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Blender via RDP is super slow. Why?
When I open blender on my old bad laptop, it works smooth. Even if there are hundreds of particles on the scene.
But when I open the same file on the powerful 64-core server via RDP (windows remote desktop), it is freaking slow. Just unbelievably slow. Each click takes 30-40 seconds to react. How can I fix it?
I've tried TeamViewer, but it is not working on the server (stucks on Initializing Display Parameters).

I can confirm the same behavior. In order to get Blender GUI to run on a remote machine I had to place an openGL file in the blender installation folder. I'm currently looking for a solution to this.

This does not seem like an answer to the question but rather a "me too" post.

In my case, I just put All mesa-dist-win 18.2.1 DLLs to "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender" and it worked.
This DLL is not very slow.
using this
https://github.com/pal1000/mesa-dist-win/releases


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Is there a way to make the object move infinitely?
Like if it had some kind of invisible propeller.
Thank you.

rigid body simulations by default have earth gravity (but you can change it) so a falling object will fall forever, until stopped, reversing G, it will fall upwards. to make it really "fly", you need either to "propel" it or animate it, imho.

do you need it as an active rigid body object? If not, just animate it.

I need it, that's the problem.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


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How to make newtonian particles to not go through each other?
Right now it just looks more like fluid, and the objects are going trough each other a little bit like this:

If i understood the question you can use the Cast Modifier
Make 2 sphere

Select 1 sphere and add Cast Modifier and Target to other sphere
When you move the 1st sphere it goes inside the other.

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


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Glare and transparency
So I did add Glare in Compositing mode and when I render, it works as it should.
But when I try to render it with transparent background, it's not working. Why?

Some screenshots would be helpful to answer your question. However, my initial guess is that even though the Glare might actually be working, the original alpha is still being used for final output and therefore cuts off the Glare.

To see the glare in action, I would do this:

So the glare is working, but it doesn't affect the alpha channel. To make it do so, I'm setting the mix value to 1 to make the node output only the glare. I'm adding the glow to the image and the alpha, so it will be part of the alpha channel too. I'm then recombining them with a set alpha node.
Remember to clamp the add on the alpha, as it should never be greater than 1 (or smaller than 0)
I hope this helps you :D

Holy moly... I've read hundreds of resources and tried dozens of solutions... only this one worked... I very much appreciate it, dear @Uanpis Cardada

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


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Can I have 2 curve guides to make particles go 2 different ways?
So when I use curves as force fields Curve Guides, the particles tend to go only one way. Is there a way to make two separate curve guides, so the half of the particles will follow one path and another half will follow another path?

Make two identical particle systems one for each curve each with half the total particle count?

But how do I attach particles to curve?

Google Search is your friend


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Disable gravity on the certain layer. Possible?
I have the levitating object with a rigid body physics and, as expected, it falls down when I start the simulation.
But I want it stay still in the air (without disabling the Dynamic).
So I've tried next: I moved it to the different layer from the scene and tried to use force fields like Wind to oppose the gravity, but it moves anyway. Because I can't calculate exactly what is the opposite of -9.81 gravity force.
Any possible solutions?
Maybe the gravity can be set to zero on the certain layer?

Yes, that is true, but there are too many points of interaction, so it will take days to place all the keyframes manually like this.

I'm not familiar with this process myself, but you can run a simulation in the game engine and bake it to keyframes. You could then have the levitating objects moving via keyframes and the non levitating objects being simulated. Only issue would be is if they levitating and non levitating objects interact.


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How to set the origin point of each bone differently?
I've been changing stuff while i was rigging, after i finished adding stuff i noticed that the single bone wasn't rotating like it was doing before, now every bone have one common origin point and if i try to change it for every single bone it changes for every other bone.
As you can see in the picture the arm bone have the origin in the main bone.
How do i fix this?

OK, There is only one object origin because it's the origin of your object. It's the 0,0,0 point of reference for all bones inside the armature. All bones share this one origin. It's the ball joint that connects the invisible shoebox with the outside world. In that invisible shoebox lies the armature.
In Object Mode, the whole armature rotates around this.
In Pose Mode, every bone usually rotates around it's own root unless constrained in some way.
You are in Edit Mode where neither necessarily applies. There, stuff rotates around the pivot point. That can be, for example, the center of your selection or, if chosen: the 3D Cursor. It changes violently depending on your settings and your selection.

That also means you are often not merely rotating, you are rotating and moving bones.
Example: you select an entire bone (orange, Edit Mode) and it rotates around its middle. That's not a rotation, that's moving its tip and root in a circular motion. Tip and root will have changed their coordinates.
You select an entire bone (blue, Pose Mode) and it rotates around its root. This is a true rotation because only the direction in which the bone points has changed.
Tip: use CTRLF3 with 'Fullscreen' disabled to make screenshots. Without the header or the properties (N) it's hard to see what you are doing.
I think learning by doing is beginning to reach its limits for you. Flying blind can be tiring. You will run into lots of roadblocks if you keep using Blender without knowing it's fundamental concepts of how it organises its data and its hierarchies.
Make it a sport to read a few pages of documentation every day. Otherwise you keep having blind spots creeping up on you when you need it the least ( :

Thank you for your tips, they are very appreciated! I'm sorry if I didn't explain it corrextly, so the problem appears in Pose mode, where the root of each bone is located where the origin of the object is

@HelenT. You're welcome. After all, I wanna see a finished movie with the robot ( :

Sure thing! :) I don't know if I can post another screenshot in the comments to better explain the problem anyway it appears to be in Pose mode too. Is there a way I can tell Blender where I want the root for each bone?

@HelenT. You can expand your question as much as you like. Also: the root of each bone is at the root of each bone. Where the thick end of the bone sits is where its pivot point is.

I'll have to guess, but I think you have set the 3D cursor as pivot point and that's why everything rotates around this artificial point. It probably has nothing to do with any origins.

Oh God... Thank you so much, I was following this tutorial where I needed to change it and I didn't connected the fact that it was that. Problem solved!

When I had this issue the reason was that I had my pivot point at "3D cursor" instead of literally any other choice.

My post is very late, but I feel this will help others having the same issue.
At some point, the visual cursor ( where you place the mouse to make edits / changes to the bones' translate, rotate, scale, etc. moved to the on-screen origin 0,0,0. This may have happened as a result of some process in Blender.
In Pose Mode:
Clicking somewhere in your work space and pressing . will set the on-screen location for editing your object's translate, rotate, etc. This will not change the bone's actual pivot point. Let's say, for example, you want to see you model without the on-screen cursor getting in your way visually. You can move the on-screen cursor as a visual aid ( again by pressing . ).
Pressing , will restore the on-screen cursor back to the bone's root on-screen.
Hope this helps.


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Primitive Z Function- Changing Equation in Realtime
I am using the following function:
bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_z_function_surface(equation = "(x*y)/10", div_x = 16, div_y = 16, size_x = 15, size_y = 15)

to plot a 3D graph as a mesh. Is it possible for me to change the equation passed in with a python script, without deleting and re-instantiating a new mesh object?
Apologies if this question is dumb, just not super familiar with Blender.

Does this help?  https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/74063/animating-z-surface-math-functions

I saw that earlier, but I couldn't seem to get it to work- I'll take a look again though. Thanks!

@RobotKarel314 If it is my answer you are having issues with, don't hesitate to ask via comment on A.


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Blender 2.79 Adding Propeller to plane and moving whole object
I created an airplane, added a propeller, It is connected but not joined. I want it to spin and move together with the plane. Appreciate any feedback. Thanks

Right click on the propeller, then Shift + Right-Click on the plane. Then Ctrl + P to set the plane as a parent.

@corkj Obligatory reminder to accept ;)

Thank you. I had found the solution. Went on hiatus...


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Shrinkwrap remnants - during model wall creation
I am creating the wall of an object through shrinkwrapping a big sphere around the object, and then remeshing. Few cycles of this. However, I get some remnants of mesh between arch. How to solve that problem? Of course I can do it manually but it is a lot of work. After removing it there is a big hole in the mesh so again need to be corrected manually. Any simpler ideas?

does it really have to be a sphere? Why not a tube?

Tube is working even worse. Its not covering the whole object, and produce same remnants.

Do you mean a cylinder fresh from the add menu or a topology of a few hundred verts that roughly follows your whatever that is with a subsurf to give it some verts?

The Shrinkrap Modifier is not really a fire and forget kind of tool that takes care of everything. It needs some love.
Here is how I use it:

I model a very low poly mesh that wraps around the target. In this case a simple circle with 6 verts. It's not just a blanket thrown over everything. Any topology worth considering is mirrored lowpoly in this mesh. The structure of this mesh is crucial. It makes sure my result has a nice flowing topology instead of being a random mess. Blender's workflow and chaotic topology don't harmonize all that well.
Step two is a Subsurf, can be a simple one, so the Wrap has something to work with.
Step three is the actual Shrinkwrap Modifier that gets its offet.
Step four is adjusting the verts. In some places the modifier will goof up. It needs guidance. But since all the geometry is procedural, you can still adjust the lowpoly base to help the Shrinkwrap along. It'll search for the closest surface point and its the modeler's job to make sure the right spots are closest.

If you want to, you can sandwich the Shrinkwrap between two subsurfs where the first is for shrinking and the second is for smoothing.

@cegaton Blender never gets boring.


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Set pose position to armature
I'm having some problems with this model.
I created the armature using mixamo, and he also gave me the pose position.
As you can see in the pictures it is a T-pose and the inclination of the hands is different.
I would like to be able to apply the pose position as a new rest position (using the command "apply position position as rest position") but the result is that the model does not fit the skeleton.
I could recreate the model and its armor, but I want to know if there is any way to recover the model, if I were in similar situations.

tnx to all.

Just adding four screenshots doesn't help. What do they represent?

