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Why can't I see the Cycles Rendering button in Node Editor?
When I enter into the Node Editor to mess around with materials, i'm greeted with no cycles render button, nor any of the others.
The buttons aren't there.
Please help, I've tried to see if it was enabled in Add-ons and it was, yet it's just not there in the node editor. I've also tried to change my rendering from CPU to GPU rendering, but to no avail, it's not there.
Please assist me, I've had this problem ever since i got blender.

"I've had this problem ever since i got blender." That is expected, render buttons were never in the Node Editor header.

What do you mean?

have you switched from Blender Render to Cycles Render in the top horizontal menu bar?

Cycles workflow is not like Blender Render (which is what i assume you've been using so far). Just follow the steps below and you'll be good to go.

The yellow box is the "Outliner" panel. Select the object here.
The green box is in the "Materials" tab of the "Properties Editor". Click the "+" button on the right side of the green box to add a material to your object.
Check "Use Nodes" in the cyan box.
The green box is in the "Render" tab of the "Properties Editor". You can select your render device (CPU or GPU) there.
The magenta box is the workspace of the node editor. Make sure you have shaders (BSDFs) connected to an "Material Output" node or you won't see anything in the render (or just black objects).
Press the render button in the red box (again in the "Render" tab of the "Properties Editor") once you've set up materials for all visible objects in your scene, and you're good to go.

I hope this helps.

You also sometimes need to press the button in the red box and select the material for the active (selected) object from the drop-down list as seen below.

That didn't work, those 4 buttons next the material list in the Node Editor is what i'm looking for, it doesn't seem to show up for me

I updated my answer, the additional step should fix your problem.


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bones on the right side affect the left side
ok, so i was creating a character in blender for my game but when i parented the mesh to the bones with automatic weights, i quickly found that when i moved bones on the left side of the body it affected the right side but the right side had no affect on the left. when i redid it the same thing happened so i applied the mirror modifier and did it again and it work perfectly but then when i was doing the weight painting the weight painting wouldnt affect both sides because i didnt have the mirror modifier. can anyone explain what could have happened if you can understand what i am trying to say? thanks.

I guess what you want is to create symmetric vertex groups so you don't have to repaint for the left what you've already painted for the right? Once you have finished the weight paint on a side, stay in Weight Paint mode, go to the Properties > Data menu, then click on the button on the right of the Vertex Groups list, choose Copy Vertex Group, a new vertex group is created, then click Mirror Vertex Group, the group has been mirrored. But this method only works on a real symmetric object.

if you model used a mirror, apply it then do automatic weighting for your bones.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


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How to make objects not pass through each other when animating
Is there some kind of way that I can make meshes not pass through each other when I'm animating them? Like maybe use rigid bodies or physics or something like that (sorry, i'm still new to Blender)? Like for example, if I want two people to handshake, how do I make it so that the hands don't go through each other? Or do I just have to animate it in such a way so that they don't?

I don't think there's a way to do it other than fake it with your animation

You can use the Soft body modifier after you animated the general movement.
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/physics/soft_body/index.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofIi4ddHGW0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZHmo3iH4cE

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


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How to copy paste positions of multiple vertexes (UV Mapping)
I have a mesh, and when I join it with another mesh with the same material, the first mesh loses its uv vertex mapping, so I have to make a copy of the first mesh then copy paste the vertex positions from the original uv map to the uv map of the joined mesh. Is there a way I can do this faster?

Do you mean that after joining 2 different objects with UV maps one of them loses its map? I can't reproduce this. When joined into one object there will be several meshes with their UV maps respectively (even if active object didn't have UV map before join)

Blender shouldn't delete UV maps when joining materials.  There are a few caveats:
1) If there are more UV maps than Blender allows between the two objects, UV maps will be dropped.  I believe Blender will preserve first all UV maps of the active selection.
2) If a mesh loses its faces, it loses its UV, as Blender stores UV separate from vertices (not the only way to do it, btw), so there's no such thing as a string of edges with any UV.
When you join two objects, any UV maps with the same name will be merged.  So if you want one UV map to join with a particular other UV map, just make sure they have the same name.
Finally, there are a few tools that you can use to copy UV maps.  Assuming identical topology, ctrl-l Copy UV works.  The data transfer modifier also permits the copying of UV via Face Corner Data.  Data transfer modifier can be vertex group limited, and behaves perfectly on seamless, identical meshes, although in my experience it doesn't do a great job with seams/islands (maybe I just don't know all the tricks yet.)


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Why does my normal map not work with the Principled BSDF shader?

Hey guys,
I have a fairly simple problem that i simply can not get past. I've connected 3 image textures (Color, Gloss and Normal) to the Principled BSDF shader. The Base Color and the Gloss seem to work fine, but for some reason, plugging in the normal map (and running it through the Normal Map converter) doesn't appear to have the desired effect. The surface simply doesnt change and remains flat. Am I doing something wrong?

Did you unwrap your model?

Normal map influence rays reflection angle. And there are plenty variables influence if you can or can not see normal map effect in your render. Maybe your normal map work, but you can't see it due to weak, big and not good positioned light source. Also normal map "default" strength can be low. Try plug normal map to glossy shader with zero roughness, set light to about 1cm and make light stronger. Try different light positions. Anyway: you working with materials in dark scene - how you can see what's happen and how materials react to light, if there is almost no light in your scene? :-)


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How to hide this object
Can you please help me? This green object is attached to another some 6 meters away. When I delete it The object it is linked to also disappears. What can I do so it will not appear in my scene, please?
Alan Yuri


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Hundreds of orange squares after appending object
This book has been sitting there in my scene for many weeks now, and suddenly all those orange squares have appeared below it. I opened a new file and appended the same book, and that does not happen there. It only happens when I append to this scene. Can you help me? A conflict must be going on of some kind.
Thank you

That is a particle system, you must have changed the current frame


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How to join two parts of an armature
How can I connect those two parts of my little monster? I came extruding the bones down and now when I grab the torso it does not bring along the legs! Can you help me, please? All the rest is working fine.

Thanks Moonboot. Can you tell me where to find a tutorial for that?

Go in Edit mode, select the 2 hip bones, then the torso bone, then ctrl P > Make Parent > Keep Offset. Now the torso bone is the parent of the 2 hip bones, and the Keep Offset option allows them to keep their position and not stick to their parent.
Also, you need to assign an Inverse Kinematic constraint to your calves, it allows to reverse the influence of the bones so that the legs are not controlled by the base anymore, but by controllers that you will create and assign as Targets.

Thanks Moonboots. I had done that before posting my question. What so happens is that when I do that, When my character bows, the two legs follow it along, which should not happen.

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

also, have you assigned an Inverse Kinematic constraint to your calves, it allows to reverse the influence of the bones so that the legs are not controlled by the base anymore.

Thanks again. When on pose mode I click on the calves bone the IK appears checked.

Please share your file, because it's hard to tell. Your calf doesn't seem to have any constraint as it is not green

If you don't like the way the rig controls with the legs parented to the torso, perhaps try making a new pelvis bone to which both legs and torso are parented


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How to drive the Scale and Position of the Mapping Node to the value of other Nodes?
I want to drive the scale and position respectively by the value of other nodes.
So say I have to use the value of the green nodes in the second image to control the scale of the Mapping Node and the blue nodes to control the position values. How would I do it?

I have tried drivers but they seem to not be affected by other nodes even though they can be linked.

You build your own Mapping node from bunch of Math nodes: https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/40829/7777 with all the inputs nicely exposed.

So I gave it a shot but you cant really combine the separated vector nodes for scale and position which is what I need. At this point an image sequence might be better than doing it this way but at this point I want to figure it out.

@Cutis Why you can't combine scale and position? You can combine all the math into one long transform node. Scale first, then rotate, last translation but in the node flow the order will be reversed.

Ohh. I was just trying to add them using vector Math. OK that might work


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Rigid Body option not available
First time poster so apologies if this is in the wrong place.
I'm trying to enable physics for rigid body (as per loads of online tutorials) on two objects as I need to get them to crash into each other, however on the Physics tab of the objects, the Rigid Body option just isn't there.
There are lots of other options (Force Field, Collision, Cloth etc.) so feel like I'm in the right place, just not sure what I'm doing wrong?
Am using version 2.62 if this makes a difference.
Many thanks

v2.62!? holy cow!! try this: select the object, open the Python Console, type in bpy.ops.rigidbody.object_add(), and hit enter.

Haha I know.... constrained by what they'll install for me in work, apparently that's the latest version they have/are willing to download.
Have tried the python script but to no avail -I'll have a play around with the other options and see if I can get a result, thanks for your help

If you are constrained by administrative rights you can always download and run the zipped setup which doesn't require installation

Now that is a wonderful idea, I'll download from home onto USB and try it that way - thank you very much


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How to combine two Blender projects
I am making an apple with a face and I made the actual body and the face separate. Both parts are in different files and I was wondering how I can merge them into one file so I can attach them together.


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Knife tool randomly snaps to weird places and creates weird geometry
So, I have been experiencing problems using the knife tool.
Normally, when I am using the knife tool it just creates a straight line between the two points I click.
However, sometimes when I am about to confirm a cut,
this appears. (it is trying to inform me that I have cut through an edge, but I did not go through that edge and it is far away from the path I am cutting).
When I click and confirm the second point, it cuts from the first point, through a weird path, usually to somewhere off my screen, and back to the second point.
This is an urgent project, help will be greatly appreciated :)
Software: Blender 2.81 2019-11-20 release
Hardware: MacBook Pro 13 inch, Late 2018, 2.3 GHz Quad-Cure Core i5, Iris Plus 655

Hello and welcome :). There is a very similar question asked 9 hours ago. Would that help?


