text:
2.8 Shortcut to turn on/off "Emulate 3 Button Mouse"..?
Could use some insight please, I am not sure how to properly formulate this question (brand new to 3D and Blender 2.8). After reading up on various forums there maybe a way to reprogram a keymap shortcut for the ALT key?
I prefer having the "emulate 3 Button Mouse" checked for general tumbling/navigation so I don't have to use the MMB when zooming or nudging viewport but when  "emulate 3 Button Mouse" is checked it nukes the ability to employ the ALT key for selecting edge loops/rings.
I found that Left Double Click works although selection is limited and does not do half of what is available as far as selecting/deselecting goes... Hmmm?
Sorry for long scenario here, not sure if there is a workaround. It's be nice though.
Thanks in advance.
:)

I wanted this as I find using the MMB to be a bit of a strain compared to the other buttons, I agree it is easier to use the ALT key for rotating the camera.

Blender's keymap requires an operator to execute when the shortcut is pressed. Currently there is no operator to toggle the Emulate 3 Button Mouse option from the preferences, but this can be solved by writing a little add-on.
The following add-on creates an operator that allows to toggle the preference option and can therefore be added as a shortcut into your keymap. Copy & paste the script into a file and save it with the .py file extension.
bl_info = {
    "name": "Toggle 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse'",
    "author": "Robert Guetzkow",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 80, 0),
    "location": "Edit > Operator Search",
    "description": "Operator for toggeling the 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse' option.",
    "warning": "",
    "wiki_url": "",
    "category": "Preferences"}

import bpy

class PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "preferences.toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse"
    bl_label = "Toggle 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse'"

    def execute(self, context):
        context.preferences.inputs.use_mouse_emulate_3_button = not context.preferences.inputs.use_mouse_emulate_3_button
        return {"FINISHED"}

classes = (PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse,)

def register():
    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.register_class(cls)

def unregister():
    for cls in classes:
        bpy.utils.unregister_class(cls)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

You can install the add-on in Edit > Preferences > Add-ons.

Once it's installed you will have to enable it. You can find it in the Preferences category.

Then switch to the Keymap in the preferences and add a shortcut referencing the operator from the add-on. You'll have to decide what key binding you'd like to use.

wow thank you, this is way above my level of expertise but I will try my best. I am only guessing but do I save the script as a .py or is there a file extension blender prefers ?

Yes, you need to copy & paste the code into a file and save it with .py extension, for example toggle_emulate_3_mouse_button.py. In the preferences in the Add-ons section there is an Install button at the top. Click it and select the file.

It should show up in the list of add-ons afterwards. You need to enable it by clicking on the checkbox next to it.

I did it..! You Sir are a genius! Thank you so much. It took a bunch of attempts but made it work.

@halipino You're welcome! If my answer solved your problem, please mark it as accepted by clicking on the checkmark.

10 stars **********

Building on Robert Gützkow's excellent answer and script, I've updated the script to perform a similar task for Emulate Numpad, and which also applies the hotkeys for your particular concern (Toggling Emulate Middle Mouse Button) that involved an extra manual step in Robert's Answer:

" for Toggle Emulate Middle Mouse Button

; for Toggle Emulate Numpad

You may change these hotkeys in the Preferences.
bl_info = {
    "name": "Toggle 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse' & 'Emulate Numpad'",
    "author": "brybalicious courtesy Robert Guetzkow",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (2, 90, 1),
    "location": "Edit > Operator Search",
    "description": "Operator for toggling the 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse' & 'Emulate Numpad' options",
    "warning": "",
    "wiki_url": "https://github.com/brybalicious/toggle_mmb_numpad/wiki",
    "category": "Preferences"}

import bpy
import rna_keymap_ui
from bpy.utils import register_class, unregister_class

# Surfacing the Operators
# They can now be looked up via their bl_label attribute with the search function on default hotkey F3

class PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "preferences.toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse"
    bl_label = "Toggle 'Emulate 3 Button Mouse'"

    def execute(self, context):
        context.preferences.inputs.use_mouse_emulate_3_button = not context.preferences.inputs.use_mouse_emulate_3_button
        return {"FINISHED"}

class PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_numpad(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "preferences.toggle_numpad"
    bl_label = "Toggle 'Emulate Numpad'"

    def execute(self, context):
        bpy.context.preferences.inputs.use_emulate_numpad = not bpy.context.preferences.inputs.use_emulate_numpad
        return {"FINISHED"}

# Keymap Code

# First, set up a dictionary of key mappings.

# "TEMPLATE": [{"label": "Human readable name of keymap in Blender Keymap UI",
#               "region_type": "WINDOW", //Default is WINDOW (optional)
#               "space_type", "EMPTY", //Default is EMPTY
#               "map_type": "KEYBOARD", //Device to be used (optional)
#               "keymap": "Window", //Name to be chosen from declared list of keymap names
#               "idname": ..., //Specific reference to operator from blender API
#               "type": "", //Key type identifier - choose a specific keyboard button or mouse button, etc...
#               "ctrl": False, //Combination keys for compound hotkeys (optional)
#               ...
#               "value": "PRESS"}, //Whether key will be held, pressed, etc...
#              {...}]

keys = {"MENU": [{"label": "Toggle Emulate 3 Button Mouse",
                  "region_type": "WINDOW",
                  "space_type": "EMPTY",
                  "map_type": "KEYBOARD",
                  "keymap": "Window",
                  "idname": "preferences.toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse",
                  "type": "QUOTE",
                  "ctrl": False,
                  "alt": False,
                  "shift": False,
                  "oskey": False,
                  "value": "PRESS"
                  },
                {"label": "Toggle Emulate Numpad",
                  "region_type": "WINDOW",
                  "space_type": "EMPTY",
                  "map_type": "KEYBOARD",
                  "keymap": "Window",
                  "idname": "preferences.toggle_numpad",
                  "type": "SEMI_COLON",
                  "ctrl": False,
                  "alt": False,
                  "shift": False,
                  "oskey": False,
                  "value": "PRESS"
                  }]}

# Define a function to get a list of key mappings, 'keylists'
def get_keys():
    keylists = []
    keylists.append(keys["MENU"])
    return keylists

# Define a function to register the key mappings templated in the dict as keymaps, using the constructor kc.keymaps.new()
def register_keymaps(keylists):
    wm = bpy.context.window_manager
    kc = wm.keyconfigs.addon

    keymaps = []

    for keylist in keylists:
        for item in keylist:
            keymap = item.get("keymap")
            space_type = item.get("space_type", "EMPTY")
            region_type = item.get("region_type", "WINDOW")

            if keymap:
                km = kc.keymaps.new(name=keymap, space_type=space_type, region_type=region_type)
                # km = kc.keymaps.new(name=keymap, space_type=space_type)

                if km:
                    idname = item.get("idname")
                    type = item.get("type")
                    value = item.get("value")

                    shift = item.get("shift", False)
                    ctrl = item.get("ctrl", False)
                    alt = item.get("alt", False)
                    oskey = item.get("oskey", False)

                    kmi = km.keymap_items.new(idname, type, value, shift=shift, ctrl=ctrl, alt=alt, oskey=oskey)

                    if kmi:
                        properties = item.get("properties")

                        if properties:
                            for name, value in properties:
                                setattr(kmi.properties, name, value)

                        keymaps.append((km, kmi))
    return keymaps

# Define a function to unregister the keymaps
def unregister_keymaps(keymaps):
    for km, kmi in keymaps:
        km.keymap_items.remove(kmi)

classes = (PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_3_button_mouse, PREFERENCES_OT_toggle_emulate_numpad)

def register():
    for cls in classes:
        register_class(cls)

    global keymaps
    keys = get_keys()
    keymaps = register_keymaps(keys)

def unregister():
    global keymaps
    for km, kmi in keymaps:
        km.keymap_items.remove(kmi)

    for cls in classes:
        unregister_class(cls)

# if __name__ == "__main__":
#     register()

To install, please download or clone the repository from https://github.com/brybalicious/toggle_mmb_numpad.git and follow the same instructions for installing the addon as an archive with .zip extension, as per Robert's answer. Hope this helps!

Ineresting, but please prefer past the code here instead of refering an external link. Thanks you.

sure thing @lemon I updated with the code inline. If the answer is satisfactory now, please rate it :)

I like this automates adding the keymap, I did find that using the double quote didn't work right.  It seems you cannot use any key in preferences > Keymap that requires you to hold down the shift key first for a symbol, it only picks up left shift or right shift.  It works to set in code but I could not reliably get the shortcut key to work.

It's a few more keys but I used Ctrl+Alt+Shift+Q.  Blender does have quite a few functions, single letter shortcut keys are probably all used already :).


text:
Add an image texture to a shader subgraph
I am trying to create a material which uses a texture. That texture is used in a subgraph (I think the technical term in blender is NoedGroup, but Im not sure). The input for that subgraph is the texture name as a string, uv coordinates and some other stuff.
I have a osl script which loads the texture using the texture name and do all the operations needed. The problem is that the script node is not compatible with eevee.
Is there anyway to add the image texture as an input to the subgraph so I can replace the osl script with eevee compatible nodes?
I have check this other answer, but seems to be doing exactly what I currently have.
Select Input Texture file name as parameter/node

You'll have to script a custom node with Python, as far as I know

How would do that with eevee compatibility?

@cegaton I think you have completely misunderstood the question. What I want is to replace the script by the ImageTexture node, but be able to modify the image using some input to the node group

Unfortunately there isn't any way to create a NodeGroup that has a Texture selection as an input without some coding to create Custom nodes. For the Custom node, you'd have to have the image texture node in the node tree, whose value you would change via code using the custom node UI. Please read information in the link below for a much more thorough explanation of this process.
Cycles Materials Math node with more than two inputs

Will this be compatible with eevee?