It appears, that you want to apply your new pose to the model as well as the armature.
To do that, make sure you are in the desired new rest pose. Then apply the armature modifier on the object first. The object will now be unlinked from the armature, but it will be in the target pose.
Now, you can apply the Pose as Rest Pose to the armature. Following this, both (armature and mesh) have the desired pose as the default pose.
To clean up, re-add an armature modifier to the mesh and select the armature as the target object of the modifier.


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Streching near edge on unwrapped mesh
On the left view (rendered 3D) the material looks stretched and I can't figure out why that is happening, I expect it to work well. It's a fresh project and the plane object has a subdivision modifier applied with adaptive checked.

This can be result of Adaptive Subdivision as well, though in this case it would be more apparent

You have probably unwrapped the UV before you made the margin wider. Mesh changes require UV changes accordingly to avoid distortion. Best to avoid unwrapping unless no further changes to the mesh are planned.
Unwrapped the geometry:

Changed the mesh. The UVs are no more correct:

Corrected UVs:

The mesh was unwrapped after all the cuts have been made. The problem actually seems to be with combining UV texture coordinates with procedural textures (link). Procedural textures work with the geometry texture coordinates.

It is visible in the screenshot (I have measured the Pixels) that your UVs are not sized accurately. Does the Problem still occur if you match the size of the inner face to its UV exactly?

The polygons are blue because there is no stretching (there would be some green showing otherwise), but yes, when i move them manually I can correct it. But why do I have to move them manually? The seams look ok, there is not stretching and the mesh was unwrapped after all the cuts and seams were added.

For the stretching: the color does only take angles into account, not correct aspect ratio or line lengths. Which unwrapping method did you use to generate this UVs?


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Animation with unintentional black boxes
I'm making an Animation with a Motion Track. In my preview render everything is fine, but when I render my scene in png there are black boxes in some pictures.
At the beginning of the animation these dots (showing the cities) appear. After that the lines move towards the city Höxter. At the end a street sign is falling on the position where all lines are ending.
These black boxes just appear when the second animation is running. I don't have any other meshes in my scene that could create these black boxes or cast shadows on the map.
How can I fix it?

.
Heres the blend file:

its hard to tell if you dont include the blend file, my assumption is that it has something to do with the red squares but not sure, things like that normally dont appear out of nothing. i wonder maybe some path deform effect on red cube .. and maybe things went wrong in setting that up.

How can I include the blend file? I'm new on this website: Please Tell me. I will do it directly...

please use http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/ for all blend files. (pasteall link only last for ~ six months)

One last question. Do you have the textures and the Video ( Motion Track) if you download the Blend.file ?

i've rendered it all, but i dont get the boxes...
could it be a problem with post operations (where you combine it all).

Ok, that's interesting. I probably just worked in blender. :/ Do you think installing blender again would help? Which version do you use ?

I downloaded my download file now, because user3800527 (thanks to you) told me, that its working on his pc. Now its working and there are no black boxes anymore. I can't tell exactly what the problem was. Maybe it just was a problem of blender.

Try some "debug" in your "glitchy" file. Press "~" button to enable all the layers, then press Alt + H (unhide all). It looks like some boxes were hidden, so they are invisible in the viewport, but still are visible on render.

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


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apply one textures to others
I'm modeled a a tree before some days and right now I'm trying to texture the leafs. Is it possible to just texture one of the hexagons as a leaf and to apply the texture of this one to the others ? Thank you.

If you created the tree with Sapling and didn't change UV map then most likely you don't need to anything other than usual adding material and including desired image texture/s there. All the leaves should be textured the same according to the created UV map

Ok, I will try it tomorrow. Thank you very much :)

As part of the same mesh, it would be very dificult, but you can separate the leafts into individual objects, that way you can put the same texture to all of them.
In order to do so, you must select all the leafts whit A and then Press P and choose by Loose Parts. then you can asing the same material to all the individual leafts.
It should be posible to use unwrap and uv textures to return them to the same object, but i'm  not so sure, so lets keep it that way, good luck.

Note that separating several thousands leaves into different objects will take quite a bit of calculations, not to mention it will slow down the viewport performance. By default Sapling addon for creating trees unwraps the leaves making each leaf using all the texture space.

thank you very much for the answer! i really I appreciate it !!! I really believe that it will work. My laptop is too slow for that :*(, and its not working hard enough. Do you got a tip for me what I can do ?

Mr Zak I made my tree with the add on, what do I need to do now?

I would do it like this:

Select all Leafs, hit P and select "by loose parts" to make all leafs to an individual object
Select all the new leaf-objects,hit alt+ctrl+shift+c and select "origin to geometry" to fix the origin of each leaf-object
If all leafs should have the same geometry, select all leaf-objects, hit ctrl+l and select "Object Data" to make each leaf-object use the same mesh data-block
Select one leaf-object and unwrap the mesh
Select all leaf-objects with the unwrapped one as the active one, hit ctrl+l again and select "Transfer UV Maps" to copy the UV-map to every leaf
Select one leaf-object and add a material to it
Select all leaf-objects with the one with the material as the active one, hit ctrl+l once again and select "Materials" to copy the material to every leaf

I see a problem with my answer: the resulting leafs will all point in the same direction.

ohh thats not good. But a pretty good idea! Thank you anyway :)


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Missing parts of the model when importing as Collada (DAE)
I use Collada files from SketchUp.
When I import them into Blender some times import goes as intented but sometimes it imports only part of it.
Here is for example you can see this chair.
The right one is imported as Collada (DAE), and the left one is the same .DAE file, but I put it trough online mesh converter and imported as OBJ.
Why can it be and how to fix it?

try importing into .obj,
it is much better than .dae
besides not disturbing the vertices

Rafael, please, read carefully.
I already wrote in the question about .obj
I need to import .dae

Related. I've stumbled across this problem too. Seems like conversion is the only solution so far.


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Random color in materials to not change when I copy the objects
I have 100 balls with random colors. The nodes looks like this

When I copy these 100 balls (no matter if I use Shift + D or Ctrl + C) the color on the new 100 balls is different (that's what you should expect since the material has that randomizer in nodes).
But I need the color to be the same as it is on the original 100 balls.
How can I achieve that?
Maybe I can fixate the material somehow?

While waiting for a better answer, a possible way to "hack" the problem could be to bake the 100 random color into a texture and then use that as color input for a brand new material.

Thank you, but I'm not sure if I know how to bake these random colors.

As Carlo's comment suggested, you could bake the color onto a texture.

Activate the Texture Atlas Addon.
Add an empty image texture.
Select all objects and unwrap them using the texture atlas addon.See the texture atlas documentation for more instructions on this addons usage.
Bake the Diffuse Color only using very few render samples!
Replace the Object Info random output with the image textures output.


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Blender via SSH stops rendering if I disconnect
So I'm running the Blender in UI-less mode to render animation on my linux server.
Everything works smooth, but one thing does really bother me - if I disconnect from SSH (for example, if I close the PuTTY) the Blender stops rendering. Why?
And how can I make it work without me being always on the line?

Consider using screen or tmux: https://askubuntu.com/questions/8653/how-to-keep-processes-running-after-ending-ssh-session

The session is closed when you disconnect from ssh. The solution is simple. You need to use screen
sudo apt-get install screen

(in case you are using Ubuntu)
Then do ssh normally.
Inside the ssh session, type
screen

Accept, and then run your process. Now, do not close the window. Press Ctrl, hold it while you press A, then hold both keys and press D.
Then the screen session is detached, the process is running in the background and you can exit your ssh session.
Later, you can ssh again. Your process will still be there. To recover the screen session, type
screen -r


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Is there add-on to skip rendering for identical frames?
I've googled a lot about it, but everyone suggests to skip them manually. It's not easy.
Maybe there is some add-on or script to make Blender render identical frames only once?
And then I can make the needed frames longer using video editors. It could save many hours of rendering.

Good news, everyone!
I found it! One Canadian guy created the add-on for this. It's called Dopplerender (lol).
Here is more info and link to download: http://creativityhacker.ca/2017/08/08/dopplerender-a-turbo-boost-for-blender-animation-rendering/


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Partial Motion Blur in Cycles
Is there a way to make Motion Blur to have effect only on certain objects?
Like if I want the main scene to be still and don't have a blur while camera moving, but all the other object want to be blurred.

Not sure if feasible for your project, but you could parent all your objects in the scene to an empty and move the empty instead of the camera.
Also, turn on motion blur in your render settings and turn it off for the individual objects that you don't want blurred. (In the Object Properties Panel)

It worked. I've just turned off Motion Blur for all the main scene objects and they are not blurry. I didn't know it is possible to do in the Object Properties Panel. Thank you!

Cool! Glad I could help! :)


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The Character has in the Blender view no colour!!
My character, the man in the screenshot has no color in the 3D view. I marked it with blue color. There is also a UV texture, which I added to [Image Texture]. Does anyone know how to get the color in the 3D view according to the texture?

Please change the Viewport Shading as high lighted below:

To: Texture or Material


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Overlapping surfaces problem
I want to make a shoe in Blender, but I cannot get rid of the overlapping surfaces, as you can see on the first and second image below. In the third image I joined the two surfaces using (f). Why is the overlap still visible on the third image?
Although I merged the two surfaces.

You probably need to delete the faces and reconstruct that part of the model from scratch, try selecting the overlapping faces, press X and select "Only Faces", this way it deletes only the faces, leaving the edges and the vertices, then you can repair the model by recreating the faces, selecting the vertices you want and pressing F. Keep in mind that you probably need to delete some of the edges too, because it's likely that some of them are intersecting each other as well; in that case after you press X select "Only Edges & Faces" so that it only deletes the edge, leaving the vertices intact.


