text:
Printing special characters and latex using python script for geometrical diagram labeling
I am trying to create figures such as this:

Or this:

This clearly requires text to be linked to objects. In addition, there is a large requirement of special characters which would most easily be handled if latex could be used to render the font used to make the text object.
I have found the following links which point me towards a direction:
SE python script text
Latex python text
However, the latex solution does not appear to work for me. I am unable to find the settings php file they claim is installed under the root folder in my ubunutu desktop, and windows is unclear as to where this file may be.
The second, perhaps minor requirement is that I would like to do this using a python script, such that the figure can be recreated easily without the ble der file, and some text performs all of the required steps.

would you need this to be dynamic? ie, if you annotate a graph, the text stays rotates towards the view/camera ... not just a single overlay to be used as a final composite step on top of a render.

I would like it to be dynamic if possible.  That way if you would like to distort the object in any fashion - such as moving the 2D image into the 3rd dimension - the labels will follow the portion of the object with which they are associated.

Unfortunately the is no LaTeX mode for the TextEditor to spit out Mathematical notation. Best and least work I can think of is still quite involved (calling nodejs from python to render latex as svg files and importing those). Then there's the dynamic update part which is a bit easier would be custom script until you get enough examples to think about writing a module for reuse...  I totally understand why you might want this btw, and have experimented with similar myself. -- but I'm not aware of any ready made solutions.

blender isn't matplotlib, but it could definitely approach the same feature set if enough people cared out loud.

:( OK.  I did see that special characters can be put in with chr() in python here:  http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/4801/how-to-write-all-characters-in-a-font-to-a-3d-text-object?rq=1  Is there a way to do greek letters like that? I have been searching for a table that would map the desired letter to the number required, but idk if it exists.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Unicode_characters#Mathematical_Operators - but you need to load a font that supports them...  https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/unicode.html read

Trying to do something similar, I found a potential solution.
You can create a tex file, convert it to a dvi file, and convert that to an svg, which blender can import via bpy.ops.import_curve.svg(). The result will be a collection of curve objects rather than text objects, so you'll have to do any text-related styling from the tex file itself, but if you're working with scripts, that might be easier anyway.
As a starting point for doing this in python, I used functions defined around line 300 of this github file (related to quite a nice math animation YT channel, incidentally). The functions themselves just pass commands to other utilities that do the actual work, but they show a process that could be used to get from tex to svg. tex_to_svg() is the core function, from which you can follow the flow to other functions as you make sense of things and adapt to your needs.
The needed utilities are pdfTex (for tex->dvi) and dvisvgm (for dvi->svg).


text:
How can I make an object transparent in material preview mode for viewport shading?
I am using a material as reference for my modeling. Im therefor using 'material preview' mode as viewport shading. Is there a way to make the model transparent so i can see the reference behind it? Or is it better if i use reference planes instead in solid shading?
thank you!

You could enable the In Front option of your reference image, and also lower down its Opacity:

Result:

I not currently using a reference object. But a plane with a material. I'll switch over as its probably alot more convenient that way! thanks!

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
Viewport rendering with bpy is not using the correct shader
I have a blender scene set up with a script attached that rotates an object, renders an animation, saves the frames, then repeats:
import bpy
from math import radians
from mathutils import Euler

track = bpy.context.scene.objects["BezierCircle"]

for angle in range(8):
    angle = angle + 1
    # set output
    bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].render.filepath = 'C:/Users/Evan/Pictures/BlenderSprites/Angle' + str(angle) + '/'
    print(bpy.data.scenes['Scene'].render.filepath)
    # change camera angle
    new_angle = radians(angle*45)
    track.rotation_euler = Euler((0, 0, new_angle), 'XYZ')
    # change viewport settings
    view3d = None
    for area in bpy.context.screen.areas:
        if area.type == 'VIEW_3D':
            for space in area.spaces:
                if space.type == 'VIEW_3D':
                    view3d = space
    print(view3d.shading.type)
    # render viewport
    bpy.ops.render.render(animation=True, use_viewport=True)

This part is working. However, the images produced are being saved using the "RENDERED" shading, not the "SOLID" shading that I have selected in the GUI, despite print(view3d.shading.type) outputting "SOLID".
I figure this may be because I'm using ops.render.render instead of ops.render.opengl, but ops.render.render uses the setup I already have configured, which is much nicer.
Is there any way to easily make ops.render.render use SOLID shading?