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Strange face transparency artifacts in Eevee
Can somebody explain whats wrong with my mesh? Have no idea what to do.
Why some of these faces are transparent?
It is rendered with strange holes in Eevee, but in Cycles all is ok.
3rd and 4th screenshots with marked edges
You can achieve this with any texture in my .blend file.
http://pasteall.org/blend/index.php?id=52822
Please help!

You have an Alpha sorting issue. (Z fighting) When you have an Alpha channel in your texture the renderer has problems sorting which face is closest to the camera (or viewer).
This can be corrected if you tell the renderer to ignore Transparency or Backfaces.
First screenshot shows your present alpha Blend Mode :

You have a choice, either set the Blend Mode to Opaque :

or deselect the option Show Backface :

Third option create a new material and assign that to your model. The default settings work as is.
BTW. Your model also shows Alpha sorting issues in Cycles (and Eevee, when Viewport Shading is set to Material View.

Oh Dude, thank you so much!

your welcome :)


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Blender Tree particle system
Hi I made a low poly tree with Branche particles as hair and want to set the trees with a particle system on a ground
But if I set them with a particle system to the ground I can’t see my branches

I need to use displacement on the leaves threats why I want 2 particles systems

If I understood your question correctly, this should be a solution: the branch of the tree is one object and the leaves are one object. So if you set a particle system on the leavs, the leaves will be the only ones that get multiplied. You need to combine them to one object. (For example, Ctrl J) (If Yes, please write back so I can post it in the users tab - if not tell me as well so I can delete it)

If I join it to 1 object the leaves are going to deleted

you need to convert the tree branch from a curve to a mesh. Then it should work. You need to "rightclick" on the branch and select "convert to mesh". Then select both (branch and leavs) and then combine them to one object "Ctrl J"


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Found Bundled Python and EXCEPTIONAL_ACCESS_VIOLATION error
I just installed Blender today, and it was installed succesfully. After that, I tried to open the app. The program opened with no problem, but whenever I click new project, or I tried to use any feature Blender has, the program crashed. After that I tried to look up the solution in this forum. Someone said I should try to use the command prompt to debug the app, then i open the directory of blender exe file and start it with blender --debug command. Then, i got some error messages.

So, based on the suggestions i got after reading some questions in the forum, I opened the preference and changed the frequency to 44100 Hz and the bit to 24 signed bit. After that, I tried to restart Blender. But, I still have the same problem as before, the program will crash whenever I start a new project or try to use any feature. I tried to lookup the problem from command prompt, and i got these error informations.

I think the problem lies in
(1)version 280 sub 39 date unknown has unknown
(2) found bundled python: directory line
(3) Error: EXCEPTION_ACCESS_VIOLATION
But i don't understand any of those. Could anyone help me to solve this problem? Thank you.

This seems like an issue with your graphics driver or unsupported hardware. Please check if your system fulfills the minimum requirements for Blender 2.8x. If it does, then update your graphics driver.

I've checked my hardware and it seems it is compatible with Blender, at least for the minimum requirement. Here i list my computer specifications.
OS: Windows 7 Professional 64-bit, (6.1, Build 7601)
Model: HP EliteBook 8470p
Processor: Intel Core i5-3360M CPU @2.80GHz (4 CPUs)
Memory: 8 GB
Intel(R) HD Graphics 4000 with 1696 MB memory

Oh, I also have tried to download the zip version, and started it both after extracting it and before extracting it. both of them didn't work, with the exactly same problem

Try to update your graphics driver from the Intel website. Officially your integrated GPU isn't supported, although there are some workarounds implemented and Germano Cavalcante tries to make it work.

It works! Thanks a lot, now I can use blender!


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Subdivision Surface Error
I am trying to make a base mesh using the skin modifier in Blender 2.8, but every time I get to the Subdivision Surface Modifier,the top is left flat.
How do I fix that?

What does the mesh look like without the modifiers? And what is the full stack of modifiers?

I presume it could be that due to a double vertex in the base mesh the top square also has double vertices after the skin modifier, so the edge might be actually rounded just between two points at the same location ;) You could try if this is correct, by selecting the base mesh in edit mode and doing "merge by distance"


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Makehuman Importing Error
I just made this model in Makehuman and it is ready to be imported, but everytime I try, a tradeback error pops up and my model doesn't.
How do I fix that?

Since you're still using 2.79a, could it be that the MakeHuman file format has changed in the meantime and the add-on doesn't support it?

If that's true, what should I do? Please.

Check if a newer version of the add-on is available. Test if that one works.


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Multiple addons found by Blender but only one is in folder
I have installed the MakeClothes addon, but the "Multiple Add-ons with the same name found" error pops up. It is only in one folder with one copy of each file. Everytime I try to fix it, the add on disapears. How do I fix that?


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Match mesh on top of another
I am making a costume for a character. I have the costume ready, but parts of the modelling mesh keeps on slipping through it. How do I make the costume completely cover the model mesh? This is my exact problem:

you could hide the underneath mesh with a Mask modifier

My suggestion is to use the Shrinkwrap modifier. Just add it to the costume object and set the model mesh as the target object. Enable Keep Above Surface and adjust the offset value, so your costume mesh will stay above the model mesh.

With the Shrinkwrap modifier your costume mesh will follow the exact shape of the target mesh, so the mesh will be modified. But if you just want to completely cover the model without changing the costume mesh, use the Displace modifier - tweak the Strength value.


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How do I make a cloth cape for LEGO?
I am trying to make a cloth cape for a LEGO Character, but the flow is always strange. It won't go down and won't stay still.
What am I doing wrong?

show us what you tried so far. Best way: provide your blend file.

ok, i made a "quick and dirty" example, how to do it.
Result:

add a plane on ground -> passive, collision (gray)
add a rigid body (active) on it (green)
add a plane, which does NOT collide with other meshes when you place it
3b) at lots of subdivision surface to plane, but not too much, else your computer explodes
add cloth modifier to plane, fix it with a vertex - pin group
raise qualitiy collisions to 20
add solidify modifier to plane with thickness -> apply
check object- and self collision
increase your outer thickness of your rigid body
let the other settings of cloth as they are -> little changes in the properties change a lot for the simulation

here is my blend file to check it out:


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Hollowed text inside a solid
I am trying to make a word appear in the empty space of a solid cube. Very similar to the Marvel logo attached. How can I achieve this?

If you start from a logo, you first need to import it in SVG format. Keep in mind that it will be very small in the center of your scene so you may not see it at first and you'll have to scale it a lot.
If you start from your own text, you can type it in Blender: Press shiftA > Text, go in Edit mode, type your text, if necessary choose the font in the Properties panel > Data > Font, and press on the Load a new font from file button to browse into your own fonts.
Then convert it to a mesh with an altC.
Simplify it in Edit mode with X > Limited Dissolve.
Extrude it on the Z axis: E.
Create your parallelepiped, put your text on it.
Give your parallelepiped a Boolean modifier / Difference mode and choose the text as Object.
You can keep the text and make it transparent in the Properties panel > Object > Display > Maximum Draw Type > Wire and, for the render, in the Properties panel > Object > Cycle Settings settings (deactivate all the options), or you can apply the modifier.

Is it what you want?

Might be worth adding a note that you don't need SVG format if don't have it and are able to model the text yourself.

oh ok you're right, done

Did you mean to addt he word "parallelepiped"?

Sorry I don't understand what you mean?

Ok, I've just googled it, but I'd never heard of the term. Not quite sure why you would use such an obtuse term instead of 'mesh' or 'object'.

I didn't want him to be lost with a "add a mesh"... what would I've been talking about? "Parallelepiped" is not so uncommon, at least in my country, sorry if it sounded obtuse...    :/


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Orthographic mode render
I'm trying to render in orthographic view, clicking on the cam, and going to settings choosing type: Orthographic. But when my PNG sequence is exported its still in perspective. What further more settings do I need to do?
Thank you.

What are you trying to do with your scene? Why did you add a modeling tag? Can you post a screen shot?

Double-check if there is a different camera that your scene is using.

Here's a screen shot.
I'm just practising how to export a PNG sequence. the cube goes from left to right. There is only one camera in the scene. And its set to orthographic.
https://ibb.co/DMkgbYn


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Combine png image with a background color for a shader
I have UV mapped a PNG image (Has no background of course) onto a Taurus shape
The image appears as I'd like it to, but I cannot figure out how to change the colour of the Taurus. I'm selecting the subsurface colour but nothing is changing.
is it possible to change the colour in some way, but having the numbers intact as they are?
Thank you.

Hello :). You can use the PNG image as a mask for two materials. Here is my answer to a similar question

Hi, I followed you node settings, but my PNG image disappeared.
https://ibb.co/72481vw

Use a mix shader node - plugging image texture + Colour node into both and then plug that into material output. This worked for me.

is it possible to share a screen shot?
Thank you.

There are multiple options, but the easiest would be :

Put a hue/saturation/value node between your image texture and the principled BSDF, then tweak the hue to get the desired color.
Note : The downside is that you have to "guess" which hue you will get by tweaking the hue factor value.
Since your texture is black and white, you can use that as a mask to get the desired color. Insert a mix rgb node between the image texture and the bsdf, then tweak the Color2 input to get your color like so :

Note : You can disconnect the Color1 input from the mix RGB node and set any color you wish for the numbers.
You can also use a mix shader and use the color for the factor, that way you can have a different roughness value for the numbers and the rest of the clock for example. I have used diffuse shaders for the sake of simplicity but you can use Principled bsdfs :

Edit :
Since your image may not be exactly black and white, it could mess up the masking factor. I'd recommend inserting a color ramp, setting it to "constant" and moving the white slider to 0.5 like so :


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Boolean Technique
(I'm currently learning Blender 3D 3 months now)
The reason why I'm posting my question is to get the best possible feedback regarding this modifier on how to use it without making such a mess once it's applied on a mesh. What should I be taking into consideration when using this modifier, to have a nice smooth shape without the mesh having jagged and pinched edges on the surface. When should I use it and when not for example. Should the subsurface modifier be also applied if using Boolean, or is it best not to use it at all.
Thank you.