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Incorrect context Runtime Error on calling .poll() method via command line
I'm trying to get a python based audio visualisation script to work in blender via command line interface. Here's the code myscript.py
When I run the following in blender 2.66 on Ubuntu 14.04
blender -b -noaudio -P myscript.py
I get the following error
File "/home/random9/myscript.py", line 66, in <module>
bpy.ops.anim.keyframe_insert_menu(type='Scaling')
File "/usr/share/blender/2.79/scripts/modules/bpy/ops.py", line 189, in __call__
ret = op_call(self.idname_py(), None, kw)

RuntimeError: Operator bpy.ops.anim.keyframe_insert_menu.poll() failed,
context is incorrect

in [line number 66]
bpy.ops.anim.keyframe_insert_menu(type='Scaling')
How do I resolve this error?
I've been going through the python scripting docs and it suggests that I should be able to figure out what context an operator needs simply by seeing how it’s used in Blender and thinking about what it does.
Any help is appreciated.

You can avoid the keyframe insert menu operator  completely with context.object.keyframe_insert("scale", group="Scale")

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/2848/why-avoid-bpy-ops

@batFINGER, however armature data objects have no keyframe_insert_menu method.

You can avoid the keyframe insert menu operator completely with context.object.keyframe_insert("scale", group="Scale")

@batFINGER, thx. With your suggestion, I substitute bpy.ops.anim.keyframe_insert_menu(type='BUILTIN_KSI_VisualLocRotScale') with obj.keyframe_insert('location', group='Location'); obj.keyframe_insert('scale', group='Scale'); obj.keyframe_insert('rotation_quaternion', group='Rotation'), and everything works fine!


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Expanding Circle on Sphere Surface
I'm trying to animate an expanding circle as a texture on a sphere.  I've tried using a wave texture, but that doesn't seem to be working.  It has to start as a point (very small circle), then expand out a little way like a rock dropped in a pond (with no waves) and then disappear.  The coordinates it starts on as well as its maximum size has to be random and repeat.  It has to fade out at maximum size.
I'm stumped.  Can this be done with anything but a custom written procedural?
Thanks!

It's fairly simple to make one sequence animated manually, but changing location in repetitive manner could be quite tedious (by hand). If you want I can make an answer with manual setup - only one sequence.

Use a gradient node and modify its color with a ramp node.

Then drive its location with an empty.

That's great, could you mark the answer as accepted?


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Fluid simulation baking
I am experiencing issues while following an introduction to fluid simulation. When I try to bake my simulation, either Blender crashes with the error "Error: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION" after a few frames (21), either the baking continues after the frame 21 but the top surface of the mesh disappears (photo).

Do you have an idea to fix it ?
I already tried to uninstall Blender 2.79 and install other versions instead but it didn't help.
Config :
- i5 7400
- Gtx 1060 6GB
- driver 391.1
- Windows 10

That sounds like a Blender bug. Can you share the Blender file so I can take a look at it?

Sure, here is the file : beach.blend . Baking the simulation should be enough to reproduce the bug.


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How can I change the shape for the emission of fire?
I created a fire on the base of a circle. How can I change the shape of the base where i emitted the fire? Every time that I do the fire does not emit on top of the additional pieces that I extrude from the circle.


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Can't see object in weight paint mode
I can't see my object or model in weight paint mode

How did you make this object? What should be showing? What object is the armature bound to?

I used skin modifier to make this object.

Maybe you have some modifiers on your mesh, such as "Mirror modifier", "skin modifier", "sub surface", etc.
Just apply those modifiers, check if they got out from the hierarchy on the right tab under your mesh.
Then select your mesh and your armature and go to pose mode: from there select Parent > Automatic weight > Automatic weight.
You should be able to see the weight on your mesh then.
Good work and have a nice day.


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Offset Function?
In Adobe Illustrator, there is a function called offset path. It's particularly useful when you want to create a uniform outline around an irregularly shaped object because simply scaling it often doesn't yield desirable results. The picture below illustrates my point

I'm looking for a similar function in blender that will allow me to select a closed mesh and produce a duplicate that is offset some degree from the original. How is this conventionally done?
Thanks so much!

This should get you started: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/101324/outline-that-follows-character

Related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/48152/is-there-a-way-to-inset-in-the-opposite-direction-not-outset and https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/61430/how-to-use-the-outset-option-from-the-inset-command/61431#61431 or https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/98518/how-to-outset-faces-evenly and https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/76628/how-to-outset-from-edges-vertices or https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/1088/is-there-a-way-to-offset-an-edge-extrude-edge-loop-perpendicular-to-each-edge

... and https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/38781/how-to-add-outline-to-text ... and https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/36862/outline-bezier-curve-in-2d-mode


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How do I merge along a single axis?
I'm trying to model a custom guitar pick. To create the curvature along the top of it, I created a series of edge loops and used proportional editing to pull the middle up.
Now, I'm aware that I can simply use the same loops to repeat the process at the tip, but as a beginner, I'm curious - is it possible to merge all the edges so the preserve the width of the pick along the y-axis, creating a single edge rather than averaging all the vertices along both the x and y resulting in a single point?
The picture below probably better conveys what I'm trying to ask. Thanks in advance!

If you do what you want you'll get surface converging at perfectly thin angle which is not really existing. You could bevel it though afterwards, just try to avoid more than 5 edges sharing one vertex

I assume what you want is some sort of "Merging vertices only along x-axes" or in other words "Merge vertices with identical x-coordinate".
Two ways to accomplish this come to my mind:
Option 1: Merge the front and back vertices separately

Select the front eight vertices
Merge "At Center" with Alt + M
Select the back eight vertices
Merge "At Center" with Alt + M

Option 2: Scale to zero only in X-direction and remove doubles

Select all bottom vertices/faces.
Press s for scale,
while scaling press x to only scale along X-axis (X-Constraint),
and 0 to set scale factor to zero.
Confirm scale with Enter
Finally "Remove Doubles" in selection (via Toolbar-Button or search with Space)

Aah didn't refresh to see the other answer!

There are two ways to go about doing this.
Method one is to merge the front edges first, then the back ones. If the vertices you are merging have no depth on a certain axis (the Y axis in your case) then merging them will not move them on that axis. Simply select the from ones, merge them, then the back, and merge them.
The second Method is to select all the vertices that you want to merge and scale them to 0 on whatever axis you want to merge the vertices along. In this case, you would press S then X and finally 0 to completely flatten the vertices along the X axis. If the vertices you have selected had some variations along the Z axis, you could instead use Shift+Y instead of X to scale on all axes but the Y, so that they would be perfectly flat. Confirm the scale operation, and then, with all of the vertices still selected, press W and select remove doubles. This will merge together any vertices that are in the exact same position.
One other thing I should mention is that blender has a feature called Auto merge editing that will automatically merge vertices that are in the exact same place. This could be used to save a step in method two. The feature can be found at the bottom of the 3D view on the right side of the toolbar there. It is the little button with the two arrows pointing to the center.
Method two sounds longer when I describe it here, but in practce, once you become familiar with the shortcuts it is quicker that way.


text:
Can I permanently change some default settings like inset size, remove doubles threshold, new mesh size?
Ver. 2.79. I was hoping I could change some annoying settings by just editing some of the .PY files bundled with blender. Especially default inset amount. Maybe it's not that easy.
But for example, I see this file - "C:\Program Files\Blender Foundation\2.79\scripts\addons\mesh_inset__init__.py"
Within that file is this code:
inset_amount = FloatProperty(name="Amount",
    description="Amount to move inset edges",
    default=5.0,

I was hoping just changing that default might do what I want, but it doesn't seem to have any effect. Does anyone know if/how I can do this without having to recompile Blender?

Try to look in User Preferences, in Input tab. There is 2 different ways to do what.
First if your command called right from key-building. In this case you don't need to edit any python code, just go in Input tab, find command and here you can set any default settings as you like:

For example, I changed segments count. And after changing press Save user settings.
Second than your command called from menu, like W -> Remove doubles. You can also create a new shortcut and edit this settings like I explained before:

But of course it will affects only on new keybinding. So how to change default settings in menu? This time also go in Input tab, find command Call Menu that calls from keybinding (in case of Remove doubles it will be  W ):

And we interested in Name of menu (in our case it is "VIEW3D_MT_edit_mesh_specials")
This is what can search in files, and find menu like this:
class VIEW3D_MT_edit_mesh_specials(Menu):
    bl_label = "Specials"

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

        layout.operator_context = 'INVOKE_REGION_WIN'

        layout.operator("mesh.subdivide", text="Subdivide").smoothness = 0.0
        layout.operator("mesh.subdivide", text="Subdivide Smooth").smoothness = 1.0

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.merge", text="Merge...")
        layout.operator("mesh.remove_doubles")

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.hide", text="Hide").unselected = False
        layout.operator("mesh.reveal", text="Reveal")
        layout.operator("mesh.select_all", text="Select Inverse").action = 'INVERT'

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.flip_normals")
        layout.operator("mesh.vertices_smooth", text="Smooth")
        layout.operator("mesh.vertices_smooth_laplacian", text="Laplacian Smooth")

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.inset")
        layout.operator("mesh.bevel", text="Bevel")
        layout.operator("mesh.bridge_edge_loops")

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.faces_shade_smooth")
        layout.operator("mesh.faces_shade_flat")

        layout.separator()

        layout.operator("mesh.blend_from_shape")
        layout.operator("mesh.shape_propagate_to_all")
        layout.operator("mesh.shortest_path_select")
        layout.operator("mesh.sort_elements")
        layout.operator("mesh.symmetrize")
        layout.operator("mesh.symmetry_snap")

I found this file here: /usr/share/blender/2.79/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_view3d.py
This is a menu, that called from Call Menu("VIEW3D_MT_edit_mesh_specials"). Here you can add some default parameters.

Although it says to avoid comments like "thanks" I really want to thank you, Crantisz. I can't believe all this time I overlooked the fact that default settings can be changed in keybindings. The inset thing drove me crazy for so long.
If I decide to edit e.g. space_view3d.py, do you know how I can find the syntax to write in my own new defaults? For example how would I specify a new merge distance for remove doubles, is it going to be similar to the subdivide smooth syntax? Something like .merge_distance  = 1.0 ?