Do not pass the  'use_viewport=True' argument while calling bpy.ops.render.render() function. Use bpy.ops.render.render(animation=True). Another error might be that you are not using keyframes for your animation. By using rotation keyframes, blender can animate in better ways.  For additional debugging, you can save the final output in a blend file. Open the blend file using GUI and you can understand what is going on.

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


text:
import Mocap Json into Blender
I have a Json file that has, for each frame, a cam coordinate and the poistion of each bone from a skeleton (see screenshot). I was wondering what was the quickest way to import it into blender ( like applying it to a skeleton for instance).

Thx.

Possible duplicate of https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/118822/is-there-any-way-to-import-a-json-model-into-blender

hmm it's not quite the same at this user wanted to import model stored in json meanwhile I want to import mocap stored in json.

What does the "positioning" of a bone look like, is it a quaternion with four values ((0.707, 0, 0.707, 0))?

yes, 4 position times 2 for each bone, it is the data format coming out of openpose. I'm currently perusing how to export in bhv from openpose at it seems a easier but under developed at the moment.

Did you come up with a solution.  I would also like to use openpose data in blender or iclone

Just found this it converts openpose data to bvh. MocapNET https://github.com/FORTH-ModelBasedTracker/MocapNET


text:
Blender .fbx to unity. textures not working
So i`ve made a low poly tree and make the tree crown using an object info and a color ramp.

The problem is that when i`m exporting the model to unity the only texture that shows up is the log witch is a flat color, the crown goes grey.

I`m new to unity and exporting, so sorry if this is a simple question. And aalso sorry for the bad english


text:
Can tracking data from Blender be exported to use in Fusion?
I’m new to blender and resolve and was curious if it’s possible to do the tracking in blender and then send tracking data in some way to resolve to use in fusion? If so, how?

Have you tried alembic or fbx already?


text:
Why doesn't my render look anything like my camera view?
I am having trouble trying to figure out why my render isn't appearing like my camera view. All objects that need to be seen are checked on.
I would greatly appreciate any help whatsoever. I've attached a screenshot of my situation. The left is my render result, and the right is my camera view.
Thank you so so much!

Looks like the volume is turned off for viewport rendering...?

Right the Cube Volume and Cube Volume.001 are hidden in the viewport, but active in the render. You can deactivate them in the render by clicking on the camera icon in the outliner.

Do you have your lamp setting way too high?


text:
Problems updating the context within a loop? C.scene.update()
I'm using these loops to change the location of an object (I need to see how this object interacts with other objects in the scene when it starts from different locations).
Anyway, based on what's printed, the object's location is not updated in every "loop" repetition. It wasn't updating the location at all, I added the bpy.context.scene.update() line, and now it's only updating it once, so the output is always the same two coordinates (x=3 and y=2).
for ix in np.arange (3,50,0.25):
    for iy in np.arange (2,50,0.25):
        bpy.data.objects["Ball.004"].location[0] = ix
        bpy.data.objects["Ball.004"].location[1] = iy

        bpy.context.scene.update()

        loc_ball=bpy.data.objects["Ball.004"].matrix_world.translation

        print(loc_ball.x, loc_ball.y)

How do I need to update the context (if that's the problem)?

What I don't quite get is what you're trying to accomplish, since multiple updates of the location will just be the same as setting it to the final location at once. If you intend to script an animation, you'll also have to set keyframes on the location and increment the frame.

In terms of what I'm trying to accomplish... I didn't copy the entire script here because the rest didn't add much to my question, but after the code I copied up there there are a few additional lines that get the coordinates of another object and copy those coordinates in a txt file. The idea is that I want the "Ball.004" object to hit a second object so the second object ends up at a specific location. That will happen only when Ball.004 starts from a few specific locations. I'm trying to find what the coordinates of those locations are.

Sorry I was mistaken. np.arange works correct.

What do you mean by "hit"? Do you intend to use rigid body physics? In that case your approach doesn't work, because of the aforementioned reasons.