It is a know caveat of boolean operations that it often gives bad topology.
You either have to retopolgize your mesh after applying this boolean modifier, or you can use the weld modifier with blender 2.82+ and tweak the treshold value, which will get rid of some of the artifacts but may also deform your mesh in an unwanted fashion.
Using a subdivision surface modifier is fine but it will indeed magnify spots where your topology is lacking in quality.
Ideally if you want your boolean modifier to be applied without screwing the topology, its edges and vertices should align perfectly with the opposing object's geometry.

Blender 2.82 is not released yet. There are other methods of cleaning up topology that can be recommended without the use of experimental unreleased version that may change and is not recommended for use in production yet. Makes no sense to recommend features from experimental builds without first exploring already existing methods in stable official releases.

Well that seems a bit harsh. I would'nt say it makes 'no' sense to propose different solutions to a given problem. My first proposition was to rework the topology after the boolean is applied... Have a nice day

@Gorgious your answer is nice, well written and factual. I gave it +1

Should the subsurface modifier be also applied if using Boolean, or is it best not to use it at all?

There are no rules that fit every situation. You can use any modifiers together to reach some result that you happen to be after. You can use Subdivision Surface modifier after or before Boolean if that gives you your desired result - that's all there is to it. This is true with any other modifiers and their combinations as well. You should use whatever works best for you and your specific situation.

When should I use it and when not for example?

Once again it depends only on whether it gives you your desired result or not. You should obviously not use it if the resulting geometry is problematic for you like in your example with jagged and pinched edges unless you are prepared to correct it manually.
It is good to use if you need the geometry to remain editable/procedural for example. I always use it to make spotlights or led strips in the ceiling when they are recessed in my interior visualisations because if the lighting is changed later it is very easy for me to edit the "cutter" object that is hidden for the render.
Of course you can use booleans while modelling regular stuff, but if you wish good result you will often need to clean it up manually so the use of it is quite limited and quite often you will be better off using some other techniques. Basically, I think one could say it should be used when you can get away with it.

What should I be taking into consideration when using this modifier?

You should be aware that it can produce unexpected results if used on objects that have overlapping faces or edges or vertices very close to each other. You should also always be aware of the topology of the objects you use and if you are going to need to fix it and obviously then fix it after the boolean operation.

Thanks for your input Martynas. I have lots to learn and practice, I'm currently, cutting, joining, dissolving vertices and edges, trying manually to see how I get a desired result. but these ngons and triangles are not making it easy. But I guess it's the only way to learn about topology.


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Loop Cut Coordination technique
A while ago I following a tutorial which demonstrates how to position loop cuts in specific places using loop cut, Grab X-Y-Z and giving a specific numeric so the lop cut can relocate to the desired position.
I'm trying to use the same technique on this mesh, I have added one loop cut on one of the triangular faces. Which I then used the factor to designate the position. But when I try to use the technique as the instructor, instead of the loop cut moving, the whole face moves and deforms. In this case, should I just use the factor after doing a loop cut on each individual face, or am I complicating things trying to do what the video instructor is doing?
Thank you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSR6bVFe5LM

In the tutorial, the side 'rails' down which the edge is moving are parallel, so a translation (GY, for example) is equivalent to a slide (GG). On a triangle, that's not the case.
You can make a numerical entry for the distance of a translation, because all affected components move by the same amount. But you can't, by distance, for a slide, because vertices in a sliding loop will move different distances, depending on the location of adjacent vertices on the rails.
Instead, a numerical entry for a slide represents the fraction of the distance to adjacent vertices, where 0 is the current position, and distances to adjacent vertices are mapped to  1 and -1.
You might be able to use that fraction, with a bit of mental arithmetic, but usually, for accuracy, I find myself G translating single vertices down edges using Custom Orientations derived from them where necessary, and as far as possible thinking like a carpenter.. finding ways to transfer measurements from one part of a model to another.

Oh. I finally understand why loopcut position is relative and cannot be an absolute value :). Always learning.

Hi Robbin.
Thanks for your reply, in this instance I believe it's not too tedious to use the Fraction option, although it would be convenient if there was a way to achieve this using a method on the triangles.
Thanks for your insight.


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Modelling Round Curved Edges
I'm trying to make rounded off inner edges on a mesh. But I'n not on the right track, (I'm avoiding to use the Boolean.) I'm trying to achieve it using correct geometry. It does look a little bit decent, but that's after bumping up the viewport subdivision,and I've added way too many loop cuts. What would be the best modelling approach?
Thank you.

First of all, what's the purpose of your mesh, in terms of "correct" geometry? Rendering, 3D game asset, 3D printing? All three of them might have different requirements, when it comes to "correct" geometry (please read this if you want to know how you can help us to give good answers). Second question: Why not make use of Blender's built-in Bevel tool?

I have no purpose for the specific mesh, I'm trying to understand good way how to solve a problem in this situation. I made the same mesh this time using Boolean and then bevel which is clean with no shading issues, which I could of done in the first place,  but I wanted to see more techniques without taking the easy way, since I'm a novice user of Blender.
https://ibb.co/sR9Pytq

What about such topology? All quads.

All quads, really ?

I'd like to see your technique how you achieved this shape. But what worries me, is once the subdivision modifier gets added, that corner where you did the bevel, will look messed up. Also you have stray vertices..
https://ibb.co/jJNWHcH

I can spot at least 4 ngons. Some of those shapes might have 4 vertices, but that doesn't make them into quads. Furthermore, those vertices that are located "within" the base shape most definitely lead to shading problems.


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Modelling Sphere Pole
I've applied smooth shading and auto smooth to this sphere shape, and when I apply the subsurface modifier I'm getting artefacts on top of the sphere. Ive tried adding loop cuts, and also deleted the top faces and did a grid fill but only made it worse. How can I fix the sphere not to have that weird pinching on the top?
Thank you.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/3199/why-does-subsurf-modifier-cause-weird-deformation-at-the-end-of-a-cylinder

Hello :). These threads should help: https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/70810/, https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/28963/


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Text and details on Objects
I'd like to know how this text gets adapted onto these 3D models. Could it be a PNG  which gets mapped. Or is this text pre planned how it would be layout onto the model? what's the method involved in this technique? Would the text layout need to be the same ratio done with a graphic editor like Photoshop or Illustrator? and have the mesh modelled in the same metric unit so the text can later fall correctly in place? All information is appreciated, unfortunately my college instructors are really lame in giving information....
Thank you.

Hello. You talk about some text layout, but I cannot see any. Is there something missing, or am I just blind? :).

Sorry, I should of being more specific with the image, So everything you can notice which is numbers and text around the knobs, sliders, etc etc, logos which are on the material.
https://ibb.co/KwMP38D

I believe you could always go with texture mapping in this case. You can create personalized texture maps and wrap it around the object. Yeah, photoshop can be used to create the maps.

The way I see it, there are two distinct ways you could go about this, the image based solution, or the geometry based solution.
Both have advantages and disadvantages, which is best is up to you, depending on whatever end goal is planed for the model.

Image Based
This solution will use one or several image based textures mapped all over you surface.
Advantages

It is relatively easy to achieve
It can be light weight because it doesn't require additional geometry or objects
Relatively standard workflow using well known common texturing techniques
You can use a photo based textures to spare the trouble, or for added realism
You can use a custom made vector-based image textures (from say an illustration program like Inkscape or Adobe Illustrator) for added accuracy
Will easily allow you to add scratches grunge or wear, if you want to give it a worn out aged look
Exports well to other applications like external render engines or game engines

Disadvantages

Requires image based textures (which can consume a lot of memory for high resolution quality)
Image based textures don't work well for high contrast details like text or line art, so it will likely require several very high-resolution images for closeups, which will be memory intensive
You will likely have to manually unwrap your meshes for proper texture coordinates which requires additional work, and may be difficult to guarantee accurate dimension relationships.
A good UV map will require proper topology, and/or carefully placed geometry elements with correct rotation orientations to get good real-world texture proportions correctly.
You can simplify by using generated texture coordinates if you don't need to  export the model, but it will still require separate geometry elements with correct transform orientations to get good real-world texture dimensions correctly.

Geometry Based Solution
This solution will use text and/or bezier curve objects overlayed all over your surface for details. This will work well if you designed the console yourself and already have (or are willing to make) vector based drawings of the prints and surface details yourself. Can be imported as SVGs from illustration or vector drawing applications.
Advantages

Very high degree of quality and accuracy
Sharp details, well suited for closeups
Depending on required detail may consume less memory than several high quality textures
Good for a clean "shiny new" look (like product rendering)
Easy to edit and tweak, can be modified directly in the 3D View
Suited if you already have vector illustrations or CAD drawings of the prints
May be optimized with instances for repeating geometry or similar parts
Compatible with different materials, using separate shaders for LEDs and lit parts or color prints.
No need to fuss around with UV mapping or texture coordinates
Poor topology tolerant

Disadvantages

Heavy geometry based solution, may result in high poly count, and/or high number of objects
High poly and poor topology are likely less suited for exporting to game engines, or real time visualization
Non standard workflow (poorly documented, harder to find help online)
Less suited for "non vector" details like scratches, grunge or other weathering effects (may still be added as an overlay).
May require additional manual work designing vector masks
Geometry produced by bezier curves will have intrinsically ugly topology

Hi Duarte thanks for your reply, Its surely is very descriptive all the information you mentioned. do you have any links to tutorials which show the difference in both techniques. because I'm a novice Blender user, I'm confused under what category would these tutorial titles fall under.