@CreeDorofl on top panel you can find list of last used commands https://i.sstatic.net/yQF2F.jpg


text:
Volumetric haze is showing through solid objects when 'stacked'
I have my whole scene contained in a big cube, and the cube's shader has both volume scatter and volume absorption (which are mixed with an add shader). So the whole scene has haze.
Then, where light is emitting from some conical lamps, I have some invisible light cone meshes, and their volume shader has a stronger haze effect, about double that of the room.
Either haze effect works fine on its own. But when I enable both of them, some haze from the cone lights appears to show through solid objects. But not consistently... like in the pic below, areas near the camera don't have the issue while areas a bit further away show it.
What's the cause, how can I fix it?
See the screenshot below to see what I mean.

Haven't had much luck on this site lately! But I kept banging away at it and figured it out on my own.

The three overlapping cone shapes that you can see at the 3D window (bottom right), don't come to a point, the point is chopped off. So they're like cylinders that are skinny at the top and fat at the bottom.
The issue was apparently caused by the fact that my cylinders were open-ended (aka non-manifold). They had no faces at the top or bottom.
So for example in this pic, the first and last cylinders/cones have faces on top. The middle is open. So if I rendered it like this, the middle one would have the problem while the others wouldn't.

So it seems volumetric effects are sensitive to the mesh that contains them. I should have figured that out sooner because I tried making the cones originally with no faces, just 'wireframe' vertices and edges... and the volumetric effect didn't show. They needed faces to contain it. Since the faces have no material, light passes through them ok, so leaving the top of the cones open wasn't necessary.


text:
How do I make only a portion of my shader to be bumpy?
I'm using procedural shading at a beginner level. So i wanted to sort of mask out where the lava is. How do I do that?

how does your final result should look like?

Basically, only the "rocky" or cooled lava part should be bumpy/ or look like rocks. The hots lava (orange parts) should look smooth or less bumpy.

You should be able to invert the output of your Color Ramp and plug it into the Strength input of your Bump node.


text:
How do you decrease the amount of Vertices in an object?
Let's say I used the subsurf mod to 5 and applied it, but later want to it not subsurf-ed, let's assume that i didnt do a save either.

Try Decimate Modifier.

Never apply modifiers unless strictly necessary, and if you do save a copy of the original .

I doubt there is a way to restore the original mesh (with the exact topology) after applying subsurf modifier. What you can do is use an Un-Subdivide option of the Decimate Modifier (expect some loss in detail though). General rule is if your applied subsurf level was set to 2 you set the unsubdivide level to 4 etc. In my case I set the Un-Subdivide level to 10 on a model with the level 5 subsurf applied.

Note: After appling Decimate modifier you may go to Edit Mode, select all the vertices (A) and hit Alt+J to get rid of some tris to make the topology even more similar to the original mesh.

Thank you...i did saw that modifier, but never knew how to use it...thanks again..

you can try to project your decimated mesh onto your lvl 5 subdiv mesh to regains some of that lost detail


text:
I can't seem to get Smoothing by Loop Cutting very well
I was making a bridge but while smoothing with loop cuts, I just cant add loop cuts (on the blue part). I tried inverting the normal behind the faces(in the second pic) but it didnt solve it. I also tried to delete the faces and do them manually but i still cant add loop cuts and also increases the amount of loopcuts needed.
*Note: Note sure if that's needed, but i have a mirror mod on too.

It's the first project im trying by myself(out of my own imagination), so i dont want to be discouraged...

Loop Cuts will only work properly with quad based topology and as far I can see there is and ngon which is preventing placing Loop Cut.

Yep! Thx i fixed it using triangular faces instead...

Nevermind i fixed it by deleting the face and used triangular faces instead. This let me add the loop cuts.

You could lower amount of faces and improve the edge flow by dissolving 2 diagonal edges which form the tris and connecting the edge loops from the bottom either with Knife or Connect Vertex Path tools


text:
How to align seamless textures?
I'm doing a pathway which involves a curve/corner, i can't seem to be able to texture it properly, I want it to be seamless...i just cant do it...the texture I,m using is seamless,
Things that I've tried:
1.Make single object(One straight path tile and one corner)
Result: Textures wouldn't align
2.Make it so that i would get a corner with 2 straights at the end(as shown in the pic)
3.With the model I have in the pic, I straighten the UV of the curve but it still doesn't align
I was expecting an easier way to do this or a fix...Thank you
The first and second pic is with the UV straighten and the result

Third and fourth shows the normal UV and Straighten

You need to have a special corner texture that will seamlessly tile into the straight pieces.

To avoid seams you need to unwrap your path as a single UV island. This UV island will be straightened out, be all quads and lie horizontally in the UV space. The bottom left hand corner of the UV island will be snapped to the UV space X = 0.00 and Y = 0.00. Then the UV island will be scaled along the X axis until the texture looks about correct on the object in the 3D viewport.
1: To Unwrap so that the path's UV's will be all quads in face select mode select a face of the path that is already a quad that has  angles of 90° at each corner.
2: Then select the rest of the path that will be using the path texture.
3: Open the UV Unwrap menu and choose the option Follow Active Quads
4: In the last operator panel choose either the Length Average or Length option.
5: The Uv's should unwrap with all UV faces as quads.

6: In the UV editor select the UV island and (if necessary)rotate it so that it is lying horizontally in the UV space.
7: From the UV menu enable the Constrain to Image Bounds option.
8: Drag the UV island down so that the lower left hand corner of the UV island is "snapped" at the lower left hand corner of the UV space.

9: Check that the 2d cursor is also positioned at X =0.00 and Y = 0.00 in the UV space.
10: Change the Pivot Point to 2d Cursor. This will be used as the origin for the scaling in the next step.
11: Select the UV island and scale it up along the Y axis until the top edge of the UV's align with the top edge of the UV space.
12: Uncheck the Constrains to Image bounds option in the UV menu.
13: Scale the UV's along the X axis so that they extend beyond the UV space until the texture on the object in the 3d viewport looks OK.

If you notice that the texture looks a bit deformed (wavy) where the path bends then adding more longitudinal loop cuts along the length of the path will lixiviate a lot of this deforming.

Try to press 7 to have a view of your model from top and make a UV mappingfrom view (select the faces you need and press U - Project from view)

Your UV-Map is stretched. Your last approche is pritty close. Maybe unwrapping it in Top View with Project vom View will work in this case.


text:
Join function creating unwanted edge loop?
I'm trying to follow along with a CG Masters tutorial, but I'm getting some unexpected results! The goal is to restore the topology with a series of join commands, but instead of affecting only the selected area, it creates a loop around the entire object! I've attached before and after pictures to clarify. Does anyone know why this is happening?

What you see is what I would call unexpected behaviour of the Vertex Connect Path tool, this is the tool that has a J shortcut.
The expected behaviour is to add an edge between selected vertices, existing faces are cut through in the process. In your example the missing face between the selected vertices causes this to take the long way around the entire object, effectively cutting an edge loop around the whole model.
To get the result you expect, the space in the middle needs to have a face.
In the tutorial, at that stage, the hole is filled in with an n-gon before using J to cut it into quads.

Bless you. Thank you so much for the clarification!


text:
Why is the array modifier scaling my object?
I'm trying to practice using the array modifier by creating a ring and having a series of gems that wrap around the surface. I created an empty in the centre of the ring that would serve as a pivot point, but when I clicked object offset (which I assume is the correct thing to do?) it created copies that became progressively more massive. What have I done incorrectly?

Your object and your empty have different scale values. Hover over your object's scale values and press CTRLC, then select the empty, hover over its X scale value and hit CTRLV. Repeat for Y and Z (provided your object is uniformly scaled).
Alternatively: Select your empty, then shift-select your object, rightclick on the scale values and say: copy to selected.
Any differences of rotation, location or scale between the two objects get multiplied for each new copy. That can be pretty powerful.

Two array modifiers on top of each other. The empties just differ a bit in scale, rotation and location.


text:
How do I make volumetric light fade to nothing
I'm trying to make some beams coming out of the headlights to give the render a bit of atmosphere but I only want it to come out the headlights so I created an area in which to do so but it fades from the desired blue light to a white haze rather than to nothing. I've put a couple of vague reference images. I added a couple of area lamps just in front of the actual headlights as I still wanted to see the blue and the details in the headlights (as there is also another light source but more dim inside the headlights). Do you think perhaps it would be better to make particles for the light to bounce off?

Thanks in advance

Also related: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/67309/how-to-create-a-ufo-pickup-light-ray/67336#67336

Thank you @joshsanfelici that was a very helpful link to keep in mind!


text:
Blender keeps wanting to use my CPU instead of my assigned gpu
So just to start off, I have checked that all the hardware I have is compatible with one another, and I have no problem running video games which use up my gpu and cpu in unison. However, when it comes to blender, even tho I set my device to GPU COMPUTE and i am on feature set: supported (ive tried experimental), whenever I render, I can see that my cpu sky rockets to 100% load! and zero gpu. I dont understand why this is happening. I have updated my drivers for my gpu and re-installed blender. I really dont know what to do! It keeps crashing after about 30 or so minutes but it isnt a continues crash. Sometimes, it renders completely...
Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!
Yokubo~

how does your GPU settings in the preferences looks like? (Preferences > System)

Here is what it looks like: https://imgur.com/a/JJl7T

FIXED! I had to enable CUDA in my user preferences under |system| in "cycles compute device.
Thanks for answering tho! I would not have looked as closely if it was not for you.


text:
Why can I not go into pose mode?
I have imported a collada file.
I press Control + Tab to select Pose mode, but there is no such.
What am I missing here? The bones are there, so I should be able to pose them, right?

You have the model selected.  To pose you need to select the armature instead.  Go back to object mode and select the armature.  You should then be able to go to pose mode.