I was thinking on adding a color input to the NodeGroup. By code, I would detect if that color input is connected to an external ImageTexture and update the internal ImageTexture node to match the external one. Would this be possible?

I have tested it with a very simple material and the ShaderNodeCustomGroup appears to work fine in eevee

Hey, sorry I didn't reply. I see that you've already tested it. It's definitely a more powerful alternative to OSL shaders which are more convenient in comparison. Glad I could be of help ^^

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Baked normal looks pixelated
I have two models one low poly and one high poly. The high poly is one that I have been sculpting on and I used that one to bake a normal, but for some reason when I use the normal on the low poly model it looks pixely.Any idea why?
This is the low poly model with the normal applied

This is the high poly

That looks like compression artifacts to me, possibly because the normal map was saved as jpeg.

could you please pack the image and share your file?

Thank you @rjg that was the problem.

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


text:
Why does the File Browser's 'filepath' property include the blend file name once the file has been saved?
I am puzzled by a weird behaviour of the Blender File Browser (v2.81) that I use to select the path to a folder containing the data my script processes:

when it is invoked from a Blender project that was never saved, self.filepath returns the path selected e.g. my/selected/path/. This is the behaviour I am expecting.

when it is invoked once the Blender project file as been saved (foo.blend), then self.filepath returns the path selected and appends the name of the project to it my/selected/path/foo.blend

I am getting around this by stripping foo.blend but I am puzzled by this.
Test code (courtesy of this page):
import bpy
import os
from bpy_extras.io_utils import ImportHelper
from bpy.types import Operator

class OT_TestOpenFilebrowser(Operator, ImportHelper):
    bl_idname = "test.open_filebrowser"
    bl_label = "Select"
    def execute(self, context):
        filename, extension = os.path.splitext(self.filepath)
        print('Selected:', self.filepath)
        print('File name:', filename)
        print('File extension:', extension)

        return {'FINISHED'}

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

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

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()
    bpy.ops.test.open_filebrowser('INVOKE_DEFAULT')

Run from a never saved Blender project:

Run again after saving Blender project:

Why is that? Am I missing a setting or parameter?

self.filepath contains the concatenation of the current path and the filename. There is no check whether or not that file actually exist, how your script is currently implemented. You can enter any string you want in the filename field or set it to an empty string. Perhaps it's easier for us to help if we know what you're trying to do.

IMO the filebrower is a tricky beast.  What you are seeing is context.space_data.params.filename   which you typed in  when you saved the file.  Other undocoed stuff like  multi select files ie can define a files collection property of OperatorFileListElement  see https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/39855/15543 (may be somewhat outdated)   Suggest too checking out the code of bpy_extras.io_utils.py

Thanks to all for the input. I am answering my own question.
I wanted to have in my AddOn a way to choose a folder containing some input files. It turns out that it was very easy using bpy.props StringProperty as panel property:
import_path: StringProperty(
        name = "Path",
        description = "Path to the folder containing the files to import",
        default = "",
        subtype = 'DIR_PATH'
        )

The DIR_PATH (or FILE_PATH, if expecting files) subtype is presenting a file system browser and retrieve the relative path, one just have to convert it to a absolute path in the operator:
bpy.path.abspath(self.import_path)

see here


text:
Weird reflections from HDRi
I have been having some problem with reflections in my windows and can't find out what I am doing wrong. I have purchased 2 car models and I get the same problem with the windows. Is is the model itself that are making it or my HDR or perhaps the material?
I am posting a screenshot of the scene, I have also added a sphere just to you can see that in the sphere I think it looks correct.

Posting the final result here, but made it in photoshop.

Latest dumps from blender with magnifying effect and normals.

Looks like a normals issue with the glass

Thanks got info. I am quite a beginner so can you please explain more in detail what the problem in with the normals?
Thanks!

The material isn’t glass in the principled shader - you have Metallic set to 1.0 and Transmission set to 0.0. It’s essentially a reflective metallic surface. If you don’t specifically need to use the Principalled shader then just delete that node and replace it with a Glass Shader node - much simpler to use. Alternatively, start by changing Metallic to zero and Transmission very close to 1.0.

Thanks for the tip. I tried it but no luck. Its also making the background like you see in a magnifying glass. Maybe that the reality but I don't like it.
Still some weird reflections. This time I made the windows in photoshop but it any one else have any suggestion regarding this please make a comment.
Posting the final windows/glass I am happy with.

@gubbfet If it’s magnifying then there’s definitely something going on with your normals - with a pane of glass the normals should all be pointing out in the same direction - possibly you have the window mesh set to Smooth rather than Flat?

So I have posted screenshots of the normals it looks like they are pointing outwards. And I tried to put the object to flat but the reflection is now then looking like minekraft :) if you know what I mean.

@gubbfet The side windows look ok to me but the front one looks wrong - looks like it’s just a single plane rather than a manifold mesh - has it got thickness? Try addinng a solidify modifier.

Set your Principled Shader Transmission to 1.0 (not Metalic) and make sure your windows are shaded flat, that solved the problem for me!
Don't forget to add a Solidify Modifier too.

What does it mean to have your windows shaded flat? Where you do you set that please? (I am having spherical reflections on my flat window.)

I think I have found it, thanks to @Rich Sedman


text:
Is there a way to make the scale an actual representation of the measure system (metric) I use?
I don't know why this is made as it is because it's totally not making ANY sense and broken as well. Why is scale a multiplication factor instead of a representation of real world values? [Metric system:] Why is a cube 2 meters at a scale of one?
I chose metric and set the unit scale to 0.5 so it would actually be what I enter it to be, but this blender is doing what it wants. First it acts like I want. Doing a cube of 20 x 12 x 1 meter works. Then I save everything open the project up a day later and when I add a second cube of the same size, it's not the same size as the object I created a day before. Even though the settings are still the same (metric and unit scale of 0.5). I can't believe that crap. i mean I understand it in a game engine like unity or unreal engine to be a factor instead of a unit, but not in a 3D modelling tool -.-
what is also not understandable is that when I create a cube of height (z) 4, I actually have to put in 4 into the location z field so it is on top of the grid even though the origin is in it's middle. so actually shouldn't i have to enter for the location just 2...
Is there any way to correct this so scale can actually be set in meters instead of a multiplication factor??? Can't understand that implementation at all, especially annoying when it's not working as it should

Related

If you set up a unit scale for Blender, inputs will parse the strings you enter in any field which expects length.
Supposing you have set the units to meters, and the Unit Scale to .5 (at least, in my build)..

If you enter '1', Blender will always interpret that as 1 Blender Unit (50cm)
If you enter '1m' Blender will interpret that as 1 meter
You can enter '25cm' or '250mm' or '.25m' etc. to refer to that length
If you enter '1in' Blender will interpret that as 1 inch. Because you have declared your dimensions to be in meters, that will be translated to 2.54cm
You can even enter an expression like '25m / 4' to get 6.25 meters

I'm open to correction, but it is true that the last-used radius for object creation can not be made to persist in the .blend file, and reverts to 1 of your declared base unit when you reopen it. However, the last creation size requested (in the tool region) does persist within sessions, on a per-primitive basis.
These are deliberate choices on the part of the developers, not careless. There are many choices in Blender that I don't personally agree with, but in the vast majority of cases, if I stop to think about them, I can see the arguments for the choices having been made that way. Usually it's to do with 'cleanliness'.. i.e. consistency between different parts of what is, after all,  a large application. I have been pleasantly surprised by that consistency in Blender's way of thinking, compared to many proprietary applications, especially those with a long history of accretions .. :)

The system is not broken in any way and is working as intended and it also makes perfect sense.
Scale is the size of an object compared to itself. If you have a tennis ball of standard size or in other words one that has a scale of one standard tennis ball and you want to redefine its size and make it twice as big, you can enter 2 in all scale fields to get a ball precisely twice the size of a standard tennis ball. Notice that I can participate in this whole situation without having a clue about what the actual dimensions of a standard tennis ball are in centimeters or any other units, because it's irrelevant. Scale property exists only for this purpose - for you to be able to redefine object's size in relation to its original size. It has nothing to do with units or any measurement systems and is intended to be like that. There is nothing wrong with it, the whole concept of scale in Blender(and pretty much in all other 3d applications) is like that.
What you want scale to be is dimensions:

Well - it is not. Dimenstions are a different thing. Only they define the size of an object in relation to a specific measurement unit and unlike scale not in relation to the object's own original size.
If you adjust the scale of an object for it to have the dimensions you want or if you adjust the dimensions of the object this way changing the scale and then decide that this should be the new original scale of this object, you can apply the scale with ctrl+a -> Scale:

I would like to advise to keep an open mind and try to understand how things work first assuming that they are working as intended. Searching for the reason and explanation why things are working the way they are as opposed to getting angry at them for not matching your expectations may be extremely valuable when learning to work with complex 3d software like Blender.

There is a disappointment, here, in my build, anyway.. in any other field-set, I can left-swipe the set, and enter, say '.5m' in all of them simultaneously. For some reason, in the 'Dimensions' set, that doesn't work. I have to enter the values one at a time. I can't think why... do you think that's a bug? No exception is thrown..

Now that frustration I do understand. I would consider it a bug. It seems to me that functionality does not work as intended or as it works in other parts of the interface. It is like that for as long as I can remember as well and it doesn't seem to be fixed in 2.8 yet. I think this should be reported as a bug.

Since you confirm you can reproduce that, I'll go ahead and make a report. The 'Dimensions' set is unusual, in that it has to update another set in the interface: ('Scale').. I suspect that might have something to do with it....

