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Close hole after using screw modifier
I am trying to create a specific kind of look on a mesh, as to be seen on the following picture:
https://www.bz-berlin.de/data/uploads/multimedia/archive/00375/Merida2_375848a-724x432.jpg
Doesn't have to be 100% accurate, since it won't be too close in the final render, but I still want that swirl effect at the end parts of the bow.
In the picture you can see my attempt to screw two vertices, connected via an edge, to create a similar effect, but whatever I do I end up with a distorted spiral, or with a big hole in the middle. Any idea how I can close this hole? Or maybe a smarter way to get by?
Thanks already! :)

You can enable the Extra Curves Add-on and then add a spiral curve that can be used as Array Modifier length and Curve Modifier. The down-side is you will have to fiddle with the size of the spiral and the size of the plane. I tried it and got a lot of over lapping geometry but at least no hole in the middle.

You could do it with a circle or with Grid Fill, but it really depends on your goal, what are you supposed to do with this spiral?

Hi, thanks for the reply. I want the spiral to go on, without being interrupted as to be seen in your suggestions. I guess I will check out the suggested extra curves add-on and see what happens.


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How to create razor wire
I am trying to create fences with razor wires on them, as to be seen here:

I modeled it as a straight wire first, adding the blades in an array and then combined the cylinder and the blades to one object. But when I try to deform it with the screw modifier it get's too distorted. I also didn't get any usable results by trying to start off with a coil already and using particles, for example.
If anyone has an idea to solve this, it would be highly appreciated.
Thanks for reading.

What you've tried to do is not very clear, what do you mean by "combined the cylinder and the blades to one object"? Array along a spiral curve seems to be the good solution

When I try it as you recommend with your link I don't get any usable result, just a row of array, that doesn't follow the path at all. And @moonboots I meant I joined them using ctrl+J.

There are 2 problems to solve:

To distribute the barbs evenly along the length of the curve
To do so without distorting the barbs

This used to be a typical use for Dupliframes, but they has been removed from 2.8.. they apparently don't play well with the new dependency graph.
so you can treat the barbs as particles (which will not be distorted), and distribute their emitter evenly along the curve. Distortion of the emitter will not be inherited.

Create a plane to be an emitter for the barbs
Give the emitter-plane  Array and Curve modifiers, both along its Z, to distribute instances of it along the curve
Give the plane a particle system with the barb as target object.. particle settings something like the illustration below:

(Lifetime: as long as you like .. Count: the count of the plane's array modifier, the Barb object edited to have its local X along the curve)
Result: (plane yellow, barb blue, curve red)..

.. which has the advantage that you can put a random twist on to the barbs, if you want to, using the 'Phase' settings in the particle system's 'Rotation' panel.

Try adding a curve modifier after your screw modifier.
First align a curve on top of you wire.

Then add a curve modifier and set the curve to the one you just created.

Even I'm not very good with curve modifiers and find them to be a bit finicky at times. It is important to make sure you apply rotation and scale for the curve and the the wire because sometimes they can lead to some weird results. In my experience, it usually works better to have the curve's and the wire's origins on the same spot too.
And I can never guess which is the correct deformation axis either. Just go through them all until you find the one that works. In this example, I also had to move the wire a little bit so the curve would have more of an affect. Be sure you do that carefully and only on one axis at a time so you don't mess anything up.

source: Stack Exchange

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

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Mirror multiple meshes with bezier curve
I am standing in front of a problem, hopefully somebody knows a solution to it.
I have a torus array and inside a bezier curve; I've added a curve modifier to the array to follow the bezier curve as should be seen in the picture. The curve is parent to the array.
Now I had to copy the array multiple times to get the needed length and now I have multiple meshes arranged around a bezier curve and the modifiers are applied.
I just copied the whole thing, curve and meshes and turned them 180 degrees on Z axis to put them on the other side just to realize that I somehow need to mirror it to fit correctly, but if I do it starts looking like rubbish
Alt+C is not helping for the curve nor is Ctrl+J properly combining the meshes, I tried before and after applying the modifiers.
I hope I could make it clear, thanks for the attention.
The left one is the one I need to flip/mirror, it has 4 meshes and the said bezier curve.

This looks awfully similar to what you describe https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/57615/how-can-i-model-these-support-wires/57618#57618 . Also if you need an array to fit a curve there is a mode called Fit Curve specifically for that purpose, check here for more details https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/47359/how-to-evenly-space-vertices-along-several-segments-bezier-curve/47366#47366. Don't apply modifiers, or convert to mesh unless specifically needed, keep modifiers around for as long as viable.

Hey, thanks for the comment. :) In my eyes it looks a bit off topic though, since I am looking for a way to mirror this thing anyhow and to be honest I don't see how this could help me at this part, might be my own newbie blindness, but stil. xD

Actually found solution to my own question xD
So here we go:
I just picked all 4 meshes and then pressed alt+C and then clicked on mesh from curve and done. That such simple things can stop one from progress for like a good hour straight... anyway, riddle solved, case closed.

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


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Light diffusion through multiple transparent layers
I am trying to model a shadowbox but am struggling with getting the light to diffuse through the layers properly. It seems the light is traveling through each layer equally instead of losing strength as it goes so that the layers get more opaque the farther they are from the light source. I have attached screenshots of my material and light settings as well as what it currently looks like. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

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


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Lighting for a layered shadowbox
I am trying to model a shadowbox like the ones shown in the image below. However, I can't seem to get the lighting to filter through the various layers as you would expect. Right now I have an area light placed behind the object but I am unsure what else I need to do to achieve the desired effect. Any help would be greatly appreciated.


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Is there a way to keep the weight painting you already have on old bones and use automatic weights on new bones?
Is there a way to keep the weight painting you already have on old bones and use automatic weights on new bones?

Select the armature, shift select the mesh, go to weight paint mode, hold Ctrl to select a bone/Vertex group, use Shift to add others bones to the selection, then go to menu > weights > Assign automatic from bones.
This procedure will assign automatic weights to selected bones, without altering weights of non selected ones.


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Is using the denoise compositing node to denoise FFmpeg video possible?
If so how?
If it's not possible to do it with FFmpeg are there any other video formats that are compatible with the denoise compositing node?

FFMpeg is not a video format, it’s an encoding tool that blender uses to export video in various formats.

I guess I should've said a .mkv file instead.

You mean you have a noisy video, add it into the compositor as movie-clip, plug it into a denoise node and render through the composite output? Firstly: yes, the denoise node will denoise a plugged in image etc., but secondly: the noise has to be quite "clean", so more or less single pixels like fireflies etc. As soon as the noise is a bit blurry (and I guess it is if it's not a noisy animation but coming from some camera footage), then the denoise node will not recognize it as noise. And thirdly: if you mean artifacts caused by video compression, they will return when saved again as video.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/231376/110840


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how to create curved extrude faces that works with subsurface division

hi, new blender user here, atleast here is what i am trying to do, a curved faces like the pict, extrude outward and subsurface division it, even after adding bezel on last image, the top and the triangle web didnt works well and overlapping, is there other simpler method to do what i am trying to do ? thanks !

This topology seems to work fine:

This topology seems to work even better:

Or:

To do it, create a 8 vertex circle, put it in front of your cylinder, select your cylinder, switch to Edit mode, Ctrl left click on the circle and header menu > Mesh > Knife Project, it will cut the circle on the cylinder, then you just need to join vertices, add edge loops, etc:

yes thats what i am looking for, how do i do that, because my first step was insert faces and then bevel the vertices ( having hard time to have curved faces to extrude, so far only found that way ), how to get what you are doing if i can ask ? thank you !

great, got it, thank you again kind strangers !

I've edited, I think the second topology works better

yep, just tried the second/alt for learning purpose also, it works better and nicer. last question if it's still ok, how do i copy the extruded face into 360 literally, like 5/6 faces the fast/right way that still have same spacing range between extruded faces? with anchor point in the middle of the cylinder

you mean you want to duplicate the same extrusion all around? You can keep only several faces of the cylinder, like a slice of cylinder, and use an Array modifier with the Object Offset option enabled, put an empty at the center of the cylinder, choose it as the object of the Object Offset, rotate it. Or simply duplicate and rotate the slice of your cylinder with the rotation center at the center of the cylinder.

yeah that's it, i just need a direction on what menu/step to look for and that's correct ! thanks again mate, means a lot to me !


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How would I make the "box" glossy but the image decal on top of it matte without it losing all the color?
I'm working on a product. I made the box dieline and then made the decal png design and adjusted the UV to fit. I want to make the png decal maintain the color but have a matte finish. I want the box itself to be a "holo" effect so I need it to be glossy. I can't find info on how to do this without losing the detail in the decal (i.e becoming a flat color). Can anyone give me any pointers?

You could make them two separate objects, or you could use a UV map to separate regions, or you could put the decal on a subset of faces and give the faces different materials.  Depends on whether you want the decal to be partially transparent so that the matte surface shows through

Is alpha layer a mask of the decal?  Take alpha layer through a color ramp set to constant and use it to drive Roughness.

You can mix your background color with the decal in a Mix Shader, use the decal alpha as the factor:


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Geometry Nodes - Curve driving position of separate curve
Is there a way to make a curve follow the path of another curve solely in geometry nodes? I am attempting to wrap a spiral curve around a circle curve and am unsure on how to bend the spiral curve to follow a separate path. My goal is to create a torus with the circle curve with curve to mesh and then join that with a curve to mesh of the wrapped spiral curve so that I have a torus with a small wire coiling around it. If there's a better method than using curve nodes I'd be happy to change my approach.
Outside of geo nodes, I can use a curve modifier to achieve this effect but I'd prefer to have this integrated into my node network.