First technique is basic texturing, its is a very common and well documented worflow you will find plenty of tutorials covering. Second one is mostly done outside blender and as stated is probably not well documented aside linked answers

Just to add to Duarte's great answer.
If you're not sure, follow real world examples.

Text is usually printed flat onto a plastic board - use image texture for that.
Ridges on buttons are like 0,3 mm deep - use normal maps/bump maps
Knobs and buttons are large - use real geometry

Example:
Take a random fader console. Add real buttons, and use the image as a texture.

Original image

Hi Jacym thanks for your reply. I found a Blender tutorial which shows the instructor exporting the UV  layout to an image editor (PS), types all the text and ads icons, and then imports the text layout into blender and maps it onto his keyboard. So is this the correct way?
This UV mapping technique starts at 22:00 if you care to have a quick look. (and of course scroll quickly through it )
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UznzJP6UW6k


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Modelling Advice Using Boolean
I spotted a tutorial on YT, modelling a keyboard Synthesizer. The Instructor (which actually says in the beginning is a novice blender user)is constantly using Boolean Operation to cut into the main shape, saying that Ngons wont matter, and if using another method loop cuts to make quads would take for ever. So would it be any benefit of me watching this tutorial or would it lead me astray from correct 3D modelling approach? Or are the Boolean cuts safe to use as long as there is no subdivision surface modifier applied to the mesh?
Thank you.

Advise using booleans? Avoid them as much as you can, and learn how to model without them.

There is a great exercise that I came across from a YouTube tutorial by Josh Grambrell who demonstrates a great way to work with Booleans in a non-destructive workflow.
link here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LdQwmfPyuw0
But more importantly to answer your question a little closer, the youtuber gets his reference from an Artstation blog post by Frank Oczur Jr. who talks about different workflows using including subdivision modelling exercises. I'll post he link as well.
https://www.artstation.com/frankpolygon/blog/M7w7/sub-d-hard-surface-modeling-v-block-exercise-amp-tutorial
I won't try explain it myself as I'll probably butcher their work but both are really good reads and a video to watch which might help answer your question.
Hope this helps

There are many use cases where the Boolean modifier can be very useful for hard-surface modelling, when used appropriately. The big benefit is that complex shapes can be created non-destructively. Applying modifiers is a destructive operation. Using it as a go-to method for modelling with boolean modifiers is not a good approach. Without cleaning up the topology, it will most likely not be possible to work with subsurface modifiers.
There is no rule/law that says you cannot ever apply boolean modifiers or use n-gons/"bad" topology in your model. However if you're just starting to learn 3D modelling, it's likely beneficial to learn how to create proper topology first and then later when it's not necessary to.
If you're interested in hard-surface modelling then I recommend watching the videos by Gleb Alexandrov and Aidy Burrows, specifically the Boolean Modifier 2.8x video. The videos are a free update to their (paid) hard-surface modelling course for 2.79b and therefore a bit fast paced, however they contains plenty information about boolean modifiers.

For everything I have seen & heard, having a good topology is better. For the immediate model it may make no difference, but it is best (if possible) to do it right.
If you are using this to just learn Blender, then I find one of the best ways to learn is to apply your knowledge, rather than just following along. So follow the tutorial, however use loop cuts instead of boolean modifiers and discover the differences. You may take a lot more time, but I find you also get a better sense of achievement.

Thanks for the comments, I think I'd rather take a more correct path towards modelling. I was experimenting using Boolean and if your mesh has subsurface applied to it, the Boolean just created a mess. Ill be looking into those tutorials with Alexandrov.
https://ibb.co/0ZV02Y6


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Modelling Top Surface
I'm modelling a bottle shape. And when I add the subdivision modifier the top and rear of the bottle has its surface seem pinched non smooth (although I have added shade smooth). So I delete the top face, select the vertices and do a grid fill which can be seen in the image attached. But when I increase the viewport quality in my subdivision modifier the top of the bottle seems more square than circle.
What's the best modelling tip so the top of the surface doesnt make that pinched surface?
Thank you.

The idea is to isolate areas of topology where the interpolation of normals (used by smooth shading) might screw the illusion of a smooth surface from parts of the model where it matters - from places where curvature has to be kept even.
Either:

I inset the flat top region, and
CtrlR cut a loop around the neck and slide it
up towards the rim

Or:

CtrlB Bevel the rim with (e.g.) 2 Segments and
a Profile of 1,which has the same effect.

Now the thin triangular faces are in a flat area, all have the same normals, so no interpolation
Or....
... you could do the bevel with a Bevel modifier, targeted by angle .. or edge Bevel Weight, so you can adjust the bevel later.. you could split the normals for shading alone without adding any geometry or subdivision, by going to the Data tab and checking 'Autosmooth' .. or..


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Material causing outline on Mesh
I'm trying to UV map on a different section on my model. So I separated the mesh, and assign the same material which I made, just under a different name because it's already using a UV image on another section of my model. Once I add the UV image, I adjust it accordingly but its causing some type of border which I can see. Where is this coming from?
Thank you.

Hello :). There's no need to separate the mesh - just add another material slot and assign the material. This looks like normals issue, caused by the separation.

I wanted the bottom section where it's green to have the same material like the above. So I duplicated the material and all the nodes were the same. So I tried to put another UV image texture in the green section. And because the nodes were the same, it would delete on the above image RED section too, I thought that by making a duplicate of the same material  wouldn't affect the faces I choose but it was getting affected the whole mesh. So I separated the section and use new material and add the same UV and it wouldnt affect the rest of the mesh.
https://ibb.co/NYzVHmr


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Pixelation on my UV image text
I've added my UV texture, and I can see white pixelated borders around my red text. What's causing this?
also below are the nodes I'm using, The text is supposedly going onto a screen surface. which isn't so realistic, any ideas what other nodes I can use to give it some screen surface feeling? I've seen some internet suggestions which are overkill over 10 nodes to get what's meant to be a realistic glass reflection. But I'd like a bit more minimal node composition if it's possible to get a nice result.

It's cause by your reference image, which is an png image I guess?
PNG(Portable Network Graphic) is not just a simple algorithm but an image storage solutions bucket. There are two main way to implement the thing "Transparency". And you might choose the simpler one:

If I use PNG-8 bit(paletted method) I will got the strange White border. That is actually coming from matte color since paletted method only allow one transparency value instead an alpha channel. When I choose PNG-24 bit(true color with alpha) we get a better image without border.

So you need to redo that image to make the border show as an actual color. Or you can also use your image as alpha material socket input to reduce the white border effect.

Ah... my image is made from Photoshop if you want to know. I am pretty sure GIMP got the same option to deal with saving PNG.

Thanks for your reply, I tried PNG 24, and still getting the same result.

Found a great solution, in the node editor:
Change from Linear to Closest in your Image-Node, and it works perfect.

@blenderbreath great idea, Blender use interpolation between those non-opaque color (which should be white as default?), you might want to upscale your png file if you want a smooth edge and no white border. Also you can answer your own question, that is a good practice

Found a great solution, in the node editor: Change from Linear to Closest in your Image-Node, and it works perfect.


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UV texture getting replaces by another image texture
hope everyone is well during these difficult times we're going through.
I have a logo which I want to map onto my model. I have marked the seams, even separated the mesh from the model, made a material, just for the specific location which I want to map my logo. But when I do the UV mapping, the UI text is getting replaced by the logo. What am I doing wrong?
Thank you.

Hello :). You need to assign the new material to only the selected faces: https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/516/

On a different note.. Sobibor? Hope it's not for a Polish client :)

Hello Jachym.
Thank you for your reply. Yes it did work, I choose new faced and added a new material by duplicating the already existing one, just renamed it. And if this was client work, I think this would be a very unhappy customer lol. I was watching a move called escape from Sobibor when the idea came to me. Kind regards.


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"Bump" node glitchy?
Trying to compile a PBR shader in Blender 2.83.4. The CUDA optimization is set for
both the processor and graphic card (AMD Ryzen5 3600 and GeforceGTX 1660). Plugging several masking nodes into the Color channel does not load the GPU too much(although I can feel some minor slowdown). But when I plug in the BUMP node - everything starts to lag and the GPU load peaks to 100%. Surprisingly enough it is the same for 2.91 ALpha. But when I open the same scene in 2.8 - everything is lightning-fast. Friends, maybe you have had the same issue? Is it hardware,driver-related or just a bug, they made after version 2.8? Is there any workaround, because why roll back to the older version if the new ones should be more stable?
Thank you.

Try going into eevee renderer, performance and untick the high quality normals.

2.9 Alpha (not even beta) is not going to be more stable, as is still work in progress. Some things break on "experimental versions", or might be buggier. Release versions are in general more stable.

@Mobin yeah, I did not even turn it on. Interestingly enough - this slowdown starts with version 2.81. In version 2.8 everything compiles very fast - I don't even see the process of shaders compilation - they fire up right away.

yeah I have the same slow downs in one of my blend files too. it uses bump. I think you should report this.

The answer from bug report team: "This was an intentional change in 2.81 in order to improve the quality of the bump node. While we do continue to work on improving performance in general, potential performance improvements are not handled as bug reports.
To improve performance, consider using less complex geometry, simpler shaders and smaller textures."  - In other words Bump node in Eevee is unusable and it's not gonna change in nearest future. Stick with Substance for texturing.


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What is a 8, 4, 2 and 1k texture?
I read about this for GPU computation and limitation. I don't know what it is...

