text:
Blender ascii fbx adds a Armature bone before root bone UE4
I am using blender 2.73a.
I rig a mesh with a armature and export it using FBX 6.1 ASCII exporter. However when I import it in UE4 there is a another bone named 'Armature' before root bone!
This happens with every mesh-armature pair. This is undesirable as it shifts the origin of the mesh (Which is root bone in UE4)

Please note FBX 6.1 ASCII exporter is no more maintained and considered deprecated… Would advise to use 7.4 binary one, but it also has major issues with UE4 currently (regarding bones’ animations).

yeah so blender is a no go for UE4 as far as animation is concerned

There is a lot of "fixs" for this problem. For me, this one do the trick Blender (2.83 y UE 4.20):
"As things stand right now, the importer for fbx is effectively patched (a nice word for hacked) to allow as exception for Blender made fbx files if the name of the root node is 'Armature'."

Source: https://forums.unrealengine.com/deve...blender-export

Had this same problem and spent a day trying to work it out. Reverted back to Blender 2.74 and export with FBX 7.4 binary and it worked fine.
For some reason Blender 2.75 and 2.76 add this bone, which means enabling root motion in Unreal Engine does nothing. This sucks because replacing a skeleton in Unreal when you have heaps of animations and montages is annoying. Really hope this gets fixed.


text:
Why use bone as target for IK?
I have seen numerous tutorials about rigging and animation of armatures. Whats bugs me is why everyone of it uses a extra bone as IK target and not something that is not related to the armature? like a spehre or other primitive mesh that is not part of the mesh?
Imagine the case where I don't want to render the animation in blender but want to export it then  there would be two useless bones along with the Armature which are not used in animation anymore.
Just why use a extra bone why not animate with a seperate object or mesh for IK?

so you can move them while in pose mode moving other bones?

The real reason is Bone targets positions can be stored in pose library. Also the scene is cleaner if everything is under armature.
But if you want to export the armature and another rig setup suits that better its ok. You can use anything you want for IK target.

yup, forgot this

I also noticed that the major reason that I can Speculate is that blender lacks the ability to export armature animation independent of the IK target keyframes. As I couldn't export the only armature animation unless I included IK actions as well. It was a nighmare there were like 20 actions generated each of which corresponded to a bone and was garbage, I have no idea what happened there, but if i use bone as ik and make only armature keyframes then everything is nice

The pose library is a good argument! I'm giving you tick for that

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Unavoidable mirror modifier
2.76b   using the default cube I subdivide edges with 10 cuts. Unselect all. Rotate the cube and box select only 1 side. P to separate by selection.
Now in sculpt mode, all sculpting is mirrored about the center of the plane I separated.

Sculpting can be made symmetrical in the toolbar.
Hit T to show it if it's hidden.

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


text:
Collada Export confusion
I make a simple animation in Blender and export to Collada format. Everything looks the way I would hope for. There is 1 <animation> for each bone consisting of input/output/interpolation arrays.
If i happen use 'Action Editor' Mode in the DopeSheet view, the same blend file now exports many more <animation> to the dae file.  Each bone now also has location(x/y/z) input/output arrays  and  scale(x/y/z) input/output arrays.
Why does simply selecting the 'Action Editor' mode in 'Dope Sheet' view introduce all the new <animation> in the .dae file?
Is there a way to stop that? It was my understanding that transform matrix can take care of all 3 (TransLocRot).


text:
Show a objection reflection onto another surface in Blender internal
I will show a objection reflection onto another flat surface in Blender internal, Material viewport because I will like to try and use the opengl render.
I tried using mirror but it wont show up in the Material viewrport, only show up in Rendered viewport.
Is there other way? Please advise.

Would it be acceptable to bake it. or do you need moving parts over it, as in the game engine?

There will be moving parts, thus will need it to be dynamic.


text:
what are these scribble controls called?
I was watching this video and i noticed some scribble like things that controls the bones like IK what is it?  video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NkJPfGEcrrA

Custom bone shapes...

I believe what you are calling 'scribbles' are the 'custom bone shapes'. Instead of animating the actual bones of the armature, which can be fiddly, it can sometimes be easier to add a custom shape which represents the bone.
These might be shaped to represent the feature of the armature that they control; a bone that controls an eyebrow might be replaced with a custom bone shape that is in the shape of an eyebrow, for example.
Custom bones can be set in the display panel of the 'Bone' tab in the 'Properties' area:

When a mesh is selected as the custom bone shape, the bone it represents will be hidden. The custom bone shape can then be moved or rotated in the same way the original bone could have been.

Also as you are here I'm banging my head over other question , How do you make and export animation (actions) by using a object as IK target which is not a bone?

Here's the question http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/24797/cannot-make-actions-with-ik

@user1062760 I don't know, but if you can add screenshots and a blend file to the other question it will help others in diagnosing what is wrong.

uploaded the blend file

@user1062760 If my answer helped, you can mark it as accepted by clicking the tick icon to the left of my answer. See: http://stackoverflow.com/help/someone-answers


text:
How to remove Armature bone from Binary fbx export?
Exporting from any blender version with binary fbx support leads to addition of a redundant bone at root with same name as the armature.
How do I disable addition of that root bone for binary fbx export?

I'm not sure if the bone being exported is infact Blender's armature object (since Blender has an armature object, which can have multiple root bones in the armature).
Seems like this is a known bug, see this report: https://developer.blender.org/T45368 for details.


text:
How do I cut a flap using edges or vertices
Lets take a simple example of a cube.
I want to cut open one of the face of the cube from its three edges but let the third edge connected so that it looks like a flap.
In a more detailed example:
I got a airplane model

I want to cut the cockpit windshield along the selected edges in the following photo , please I don't want to completely cut it out but to let some edges attached to main mesh

You are looking for v rip edge.

This can be done using the Rip tool. Go into edit mode, select and edge or a selection of edges (or a group of vertices):

Now press V. You will now get something like this:

For your specific instance do not select the shown edges.

Every edge is made from two vertices, one on each end. When you rip them, those vertices separate from the mesh, and a new edge is created. However the vertices at the end connect to the mesh still. In your example, pressing V would make there be a single vertex connecting the two parts, instead of two edges. Use the suggested selection to get the desire result.

what If I want to cut more than one edge?

select more than one edge :)

unfortunately I cannot get it to work as intended, if I select just one edge and press V it also cuts other edges which share the vertices of the selected edge. what am i doing wrong?

Like in [this image] (http://i.gyazo.com/1675c388d27d12648e762dbae92cbc51.png) ripping only the edge shown in white also rips the edges shown in orange

@user1062760 You are ripping Vertices, which are connected by edges. Selecting an edge tells Blender which vertices to rip. Think of it that way.

but -b b but I wanted to rip only edges :(

An edge is the line segment connecting two vertices, so having two vertices means there is an edge . . .

@user1062760 That is laterally imposible due to the way meshes work, unless you want to duplicate edges sitting on top of each other.

@user1062760 I added a diagram of exactly what your issue was as far as I can tell.

There is a "edge split" tool in the "edge" menu that does just that. Select all the canopy edges and split them, and Bob will be your uncle.
However, if you do that, you will end up with duplicate edges around the canopy, which will be difficult to handle.
First you will need to be in face mode to make sure you select the proper ones (i.e the ones tied to the aircraft or the ones tied to the canopy)
Second, to animate the canopy you will need to rotate all these edges along the hinge, which is pretty awkward to do.
I think it would be easier to separate the canopy from the airframe and then rotate it around the hinge (as a separate object) to open and close it.


text:
make an object's z axis parallel with another object's normals
I have a ball that's rolling around in a bowl, randomly, using rigid body physics with the rigid body motor constraint motor on the ball making it roll around.  I've put a cap on the ball by duplicating the ball and scaling it up, cutting off the bottom, and adding a Solidify modifier.  The cap stays on the ball using the Copy Location constraint.
The cap's local Z axis is always parallel to the world's Z axis.  How can I make it parallel to the bowl's normals for when the ball rolls up the side of the bowl?
Keeping the Copy Location constraint isn't necessary; it's what works for me.

Why don´t you just parent the cap to the ball? I don´t see any problems with that...

@Dino Binghou Xue because the ball is rotating, and when you do that the cap rotates as well.

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


text:
suspend/sleep while blender is running
I hadn't used blender for several months and previously when it was running a fluid simulation overnight Windows would not go to sleep.  But last night my computer went to sleep.  This is blender 2.93, Windows 10 with whatever the latest update is.
Other than changing the system settings, is there a way to prevent the system from going to sleep when blender is simulating, or rendering?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/260615/is-there-render-setting-to-prevent-pc-suspend

No, there isn’t. You should change the system settings.
If you’re working with a laptop, you can set it to only go to sleep after a certain amount of time if it is not plugged in. If you’re working with a desktop, unless you are in CA, I would recommend just setting it to not go to sleep after any amount of time.

Leave the main Blender window open (don't minimize it). You can minimize the Blender Render window.

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


text:
how do I parent to a soft body?
I have a cube that's a soft body falling down some stairs.  I want to put a little sphere inside the cube and have it stay at the center of the cube while the cube falls.  How do I set this up?

You could parent the child object to 3 vertices of the soft body object: Select the child, shift select the soft body object, go into Edit mode, select 3 vertices, press CtrlP > Make Vertex Parent, and the child will follow:

Thanks.  I'll try that.