I think you will be doing a very good job for all of us by reporting it. And I also hope it catches some developer's attention, it would be great to sort out all the little things like that in Blender.

@RobinBetts recommend not reporting. Has come up before, one of the issues mysteriously known as a  "known limitation"

Oh yes, a known limitation... If reported enough times 'known limitations' can evolve into bugs and get fixed.

Hello Everyone, Hello Martin Z. Thank you so much for this superb answer to my question!!!! I was a little frustrated as I tried to create a duplication of the store I'm working for for a small mini game and could never figure out that there were actually dimension settings like in your picture! I'll investigate as soon as I have the time to get these showing in my blender environment. Thanks a lot for your effort!!! :D

Nonetheless, thanks @batFINGER .. I'll confirm it's been reported previously...

It seems its already reported. It is confirmed as a bug. I can find nothing about it being any serious limitation.

@RobinBetts The link I was searching for


text:
Bending a mesh along spline which it's also following,not working
I have some sleepless nights because of this and now I really have to ask you this =)
I’m working with Blender 2.80 Beta and maybe it’s also a slight Blender bug as I have seen others achieving this the way I wanted to achieve this (with the first mentioned solution of mine).
The idea: Similar to creating this “alien worm” based on this gorgeous showcase (at 3:27 - 3:39):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hGSDD9-Tkc
I used a long cylinder mesh with quite enough subdivision, (location: 0,0,0), rotated it to be the same direction as my path curves start and applied rotation/scale/etc (also to the spline itself), set the origins to the front of my worm mesh and the origin of the path curve to where the start is, parented the mesh to the spline and added a follow-path constraint (this part is all working and it’s following the path exactly), then I added the Curve modifier to the cylinder but this one offsets the mesh to somewhere else and it also doesn’t seem to follow the path in it’s offset location (I mean I could live with an offset). When having a circular path, it doesn’t go in a circle, it moves around in an “8”. The body bends sometimes but this bending isn’t looking at all as it should^^ I tried using a short cylinder mesh and add an array modifier to it, but have the same exact problem. tried other modifiers which all don't give the result i need.
Do I really have to rig it or is there an error in what I'm doing?
Here's an image (as requested, thank you!) of the project:

Thanks everyone for reading :)
All the best,
Oli
edit: I had a subsurf modifier in place (above the curve modifier), then I applied it and it's the exact same thing happening. the first image looks as if everything's going to work fine, it also bends along the curve, but as soon as i press play, the mesh goes up in the air and deforms quite strangely. I uploaded the simple project: dropbox.com/s/ypwgabfig436krc/SpaceWorm.zip?dl=0 Thanks a lot!!
What is strange is that for following the path I  parent it to the curve with option "follow path" and then to be able to add the follow path constraint I have to first un-parent it again and then add the constraint. Otherwise it never follows the path. maybe it's got to do something  with this, not sure
Even though the offset and bending of the object behave not correct,it's a little  bit better in blender 2.79 but also not as expected..
EDIT 2:
First "video" shows without parenting, but with follow path constraint

Second "video" shows with parenting (follow path) and w/o constraint:

Last one representing the total  fail when using a more complex path,  on the right side you can see the curves settings, went over quite everything, nothing works:

Do you use Subsurf modifier for the subdivisions? And if yes is it before the Curve modifier in stack?

I don't know if this will work for what you finally want, but for what you described, I would simply use the curve modifier and then animate moving the object along the X axis. Here's what I did

add the cylinder, subdivide it, rotate it, apply rotation and move the origin, as you did.
add a Bezier curve.
in Edit mode, position the Bezier curve to create the path I wanted
add the curve modifier to the cylinder using X as the deformation Axis.

This will move the cylinder to the starting point of the Bezier curve.  Key frame it here.
Move the time to whatever is appropriate, move the cylinder along the x axis, and keyframe.

i tried adding the curve modifier  first, but leads to the same. I attached gifs  now to show how it looks. TY!!

also note: the path it  should  follow is gonna be more complex than only a circle :)

I see!!! I finally got it working I believe, just without the follow-path constraint and keyframing! I guess I was to tired yesterday :D Thank you Marty it works like a charm now :D I'm so happy, thank you all!!


text:
Rigging tank tracks
I am making a tank in Blender and now I am at the part where I need to create the wheels and track parts.
I want my tracks to have physics with the ground, so I guess I should rig the wheels. But I also want the tracks to smoothly follow the tracks and be affected by the ground and gravity.
My question is, how do I proceed with this?
Do I have to parents objects and stuff? I've got no idea on how to do this.
Creating the models is not the problem, but rigging it is.
Hope you guys can help.

"I've got no idea on how to do this." This tells me you're looking for a tutorial.
"Do I have to parents objects and stuff?" This tells me you haven't put in the effort yourself. Both of those things are a big "no-no" on a StackExchange site.
If you have a question that is not specific to YOUR project, we'll be happy to answer it.
I remember seeing a really cool track rig (without using a physics sim) on Blender Nation a while back. The information is available, it's just not here.

@Matt please don't be that harsh this site is still developing and shouldn't scare users away. Could you please add a link to the tutorial you mentioned?

I will be less harsh in the future. I agree and I hadn't intended to be harsh, just brief. I would add a link, but it was several years ago. My intent was to give the OP hope that the information is out there somewhere.

Sorry for my late response, but you were right. I should be more constructive and I will be next time. In the meanwhile I'll keep searching for what I am looking for.

Would it be this?

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


text:
Blender is rendering an older version my project
Blender is rendering an older version of my project, not the most recent one. I have made it using the Blender Render but it does not want to render in cycles either. A black and grey screen is rendered as if everything is transparent. Checked general camera, lighting and compute devises in case I messed something up but I can't find anything. All my textures and objects look normal, does anybody know what is wrong or what to check?
Ok added link:
http://www.mediafire.com/download/ah0brd38psfyb7i/Bathroom%20test%20upload.blend

Is it possible you could upload your .blend (e.g. to pasteall.org) and put the link here? As it is now this could be caused by many things and we can't do much more than speculate.

This is because you have some sequencer strips in the VSE.
The Compositor and Sequence  settings are enabled by default, so if there is any data in the compositor or the sequencer blender will render from that instead of the scene.
From the wiki:

If
  you are using the Compositor or Sequencer, you can tell Blender to
  process those effects instead of directly rendering the scene.

Disable Sequence in Render Settings > Post processing or remove the sequencer strips and it will render the scene instead:
version 2.8x

Thanks! Had exactly the same problem just a couple of hours ago (mind link with the OP? ;) ) and had been searching my a** off since...

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


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Object copied with python API have no users although it is used
I have a material created with ShaderNodeCustomGroup and when I try to copy, I am having an issue with the internal node_tree not being correctly copied.
In my ShaderNodeCustomGroup I have implemented the copy(node) function.
    def copy(self, node):
        print("Before")
        print("self.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(self.node_tree.users, self.node_tree))
        print("node.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(node.node_tree.users, node.node_tree))

        copy = node.node_tree.copy()
        print("Intermediate")
        print("copy.users {}, (){})".format(copy.users, copy))
        print("self.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(self.node_tree.users, self.node_tree))
        print("node.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(node.node_tree.users, node.node_tree))
        self.node_tree = copy
        self.wrapped.node_tree = self.wrapped.node_tree.copy()

        print("After")
        print("self.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(self.node_tree.users, self.node_tree))
        print("node.node_tree.users {}, ({})".format(node.node_tree.users, node.node_tree))

The output of this is the following:
Before
self.node_tree.users 1, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper") at 0x7f3ed206d808>)
node.node_tree.users 1, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper") at 0x7f3ed206d808>)
Intermediate
copy.users 0, ()<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper.001") at 0x7f3ed2d54c08>)
self.node_tree.users 1, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper") at 0x7f3ed206d808>)
node.node_tree.users 1, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper") at 0x7f3ed206d808>)
After
self.node_tree.users 1, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper.001") at 0x7f3ed2d54c08>)
node.node_tree.users 0, (<bpy_struct, ShaderNodeTree(".IroDiffuse_wrapper") at 0x7f3ed206d808>)

Initially I have self and node sharing the same node_tree, but the node_tree itself only has 1 user, which is weird.
Then, I ciopy the node_tree, which gives me an unused node_tree with different address. Makes sense. Still, the original node_tree is only used by one user, which seems incorrect.
Finally, I assign the copied node_tree to self. This makes self.node_tree to have one user, but node.node_tree to have no users.
If I now save and reopen the file, one of the materials if broken. I believes that since node.node_tree.users is 0, it has been deleted by blender.
What is wrong with this?
I edit the qustion to provide a minimal reproducible example.
Given the following code, assign a test material to the default cube. Duplicate the cube and make the material unique. Save, exit, start blender again and open the file. One of the cubes is black.
import bpy
from bpy.types import ShaderNodeCustomGroup
from bpy.props import FloatProperty, FloatVectorProperty

class MinimalTestMaterial(ShaderNodeCustomGroup):

    bl_name='TestMaterial'
    bl_label='TestMaterial'
    label = 'Test material'

    def init(self, context):
        self.width = 250 # make it large

        self.node_tree = bpy.data.node_groups.new('TestMaterial', 'ShaderNodeTree')
        rgb = self.node_tree.nodes.new("ShaderNodeRGB")

        group_outputs = self.node_tree.nodes.new('NodeGroupOutput')
        out = self.node_tree.outputs.new("out", "out")

        self.node_tree.links.new(rgb.outputs[0], group_outputs.inputs[0])

    def copy(self, node):
        self.node_tree = node.node_tree.copy()

if __name__ == "__main__":