Those are the sizes of the textures
1K=1024x1024px
2K=2048x2048px
4k=4096x4096px
8K=8192x8192px

the K stands for kilo, meaning 1000x
the number stands for approximate horizontal resolution in pixels

So 4K means roughly 4000px wide image. This also means 2048 × 858, 2048 x 1024 or
2048 x 2048 are all 2K resolutions.
Textures usually have 1:1 square ratio, but that isn't a rule. For example an HDRi texture for equirectangular mapping will have 2:1 ratio with 8K refering to 8192 x 4096.
In contrast resolutions like 1080p, 1440p, etc. refer to the vertical pixel count.


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Need help with basic armature stuff
I´m a newbie with blender and this is probably very basic stuff I´m asking, but I really can´t get my head around this. I have a snakelike mesh I would like to slither in place like a wave but having two fixed points in the start and in the end of the mesh. How should I make this?  How do I make the fixed points? Thank you!

You already have the snake mesh, create a bezier curve, bend it in edit mode so it creates the pattern in which you want to slither it. Add the Curve modifier to the snake and choose the bezier curve you just created for the modifier, play around with the axis parameters. Once you get it right just move the bezier curve up and down (or back and forth), you'll get the slither.

Nice answer, already.  The question required the two end points to be fixed. One way would be to add a couple of shape keys to curve, with fixed end points (pretty much simply a  mirror),  and animating via shape key instead of moving curve.

@batFINGER I tried 2 points: I selected all the vertices of the cuboid (snake) except the ends which need to be fixed at one place, I assigned 100 weight to those selected vertices (red in weight paint mode). In the curve modifier I selected the curve ( as usual) but this time also selected the Vertex group, theoretically it should work but it is giving me weird shape.


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edge blur in cycles render
Having trouble with unwanted edge blur in cycles render. No motion blur is enabled.
Thanks for your help,
Rick

Need more information. Looks like it might be JPG compression. What does it look like in the Render Preview view.

You are probably displaying a zoomed-in render result. In the UV/Image Editor window, where your render is displayed, go to View > Zoom 1:1 (equivalent: Numpad 1). That should fix it.


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very simple Z Normal axis rotation
new to Blender, so please forgive if obvious.I have been looking for an answer on this....
Goal: Simple object (e.g. cube) , once rotated 45 degrees, can have rotation on its Z Normal animated.
I have tried using constraints, but not getting anywhere. I have tried parenting to an Empty. No luck.The object still wants to rotate on the Z of Global. Thank you for your help.

Let's see if I understand: you have a cube that is not aligned to the XYZ axes:

If you want to rotate it along its Local Z axis, then you only have to do R, then Z twice ("Rot: along local Z" appears in the status bar):

However if you want to animate the rotation of the object through keyframes, you first need to set its Rotation mode to "Quaternion":

That's the result with the default Rotation Mode ("Euler") and "Quaternion":


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Creating many primitive objects quickly with Python
I'd like to be able to generate a bunch of primitive objects. All of them will be different sizes and have a material out of a random set.
What I'm having trouble with is the following:

Creating 20,000 primitive objects quickly
Creating a set of different materials where I can assign the primitive objects to

Here is my code so far:
import bpy, random
from random import randint

#Short hands for common calls
scene = bpy.context.scene
selected = bpy.context.selected_objects
mesh = bpy.ops.mesh
context = bpy.context
object = bpy.ops.object
selected_object = bpy.context.active_object

clouds = 500

def baseObject(x,y,z):
    #Creates base cylinder
    mesh.primitive_cylinder_add(location=(x,y,z))
    return

def clearScene():
    #Clears the current scene
    for selectedObj in bpy.context.scene.objects:
        selectedObj.select= True
        object.delete()
    return

def ObjectCreation(clouds):
    for attempts in range(clouds):
        x = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        y = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        z = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        baseObject(x,y,z)
        context.object.scale[0] = x/10   #X Scale
        context.object.scale[1] = y/10   #Y Scale
        context.object.scale[2] = z/10   #Z Scale

        materialCreation()
    return

def materialCreation():
    #for attempts in range(scale):
    randomRed = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)    #Used for random color scale, need to adjust later for color mapping
    randomGreen = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)
    randomBlue = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)

    material = bpy.data.materials.new("Material")    #Material properties
    material.alpha = round(random.uniform(0.1, 1.0), 10)    #Opacity
    material.use_transparency = True
    context.object.show_transparent = True
    context.object.data.materials.append(material)  #Applies material properties
    context.object.color = (randomRed, randomGreen, randomBlue, 1)  #Changes objects color(RGB Opacity)
    context.object.active_material.use_object_color = True
    return

clearScene()
ObjectCreation(clouds)

Adding 20,000 cubes will not be quick.

Is there a way to optimize it?

Is every single object unique?  Or are you going to have a bunch of different cubes, toruses, cones, etc.

For now, it would be a bunch of cylinders with different sizes, positions, and materials.

You could always link some of them instead of making separate objects -- probably save some memory.

Instead of using the operator to create the mesh each time you can use a copy and link it to the scene. Try and avoid high amounts of operator calls Python performance with Blender operators .  They have the tendency to bloat out because of the undo stack, for one thing.
The operator is called once to create the primitive, then a copy is used for each iteration.
Created a list of 10 random materials.  Each object mesh will have one randomly selected material from the list.
import bpy, random
from random import randint

context = bpy.context
scene = context.scene

def base_object():
    #Creates base cylinder
    bpy.ops.mesh.primitive_cylinder_add()
    return

def clear_scene(scene):
    #Clears the current scene
    for obj in scene.objects:
        scene.objects.unlink(obj)
        bpy.data.objects.remove(obj)
    return

def object_creation(scene, clouds):
    base_object()
    obj = scene.objects.active
    mesh = obj.data
    nummats = 10
    random_mats = create_material_list(nummats) # create 10 random materials
    for attempts in range(clouds):
        x = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        y = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        z = round(random.uniform(-4.0, 4.0), 10)
        obj.location = (x, y, z)
        obj.scale = 0.1 * obj.location

        red = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)    #Used for random color scale, need to adjust later for color mapping
        green = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)
        blue = random.uniform(0.0, 1.0)
        obj.show_transparent = True
        obj.active_material = random_mats[random.randint(0, nummats-1)] # random pick of random mats

        obj.color = (red, green, blue, 1)  #Changes objects color(RGB Opacity)

        # copy the next one
        obj = obj.copy()
        obj.data = mesh.copy() # a new mesh for each object.
        scene.objects.link(obj) # link it to the scene
    return

def create_material_list(len):
    #for attempts in range(scale):
    mats = []
    for i in range(len):
        material = bpy.data.materials.new("Material")    #Material properties
        material.alpha = round(random.uniform(0.1, 1.0), 10)    #Opacity
        material.use_transparency = True
        material.use_object_color = True
        mats.append(material)

    return mats

clear_scene(scene)
object_creation(scene, 1000)

A similar question answer How can I create many objects quickly?
Might also want to check this out https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/42232/15543
If you stick with CamelCase for class names you will get better formatting.

Using your object_creation results in creating 2 objects at a time but it slows down the overall process. I tested with 50 objects with the old function which ran for 6 seconds compared to yours which ran for 2.39 seconds.
Your function does have a linear speed compared to mine which drops the longer it runs which might be caused by memory.

And for 1000 objects?

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


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Wrapping a flat plane around a sphere
What I'm trying to accomplish is to be able to wrap a plane of objects onto a sphere. Think of it as a plane of varying heights. How should I approached this? I've tried using x and y wrap modifiers but it isn't looking correct.

Do you mean something like what is done in How to animate morphing a rectangular plane into a sphere?

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


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soft body simulation Object contains another Object
I would like to simulate soft objects, where an object with certain physical properties contains another object with different physical properties. Think of a t-shirt wrapped by a plastic bag.
The problem is, that these two objects don't interact with each other, they don't collide, even if I active collision on both (same collision group). The object keeps moving out of the bag.
What I have done so far:

The pastic bag is a hollow object. (soft body active, collision active)
the T-shirt is placed inside the bag (soft body active, collision active)

The soft body simulation of the objects works as expected, but the inner object moves out of the outer object, that's the main problem.

Related : https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/81992/29586


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How To Move Bones Back Into Original Position After Applying Shape Key
i'm trying out bones and rigging and i've run into a little problem. I used 2 bones to move the blender monkey's ear and applied that as a shape key. However, the bones are now in that bent position but I want them in the original position so I can apply a different shape key. Is there any way to move it back in place without manually doing so or deleting the shape key? Thanks in advance

Is it? I believe they have the same solution but this is a more niche case? I'm new to this whole "StackExchange" scene so I don't know what the proper etiquette or procedure is. Should I delete this post?

Please don't delete duplicates.

Try this

Select the armature and go back into pose mode.
Select the bones you want to reset and hit alt-r to reset rotation
and alt-g to reset position

Thanks for the response.What keys do I need to press for the "-"? Because just pressing "r" is the rotation key bind. I'm new to Blender so I'm not that familiar with all the key binds and stuff.

Nevermind, it works with "Alt-g", "Alt-r", and "Alt-s". Thanks so much for your help

I am sorry, I didn't notice that it didnt render my text right. I edited the answer to make it more clear


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how to Viewport mimic?
I am using two viewports, one with a render display filter, one displaying solid for editing. I want the viewport of the render view to mimic the rotations of my view that I'm editing in. Is there a way to parent my views?

You can use a camera view. The perspective "camera" is not accessible.

Create a camera.
Set both views to that camera.
In the editing viewport press N to open the properties panel, then check Lock Camera to View.

When you manipulate the view in the viewport, you will not exit the camera, but change its transformation.

Thanks, for the work around. It works but the rendering border is a little annoying to look at

@MrTom You an zoom in before locking the camera to view.