Worked like a charm!  Thanks again.


text:
wrapping extruded text and polygons around a sphere
I want to wrap some 3d text around a sphere, and also put a star that conforms to the sphere on the top.  Similar to the following image, except that both will be sticking out some.
I've found several videos that claim to do this but what they're really showing is how to wrap text around a cylinder and not a true spherical wrap.
Can anyone provide any pointers or clues?
Thanks

I'd either go with a Shrinkwrap modifier or a Cast modifier.


text:
Thickness of objects with transparent, translucent, etc. shaders
Do objects with these shaders need volume in order to work?  In other words, can I use an object with no thickness; e.g., 4 points on a plane?
I want to put a translucent object in front of an emission object to make it look more realistic as glowing object and was wondering if the translucent object needs thickness.
I'm guessing that it doesn't need thickness, and that if I gave it some thickness then I could use the volume shader to tweak its appearance.
Thanks

Transparent and translucent surface shaders can have no thickness.
Here's a simple plane with no thickness and a translucent shader in front of the only lightsource as an example:

I'm assuming you're solely talking about cycles.


text:
is there an add-on to switch between gpu and cpu?
When rendering an animation I'd like an add-on that switches to the gpu when I'm not using the computer; i.e., no mouse or keyboard activity.  After 5 minutes of mouse/keyboard inactivity it would stop rendering the current frame with the cpu and restart using the gpu.  I prefer to do rendering with the cpu when I'm in front of the computer because with gpu rendering the mouse is jerky and slow.
If such an add-on doesn't exist, where could I suggest it?


text:
lattice with soft body versus mesh
Can someone explain why when I create a lattice and a cube as separate objects, i.e., the cube isn't controlled by the lattice, and make them both soft bodies and give them the same parameters in the Soft Body panel in the Physics properties, the lattice just crumples and collapses while the cube bounces around.
If I turn on Stiff Quads for the lattice then it behaves more like the cube. But not quite, the surface of the cube wiggles around a lot.  Both have been subdivided so that they are 6 squares across (the lattice with U, V, and W set to 7).
In the Object Data for the lattice I also turned on Outside but that doesn't help.  I would have thought that with that it would act like a soft body cube.

Here's the active vewport opengl render with Stiff Quads off: http://gfycat.com/AnxiousAdventurousAmericanbadger

Here's the render with Stiff Quads on: https://gfycat.com/AdventurousLimpGrison


text:
import objects from the last frame of a rigid body simulation?
Can I have 2 blend files, one with a rigid body of a bunch of objects falling into a bowl, bake that simulation, and in the second blend file import the bowl and objects from the first file with their locations from the last frame of the rigid body simulation?  In the second file I'm going to have a fluid simulation pour a liquid into the bowl, over the objects.

If I export it to OBJ then import into a new file, that works. Before I posted my question I had tried exporting to Alembic because I thought it was better but it didn’t do what I wanted. I guess I needed the not-better and simpler OBJ format.


text:
how do I change the point of rotation
For example, if I were to simplify the following animation to just 2 cubes and have one of them not move and have the other one "walk" around the static cube (4 steps to make the complete circuit).  I tried moving the object's origin and that didn't work and I also tried moving the 3d cursor and that didn't work either.
http://cmdrkitten.tumblr.com/post/167838417054

I had similar problem some time ago (https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/19258/animating-the-origin-point-location-is-it-possible). Here's a link that may help you: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/802/how-can-i-change-the-centre-of-rotation-of-objects-during-an-animation

Solution of also loosely related question.

Also related: pivot constraint.


text:
How to ID NLA strips for appending elsewhere
I have a source file containing a character and its animated actions. This master file serves as a control repository for the character: All of its actions are kept here, stored as NLA strips. I give the strips catchy names to remember what the NLAs do -- Hop, Spin, Slide, etc:

When I go to my scene file, into which I would like to append one or more of the actions, I do not see my catchy names, but this:

Where or how should I ID the NLAs in the repository file so I can see my catchy names when I want to import the NLAs rather than CubeAction.xxxx?

Rename the action
You have given "catchy" names to the nla track and nla strip using your actions.  You want to rename your action.
Can be achieved via the UI
In Dope sheet (or outliner) Ctrk left click the action name and rename
before pushing down

after pushing down

by putting the dope sheet into action editor mode and renaming

via the python console, example image below, the action "CubeAction" is renamed to "walk".


text:
Profile a blender file to optimize render speed and quality
I know the gaming world has tools to optimize performance for their target devices... Do we have something like that in the Blender realm?
I would love to understand my blend files better with an eye toward wringing as much out of them as possible at render without breaking the bank or melting a CPU -- how to stay under GPU memory, where and how mesh densities are killing times, how and where trade-offs exist between skin sizes and render speeds.... Is anything like this available?
I suspect this question also entails stuff I do not know to ask or look for -- when skin sizes could be higher/lower in a scene, using LoD more effectively than I do... and more, as I have only an experience-based sense for when adding or subtracting "weight" helps... and that's not really scientific.
We (try to) do high-realism scenes with natural environmental components -- lighting, volumetrics, particles, water... and optimizing for hardware rendering is proving to be an important issue, especially as me move to 4K stuff.

I know (some) tricks to optimize scene weights: We use scrims, layer passes, post processing of volumetrics and more... but if I could analyze a live file to see where render demands are spiking, that would be cool. So this is less a question about render optimizing approaches in general and more about understanding the guts of render demands on a per-file basis.

The Cycles Roadmap mentions the following goal:

Statistics: for power users to investigate why rendering performance is slow, why memory usage is high, which objects or materials to optimize, etc. This would be a log generated that could be shown in Blender or as a HTML report, and possibly also debugging AOVs.

However, this goal currently (December 2016) is not scheduled to happen soon, it is in the

things we think are very important, but that no one at the meeting planned to work on within a specific time frame.

category.

I have learned from the Foundation that the Cycles roadmap link you provided may not accurately reflect their current plans and hopes. As I learn more, I will note it here....

@rcgauer Or you could reach even more people by updating the Cycles roadmap document itself, it is a wiki after all...

Discussed with Ton via email --  that road map seems not to be the current one....

I understood that. That's why is should be updated - in order to become the current one.


text:
To what degree does Cycles' sample level impact other passes?
Can equally useful AO, Z, mist, speed and other non-beauty passes be generated at lower sample rates compared to those rates needed for beauty passes?
How about ObjectID mask passes?

Depends on the pass. Z and Object/Mat ID are not antialiased at all, and require only 1 sample. Normal, mist, and UV are also just data/stats, but since they are antialiased you need a few samples to get a smooth result. 8-16 is usually enough. Vector is a bit of a weird case that I confess I don't fully understand. It doesn't appear to be antialiased in the normal sense, but does seem to gather some multisample data - possibly time variance?
The remaining passes are just components of the main render, so they're essentially dependent on the samples rate of the full scene. However, since different components denoise at different rates, some passes may clear up more quickly than others. The "color" passes (including emit and environment) are just texture readouts and generally don't take more samples the normal/UV/mist. AO, shadow, and the direct/indirect passes contain the lighting portion of your render and generally one of them (usually one of the indirect ones) will be the last component to clear up.

Thanks... that is a great summary! I have been messing around with 1-sample passes, and you are certainly right about Z: no diff! Interesting stuff, and thanks.


text:
True displacement mid level value
I'm trying to use the Experimental True Displacement feature, but it seems that a grey value of .5 is not the default mid level?
I tried using a gradient map and also generated a displacement map for a little indent on a wall, But my results are that the wall in it's entirety gets displaced and puffs up.
Am I missing something? Is there a setting somewhere where I can pick the desired midlevel? Or can somebody tell me what color value can be used for zero displacement?
Thank you!

Ok silly me,
It seems that the color black is used for zero displacement. So you have to use a math node on your height map to generate negative displacement with negative color values.


text:
How do I set Roll=0 after setting a bone position/roll in edit mode
When editing an armature, I would like to set roll=0 for a repositioned bone. See below.

Recalculate Role and Alt R are not resetting to bone roll value shown in the Transform panel... or I am applying them in the wrong mode? Trying Edit, Object and Pose...
Goal is to have bone orientation aligned to Z up, while at the same time the Transform Roll value is zero.

Related http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/74362/how-do-i-rotate-bones-along-bone-axis

Thanks... and I know I can cheat it... but there must be a way to reassign a bone's roll to zero... yes? I just sense I am missing something...

... just set it to zero in the right panel? or do you mean something else?

Setting it to zero in the Transform panel at right rotates the bone... I want the roll I have set to "become" zero roll.


text:
How to correct/edit/change UV map when reseaming is not possible and Select Split is not the answer
I am cleaning a UV for a project and reseaming is not possible for reasons beyond my control. See below:

I am searching for tools allowing me to correct this tangle of UV verts. I have explored Split Seam and it certainly will be useful for some needs, but not this one. I am looking for mesh-like editing of the verts, allowing me to either move them into place or delete them and recreate.
Is this possible?

It's likely assigning new seams isn't needed; that could be caused by geometry created after unwrap was done. Try pinning everything on UV map but those verts and unwrap once more. Create one more UV map in order not to mess up original unwrap.

Select the vertice and press G to move it. Set "Sticky Selection Mode" to disabled. https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/editors/uv_image/uv_editing/introduction.html#header


text:
Set up a single file for 24, 29 and 60 fps?
What's the right approach to setting up a single scene to be rendered at two or more frame rates? Ideally, I'd like to set up a single file once, and render out at 24, 29 and 60 fps... but I am not sure conceptually if I should remap time in the single file or create unique scene .blend files for each frame rate.
The skins will tolerate the highest resolution of 4K... so this is not an issue of visual resolution. Mostly I would like to have very similar visual sense of motion at the three rates... but is this asking too much?