    from nodeitems_utils import NodeItem, register_node_categories, unregister_node_categories
    from nodeitems_builtins import ShaderNodeCategory

    bpy.utils.register_class(MinimalTestMaterial)
    newcatlist = [ShaderNodeCategory("SH_NEW_CUSTOM", "Test", items=[NodeItem(MinimalTestMaterial.__name__)])]
    register_node_categories("TEST_NODES", newcatlist)
```

This's just my two cents.   .users is not updated.   You might need to call some update (recalculate) function.    I encountered such issue about Driver once.

Ill check that. But its strange, when copying other stuff, it just works

I have tested adding node.update() and self.update() in the coopy function, but still doesn't work. To me it looks like a blender bug...

Since there are no answers, I will push my luck : try .update_tag()?


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How can I Make Sure No Hair Is In The Mesh?
I am making a leopard. I have modelled the mesh, and it is sitting in the file. I am trying to add hair to the leopard, and when adding the hair to its body, it is inside the body. How do I make sure that all of the hair is outside the mesh? What if I want it inside?

Welcome to Blender.SE Aphrodite. Could you add a screenshot of the hair inside the mesh? Hair is usually emitted in the normal direction of the faces.

In your case the hair cannot get inside as the default Path render method is used. Shorten the hair as I can see it has the default length which is way too long. Make the length something like 0.1. And If you want hair all over your mesh, increase the hair number. If it's too low not all faces get it. Like check at the info bar how many faces your mesh has, multiply this number e.g. by 2 and input this value as the hair number. Set your Hair/face to 2 et voila.

How do I set this origin?

It's not working as I thought it would be. There is more hair on the face but some hair is still inside. Also, when I am combing it to smoothen the fur, it goes inside the mesh depsite having deflect origin on. What is the default path render?

@Aphrodite: read https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/2.79/physics/particles/particle_system_panel.html?highlight=particles

@Lucasz-40sth It doesn't help with the problem that the hair is still inside the mesh. Also, if I make the length smaller the hair still does not appear on the face when I want it to appear everywhere (I'm modelling a leopard, they have hair everywhere).

Certainly not inside their mouth, but this involves vertex groups. And see the edited answer.

I tried with 100000 hairs and there is still hair that is inside the mesh. It is not a problem with the hair number. Also when I brush it it still goes inside the mesh (I know because they were not there before the brush) even with deflect emitter set twice the length of the hair. I use Blender 2.8 if that helps, but if something works for 2.79 tell me please.


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Cloth simulation artifacts
Can anybody tell me how to avoid these nasty artifacts that make the flag look like it is broken on the folding part. They are shown in the Viewport and final rendering. Here is a still from the 15 second animation. I should mention that I created this flag with the "Import>Images as Plane" add-on.

It is a simple mesh, just a plane with subdivisions. The problem began when I started messing with the Force Fields and Physics.

If it looks broken, it problay is ... you sure that mesh is fully robust to start with?  Maybe make a test blend file with just the mesh and upload to https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/

I haven't seen this behavior if there aren't splits in the mesh.  Maybe try selecting all vertices, pressing Alt+M and selecting merge by distance to see if they're all unique or if there are some vertices that are doubled up.  Down at the bottom it will say how many vertices were removed.

I did the "Merge by distance" thing but it didn't help. The issue is more noticeable when viewed from the back (fourth image above).

After further investigation and testing, I discovered that the artifacts were created by the "Blend Mode" settings in the "Material" tab. Selecting "Opaque" instead of "Alpha Blend" seems to fix the problem but creates a different type of artifact that could be corrected by checking the "Backface Culling" button which once again brings other sort of issues.


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Rigging Short Arms on a Fat Character
I'm trying to rig my character here: Character Photo

He has short little arms/legs and a fat body. As you can imagine - there is a lot of awkward deforming with automatic weights. I've been doing custom weight painting - but still struggling to get great results.
Do you have any tips, methods, or examples of similar rigs? I've been watching rigging tutorials on CG Cookie and Youtube, but this character is a bit uncommon in terms of his proportions.
Thanks for any help

Please show us a picture of the character wire and the rig, in ortographic views; I think the main problem is to find the appropriate position of the bones.

I updated the post with more images


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Best way to modify this particular model
What My Model Currently Is

Hello Everyone! I am an amateur blender user and I mistakenly added the legs to far forward on my model.
I need to reposition the legs further back, on the y axis of the body of my model.
I figured there are two ways to do this. Either I detach the legs and move them back or I cutt the butt off and make a new one.
The "Body" of the model is a sphere that has been extruded on the Y axis.
The "Legs" are a custom extrusion.
What would be the best way to approach this and what tools should I use to accomplish this?
Thank you for being an awesome community and helping on your free time,
Drew :)
What The Model Is Now
With help from the community I was able to produce this. A nice mesh with good topology. I realize this model is a little bit more square around the body, but Im starting to like it :)

I don't think your topology is good: too many edge loops, some weird ngons, a sphere to make the butt... you should probably try to make something simpler, it will help if you need to to make any modification, here's a quickly made try: https://zupimages.net/up/18/27/k4rj.jpg

Hi, and welcome to bse. Modelling is, IMHO, one of those pursuits that looks dead easy, and is anything but. Despite "bad topology et al"  your model above is instantly recognizable as a dachshund (before seeing the "Dach" in name) .  My suggestion would be to start again with lessons learned.   Use the cube as a starting point. Scale and extrude to shape of torso, inset  faces to extrude legs and neck etc. Use modifiers like mirror and subsurf.

@moonboots Thank you for the example. I wasnt sure that a square was going to be enough for me so thats why I went for the sphere. Turns out it is! I did try to emulate the legs because what you showed ended up being what I wanted as legs anyways :) You have a better eye for curvature than I do, so I'll be working on rounding out the rear next.

@batFINGER Between you and moonboots I went back and tried a square and ended up with something that is much much easier to work with. When it comes to adding the head do I just extrude off the top of the cube? When it comes to the tail is it easier to make a seperate shape with a curve for instance and then attach it? I tried extruding one of the faces on the rear but it quickly turned into horns, which I shouldve known it would do.

yes, always extrude (or inset), do not add with booleans or separate curves, it's only interesting in some cases. When you'll extrude the tail make sure that the Clipping option of the Mirror modifier is enabled, it will stick the vertices on the axis of the mirror. About your new topology: it's much better, you still don't need all these edge loops all along, only add an edge loop when you need it.

I don't think your topology is good: too many edge loops, some weird ngons, a sphere to make the butt... you should probably try to make something simpler, it will help if you need to to make any modification,
As BatFinger said, start from a mirrored cube, add edge loops when needed, and extrude the different limbs
Here's a quick try:


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Pixelated Issue In Blender Render
I have been having this problem in my Blender file. I have created a short 180 frame animation that all works fine however when I render the animation one of my objects has a pixelated/distorted look to it.
I would like to sort this out but I don't know what to do. I have attached a screenshot of what it looks like after rendering.
Thanks, Brad

I know it make sense to you but to me I have no idea what your expected output is or what I am looking at in the screenshot. Is it (the screenshot) a single mesh with a single texture? Is it supposed to be dark? What shape is the mesh? Is there real world equivalent you could point us to?

Suggestion.  The face count of an object is listed on the screen in [edit] mode.  For example a simple cube should have 6 faces.  Cube subdivided once should have 6 * 4 faces.  Do you have duplicates of faces created by mistake?  Show your UV Map and Output windows.  You can also post your file for others to inspect. What is your experience level with Blender .. 2 Years, 2 Months?

If you have little experience with Blender, and the file effort recreation time is expected to be small, then consider the following.  For simple projects the 2nd time around of mesh modeling is easier than the first time . Archive/Backup your file.  Then create a new file or new object.  The 2nd creation will probably be better than the first because it will have less accumulated mistakes.  Delete and Replace.  Try a Fresh Start.  No product endorsement intended.

Hello everyone, thank you for the help so far. I haven't had too much experience with Blender thus far and only know the basics and some more advanced things. I do not think that any faces are overlapping but if someone could inform me on how to link my file to the forum some of you could look at it and try to help me out hopefully. I have also edited the post to include a picture of what the object is meant to look like when it has rendered.

check out if the object isn't duplicated. maybe there are two objects at the same location.


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Imported model scales when I translate
I made a little program for animating coordinates. It worked fine with a cube.

Then I imported a .dae model that I had exported from SketchUp. It imported fine, but when I tried to use the program on it, it became huge, and I do not know how to resize it (I tried changing the scale variables, but they just revert back).

(before)

(after)
Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
Update:
Here is the file: http://pasteall.org/blend/index.php?id=49915
The robot was the size of the cube before linking it to my program.

Can you upload a .blend file for us to examine?

"won't let me resize it", what won't let you resize it? What did you try?

What did you find online and didn't work?

I tried changing the scale variables, but they just revert back.

I am assuming by that you mean you are changing the scale of the parent object SketchUp through Blender---And not Animation Nodes. It simply reverts because Animation Nodes is overwriting the the scale of the object as defined by the Object Matrix Output Node. So, instead of changing the scale manually, define it in your node tree through the Compose Matrix Node.

Another method---Which I do not recommend due to its unpredictable consequences---is to set the scale of matrix to the scale of the object. By doing so, any manual change in the scale of the object is met with change in the scale of the matrix and is translated into a normal scaling behavior.


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Applying a baked normal map - edges too sharp
After I applied a baked normal map from a high poly cube object. The low poly cube adopted the same form, but the edges are sharp, is this happening because I have no subdivisions?
Please have a look at my pictures it will give you a good idea of my problem.

your screenshot is not clear, what are you trying to show? Normal map won't change the shape of the object, it will just fake 3D where there is not

Thank you for reply. I want to copy the form of the deformed block onto the square block