It just so happens I recently made a limited Curve modifier equivalent in GN, to answer this question.
It can be used, for example, like this:

Oops, Mis-labelled the  top Value  input node. That should be 'Turns'.


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Why doesn't my liquid material show through my transparent plastic material in cycles?
I am trying to make a pipette that has a plastic transparent tip with a red transparent liquid inside. However, when I render in cycles, the material inside the tip does not show, although I can see it in the material preview tab.
This is similar to what I want (in the material preview tab):

But this is how it renders:

I have been trying different lightning but that does not seem to help very much with the transparency, even if it is quite dark now.
Does anyone know how to fix this? Thanks!
Here is my blend file: Blend file

The most important reason your liquid is not showing is because you have set the tip object to Shade Smooth instead of Shade Auto Smooth. Therefore the transmission gets heavily distorted. I also changed this setting on the liquid. Another thing I did is removing the Solidify modifier from the liquid and closing the top and bottom, since it makes no sense to construct the liquid as a tube.

If you then want the liquid to look more like it is filling the tip, you should probably scale it larger or "thicker" by selecting the mesh in Edit Mode and use Alt+S, because right now there is quite a gap between the liquid and the inner wall of the tip. I would also slightly decrease the Roughness of the tip material to blur the view on the liquid less and increase the Max Bounces for Glossy and Transmission (and Total of course) under Render Properties > Light Paths to lighten up the inside of the tip a little bit. But note that less roughness decreases the overall brightness of the tip since less light is scattered inside the material.

If you want it to look as if the liquid fills the tip and there is no inner wall like in the Material Preview, then you have to disable the Solidify modifier on the tip. But I would probably just make the wall of the tip thinner and the liquid larger.

Thank you sooo much! This helps a lot!

@PowerPuffen You're welcome, if it helped you please consider accepting this answer.


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Rendered blender video stops at a frame when using speed control strip
I am trying to render a video in blender video editing 2.93.3. I added an effect strip for speed control in order to make the video faster.
When I look at the video in blender, everything looks good, the whole video is played and at a faster speed. But when I render it, the result is the first part of the video at a faster speed, and then it stops at a frame after about half of the video and that frame is shown for the rest of the video.
This is what my video looks like:

Any suggestions on how to fix this?

sounds weird. can u provide blend file?

Yes! Can you download it here? https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ojTdqoVekk8gUw8v7eXyC_GdVIOiME5_/view?usp=sharing

@Chris could you see it?

i can't even see anything in preview...did you do file->external data->pack resources before uploading?

Ah, forgot that. Can you see it now: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1jsI0wnvypqp6uMG7936cWqHCu-OKCQLw/view?usp=sharing @Chris?


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Create/Modify a mesh from geometry nodes
I want to create a procedural archway made of bricks using only geometry node. I've done this so far :

What I've done is basically creating an empty mesh and instancing a primitive cube over a line (for the pillars) and over a bezier curve (for the arch)
The problem is this one :
The trick of instancing a scaled cube works fine for the pillar but for the arch I need a custom mesh as the top part is always wider than the bottom one and I can't do that with the basic transform node. I want the result to look like this :

I thought about two ways to implement this, I can either use a primitive mesh and access the bottom vertices in geometry node, but I don't know how to do that or I can create a mesh from scratch with eight points but I don't really know how to do that either. Is there a way to do that in geometry node only, or am I requesting to much ?

It might give you more flexibility to deform an array of blocks along a curve, as here, using the X_Array and X_Curve_Deform groups, which are described in this answer. Parameters have been provided to make a 'Block Arch' kit:

.. with these kinds of options:

Looks like you can now answer 90% of all GN questions with your 2 nodegroups…

@Chris    It's almost embarrassing. The deform is a very handy group. You can use it to Twist, Bend, Taper, Screw....  Maybe you've come across Tom Waits:'Step Right Up' ? :)

No, didn't know that ;)

Yes this is a great, I'll definitely use this although since I started up this project to learn how to use GN I'll try to come up with my own implementation, it will make me learn better that way

Ok I figured it out, I found a way, turns out the Transfer Attribute node was the solution, I created a primitive cube and got access to the vertices with the Math node and the Boolean Node, the solution is far from perfect and need adjustment and simplification but here it is :

Here's an attempt at simplifying the setup in meh's solution. Create a Selection mask on the primitive cube's bottom vertices, and scale in their Y position.


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How could I animate something being pulled almost endlessly without changing shape
So my idea is that I have a bracelet type object that'll be pulled between a still object and a moving one, but I want it to uncoil for about a second before stopping and being pulled back. Sorta like Spawns chains, how they move almost snake-like throughout the air and return to him.

hello, maybe show a story board with the different steps, like 3 images?


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Light inside spaceship doesn't work
I made a scene with a spaceship, I did put a sun light inside of the spaceship, but the light brightens just the outside, even if the light is inside it doesn't brightens the interior.I already tried with point, spot and area lights; and to flip normals but no result.
Material preview inside spaceship

Render preview inside spaceship

Render preview outside spaceship (the light just work in the exterior

Face orientation

Can someone help me?

So is the main issue getting light through a Glass BSDF?

It was what Dale said. I need to study more before doing posts; just wasted other people time. mb guys.

No worries, @MichaelNich!  This site is meant for asking questions.

From the Blender docs:
A sun light provides light of constant intensity emitted in a single direction from infinitely far away.
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/render/lights/light_object.html
The sun light's position doesn't matter, only the direction and size. You therefore cannot put a sun light inside anything.  You need to use a different light type.

Also he has to use cycles as the eevee doesnt let the light throu glass shader. If you use cycles rendering and put there a sun your interior will be lighted by it.


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My Minecraft's Player rig doesn't have shadows, how to fix?
So, I have a Minecraft's player rig, I've put a light spot and made the render, but I can't see the shadow of the rig, how can I fix it?

Activate shadows in the lamp options

because monsters may come if too much shadow in Minecraft ?

Im afraid she doesnt have a soul and thus, is unable to cast shadows. Sry

Select your light object, head over to the light options tab on the right hand side, and turn on shadows.

Go under World and check Ambient Occlusion, If you want softer shadows.

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


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How can I fuse those blocks?
So, I made this mesh with a lot of cubes

Is there any way to fuse them (besides Ctrl J)?
Because when I smooth them, it smooths all the blocks and it looks weird

You could use CTRL + P to parent them to the last object selected. I frequently add an Empty to parent to.

This appears to be exactly the same as your other question. If you need to give additional information please use the 'edit' link below your other question instead of asking a new one.

I give you solution here, and I'm sure it work, because I try it. http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/58140/how-can-i-fuse-a-lot-of-cubes  Did you try it? It work?

You have to do this by hand.  Also, the moderators put your question on hold for a reason!  I'm going to flag this.


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black out of place faces in render
I've got a weird issue with this model. The mesh is fragmented when rendered, even though nothing of the sort shows up in material or solid view.
It has happened a few hours before and moving the whole mesh around and putting it back into place helped for some reason. Not this time.
There are no other faces in that space, so it's unlikely that it's z-fighting. It also seems to affect this particular part only (side panels and the front splitter are one object, separate from the rest of the body).  Any idea what I can do to fix it?

EDIT
As requested, I'm attaching a screen of my wireframe, together with properties. I'm using cycles.
Here's the download link: borked wireframe
Also, it's working again (don't know for how long this time), even though I changed nothing. I'm starting to think it's my graphic card glitching out, though it's weird that it's affecting only one object

Never seen anything like it before. Hard to tell what it is from the pictures alone though. Can you edit your question and add more information? How are you rendering this, Cycles, internal? Van you show your mesh in the viewport, and in wireframe mode so we can see the topology? Perhaps the modifier stack and materials. If possible post your blend file

additional info posted, as requested. truth be told, it's working again so for the time being it's only academic, though I full expect it showing up again

You have some seriously uneven and messed up topology in your mesh, there are vertex overlapping faces, tris mixed with quads and ngons at unexpected places, all that contributes to bad topology and potential artifacts at render time.
Anyway there's an (apparently) useless and undesirable Bevel modifier and the end of your modifier stack causing trouble in the resulting mesh.
It is causing artifacts even in the viewport, and some more in the rendered view. Disabling it seems to mostly fix that problem.
You may want to read up on why quad based topology is important
EDIT
You may also want to remove doubles in your mesh (under edit mode select all and W > Remove Doubles) and recalculate normals (under edit mode select all and Ctrl + N)

but theres only a single triangle in the whole panel object? unless you're talking about the entirety of the mesh, then yeah, there might be some farts of the sort. it's my third model so i'm still grasping straws here. I got rid of bevel, hope that'll prevent it from happening in the future, I'll mark your answer as the correct one if nothing like that comes up again in this model, thanks!

Yes, I'm talking about the entire mesh topology. With practice your modelling skills will certainly improve, it's hard o fix topology on finished models, so whenever starting a new one take a moment before you start to think about how it's topology will flow and how you'll proceed. A triangle here and there is not bad per se, but overlapping geometry, and uneven normals will certainly create problems

Also forgot to mention, don't forget to cleanup you mesh, added further info to the answer, check above.


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FBX Converter from the Mac terminal?
I need to convert a batch of .obj models to .fbx
I'm using Autodesk 2013 FBX Converter GUI. Is it possible to do it from the terminal? I haven't been able to find much.
I'm writing a Blender script to do some changes to a model then automatically export that model to both .obj and .fbx
The .obj export works like a charm, but the blender fbx exporter has some problems.

It can't embed all the media so I need to relink textures
The scale/rotation is off

But, I found that if I use the fbx converter on the .obj model I exported it looks great, so I was wondering if I could automate that conversion from my addon.