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NLA Editor, only top track is working
PLEASE can anybody tell me, why in the NLA Editor onloy the top track is activ, so the motion from bottom tracks is not shown?
THX

Hello, you don't give enough information, could you share your file on https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/ or at least show some screenshots?

I cant upload on "blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com". May I send you an Email?

My name is Andreas, my Email Adress cit0105@yahoo.de

in https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/ you need to enter the URL of this page then upload, it should work

I tried again, anyway, I cant find the solution to the problem.

In NLA Editor only top track is active...

This is my first visit in a forum, so I dont know the procedure..... :)

try on wetransfer

This is a little dated, but for anybody having this issue in the future, I finally found out how to fix this issue..
I have been trying to use the NLA Editor as a generic timeline to construct my animation, so I have a huge amount of actions and an endless amount of tracks in the NLA Editor. I finally found that in order to get each track to play simultaneously (sp?) no matter it's track position, you need to
1) Hop over to the "Active Strip" options (Press N, then go to the "Active Strip" area
2) In the "Extra" dropdown menu, select "Nothing"
3) In the "Blend" dropdown menu, select "Combine"
That's it! Just make sure to do this with each action strip and everything will work good.... Note: You have to select the Action Strip itself, not the Track

This answer is for the old Blender (before 2.8).
For anyone who wants to know the answer to this:
Try turning off all star-symbols in the NLA editor,
and de-selecting any actions selected in the action editor by clicking the "x" button beside the action's name. (Tip: press the "F" button before clicking th e "x" to save the action.)
Note that action-stash tracks won't play, even though their action strips look just like any other action strips. You have to add actions to an NLA tracks (and not action stash tracks).
10:22 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weMes839wlc
And here's a great tutorial:
https://tab.gladly.io/search?q=500%2F4&src=ff65
The NLA editor can be so confusing... The guy in one of the videos even says this.
I hope this helps!

Thank you for this! I was stuck in Blender 2.9 with only one Action strip playing at any time due to only one white star being select-able. I had no idea I can press that white star once more to unselect it so that all the tracks can play together!

@YusufIsmail You're welcome. So.... is NLA editor in blender 2.9 easier/easy to use than in Blender 2.7?... I've been wondering this, but kinda sounds like... not really? :/


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Blender 2.8 how to keybind pop-up menu
In Blender 2.8 when you click for example z it brings up a pop-up menu.
There are different options to choose from and these have keybinds assosiated with them, from 1-9.
I took a look through the keybinding settings but didn't manage to find a way to edit these default keybinds, anyone know how to change them?

for me, your question is rather unclear. In 2.79 AND 2.80 i get a pie menu when hitting "z" in the 3D viewport. It is named differently (from "Shade" to "Shading") and there are different options now, as the whole viewport shading changed in itself. But its still the same?
To change keyboard shortcuts, go to "Edit" in yout top toolbar and then to "Preferences". In the new window, change to the "Input" tab. There you can change every possible Blender command to your liking.

For reference, those types of pop-up menus are referred to as 'pie-menus'.

as far as I am aware the only way to change those bindings is by modifying some python files. those number are being assigned to the menu automatically in base of the order the calls are made. it kind of doesn't make too much sense but there is a specific order in which are assign. the first 4 calls will always be the S,W,E,N points and so on.
so in order have your favorite menus calls with the keybindings you like, you need to change the order of the lines.

added some duplicate lines that creates number 7 and 9

If there is another way I am not aware.. you better of learning how to do your pie menu and use that IMO.
the file in question of the Z pie menu in Blender 2.80 is space_view3d.py. you can find it in blender configuration inside the script/startup/bl_ui folder.
mac path will be
Application/Blender_2.80/blender.app/Contents/Resources/2.80/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_view3d.py

I am not on windows right now but that will be something like
C:\\Program Files\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\startup\bl_ui\space_view3d.py

I highly recommend that you buy the "Edit Pie Menus" add-on. It's $16 and allows you to configure ANY menu, and create any menu, including pies, in a very intuitive way from within the blender interface or within the add-on's own interface. No more scripting needed.
You can also do all kinds of cool stuff to personalise your menus, including colour coding/icon buttons which is a neat psychological trick to trigger memories more effectively.
It's regarded by many as the most handy of all add-ons and I can see why.


text:
How to create an edge between 2 selected edges?
I'm a 3dsmax user, I'd like to ask how in Blender, we can "Connect Edges".
Please don't confuse it with loop subdivide (https://docs.blender.org/manual/ko/dev/modeling/meshes/editing/subdividing/loop.html).
I don't mean an entire edge loop. I'd just like to connect select edges. I've attached a simple image explaining it.

Connect Edges with 3DSMAX. NOT edge looping(CTRL+R)

The second answer in the duplicate looks just like the linked video.

In Edge Mode, select the two edges you want to connect, and W > Subdivide, (or  W S).
If you're looking for an effect similar to the 3DS  'Pinch' and'Slide' you can get somewhere near by connecting edges as described with one cut, selecting it, and using CtrlShiftR (Offset Edge Slide) for the pinch, and an ordinary GG for the slide, Not quite as flexible, there's an extra edge in the way.. but it's quick.
As always, it's worth checking out the options for these operators in the tool region.

Thank you for the tip on the pinch\slide. It takes time to get my head wrapped around Blender's workflow.
Yea I got to get used to the information overload for Blender's UI. Thanks for the "tool region" tip.

It's possible by subdividing edges, the resulting edge will be the one you're looking for.

Select 2 edges sharing the same face but perpendicular to orientation of the edge you want to get (as on the first screenshot from your question).
Press W > Subdivide.

Note: there are Ngons as result of this operation; they might or might not be what you want to have, just beware if you're going to subdivide mesh with Subsurf or alike.

oops.. we seem to have given exactly the same answer at exactly the same time :)

Understand about the Ngons. This is just a simple example to illustrate the question. Thanks for this!

In the Edit Mode. Select the Top and the Bottom Edge and Press W and select sub-divide.

Thanks for the animated gif showing it. Very helpful for new users to Blender! Love the community :)


text:
Make Fluid Invisible for amount of time
Hellow, short question:
How can i make the Fluid domain invisible for specific duration?
I started the fluid simulation on frame X so i need to get rid of the cube for the first X frames. Im using blender 2.8 and noticed i can keyframe the render button, but this doesnt seems to work correctly. Im not into shaders that well so i dont know how exactly i would make the material transparent without killing the current material setup ( its basicly just the principled bsdf and no real "setup")
Would be cool if someone could get me a hand here

I think animation of visibility is still missing/broken in 2.8 https://developer.blender.org/T58187

aaw to bad, thx anyway :>

I'm voting to close this question as off-topic because it is about missing functionality in experimental version of Blender


text:
Whats wrong with my faces
I have imported an svg file for the word media, however when I add faces to it, it also adds faces to the gaps in the letters "d" and a"". Why is this and how do I solve that ? Thank you.
Amit

Please add images and more detail on your situation so we can help you. Edit your post to do so.

What do you mean by "why is this and how do i solve" without any image reference

If you just select the whole mesh and press F, Blender won't be able to know what's supposed to be holes and what's not, and it will fill everything. So create some additional vertices and fill the faces one by one with some F, except what's supposed to be holes:


text:
How to make a knight helmet face?
I want to make a knight helmet, and the face part of the helmet comes to a point in the middle and i'm not sure how to go about doing this.

Here's one approach:
Create a mesh circle with 8 points in the side view:

Scale it to get the profile you want:

Delete all but the bottom corner of it:

Go to the top view and make an 8 point cylinder and align it with the circle from the side view:

Then go back to the side view and scale it so that it matches your quarter circle mesh:

Subdivide the vertical edges and then drag the points to the right and down to match your profile:

Go to the top view and delete the edges on the left half:

Delete the back faces:

Select the vertices in the back and snap them even with the right side:

Add a Mirror modifier:

Grab the middle vertices and pull them downwards:

Select the edges to the right of the middle:

Subdivide them:

Select the new edge and do Edge Slide to move them right up next to the middle edge:

Add a Subdivision modifier, and you can see we've got that pointed crease in the middle:

If you then go to the front view and pull up the middle verts a bit:

Then go to the side and delete these faces:

Select the upper row of edges:

Subdivide:

Select the new edge and Edge Slide it up near the top edge:

And that's got you pretty far along on the top visor already:

You can do the bottom similarly, but it's almost straight, so you wouldn't need as many edges.  Just make another cylinder in top view, cut it in half, mirror it, and move the edges where you want them.

I hope that's enough to get you going.  Sorry if it's too much detail as I don't know your modeling skill level.  Good luck!