Yes... and I do this for static assets... but (and here I am probably missing something) any animations I bring in with the linked file's assets are frame based... and are interpreted at the slower/higher fps?  And if I have missed something obvious.... oops.  It would be cool if I could make a tail wag 2 seconds long in a linked 'source' file, irrespective of fps in scene... and know that it would be interpretted as 2 seconds in all cases... but if that is possible I do not know how...


text:
Tie an animated tail flap to Z position change
I have created a (frighteningly realistic) swim cycle for an object, and then added a path. The object follows the path using a constraint: as it swims along the path, the tail flaps.
I then added noise to the object's Z position. (I 'animated' the armature's location on one cell, then added an F curve modifier with noice to add some change to the armature's Z location.)
I would like to tie the rise in the Z position to be tied to a downward tail stroke, but to have some randomness in it... and I would like to end up with a keyframable value, so I can increase/decrease tail speed with a corresponding increase in the Z position change -- albeit with some noise making it not completely linear or predictable.
I have gone this route so that it looks less mechanistic... which is to say there may be a better way to do it overall... but the goal it so have an appearance of something swimming perhaps in a current... and not to have a clock-like precision in speed/location of tail.
Fish tails go side to side, I know... so say this is a porpoise... Anyway, the goal is to get an animatable value that drives both things -- flap speed and Z location change -- in a not-completely-predictable way.


text:
Using an imported model: Why does my mesh look like this?
I am using a purchased model, imported as an OBJ. In Blender Object and Render modes, I am seeing a mesh pattern I am not used to seeing on stuff I create myself:

Much of the model, in object mode, has a strange-looking waffle mesh, which affects the render as well as the solid view.  In Object properties, the max draw type is set to solid:

... And portions of the mesh appear in a mix of solid (like the area near the front and cockpit door) and waffle mesh.
I suspect I am about to learn something about Blender: Why does my mesh look and render like this?
Thanks
rg
EDIT : As requested, here is a small portion of the mesh:

Strip only a little part of this mesh (where the problem is visible) and upload it to: http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/. It's probably something with Custom Normals but I'm not sure.

Related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/76513/strange-black-shading-cannot-fully-light-mesh-cycles

Uploaded a sample, and yes, it is this: https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/76513/strange-black-shading-cannot-fully-light-mesh-cycles

Custom split normals were it:
https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/76513/strange-black-shading-cannot-fully-light-mesh-cycles

The mesh imported did indeed use custom normals. The solution as posted worked perfectly:
You have Custom Split Normals Data added to the geometry, to fix this, while selecting the object, go to Data Tab in Properties Panel, scroll to find Geometry Data, and click Clear Custom Split Normals Data.
enter image description here
More information about this issue: Strange black shading. Cannot fully light mesh. (Cycles)


text:
Detect light amount on surface?
Is there a way to detect amount of light affecting some surface and use this value in a driver?

That would be in the shaders which do your lighting computation per material, but if those values are available from within the UI is another matter.

Did you ever got to a solution? I am looking to quantify how much light hits a plane and where as well, but I am stuck

Blender shaders or objetcs does not have this kind of output to use in drivers.
You can use the Inverse square law.
$$
I \propto \frac{1}{d^{2}}
$$
Where $I$ is the intensity and $d$ is the distance. (Intensity is proportional to inverse of distance squared)
You can use this in your driver multiplied with the lamp or emission-shader intensity.
To account for surface normal (how it is rotated towards light) you would have to script a pydriver and access the mesh data inside: How to create a PyDriver in blender 2.7
Or use a dummy plane tangent to surface that will not render and get the direction and distance into the driver from there.
If you would like to account for mirrors or indirect lighting in general then forget it;)

Thought embedding Latex formula like Intensity \propto \frac{1}{distance^{2}}is a standard feature at all stackexchange sites, but I can't preview it here. Maybe it's only supported at math.stackexchange... Anyway, I've created an image of the formula for this answer, if you want to use it: https://i.sstatic.net/w8wI0.gif with this online tool.

Not very optimistic answer but thank you)
I wanted to do this for indirect lightning as well =(

@ВладимирКорнилов Well technically you could do that but it would be the same as scripting your own renderer.. or you would have to somehow connect OSL scripted shaders to pydrivers..

I understand) Well, I think I can handle my task with shaders only. Thank you again)


text:
Using Mist or Depth pass to create a color-specific mist
I have a base scene with objects retreating in the distance:

The background color is created in the World properties using a background color.
I also have Mist and Depth passes enabled. Here is Mist:

I composite them together to get:

using this node set-up:

My goal -- which I have not been able to achieve using the various passes I have thus far -- is to make the mist pass (or Depth, or whatever will get me there)  darken and obscure objects as they recede in the distance and to do so by making the 'mist' a darker color -- darker green/blue in this case...
The objective is for further objects to be less visible and to be obscured with the some version of the background color, not grayishness, and to go this in the compositor.
All input welcome.


text:
Animate location (or strength?) of alpha / opacity mask to suggest motion along arrows
I have a globe depicting trade winds:

The trade wind arrows are an image with alpha.

I am in cycles, using this node tree for the earth material:

I would like to animate the opacity of the arrows from less visible to more visible in a conveyor-belt manner, or in "waves", suggesting motion from the south to the north. The point is to emphasize the motion of the trade winds along the image.
The north and south trade winds are on a single image. I can make them separate if a solution requires... as I only want to animate the arrows in the southern hemisphere.

you can use a gradient texture as the factor into a Mix Shader with your image and a Transparent Shader. I did a similar thing in 3D https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPvYAHc9vCE

I would start by adding something like this node set up where my Diffuse BSDF is your Diffuse shader after the Trade_Winds11 Image Texture and it all goes into the following Mix node.
In my example animating the Z Location in the Mapping node will cause that black line (hopefully alpha as it is running through a transparent shader) to move up or down. You can really play with the Mapping node to get the lines from the wave texture to move how you'd like.
I hope this helps.


text:
Create a "global" value for multiple settings
Is it possible to create a single variable or defined value that can be used in multiple places -- and even in multiple ways?
Frame example:
** I would like to identify frame 250 as such a value. Some materials would, on that frame, have a mix shader move transparency to zero, and other mix shaders would move to 1.0 at that point. And then, if needed by the flow of the animation, I could change the "250" value to 300, with the resulting changes reflected in all places it is use.
** The same value would identify the point at which an object begins or ends a rotation or movement... or the point at which a light is turned on or off....
Value Example:
** I would like to define a value (either 0 to 1, a percentage, a numeric range or similar) and then animate that single value to drive nodes that accept a similar input. A single animated value/variable could control multiple ObjectID inputs, for example, and a 0 to 1 range could drive transparency and Film exposure.
Anyway: Can I make a "magic value box"? The specific use case I have in mind right now is responding as timeline changes are made -- causing the need to re-time events in lots of temporally related but operationally different areas: motion, value, VSE strip placement, etc.
All input welcome.
thanks
rg

Well, you need to know about Drivers.
Drivers are scripts which main purpose is to control properties with other properties. In example the rotation of one object is controlled with the location of another object.
Drivers can use properties, numbers, transformations, and scripts, to control the values of properties.
Using a F-Curve, the driver reads the value of the Driver Value and sets the value of the selected property it was added to.
So for example, if the Driver Value is 2.0 the property can be 0.5.
https://docs.blender.org/manual/ru/dev/animation/drivers/introduction.html


text:
Image texture --- use every Nth image
I have a series of images imported as an image texture. Is it possible to:

Use every Nth image?
Use each image or N rendered frames?

The first option results in a render using fewer frames than my image stack. The second creates a longer render by holding on images for more than one frames.
The specific goal is to do this before the compositor... applying these controls to image textures as they are applied to a material.

If OSL is an option (so you would lose the ability to render on GPu) then this answer provides a solution : https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/104474/29586. You could then use the current frame with Maths nodes to control the image however you desire.

Thanks and very interesting, but not an optiopn on this job -- but something to consider and really cool.


text:
Want to add particle systems to areas of object intersection
How can I identify and map (or otherwise ID) areas of intersection among differing objects?  I'd like to use these areas to add or subtract particle-driven object placement.
In the sample below, how can I generate a map or target on the ground plane, to which I would either add additional particles or exclude particles?
The need is to be able to stuff trash up against the intersection of a sidewalk and a building ...  or to clear grass from the immediate root crown of a tree. Sort of an AO treatment with particles where two kinds of objects meet....

During the creation of Sintel the "Grease Scatter Objects" addon was created and is included in every blender release since, you just need to enable it. You can watch a video of it in use with some more explanation and download an example blend if you wish.

create a variety of objects you want to scatter
add them all to the same group ⎈ CtrlG
draw some grease pencil strokes on your ground. Ensure your stroke is attached to the object surface not the scene.

select your ground mesh
select Add->Mesh->Grease Pencil Scatter and fill in your group name.

Outstanding... I was not aware of this -- but of course Blender usually has the features I want somewhere! Thank you!

Although I wonder if there is an issue with 2.76.... Get errors and unreliable behavior, even when using the sample file from your linnk....

My bad... For this to work, the object to which you add grease scatter must be a single object... At least as I am testing it now... So for my tree sample, I made proxy low-res trees and joined them to a proxy groundform... scattered the particles, deleted the proxies and unhid the groundplace. If someone can improve my understanding, all input welcome...

You can make an emitter mesh in the shape of the area around the base of the tree, and then use a Shrinkwrap Modifier to make it conform to the shape of the terrain.
If you parent this emitter object to the tree object it will conveniently move with it if re-positioned.

A tree parent and grass emitter mesh child, and their linked duplicates
Creating Group Instances won't work because modifiers will not be re-calculated, meaning the particles won't snap to the ground in the location of the group instance - they will still be snapping to the shape of the terrain in the original tree's location. However, you can create Linked Duplicates instead of Group Instances and in these the modifiers will be re-calculated because they are separate objects, using the same mesh data.
The image below shows what the emitter mesh looks like (with modifiers disabled). Some distance is kept between the emitter mesh and the tree base to reduce the likelihood of grass particles intersecting with the tree mesh.

You can examine the .blend file for details of the particle system and modifier settings. The roots of the trees also use a Shrinkwrap Modifier to stay planted on the ground.

Thanks... this is a good solution, too, and like the first gives me some new skills... Although in both cases what I was really hoping for was a way to generate weightmaps or comparable, because there are so many things I could use intersection information for... but specific to trees/buildings/edges, these are both great fixes!


text:
How to add randomness or variability to Action Strip scale
I would like to add variability to an Action Strip's scale, ideally within a range of values I select.
In the wing beat strip below, for example, I would like to scale between something like .3 and .5 with a curve... or noise, or something. This variability is not within the individual actions contained in the AStrip: rather it adjusts the scale of the strip throughout its repeat range.