Yes it is sorry for the confusion. I'm writing a blender script to do some changes to a model then automatically export that model to both .obj and .fbx
The .obj export works like a charm, but the blender fbx exporter has some problems.

It can't embed all the media so I need to relink textures
The scale/rotation is off

But, I found that if I use the fbx converter on the .obj model I exported it looks great, so I was wondering if I could automate that conversion from my addon.

@RobertCornwall There are the same path_mode options, so this should work for both: https://www.blender.org/api/blender_python_api_current/bpy.ops.export_scene.html#bpy.ops.export_scene.fbx, right?

You won't get any help using the Autodesk converter here, but if you are asking whether you can use blender to do the conversions, then the answer might be yes. Blender is able to import and export both obj and fbx files, you will need to do some tests to see if the models you have are handled correctly.
Blender has a python interpreter built into it, you can use blender's python console to enter python commands to do your conversion. You can also open a text file in blender's text editor and run it as a python script.
You could also start blender in the terminal and have it act as an interactive python console in the terminal without using blender's gui.
The commands you want to use to convert your models are bpy.ops.import_scene.obj() and bpy.ops.export_scene.fbx()
You could start with a script like
import bpy
import os

src_dir = '/Users/name/Desktop/obj_files'
dest_dir = '/Users/name/Desktop/fbx_files'

for f in os.listdir(src_dir):
    # delete all existing objects
    bpy.ops.object.select_all(action='SELECT')
    bpy.ops.object.delete()
    bpy.ops.import_scene.obj(filepath=os.path.join(src_dir,f))
    bpy.ops.export_scene.fbx(filepath=os.path.join(dest_dir,f))


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Can i create multiple materials for single face
Can I create multiple materials for a single face of the thing like circle?
Creating some pattern like square or other circle boxes on the circle to apply different materials on them.
Or can we create  a simple circle with sub meshes (if that's the right with terminology), in a similar way as said for creating a pattern of boxes(square/circles) so that these squares or circles are different meshes so that they can be colored or textured differently?
Complete noob at model making, first question.
Thank you.

While you can't directly apply multiple materials to a single face, you can use a texture map to control how two different materials appear on a face.

Blender Render:
Make sure your object has a material.

Click the Use Nodes button.

Drag out a new panel.

Change the panel to the Node Editor.

Add a MixRGB node...

...and plug it in like so.

Duplicate the Material node and plug it in to the MixRGB node. Make sure to assign both nodes their own materials.

Customise both materials to your liking. Notice that dragging the MixRGB slider left or right changes which Material node the final material uses. 0 corresponds to the top node, and 1 corresponds to the bottom node.

Create a new texture in the data textures list.

Customise the texture to your liking, or import a UV map for more control.

Add a Texture node from Add --> Inputs --> Texture, and plug in the Value output into the MixRGB node. Notice that the black parts of the texture correspond to the top Material (value 0) and the white parts correspond to the bottom node (value 1).

Voilà! Rendering an image shows that it mixes the materials regardless of the faces!

The same concept can be applied to Cycles; just replace the Material nodes with a shader node tree each.

You can't assign two materials on one face obviously. How would you determine the boundaries? What you can is create mask (black and white image) and use it as factor for blending two materials.

Can i create a single mask or many and will i be able to change the color of the mask when i import this thing in unity3d

This work in Blender only. For export to Unity (or any other 3D software or game engine) you need bake colors to texture. This texture you can use for coloring object out of Blender. There are no "one click solution". Here is awesome tutorial how to mix textures/colors/materials in Blender: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=liNGmdXsfbs&list=PLOg_Sr7fkqte01FyBCUNaRPsTkw0Wuz8A       And here you can see how to bake textures and maps for using in game engines. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BPy-oNtorus

You could give the material a texture (and use a specific image editor like GIMP to make a nice texture) after giving it a material.  You may or may not need to UV unwrap the object so that the texture looks proper on the model however.  This is what the texture panel would look like:

You could also create the actual geometry that you are trying to achieve in Edit Mode.  While in Edit Mode, you can use the assign button in the Materials Tab to set a particular material to the faces you have selected.  Something like this:

Which way to go can depend very heavily on what you are trying to achieve.  If you are trying to make a flat plane with a pattern, use a texture so that you do not unnecessarily increase the vertex count (taking longer to render).  If you have a tree with leaves that are going to be just one color, then go with the different materials.

Have you applied the red and blue textures on the face of the cube .without altering the shape of the face of the cube .

@SouravSachdeva I am unsure what you mean by the shape, but I used inset (press "i" with a face selected) to make the smaller square (flush with the surface), then assigned the blue material to it.  In Unity, you would then need to add another material slot (just change a number and drop in the Blue material).  If you would like, I can elaborate on the texture UV unwrapping process (though there are many tutorials out there on that) and assigning materials for easy use in Unity.


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Why is the glass transparency not consistent?
I followed Blenderguru's tutorial and made some gum drops. Then I made glass container and use rigid body to fill it with dozens of gums, but why does it look so strange from outside? It looks like there are only three or four, or as if the glass is 10 inches thick...
The gums are not intersecting with the glass either. How can I make it look more realistic?

The file:

Hello :). Keep in mind those colored spots are reflections of your foreground gumdrops, not the actual gumdrops inside the jar.

Ohhhh you're right! >< I should now change the question to why does the glass not that transparent at all....how come things inside are grey...

ok, i deleted some planes you created (i have no idea what they did) and i changed your cylinder material to this:

result was (after i added a ground plane with some color)

and here is my changed blend file to check out:


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Weird outline image with sculpting
I'm new to blender and am trying sculpt mode. All its giving me, though, is an outline with a glitched out static backround inside. Is this a bug?

SOLVED: I toggled the viewport shading and it was fixed. Not sure what it was, but that did the trick.

See How to write good answers


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How do I render something out with sound
I am a beginner and i made a simple key frame animation and i added sound in the video editing part of blender. My only challenge is to figure out how render it out open it file explorer and be able to watch and listen to the animation. i will my blend file below the question

BLENDER FILE:

on the top left > Render > Render Animation, make sure that the destination folder is correct in the Properties panel > Output > Output

thanks but that did not do anything

Sorry I can't test as I can't see any file within your file, I'm not sure you can pack movies or sounds in the VSE...

If u go to layout the animation is working but u cant see it in video editing


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Origin of individual faces don't show up
I have a cool model I'm making, but I want to move faces of my model outward along the normals of the faces, so I set the pivot point to individual origins and the transform orientation to normals, but this doesn't work and I can't actually see the individual origins, but when I watch videos on youtube about it they do have the individual origins showing up. Does anybody know how to fix this?
Thanks in advance.
https://i.sstatic.net/YWStG.jpg (I'm moving the faces in this picture)

Please use the tools from this site
to upload images so that they are displayed as part of your question.
See How to upload an image to a post?

Yeah I know how to do it, but the file was to big.

To move faces along their individual normals, you need to change the Transform Orientations to "Normal" as well as the pivot point to individual origins. Then use G -> Z to move the faces along their individual normal direction.

If you wish to add geometry, use "Extrude Along Normals"

And to visualize the normals, the setting is in the Viewport Overlay dropdown:

Yeah ok thanks, it doesn't do exactly what I wanted, but it's close enough. Thank you


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Viewport Posing Problems
I'm having issues moving my rig in my viewport. For some reason when I move a bone, the mesh doesn't follow. But when I let go of the bone to finalize it's transform, then the mesh shifts to the correct position. The problem is that I can't see the model move as I'm moving the mesh.
Here is the file: https://www.mediafire.com/file/e0xvcuf681ox8nd/Cartoon_Character_After_SubSurf.blend/file

Your nice character is what is called "Not Production-ready", its simple shape is composed by 300K vertices, while a correct Retopology could mantain the same quality with less than 5K.
In my computer everything works quite fine (i7 4 Ghz, 8 core, 32 Mb Ram, Gtx 970), but a slower machine will suffer your kind of problems.
If you want to stuck with the character as it is, you can create a low poly version to program the animation, then use the original for render.
I suggest you also to go further with rigging, as it lacks all automatic functions (IK and face features) that can make the animation process quite complicated.

So because of its poly count it’s delaying its movement in the viewport? Is that what your saying? It sounds like I could just un_subdivide it to fix this.

Never mind, i found out what the problem is. I had “Delay Refresh” on. This explains so much. Alright thank you.


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How do I make this rig's poses able to be x-axis mirrored
I don't understand how to make the rig's poses mirrored on this rig. I tried naming each bone the _L and _R, and it still didn't work. Can someone help me out?
Blender File: https://www.mediafire.com/file/qx4eosdi9o6yv0f/Sora_KH2.blend/file

It doesn't work for the moment because:

Your bones need to have the same name on both side...
They need a different suffix: _L or .L for the left bones, _R or .R for the right bones

Here is what a Copy and Paste Pose Flipped gives with the feet controllers, once I've renamed them. It can't work with the current names:

I tried this before and it didn’t work. But I’ll try again. Do I need to save the file for this to work?

no you don't need to save. Well I've tried with your file and it works so I think it will fix your problem

Ok, thank you...

Are you on 2.8 and up?

yes, it should work with all the versions

It's still not working for me. Can I see your file?

I've just changed the feet controllers and named it control_L and control_R: https://pasteall.org/blend/f5dabea40e3f41889b3ab0e352176735

Maybe I'm doing it wrong, but it looks like its not working for you either.

what do you mean? actually in the file I've shared, I've just renamed the feet controllers and it works fine, if you move these 2 bones, copy then flip-paste, it will mirror the pose, is it not what you want?