Thanks for the suggestion, @rjg Yes, I'm using rigid body physics, but... I have the feeling that this could be related the keyframes as you suggest and I'll try a couple of things next, but what I'm trying to change is the initial location of the ball and that shouldn't be related to this, should it? After this, I'm copying the final loc of the second object, for which I understand I need to set keyframes. Indeed, I have a line in my code that does that before I copy the coordinates of the second object (bpy.context.scene.frame_set(bpy.context.scene.frame_end + 1)) and that works fine.

@cildpolay if you're just trying to set the initial position, why don't you just set it right away? If you want to animate Ball.004 to hit another object using rigid body physics you need to assign its location at a specific frame a keyframe, so that it actually move there at that specific time when playing the animation later on. bpy.context.scene.frame_set(bpy.context.scene.frame_end + 1) is just setting the current frame, not a key frame. It's also a bit weird, because you set it past the final frame of the playback/rendering range. Not sure if that's what you want.

You were right, @rjg I was getting the last frame to get the coordinates of the second object at the end of the animation. The solution was to add a line at the beginning of the loop (bpy.context.scene.frame_set(bpy.context.scene.frame_start)) to go back to the beginning of the animation. Thank you! thank you! thank you!

Does this now have anything to do with your original question?

Honestly, I'm done with this problem since it's working now, but blender doesn't make much sense to me anyway. So, I had the bpy.context.scene.frame_set(bpy.context.scene.frame_end + 1) line to get the coordinates of the last frame and that was, but still the bpy.data.objects["Ball.004"].matrix_world.translation was stuck not in the last frame, but in the first frame of the first loop repetition..

@batFINGER yes. Sorry if the comments don't make sense. rjg and I deleted a couple of comments before so hopefully that didn't make this conversation confusing

Given the unforeseen cryptic nature of this question, will  leave my answer as is, since IMO it answers the question that was asked.

Maybe use matrix_parent_inverse * location
Not sure what the issue is here.  The three values "np", "xx", and "tr" in test code below correlate.
Using mpw * mpi * ob.location avoids a scene update for each iter.
(of-course if our parent inverse isn't Identity only the "xx" and "tr" values will match)
import bpy
import numpy as np
from mathutils import Matrix
ball = bpy.context.object
mw = ball.matrix_world
mpi = ball.matrix_parent_inverse.copy()
mwp = ball.parent.matrix_world if ball.parent else Matrix()
for ix in np.arange (3, 50, 0.25):
    for iy in np.arange (2, 50, 0.25):
        #mw.translation = mw * Vector((ix, iy, ball.location.z))
        ball.location.xy = (ix, iy)
        print("np", ix, iy)
        xx = mwp * mpi * ball.location
        print("xx", xx.x, xx.y)
        # required or matrices don't update in loop
        bpy.context.scene.update()
        tr = mw.translation
        print("tr", tr.x, tr.y)

Last few results
np 49.75 49.0
xx 49.75 49.0
tr 49.75 49.0
np 49.75 49.25
xx 49.75 49.25
tr 49.75 49.25
np 49.75 49.5
xx 49.75 49.5
tr 49.75 49.5
np 49.75 49.75
xx 49.75 49.75
tr 49.75 49.75


text:
Blender 2.8 - all non-rendering objects gone from viewport but still exist
I remember there was an option in pre-2.8 for "only render" option to display but where is it in Blender 2.8+.  I must have hit some terrible hotkey something.
All object such as camera, fields, empties are all invisible in viewport.
Anyone know what hotkey or checkbox that controls this?

Did you unselect the Show Overlays button


text:
How to be able to turn linked lights from another scene on and off in render?
So I have made a "master scene" with two different light setups. I have a collection in there with lights for lighting buildings and another collection for lighting characters.
I want to be able to link this light scene into files where I have my characters or buildings and turn on and off the light setups I need for the render. (I don't want to append the lights because I want my lights to be updated all the time in all character/buildings files I have them linked to in the future.)
However, when I link the light scene into my files, I am able to turn on/off visibility of the light objects in the viewport, but I am not able to turn off "rendered". It's greyed out.

How can I solve this problem? Do I need to make 2 different light files?