There isn't a way to set key frames for that value, so as a last resort I wrote a little python script.  Copy this into the text editor, and click "run script". Be sure to set the MIN and MAX values, and put the name of the action in the ACTION_NAME variable.  The script will automatically choose a new random value every time you change frame.  Setting the STEP size will make it wait n number of frames before choosing a new value.
import bpy
from random import random

# Set your min and max values here
MAX = 9
MIN = 3
ACTION_NAME = "DragonflyAction"

# Set step size.  Step size of 1 chooses a new value every frame
STEP = 5

def my_handler(scene):

    if scene.frame_current % STEP == 0:
        obj = bpy.context.selected_objects[0]
        obj.animation_data.nla_tracks["NlaTrack"].strips[ACTION_NAME].scale = (random() * (MAX - MIN)) + MIN

bpy.app.handlers.frame_change_post.append(my_handler)

Here's a screenshot:

While blender doesn't make it easy to add a keyframe or driver to the NLA strip's scale, it is posible to create a driver by typing one directly into the value. You can type a simple driver to create it and then edit the driver once it has been created.
With most editable values in blender we can press I to insert keyframes, we can also type a driver expression straight into the value if we precede it with a # as in entering #frame will create a driver that uses the current frame for the value. For a random value you can enter #noise.random()*12+10 to get a random value between 10 and 22.
You can manually add a keyframe (or driver) using python -
strip = obj.animation_data.nla_tracks['NlaTrack'].strips['DragonflyAction']
strip.scale = 0.35
strip.keyframe_insert('scale', frame=1)

Having said that - a better option would be to add noise to the initial animation and not to the NLA strip settings. In the graph editor you can add a noise modifier to each animated value.

I didn't realize you could add drivers just by typing in the value.  That's pretty cool.

This is great.... and noise within a strip is cool, but not what I need here: The goal is to have repeating actions contained within the strip to repeat at a varying scale -- so a four-beat wing pattern repeating in 10 frames, then 15, then 9... But the cue on creating drivers is great!


text:
Limit extruding by face
I am modelling for 3D printing. I want to the drop faces to that slope.

How it is possible to limit extruding by the slope to avoid cutting through like in the second image?

https://developer.blender.org/D5336

i am newbie, it is a to-do or i can install it? Cant find a way to do it

It is a to-do, it is not available yet to end users

So sad, i am right, there is no way to do it by current tools?


text:
Why can't I add keyframes to dimensions
I exported an .abc file from Marvelous Designer which doesn't show any keyframes of the animation in blender, but in the 3D view it animates.
However when I click the play button it shows the dimensions changing, indicating an animation is present, and I was wondering if there is a way to add keyframes as I am looking at exporting a USDz file with animation.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/98093/why-cant-i-animate-the-dimensions-property-of-an-object

Dimensions are just a byproduct from actual geometry size multiplied by a factor determined from objects Scale property.
They are a user-interface convenience to show resulting object dimensions rather than just the actual Scale property of the object, as such they can't be animated directly.
To have size change over time animate the scale of the object instead by keyframing Scale X, Y or Z.
If you still need to obtain accurate dimensions or particular sizes, adjust the intended dimension so you get the length you want on that specific axis, let Blender calculate the corresponding Scale factor automatically, then keyframe the resulting factor from the corresponding axis Scale property instead.


text:
AN: how to get update event from sockets?
I'm trying to understand the many features AN has developed over normal node api and by reading the code I realize that if you need to be notified of a property change with the classical update hooked to a function call it needs to be declared as normal blender property and there is no way to get update notification with sockets data? For example:
import bpy
from bpy.props import *
from ... base_types.node import AnimationNode

class TestNode(bpy.types.Node, AnimationNode):
    bl_idname = "an_TestNode"
    bl_label = "Test node"

    def runUpdate(self, context): #this never get's called by run2 update
        print("update ", self.run1)
        #print("update ", self.run2 ) #<---- this error not sure how to get it

    def draw(self, layout):
        layout.prop(self, "run1")

    run1 = BoolProperty(name = "run1", default = False, update = runUpdate)

    def create(self):
        self.newInput("Boolean", "run2", "run2", update=self.runUpdate, value = False)

    def execute(self,run2):
        if run2:
            print("RUN 1 ", self.run1)
            print("RUN 2 ", run2)

In this example the only way (I know) to get run2 value is with the main execute function and update=self.runUpdate never get called.
Also I noticed all the time blender props get hooked to events.propertyChanged / executionCodeChanged etc and/or the function calls createSockets() with @keepNodeState decorator and inside this function the sockets get declared. can someone tell me if I got it right and how is supposed to work to get notified if a value in the socket change and in general what is the correct way to take advantage of these events?

A node should not react to changes of the value of a socket. What you are trying to do is not possible. You cannot create an event handler yourself that is executed when the eg the boolean input socket changes.
Also run2 is not a property of the node. This is why self.run2 raises an error. The final value of run2 is passed into the execute function. It my differ from the value of the socket (when the value comes from another node via a link).
The propertyChanged and executionCodeChanged event handlers are mostly used by the Auto Execution system. When propertyChanged is called the tree will execute (only if Property Changed is activated in the Auto Execution panel).
The executionCodeChanged event on the other side triggers a new generation of the execution code. Furthermore the new execution code will be executed if Tree Changed is activated in the Auto Execution panel.
The keepNodeState decorator stores the current values and links to a node in the beginning of the function execution and sets them back on the newly created sockets when the real function ends. This makes it much easier to update sockets without having to care about all the details every time.
When you create/move/remove sockets the treeChanged event is called automatically. It does pretty much the same as executionCodeChanged. This is why I don't have to call executionCodeChanged again after I changed the sockets.

Very complete answer and architecture, this make more sense now, even  if I find strange not being able to register my own functions to the change of some value exactly in the case of propertyChanged. I guess is because I'm used to thing to programs "isolated" not that every time it has to run the whole tree


text:
sculpt widget sticking on surface
today I was wondering why every sculpting app has the circle widget sticking to the surface normal and Blender does not, I find it to be a quite important visual aid
Retopoflow addon's widget does it already but, as far as I know, there is no sculpting plugin with a similar widget, and don't know if this functionality can be extracted from it being working modal.
Is this sort of widget feature be even tackled by an addon (if it doesn't exist already)?
Blender it's already a really powerful tool for sculpting and 2.77 improvement are great, maybe it's just me feeling this need?

I am sure more than one person has done the work, I can recall seeing more than one demo video of it working. The only reference I can find now is a 5 year old GSOC proposal Cannot say why it hasn't made it into a release.

thanks I didn't know about this GSOC, hopefully someone will have the interest (and skill) to finish it one day.


text:
How do you fade an image over video in the VSE
I am trying to do video editing and I want an image over the video, but I don't want it there permanently. I want it to fade in and out, kind of like transitioning or animating.
I am not sure how to do this. I have seen it done in adobe premiere and people say that blender is a good free alternative.


text:
Lower resolution of rendered viewport whilst maintaining size on 4k monitor
I have a 4k screen on my laptop which means that if I position a rendered viewport in one quarter I'm rendering on-the-fly a resolution of 1920X1080. My current solution to save time is make the viewport window smaller but then it's harder to see. What I'd really like to do is set a scale for the preview rendering of something like x0.5. In other words, whilst I size the rendered viewport to something like 1920x1080 I actually want Blender to only calculate 960x540.
Is there an option for this in Blender? Otherwise I'll end up down-sizing my resolution before starting Blender :(

No, I don't think it is possible, as far as I know, If you are in camera view you can use border render around the whole camera frame then zoom out, so the rendered area is smaller, it is the only workaround I know.

Alternatively change your default screen layout and add a smaller region exclusively for rendered preview that occupies a smaller portion of the screen. It is still smaller in actual visible size, but wont slow down your computer so much

Assuming Cycles, reduce the number of Preview samples on the Sampling tab by a facfor of 4. Your preview will be 'spottier' (if that's a real word) bit the level of detail will be the same (ie, each 2x2 group of pixels at the higher resolution will contain the same samples as a single pixel at the lower resolution).

Thanks for the input chaps. To be honest I think the best option is to lower the screen resolution whilst I'm working on the lighting. I'll try and find someway to suggest this as an improvement to blender!

Merged here, not sure to which branch or for which release though: https://developer.blender.org/rB66c1b23aa10ded34869c2efabbe815ea254d4b09

there is a setting under performance that does that, it's called viewport resolution.
2x means half the resolution, 4x means a fourth etc.
Blender 2.8:

Blender 2.7:

This is exactly what I was looking for and now embarrassed that I hadn't found it! Thank you :)

Anyone know where this is in 2.80? I can't find it anywhere :/

@MrFlamey i edited the answer for 2.8

If what you're after is getting a quicker preview, then just lower the number of samples for the preview renders (bottom red box in the picture).

What I do is usually just lower it until I can't bear the quality any more; the lower the number the faster (and uglier) your preview render.
Cutting the number of samples in four will give you the same speedup as you would have gotten from halving the resolution. If you have Square Samples checked, then you should just halve the "Samples" / "Preview" number (which will in fact cut the number of samples in four).
Also, for the final render, don't forget to check out the new-in-2.79 denoising feature. In some scenes it enables you to cut the number of samples (and rendering time!) by a lot without any visible loss of quality.

A general approach that will always work, even for eevee which does not have the options mentioned by other answers, is to use OBS.
PS: The eevee case is even more "special", as rendering performance on High-DPI screens isn't that big of an issue, however, if you are doing pixelated renders, it is very useful. This should also work in all OS-es, though I've only tried on Linux.
In short: create a viewport render in blender that is tiny and always in the same position. Use OBS to capture and upscale that image.
In detail:

Download/Install OBS
Set up a scene, and the video resolution you want to view the result in.
Set up a screen grab source, this depends a bit which OS/WindowManager you are using. In Linux/X11 it is Windows Capture (xcomposite). Adjust cropping rectangle to match the small viewport output in Blender.
Resize the input stream rectangle to fill your scene.
(Optional) Right click the same rectangle, and change the "Scale Filtering" to for example point, for a "pixel perfect"-ish output.


text:
In camera tracking how do i figure out the settings for the cannon 6d
In camera tracking how do i figure out the settings for a cannon 6d. I know the sensor width it 35.8 but I'm unsure about what to use for the other settings. Especially pixel width and optical center.
Thanks

Optical center should be the center of your image height/2 , width/2 ,  unless you have cropped the image. Then it should be the original center of your image. There is button for this labeled center. This is relevant to accounting for lens distortion.  The
Pixel aspect ratio should be one unless you used something like an anamorphic lens, which stretches the pixels when the image distortion is countered in post.


text:
stitching image slices together with python or compositor
Hi I'm creating 3d panoramic spherical renders and as far as i can tell 2.75 doesn't really support that out of the box. So I found the work around is animating the camera and creating 360, 12px slices.
I'm wondering if there is a python script or node setup I can use to restitch these slices back together (horizontally)? btw- I tried using the program stereo photo maker but it failed to open and stitch my image. Then i started to do it by hand in Photoshop which works fine except  it's ridiculously tedious. Thanks for any help!