Oh, I meant for the upper half it still bugs out. But you were right about the legs.

what part? I may miss something but I can't see any IK for the arm. Also make sure that you create the same name with this kind of suffixes: _L, _R or .L, .R

Are you saying this technique only works on IK’s? I guess it does make sense.

no it works on every bones but most of the times the ones you move are the IK controllers

Gotcha. Well thanks.


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Automatic Weights Issues
I sculpted a hand and retoplogized it. I tried to rig the hand with the rigify rig, and for some reason, it didn't work. I tried making my own rig and it has the exact same problem. It's like the bones don't move the finger that they're in, and instead move the rest of the hand each. It's weird. It has to be a problem with the model, so I'd like to know how I can fix it.
Blender file: https://www.mediafire.com/file/w0nnvo5d93w4528/Hand_Problems.....blend/file

Your hand has backward normals, which is why the autoweights aren't what you expected them to be.

thanks, man! I had no idea. Is recalculating inside the way to make my Normals facing the right way, or is it recalculating out? I'm used to 2.79, so I'm not familiar with those options.

UPDATE: YOU WERE RIGHT!!! I was losing my mind over this! I couldn't tell they were backward! It works now! How do I give you a badge or something?

Foreword: you seem to have multiple rigs in your scene, none of which are named. This is the best way to get lost. Ideally you should name your things, and not have just one rig for the same character.
Two issues here: duplicated bones and weight paints.
Your metarig have lots of duplicated bones. Which lead Rigify to generate a rig with lots of duplicated parts, and when running automatic weights: duplicated deform bones fight for influence making a mess. I tried to find a way to delete duplicates in a simple manner, but I couldn't find one that didn't easily made the metarig unable tu re-generate a rig. So I would suggest you to delete all metarigs and rigs, and start the rigging from a clean new metarig.
Your weight painting is all messed up. I guess you used the automatic weights but didn't check the result afterward. Bits of your arms are assigned to jaw, chest and fingers bones, and the four arms bones weights aren't well spread on the mesh.
To fix this, ↹ Tab into object mode. The manual boring way to cleanup vertex groups is to select an object, go under Properties Editor > Mesh Data tab > Vertex Groups panel, click the dorp down menu and click  Delete All Groups and repeat for each mesh object.
But since you have many objects to deal with, I made a script that does it for you. Just select all your objects that have weights, open the script editor, make a new empty script, paste the following and hit ⎇ AltP to run it.
import bpy

# Get the selected objects
obs = bpy.context.selected_objects

# Iterate through selected objects
for ob in obs:
    if ob.type == 'MESH':
        # Delete all vertex groups
        for group in ob.vertex_groups:
            try:
                ob.vertex_groups.remove(group)
            else:
                print(f"No vertex groups in '{ob.name}'")

        print(f"Deleted vertex groups from '{ob.name}'")
    else:
        print(f"Skipped non-mesh object '{ob.name}'")

Then, you should be able to run the automatic weights again and have it less problematic. But do ↹ Tab into weight paint mode, enable Auto Normalize so that painting will take weights from other groups instead of adding new weights and make unwanted deformations:

⇧ Shift LMB over a mesh part to see and select the weights available where you clicked, and make sure only the needed bones affect the right places. Your biggest areas of concerns are the elbows and shoulders, so focus on that. There isn't any trick there, just paint till it works.


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How to implement image textures into cell shading
I'm currently working on a personal project and ran into a small technical hiccup.
I wanted to try my hand at making an anime-style model using hand-drawn shadows combined with normally edited anime shading. The idea was that I'd draw areas on the model where the shadows should ALWAYS be, such as between the eye and brows, under the nose and lips, and the eye shade. Then, I'd add a basic anime shader and make it so that the shadow color would be the same as the hand-drawn shadow color, creating a seamless effect between what's hand-drawn and what's calculated by blender. It's similar to what I think epic games used for their Omni-Man model.

Turns out it's not that simple. It's weird because making the factor 1/2 doesn't give the colors the seamless transition I wanted. I honestly thought that'd work. I swear I've seen people do what I'm trying to do online, but I haven't found a signle straight forward video that shows how to implement image textures into a shader the way I'm trying to.
Am I going crazy here?
If what I'm trying to do is fundamentally impossible, or there's a better way to do it, please let me know.
Link to file: https://www.mediafire.com/folder/ckkufrx4nknxo/Detective+Grey
Let me know if you have any problems with the link.
Thanks!

You can simplify the 2 last nodes by simply using a Mix Color node. What you have is 2 colors, no need to go through a Mix Shader (although I don't think it changes the result). In both cases, mix set to 0.5 means you want one color to be 50% transparent and put over the other color, you can see it this way. I think you'd rather play with a black&white range (instead of dark skintone and light skintone) and use a Mix node set to Multiply. Only then you want to go from black&white to skin colors. More flexibility and it simplifies the masking part. I'll try to write a full answer soon.

Single-color light and textured cel-shading
There are multiple ways of achieving cel-shading with Eevee. There is no one-way to do it, each one has its pros and cons. I'll explain a simple one that offers nice flexibility.
Limitation

Only one color of light and one color of shadow is possible. You can't have a red light and a green light at the same time.

Advantage

Flexibility : lighting is done in shader, tint and brightness of light parts, and tint and brightness of shadow parts

Method
First, I am starting with 2 textures. The first one is the base colored texture, the second one is the shadow map :

More grayscale values on the shadow map can be possible.
Then, what you want to do is to get the same range of value as the shadow map with your shader

Now, mixing the 2 black&white textures is simply a matter of multiplying the textures. Remember that black is 0, so any black part will stay black after the multiplication even if the other texture has white.

After that, we can finally choose our lighting. You could tint your shadows, tint your highlights, or don't give any color and just set the brightness. Finally, we Multiply the shadow map with the colored texture to get the final result

Here are the nodes. You'll note that the setup is quite similar to yours

By tweaking the Color Ramp which controls the lighting, you can get any lighting you want.

I tried following the steps, but it didn't seem to work out for me. I made a version of my texture where his whole face was covered in shadow, safe for the eyes and eyelid folds. I plugged the image into the shadow map node. It seemed just to make my model darker. There wasn't any change when I rotated the light source or sun in this case. The only thing affected was the eye whites. Am I missing something? I would put an image down, but it's not letting me.


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How make a face-shaped desert storm in a blender?
I'm studying effects in Blender these days. The effect I want to make this time is a face-shaped desert storm as shown in the picture below, but it didn't go well even if I followed several tutorials.
Could anybody teach me how to do it?

Hello and welcome. This question is too broad. Try to focus the question
into a single specific issue. Break up different questions into
different posts. You can ask many questions, but it is easier to
organize things if you deal with one issue at the time. To understand
how to make better use of this site please take the [tour] and read
[How do I ask a good question](https://blender.stackexchange.com /help/how-to-ask)
and What types of questions should I avoid asking?

you can make any shape emit smoke, so I guess you could animate a face and make it emit smoke?

This effect is usually done using two different techniques.  The majority of the storm is done with a physics simulation, in Blender that would be a smoke simulation.  The face is a separate mesh object that has a material related to the storm's material and is animated independently of the storm.  It may or may not also have a smoke simulation or that may be done in compositing.  So you're looking to do some character modeling and animation.

you can also use particles simulation...but you will need a lot of particles...


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Assigning custom properties automatically
I have been looking at some add-ons written by other users, and noticed that on startup, every object in the scene has custom properties defined automatically, even if the addon is never actually used. How do I go about adding this functionality  to my own add-on?

Register the property per data type you want (Object, Camera, Light...) in register().
def register():

    # Object property
    bpy.types.Object.your_object_property = bpy.props.IntProperty()

    # Scene property
    bpy.types.Scene.your_scene_property = bpy.props.IntProperty()

    # Camera property
    bpy.types.Camera.your_camera_property = bpy.props.IntProperty()

    # Light property
    bpy.types.Light.your_light_property = bpy.props.IntProperty()

    #...

def unregister():
    del bpy.types.Object.your_object_property
    del bpy.types.Scene.your_scene_property
    del bpy.types.Light.your_light_property
    del bpy.types.Camera.your_camera_property

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

Don't forget to remove each property when unregister() is getting called.

Yep that's exactly what I was looking for. Thank you! @Cod3R


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Reverse engineering Bezier Curve
I am writing a script that involves creating bezier curves from poly curves. Is there any way to return the simplest bezier curve that can be made from a series of points?
Basically I want to convert this:

To this:
If someone could give me some pointers I'd really appreciate it. I haven't done much calculus since highschool.
Thanks!

this answer points to a good algorithm and a C language implementation. There's a reference to a numpy implementation in one of the comments.

Thank you will check this out!

That numpy script looks awesome! Exactly what I need and simple enough to apply and actually understand what it’s doing. Thanks again!

If you're trying to write a script only for this purpose, and not trying to incorporate this into a larger more complex script, note that you can already do this in Blender with the "Add Curve: Simplify Curves+" add-on.
Starting with a poly curve:

Switch to edit mode
Right click on the curve -> Set Spline Type -> Bezier
Right click on the curve -> Curve Simplify (needs the Simplify Curves+ add-on)
In the "Simplify Curves" dialog, increase the "Error" value to reduce the number of control points.

Thank you! Yeah it's just part of a script i'm writing to create custom bevel objects for roads, convert to mesh, grab certain loops and turn them back into bezier curves so i can manipulate the curves smoothly. Right now i'm debating whether I should just offset the road spline for striping, but I know offset can be touch and go for bezier curves.


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How can I update panel properties only once on event
I am writing an addon that deals with creating objects and assigning them properties based on panel parameters. I want the panel to update it's parameters to match the properties of my selected object only when I first select it. If I update for every draw, I will not be able to change those parameters because it will automatically snap back to the parameters of my selected object. How can I update the panel properties only once when I select a new object?