You, sir, are awesome! I could say "this is just what I was looking for", but it's in fact better!


text:
How to see the actual commands blender runs
I'm writing some scripts for applying textures and got into troubles.
The commands showed in the info window seems to be only a part of the commands actually runs. I copied the demonstrated commands into a script to do the same things as what I do manually, but the script just fails. I guess it missed some commands setting the context.
So how can I see all the commands actually runs?
In addition, how to see the content of '...' like this

Consult the docs
What you are seeing in this instance is an object property. Blender uses operators as "command" clearly recognizable from bpy.ops. namespace.
For the case shown::
It has ID object of type screen (bpy.types.Screen) an instance bpy.data.screens["Default"] akacontext.screen  and a property name of texture_context
This means we can find it from the screen object following chain of collections or pointers screen.foo.bar[0].blah.texture_context where none of foo, bar, blah will be an ID object. It is this chain that can be abbreviated to "...". Without can produce ridiculously wide tooltips.
(Reminder to self) Before pecking about aimlessly in the python console why not consult the docs.. Using the right click and view docs outlined here will take you directly to the help page.
Searching the old** API manual using just the property name.

we find that texture_context is a member of bpy.types.SpaceProperties as shown in tooltip.  A space belongs to an area, an area belongs to a screen.
You set the space of an area when selecting the editor type, in this case we want the area of type  'PROPERTIES', aka the Properties editor which has an  active space of type SpaceProperties  (tip can toggle an using area.type = 'PROPERTIES')
Scripting
Here is an example using the py console (bpy.types.SpaceConsole).
>>> for i, a in enumerate(C.screen.areas):
...     if a.type == 'PROPERTIES':
...         i, a
...         break
...
(1, bpy.data.screens['Scripting']...Area)
# bpy.data.screens['Scripting'].areas[1]

>>> a.spaces.active.texture_context
'MATERIAL'

>>> space = a.spaces.active
>>> space.texture_context = 'WORLD'

If your script is going to be invoked from a button or menu in the properties area, can use.
space = context.space_data
# or
space = context.area.spaces.active

albeit this may seem convoluted, you'll find blender follows a pretty consistent data structure.
** Note
I believe this property has been removed from 2.80 and searching the new manual will direct you to the API changes page.

run blender with the command line options of
--debug-wm

Which will give you a bit more output for the window manager and operator calls,
--debug-all

Which will dump just about everything
there are few more specific ones listed in the documentation
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/advanced/command_line/arguments.html

For the debug, just open the Blender console (Window > Toggle System Console): everything you do is reported there, and the print() function outputs there as well (so if you need to check the value of a variable 'var' in your script, just write print(var) and run the script).
For the second question, i don't have a full solution, but you can usually find the path you need by right clicking on the button/checkbox/fiels/etc... and then choosing "Online Python Reference" or "Edit Source". These will open up the Blender Manual or the actual code for that asset, which (again, usually) have the path you are looking for


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Attempting to render animation with no visible results
I'm sorry if this is a painfully obvious question, but I have created an Icosphere whose size varies based on an audio input I have baked in. I'm hoping to be able to render a video of the ball changing sizes with the audio source, and then composite that video onto a different video I have. However, when I attempt to render, I get no visible results. Here's the settings:

And here's what it looks like when I'm rendering it:

And here's the output visual:

Can anyone give me some tips about what I'm doing wrong here? Thanks!


text:
Switch from Armature Weight Paint to Hair Weight Paint?
In Weight Paint mode, how do I switch from painting the armature to hair?  I am stuck on armature, and want to paint emission instead.

Weight paint mode doesn't paint "armatures" or "hairs". It paints "vertex groups" which are used in any way, may it be an armature, particles, objects relationships, modifiers influences, ...
So, to make it simple: you just have to choose which vertex group you want to work on, from the vertex group panel in your object data tab:

Thank you!!  I really appreciate your help


text:
How to engrave text without boolean modifier?
As the boolean modifier messes up my image texture and cannot re unwrap. I need to find another way of engraving my text.

Subsurf + displacement...don't have time to write an answer ATM...

If you can't reunwrap you are limited with tools in Edit mode which do not change UV layout (like dissolving instead of deleting, loopcut etc). If this isn't the best way for this case then it might be wise to add fake letters with height map and not change any geometry

How do I go about achieving this with a height map?

Have you tried the Boolean modifier or Mesh-->Faces-->Intersect (not as stringent)  Once booleaned, separate the inner mesh from the impaled object. This will take the outer mesh back to a near distortion-free state.  It's not perfect but with lighting, what distortion may remain can be concealed.  Other than that, masking the outer surfaces of the text so it appears to be cut into the impaled object, and yet still see the extruded text's inner surfaces might be another way to tackle this.  Masking doesn't touch the mesh at all.  Texturing the inner surfaces with bumping roughens them up also.


text:
How to seperate by loose parts without blender freezing and crashing?
Trying to get my single object to split into multiple by using "by loose parts" but as soon as I click it, blender freezes.(I've let it sit and run for 8 hours and still hasn't worked) it has a ton of geometry (over 3 million on all) but even when I just select a few thousand vert, faces, and edges it still freezes

It most likely means your hardware is too low end to allow Blender to work on that amount of geometry; probably OS is trying to swap as many resources as possible on hard disk hence it freezes but it doesn't help in the end. Without more details about your hardware and OS you use it's probably the only thing which can be claimed with certainty

I'm suing an i5, gtx960 on windows 10.

You can try to roughly select half mesh, press Ctrl L to select linked, P to separate selected vertices, and then separate each half by loose parts, allowing Blender suffer half.


text:
Trying to make my smoke simulation look like this
But not quite with that much speed and force. More so lingering out of the vents
https://youtu.be/wka3sM1cm0s

Never tried to use smoke but I just did it and it's quite easy. you put your object domain. your object flow and then a force-field wind (shift+A). you set all in physics. I put some objects in front with collision on (still in smoke settings) and it's doing some turbulence but you can make change the value of the strength of the wind. you put a first key and then in graph editor in N menu you add noise modifier or something like this to change your value randomly
you can add a vortex force too with a negative strengh to put more mess...


text:
Can you put Multiple physics simulations in one scene simultaneously?
Trying to add multiple smoke simulations running at the same time in 2.8. but only one will render at a time

In your physics settings, go to the cache tab and choose free all bakes
Once you have done that choose Bake all dynamics. That should do what you need.
FYI: If you want your smoke simulations to interact, the easiest method is to have them in one simulation, else it becomes tricky. Someone else may have a way to do so but this is the best method I can think of.
Good luck with your project and I hope I helped,
BFB

Tried baking all dynamics and its acting real wonky. Quickly flickering between all the simulations but never show more than one at a time


text:
how to generate more "gusts" of wind with the wind force field?
the noise amount is on max but i'm still not able to get the quick short random bursts of wind i'm looking for. is there a way to increase this amount or a better way of achieving this?

Another way to do this would be to use a noise modifier on the f-curve of the strength value. Like he does in this video, but do it with the strength value instead of x/y location.

Maybe you've already thought about that but you could simply keyframe the Strength value of your wind, going, for example, from 100 to 1000 or whatever, then use the NLA to repeat this as a cycle. It looks like creating a Noise modifier in the Graph Editor doesn't have any influence though...


text:
how to convert an "empty mesh" to low poly with high detail
my object is a 3d scan and is basically a shell with a mesh and image textures. i've heard about retopo but the problem is i don't have a model to retopo on. just a shell. is there another way to convert this to low poly but keep the detail?

what do you meane by "empty" mesh or shell?

as in the mesh is hollow as you can see from the underside of the photo. if i was to delete all vertices my entire model would disappear


text:
why are the edges of uv unwrap blurred? and how to fix

i used smart uv project and then baked and this is what happened

The blurred part in your image is create around the outside of boundary of each UV island when you bake. It is called the margin, and is used to hide/minimise various texture sampling errors that can occur around seams in some renderers.
You can control the size using the margin setting in the bake settings panel under output (in your screenshot it is set to 16px).
You may need to reduce this value if your image is low res or your islands are very close together to avoid overlap.
You can also control how much space there is between your islands when you make your UV layout, see https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/editors/uv_image/uv/editing/unwrapping/mapping_types.html

That worked for the bluriness however its left me with black spots all around my uv Map. Not just on the edges now

The margin is intentional, and you generally don't wan't to remove it entirely, or you can get aliasing issues around the seams in your bake. It is likely that there are problems in your unwrap, you may want to play with padding/margin values there, see https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/35137/unwrap-with-margins-space-out-islands for example.

When you created the uv unwrap, there´s an option: "padding", set to zero. Re-do paint job. Or scale Uvs.

Where is these options located? I can't seem to find them


text:
bevel shader not appearing in 2.79 on Mac
I have seen tutorials showing the bevel shader in Blender 2.79b. I cannot get it to show up in the shader menu even after doing a fresh install of Blender. I wonder if it is a Mac issue. I am running Mac OS high sierra 10.13.6, AmD FirePro D700 graphics cards. In the shader node editor I am going Add:Input... bevel shader should appear between Attribute and CameraData but it doesn't.

Cycles Bevel Shader is an experimental feature introduced after the release of Blender 2.79.
It is available in experimental trunk builds post release but not in official ones.
It is to be introduced to general public as a new Blender 2.8 feature as stated in the release notes.
It should also be used sparingly since it is computationally heavy and resource hungry. In most cases it is preferable to use geometry based solutions since it is cheaper to render then the shader, unless you encounter issues or glitches with complex geometry.


text:
How to remove or join two areas with python?
I’m trying to remove a specific area from the screen. There doesn’t seem to be a simple .remove, so I looked for other options.
I found this (How to join two areas using python?) which would have worked fine, but the operator changed in 2.8, so it doesn’t work anymore.
Is there a good way to remove an area with a script?

Somewhat related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/161725/what-context-should-be-passed-to-screen-area-move-to-make-it-work/161786#161786

@batFINGER This seems to work for moving areas but I can't get it to work for joining.


text:
Run function on material node tree update
I need to run a function when the user adds or removes a node from a material.
My first idea was to use msgbus to subscribe to bpy.types.Nodes. This works great for adding nodes but isn't called when a node is removed.
The next thing that came to mind is to track changes when the dependency graph is changed, but adding an app handler for that has the same effect. It works when nodes are added but not when they are removed.
Is there any way to track these changes and call a function when it happens?


text:
Display Value of a nodes RGB input in a panel
I have a Mix RGB node and want to display the input in a normal panel in the UI.
I can show the color widget by using layout.prop(input,"default_value"), but what I want to do is to just show the Value of the input. This would then show a float input instead of the color widget.