If the images do not have lens distortion, you only have to concatenate the images, see this answers: http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/20863/how-to-merge-images-into-a-single-strip

Cycles supports panoramic spherical renders by setting the camera to 'Perspective' and the type to 'Mirrorball'.

I found that using the program imageMagick was the best and easiest way to stitch images together.


text:
Multiple seam sets for multiple UV maps?
Since I am using Blender to create static meshes for UE4 I have to produce two different UV unwraps of the same object. One for texturing etc. and one for the lightmap. Two different UV maps are needed because the requirements are very different.
Because of this I have to cut the object differently. Is there a way to define two different sets of seams for the two different UV maps?


text:
Textures not showing up in BGE player
I'm probably doing this very wrong, but I used to just be able to map the textures with uv and everything would work in the BGE player as it did in the viewer. what is causing everything to just turn white? Thank youu
Blend file - http://www.filedropper.com/apartment_1

Did you just put the texture in the UV/Image editor or did you set up the material that uses the texture?

Sharing that file is useless. You need to pack the textures into the blend, if you want it to be portable.  Also, as @Denis said, after you UV map the image, you still need a material on the object. This way the UV maps know what images to use in the BGE.

is the object you want to texture parented to another object?
because i have a similar problem. when i un-parent my object the texture shows fine. the only problem is that i need the relationship for my scene to work.

This could be a result by making the switch from 'GLSL' to 'Multitexture' shading.
Try switching your shading method.


text:
Normal and Ambient Occlusion Map baking issues in Cycles Render
So I've been battling with the Cycles Render, trying to bake normal and ambient occlusion maps for each object I have created. However, I have been receiving the following results:

I have been baking the high- and low- poly objects within the same coordinates, selecting the High and then Low objects in order. This has been done in 2.73a of Blender, in case that also needs to be known.

Looks to me like you have overlapping faces or UVs, which is causing z-fighting. See http://blender.stackexchange.com/q/5441/599

Here's a look at the model and the first UV channel I have made for it (I have a second that has .008 padding between each face.)
http://i.imgur.com/ZBv1xDJ.png
I have this feeling now that I've built this and other models in a method that I shouldn't have.

As a test you might try unwrapping with U > smart UV project or lightmap pack to quickly get a map without any overlaps (I'm not sure if yours does from the screenshot). Note this will overwrite your UV's so you might want to test this on a new UV map. See http://blender.stackexchange.com/q/24398/599

there is a problem with alpha, try creating a new image without alpha (uncheck) then bake.

@galdalf3 Unfortunately, I got this after adjusting Pack Islands to .02 on the first UV Map (.04 on the second map for a Lightmap:) http://i.imgur.com/YkbWoSq.png

@Bithur Now I am receiving a "circular dependency for image 'image.png' from object 'Screen'"

'circular dependency' means that are trying to bake to a texture that is also being used as input for the Material.  You shouldn't try to write to data if it's already being used.

The images you posted in comments here definitely look like z-fighting to me as well.  It appears as if you have duplicated a second model onto the first.  If this happened in Edit mode it would be harder to notice there are two overlapping models.

http://i.imgur.com/JeSdre7.png
@MarcClintDion Every time I try to bake a texture, it switches the texture in the UV Editor from one that I newly created to the one I have selected on my material, which then brings up the circular dependency error.
Also, I duplicated the original model from Object Mode.

Here's progress: http://i.imgur.com/polTh4R.png
I threw one of the objects in another layer, and the AO turned out well. Still need to take care of the Normal map.

The UV Editor has nothing to do with assigning or selecting the bake-to texture when using Cycles (only Blender Internal relies on that).  It's the active Material Texture node that determines what texture is baked to. I posted some info on baking here a while ago.  http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/24048/create-a-low-poly-mesh-with-high-detailed-textures/24083#24083

So Gandalf3 did have the answer, although I did not understand the previous topic he had posted. What I did to solve it was move the high-polygon object into another Layer. As I also had multiple materials for the object to be exported into a certain game engine, I had to remove one material before being able to bake the maps in question.


text:
why does the shortcut for "image.open" not work ? (ALT + O)
i use this "open image" button a lot , so i decided to use a shortcut for it on my MacBook Pro.
 i put my mouse on the link to see the python code. "image.open"
 i searched it up in the prefs.
there it says the shortcut is:  ALT + O  .
i tried it , but it is not working.
i changed the shortcut into: shift + O  .
 that didn't work either.
 what am i missing here ?

that shortcut doesn't work because it is under UV/Image editor shortcuts you have to add the same shortcut under the Property editor :

go to User preferences->Input->Properties editor
add the shortcut


text:
Why my texture lines show up distorted and not completely straight at few parts?
i am trying to get clean straight UV map lines for an object with texture without trilling or distortion.
 as you can see in the picture , a few lines are nice and clean , some others are distorted and a bit trilled and not completely straight .
it gives a bit of a non professional look. ok i am not professional , but still...i  want things to work out at it's best where i can.
 all lines should be nice and straight , and not just a few of them .
the UV map that i have used is the basic unwrap. nothing special .
 i like this result , except for the distortion problem.
 but how can i fix the distorted lines ?
first of all , they should have never been distorted since i never changed something in the UV map  to get them distorted at the lines.
 we can see most of the lines are distorted at one side and the other side they are nice and straight.
 how do i get them nice and straight at both sides ?
i don't want to change the arrangement of how the lines are running , just want to get the distortion out of the lines.
i would think something is wrong with the UV map , but it is the basic UV map , nothing should be wrong with it ,
anyone ?

i found the answer by myself by accident ,
it was quite obvious afterwards ,
all i had to do is to increase the amount of subdivisions ,
all the lines are perfect smooth and straight now ! no more distortion.
it's beautiful.

your UV sphere has uneven faces but the unwraping made them even, distorting the texture

that is a good explanation, but i forgot to ask for a solution , anyway i found the answer already.


text:
where can i see what is my current UVmap used for an object?
i change textures all the time ,also i change uv maps when its needed.
 sometimes i come back to an object and i forgot what was the uvmap that i used ,
is there a specific location or menu where i can check what was that exact uv map i used ?
was it the "cylinder projection" that i used or the "sphere projection "?
i don't remember , but i would like to know what i did , and how to find this out.
is it somewhere shown in an info menu ?
i could not find it.
a dot in the list would be convenient for the specific uv map that i used for this object.

I do not think that is possible, because each of those unwrapping types have options after you click on the menu item.

but it would be a handy feature...it seems the only way to to remember what uv map i used is to write it down somewhere on a note..back to the stone age :)


text:
can i change the size of my thumbnails in the thumbnail browse list?
my textures are a bit complex sometimes and the small thumbnails can not show me enough details to make me decide which texture i want to choose .
 is there a way i can increase the size of the thumbnails when i want to replace a texture for an object ?
i looked around everywhere but i can not find an option to do this .
in mac osx i can increase a thumbnail view , that comes very handy most of the time. i would like to be able to do this in Blender.
i don't mean to zoom in on the screen , that will result in a pixelated view.
but a real increase of the thumbnail size while browsing in the thumbnail list.

No, there no option to do this currently.

However there is a patch in the tracker to support this: https://developer.blender.org/T27830(It's not expected you should make your own patched Blender builds, just noting that it may well be supported soon)

fair enough, but i hope there will be a future update in blender soon that has the option included in the browser,  instead of me checking out now how imported patches will work. for now i stay with the small sized thumbnails. thanks for a fast reply.


text:
is there a shortcut for toggle between default screen layout and composit screen layout?
i click a lot on the two screen layouts , composite and default.
every click that i do often,  i try to find a shortcut for it.
but i doubt there is a shortcut for screen layouts ?
i have not seen a Phyton code showing up at these places.
or am i missing something ?
is there a way to get this shortcut ?
in the worst case i will just keep on clicking each time.
 but i prefer the shortcut.
i hope anyone has an answer, thanks.

Yes, press Ctrl+Left Arrow to go to composite from Default, and Ctrl+Right Arrow to go back.

ok that worked perfect, thanks... but i had to first switch off my mission control shortcuts on my macbook. that is why it didn't worked at first !


text:
how can i offset a gradient in a colorramp
i have set a gradient with a colorramp on a cube , as you can see in the picture.
what we see is that the gradient is exactly in the middle of the object.
i want to add an offset node. so that the gradient will show up at another point on the object.
 for example the complete white part would now be in the middle.
 or the black part would be in the middle , in stead of having the black part all the way to one side now.
how can i do this the best way ?