so you won't be able to create real 3D with normal map (for the moment), but what you can do is beveling all the edges to give them roundness

Must i bevel the edges before i apply the normal map?

You must bevel the edges, then unwrap again, then bake again, it will work better with round edges but of course you still won't be able to see the bumps in real 3D

Thanks a lot "moonboots"


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2.8 & 2.81 - WebM / VP9 Encoding error: Additional information: g_timebase.den out of range
Using either Blender 2.8 or 2.81 when trying to encode a video using WebM/VP9 I get the following error:
Additional information: g_timebase.den out of range [1..1000000000]

I've tried a variety of containers in 2.8 including the previous workaround using "Matroska". And I've also tried just WebM encoding preset. Every attempt results in the same error mentioned.
Is there somethign else that I'm missing?

That is weird. Can you add the complete output / video encoding settings that you've used? I have tested the container and codecs in the past and they worked fine. It's possible that this is a bug in Blender that's caused by the way it calls ffmpeg.

The WebM/VP9 Container and Encoder only worked after I had selected a Dimension preset. Then afterwards readjust the render scale percentage and frame rate.

Does this solution make sense? No. But it worked with two different files I had been working on. Defining the dimensions manually for some reason caused the error previously mentioned and also the error,
CQ level 0 must be between minimum and maximum quantizer value (2-31)
which I received when setting the "Output quality" to "Lossless".

Worked for me as well. Blender 2.91/Win10

I had another problem where the internal player in Slack (the team working app) would play the video back really jittery. That was also fixed by doing what you proposed.


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Why are random white gaps will appearing in this texture?

I tried getting help on r/blender to no avail.

Hi. If possible, please extract any relevant information from that reddit screenshot and include it as text (I think people may find that easier to read). Also, for blend files, please use https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/ which is our official unofficial blend hosting site (pack images beforehand). Thanks.

@RayMairlot Pretty much all information on that reddit screenshot is relevant. Also, I've added the .blend file.

Set the image texture node interpolation to "closest". The issue is due to uv map very near to some texture parts, but with "closest" should do it.

@lemon That worked, thanks for the help.

On official 2.80.75 no white gaps with even with linear extrapolation. https://imgur.com/0F71Ibs


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How to delete texture
my problem is the following: I have a 3D scan's output with color (texture) in some image file. I import this into Blender and I can see the various colors on the model. Going into the material tab, I can select the texture and see the image file pop up.
Now I would like to erase / delete part of the texture. Say there is both orange and green in my scan. I would like to only have the orange appear. Since I am pretty new to this, I tried opening the texture image file into a simple image editor and blacken the areas I did not want. Then I re-imported the 3D model with the updated image file, and I can see the changes in the viewport, but unfortunately all of the model's vertices are still considered part of the texture.
What I want is to edit the image file (or do whatever else it takes) so as to end up with some of the vertices no longer being associated with the texture image file. Is that possible at all, and if so, how ?
Any input on this porblem would be highly appreciated. If you need any further information please let me know.
Thank you very much in advance for considering my question,
Gustavo
Edit: this was part of a bigger aim and, ultimately, I have managed to achieve what I wanted. I do not think this question is relevant anymore to me.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/516/add-different-materials-to-different-parts-of-a-mesh

Thank you for your answer. I have read through the post you've provided but I'm not sure how this would help my case ? Maybe you can briefly let me know how you think I could use adding textures for the purpose of deleting it in the way I am mentionning (that is, not simply some pixels no longer having color, but having those pixels removed from a given texture).
Sorry if this is obvious.

@GustavoLucenaGómez   Is it a packed file?

Hey there. Thanks for answering. I guess it's not a packed file, though I'm not sure what a packed file is?


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No objects or images to bake to error, driving me nuts
I am trying to bake texture for a model, and I get the infamous error "No objects or images to bake to". I have done a lot of googling to try and solve this, and in particular I have read pretty much every post related to that on this forum. It does not help and I still get the error. Here below are some details - please ask for more if necessary. Any help would be hugely appreciated.
Set up: I have an obj file, in the same folder as an mtl file along with a jpg picture for the texutre.
Import: I open up Blender 2.7 on Linux, default mode, delete the cube and subsequently import the obj file; I can see it alright and I recenter it.
Texture: in the materials and texture tabs, I select the jpg image for texture, so that when I set the viewport shading to texture I see the texture on the 3D model view.
Bake: making sure that coordinates is set to UV and that Map is set to UVMap in the Mappin dropdown menu of the Texture tab, I then go to the Render tab to the Bake dropdown menu. I click the Bake to Color vertices and choose Texture in the rollout. Clicking bake then yields the error.
Details: I make sure that the object is selected, both in the 3D viewport and in the Outliner. In the latter, the icons are on (the eye, the pointer and the camera). I have also been careful enough to open up a second subwindow for the UV/Image editor, and in there I select the jpg image for texture that is in the folder, and I can see the UV map alright. Also, this is all with the Blender Render engine, not with cycles.
What I have in mind after all this, and the reason I want to do it, is that I ultimately want to export the model to a ply file in a way that all vertices are listed together with an RGB color for each vertex, which is impossible currently (because color/texture is associated to faces of the mesh and not to vertices), even if I tick the "include vertex color" option in the ply export.
Thanks a looot in advance. I am absolutely out of resources here.
Gustavo
Edit: the thread How to bake ambient occlusion into vertex colors? is different I believe. My question is more specific. However the answer to that thread does include what I was missing: adding a set of vertex colors under the object data tab.

You need to create set of vertex colors in the Object Data tab.

Good God, rjg: I have been Googling the heck out of this and I never saw mention of creating a set of vertex colors. This makes absolute sense of course, given what I am trying to achieve and given the error message - but I'm a bit new here, so I did not think of it.
You solved it, anyway. Thanks a million times !
(also, no I don't think this was a duplicate of the thread you mention ...)


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Integrate an external application
What I'd like to know is, would it be possible to display the output of an external opengl application inside Blender?

As shown on the image the left part is the standard 3D viewport, and on the right would be the output of an external renderer or game engine that would be displayed inside Blender directly.
A use case for this would be to use Blender as a level editor and seeing the edits being replicated live in the game engine.

For an external render engine, yes. Have a look at cycles, it is actually created as an external render engine made available through a python based addon. Luxrender also utilises this to integrate with blender.
For general opengl drawing I would say no. Blender is developed to read it's own data and draw it to screen. There is the bgl module available in python to allow python scripts to draw as needed, you could get data from another application and draw in blender with this but I would not expect decent performance with anything but a very simple scene.


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How can I mix two materials based on incoming light
I was watching the Create a Realistic Earth tutorial by Andrew Price and I was able to follow along in Cycles until I hit the part where he mixes the day and night materials together so that the lights show up on the "dark side" of the earth.
How can I recreate this effect in cycles? I thought I could use the ray information to tell me if there was incoming light but I've found no such node to give me this information.

Possible duplicate: http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/701/brightness-dependent-texture-on-mesh/703#703

I have made a little shader that does this. See below for the node setup and a test render.
First there are two shaders, one for the ground (green-brown-noise) and one for the glowing city lights.
Second, there is a mask for the city lights that makes them appear as spots.
Third, and this is answering your question, a value calculated as the dot product between the normal of the planet surface and the vector from the light source to the planet. Very simplified, dot product does this: If they point in the same direction, the dot product will be 1. If they point in opposite direction, dot product is 0. It was a loong time since I studied linear algebra so don't sue me over this.
Fourth, the second mask is multiplied with the third and this is fed as a factor into the mix node that mixes the two materials (land vs city lights).
Node setup. Note how I had to manually calculate the vector for the dot product. In this case (my planet is at 0, 0, 0) it is only the negative value of the light source position.

Test render:

Great answer :) As a small note, this is also possible using multiple renderlayers in compositing, however this solution is far nicer.

Dot product is actually 0 when perpendicular and -1 when parallel but pointing the opposite direction, i believe.

No one seems to hardcode dot products in shaders here :D Dot product = lengthA x lengthB x cosine(AB). So for normalized vectors, lengthA x lengthB = 1. The cosine then varies from 1 (same direction) to -1 (opposite directions), 0 being perpendicular vectors. In Blender cycles normals are normalized as in every engine, so using a non normalized vector of length L for light source makes your result stand between L (same direction) and -L (opposite directions). Since Blender uses factors from 0 to 1 the dot product showed here is automatically clamped between those values, so it works :)

cycles nodes to mix based on incoming light

Please do not rely only on pictures. Posts need text.

"cycles nodes to mix based on incoming light" Also this is not based on incoming light, it is based on Lamp object position actually

I have got the same problem, and tried to solve ot this way using normal map node. Be careful with displacement, because it changes the normal map


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Photoshop Filter in Compositor
Is it possible to use Photoshop filters from inside the Blender compositor? Just thought it was an interesting challenge that somebody out there may have solved? Of course I can run batch filter on rendered frames - but think it would be nice to see live effects.
Thanks.

It is possible to replicate most PS filters in the compositor with a combination of nodes, blur, noise etc.

Yep, as iKIsR said, many PS filters can be "reproduced" via the powerful node compositor. Some are directly supported, such as blur, sharpen, etc. While others, such as halftones, need a bit more complex settings. However, if you succeed in making them, you can save the setting as a single Node Group for the future use. :)

No, As far as I know, nobody has done this before.
Even if this was done it wouldn't be cross platform (since Photoshop plugins are compiled AFAIK).