There are some override operations you need to carry out so that various properties can become editable.
Here is a more complete, terse answer, but basically...
First make the library override for the data block via the RMB for the object in the Outliner panel:

Start with the top of your hierarchy that has the link icon, and you may only need to operate on the top parent, as Hierarchy implies "all children".
In additions (more complex items) you may have to do a second operations to make overrides Editable, probably not in your case:

Also note that if you linked the scene instead of the master collection, nothing is editable.  You'll either have to click on the link button to make it local:

or you can create a Linked copy of the scene, where you will be able to do your overrides.

Thanks for the answer.
However, blender gives me an error message: "Could not create library override from data-block (OBLight_Back_Buildings), one of it´s parents is not overridable. (SCLights).
"SCLights" may refer to the scene here, but I am not sure.
None of my lights has a parent, so I´m a bit confused here why I get this error message. And if it refers to the scene itself this makes no sense to me, as the sole point of making an override, is to override individual objects of the linked scene.

@liese -- So I think when you linked, you linked the Scene instead of the collections.  I've added to my answer how to compensate for this (create an editable scene); hopefully solving your issue.

True, I linked the whole scene. I got it to work now, by linking specific collections I need. To not have specific linked collections show in render, I use the "exclude from viev layer"-tick in the outliner. Also important to still be able to touch the button "exclude from view layer" after linking is to turn off the tick "instance collection" when linking.

I was able to solve my problem by not linking the whole scene into my new file, but instead linking the collection, in which my lights are.
Also it is quite important to have the tick at "instance collection" when linking it in.
After having the lights collection in my scene, I still can´t turn off the little photo button to exclude it from render, but intstead I use the tick called "exclude from view layer".
A workaround for beeing able to turn lights on and off individually, is to have them in collections individually (in the source file).  Because the little tick only is available for collections.

One solution is to play with lightgroups from Blender-3.2 and Cycle Engine (eevee doesn't support lightgroups)
Ok, imagine having 2 files, the Master and the Slave.

Master will contains your lights and defines some lightgroups
Slave will link and use lights from Master according to your needs and will define lightgroups too

1. Master
- modify Scene Pty:
    > Passes:
        > Light Groups
            create 2
            + 'Buildings'
            + 'Characters'

- add Light.000 and edit:
    > Object Property
        > Shading
            > Light Group
              select 'Buildings'
    > Object Data Pty (Light Icon)
      set some color

- add Light.001 and edit:
    > Object Property
        > Shading
            > Light Group
              select 'Characters'

    > Object Data Pty (Light Icon)
      set some other color

2. Slave
File -> Link your 'Character' lights from Master, then:
> Scene Pty:
    > Passes:
        > Light Groups
          create 1
          + 'Characters' (!! SAME NAME !!!)

render the scene
Compositing:

    > Render layers Node:
      link the 'Combined_Characters' slot to Composite 'Image' slot.

Some pictures:
1. Master 3D View with 2 Lightgroups:

2. Slave 3D View with One Lightgroup and linked lights:

3. Slave Composite View using Lightgroup 'Characters':

That's all folk!


text:
How can I reset sculpting in Blender?
I am pretty new in Blender and I am working on a wrestling match. My question is, how can I reset a sculpt? A character took a side punch to her belly and I made with sculpting a punching/hole/impact effect. But I want to reset it to go further to the next shot.
I am so new that I don't really understand all the options and where to find them all.

If you want to come back to the previous shape you need to use shape keys, the basic shape key being the default shape of your object

Can i just find it or do i need to make it? Because i don’t really get it. Sorry, i am not really familiar with blender

In the Object Data panel, under Shape Keys, create at least 2 shape keys, select the second one and put the Value at 1, never modify the first one so that you keep the original shape:

In Sculpt mode, change your shape as much as wanted:

Back to Object mode, now you can switch from the basic shape key to the second one, if you need animate, just put some keyframes on the Value:

ah yes, it worked but i'v found a second problemXD. when i try to sculpt. the sculpt won't work so i apply the subdivision and then i get a error. (modifier cannot be applied to a mesh with shape keys).