You can use the the Mapping Node, add it with Shift-A>Vector>Mapping

You edit the location to move it. You may have to try negative values.

i found it , it didn't work before when i tried , because i had "vector selected , in stead of "point".
one big thing i learn in blender, most of the time when a function is not working as expected, is because something is not selected in the right way ...that simple.


text:
Adding tracks/markers with a custom name?
In the Movie-clip-editor:
Is it possible to make a button for adding a marker with a pre-defined name?
The code below I build a custom menu with button-names defined in a text-file. When clicked on a button you need to add a marker. The goal is to give that marker the name defined in the text-file. But for now just giving it a custom name (not Track.xxx) is OK.
I can not find a way to change the name when markers are created. So I tought of a workaround wich just renames a track/marker called "Track" to the custom name. But that code is executed before "add_marker_at_click()" is finished.
from __future__ import print_function
import bpy
import os
class addmarkers(bpy.types.Operator):
    """ This operator adds markers
        add marker and give it a good name
    """
    bl_idname = "wm.addmarkers"
    bl_label = "addmarkers"

    def execute(self, context):
        # lmc to add a marker and change the name of the track

        bl_space_type='CLIP_EDITOR'

        sc=context.space_data
        clip=sc.clip
        bpy.ops.clip.add_marker_at_click('INVOKE_DEFAULT') #click to add a marker

        #bpy.data.movieclips["test.avi"].tracking.tracks["Track"].name="TESTNAME"
        #previous line is executed before add_marker_at_click is finished, so it doesn't work
        return {'FINISHED'}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        return self.execute(context)

class MARKERPANEL(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "Add markers"
    bl_space_type = "CLIP_EDITOR"
    bl_region_type = "TOOLS"
    bl_category = "MARKERPANEL"

    def draw(self, context):
        f = open('settings.txt', 'rt')

        for line in f:

            layout = self.layout
            row = layout.row()

            sc = context.space_data
            clip = context.space_data.clip
            row.operator("wm.addmarkers", text=line)

bpy.utils.register_class(addmarkers)
bpy.utils.unregister_class(addmarkers)
bpy.utils.register_class(MARKERPANEL)
bpy.utils.unregister_class(MARKERPANEL)
bpy.utils.register_module(__name__)

for information: picture of the custom menu

add_marker_at_click() is modal operator so it seems that it returns 'RUNNING_MODAL' and keeps running (waiting for user interactions) while your operator will finish without waiting for it , so I have used add_marker() instead and changed the your operator to be a Modal operator ,also added how to pas the button name to the operator , but the problem is that i could not get the coordinates of the mouse in respect to the movie clip, so i have used the region where the movie is :
import bpy
from bpy.props import *

class AddMarker(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "wm.addmarker"
    bl_label = "add markers with names"

    def __init__(self):
        print("Start")

    def __del__(self):
        print("End")

    x = bpy.props.IntProperty()
    y = bpy.props.IntProperty()
    name = bpy.props.StringProperty()

    def execute(self, context):
        #using 'region' in this calculation  is wrong
        self.x -=bpy.context.region.x
        self.y -=bpy.context.region.y
        x = self.x/bpy.context.region.width
        y = self.y/bpy.context.region.height
        #add marker at that position
        bpy.ops.clip.add_marker(location=(x, y))
        #rename this marker
        bpy.data.movieclips[0].tracking.tracks.active.name=self.name
        #bpy.context.scene.active_clip.tracking.tracks.active.name=self.name
        return {'FINISHED'}

    def modal(self, context, event):

        if event.type == 'LEFTMOUSE':
            self.x = event.mouse_x
            self.y = event.mouse_y
            self.execute(context)
            return {'FINISHED'}

        elif event.type in ('RIGHTMOUSE', 'ESC'):
            return {'CANCELLED'}

        return {'RUNNING_MODAL'}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        print(context.window_manager.modal_handler_add(self))
        return {'RUNNING_MODAL'}

class MARKERPANEL(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "Add markers"
    bl_space_type = "CLIP_EDITOR"
    bl_region_type = "TOOLS"
    bl_category = "MARKERPANEL"

    def draw(self, context):
        f = ['left','right','floor','corner']

        for line in f:

            layout = self.layout
            row = layout.row()

            sc = context.space_data
            clip = context.space_data.clip
            row.operator("wm.addmarker", text=line).name = line

bpy.utils.register_class(AddMarker)
bpy.utils.unregister_class(AddMarker)
bpy.utils.register_class(MARKERPANEL)
bpy.utils.unregister_class(MARKERPANEL)
bpy.utils.register_module(__name__)

Thanks for the info and code. Realy helped me. I haven't figured out how to get the proper x,y positions of the mouse click. But for now I put the marker at a locked position and just drag it to the correct position.

If someone else wants to use the code: put the rename part in a for-loop. Then multiple video-files can be loaded.  "for clip in bpy.data.movieclips:
clip.tracking.tracks.active.name=self.name"


text:
Blender Game Engine - Reporting Correct Angles?
New to blender game engine.. The image shows console window, blender and a simple python script to report current angles associated with a camera. I set angles for X, Y and Z to be 135, 0 and 135, just to show a sample case of weird angles being reported.
If played, console shows angles as -45, 180 and -45. Is this an expected behavior?
Thanks,
Chandra

I've just tried the same setup and it is outputing the right values (135, 0, 135) try first outputing the values before conversion

Many thanks for setting up and trying it Chebhou. Blender seems to take 135 as 135 most of the times, but as 134.99 occassionally, don't know the reason. Kindly type 136 for angle x, chances are high to get weird values reported.
I have attached another image with another combination of position and angle reporting in unexpected way.
By the way, 'before conversion' means conversion to degrees (unlikely) or to euler? I tried both in the new snapshot attached..


text:
Why is a face appearing in Object mode but not Edit mode?
I have a face appearing in object mode which is not present in edit mode. Does anyone know why or what to do to remove it?
The screenshots show the problem clearly:
Edit mode showing no face:

Object mode showing a face:

Thanks,
Andrew

in EDIT MODE hit Alt+H to show hideen elements

They were indeed hidden... sorry for posting such a trivial question.

Especially if you downloaded the model from someone else and didn't even know hiding faces was a feature that existed.


text:
Strange shading in smooth mode
Smooth mode has strange patches on a flat surface. Normals are all facing outwards. Turning off subsurf fixes the problem but isn't ideal. Any ideas how to fix this?

Try recalculating the normals

maybe you have inner faces?

@NascentSpace I've tried that, but it doesn't make a difference.

@moonboots I've tried selecting innner faces, but there aren't any.

Merge by distance?

please share your file: https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/

Try going into vertex properties and check Smooth Normals and play around with the angle limit.


text:
How to apply hand painted textures
So I am trying to make a model with hand painted textures. I marked some seams and UV unwrapped it to start painting. (maybe i forgot a step?), but then i try to apply it. I don't really know how to apply it. And once I thought i succeeded, but when I opened up the file again it was blanc.
Anyone knows how to do this?

saving the blend file doesn't save texture files, you have to do it manually. check http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/14050/uv-map-model-turned-black-on-saving-how-to-recover


text:
How can I make the trees straight?
I have a problem. Some of the trees are horizontal. I tried to straighten the hairs in Particle Edit, but it didn’t work.

Hello, could you please share your file (keep only the necessary items)? https://pasteall.org/blend/

I did. Did it work?

you need to share the URL it will generate  ;)

how can I do that?

once you've uploaded the file, it will generate a URL, you need to copy it and paste it here

https://pasteall.org/media/6/c/6c89cdcc91118967146ea3805078f42e.blend Is that the right link?

@Allen Simpson, I don't think that your link answers his question

yes, unfortunately that did not help!

my answer helps ;)

delete edit

apply scale to "Cube"

cylinder 8: tracking axis +z

result:

oh my god, you were too fast this time :((

ok....do i HAVE TO delete my answer so that you are not mad at me? ;)

don't worry I'm going to time travel and you'll remember nothing in several seconds

so you are superman AND man in black!?

come on, don't you know, the one and only Superman (Christopher Reeves 1978) can make the earth go counterclockwise

Sounds like Men in Black! :^)

Thank you so much!

Glad I could help

@Chris ... you are one of the biggest influencer here, thanks for that ... but I would like to ask you - please, please, please ... can you grab your screenshots in wide or square proportion with setup panels filling like half of screenshot max? Even from first image I already know it is your answer ... those oversized panels always punch me to my face :) Thank you if you can do this little thing for me :)

@vklidu: Thank you! ;) i will try. I cannot promise that i can always do it because my memory isn't the best...but i try. Sorry for punching in your face ;)


text:
mesh is twisting on bezier circle

after managing to get the mesh to follow the bezier circle theres a problem where it twists and screws up in one corner but the other corner seems fine. if it matters the origin point is at the top of the curve.

perhaps you could fix it with tilt (ctrl T or in the N panel > Transform)? If not, could you share your file?

Add a subsurf modifier to both curve and the mesh.
Select the Curve in edit mode -> Tooshelf -> curve tools -> Switch Direction

If there is a gap seen in the mesh go to edit mode and scale in Z axis.


text:
How to Make a Coffee Plate?
I was watching Blender Guru's tutorial for making donut and coffee with plate, but when it comes to curving the coffee plate, I grab part of it (with Proportional Editing switched to sphere) the whole plate comes along and nothing curves.
I followed all steps including adding loop cuts and pressing I to do the thing which he showed.

you tried wheel up on mouse?

Wheel up and down will define the influence area (you can also use PAGE UP - PAGE DOWN). Here's the manual: https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/scene_layout/object/editing/transform/control/proportional_edit.html#influence

Thanks, it helped.


text:
Extruding an arc shape with a plane as the extrusion path

I created this model in AutoCAD and I am looking to recreate this design in blender.
To create the model I created two closed polylines and set there Z's. To draw the arc between the top and bottom plates the UCS can be aligned so that an arc can be drawn in 3D and then extruded along the top polyline to create this part that looks kind of like a lantern.
I am continuing to try to do this in Blender but I have not yet been able to achieve the design. Is this possible to model in Blender?
Thank You!

there could be many ways,  this is one :

add a biziere curve align it to front view
convert it to mesh with Alt+ C
add a screw modifier
set the steps to 4 (in the modifier)

Yes that looks like what I needed. Thank you for posting.

In Edit mode

Loop cut a cube 4 times around the Z axis CtrlR 4 or scroll with MMB  to change the number of cuts.
Select the top 4 vertices then enable proportional editing, and change the Falloff to Sphere.
Press S ShiftZ to scale along the X and Y axes.
Press AA to select everything then scale along the Z SZ.


text:
Translating vertices orthographically
I'm a change over from AutoCAD. One of the CAD like features that I am really ingrained with is what is called orthographic mode.