To switch to Pose Mode you just need to select the armature object and make it the active object (=highlighted in orange). It's called RootNode in the outliner. You have selected it but additionally, you have selected the mesh Genesis2Female-skininstance and this mesh is the active object. That's the reason why you can't switch to Pose Mode.
The deformation of the mesh in the pose mode works but the bones are all very tiny and they all stand vertically upwards. If the model was imported as an FBX file you can adjust the import settings for the bones. See this question: Rotate all bones in rig by 90 degrees
Edit: You wrote that it was imported as collada file. But there are also options for the bones in this case. Try Fix Leaf Bones.

I can confirm that for collada "Fix Leaf Bones" orientates the bones in the right way. Thank you. Just a note: The finger bone roll is still wrong, no matter if I choose collada or fbx. I have therefore filed a bug report here: https://developer.blender.org/T88272

You need to select just armature object.

Hi, thanks for the post.  When you answer the question, please completely describe the process and perhaps include images if necessary.


text:
Where is the "Object" menu?
For some reason, the Object menu...

... is missing in my project.
How do I show it again?
Thank you!

on the bottom of your window? you can bring it back to the top with a right click

I'm not sure of his question actually  ^^

+1 -> moonboots is the master of finding menu...and the rest of Blender ;)

moonboots looking for lost menu: https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a1YuRH4onms9_Ag2-KkA_0BsiHbz0xOd4w-YgHeknYk3CFCy0nHYkyu4cd1CLvbl3Ljipg4pVIShrEGXT8dM-BiP7hz9qN-CPLfZxQ=w600-l80-sg-rj

@moonboots Thank you! Right-Click the menu on the bottom and then "Flip to Top".

It is on the bottom of your window, you can bring it back to the top with a right click > Flip to Top


text:
Box Trim has no effect
I have recorded a video here.
As one can see, the Box Trim sculpting has no effect in this case.
What might I be missing?
Thank you!

Your character is in Pose Position but should be in Rest Position to sculpt the mesh.
Select the Armature in the outliner, then select the Object Data Properties tab ("green running man" icon); look at the section "Skeleton", there switch to Rest Position.

Thank you! Can you tell me why that is required?

@tmighty I don't know for sure but the armature deforms the mesh and most deforming tools need the mesh in its original form. If you switch to Edit mode then automatically the rest pose is selected. For some reason, this doesn't happen when you switch to the Sculp mode.


text:
Where is the mesh?
I don't see my mesh anymore, only the bones.
I don't remember how that happened.
How could I make it visible again?
Thank you!

Your Mesh scale is 0.025, make it bigger to see it

Where do you change that, please? Ah, I got it: PCL3-> Orange dot -> Scale


text:
Why are no keyframes created?
I am following along a tutorial.
In this tutorial, the tutor moves the camera, and this makes the camera position green in order to show that it has changed. Also, one can see how a keyframe was created.

When I try the same, nothing happens: No keyframe is created when I move an object around, and its position doesn't change its color.
What am I doing wrong?
My version:

You have to create an initial keyframe, either by pressing 'I' and selecting your required options, or hovering over the location in the N panel and pressing 'I'. When you then move the timeline marker the saved locations will change to green and you can move your object (which changes the location colour to orange) and press 'I' again. I don't know what video you're watching, but all decent beginner tutorial will explain that in detail.

Green means that there is no keyframe on the current frame but there is one on some other frame and there have been no changes to the keyframed value. If there was a keyframe, it would be a dark yellow shade. If there was not one but the value was different it would be orange. Notice that the blue pointer above the timeline in the video is on a different frame than the one with the keyframe.
Since the dot next to the playback buttons is white in the video, it means the other person is not autokeying, so the only way they could have set a keyframe is to move the cursor to that particular frame and insert one manually.
You can do this by typing I in the 3D Viewport which will bring up a menu or by hovering over the transform settings, right clicking and selecting Insert Keyframe from the menu.

Thank you. What might be the reason that no keyframe appears when I type "i" and then select "All channels"?

Ahhh, I got it. Could you please add to your answer that the "i" needs to be pressed while the mouse pointer is in the upper window (not in the time line)?? And then "Insert keyframe menu -> Location". Else it would not work for me.

@tmighty I will when I get to my pc


text:
Did I create N-gons?
I have modelled an oven.
The front has some details, but the back should be plain as nobody will see it.
To remove unnecessary geometry from the back, I select it, then choose "Dissolve Faces".

This looks good to me, but I am afraid that I might have created N-gons.
How could I check if I did that?
Thank you!

yes the face on the right is a ngon as it has more than 4 vertices, ngons are not always problem though, it really depends on what you want to do

Yes you created an ngon in the back. Being that It's in the back maybe it's not a problem. If you are encountering a problem a very easy thing to try is to inset the ngon face which gives you quads around the perimeter of the ngon which will solve some problems. If you want to rework your topology so that you don't have ngons or unnecessary geometry on the sides without detail I recommend watching this video which shows how to step down your faces while maintaining quad geometry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGL6QpVRyXk&list=PL0v8ug1WwacVeXGNVRHexenYbip_7LMPD&index=19&ab_channel=DECODED


text:
Add extra control to rigify?
I am using rigify and it works great, but I also want to add an empty sphere, that will allow me move part of the clothe, for example on this photo:

But I also want when I create the extra bone from rigify, to apply it to the clothe as control without breaking the already applied skin weight. Can someone guide me on how to do this? I need this controller so I can move the area of the clothe that is behind the middle area of the legs to push the clothe closer towards the legs, as the character sits on a chair for example, so the clothe won't go through the chair.

Found the solution, in this tutorial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jtX_zBVwBgI&t=973s


text:
Choosig split screen rendering?
I am using split screens, and the issue I am having is that it uses for rendering randomly one of the split screens, how can I choose which of the screens to be used always for rendering?

I can't replicate your setup, but if using "image editor" as rendering  display area, try using a duplicate window, maximize it in your preferred scren, and set a single UV/image editor. "image editor" should use the largest area it can find... on my single screen, a duplciated window setup like this works reliably, it seems

Well its a good idea to render without UI, will it be helpful for you?


text:
Rigify issue, cannot move controls
I have an issue with rigify, when I create a human armature, and then I click on generate button to generate the controls, and after that I click on any of the curve controls, it always selects the whole thing, as if it's combined or locked, is that a bug? I cannot control anything like that, let alone to skin any mesh with it.

Problem solved, I had to press CTRL+Tab in order to enter pose mode and now I can use the controls finally.


text:
Using rigify armature, how do I create a control for eye color?
I am using a rigify armature for my character and all works great, but I also want to create an extra control for the eye colors, Like for example to make a nurbs circle that I can move to left and right which will modify the eye textures "Color", could someone give me step by step walkthrough?
Many thanks in advance!

You can add any object to be the controller. Then add drivers to the RGB component of your material. (Right click the RGB color box and click Add Driver). Then for the eyes, go into the Drivers Editor and select the Drier to be of type Averaged Value. For the object, have it be the object you want to control the color. Set type to Y rotation. You can do this for R G B and A. Then when you move/rotate your Nurbs circle (or whatever object you want, the color will change (need to be in rendered view).
Here is a .blend file with a simple set up. If this doesn't quite make sense, let me know!

Thanks for your quick response, will try what you said, but due to internet issues, will most likely delay to respond back.


text:
UVs in Blender issue?
I have an issue with UVs, I want them to show up as subdivided, I have used on my model a subdivide modifier, but it does not affect the UVs, is there a way to get them affected without having to permanently apply the modifier to my mesh? Subdivide UVs is also checked in modifier, but does nothing to them.
Also when unwrapping my character, the ears appear to much distorted, any idea how to improve the distorted areas?
I am using Blender from about a month. Before that I was using Maya. And for such issue I usually used smooth tool to improve the form of the UVs to match more precisely the form of my mesh, is there such a UV tool in Blender?

I think its called minimize stretch...

This helps fix the form of the ear, although the distortion is not completely gone, there's some green and light blue remaining, still though thanks for the help!

When trying to unwrap my model with subdivision applied to it, the distortion issue is solved, so I first mark seam in low poly, then I apply the subdivision to the character as level 3 and then unwrap all good to go. :)


text:
Setting origin of empty "group" object
I have an object that consists of 2 meshes.
To group them, I have added an Empty object and added my 2 objects as children.
I have then put the 3D cursor where I would the origin of the grouped object like to be.
Then I click "Origin to 3D Cursor", but nothing happens. The orange dot stays where it is. I expected it to go where the 3D cursor is.
What am I doing wrong here?
Thank you!

You cannot set the origin for empties. They're just little more than an origin and a world matrix.
For Blender 2.82 and later:
In the header of the 3D View there is a drop down labelled Options. Within you can choose that the transform shall only affect the Parents. Select the empty, press SHIFT+S and click Selection to Cursor to move it to the cursor's location. The location of the children will not be modified.

Note that the "affect only" option already exists since Blender 2.81, but the Snap transform didn't support it before commit 3ba5461af0c8b1273d3daf87d050c24a690273be.
For Blender prior to 2.82:
If you want to have the empty at the 3D cursor's location, you will have to position the empty there. It is necessary to remove the parent relationship first ALT+P and add it back afterwards CTRL+P if you don't want the parented objects to move with the empty. With the empty selected, press SHIFT+S and click Selection to Cursor to move it to the cursor's location.

Is there a workaround with a large number of empties? I have a CAD import (Navisworks Simulate -> FBX -> blender) with all objects at origin, including three-four levels of empties representing a hierarchy.

@ÅsmundHj Depends on what you mean by a workaround. What do you want to do with the empties? There is now an option to only affect the parents, allowing to move the empty without removing the parent-child relationship first. Perhaps it's better if you post a new question for this.

I would like to set the origin of all parents to be the a function (average?) of the origins of the children, which I think is the original question. I just have too many of them to do it manually.

@ÅsmundHj Please post this as a new question and add an example screenshot showing the hierarchy. I'll take a look.