It's not clear why you can't sculpt, do you mean that your object had not enough topology? In that case, yes, give it a Subdivision Surface modifier and apply. As you can't apply a modifier if your mesh has shape keys, you need to remove the shape keys, apply the modifier, then give it shape keys again

A quick question, do you maybe have discord? It’s much easier to talk to if you want to ofcours

Sure, use this one and ask for moonboots:  https://discord.gg/E6wXbR7A5S


text:
How would you approach disembodied eyebrows?
I recently started to dig deeper into animation and modeling of Nintendo's characters and I was wondering how they animated the disembodied eyebrows of Toon Link. What would your approach be? Did they change the texture of the whole head or maybe used simples planes that change with the facial expression?

(source: cbsistatic.com)

You can draw the face with the Grease Pencil. I'm not sure if and how it will work with this style of hair. Have a look here: https://youtu.be/7o5JGXU-V2Y

My guess would be it's a simple mesh placed in front of the head mesh (like a mask) and the eyes and eyebrows are a texture with alpha/cutout. And it is set to always render in front of the hair, even if it "should" be behind. I think in blender you can set something to always render in front of everything else, but I don't know if there's an option for this type of 'selective' render in front (cause it only should render in front of the hair, not other objects). Of course It could also be done with simple meshes for eyebrows, but it would still need to always render in front of the hair.


text:
Adding a keyframe to different object inside of armature animation causes entire object to move
I have an armature animation set up. The armature animation works perfectly smoothly.
I add an object to the scene, and add a location keyframe from this object to the armature animation.
As soon as I play this animation with the new keyframe, literally the entire armature mesh moves INSIDE of the new object I just added.
There is no parenting relationship between the two as far as I can tell-- this happens even immediately after I add a new object.
Am I doing something wrong here? This is completely baffling to me and I don't understand what's happening at all.
In addition, when I press ctrl+z, the weird displacement doesn't fix itself until long after the initial keyframe-adding is reverted. It has to also undo several seemingly unrelated actions before everything is back to normal.
Please help-- I have no clue what's going on.


text:
why is the entire object is following one face when i scale or move it?
hi im new to blender and i would like to know how to move the face im selecting and not have the entire object followenter image description here

Well, based on the shape of your inset, your object has non uniform scale. Select it in Object mode then press Ctrl+A and select "Scale". This might not be the problem, however, but needs fixing nonetheless. Its hard to tell, but in your image it looks like there may be faces selected on other sides as well. If  that's not the case (and just a trick of the image), my last guess is that you have proportional editing on - press O to turn it off.

thanks, proportional editing was ON so that solved it


text:
Active scene camera reverting to Amature?
When I select the active camera in the scene everything looks ok, but when I go to render the image the camera is at a weird location (the origin?) looking up at my character.
I've set the camera in the Scene properties panel, but when I hit F12 the Camera changes to'Armature' weirdly, which is obviously not even a camera.
I tried deleting all the cameras in the file and recreating but no luck.
Anyone know what is going here??

You might want to spice up your question with some screenshots, namely Object View, Outliner and Render result. You can also share files via https://blend-exchange.com/.

OK I solved this, when scrubbing through the timeline I noticed the scene camera also switched to 'Amature'. At the bottom of the timeline it was showing a little camera icon with Amature next to it.
This is a marker which is used to set the active camera during rendering and animation. Select the icon and then go to Marker > Delete Marker and it will get rid of it.


text:
How can I repeat an object at specific locations?
I want to build a bus, and repeat the passenger seat object. Array does not work, because the required locations are not regular. I need the seats at specific places.
How can i repeat the seat on several specific, defined locations?

thank you very much. is there somthing similar for Blender 2.79b?

I'm very rusty on older versions but you should look into dupligroups which is pretty much the same thing with the older hierarchy system

you can use Instancing > Vertices or Faces on a subdivided edge or face loop, or even Particlesystem > Hair on vertices

You can use Instancing: Create a plane made of a series of faces, rearrange them the way you want (as you don't want a straight line), in the Properties panel > Object > Instancing, enable Faces, then parent your chair object to the plane:

If you want to make each object independent, select and CtrlA > Make Instances Real.
A pretty close solution would be to use ParticleSystem > Hair with your object as hair.