There have been applications that implemented the host API before (Eyeon's Digital Fusion does it, for example), but it hasn't been done for Blender.  Even if you did, most Photoshop plugins only work with 8 bit color, and they would indeed be platform specific.

Sure, its possible to do, its just not been done (AFAIK).


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Edit Image Externally
When I render an image, the "Image" menu has an option to "Edit Externally" but I can't get it to work. Would love to render, then edit in Photoshop. Can anyone help? I've tried setting the  "image editor" in user preferences.
Thanks!

You have to set the associated image editing program in User preferences > File first. Next, make sure that the image is saved to disk (you can use F3) and it should work.

When saving, use Save As Image and untick Save as Render and Copy but keep Relative Path.

I have set this but no joy :( .I should have added this in my original message but I get an error when I click "Edit Externally": "Image path '.' not found, image may be packed or unsaved" However I have DEFINITELY just click "Save As Image" and saved the file in my project folder!

@user1841 See updated answer.

Tried unchecking box but still wrong. Noticed that if I do "Save As Image" (F3), save it, then immediately do "Save Image" (Alt-S) I get error "Cannot save image, path '' is not writeable". I would expect it to save it in the same place as F3. Obviously it's not looking in the correct place :(

SUPERSTAR! Works! I didn't have the "Relative Path" (thought we were just on different versions). It appears when unchecking "Copy" and makes all the difference! Thanks a million! Here are a few more exclamation marks for safety!!!

@user1841 This was an old bug that has come back somehow it seems. Reported and a developer has claimed it.


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Rotating the viewport
Is there a way to rotate the 3D Viewport as if rotating your head? I don't want to "rotate around the current selection" or around where I click, etc. Something like when you move the mouse in "Walk Navigation"
Unity has this in its Scene view when clicking RMB but I can't find the equivalent in Blender.
Thanks.

I decided to bind "Walk Navigation" to a keyboard shortcut. Not ideal but works OK - just click to set the new view.

This can be done in the 3D Viewport with Camera View (Numberpad 0), since the movement of a camera can be controlled through its Transforms (found in the N-Panel and Properties area > Object Properties tab) as well as the 3D Viewport's Tools.  If you don't want to move your rendering camera then another camera can be added (Add > Camera or Duplicate a selected camera with Shift-D) and changed to the Active Camera (View > Camera > Set Active Object as Camera):

Since the Active Camera is used for both rendering and the 3D Viewport's Camera View you'll need to remember to make your rendering Camera the Active Camera again before rendering.  (There are exceptions, see Local Camera in the Display & View Panels page of the manual for more info.)

Thank you - this is a very creative answer! I was hoping there'd be a solution more like the natural viewport controls i.e. as I navigate around the scene, I can "turn my head" - I believe I'd have to move the camera to get this effect, with this solution.

Yes, you'd be moving a camera, which is why you'd probably make another camera for this.  Sorry it wasn't what you were looking for.


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Why are blender simulations jittery on small scale?
It's been common wisdom that, when a rigid body, or cloth simulation gets jittery, it helps to just scale up the entire scene and the simulations start to behave more predictably. And while I have myself experienced that this is good advice, I don't quite understand why. Since the simulations are just calculations, they should behave exactly the same when everything is 10x smaller, with mass, speed, and so on adjusted accordingly. And yet the results differ wildly. Could someone explain why?

Jitter is often caused by floating point instability. If you're not familiar with floating point and the problems which cause this, I have attempted to write a high level overview which I hope might be helpful. However the standard disclaimers apply; I'm not an expert on physics simulation nor a bullet or blender developer nor an authority in any sense.
Bullet, the physics library blender uses for rigid body simulation, uses floating-point arithmetic. Floating point numbers have the impossible task of representing all real numbers in a fixed number of bits, and so not all numbers are actually representable; arithmetic in floating-point is almost always rounded to a number a little different from the exact correct answer.
This tends to translate to jitter in rigid body simulations when an object is in constant contact with another object. Imagine that the precise position the object should sit so that it exactly collides with a collider (i.e. is neither inside it nor outside) is not representable. When calculating the next position for the object, bullet inevitably calculates a position inside or outside the collider. Lets say its inside; then a collision occurs and the object gets pushed outside, and then gravity (or any number of other forces) pushes the object back again and an oscillation starts. If the velocity of the object starts increasing, the jitter can quickly magnify in a positive feedback loop.
This is of course a simplified version of events, there are countermeasures which bullet employs to avoid this sort of thing and I don't pretend to know half of them (but Split Impulse is one you have control over from blender) but there are also many other ways things can go wrong in any complex simulation with multiple simultaneous interactions.
As to why shrinking things tends to help, that is likely because the standard format for floats (IEEE 745) is clever and manages to offer a higher density of representable numbers near zero; the logic being that larger errors matter less with bigger numbers. As for why making things larger can help; that may have more to do with collision detection being better behaved with a reasonable number of simulation steps for the size and velocities of the objects involved. (even with all the physics properties scaled, properties such as substeps and behavior of things like split impulse may not scale in a perfectly analogous way.. but i'm at the end of my knowledge here)
It would be possible to not use floating point arithmetic, but writing the physics engine would likely be harder especially while achieving comparable performance. The author of the bullet physics library has commented on this possibility and suggests it would be a completely separate engine.

Hey @gandalf3, thanks for the response, however, I find the part about floats not very convincing, here's why: the usual 32-bit floats have 8 exponent bits, which means they can go all the way down to around 10^-37. On the other hand, in a simulation, let say we have a 0.001 kg object with radius of 0.001 m, and the impulses are computed for 120 fps, with 100 sub-steps per frame. Even at this extreme, we get numbers around 10^-10, maybe 10^-13, still very far from the end of the range - so far that that even multiplying the entire deal by another 10^-10 shouldn't make any visible difference.

To put this another way: multiplying all floats in a calculation by some constant factor mostly just shifts their exponents, it doesn't affect the (relative) precision. What usually does is an add (or similar) operation of numbers with wildly different exponents - but I don't see how this kind of problem could be fixed by scaling things up or down. I like your explanation of the feedback loop, I agree that this is certainly the case, but I feel we didn't get to the bottom of it yet.

I don't think the issue is that the "range of precision" is somehow exceeded. I suspect its more to do with most numbers throughout the entire range being rounded slightly. Under the wrong conditions, that slight rounding can lead to a positive feedback occurring in the simulation. The reason overall scale would matter is the density of representable numbers; where the density is higher the error should stay lower, enough so that the simulation may be less prone to driving itself out of control.

One thing I should have noted earlier is that it's a known issue with the rigid body simulation that unapplied object transforms causes misbehavior. I've never satisfactorily found an answer for why this matters and it may be a bug, but either way something to keep in mind when testing for instability at different scales (i.e. apply transforms before testing for best results).


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When I render the model it appears without the subdivision surface modifier
When I apply subdivision surface modifier for a model I set render and view to 3 then I apply it but when I render the model it appears without the subdivision surface modifier as if it is set to 1 what should I do?
I tried to render it as a video or as a photo I do not see the modifier applied.

Check did you set simplify?

Sorry for th caps I didn't mean it @cegaton

@Crantisz what is simplify?

You need to apply subdivision surface.Dont leave it click apply and then you can render video or image with sub surface.

Hi. Please take screenhots of your screen instead of photos. They will be higher quality. https://www.take-a-screenshot.org


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Mesh surface using image textures need to be unwarped everytime when assigned or changed in cycles
I'm having an issue with image textures. Everytime i change the picture or texture coordinate or anything connected to the image texture, i need to unwarp the mesh to make the changes displayed on render. It is kinda ennoying when rendering a whole scene with animation.
Do you guys know how to fix that?
[edited]
Here in the first door's window, We can see the original texture image

In this picture, i have copied the first door and put it at the end of the room, and the image texture displayed like this.

As you can see, the image Texture is displayed wrong (zoomed or something) and i have to unwarp the upper bart of the door to get the the proper display(like the yellow door).

Is this happening in all of your files? Did you tried with the factory default scene? Could you show a picture/video of your issue?

it happened on different projects too.

I have fixed it temporary until i find a better solution, if you guys got anything better please share with me. Well, i placed a simple plane with my texture on it in the background door, i removed the window faces so I can see the background plane behind it,


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Pixels while texture painting
I come to a problem while texture painting. The lines and strokes are all pixelized and looks very ugly.
I tried to double/quadruple(2048px X 2048px/4096px X 4096px) the size of the image in the UV Editor window and reassign the new image to the image texture which is linked into a Principled BSDF, but even this seems not to get drawing sharper.
I even tried to enlarge the mesh to maybe cover more pixels but nothing works.
Is there anything we can do for this?
[Edit]
I figured that the faces ratio are not correct in the UV Map. I don't know if it may be part of the problem.

What does your UV mapping look like in the UV Editor compared to the pixels underneath in the image texture?

the face is deformed, really tiny in the uv editor compared to the real face

Yes, the amount of pixels assigned per face will affect your painting result. Scale up the smaller faces or at least try a smart up unwrap to fill the image space as much as possible.

I tested with a picture from the internet which is way smaller than those I did and comes out better in details than painting. I might just paint my textures with another app and add them.

From your description I guess what you're getting is the strokes on the left and what you want is the strokes on the right.

To get that make sure that the fallout is set to smooth or something similar

It's more when i use low pixel brushes like 1-3 pixels and being very close to to object, I think it might be due to the uv map. that faces are not properly set by the system. I edited my post with a picture of the uv map and the mesh.

I had this problem. I did not set my scale before unwrapping my UV. Go to Object Mode and select the item(s) to unwrap. Press Ctrl + A > Apply Scale, then unwrap.
If you have already painted textures you will have to start again.