I ended up doing
def update_origins_from_children(obj):
    if obj.type=='EMPTY':
        barn = list(filter(lambda x: x is not None, [update_origins_from_children(o) for o in obj.children]))
        antall = len(barn)
        if antall>0:
            print(barn[0:4])
            total = sum(barn, Vector((0.0,0.0,0.0)) )
            nypos = total/antall
            for barn in obj.children:
                barn.location-=nypos
            obj.location=nypos
            return nypos
        else:
            return None
    else:
        return obj.location

The following python function goes through all empties and moves them based on children origins. (Set mesh origins using Select Hierarchy and Object > Set Origin > Origin to Geometry first)
def update_origins_from_children(obj):
    if obj.type=='EMPTY':
        barn = list(filter(lambda x: x is not None, [update_origins_from_children(o) for o in obj.children]))
        antall = len(barn)
        if antall>0:
            print(barn[0:4])
            total = sum(barn, Vector((0.0,0.0,0.0)) )
            nypos = total/antall
            for barn in obj.children:
                barn.location-=nypos
            obj.location=nypos
            return nypos
        else:
            return None
    else:
        return obj.location


text:
How do I set the origin of an Armature
Using Blender 2.8, I'm trying to move the origin of the armature.
I have uploaded my blend file here.
I am able to move the origin of the mesh, but not the origin of the armature.
I have uploaded a video here that shows how I'm trying it.
When I export my armature-mesh-object to Unity, the origin is the origin of the armature, that is what I need to change the origin of the armature. Changing only the origin of the mesh wouldn't help.
Thank you!

In object mode, put the 3D cursor where you want the origin to be, then select the armature and choose "set origin - origin to 3D cursor".
If you need precision for the placing, select the place (maybe a vertex, a face, a bone or whatever) and press Shift S "Cursor to selected", then again set origin.

When inspecting your file, turn off this option (that I don't even knew it existed).

Thank you. Can you tell me why it's not possible to move the origin like I move the origin for a mesh?

When you're using the grab tool you're moving yhe whole object, not only its origin, but the vertex stay in place because they're hold by the bones action. When you do the same for the armature, the bones carry the vertices with them. So, also for mesh this is the correct way to set the origin.

Expecially for exporting, it's a good habit to model starting from the world center and finishing with both mesh and armature with origin in world center (loc 0,0,0). In this case you can press Ctrl A Apply loc, rot and scale, so that mesh and rig have default transform values ( 0,0,0 - 0,0,0 - 1,1,1).

Could you perhaps upload your version to pasteall.org? I would really like to see how you would do it / where you would place everything. That would be really nice.

Or a video? I just don't understand what the Armature does and why it has its own origin. :-( :-(

http://pasteall.org/blend/index.php?id=52991 I also updated my answer.

Dank u wel!!!!!


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Baking high poly model texture to low poly model (2 models)
I've watched quite a few video on how to bake from hi to lo poly models in Blender, but they all dealt with a situation where the high and the low poly model were 1 object.
In my situation, I have 2 models. I imported both to Blender as OBJs.
The high poly model is textured, the low poly model isn't.
I have created UVs for the low poly model, and now I would like to bake the high poly model's textures onto the low poly model's UVs.
I have created an empty image for the low poly model, then I've selected both objects and pressed "Bake". This would however not result in what I expected.
Does anybody see my mistake here and how to resolve it?
Thank you very much!

There are a few possibilities, so here's a checklist to go through:
--Selections. I know it seems obvious, but it's actually pretty easy to accidentally deselect something, and it's not always obvious when it happens. Make sure your image texture, the one you want to bake to, is selected, and the only thing selected, in your node editor. In the viewport, check to see if you selected your high-poly object first, then your low-poly object second (click the first, shift-click the second). You can't do this with box-select, it won't have a proper active object. If you're having trouble doing this in the viewport, you can do it via the outliner window (the little one that lists all your objects in the top right).
--UVs The reason it's usually done with the same object is because Blender tries to follow the UV layouts when baking. While it doesn't have to be the same object, the UVs of the low-poly should be laid out in roughly the same way as the high-poly, so it'll show up on the right places in the texture. For example, if it were a character, the face of the low-poly character should be unwrapped to the same location as where the face of the high-poly character is unwrapped.
--Images Make sure you've named and saved your target image to your computer before baking. If you don't do this, Blender doesn't know where you want that information to ultimately go, because you don't have a physical file selected. This makes sense when you realize baking works by essentially overwriting existing information, rather than creating entirely new information from scratch. At that point, it'll only be a big black square, but Blender will overwrite it with the map you're after as you bake. Just make sure to save a second time after, too! Blender won't remember your changes for you, when it comes to external files. In addition, make sure the textures of your high-poly have been appropriately uploaded, as well. It can be easy to confuse object color, which can be baked into a file, with what the actual texture looks like.
I hope this helps! Happy Blending.

Thank you for the great explanation. One thing to remember (note to myself!): Select what you bake to bake ("Textues" in my case) in the Render tab. I followed your instructions, however, it seems to bake the low poly textures (the UVs are colored white on black background.

You can bake different kind of maps! Check the dropdown, and make sure you've got the type of map you want selected. You might be baking combined, or some other map.

I have uploaded a video here (not very clean though): https://youtu.be/EdfQvLZ-6RA Do you see any obvious mistake?

Did my reply comment not go through or get deleted? (It's okay if you did, I may have rambled a bit.) Troubleshooting some various browser issues on my end.


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Getting low resolution render images
When i am rendering my scene in 1920×1080 at 100℅, and with a sample value of 500, I am getting a low qulality image which got rendered in just 8 seconds. How can I fix this!

500 samples in 8 seconds? Wow. Either those weren't render samples or you have really decent hardware

My pc specs are 2GB ram, and internal intel graphics. And thats what i can't understand. Once it took me 2 hrs to render just one scene with 450 samples of 1080px

Did it really take only 8 Seconds? Did you accidentally set your preview samples to 500 and have your render Samples at .. maybe 3 ?.. :D

that is not 500 samples. and no 500 will never render in 8 secs. Double check that you do not have a sample count overriding your 500.


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Texture paint blend mode issue
I seem to be getting this very annoying black line around my brush strokes when I use a lot of the different blend modes (Linear light in my image, on the beard), whilst texture painting. It make the blend modes virtually useless. Anyone have any idea why it's doing this? (2.79)
Much appreciated!

There are some limitations with the blend modes when painting in texture paint - and I am not sure what causes it. I am trying to reproduce the effect in 2.8, but when I paint with a color sampled from the target area and then switch blend modes, I don't see much of this - though I do see it in 2.79. Could you test 2.8 on a single image texture and see if it does the same?


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Texture Painting stuttering
i am having an issue where whilst I am painting (on a new layer, effecting Alpha) the stroke is very 'bumpy', and stutters. I have attached a video to demonstrate. I'm in Look Dev in the video, and are painting onto a 2048 x 2048 texture. Appreciate any help.
Video:
https://youtu.be/a9LPmrlIxVA
Comp:
AMD Ryzen 5 3600 cpu,
RTX 2060 Super,
16gb Ram,
SSD not HDD,

Sorry what do you mean by "calibrating his tool"? I have reverted back to 2.79, with the same model, and it seems to work better there...

Check your stroke steps as well as the stroke sample size -steps can be like 1 or 3, and sampling up can smooth the stroke except then it will lag a bit as you go higher. Also look at your brush Falloff curve, see if using a different profile will help there as well. The Shift-S lazy brush also causes some lag for calculation when using high sample rate.


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How to see vertex alpha transparency?
How can I see vertex alpha as I paint it in Vertex Paint mode in 2.8? I get how to see vertex colors, via the node system, in LookDev, but I can't seem to figure how to see vertex alpha as I go to add and erase it...

I know this is old but here's the trick for anyone like me stumbling upon this in search for an answer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km1HLQpbCoo

It's often wise to set up your material and open up a material or rendered preview viewport.  You can have multiple viewports open.

You can paint in either window.  For alpha in a material preview, you'll need to set an appropriate alpha blend mode for your material, and to set that, you'll have to temporarily switch to the Eevee renderer-- material preview is just an Eevee render.


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How to change default option for UV selection?
How might i change this 'Select Linked Pick' option to not, by default, have the 'Extend' option turned on? In 2.79 it didn't operate like this and so that is my workflow, so this keeps throwing a stutter into my unwrapping. These more obvious options in 2.8 are great, but I'm just wondering how to edit their default settings.

Just untick option in Preferences... (I searched by key, which is 'L', and scrolled down to UV Editor).


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split up and render depth slices (for extreme dof)
I'm doing a particle simulation of fire embers swirling around, to be matched up to a filmed plate.
The plate has a very shallow depth of field,  which creates a problem when comping it in.
It takes far to long to render the dof in cycles, so I'm applying it in nuke.
The problem is, there is way to much z-occlusion for a single z-defocus to work, and as far as I know, cycles can't render deep data.
So, what I would like to do, is split the render up in, about 5 different depth slices.
I can't figure out how to do that though. At least not in a procedural way.
I guess I could convert the sim, and split it up with a bunch of booleans. But, that is not very flexible.
Or, I could duplicate the camera, and adjust its near/far clipping for each slice, but then I would have to render everything five times, and change a bunch of settings between renders.
The optimal way, would be if could use the layer masks, but in a "volumetric" way. So, that it masks everything outside the object, instead of behind. But that does not seem to be possible?
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Thanks!

Adding pictures to your question would help greatly those that can answer it, and even more the rest of us that can barely understand it.


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How can I blend two textures together using a brush?
I have a game in unity, I made a scene with a terrain brush, in order to blend two textures together, but with blender I have difficulties in doing the same
Unity:

Blender:

Thank you!

It doesn't help me, but thx for the comment.


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How to import model along with embed texture in blender?
I have a FBX model with embed texture. When I import the model in blender the model get import but not its texture. Model has a bitmap texture folder from which it has to call texture. Now how can I call all the texture from that bitmap folder so that the FBX model import all the textures.

Usually, textures it comes with the name of the material and its mapa! example: materialA_Normalmap ... how is it there for you?

I don't know how to know that? The model is exported from 3DS MAX with embed texture than it imported in blender.

in the texture folder, can you see the images?

