolean value. I found this out by looking at the Info menu.
I think it's called a context attribute?
I just don't know how to set its value to True or False with a toggleable hotkey.

@RobinBetts why answer as a comment instead of as an answer?
It's the second time I see this phenomenon. And yes, that answers it.

In 2.8x, it's simpler than that. Just open the overlays panel, right-click the Face Orientation check-box, and select 'Assign Shortcut' from the menu.


text:
Can you design highly detailed miniature model trains, cars, buildings, etc, for 3d printing with Blender? If you can how?

Im starting a business to design and make highly detailed 3d printed miniature models of trains, vehicles, boats, buildings, etc. Don't have much experience with 3d designing, not sure of what I need for cad. Want to make my designs on Shapeways. Appreciate it if anyone can help, Dan.

Unless you are ready to deal with the intricacies of proper topology you'd probably be advised to use a either a NURBS or Solid modelling based software instead. Bad news is there are no free examples.

Looked into some solid modeling software, seems like more than necessary for a small business, but I have contacted SolidWorks. Any other suggestions?

Closest to free is MoI which is relatively cheap for this type of software, considering the competition. And excellent quality too, I've used it myself. There is also FreeCAD which is more of a parametric tool. But this just to say that Blender is fully capable of doing what you want, just takes some getting used to.

Can mol create very small details? Have you ever used it for 3d printing?

Never used it specifically for 3D printing, but Moi is a joy to use. It is particularly aimed at small projects and single pieces, not full fledged modelling of large structures. Not in terms of physical size, more in terms of complexity or scope.


text:
Why isn't Armature>Separate Bones working for me
I'm a blender noob.
I obtained a blender model which has two rigged low-poly hands attached to an armature with shoulders and arms.
I'd like to edit it so that it only has the right forearm and hand.
I think that I should be able to do this by selected the relevant bones and then using ctrl-alt-p to make the arm a separate armature.
But no matter what I try that command doesn't seem to do anything.
I'm using Blender 2.79, on a Mac.

What does Ctrl Alt P do for you? because in the default key bindings Ctrl Alt P makes a proxy.

In edit mode, select the bones you want in a different armature, then press P.


text:
How to create mesh collider for a blender model
I have built a house model in blender. I want to add collider to it's interior and exterior walls. How do I do that?

If i understand you correctly, just go to physics tab and apply collision to walls. Or make a secondary box around it and give that collision. This is for blender related stuff. If you are going to export it you need to dig around youtube for a tut.

Could you please point me to a tutorial for adding the collision to walls? Basically when I export the model to .obj and use it in a-frame, my camera ends up going through wall instead of colliding


text:
Moving grid instead of model problem
I use A to select all my model parts, but when I hit G to move it only the grid moves. How do I correct this?

Are you currently looking through your camera? If so, by selecting everything in the scene you also select the camera. By then using GKey to move, you're moving all your parts and the camera as well, so it'll appear that only the scene grid is moving.
Try locking the camera in place (the X, Y, and Z locations on the N Panel) and see if that helps.

Thanks, but it did not solve the problem.

You have the view locked to an object. Press N to show the 3dview properties region and find the View panel, in there you will find the Lock to Object option.
Click the little X to the right to disable the lock view to object.

If I got your question right you probably enabled the snap during transform option. Disable the magnet button and it'll work as you need.


text:
Trying to get a spotlight to project an image in Blender 2.80
I'm new to Blender and I want to project an image on a plane from a spotlight but I'm having difficulty.
This link says to find Texture panel for the lamp which I can't find. There is a Texture panel in 2.80 but it doesn't seem connected to the spotlight. I presume these instructions are for 2.79 or earlier.
Can someone direct me to a useful link or at least give a general overview of how to do this in Blender 2.80?

Related.

Related https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/80007/29586


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Bone heat weighting: failed to find solution for one or more bones error hair
I've got huge problem.I am trying to connect hair to rig, but all the time this error appear. I tried removing doubles, applying mods and other smart tricks i found on this forum, but still fails. If anyone have any idea how to fix it I would be thankful.
I drop my blend file:

http://blender.stackexchange.com/search?q=failed+to+find+solution+for+one+or+more+bones+error

Automatic weights is an useful shortcut to speed up the weighting process, but every complex character will need some handmade fine tuning: you can rely to automatic weights only if the character is a single-piece mesh, manifold, no doubles, no crossings, ecc .... In your case there are lots of different spare parts. The hair, in particular, has inverted normals; after you recalculate normals you can select all hair mesh, then shift select the armature, go to pose mode, unselect all, select the head bone and Ctrl+P, "bone" option: in this way, hair will be strictly parented to the head bone, without any weight issue. Then you will have to fix all the dress problems ... Good luck, and start using manual weighting (my favourite way is "with empty groups": this option creates empty vertex groups that can be manually weighted in edit mode).

Thank you bro i will try to do this as you said hopefully it will works.


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How can I fix the orientation of the camera so it is above the grid?

This is my first-time camera tracking in Blender and I have no idea how I would fix this, the tracking points are above the camera when they're meant to be below. Does this matter?