Thank you very much. ill do instancing on vertex, as instancing on face implements rotation for some reason.
Instancing on Empty Objects would be better to handle though.

yes Gorgious' solution is good too. Instancing on vertices won't take orientation into account, Instancing on faces will


text:
Smoke Simulation in Blender 2.92
Disclaimer: I'm pretty new to blender, most things I say are mostly based on observations.
So I was trying to make a Smoke + Fire simulation in Blender 2.92. The goal is to have a (UV-)Sphere emit smoke and fire in the shape of a cone. After researching, I followed the official docs and added some nodes based on this question. I checked if the domain is actually a domain object and if the flow is actually a flow object and both of them are.
The problem I'm facing is that the smoke and the fire go in the wrong direction (at least from what I can observe). Rotating either cone or ball does nothing, the smoke just moves on an almost two-dimensional plane.
Please download my .blend file since I can't upload images yet because I don't have enough reputation yet.

i worked with your file and i very easy because The smoke domain can only be a cube or a Cuboid.thats your are not able to get a desired result.Your have to make your domain as cube and cone to effect in the physics tab.I also made some changes to your file my adding noise to our object (sphere) if you don't want it you can change it.Also make sure that you make change in object flow type(sphere) to inflow.
Read this post below....
Why isn't smoke flowing with the shape of the domain?
your blend file


text:
Is there a Musgrave Texture color output in Blender 2.9?
So I needed a plane to have bumps and while researching, I came across this question, which answered my question pretty much. As I followed along with the second answer by Nicola Sap, I saw that his Musgrave Texture node had a color output and mine did not. He was, AFAIK, using Blender 2.80 and I am currently using Blender 2.92. Is there a way to have a color output on a Musgrave Texture node or do I need to use something else to accomplish the same thing?

From the manual of version 2.80:

Outputs
Color
Texture color output. It is grayscale, all three RGB components are equal to the value of the Factor output.
Factor
Texture intensity output.

So you can just use the factor output as you would have used the color output, it makes no difference.

Be careful !! The factor output can be negative (which may be a problem if used in a bump map, and will cause artifacts if plugged into a Roughness input), while the color output is always a positive array of 3 or 4 values. The solution is to use a map range node or a clamp node afterwards to restrain it to positive values

I only have a Height output, is that OK too?


text:
UV map not applying on Object
I am trying to build my own spaceship according to the spaceship tutorial created by BlenderGuru.
However, there' s a problem with the UV map I have created for the spaceship.

As you can see, I have already added the image to the node editor and connected it to a displacement socket and added the image to the UV image editor.
I am clueless what might cause the problem. Maybe you could help me to solve this problem.
Here' s an additional image of the UV map I've created for the spaceship.

Here is the .blend file:

Try to enable "keep UV and edit mode mesh in sinc" and select the areas on the mesh which you want to have Displacement map on them, then make sure they are fine with the UV Texture(layout)

In the image I added, the UV map is correctly placed over the object. :S

Did you tried to add Displacement through the Displacement Modifier ?

I tried, but it doesn' t give me the look like there was in the video. By the way, I am sure he didn't use displacement modifier in the video. It must be done some other way. I must have missed something important..
The video is here: youtube.com/watch?t=1811&v=06A_l95vJWw. Watch it from the 30th minute.

I think I know, did you subdivide the mesh? displace only works on geometry that is there, no vertex to move = looks like it does not do anything?

Duplicated Material output node
Even though it seems to be one, if you try to grab it and move it slightly you should discover that there's another one just behind it.

When you have multiple material output, Blender set as active the last selected of them. As in your setup Shader/Surface and Displacement are in different output node, you cannot see both effect at the same time.
Delete one material output node and plug the cables in the other.

Oh. Damn. I feel so ashamed now. I didn't know the problem is caused by this..
I truly thank you all for trying to help me and Carlo, thanks for your solution. (still feeling so bad that the problem had so easy solution)..

Try adding a UV map node and plugging it into the image texture's vector input.

For more on texture coordinates see this answer.

Thanks for the solution, but as weird as it seems, it doesn' t work for some reason..
I am really confused now. What might have caused the problem for me...

@TheLast_BlenderBender  Well, beyond this it's really hard to tell what's wrong without seeing the actual file.

I added the file under the comments of my question.