In orthographic mode I would be able to move the selected vertexes by clicking parallel to the Y or X grid lines some clicked distance (or snapped distance). Is there an equivalent in Blender?
Thank You!

Yes, you hit 5 on the Number Pad, and then you are in orthographic view. You can then use 7 for top,3 for side, and 1 for front. using Ctrl with the numbers will give you bottom, left and back views respectively.
If you wan't, you can aslo change these using the view menu at the bottom of the 3d view.

Now as for moving them a set distance, you can use the G command followed by an axis X,Y, or Z. Finally you can type a distance out in blender units. Eg the move two vertices 2.25 units forwards you'd type GY2.25

No problem :D !


text:
Appending a scene and materials do not come through
So I spent several hours making this blender scene for school:
I figured I would be able to append it into my current project:

I entered a separate layer to try and add the text to the snow.blend, but when I added it, it appeared with no materials/different lights/nodes not coming through etc.
It appended and appeared like this:
HELP ME PLEASE!!

both scenes are very different. Your text uses front and backlight, your moutain scene uses a sun from the right and an environment texture. the sun is probably on a different layer but the environment is used on all layers. Can't say more without the  .blend file


text:
What is the difference between a running man and a man holding a ball?
What do these icons mean? Why does the man with the ball have the bones?

In another blend file, the running man has all the bones instead, and there is no ball man.

Hello, we lack informations, what icons, which bones are you talking about

@moonboots All fine, I know what's going on.

Oh ok I get it  ;)

The answer is quite simple: in the first image you are in Object Mode or Edit Mode. In this case the bones are shown under the Armature which is the man with the ball:

In the second image you are in Pose Mode, in this case the bones are shown under the running man symbol:

Now here are the differences between the different armature symbols: the orange "Armature" is the object. It can contain an armature of one or more bones.
The green "Armature" (the man with the ball) is the object data. Like other objects you can have linked object data or single user object data. This means, you can have two orange objects "Armature" and "Armature.001" for example, but they can share the same object data, the green "Armature". Which means, if you change one of those in Edit Mode, they will both inherit the changes (like linked mesh objects).
The green "Pose" (the running man) now is the pose you are creating in Pose Mode. This is individual for individual (orange) armatures - and even if they share the same (green) armature, you can individually change the poses.

Extra confusion: if Blender opens to pose mode, the armature item is entirely absent from the outliner and is created when I switch to object mode.

@AnsisMāliņš Maybe some kind of different setting...? In my outliner for example the hierarchy is always: Armature (object), Animation, Armature, Pose, Bone Groups. Whereas your outliner shows the Armature at last... which Blender version are you using?


text:
What is this pattern at the bottom of the default cube?
Start Blender, hit Tab to enter edit mode, orbit to see the underside of the starting cube. The bottom face is marked with a grey pattern, unlike all the other faces of the cube. What does this mean? I haven't seen this pattern in any images or videos in tutorials.

That is the active face.

It is the 'active face', which is the face that was selected last.
This can be useful for actions like transforming, where if you change the 'Pivot Point' to 'Active Element' you can scale towards or away from the 'active face'.
'Vertex' and 'Edge' selection modes also have 'active' elements and will display the last selected element lighter than the others. Object mode also does this when you have multiple objects selected, which can be used to (among other things) copy settings from the active object to the other selected objects.


text:
Only one child light source for parent objects created multiple times
I have a minimal knowledge of Blender because two classes in my course requires it. I'm making a game where a cannon shoots at targets. I've decided to make a night level (the day level is 100% working) and add point light sources to the targets and the ammo, which is a ball.
I created a point light source and added it as a child to the ball. Both are located on a different layer than the "shooter". When I fire a shot, the light follows the ball as expected. But when I fire several shots, there's only one point light source and it follows the last ball fired, jumping from ball to ball as I fire them.
I've searched a bit and I found out that that may be impossible, but I'm not sure, so that's why I'm asking if it can be done and how. I'm not in a hurry since this is not mandatory.
Using Blender 2.73a in GLSL mode (can't change that) in Windows 7 Ultimate.
Thanks in advance.

Welcome to BSE! Yours is a known problem with the game engine, (found that out last week) and as far as I know, there is no solution, I'm very sorry.

Thanks for your comment. Considering your experience and that link, there really must be no solution. At least it's good to know that for sure.

I wouldn't base too much off my experience, but I think that link states I pretty clearly as a bug that needs fixing. :D

This solution, is called a FX lamp lending library.
Add a bunch of FX lamps like lamp1, lamp2, lamp3 etc,
Parent them to a object, name it LampFX, set each lamp energy to zero
Add a property in each lamp "Lamp"
Have the LampFX object run this (one time)
#build lamp list
import bge
cont = bge.logic.getCurrentController()
own = cont.owner

if "LampList" not in own:
    Lamps =[ ]
    index=0
    for child in own.children:
        if "Lamp" in child:
            Lamps.append([child, False])
            child['index'] =index
            index+=1

    own["LampList"] =Lamps

When a projectile is added to scene, use
added = own.scene.addObject("projectile", own, 0)
for Lamp in own.scene.objects["LampFX"]["LampList"]:
     if Lamp[1]==False:

         Lamp[0].worldPosition = added.worldPosition
         Lamp[0].setParent(added,0,1)
         Lamp[1] = True
         Lamp[0].energy = 1.0
         break

Now the lamp is "checked out"
Now, before the projectile is deleted, a script needs to put it back and check it back in, so another projectile can chexk it out again.
for child in projectile.children:
    if "Lamp" in child:
        own.scene.objects["LampFX"]["LampList"][child[index]][1] = False
        child.removeParent()
        child.energy =0.0

own.endObject()


text:
Taper Object Cannot Alter Curve Start?
I'm trying to make use of curves to animate a stroke, specifically a cartoon-ish "wind" effect, by animating the "bulge" shown in the taper object from left to right (as indicated by the arrow).
My problem is that no matter how much I twiddle the control points for the controlling Taper object, I cannot get the very beginning of the curve to act with a zero diameter (shown circled) – which apparently is not a problem for the end of the curve.
Is this a bug, or am I doing something wrong?

Probably caused by the very beginning (left) of the taper object. You can see it's fairly high there.

Oh man, thanks so much! That's what I get for following EVERY SINGLE Youtube tutorial out there about "Grow a curve"! They ALWAYS say to put that point there, so I thought it was necessary to, like, set the y-extents for the calculation...


text:
Applied texture is deformed or pixelated?
Blender noob here. When I apply a texture to my model, sometimes it becomes deformed (circles 1 and 2) or pixelated (circle 3), and sometimes it works perfectly (circle 4). I've tried changing the face to a different texture and back to the desired texture, but it doesn't change anything. This issue persists in textured and rendered viewport shading, as well as in the final rendering.

Before applying a texture to your object you have to properly uv-unwrap your object. You can do it by going into "Edit Mode" than hitting "U" on the keyboard and selecting "Unwrap" form the drop down menu.
With a complex model like yours a simple unwrap is not going to solve all of your issues.
So you should go get some more informations about uv-unwrapping from the Blender Wiki or other web tutorials.

I had unwrapped my model but hadn't thought to modify the UV map. Thank you!


text:
Structure left after deletion
I'm trying to create a very basic arrow, and I've cut it from a cube, only to find that this persists after deleting the cube. I am not entirely sure what to call it, hence searching for help has been pretty hard, but if anyone could answer, it would be much appreciated.

The dashed cube is drawn because you've enabled the texture space option. This can happen accidentally by a shortcut.


text:
PitchiPoy Rigify missing finger controls
I have a problem, I am using the rigify tool in blender. Not the normal rigify but the one form PichtiPoy with the faceial controls. I love it but with the normal rigify tool you get the nice finger controls, where you just have to scale something down and the fingers wil close. I find thant very useful but I can't find it anywhere on the PitchiPoy version of the add-on.
Can sombody tell me what the problem is? What I'm doing wrong or how I could make it work?
I would love to hear it!
Thank you in advance

It's easy enough to switch.
First you need to select the Pitchiboy metarig and go into Pose mode. Select the root of the finger (3rd from the tip) and go to the Bone properties view. Under the Rigify Type view it shows that the bone is set to create a "pitchiboy.simple_tentacle".

Click the Rig type field and select "finger". You need to do this to each finger you want to change.

Now when you generate the rig, you'll have the default finger controls. The Rigify system is pretty flexible, allowing you to mish and mash rig controls any way you need.

I have played with this rig as well and it is awesome! What I tend to do is create the PitchiPoy meta rig, delete all but the face bones (everything from "head" down inclusive). Than I create the regular rig and join the face rig to it (select the face rig, than the other meta rig, and hit ctrl+j to join). Then I click "generate" which gives me the default old style rig (finger scale widgets included) with PitchiPoy's face rig which is amazing.
The problem is that PitchiPoy's rig uses different finger controls. If you "rotate" the root of the finger, the entire finger curls. Its a bit different set up so it just depends on your preference. I think I could get used to it, but I am still using my method.
The above method of changing the rig type to finger also works if you want to use all of PitchiPoy's rig.


text:
One Object won't Show up in Final Render even though it shows up in the Preview Render
I have a model of a building with a sidewalk around it.  Both show up when I switch to rendering mode in both Blender Render and Cycles Render mode.  But:  when I hit F12 for a final proper render, the building shows up -- but the sidewalk doesn't.
I've checked the normals and I thought the normals seemed pointed in the right direction.  I've set the Clipping on the Camera to a high number.  I removed all the materials from the sidewalk and added a new material-- the problem persists.  I've exported the blend as an FBX file and the Sidewalk shows up fine in Unity.  Just in final renders, it doesn't show up.
Here is a blend file: http://www.pasteall.org/blend/35247.  I tried to destroy everything unrelated to the issue and label things in a clear way.
Thanks.


text:
How do I lock editing the position of faces?
I have a large model -- I am going through it and selecting out faces in order to break a large, messy model into smaller sub-parts, so that painting it is hopefully easier
I've locked the position on the object level, but that doesn't seem to translate to the faces, apparently-- it just locks the overall object position.  When I'm in edit mode, right-clicking away on faces, the faces still move around.
(My worry is that when I'm doing a lot of right-clicking to select faces, some small bit is going to get moved without me noticing, and I want to lock face positions for that reason.)
Thanks.