Yes I can see images. They are ,jpeg

Any reply from you folks will be appreciated.

first: Activate the node add ons
Second: In shader editor: click in principled bsdf, after press shift + ctrl + t, and select all texture


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Can we set any specific folder in file browser of blender?
I have made the specific folder save folder for blender. Now every time I want to save a new project I have to manually visit that folder to save the project. Can I just set the folder in blender file browser?

To set folder in favourite just select the folder which you want to add on file browser favourite. Press mouse right click: then select add bookmark. The folder will be added to the favourites in file browser of blender.


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How do I duplicate an edge?
I am trying to follow along with this tutorial. I had to put its speed to 0.25 to be able to view it.
In this tutorial it is shown how the author selects an edge and then duplicates it and "scales" it while dragging.
I have taken some screenshots:

How does he do it, and what is this operation called?
Thank you!

Probably a bevel (Ctrl B)

If the "tutor" doesn't explain, then why bother following that "tutorial"?  It might be a bevel or extrusion. Hard to guess, For extrusion use the E key, for bevel Crl + B.

@susu Agreed, but he does exactely what I try just now, so it's super tempting.

It's a bevel, shortcut Ctrl+B.  They then delete the resulting face to leave a gap between the planes.


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FBX Export: What does Forward / Up assignment do?
I want to bring my object from Blender 2.8 to Unity.
I'm experiencing that the object lays on its belly in Unity.
To find what is actually happening, I'm trying to find out what the following settings actually do:

However, I didn't find this info.
Here is what my Blender scene looks like:

To me, the object looks adequately oriented, so I don't understand what Blender actually wants to know from me when it allows me to assign Forward and Up axis at fbx export.
I would like to actually understand it and not just try it until it works accidentally.
Thank you!

I've also wondered about this and I've found the best answer here:
https://polynook.com/tutorial/how-to-export-models-from-blender-to-unity/

Each software handle axis names/orientation differently. That doesn't change anything while your working into a soft, but can be problematic when you export models and animations.
Z Up / Y Up
In Blender, the vertical axis is called Z (so X and Y define the floor plane). In many other software like Unity, the vertical axis is called Y (so X and Z define the floor plane).
Y Forward / -Y Forward
Once you know which axis means vertical, you need to determine how the two other axis are oriented.

In Blender if you turn the view so the Z axis points up, and the X Axis points right, then the Y axis points backward ; in other terms, the -Y axis points forward.
Sometime this kind of orientation is called "left-handed coordinates" :

Of course it opposes to right-handed coordinates where the "Y-finger" would point forward.
Blender / Unity
Blender is Z Up / -Y Forward
Unity is Y Up / - Z Forward
Other cases
It's quite conventional that the vertical axis points up (not down), and the X axis points right (not left). However, that's not universal, so the fbx exporter allow every valid Up/Forward combination. (an invalid combination would be something paradoxal like : Z Up, Z Forward).

Blender is +Z Up / +Y Forward, not +Z Up / -Y Forward.  From blender manual: Blender uses Y Forward, Z Up (since the front view looks along the +Y direction). For example, its common for applications to use Y as the up axis, in that case -Z Forward, Y Up is needed.  If you want to FBX export with coordinates that match the Blender UI you need to set +Y Forward, +Z Up - that way the FBX exporter won't apply any rotation on your coordinates.

Anybody knows if this has a bug? I'm trying to export from Blender to unreal but no matter what I choose as 'forward', the model is always rotated 90 degrees to the same side when imported to Unreal.
Either I'm doing something wrong or the export settings in Blender have a bug. (I'm using 2.92.0)

If you are unsure where is the true forward of blender, use this.

That being said, I tested Blender on 2.93 the forward vector based on looking from Back is -Y. Also, Unity use Z forward, not -Z forward.
Conclusion:
Blender forwad -Y
Unity forward Z
Additional answer how to convert from Blender to Unity
(Setting non-armature)

(Setting armature)


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Hair particles is less when rendered
I am having trouble with making the hair particles, when rendered it does not seem to render all the hair that is visible in viewport:
When rendered image:

Would converting it to mesh help?

Check that  the scale of the hair is not too small.Because if it is too small the hair will be very thin and will not be visible clearly.

It is because on the end, by default, hair is tinnier.

Look at hair settings:

It is 1.0 thickness at root, and 0.1 at end of the hair. Tune this settings.
Also, look at shape setting, it setups how thickness distribute along hair length:

Thanks for the help, you helped me avoid a lot of trouble! :)


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Hair particles rendering white dots
When I use Hemi light to do rendering I got white dots on hair particles, but when I use sun light it shows no such issue, what am I doing wrong? Cuz the issue goes away when I do not use the glossy shader for making my hair more gloss like.
When with hemi light rendered:

When with sun light rendered:

Shader nodes I used to create the shiny hair effect:

The issue with the white dots is solved, I used different node setup, now it looks much better with hemi light as well:

Here's the node setup I used:


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trouble with adding a logo on a material

I have issues to put a logo on a surface that already has a material and it make a pink color that blend with the transparency but on the right on the preview we can see the résulte that i want. It's only for one face of the 6 so i duplicate the material for one face and and the image on the new material, add the image on the uv editor and unwarp the face.

imho strange material setup... which UV should be used by texture coordinate node? and why non-color data for the image texture? is it a normal map? I can't understand what you wish to obtain, and which image are you using...

oh sorry the non-color data and the coordinate were a test i just forgot to undo that.

and i just begin with nods so if the material is strange you can say what's seems wrong

Argh, I was just about to post an answer! (:

And @Baptiste, your setup looks good to me, except I would plug the Alpha into the Fac of the last Mix node.

I tried and the preview looks better but it's steel look pink in the render. I don't understand what's wrong cause the preview is exactly what I want in my render. And my image is just a logo with no background.

Have you UV unwrapped it yet?

yes I already UV unrapped it and put it like i want and the image

Probably you have some problem with your environment map not found or something like that that causes the material to reflect pink...

I try on a other surface and it's the same result so it something i do wrong but i don't no what

Is the type of image changes things like if png don't work ?

i change in the image texture node the extantion to clip and now i can see taht the pink is the rectangle of the image in the uv editor.


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Workflow for modeling assets like this (picture included)
I've been modeling in Blender for about a year now, and I am modeling for games and use Unity to put the games together. Now, I know Blender pretty well but I lack knowledge about specific techniques to achieve more naturalistic looks (closer to AAA games). In particular, I am looking for a workflow or techniques to reproduce something along the lines of the pictures below (it is an asset on the Unity store).
It looks like the author of this model created a low-poly based mesh, then sculpted it, decimated the model, baked the normal maps from the high-poly model onto low-poly one and used procedural materials (maybe Substance Painter). But I am not sure whether my guess is correct.
Do you think this is how this was made? Can you share your own experiences workflows and techniques of creating assets like that? I feel like I don't have problems creating things in Blender but I am really struggling with making them look more natural.
Thanks so much!

Hi, if you aim for photorealism modelink "rocks", see this also  https://blendermarket.com/products/the-rock-essentials. It is about a paid assets pack, but the page explain why it is so difficult, and why the item is worth spending some money, because it explains how you could do the same (hint: is not so easy...)

Hi m.ardito, thanks for this link! I understand that it's not easy. However, I am looking for a solution that will give me at least a somewhat similar result and still will be doable without spending a ton of money. The result does not have to be super realistic, I am looking for just a more or less decent look.

There are many ways, it depends of the type of asset you want to create (asset with handpainted texture, etc.).
 I use this sometimes:

model low poly first
UV unwrap the low poly model
texturing of the low poly model.  In "properties" panel, go to "data" tab and then "UVmaps", add a second UV map by clicking on the plus button, highlight this second by clicking on it, unwrap the low poly model for a second time for a good unwrapping because of the texturing
create a new image, bake textures and normal maps and remove all the materials and the the second UVmap
duplicate the low poly, add more details to the second low poly models and  bake normal map again.
And you can export textures if you want for more details on Photoshop or Gimp.


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Can I create deep divots in my mesh using sculpt brush? Is there a better way without booleans?
The image below may help explain. I'm doing a watch band with stitched thread. Wherever the thread enters the band, I would like to just suggest a dark little hole where the needle punches through.
I was hoping to do this without making a million actual holes in the mesh, using booleans and subtracting the thread shape. It creates lots of ugliness in the mesh, non-manifold edges and shading issues.
I thought maybe I could texture paint in deep divots with the sculpt brush, and then bake that texture onto a tidy mesh.
But I can't seem to create the deep divots I want. the underlying mesh has been converted to lots of skinny triangles (due to dyntopo?) and when I try to make holes with a soft brush set to subtract, the result looks bad and wrinkles areas way outside the brush, causing lots of shading problems.
What's the best way to do this? paint black dots onto my watchband texture? That's gonna look fake up close. Re-do the mesh somehow so it's much smaller and finer? Am I just using the wrong brush (the default one)? Is some setting the reason my brush seems to affecting areas of the band way outside its radius, even with dyntopo and a resolution of 3 pixels?

Well, after banging away for a while I concluded that the brushes are not really made to creating deep pits like I was thinking, an that actually editing the mesh would make the realism I want. So I went back to an earlier version of the watch band, one with the subsurf modifier still intact, and added lots of loop cuts until most of my faces were squares and there were no long skinny triangles. Then I increased my subsurf level from 2 to 3, made a backup, and applied it. This gave me a ton of evenly distributed geometry to work with.
Then, rather than trying to do it with a brush, I simply went to the top-down view, in vertex select mode, used the circular selection tool, and just selected a blob of vertices near each entrance/exit point of the thread.
Next I did proportional editing mode, sharp falloff, used individual origins, and just did G, Z to move the select vertices downward to create little pits.
The result is what I had in mind and looks pretty good when rendered.


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Why do bones without visible weights move the mesh?
I'm using Blender 2.82.
It looks to me as if the first 2 bones in my .blend file do not have any weight.