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Blender Game Engine dynamic text wordwrap
I want to display some text that change dynamically when I select another item. Displaying the text is working, but I'm wondering if there is a way to make the text multilines and/or wordwraping it so the text don't shows on only one line.
I saw some explainations on the web but these informations are over 8 years old.
It can be done by adding some "\n" in the string, but i would like to do it automatically like any textbox in most of UIs.
Can you guys help me on that issue please?

You can easily achieve it by using the Python standard library's textwrap module. I've written this article about text alignement in BGE some time ago, you may find it useful (it's in brazilian portuguese, you may try to use Google Translate on it). Here I will explain about left alignement, but in the article I explain about center and right alignement as well. Example file with all the modes provided below.
Left aligned text
With this simple setup:

The following code:
import bge
import textwrap

def main(cont):

    # Objects
    own = cont.owner

    # Sensors
    sensor = cont.sensors[0]

    # Properties
    text = 'The Blender Game Engine is a component of Blender, a free and open-source 3D production suite, used for making real-time interactive content. The game engine was written from scratch in C++ as a mostly independent component, and includes support for features such as Python scripting and OpenAL 3D sound.'

    #### INITIALIZE ####
    if sensor.positive:

        # Max number line characters before line breaks
        line_size = 35

        # Left alignement
        own.text = textwrap.fill(text, line_size)

It results in:

Example file


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Make particle system using settings on every faces of a mesh
Im working on a grass project and wondering if there is an option to apply hair system on every faces of a mesh. Do Blender 2.79 have something to do it so i dont need to make multiple hair systems for differents meshes?
When i say "multiple hair system for different meshes", i have multiple meshes that have faces the same size, but those meshes are not the same size. So the smaller one will have more hair per faces. I just want all meshes having the same amount of hairs. Can you guys help me with it?
Very appreciate!
[Edit]
At this moment i understand that the number of particles is for the whole mesh, no matter the size of itself.

So here, the smaller mesh is 4 times smaller than the other one, so the particles will be 4 times more dense from the smaller mesh compared to the big one.
What im looking to do is something like this :

so all faces will have to same particule density.

select you objects (the one with the correct particle system last) and press Ctrl+L and choose Modifiers

nope, that's not what im looking for.

I figured it out by using some settings in the particle system itself(If better result, please share it with me).

I assigned the same particle system to both planes here, small one got 1 face and big one got 4 faces as big as the small plane.
I cranked up the Hair number to 50k but assigned only 500 per face. So both planes got the same hair density.


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Vertex color display
Blender v2.79 user over here. I've baked my texture to vertex colors and I was wondering: is there a way to view the RGB color of a selected vertex, much like you can see the XYZ coordinates of it in the side pannel ? I thought this would somehow be possible in paint mode, but I can't find it anywhere.
EDIT: an obvious way of doing this is to delete all vertices except the one I'm interested in, and then export an xyz-rgb .ply file for the model (which now contains only the one vertex). This, evidently, is incredibly tedious and I am asking for a faster way of retrieving RGB color for the selected vertex.
Any help would be highly appreciated, thanks!
Gustavo

I can't find a way to do it, and even using the color sample eyedropper in vertex paint mode, I more often than not got a darker color than was there at vertex or even got the white of the selected vertex.


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Strange z-fighting-like happening only in textured view for certain models
I bought a collection of models that all came in a single model file (bad form already, I know). So I started working on splitting the models into each of their own files. This is when I notice that when in textured view, there is some weird z-fighting going on.
To narrow it down, I selected a single face in part of a model, then selected connected with sharp edges as a separator, so I only got part of the model (which is shown in the video). I turned on x-ray to select a face to verify that I'm only selecting a single face, thinking that there may be duplicate meshes on top of each other. Nothing. I did a point merge with a very small radius, but nothing merged. I'm convinced that the mesh itself is not fighting with a copy.
Since it only happens in textured view mode, I cleared the material and created a new BSDF shader with no textures attached to it, which is what you see in the video. So it seems to rule out the shading.
I can't figure out what is causing this. Any ideas?

Face orientation/normals:

Strange z-fighting-like happening:

Video showing the issue:
https://youtu.be/PBJmexufsz8

have you try an Object Data >Geometry Data > Clear Custom Split Normals Data?

This looks not like z-fighting, it appears to be a face normals artifact caused by some transparency. That's why it only shows on textured view.

@moonboots Where do I find Object Data? Is that a menu option somewhere?

in the Properties panel, bottom right panel by default

Your model doesn't use transparency but you have set Blend Mode to Alpha Blend  in the material's setting together with the option [X] Show Backface. That's a bad combo and causes the so-called sorting problem.
Quote from the documentation (Show Backside is the Show Backface option):

Show Backside
If enabled, all transparent fragments will be rendered. If disabled, only the front-most surface fragments will be rendered.
Disable this option to ensure correct appearance of transparency from
any point of view. When using Alpha Blending this option should be
disabled because with Alpha Blending, the order in which triangles are
sorted is important.

To fix this uncheck the [ ] Show Backface option.

Thank you! The model was imported from an OBJ file, so I'm surprised Blender set it like that. I suppose there must be something in the OBJ file that Blender looks at and uses for that setting.

@Blunder Do you happen to know how to solve this in Blender 4.3? The backface options no longer exist. The issue manifests whenever a viewport overlay like Face Sets or Face Orientation is enabled. Thanks!

@Blunder SOLVED! :-) Because I was using a scene unit scale of 0.01, I had to set my Clip Start 100 times smaller than normal as well, to 0.01 cm. Now it works normally!

@Blunder Update: I discovered the real culprit was NOT actually the Clip Start / End values, but a new setting in EEVEE called Viewport Pixel Size. Setting this to "1x" instead of "Automatic" solved the issue. See answer here: https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/327058/39431

Ah! That’s good to know. Thanks for the update about Blender 4.2 and the new Eevee settings.


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Why is my Eevee render pixelated?
I am getting an extremely pixelated result when rendering with Eevee and I don't understand why; you can see the settings I am using for render and output in the attached screenshot.
Images
I tried to copy and paste in new file did not work. Any suggestion or help. Thanks

Please provide a simple file to test this. Best if you delete all geometry and just add a cube, so there is no problem with unwanted models uploaded. And please use the screenshot functionality of your OS, this way they become actually readable...

yes, share screenshots or the .blend file. However, possible fixes are to increase the resolution and screen space reflections

It could also be useful to know how to purposely get this pixelated result :)

@aliasguru file is be attached

@Tareyes file is be attached

@amonroejj file is be attached

I have tested your file briefly, no pixelation happening for me. You do have the effect with the very file you uploaded?

As has been mentioned on several of your questions, please upload the images using the built-in uploader so they appear in the post and not just as as link. Also, please look at this to take better screenshots: https://www.take-a-screenshot.org/

You are using an old version of Blender 2.80, which is 2.80.57. Update to the official release and check if that resolves the problem.

Looks like a result of setting Render Properties > Film > Filter Size to 0, try changing that setting.


text:
Lights looking weird
I add light but what ı do its looks still pixel
https://pasteboard.co/IH6dcFq.png I render with eevee.
Why it's happening.
https://pasteboard.co/IH7xBME.png These my nodes for wooden table.

Please show the table's material node tree

I add my nodes with edit post.

-Low Texture Resolution / Light with Specular = 1
-High Texture Resolution / Light With Specular = 1
-High Texture Resolution / Light with Specular = 0
see if tweaking any of these values solvesyour problem

If ı change specular then lights being not enough for scene but probly this was a bug because i render with cycle everythings be perfect. Lightning still not good but thats my failure.

hummm, try this with 2.81 to see if its still an issue

If your problem is that the light is too small, then changing the radius setting in the properties should fix your problem. If it is too weak, you should change the power setting.

If that doesn't answer your question, please specify.

I think problem happening from wood table in scene because when i change color ramp (connected roughness) it's decrease little bit not completely.


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How to unparent children and keep them (where they are)?
So, I don't really know how to formulate the problem to begin with, so here's a picture. The object in the middle is child of the two circles, with instancing set to vertices. How can I unparent the objects and keep the ones on the vertices where they are?
TIA

Select the circles, go to Object > Apply > Make Instances Real or press F3 and type "Make instances real"

Booyah! Thank you.


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How to clean up intersecting faces and edges?
I'm currently trying to build grid structures by using planes and solidifying them. Problem is, when I use this to create hexagonal grids, the solidifying modifier does this in a way that faces of the same mesh intersect each other:

Above object started out as three planes which were joined to a Y-shape, then solidified.
You can see that in the middle, the upper faces actually cross each other.
Is there an easy way to clean this up in a way that…
a) …where the faces intersect each other, edges and vertices are created
b) …the inner parts of the faces are removed?
To clarify, I am working with planes, because I am warping them, which works far easier than dealing with already solid meshes (hard to explain I guess… My point is that I really don't want to change my underlying workflow, if I can help it). And since I'm working on grids, where this phenomenon occurs often, having a way to automate this would be really helpfuL.
Here is a picture that better illustrates what I want to achieve (right), as well as my current workflow(File is in a comment below):

Edit: As your request has changed I give a second answer below.
Maybe you're not choosing the best way to build your object, in your case the Solidify modifier will create unwanted intersection and it will be hard to fix.
What you could do for example is begin with a triangle (3 vertices circle), extrude it up, then select the 3 faces, press AltE to extrude, choose Individual Faces and drag to extrude.

Second answer:

Create a 10 vertices circle, scale one of 2 vertices so that it makes a hexagon.

Move down those vertices, extrude down the whole mesh.

Select one of 2 edges underneath, bevel them, extrude down.

Thank you for the suggestion. You're probably right that there has to be a better way, but your approach doesn't work for me, because I want to warp the planes in three dimensions. Maybe I'll add a picture later. A friend suggested building the negative spaces, then using boolean on an object to remove them. This sounds like a pissi le approach