Not sure this will solve your problem but maybe explore getter/setter : https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/245167/86891

Also maybe it would be nice to include the code for defining these properties, and consider storing them on bpy.types.Object instead of bpy.types.Scene (if it's the case) that way you won't risk overriding your parameters

@Gorgious https://github.com/rocstar293/TyTools.git Here is my Git repo. I made a branch with better commentary so you can get an idea of what's going on. The relevent files are panel.py, operators.py, presets.py, and utils.curve.py. but that's a lot so you might be able to see the gist from the utils.curve, which is where I set the object props from scene.props. If you can let me know if I'm going about this the right way, I would very much appreciate it. Thanks!


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Quick script for joining bmesh verts; Only last operation is performed
So I built a simple script to take a set of selected verts, mark the most recently selected as target and connect all other verts to target with bmesh.ops.connect_verts
import bpy
import bmesh

sel = bpy.context.active_object

if sel.mode == 'EDIT':
    bm = bmesh.from_edit_mesh(sel.data)
    verts = bm.select_history
    target = verts[-1]
    for v in range(0, len(verts)-1):
        bmesh.ops.connect_verts(bm, verts=[verts[v],target])

    bmesh.update_edit_mesh(sel.data)

So I have something like this:

When I run my code it only seems to connect the second to last selection with the target

What am I doing wrong?

Wait, what? You are trying to connect vertexes without making faces between them?

All the verts are connected by an ngon, my goal is basically to triangulate the ngon based on the active vert instead of just an auto triangulation.

Yes, but if you will add edges like this you will end up with the same N-gon and a bunch of edges connected to vertexes, but not divining the N-gon.

How do you recommend I achieve this?

One think I've just found: there's a bug in select_history.  If you select by using CTRL-LMB to include all of the vertices between the starting point and the vertex you're clicking on it only records the vertex you're clicking on and not all of the others.  You need to find the selected vertices by another means.

@MartyFouts Thank you! Just did some debugging and found this to be the issue. Found the solution to be adding verts = [vert for vert in bm.verts if vert.select] and then popping with verts.pop(verts.index(target)) Gives me a list of selected verts without the target.


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Correct Face Attributes not working
I'm trying to create a mesh with a procedural checkerboard shader, but when I scale the mesh, the material scales as well, even when I have Correct Face Attributes applied. Oddly, it seems to work correctly in Edit Mode, but as soon as I jump back to Object Mode, the shatter gets stretched and stays that way.
I have tried scaling the mesh and applying the scale both before and after I assign the material, and assigning the material and then scaling. I have tried both moving a face, and scaling, both in Edit Mode.
What can I do to get the mesh to sale without affecting the material?

Correct Face Attributes is supposed to work in Edit mode. To do what you want to do, you can choose the Object output of the Texture Coordinate and choose an empty as Object:

It's the empty that is now determining the texture projection, if you move the object, the texture stays still:

That worked. Thank you!


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Problem with instances on curve
I have 4 objects (each as a linked .blend file) that I have running along a path in the sequence of blue, green, orange, red. As you can see, some of the objects are overlapping. How can I get them to not overlap and sequence properly?

Here's my geometry node:

Replace "Geometry to instance" by "Join Geometry" and use a random value as an input for the index

I suspect that your input mesh has overlapping vertices. Try merging them by distance, either in edit mode or using the Merge by Distance-node directly in your node setup.

Yup, that was it. Thank you!!

just use this node setup:

So check "separate children" and use join geometry.


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Object Parenting in Geometry Nodes
Lets say that I create three (3) cubes, side by side, in Geometry Nodes. Now, I want to make the center cube parent to the others. Is this possible? I am not seeing an option to parent in Geometry Nodes.

you can use this kind of node setup:

I used these "legs" with the pivot points as you can see here:

The Sub leg is the child of the Main leg (no, don't set this in relation, the node tree behaves like this would be the case).
How it works? i set the boolean attribute to True for the Sub leg. Via the join geometry i can move both objects via the transform geometry node which "looks like" that i move the parent object (main leg). Now i can separate the geometry via that Sub attribute and rotate (rotate instances) just the child object via rotate instances node. Of course i have to join afterwards both objects.
result:

This is the only solution, as nested instances can't be accessed (e.g. rotated), only the outer layer (parent) can.

Geometry Nodes is a modifier. This means it works on a single object. It is not meant to control the 3d scene and object hierarchy so you cannot do object parenting in Geometry Nodes. You could probably replicate various kinds of functionality similar to parenting with Geometry Nodes, but you certainly cannot change object hierarchy in the scene from the modifier.

That much I understand. Yet, with all the "instances" of objects are created, there should be a means of establishing relationships between those objects.

What are you talking about? Instances created with geometry nodes remain in a single object, don't they?

Let's take the example you provided with 3 cubes. Let's see how that would go. Here it is What objects do you want to have what relationships in this case? There is only one object.

Even more so, a modifier (I think each modifier) can only access the data of the object (a mesh, or curve data), it can't even modify the properties of an object like its scale for example. Though I'm not sure, e.g. attributes reside on object wrapper rather than mesh data? Since geonodes can create attributes, so perhaps they have some access to the object…

Can you modify transforms of an object from modifier without Python? I don't think so... I don't think the devs would implement something like that because that would conflict with other features(keyframes, drivers and so on)


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Where to find bpy name lists for scripting?
I'm sure this must exist, but all of the information is hard to navigate:
I'm putting together QoL custom workflow tools as a way of getting started in Python scripting for Blender, and I'm finding that much less of my time is being used writing or even figuring out the structure of code I want to put together than hunting down syntax.
For instance: I found this very helpful for figuring out the structure of code if I want to append a custom button to a particular editor's header. What I DIDN'T find was what to write if I wanted to put it in the dope sheet header, rather than that of the shader editor. Like it looks like the name for the shader is NODE_HT_; what's the name for the Dope Sheet? Or the Video Sequencer?
I'm sure I'll eventually find it floating around somewhere, but there's got to be a resource somewhere that just lists how to refer to each of them. I saw that it was in bpy.types. so I tried to use TAB to at least get the list of potential options, but there were so many returned that it wouldn't let me scroll up through all of them.
Where can I find this info?

I don't know of a list of every possible name of UI element. But there are some lists for some elements. For example:
Space Type Items — Blender Python API
You can also easily identify things in Blender itself, using the Developer Extras and Python Tooltips. You can enable them in the Preferences > Interface tab:

Tooltips
Python tooltips will display when hovering UI elements. Hovering a menu will show its menu class (if your menu opens instead, disable "Open on mouse over" in Preferences > Interface tab).

Properties will show their full data path, operator their method name, etc.

Developer Extras
Developer Extras add a lot of usefull things for devs, like the operator search or copying python commands. And in particular for our topic:
It lets you  RMB a UI element like the node editor header and select "Edit Source", and it will open the corresponding python file describing the UI of that element, and it will even jump to the corresponding line of code.
If you know a bit how BPY works, you will easily find what you need there:

May it be class names, idname, space types, ...
Edit Operator Source
UI elements called by operators don't have the Edit Source contextual menu.
But there is an addon shipped with Blender that allows you to do exactly that:
Edit Operator Source — Blender Manual
Enable it in the preferences, open the text editor's sidebar, click the Edit Operator button, paste the operator method (without bpy.ops.) and click it in the search result. It will show the different elements available for that operator, chose the one that you need, and it will open in the text editor.
NOTE (2023-07-06):
This addon seems to have a bug (recursion errors) when other addons such as Animaide are enabled. If you encounter such an issue, try disabling Animaide, rebooting Blender and trying again.
Bug reports were made on both addons, with a proposed patch for Edit Operator Source. You can follow up the bug reports here:

#104725 - blender-addons - Blender Projects
#95 - aresdevo/animaide · GitHub

Blender's output
Blender have a few ways to tell you what's going on:
Info Editor

The Info editor logs executed operators, warnings and error messages. Logged reports can be selected by clicking on them. To select multiple reports, hold down Shift-LMB.

Info Editor — Blender Manual

Python Console Editor

The Python Console is a quick way to execute commands, with access to the entire Python API, command history and auto-complete.

Python Console — Blender Manual

System Console
Menu Window > Toggle System Console, or run Blender via console/terminal.

The Console Window, also called a Terminal, is an operating system text window that displays messages about Blender’s operations, status, and internal errors.

Introduction — Blender Manual

I had no idea at all about that last bit and it's EXACTLY what I didn't even know I needed, this is gonna make everything run smoother. Thanks!

Glad it helped! Don't forget to accept my answer by clicking the checkmark ✔ icon below the vote arrows.

You can also hover your mouse over a menu button to see the menu class name in the tooltip. You do need to disable "Open on mouse over" in the menus settings in the Interface preferences

updated answer with more details and stuff to know


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Why is my Grease Pencil object rotating along this path?
I describe the problem in this video
But the basic summary is this:
I'm trying to get a camera and a grease pencil object to travel along the same path, with the camera offset slightly so that it can watch the object. I'm trying to have each of them track each other, so that the camera is always looking at the GP and the DP is always facing the camera.
I did something similar previously using Track To constraints for this video, but in that one I used two paths, and the necessary Track Axis and Up settings seemed to be different for this one. After some finagling, I got the constraint settings aligned so that they were facing each other.
The problem is now that for some reason, when I actually have them move along the path, the grease pencil object will rotate, tilting slightly on the y axis and then doing a full z-axis rotation. This persists if I use multiple paths along the same line, if I remove offset. There are no transform keyframes on either the camera or the GP.
I tried starting over by deleting all paths and follow constraints and setting up the dual tracking constraints first, confirming that that was working properly, then adding the follow path constraints onto two different paths; the result seems to just be that it now rotates less, and only on the x-axis, which is an improvement but not a fix or an explanation.
I am pretty lost on this, doesn't make sense that this happens for two objects traveling at the same speed in a straight line. Anyone else have insights?
Blender file here

hi! it's hard to say what's going on here cos the example file doesn't include the path nor GP object. would it work to parent the GP obj to the camera and just animate the camera to follow the path?