see if this helps

or use shape key


text:
Rigging a Character Model- Bone Heat Weighting Error
Here is the blend file:  http://www.pasteall.org/blend/35832.  I am getting the "bone heat weighting: failed to find solution for one or more bones" error when I click "Armature Deform: With Automatic Weights."
I see from google this is a very common issue, but all of the solutions I've found are different from one another or sound model-specific.  I've tried many of the methods I've seen suggested (removing doubles, recalculating normals, and adding a subsurface modifier), but so far those don't seem to work (and the other solutions suggested start to sound complex).
I followed a tutorial online for the rigging-- this one, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGvalWG8HBU. I made the model in zbrush.  One of the answers suggested to not even try if the model is in any way asymmetric-- I'm not sure if this model 100% is (though when I look at it, it seems symmetric) -- but that answer was from 2008 or so, and I don't know if it's been fixed in later versions of Blender.  (And if there are good tutorials about rigging asymmetric models, I haven't seen those).
Thank you for any help.


text:
Can I make the array modifier work on global coordinates?
I believe the array modifier uses local coordinates to the object being replicated.
I have a cube I want replicated and I would like to get

but what I always get is

I have set Transform Orientations for the object to global but to no avail.
As usual, any help appreciated...
TIA

If you ask this question I suppose that it's because you don't want to change the orientation of your object in Edit mode? Just to make sure...   ;)

Modifiers work on the mesh.
The orientation of the default cube is "logical".  With (0, 0, 0) rotation it sits "flat".  It all makes sense. Start to rotate in edit mode (or in object mode and apply) it all starts getting a bit hard to follow.
Modifiers work on the mesh (data) part of an object.  A couple of ways to change the orientation of the mesh before using the array modifier.
1. Armature Modfifier before the array modifier.
If the armature modifier rotates the mesh before the array this'll work.

Rotating the bone, and result on cube 16 x 16 array
Here I've added a single bone middle of default cube, selected cube, ⇧ Shift selected bone, ⎈ Ctrl P set parent,  and chosen automatic weights. Now rotating the pose bone rotates the cube. If the armature modifier is before the array modifier it will do what you want, ie rotate each cube in the array.

Shape keys
Keep the normal orientation of cube as the Basis key.  Add a shape key(s) for the rotated state(s).  Because shape-keys are moving the vertices (data) of the mesh, this will give desired result too.

It turns out that array will do what I want if only I go into edit mode. I had been in object mode...
Sorry to have asked a little hastily.


text:
Can someone tell me what an "Editing context" is and how to get there?
I am using version 2.73 under Windows7.
This refers to page http://www.blender.org/manual/modeling/texts/introduction.html
One can read at the top in the box labelled "Reference",
"Panel: Curve and Surface, Font and Char (Editing context, F9)"
I am in Edit mode (which I gather is not the same thing as "Editing context") and F9 does absolutely nothing for me.
Nowhere in the properties window can I see anything like "Curve and Surface"??
I can find a panel called "Font" but neither "Char" nor "Font and Char"
Help!!

What are you trying to do?

you are looking at DOC of blender 2.4

@Chebhou Those are the modern docs, but they are still a bit under construction ;) Bernard I don't see any shortcut in blender which consists of just F9, and none relating to "editing contexts". Sounds like an outdated piece of the 2.4 manual slipped into the modern docs. What exactly are you trying to do? Perhaps we can find the 2.7 equivalent.

I hope you won't find this too cutting, but what I'm trying to do is

I hope you won't find this too cutting, but what I'm trying to do is use the manual! To my personal taste an incomplete manual is better than an erroneous one. I am fabulously impressed by Blender's capabilities but I think it fair to say that it has a very steep learning curve and errors like this don't help. But to answer the question asked, I want to master text so I can extrude text onto&from a curve surface (I know there are youtube videos on this but I momentarily don-t have access to them).

@BernardHigonnet The manual is a community project, and has just recently been transferred from the old wiki system (which was far worse in terms of erroneous and disorganized information). So as you might expect there still old pages like this one floating around.. Not good. When you come across one, pointing it out and/or contributing fixes is most welcome! I've already taken the liberty of looking into this one. As for extruding text, the easiest way is by using the extrude slider in the curve panel: http://pasteall.org/pic/85686


text:
where can I set the axis for the simple deform modifier ?
The title should say it all, I want to use a twist but there is not option for the axis. Why is that and how do we get around this ?

You can add an empty and chose it as origin object in the modifier on the deformed object.

By rotating the empty you can change the direction of the deformation.

It should probably be mentioned that the local Z-Axis of the origin object is the one that is used in the deformations. That stumped me for a while.


text:
Mouse cursor BGE low resolution
I divided my display size by 4 for my window having 420x360 resolution, this is what I need for my game, but while in fullscreen mode the cursor is stuck in the area of window instead of extending over the display area. This makes it impossible to select anything outside the initial window box. Doubling the resolution doesn't create this issue though, I wonder how to fix this..

In case this is usefull, I used a script to track the mouse and move an object which acts as a cursor independently.
import bge

cont = bge.logic.getCurrentController()
mouse = cont.sensors['Mouse']
cursor = cont.owner

width = bge.render.getWindowWidth()
height = bge.render.getWindowHeight()

mousex =  float(mouse.position[0])
mousey =  float(mouse.position[1])
x = (mousex  / (width/2))  -0.75426
y = (-mousey / height) +0.35371

cont.owner.worldPosition = ((x), (y), (0.0))


text:
Working with Arrays LOD
I was wondering if the LOD feature is working on top of an array modifier.

Could you explain your scene in a little more detail? From what I can tell, you have an object with LOD, but also with an array modifier. Does the object's LOD work if you disable the array modifier?

yes, i had no problem with LOD, but I'm asking this as I can't acces my computer to test if on a big scale array it works or if i have to apply the array and split the meshes. I want to create a land from tileable patches.

Instead of using an array modifier, I'd just use Alt+D to duplicate the object but keep the same mesh data.

Well the purpose was using the "merge" option of the arrays as it allows to set up a huge area with 0 offset in between my (tileable) patches of terrain, on top of it I can also add a displace modifier. Anyway I'll try this as soon as I get my workstation back because now I'm on an eeepc (700mghz, 1G, no graphic cards) and cannot use newer versions than 2.66 where LOD feature's not yet implemented.

I once tried to setup terrain from a heightmap. It would auto-generate terrain tiles using displace, it would create different LOD levels with the decimate modifier and a vertex group (so the edges still lined up).
It worked great in the viewport, but didn't work in the game engine.
Modifiers are a bit strange in the GE. Sometimes they appear correctly, but when adding objects you get CPU spikes (there was one case I worked on where modifiers caused a drop from 60FPS to 20, but that was on lots and lots of objects). Other times they simply don't work. LOD seems to make modifiers in the GE not work.


text:
Can I reach the World's horizon_color in bge?
I was wondering if possible to retrieve and change World properties in-game, especially the horizon_color.

I'm not sure if this is what you want:
import bge
scene = bge.logic.getCurrentScene()
# background
saveit = scene.world.backgroundColor
scene.world.backgroundColor = [r,g,b]
# ambient light
scene.world.ambientColor = [r,g,b]

With r,g,b float values from 0 to 1.
If you have mist enabled, you should also do:
# mist color
scene.world.mistColor = [r,g,b]


text:
nodes in blender game engine
I have an issue while tring to set up a material for blender game engine. You can see the setup on the image, and the BGE doesn't render my purple object that's on the View panel.

Looks like it's an "Alpha" issue? What if you try plugging those nodes into "Color"? Can you post the blend? I just noticed how old this question is... I hope you either found your answer or find my input useful. Don't wanna get slapped for bumping something too old, if that's even an issue here.

then you'r just a purple object


text:
How can a normal map be masked through a stenci?
I have a mesh that i use as a ground in the game engine, I used multiple stenci layers to dispatch the textures, all tileable. It works well but for the normal channel, what i mean is that when I turn on normal influence for a texture, it appears on the other layers without taking the stencis into consideration, so that when each texture has its normal turned on, the effect piles up until the last layer. What I have managed to do is to create normal maps for every layers but the last (the path as you can see on the picture) but in doing so i'm loosing the ability to repeat my picture. Is there a way through this ?

I had to use the node system to use my normal maps in HD, instead of stenci I set up a series of color mix nodes. I needed to substract a geometry normal node via a vector math...don't ask me why.


text:
LOD parameter link
I have an Object with LOD and i use a particule system to spread it on my ground, after applying the particule modifier I get thousands of this object and I want to instanciate them, so that when I modify my LOD setting it applies to all objects. I didn't figure out how to do it and need some help.


text:
billboard not rendered
I am trying to achieve a snow effect with billboard particles, everything is fine until I render the scene where my flakes don't appear.
I understand billboard UV are automatically generated but couldn't sort my problem.
The UVmap slot uses the unwrapped emitter plane (I though it would sort the situation but it obviously doesn't) as the Normal and time index UV.
Thanks for your help.

Cycles does not support billboard particles as far as I know. Replace the billboards with objects (simple planes will suffice): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqBIAE8A-4k


text:
How to deal with seamless textures, tiles, and tesselation
I am facing an issue with patches of grounds and several meshes.
The fact is I have to split the ground into several patches and use LOD (which is not the issue).
A huge mesh cannot be detailed, and several meshes react badly to tesselation enven with a (I guess perfectly) seamless textures.

My only solution here is to scale all patches locally a little bit.

Sounds like job for UDIM Textures, but i'm not sure what your final goal is

thanks i'll chech it out.

I come up with a long list of textures and what seems to be a lack of dram (crashes).
Do you know if it's possible to use the same texture for all tiles ? I mean only one picture per udmi texture.

No, it's a texture per tile, eve if the texture is the same

Ok thank you for specifying.
Can be real costly with a lot of lod meshes i can't with my 8gb computer.