In the texture tab, do you have UV mode selected?
for nodes you will need to use the output from the object
node UV

I sincerely apologize, but I didn' t understand your solution...

Using uvs with non node materials is just as easy as selecting Uv in the mapping section.

using Uv in the node layout means you need to start with a node(geometry? or object?) to get the uv cordinates to begin your node graph, I dont remember the name of the node,

No. apparently it doesn' t change anything, Igor

post a picture of your full node graph?

Hmmm.. That' s weird.. In the BlenderGuru tutorial he just connects it to the displacement socket.
The video is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=1811&v=06A_l95vJWw.
Watch it from the 30th minute.

The node graph is here: http://gyazo.com/4f82b4ff6831fe76f0108fa05b7c300e

see the input vector? on the node connected to displacement? try connecing Uv output from the Geometry node to that.

also, is the node material selected for the object in materials tab?

Hmmm.. Can' t find a way to a connect it to geometry node..
And yes. The material is applied to the object.

just add the geometry node, drag from UV to Vector?

also, a displacement map is usually baked, I am not sure what that UV map would do?

Hmm. I am not sure, but it doesn' t work..

I just baked a displacement map, and set it up as a modifier, and it's not behaving correctly.

ok, I can get a modifier working using a uv map,
http://www.pasteall.org/blend/37438

I will try using nodes

@BluePrintRandom It sounds like your answer is for BI, but I think the OP here is using Cycles.

yeah I was just testing what I know, before I tried to apply the same maps,
to nodes.

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


text:
Moving a layer behind another one to apply a glow effect
I've been creating a spaceship and I am now trying to set up the compositing nodes. For that, I am using pass indexes for materials, so I can change the effects in compositing nodes and i am having 3 different render layers: spaceship, afterburn and one more layer for slipstream.
I've been trying to place spaceship layer in front of afterburn so the glow effect of the afterburn would be exactly behind the spaceship and wouldn' t affect spaceship layer itself.
However, I can' t understand what I am doing wrong. Connecting two layers (spaceship and afterburn with glow effects) into mix shader's image sockets and spaceship's render layer alpha wire into the same mix shader's Fac input nothing happens. The spaceship layer doesn' t get placed in front of afterburn.
Here' s also an image for summarizing my problem. In other words, the glow of the afterburn affects the spaceship:

Here's the source file included:

In render tab, film options just click "transparent" to get alpha

Think about accepting answers. http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/35096/uv-map-not-applying-on-object

Oh. Sorry for that and thanks for reminding.

Oh. another question, if I may. I added another scene that contains Earth to that project and added another render layer of the planet Earth into the same compositor as you can see in the previous picture.
However, I couldn' t find the "Film" option to check "Transparent" for the planet scene to use the alpha input. My question: how can I set the transparency for the Earth layer in seperate scene?

Here' s the source file again. Don' t mind the crappy space picture though..

it's probably a blender internal scene. Go in render tab/Shading/Alpha:transparent

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


text:
How to fix Sprinkles in rendering?
Just started out Blender, and as my first project, I made Blender Guru's donuts. The problem is, when I go rendering, there are A MASSIVE amount of sprinkles, quite different from the Viewport. Here are some screenshots:

You can find the file here!
Any help is appreciated!

You have enabled Interpolated children in the particle settings, which means every sprinkle will spawn new sprinkles. If you set children to None and activate Show Emitter to render both sprinkles and the icing it will look just like in the viewport.

That solved the problem, thanks. But now I have another problem, the icing isn't showing anymore

@Jojo you need to enable Show Emitter.


text:
Self Collision - Blender Cloth Sim shrinks mesh
I have been searching for days and have not been able to find an answer to this question.
I have a simple model.  A thin cube with default collision physics applied and a plain 1x1 with default cloth physics applied.  I checked self collision, leaving this default too.
I get the below result only a few frames in.  It is like the mesh shrinks rapidly.  I have relaxed the stiffness. lowered the weight.   Also rendered with out self collision fine....I can not seem to work out why this is happening.
I have a sub divide on the plain with 6 steps...!  lowering decrease render time but doesn't help the shrinking.