@pevinkinel Thanks for having a look! If I could animate the parenting property, that would work, but because the paths are different lengths - I'd be trying to get a bird animation to reach a branch, and then for the camera to continue pulling out to a wider scene.
And yeah, sorry, I was editing the file and forgot to save an alternate version of what I was doing; I went through the backups and it should be viewable now.

Just want to update this to say I figured it out:
For anyone at my early level who is having a problem similar to this, the order in which Object Constraints are placed matters. My GP Object was calculating Track To first, then Follow Path, so its calculated orientation towards the camera was being thrown off by the tilt of the path it was on.
As soon as I switched their order - so that it figured out the path and then tracked towards the camera - it worked perfectly. Lesson learned.


text:
Blender Subdivision mod doesn't work more than 1 level

Blender Subdivision mod doesn't work more than 1 level.
This is the first time I have had this problem in my current working file (other files are fine) so I think I clicked something stupid.
File here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GY1MQimn1CcDDLGrqtQ2khOii6Khh770/view?usp=sharing

You've activated the Simplify option in the Render panel, disable it or increase the Max Subdivision value:

Thanks, It worked.


text:
How to make comic panels in Blender?
I am working on my personal project, trying to make comic from Blender.
The problem is: i don't know how to make Blender render 1 whole page for me without do it once for each panel separate and edit it later in other software.

For example: If i am working with this page in Unity
I will set up 1 "Main Camera", 5 "Panel Camera" and 5 Planes. 5 planes will be put at position fit with the paper, then they will collect data from 5 "Panel camera" and use them as texture. After that "Main camera" will render the whole things out as once. (Similar with how people making the minimap in games)
But i don't know how to do it in Blender (cycles). Is there any way for me to do it ?
Thank you in advantage.

I'm confused, do you want to export the object with texture, or an image generated from camera view?

That's definitely a job for an image editing software like inkscape or gimp. Not saying it's impossible to do in Blender but it would be much more complicated to set up and you'd probably still need to render each panel separately anyway


text:
Snap vertex to edge in only one direction
I'm trying to snap a vertex to the edge right above with with axis locked to z. But it just slides along the edge. Going to vertex mode doesn't help either. This should be possible though as there is only one solution for blender to accomplish this really... idk if this could be a feature request? It's not the first time I'm encountering this problem.

Is there a way to make it work?

Would you like workarounds as answers?  For example, use knife with angle constrain, cut a new vertex where you need to snap to, snap to that vertex, remove it after.  Alternatively, use one of the many addons (TinyCad is good) to construct or modify the mesh to have a vertex there quicker, but either way they're not really direct solutions.

I tried tinyCAD, it just creates a vertex in the open, but I need it to be part of the face.


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Move object to 3D-Cursor but only on one axis
I often find myself in situations where I want to move an object to just one specific coordinate of the 3d-Cursor. Like in below example I want to move a wheel along the y-axis to the center given by the 3D-cursor but I don't want to move it in the other directions (as Shift-S and Selection to Cursor would). I'm aware that I can just copy the x/y/z location of the cursor from the N-Menu. Still, is there a faster way that works with shortcuts maybe?

Well I snapped the cursor to object so it centers on the x-Axis. If i could do that with snapping directly i would :/

Sorry, shouldn't have used 'X' to mean unknown :) I can't tell whether your disc has an edge or a vertex centrally aligned down the X axis running towards us. Depending on which, the snap would be to 'Vertex' or 'Edge Center', the appropriate target on the disc. The move, in Object Mode, would be GY.

I don't think this is possible while creating the objects but you can move them all to the same z-coordinate at the end instead. To achieve this, select all the objects you want to move and then set the Y-coordinate (or whichever property to want to have in common). Then right-click the coordinate property and select 'Copy Single to Selected'.

That's a good tip I didn't know that thank you! :D


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Alpha not showing up in renders for textures painted with transparent png
I want to paint the fassade of my building with some leaves here and there. The file I'm using as a brush is a png with transparent parts. It's working fine in texture paint mode, but in renders it always displays the alpha as black. I created the picture which is painted on with transparent background though, so I'm not seeing why this is happening. Any clues?

How does your shader network look like? Related: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/46424/add-a-transparent-image-on-top-of-a-material

Thanks to @brockmann's hint I was able to resolve this issue. It was just a matter of connecting the alpha channel of the image node (got to shading tab) to the alpha input of the material node as such:
before:

after:

Apparently Evee does not render this correctly, so I needed to switch to cycles to see how it looks!

Works with Eevee as well: https://i.sstatic.net/h3eec.jpg


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How do I render a normal pass that is blue/pink instead of red/green?
In my case, it's for an aesthetic purpose. I want to render out a version of my scene that has the blue/pink normal map look. Blender's standard Normal render pass seems to be red and green. I'm sure there is a functional/technical reason for this, but in my case I only want the pass for the look of it.
I would also prefer to do this with compositing nodes/rendering because I don't want to have to change all the materials in my scene individually just to fake the normals/blue pink look. I need both the combined render and the normal.

Not sure what settings you're using to bake, but blue/purple normal maps are Tangent Space normal maps, whereas multicolored like that are usually Object Space, or World Space ones... if that helps at all.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/14044/render-entire-scene-normals


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Parallax occlusion portal effect
I'd like to create a parallax occlusion effect (cycles or eevee) where a cube or plane appears to contain another universe inside of it. I've seen a lot of brilliant solutions that can fake it using 2D images, but I'm wondering if there is a solution that would allow for objects within the plane to actual "pop out", like below --

These solutions all work well for 2D planes, and I know a lot of people use this to create fake rooms inside buildings, but again you're stuck using flat images that can't cross the border of the plane. I also think anything to with compositing nodes would make the effect I'm going for impossible.

https://twitter.com/Magryllia/status/1129566134024396800
Portal effect in EEVEE?
How to make a holographic reticle shader in cycles)

One way si to build both worlds inside one scene.
And then fake an 'infinitely deep' wall between them.

Build one set (I used an HDRI)
Add a wall with a 'portal' cutout.
Add a texture to this wall (I used stars) and use Texture Coordinate node > Window to map it.
The texture will always be facing towards you, faking an infinitely deep space.

Since both worlds are actually inside one scene, you can freely move objects between them.
I'm not rotating the portal, I'm moving the camera.

Super easy and elegant solution, thanks!

And thank you, for asking interesting questions :). Good luck with your project.

Ha :) what a nice illusion!

@vklidu Thanks, been kinda proud of it then :))


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Is there a way to hide/remove parts of a fluid sim mesh so they won't show in render?
I have my fluid simulation beneath a floor plane, and I only want the splashes that rise above the plane to be visible in the final render. I've been trying to find a way to make the pool of fluid below the plane invisible, but applying a boolean to the domain didn't work. I don't think an outflow object would work either, as I do need the fluid to be there in order for it to splash.
Is there any method out there for doing this?

If I understood Boolean should work, tested here https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/176612/can-we-make-our-fluid-domain-object-from-a-cylinder/181655#181655 probably you should post your simplified blend  via https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com so we can check

Thanks for confirming that is the right method. I'm going to take a look at that thread and see if I can figure out what step I missed. I'll post back

So it does in fact work using a boolean, but not if the fluid mesh has been converted to particles. I thought this was the accepted practice for fluid sims but I'm assuming there's also a way to texture your fluid without going the particle route. I'm going to look into it

What? I don't understand your comment  and probably for that I don't see a relationship to your original question.

I meant when you go into the particle settings for the fluid sim and by default it is set to "Halo" which as I understood it would not render. So I set this to "collection", where I have several UV spheres with the material I want. Using this setting,t eh boolean did not seem to work.

In case of Particles System type Fluid, there is not a direct way to hide part of particles. You would have to convert sim to mesh.
In this example I used Metaball as particle (because Icosphere object keeps particle system after export).

export into Alembic format
import back and use Boolean Modifier

EDIT
OK I got it, you mean particles generated by Fluid Simulation (Mantaflow) - Liquid and Spray.

Yes, particles are not affected by Boolean Modifier.

So there does not exist a way to hide a part of released particles. So only way I know is to use Mball as particle and export-import it as Alembic and use Boolean.

Note: In theory - to exclude some particles from render you can influent particles size by Texture, so classic particle system can do this, but fluid sim particles doesnt have such feature.


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Creating a noise distortion along the edges of an object only (for a hologram effect)
I'm trying to make a distortion/glitch effect driven by noise along the edges of my object. I'll cut the mesh in half to just have the front face, and then I want to push back the outlining vertexes behind the mesh randomly based on the noise. So, if the mesh is animated to say, turn its head, it's almost like the parts of the face that are turned that direction are being pulled backwards like a magnet.
I would assume weight proximity editing with an empty placed a distance behind the subject would help, but I am relatively new to dynamic painting. Can anyone point me in the right direction?
Thank you!


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How to shrink edges with angle in a mesh?
I'm struggling to find a way for this problem.
I have a mesh with cloth simulation applied, I want only the upper edges to shrink angle mantaining the same radius and center so it makes the effect of a folded curtain. I have seen Blenderguru make this linearly scaling the upper edges using shape keys but don't know how to do it with curved edges.
In the first picture is a scheme of the way I want it to be.
The second picture is the idea taken from blenderguru tutorial.
I'm stuck and a response would be terrific. Thank you in advance.