to warp the planes in three dimensions? Yes please give more explanations, I don't see how what you've done could work better than my solution

Here you go, this illustrates my current workflow: https://www.mediafire.com/file/xkeh2a0ymead2gl/untitled_001.blend/file I assume you are right and there is an easier approach. I didn't even mention the open parts on top of the mesh...

so you should have directly asked how to do the final shape, maybe edit your question with a screenshot    ;)   I'll try to find out

ok, edited, tell me if this is correct

I first assumed your answer was right, but it left out a crucial part: in your solution, the faces are triangular and therefore planar. If you take a look at the object with the subsurf modifier, you'll see how the face is distorted. This is not easy to spot in a picture, but if you move the object around, you can see it. I now rebuilt the whole thing and kept the planes as separate objects to which I applied the modifiers. They now still have overlapping faces, but I think I can manage this better. Still, thank you very much for your input and time.

You mean as soon as you give it a subsurf it doesn't work? I didn't you wanted to give it a subsurf, I think it can easily be fixed, I'll take a look later  ;)

No, the subsurf doesn't seem to be the problem. I think the core problem is that when you have an object with connected, but open planes, as the planes have an inner and outer side, the solidify modifier orients itself along this. But since the planes are all open, there is no actual "inner" face. Come to think of it, a dirty hack might be to put two planes in the same space, but give them opposing normals... Edge cases, edge cases everywhere.

It's very hard to understand, maybe edit your question with more details if you want help   ;)

Well, I think what we discuss here is outside of the scope of the original question, which was "how to deal with intersecting faces and edges". The answer seems to be "it's complicated", which is fair enough. I think I've found a process with which I can avoid the problem in the first place. This is not a solution per se, but I can live with that. Thanks again for your time.

…ok, after playing around with it some more, the way to go for me is to use the edge split modifier to treat the different planes as separate meshes when applying the solidify modifier.


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How to get rid of sharp edges when using subsurf modifier?
I am currently playing around with the Catmull-Clark part of the subdivision modifier and I'm starting to get the hang of it. However, I have one edge that does just weird things:

I want to have a smooth rounding here, but somehow the edges and vertices of this region don't seem to cooperate (other parts of the same mesh are fine).
I tried rebuilding this section from scratch and checked for hidden/inside faces or edges (didn't find anything). I joined adjacent vertices and am pretty sure there are no double vertices, edges, anything. There is a mirror modifier in front of it, but it doesn't interact with this particular region. I'm currently out of ideas and welcome input.
File (Has been cut down to the tricky part.):
http://www.mediafire.com/file/8u5tqhf1wyonr0y/for_stackexchange.blend

it looks like you have an inner face, but maybe share your file

@moonboots done. I checked for inner faces, but didn't find any.

As we see if we enable the Face Orientation option in the Viewport Overlays, you have some flipped normals, Blender can't smooth correctly between the faces. In Edit mode select all and press ShiftN

That's it, thanks. Is there some simple explanation how this happens?

I don't know, maybe you've assembled faces that had reversed normals?


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Camera can't be changed to another
I have an issue with the cameras. It usually worked fine just to now. I added a camera to have another point of view. I must had touch something unwanted because I can't change to any other camera.
I can switch camera in Scene menu, but it does not seem to do anything, the first camera keeps the focus.
I did try to create a new project and play around with cameras and all went fine.
Can you guys have encountered that issue too? how do I fix it?

An active camera is not the same as an active object. Try selecting the camera to switch to, then use the Spacebar search function and type "Set active object as camera".

I figured it out with the 3pointedit post.
I had to set the Local Camera option to the proper object(camera in my case).
I used to just change the Scene's camera but apparently do not work anymore. At least I know another way to change it.

[Update]
Here is the button I hitted by mistake :

Now I can change the active camera directly from the scene menu.

Button active : only camera can be selected as camera from the Scene menu.
Button inactive : Camera in Scene menu do nothing, but in the first picture, you can set any object as a camera.


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Ver 2.8 Texture paint works only on a few faces
I ran into a problem today while texture painting a mesh. Did it multiple times before and everything went fine but not with this mesh.
Here my steps:

Made my mesh composed of few objects (nothing with weird shapes, just cubes)
Went in Edit Mode, selected all vertices, pressed "U" and selected "Smart UV Project"
Created an image for the UV map
Created a material with an image texture linked to the UV map Image.
Went into Texture paint mode and start painting on my mesh with paint mask activated so i can paint everything or just the faces i want.

Some faces got half painted vertically, horizontally or just a few parts of the face, some not getting any painting while some are good.
Don't know what I did wrong. Please help me!
Blend file link

Your problem probably comes from flipped normals, so select all in Edit mode and press ShiftN, now it seems to work:

Wow! That fix my problem! Thank you so much!


text:
Object showing up strange in render
an object in my scene looks fine in all other views but shows up weirdly transparent/ invisible in the render? I've tried everything I could find online about invisible rendered objects but none of them worked. I'm a bit of beginner so this could be something obvious
Below is object next to a cube for comparison. it renders fine while the object seems to sort of be there and obstructs the cube but is the color of the background. This only happens in cycles render.

solid viewport:
Right now I can only theorize it might have something to do with grouping/ duplication, as I used a modifier to make the object symmetrical during modeling.
Or it could be a material setting I haven't learned yet?
Link to the blender file (sorry about that!):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/tzf2v0i57iu8tku/fruit%20basket%201.blend?dl=0

Can I have access to the blender file?

It's easier for someone to help you if you upload the blend file here.  In the absence of the blend file, it does seem like you have multiple blank materials assigned to the object so perhaps you have one of the bogus materials assigned to the object rather than Material.003?

I've added a link to the file!

You have enabled Shadow Catcher the object.
Select it, go to the object properties in the Properties area, uncheck Shadow Catcher.

Shadow Catcher objects will appear as a transparent mask except for the shadows.

[The shadow catcher enables] the object to only receive shadow rays. It is to be noted that shadow catcher objects will interact with other CG objects via indirect light interaction. This feature makes it really easy to combine CGI elements into a real-world footage.

Manual Page


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How to melt an object into fluid and then morph into another object?
I am a beginner in Blender. I really want to accomplish a short 3D animation, I have built the models but I don't know how to deal with the animation. I watched many tutorials about fluid simulation but I still don't know how to finish my animation.
These are my models:

And this is a sketch of how I want the animation:

I was trying to use fluid with Domain and obstacle, but I couldn't achieve that animation effect.
I am confuse about what Blender tools I can use for this.
Here is my blender file:

Best wishes to all!

I don't think you can get a satisfying result with the built in simulator. You better try a Mantaflow Branch.

Thank you very much！I don't know about Mantaflow Branch before, and I would go serch for the tutorial , thanks for commentting!

This is morphing and in Blender it's done with shape keys which have their own editor.

Also look at the Lattice Modifier. You can construct a Lattice that affects everything passing through it. Best example is a car going through a keyhole, but can do a lot more.

Thank you very much! I would try that!

By the way, does anyone could help me to make it in blender files directly? I would very appreciate, and if necessary, I would do my best to reward it.


text:
Texture painting wired issue
There is a wired boundary around the big hole, everywhere else is fine, the small hole does not have this problem. Does anyone know what causes this problem? Thank you!

maybe recalculate the normals?

normals are facing the right direction.

maybe share your file?

Can you check and share what the subdivision modifier is set to?

I have trouble uploading the file here. The subdivision is 3. The normals are right. There are detailed images uploaded to the original post. Thanks, everyone.


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How to make displacement to effect all the surface?

The displacement only working on the side of the woodblock, how to make it on the top of the surface? I have already added subdivision, and still, nothing happens.
Thanks~ :D

could you please share your object? https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/

there is the file.  Thanks a lot! :D It is under the original post.

You need to do several things:

Select your plank and in the Properties panel > Material tab > Settings > Surface > Displacement, enable Displacement Only, otherwise the Displacement node won't give anything.

Give your plank a Subdivision Surface modifier so that it has geometry to move.

Switch to Render mode to see the result, apply the scale of your object so that you have a 1/1/1 scaled object, you'll see that it will go crazy because of your settings.

So just adjust the settings (didn't try to understand all your nodes organization though).

I adjusted the value, the result is not even close to yours. they became rounded. :(


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Weight Painting is not working

There is another issue. (There is alway an obstacle daily.haha)
This time is Weight Paint. And I have no problems painting on other objects, this is the only object that has issues.
Problems are:

When I paint, it only affects the corner of the box. and it does not read this vertex group. Is it because there are no vertices on this face, it only paints on the vertex?
It paints through the box, it should be only on one side of the box. The box has Solidary and Subdivision and paper material.
How could I prevent the sprinkles from passing through the box?
Thanks for your time to review and help me out! :D

Weight painting gives a strength value to a vertex or to some vertices, it determines the level of influence a group has on this vertex or on those vertices. If there is no vertex it can't paint.
You say that it paints through the object. Maybe you've given your object a Solidify modifier (is it what you mean when you talk about Solidary)? In that case apply the modifier. The other possibility is that you've enabled the 2D Falloff option, deactivate it in the N panel > Tool > Brush > Options.
You don't say anything about these sprinkles and you don't explain what you mean by "passing through the box"... If they are Particles > Hair objects and if you want them to appear only on some parts of the box you need to create a vertex group and select it in the Particles panel > Vertex Groups > Density. If they are Particles > Emitter, maybe you need to choose Faces instead of Volume in the Particles panel > Emission > Source > Emit From.

Thank you for the detailed explanation. And you are right on what I meant but either typed the wrong word or didn’t mention. THANKS again! :D