However rotating them cause my mesh to deform.

I know that rotating the root bone causes the mesh to rotate, but that is not what I mean. In fact, parts of the mesh are deforming.
Why is this happening, and how can I resolve this?
Rotating the first 2 bones should not have any effect.
I have also uploaded a video here that shows the problem.

Actually blue doesn't necessarily mean zero weight. To make sure that a bone has zero influence you need to enable the Zero Weight option in the Viewport Overlays panel. The black areas mean real zero weight. Here you can see that the second bone has influence on a large part of your object.
I don't know why zero weight is not displayed by default in Weight Paint mode by the way, blue confuses people as they may think there's no influence when actually there might be.

Also note that you can make sure that a bone has no influence: select it and in the Properties panel > Bone, disable the Deform option.

The first bone's Deform option is deactivated but as it makes the others rotate, and as the others have influence on the top of the mesh, rotating the first bone will move the top of the mesh.
I guess you need to set your armature correctly, reparent the mesh to the armature, and give corrections in Weight Paint mode (most of the time parenting With Automatic Weight is not right away correct).

What do you mean by "set your armature correctly"?

I didn't mean yours was not set correctly, I meant make sure that it is  ;)  I don't know your project so I can't tell, for example, are you sure that your first bone must not deform?


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Is there a Unity coordinate system export option?
I have created an animal-skull-like mesh in Blender.
In Blender, forward is negative Y.
This is what it looks like in Blender:

And this is what it looks like when I import the .blend file in Unity:

As one can see, the model appears upside down in Unity.
Once dragged into the scene, the model is rotated -90, 0, 0.
I guess this is some "hack" that Unity automatically applies to make it look well-oriented.
I have read about this problem, and the problem seems to be that Y is not up in Blender.
While it now looks correct, the rotation gives me headaches as I'm doing some calculations with it, and I expect a rotation of 0, 0, 0 by default.
I know that many people suggest to simply put the mesh into a container and work with the container only, but I would like to avoid this if possible.
I would like to ask if there is perhaps a special export option (for example for .dae format) that would make the model appear perfectly normally oriented in Unity without any rotation tweaks.
Thank you!

Most file export formats allow you to configure some kind of world orientation in the export settings. As you can see in the images below. .FBX, .DAE, .OBJ, and .PLY allow you to specify a "forward" and an "up" axis, and others like .GLTF have a checkbox to specify Y-UP. See below (examples are from .fbx and .dae):

Thank you! I have used "-Z Forward", "Y Up" and "Apply Global Orientation", and it looks as expected in Unity.

Glad to hear you got it working!


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How do I limit scaling in 2 directions?
I would like to enlarge the hole of this model.
To do that, I have selected some vertices, then I used Scaling.
However, I need to avoid scaling in the z direction, else it looks like shown on the right.
How could I do that?
Thank you!

Instead of pressing S then Z to limit scaling to the Z axis, you have to use Shift+Z, this locks the Z axis and scales only on X and Y.

Thank you very much. That helped me.

Just for it to be answered properly for people to find it in the future:
Press S for scale.
Press Shift+Z or X or Y to lock it on the respective two axes.
Also: works as well with moving and rotation.

Well, I thought there are already enough answers on how to lock certain axes. This one for example: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/74455/ but I just didn't bother to mark it as duplicate.


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How can i feed the output of the Dynamic Paint into the input of the Wireframe Node?
How can i feed the output of the Dynamic Paint into the input of the Wireframe Node (or any other Node)? So that the red areas show a bigger wireframe effect than the the blue areas.
The effect should look like this: https://twitter.com/MitsuruMan/status/822067706308366338
Thanks for the help! :)

To get direct node access to the output of the Dynamic Paint you need to use the Paint Surface Type in the Dynamic Paint Advanced properties (in your example you appear to be using Weight). For 'Paint' surfaces the Dynamic Paint Output can be set to output to a Color Map Paintmap layer and this can then be accessed in the material nodes via an Attribute node set to the name of your Color Map.
For the Canvas object (the one receiving the paint), enable Dynamic Paint, select as Canvas and Add Canvas. Ensure the Surface Type is 'Paint' and in Dynamic Paint Output click the '+' button alongside the Wetmap layer to create the Color Map (wetmap allows 'drying'). To have the paint 'fade' when not near the 'brush', enable Dry. This will fade out the paint effect as if drying, until it returns to the original color.

Note : Since the canvas is outputting to Vertex Colors, ensure your canvas mesh is suitably sub-divided.
For the Brush, enable Dynamic Paint and Add Brush and set the Paint Source to Mesh Volume and Proximity to allow it to affect nearby surfaces.

In your material, add an Attribute node and set it to the name of your Color Map as specified in the canvas Paintmap layer ('dp_wetmap' if you haven't changed it from the default). This can be used to affect the size of the Wireframe as shown :

This can produce the following results :

Blend file attached


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Make a tube from a straight line
I found this great guide for creating tubes from Bezier curves, but I am working with an imported set of straight lines that came from a shapefile (geographic data format). I would like to render these as 3D pipes, but this guide seems to only work with Bezier curves.  I do not have the option to change the "Bevel Object" on these straight lines.

Is there a similar way to just transform all of my straight lines into 3d tubes? I'm not worried about it looking perfect, I just need to see a 3d approximation of them.

I can't see how your "set of straight lines" is, but I assume they're just lines, no faces, like a "tube map": then for an approximate result you can try to convert them to curves (alt-c in object mode) then use the same approach (bevel object), perhaps.

You can simply convert the straight lines into a curve then give them the bevel you want.
To convert the straight lines :
Press Alt + C (Select Curve).
By this step the straight lines is converted to curve , so you can easily give it the bevel and control it also as a curve.
To give it bevel - When it is a curve - :

This created very squashed tubes for me. Also I couldn't scale it normally - it rotated when scaled. (I first converted it back to a mesh using Mesh -> Convert -> Mesh from Curve / …)


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How to create a cylinder which fits snugly to an existing ring
I want to add a cylinder which will snugly fit an already round object that I have imported. I can select all the edges in the ring like this:

Now I want to add a cylinder which will have the exact same circumference/diameter as the selected ring so that I can merge them together to continue this round object.
How can I do this?

Extrude the selected ring downwards?

Try Extrude Region tool in the tool bar.
Select the edge and drag the + handle:

You can also use E shortcut.


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Shadow catcher. Why am i getting different shadow density

Top image is a shadow catcher turned on with transparent film laying on the #404040 background (default in cycles render). I made this inside a photoshop.
While the bottom image is the shadow catcher turned on without transparent film.
As you can see the shadows are denser on the top image (transparent). Why is that, and is it possible to fix?

This may be a color management issue. For physically correct results, compositing should be done in a linear color space, like Cycles and the Blender compositor. If you save the image as e.g. a PNG file and then do compositing in Photoshop the result is likely to be wrong.
For external applications you can save images as linear OpenEXR, and/or try to tweak Photoshop settings to work in linear color space.

Just turn Photoshop to 32-bits mode

Darkness will go away!


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Retargeting animation with gizmos, delete gizmos in action editor or export without them
I am retargeting animation which works great. I select MODEL1 then MODEL2 and apply the animation of MODEL2 to MODEL1 in dopesheet -> action editor. Everything works great.
The problem is that MODEL2 has around 10 gizmos, which also are seen in the action editor as animations, they indeed hold the same animation, so I have it 10 times.
Because of this my file becomes really large. I need to export it as .fbx. I need to delete all gizmos. I tryed deleting them from the world before applying the animation, but that didnt helped.
The only way I can delete them if I select every gizmo one by one, unlink it and reload the file. That is very very time consuming. If one model has 8 animations, I need to select 80 gizmo animations manually. There must be a better way to do it.
Here are some images
World, thats the model which holds the animations which I want to use on an other model:

Here is my model the action editor and animations it got after retargeting:

I only need GhostCastSpell, the other things also hold animation data, depending which animation gizmo I select it does animate, but the model is offset.

After many different approaches I found a solution myself.
To seperate the animations you want, you have to put them in NLA tracks and when exporting to .fbx you must go to animations and uncheck all actions:

It will only export the animations from the NLA tracks
To add animations to NLA tracks you have to open dope sheet -> action editor in one window and NLA Editor in the other. Then you have to select each animation which you want to keep one by one in the action editor and add it to an NLA track on the NLA editor. You have to add them to the armature not the mesh.
Here is how it has to look:


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Boolean union with overlapping faces
Is there a way to make a Boolean union of two objects which have at least one touching/overlapping face (same orientation)?
Let's say I have a cube and a cylinder (same size), shift the cylinder on x and y and in edit mode move up the top vertices, so the bottom ones stay overlapped:

The I'll select the cube, add a Boolean modifier with union and select the cylinder as other object.
When I then apply the Boolean modifier, the cylinder disappears either or I will have non-manifolds, because of inner geometry.
The only known solution to me is to move all the vertices on the ground layer (z 0) a tad up or down so the don't exactly overlap.
But doing this to every object I want to Boolean union is very tedious, especially when they are rotated and I can't move the vertices exactly in the right direction.
So is there an easier way?

The boolean modifier has two modes, 'Carve' and 'BMesh' (under the box for the second object)
A quick test shows for me that if I use 'BMesh', internal edges and faces are preserved, while with 'Carve', they are removed.


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I don't know how to be able to view my object normally again

So this is what I see now, but I cant get the bottom part (that's orange right now) to be viewed normally again, like the top part.
I have no idea how this happened and I tried to google the problem but I am unsure what has even happened so I don't really know what to look for.
Can anyone explain what I can do to fix this?
Please keep in mind that I'm a beginner.

Probably the rendering of the torus is limited to "wired". If that, look at this object's property panel, in the display section and check "maximum draw type"

Is there only one object in place? Probably there're 2 of them, one is drawn as wire, another one as solid. Or maybe some modifiers on the objectm could you show screenshot with modifier stack for the selected object shown?