You could use a Curve modifier?

Heeey thank you very much you saved my day, didn't know the functionallity of this tool, have to check it out!

Used curve modifier and worked perfectly! Thank you!

you're welcome, nice that you succeed on the first try  ;)


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A couple weird rigging questions
Im new to almost everything in Blender except modeling so I wasn't quite sure how to get the skirt on my model to move in relation to the legs. I want it to be kind of in a way where if i moved a leg up, the skirt model would move with it so it doesn't clip through. But I have no idea how and don't know how to search it up.

You can give a cloth simulation to your cloth, but it may be tedious to adjust. Another solution is to create bones for the cloth in order to control it, like for example 6 x 3 vertical rows of bones all around the cloth:

thanks dude i'll try those


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how should i make an object show through another
im making a face thats meant to look cartoonish in style, and i want to know how to get the eyelashes to show up over the hair in renders, (and if possible, the viewport.)

it looks like this

but I want it to look like this (bad at photoshop)
how do i do that?

This might be of interest, but only in Cycles with OSL...

To show an object in front of everything else in viewport:

To do that when rendering you need to use compositing, check this answer for that:

How to render object in front of everything else?

oh ok thank you!


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Moving objects inside the collection (Layers panel)?
Is it possible to move objects inside this objects panel/Scene collection? I have now a Camera as a 1st object, 2nd is Cylinder and 3rd is Cube, but I want to arrange them differently. Is that possible? Or do I have to create first a Collection for each of the objects?

AFAIK that's not possible. It sorts alphabetically. You could rename your objects...

Use symbols in front of object names to move them up or down Cube - _Cube would be first. Also, you could try Parenting to change the order.

In 2.9 and later it is somewhat possible, but it is difficult.
First, you have to disable "Sort Alphabetically":

Then there is no way to drag objects around within a collection.  So you have to remove objects from the collection and return them, knowing that each object added to a collection is added to the front of the collection list.

Slightly simpler, but still annoying - you can Shift-D the object (it appends to the collection at the end) and then delete the original one.


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Objects behind other objects show through in camera view
Blender 3.0 and 2.93.6 - same issues in both.
User vs. Camera Perspective
This issue is only in Camera Perspective:
I have images as planes surrounding two image textured cubes (one as a pyramid) - all with pngs as their textures. In Camera perspective, any object will show through any and all objects between it and the camera. This is true for the Viewport solid mode, material preview mode, and display render mode for Evee. Cycles shows nothing at all - just gray.
I added a plain red cube to see if there was an issue with the PNGs. Same thing with the cube - anything behind it shows through. Nothing appears with Cycles.
I've searched and adjusted to various Alphas and Opaque - no difference to the issue.
Clip start and end are set to .0001 m & 6000 m.
When I render a still (F12), the render shows the same issue as the Camera perspective.
All the above was done via the Layout view. When I went into shading view and zoomed the view back/out the foreground images would flicker and I can find distances where I can get some or all of an object to appear. Weird. It has nothing to do with clipping that I can see. But maybe I'm missing something here.
Any thoughts appreciated!
Glenn

please provide blend file so we can check it out

Hi Chris - Thanks for looking into this. I don't see a way to upload a file so I'm putting the file up on google drive. Here's the link:

That didn't work. Trying the link again. Let me know if the OneDrive link below doesn't work for you. I don't see a way to upload the actual file.
link

you totally messed up your camera clip range. change it to 0.1 (start) and 1000 (end) and it works

Wow. Right. I had the start/end #s backwards. Basic clipping issue. Thanks for pointing me back to something I'd checked several times. Noob 101.

No problem. I still make every mistake at least 3 times again…♂


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Rigify eye problems
This model is based on the character Phoenix Wright owned by capcom.

In general, the modeling and rigging process went well, but there were a few issues I'm not sure how to fix. The base of the red tie doesn't move the way it's supposed to. You can see it in the picture above. I tried playing with the vertex groups to see if I could fix this somehow, but I just can't get this to work. I'm sure I could eventually get it working through brute force. The main problem is the blink.

Yeah....
The master eye bone that the eyelid bones are supposed to rotate around is in the middle of the eye, which usually works. Not sure why it didn't this time. I can't tell whether it's something wrong with the model, or the rig. If I could get help with this, that would be great. That way I could learn how to do it in the future.
Here is the link for the file: https://www.mediafire.com/file/agpen73hi4ea3xv/Phoenix_Wright_Stack_Exchange.blend/file

My experience is that the eyes always need some manual weight painting. Your mesh looks a bit dense, not sure if you have applied a Subdivision modifier. Weight painting is usually easier when you have a light mesh. Here is an example of the weight painting for the eyes: https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/211089/107598

Thanks for the feedback. I’ll take the poly count down using decimate, and try again. Thank you!


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I'm having trouble with my shape key mirroring
I created a shape key for this character. The original shape key was placed on his left eye. I then mirrored it by topology. For some reason, it affected his tongue. So now when I activate the driver to get his right eye to blink, part of his tongue gets deformed for some reason.

I wanted to know if there was a way to make the tongue geometry unaffected by the shape keys. Here is the link to the file: https://www.mediafire.com/file/83ncatlgc54no1k/Mega_Man_Blend-Exchange_Blink_Problem.blend/file

Select the uncorrect shape key, go to edit mode, select the vertices that should not move, go to menu Vertex > Blend from shape.
In the black box of the last operation properties (left bottom of the window, press F9 if it disappears) select the "Basis" shape key, leave the default value of 1 and uncheck the "Add" option.

Another method is to go to edit mode, select all vertices that should move, press Ctrl G to assign them to a new vertex group. Name it something like "Affected", then in object mode select the shape key and set Affected in its vertex group field.


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I'm Having Problems Rigging This Model
I made a custom Sonic model, with a custom rig, and for some reason, even after lowering the poly count, or removing doubles, automatic weights keeps failing. I'm not sure what else I can do. If anyone has some tips, please share.
File:https://www.mediafire.com/file/mf8ujfm58vxo8o3/Modern_Sonic_Model_Rigging_Proccess.blend/file

Automatic Weights works for me, it will need a bit of corrections though, what do you mean when you say that it fails, is there a message? Nothing happens when you move the armature? https://zupimages.net/up/22/15/kyo1.gif

Hello and welcome. While files, images, and external videos or links may be helpful additions they should not be the only way to obtain information about your issue. Don't make understanding your question rely on downloading a file, watching a video or visiting an external site. Use the builtin tools to upload images or gifs, along with thoroughly explaining the problem in written form so it can be indexed and searched for thus helping future visitors with similar issues.

I get the message: Heat Weighting: Failed to find solution for one or more bones. Sorry for late response, I had work.

I didn't have any problem getting your mesh to bind to the armature by:

Enter Object Mode
Select Mesh, SHIFT+select rig
Type CTRL+P
Select "Parent with Automatic Weights"

Here is a link to the rigged mesh:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/0j5plr4n1b2xb0j/Modern_Sonic_Model_Rigging_Proccess.blend/file

That’s weird that it worked for you. I was using blender 2.79. Is the AI that applies the weights is smarter on newer versions?


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What is the best way to import SVG text and extrude without random n-gons?

Why does text always do this? Is there way to import SVG text in a cleaner way? This causes problems while extruding and smoothing.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/47217/extrude-and-bevel-an-imported-svg-curve/ https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/52825/svg-curve-incorrectly-rendered/ https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/56344/reducing-internal-faces-generated-by-extensive-curve-extrusion/56352#56352 https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/49979/extruded-svg-showing-spikes/49980#49980

Hello and welcome. This question seems to have been asked before in multiple forms over time, and already has various answers but you never acknowledged any of them. We are not sure if you aware of the existing posts but none of the described techniques address your particular requisites, or you simply didn't do any research at all. Could you [edit] you post and clarify how your question differs from the suggested duplicates? Otherwise could you rephrase it to focus on a particular step you are stuck with?

Hello, and thanks for your comment.
I did do a preliminary search, but I'm not well versed enough in Blender to understand or know that what I'm looking for has something to do with "curve extrusion". In any case, will look at the links you shared, thanks!

See if the links help, otherwise you can edit your post and clarify what you are still stuck with. editing it will automatically queue it up for review.


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How can I recreate this well-lit, vibrant, hi-contrast lighting setup?

Above render by Peter Tarka
So, in this scene, the lighting is bright, vibrant and yet not over-exposed, and no details are lost. Every time I try something like this, my scene ends up becoming overexposed or washed out. How can I achieve this level of detail and clarity?
Here is a quick sample of my scene—

I think it's both a question of material color and lighting, did you try a stronger light (sun)?

Yup. But then the shadows get sharp and angular, unlike the softer ones in the reference image.

you can use the blend value to make the shadows less sharp, are you working with cycles or eevee? maybe share your file (just leave one object, the plane and the lights)

Cycles. But I think the tutorial listed below seems to do the trick—I tried the same setup, and got me close to where I was trying to get at.

oh ok good so maybe give the trick you used to fix your scene

Sure—like I mentioned in the comment to the answer below, I merely followed the tutorial, and removed ambient occlusion from the scene. That was screwing up the shadow values, both the factor and the distance values.

Use the concepts of three point lighting-
First is the Key light

It usually is quite bright light, facing the subject at certain angle (Basically to lit the subject from one angle)

Second is Fill light

To lite the subject from another side/Angle(To fill the Dark shadows created by the Key light).

Third Rim Light

A VERY Bright light from the back of the subject to create an outline of Brightness on the subject also it helps to highlight the shape of the Subject .