Use the indexed element, eg red is index 0

For array properties can display an individual element in a layout.prop(...) by specifying the index of the array element.  Eg for the red channel of mix color input input.default_value
layout.prop(input, "default_value", index=0)

The color node socket input has a type 'RGBA'
def draw(self, context):
    layout = self.layout
    # node for testing
    node = bpy.data.materials["Material"].node_tree.nodes["Mix"]
    input = node.inputs["Color1"]
    col = layout.column(align=True)
    for i, c in enumerate(input.type):
        col.prop(
                input, "default_value",
                text=c.upper(),
                index=i)

What about using a label?
I haven't tested the following, but something like this:
value_string = "({:.1f}, {:.1f}, {:.1f})".format(
                                    input.default_value[0],
                                    input.default_value[1],
                                    input.default_value[2])

layout.label(text=value_string)

This just displays the different values. What I want, is to display the Value as in HueSaturationValue as a layout.prop(...)

There may be a better way, but what about creating three new float properties and having some python set the node color when they are changed?

Yeah I guess that'd be possible, I hoped there was a better way, but maybe I just have to do that.


text:
Display UV-Map node input in panel
I want to display the .uv_map property of a UV-Map node in a panel, the same way it looks on the node.
I tried layout.prop(node,"uv_map"), but that simply adds a text input which isn't what I'm going for.
How would I display this properly?

UILayout.prop_search
Test code, draw method, looks for all uv map nodes on the active object's active material nodes, adds a prop search to each listing all the uvmaps on the objects mesh.  The search data is the mesh, the search property is "uv_layers" and the name of each layer is displayed in the prop search menu.
def draw(self, context):
    layout = self.layout
    col = layout.column()

    obj = context.object
    me = obj.data
    mat = obj.active_material
    nodes = [n for n in mat.node_tree.nodes if n.type == 'UVMAP']
    for n in nodes:
        col.prop_search(n, "uv_map", me, "uv_layers")


text:
Armature duplication causing problems
I'm currently learning about rigging, skinning and animating, but I've run into a problem with a part of my armature. The scale, rotation and position of my mesh and armature on right side has been applied, I've duplicated the armature for the arm, hand and fingers, mirrored it to the left side on the X axis, but for some reason a part of the arm is twisted. I tried resetting the rotation, scale and position using Alt + G, R, and S, which has helped, but it's still not right. To begin with, the arm was twisted round like a sausage. This is what it looks like now:

If you've given your forearm an IK constraint, you might need to play with its Pole Angle value to correct this kind of twist

I don't believe it has. I'm following a book on character creation. There is an arm pole, but the book never said about parenting it to anything, though the right arm is perfectly fine. It only mentions adding an IK target at the wrist to control the arm.

I'm not sure to understand, if there's an arm pole, it means that you must have given your arm an IK constraint, please check and try to play with its Pole Angle value. If it's not that, please share your file: https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/

I'll upload my save as I can't see where I've gone wrong or what to try.

https://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/b/5522/

You need to correct the IK Pole Angle value of your forearm:

First, select your armature and in the Properties panel > Data > Colors go back to Default Colors so that you can see where are the constraints. You can see that your forearms have an IK constraints (green bones).
In Pose mode, select its right forearm (the one on our left) and go in the Properties panel > Bone Constraints. Now play with the Pole Angle value to correct the rotation. You often needs to do this after giving an IK constraint so that Blender knows how the bone is supposed to be oriented.


text:
How do you restore previously tracked footage?
I've recently reformatted my PC, and once I reinstalled and loaded my Blender file back up, the trackers were still there, but the footage wasn't. I tried to reload the sequence back up, but now that the footage is there, the trackers aren't. Though they do appear in the camera's view in Object Mode. How do I go about reasigning those trackers to the footage?
Thanks


text:
How would I connect these up...?
I'm a bit confused as to how I'd connect these up. Basically, I parented the eyes to the H.eye, so where the targets are moved, the eyes follow. However, if the head is rotated too far, the eyes will bulge out due to their lattices staying in place. I've tried mixing and matching by parenting the lattice to the head, the eye, the target etc. in order to get both to follow the head and the eye target naturally.

First, make sure you're in pose mode with your armature. Then, still in Pose mode:

Select both your eye's lattice objects (it will turn back on object mode, no worries)
Shift select the head's bone (it should switch automatically to pose mode, otherwise do it manually)
Hit CtrlP → Set parent to Bone

This way your lattices are following the head's bone.
The only remaining advice I would give you is to use a constraint Child Of on your C_look_target bone, to make it parented to the head's bone.
That way, the eyes, and their target will follow the head, as well as the lattices, which is usually more practical to use when posing.
When you will need to move the head while the eyes target stay still, simply animate the Child Of influence parameter from 1 to 0, and vice versa when you need the opposite behavior.

Excellent. Thank you. That's done the trick nicely. :D


text:
How can I get rid of this bulge?
This bulge on the glove has appeared whilst I was adjusting my hand and arm armature. I figured it was just down to messing with the Weight Paints, but after trying, I could only reduce it slightly. How can I get rid of this?

Thanks

A blend is good, but ideally blend files should be supplemental to good question content, e.g. a detailed description of your problem and screenshots to illustrate your points. We ideally want people to be able to answer the question (or see if they have the same problem) as easily as possible.

https://blender.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/2449/what-is-the-problem-with-posting-an-image-or-link-and-asking-how-do-i-do-this

Okay, I’ll be sure to make the problem more clear in future. Thanks for the heads up.

You should have added that picture; I'll bet a hundred would know in a second. It's the inside of the glove poking the wrong way. It's weight is too strong and possibly to the wrong bone. It's outpacing the outside of the glove (assuming it's a glove specifically) and moving faster than the positive-facing normals. That gray strange color is the dead giveaway; those normals are flipped and display like that when you haven't enabled 2-sided. (I'm glad you didn't enable 2-sided or it wouldn't show up so clearly.)
Less weight will reduce your swelling. That will keep the gap between outside and inside from inverting. Depending on your needs, you might paint that portion to another bone? I understand the problem but can't tell you the perfect solution for you.

Thanks for the suggestion. I’ll look into it today. I did try and reduce the weight yesterday, but the swelling only reduced so much. I’ll make sure it’s to the right bone as well and check the normals.

I'm afraid I'm still not able to fix it. The glove has weights in the D_hand.R and D_forearm.R groups, but applying a weight of 1 (red) only reduces the issue somewhat, but doesn't clear it completely.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but do you have both your FK and IK showing at once? I'm trying to clear the pose and recreate the problem but then think, how about Clear Transform: All, piece by piece? Finger Poles. I reverted to the file you sent me and cleared ONLY the blue, like: H_finger_5_ik.R and when all cleared, the bulge is totally gone.

I don't quite follow. With a FK, does that have to be set as a Constraint like IK? I don't see it on the list. Or I take it that by default, without IK applied, it uses FK automatically...?
Thing is, using Clear Transform or resetting the blue IK poles resets my pose, either completely or the clenched fist.

Okay, I think I'm on the verge of fixing it. :) I cleared the transforms for the blue IKs and I'm re-positioning them more carefully and tweaking the weights whenever the bulge starts to form.


text:
Is there a way to isolate an area of a mesh when Weight Painting?
Is there a way of isolating a particular area of a model whilst Weight Painting? When in Weight Paint mode, and you can see your entire model in blue (0) is there any way of being able to focus on the part your working on without everything else obscuring your vision and potentially getting painted as well?
Hiding parts of the model in Edit Mode has no effect in Weight Paint mode - they just reappear. I know you can paint areas within Edit Mode, but I'd like to do it in Weight Paint mode with my tablet.
If there is a way, how do you go about doing it?
It's quite frustrating when you've spent ages painting an area to get just right, you accidentally get paint on another part of the model, and then you spend ages trying to find out where and why a part of the armature is causing a strange mess up.
Hope this is informative enough.
Thanks

Using the button I have highlighted in the screenshot will basically translate what you see and have selected in edit mode, to weight paint mode.
So if I hid the top rim of the cup in edit mode, with that button enabled it's hidden in weight point mode.
You will need to have whatever faces you DO want to paint on selected however.

Thank you. This is just what I needed. :D


text:
Model won't render
Not sure what's going wrong here, but for some reason I can't render my character; I just get a blank image plane. I don't believe my camera and scene settings have been changed, so I'm not sure what the problem is. I even tried adding a new camera, but that didn't work either. Does anyone have any ideas?

You have an image in video sequencer:

Remove it, or turn render from Sequencer off

Bingo. That's done it. Must have been from my previous render before I altered the model. Thank you. :D

Other problem now is that my renders are dark as though there's no light. The layer with my light is selected and it's enabled in the outliner.

@DustyShinigami please, ask one question per tread.

Solved my same problem!


text:
View Layers Panel
I have a relatively simple Blend for testing: a couple Suzanne's and some text. I want to be able to render either just the normal image, or the depth map image.
In the Compositor, I've created two Render Groups: 1 to render the depth map ("Depth Map View Layer Render"), 1 to render the normal image (with background image) ("Normal View Layer Render").
What The Manual Says about the View Layer Panel: "Use for Rendering - The active view layer will be used during rendering."
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/render/layers/layers.html
What Actually Happens: Whichever View Layer Group I have selected in the Compositor gets rendered (OR if NEITHER group is currently selected, then the last selected group), regardless of which View Layer is active in the View Layer Panel.
Note: selecting the Render Single Layer option in the View Layer Properties panel has no effect on which group gets rendered.
What am I missing? Yes, I can accomplish what I want, but is this "normal" behavior? [I've never tried this in previous versions).
Blender Versions: 2.81 and 2.82a

Hi. Please make the title of the question specific to what you are asking and not just the general topic. Thanks.

Short answer: You are using 2 Viewer and 2 Composite nodes. The one which is currently active (red vs grey) will be rendered. Only put down 1 of them and you are good to go.