Now you have a basic 3 Point Light Setup.
Now you can use your Imagination and creativity to explore the lighting setup by changing the Intensity or Colors and the Size of the Lights also additionally, if you are trying to lit a subject/object and not a scene in particular; Then create a Backdrop or just a ground plane to have a nice bounced light on your subject. Also please consider the Size of your lights while lighting your scene as the Size of the light will affect the way the shadows are being cast and also it can change the look and mood of your subject or Scene."
Please, refer to this tutorial. This can be a good help for you for lighting in blender.

Ok, let me go through this, thanks!

This did the trick. And also, I had ambient occlusion set to some random value, and that was spoiling the whole setup. Removed that, and followed the tut, and got me close. Thanks!

Its good to know it worked for you. Great!

hello, could you please quickly precise what trick/settings were used in this tutorial?

Three lights in the scene—one area light, as the key light, facing the subject, and another area light coming in from the side. Then a third light, a “rim” light from the back, to highlight the shape of the object better. This rim light needs to be the brightest in the scene by far. The other two you just play with values and see what works best.

And also please do use a backdrop(Depending on your scene), as it will give you a nice bounced light.

@HDFXVFX please help us with keeping useful answers in this site. A link is not really an answer, if the link goes down, then there is no answer anymore. Please outline the main concepts so that other users can learn.


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Selecting vertices in the interior of a given grid x by y (vertices)
In geometry nodes, I need to be able to select dynamically those vertices of a given grid of X by Y that are not positioned on the outside border of the grid... that is, if for example you have a grid of 4 by 4 vertices (16 in total) I need to be able to select procedurally vertices 6,7 and 10,11. ANy suitable nodes for doing this?

If this is a standard-issue GN-generated grid, you could wrap the Mesh Primitive > Grid node, in some way like this, to make an  Indexed Grid group, which might come in handy elsewhere, too:

.. it associates a (zero-based) X and Y index with each vertex. In this version, I've passed the vertex-counts on, out of the group, because it's important that they remain integers, and Floor-ing a common input to guarantee that, takes more nodes, and creates spaghetti.
Once you have X and Y indices, you can use them in some way like this, to select the vertices not on the edges of the grid:

..dynamically:

There are plenty of other ways to discriminate. You could compare X and Y locations of points to the Bounding Box of the grid, or you could use a pure distance-from-rectangle function and measure lengths. The Indexed Grid method emphasises being able to select rows and columns in any way you like.

I like how you wrapped the mesh to get X and Y indices. I think that the group output for 'X index' and 'Y index' should be integers instead of floats, or would that cause a problem?

@Ethan-Hall Oops! You're absolutely right! That was the whole point! Will fix. Thank you :D

you can use this nodegroup:

to get this:

I believe this is the group of nodes you need.


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My USDZ export is very metallic, but blender model looks good
I am trying to turn this iclone model from blender into a USDZ file, but my USDZ exported models look very metallic and golden. I disabled the metallic nodes and they're all zero, so what is causing this?
I have been stuck doing this for months and I still can't figure it out..

Please clarify your specific problem or provide additional details to highlight exactly what you need. As it's currently written, it's hard to tell exactly what you're asking.

Which USDZ exporter are you using?  Can you add a screen shot of your skin material node groups in the shader editor?  Can you add a screen shot of your export settings in the exporter?  Better yet, can you add a small blend file that shows the problems? (How to add a blend file)


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Objects In Viewport Not Rendering Properly
The objects are fine shape-wise, but when It's being rendered in the viewport, It has random triangles cut out, there are no modifiers applied, and I'm using blender 3.0.0, and I'm rendering the viewport with EEVEE.
This was rendered in the viewport with EEVEE
This was rendered with cycles.(colors are random and for testing, that's not the issue.)

please try to change clip start from those 0.000003 to something like 0.001


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Animation Nodes: Distribute N amount of objects taking into account their length
I have 3 objects of varying lengths which I want to distribute in random order to a grid or matrix of certain dimensions. If I do the basic matrix distribute then the meshes overlap.

Method of distribution is not important just that the objects do not overlap(only one dimension varies ) and that there are N of them in a row or a column. Would appreciate your help.

you can do it with these 2 nested loops:

result:

How it works:
The inner loop (calculate x positions) calculates the x positions by reassigning the currentX value in the loop by just adding the size of each object.
The outer loop just calls the inner loop for each y line and give it the right y-value.

This is exactly what I needed! Thank you very much it works perfectly!

You are welcome


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How to get a collection of a material node's unique properties with the python API?
I'm attempting to find a way to identify the unique properties from material nodes to put into a collection instead of accessing their values by their name. Nodes have collections for inputs, outputs, links, etc. I'm looking for a similar type collection for the node's unique properties.
For example, the Ambient Occlusion node has three unique properties(inside, only local, samples) which values can be accessed from ShaderNodeAmbientOcclusion by using their name. ie. node.samples. I can get a list of all properties from the node.bl_rna.properties.items() but I don't know to identify the uncommon attributes.
Also, the draw_buttons_ext seems to have this list for each node when it creates the panel, but I don't know if there is a way to access this through the ui or node objects.
The current solution I thought of was to create a list of common properties from a node object and identify the ones that don't match, but this doesn't feel like the right way to go about it.

I can't think of a better way than grabbing props that the superclass doesn't have. The draw_buttons functions just hardcode the properties for every node type, eg. for ambient occlusion.

Thanks! I thought there might be a hidden property type or flag that I could access for built-in properties that weren't custom, but I guess there wasn't a need for that level of identity.

Possibly related: What's the most reliable way of converting a material into reusable code blocks?

I spent a good while poking around on the console and arrived at this. It's a bit late but I'm posting in case it helps anyone.
[attribute for attribute in node.bl_rna.properties.keys() if attribute not in bpy.types.Node.bl_rna.properties.keys()]

Will get a list of properties that are not in the base Node class.


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Rigid Body Particles Falling to Outline Object (negative space typography)

I would like to use an invisible text mesh to force rigid body particles to fall around it, thereby creating the outline of the word in the negative space. I'm using larger and irregularly shaped objects as my particles (so a little trickier than the example photo, which uses rice) and so far I've been having trouble getting a clean, readable result.
I tried creating an open faced cube as a collision container for the falling particles to keep them contained to the general area, then used text converted to a mesh and extruded as collision objects inside that larger container. So far, my particles either bounce around wildly and refuse to settle, or end up landing directly on top of the word mesh and blocking parts of the letters that I am trying to reveal in the negative space.
Any suggestions from more experienced users would be greatly appreciated! Thank you

I'd check your collision stickiness.  I posted an example blend file with your similar approach but with these params tweeked.  You were close!

Ideally, I'd try to apply a Force modifier to Text that I've converted into a mesh, but alas, blender has no "Force Modifier"!
Your approach is what I'd do.  Converting the Text into a mesh, apply a clear texture (see-through) and apply Collision physics to both an underlying plane and the text mesh.   I'd adjust the Friction and Stickiness of the Text and Plane meshes to allow some particles to "remain in" the text mesh as your photo seems to indicate.  Apply some dampening to the particle physics to slow things downs a bit.   Here I didn't use as many particles as might give a better results.  I used particles mapped to an Icosphere object -- in your case you'd model a grain of rice.

And here is the  file example.


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What is the process for applying a realistic texture over an emission object (ex a fluorescent lamp cover)?
What is the correct node procedure to add in a realistic texture over top of an emission object (CYCLES)? Adding an emission shader makes an object completely uniform with no apparent depth to it, in which case we add a fresnel or layer weight.
So let's say I have a plane with an emission shader on it --
What I'm trying to do is take a texture like this

And apply it over top of that plane so that the emission comes through it and still provides light to the scene, and (ideally) takes into account the light and dark areas of the image rather than simply an even, uniform brightness throughout.
As a point of comparison, this is the kind of effect I'm getting now by simply using the image texture as an emissive plane -- note the lack of detail and texture in the lit signs.

Add a texture to control the strength

I think this is what I was looking for. The trade off seems to be that you lose control of how bright you want the light to actually be, but I think that makes some sense as it limits you to the "reality" of the light output implied by the texture. Thanks!

"The trade off seems to be that you lose control of how bright you want the light to actually be" Add a Math>Multiply node after the texture to keep the ability to control intensity

Add a texture to control the strength as well.
So you would have a texture for the color and one different for strength.
To further control the strength you can add a math multiply node (or any other math operation you want) before the strength socket.
using the image from the reference:

For even more control you can add a Light path node and make it so that the camera doesn't see a brighter version of the emitter. Use Is Camera Ray, to control the mix between the visible emitter and the one that illuminates objects.

If you want the lights to flicker in animation just add keyframes to the multiply value or to the emission strength.

The issue is likely with Cycles dynamic range. See if you are using filmic on the Render settings. Render > Color Management > View Transform > Filmic. This transforms the dynamic range to a logarithmic scale that retains details in the bright and dark ranges.
If this is already set to Filmic, than the issue is the nature of exposures in photography. You have a dark scene, and you're using bright lights, but expecting to clearly see the lights AND the scene, but this isn't how we see light. In a dark room, if you look at a bright light, it will seem blindingly white. Move that light into a bright room, and your eyes/camera will shift to a lower exposure and you'll see details in brighter objects.
If your scene was lighter, or the lights dimmer, the details will come through.

I understand what you mean about the dr, and it's a good point about some of the issues with the above scene. It's not actually my render, I just used it for illustrative purposes.

Have you checked to see in your scene what the dynamic range you're working with is? It may still be the issue in your scene. At worst, you can make an invisible emitter and dim the the emissions on the visible one.