Most likely your cloth vertices are self-colliding with their neighbours due to the Self Collision Distance being too large.
Firstly, when running a simulation always ensure the meshes are created at 'real world' scales - eg, for a bedsheet you might assume 2 metres a side (or 2 Blender Units). Ensure you Ctrl+A and 'Apply Scale' following any changes to scale - to ensure the simulation is using the correct scale.
Secondly, reduce the Self Collisions 'Distance' property. At Blender 2.83.2 this defaults to 0.015 metres (1.5cm). If your vertices are closer together you may want to reduce that value.

hello Rich Sedman, can that also solve this question? https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/192115/self-collision-breaks-or-shrinks-the-cloth-if-the-mesh-has-dense-polycount

Hi @Michael - yes, it does look to be a very similar issue.

and something i hate is that you cant set a lower value than 0.001 in the setting of both object and self colission distances...that you would help more rather than having to scale up the object to real scale...

It can be a bit annoying - although for the simulation to be realistic (using real world gravity, real world mass, etc) it’s kinda necessary. Also, it is to specifically simulate cloth for visual purposes and has been optimised for those scales. Using extreme values can cause internal rounding issues and so I guess it tries to limit the inputs to something that isn’t going to cause a problem.


text:
Change Sculpt Brush Strength with Scroll Wheel
Is there any way I can change the hotkeys in the Blender 2.80 settings to change the brush strength? I know you can change size with [ and ], but what about changing the strength with, say - and = (i.e. the - and + keys on the physcial keybaord itself).
A more ideal option would be to do this with the mouse scroll wheel while holding down a keyboard key such as Ctrl, as this is obviously more comfortable to use.
I don't necessarily want to use python scripts or addons, mainly because though my Python ability is pretty good, by Blender-Python ability is 0. However, if that is the only way, I'll take it.
Thank you in advance.

Landed here when looking for the F (drag mouse to change brush radius) and SHIFT-F (drag mouse to change brush strength) shortcuts: https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/sculpt_paint/sculpting/tool_settings/brush_settings.html

You can use the shortcut Ctrl+F to control the brush strength.


text:
Blender 2.80 no option to "delete hierarchy" in Outliner
In blender 2.79 in the Outliner you can right click a parent object and delete all child objects by right clicking and select delete hierarchy.
In 2.80 I don't seem to be able to do this as I only see delete. The "delete hierarchy" option is not there.
I have changed Outliner to 'Scene' type view mode.. not the 'Collections' mode it defaults to.

The outliner branch is in development, expect improvements for the  2.81 release.

It seems that some Modes don't show the noodles....switching from Animation to Layout they appear...withing back to anim they disappear....(?)

FYI - "Delete Hierarchy" still exists, but only for collections - as mentioned is missing for objects.
Related to this (an example why this is still needed):
1. File > New > General (creates the original cube)
2. Switch to edit mode (modify or not the original cube)
3. Add > cube (accidentally in edit mode)
The added cube is a child of the original cube. This child cube automatically gets a material child - without doing any shading or such.
Once created this way, there seems to be no way to delete it from the hierarchy. Selecting the child cube object, also selects the parent. Using delete here will delete the parent too. Likewise deleting the child from the outliner hierarchy will also delete the parent.
Selecting the child vertices in edit mode, then deleting vertices or faces will delete the visible object. But there will be the empty object still in the hierarchy of the outliner. You can delete the material, but it seems to be still lurking around unused.
Also just after creating the child cube, you select it in the outliner, it becomes attached to the original cube (both same size). Then there is no way to select the child to move or modify it independently.
Also you will note, that both cubes are named "Cube". In other instances, I have seen this happen when intentionally creating child objects in the edit mode. This seems to confuse things - editing one of the same name will edit both.
The old method of shift-g > children and then alt-p to un-parent also seems not to work - or do anything obvious.
The only solution is to delete the parent and start over. This time being careful to be in object mode instead of edit mode. Save often (every edit?) so you can revert!
In general the UI menus lack interlocks (gray out/disable) where actions are inappropriate or will have no effect. You will also note that most menu items of the outliner say "(undocumented operator)" - probably means the help text is missing. My guess would be that this menu is not yet fully developed.


text:
How long does a 2 minutes animation takes? with 33 second for a frame, and 30 fps.?
how long does a 2 minutes animation takes, my GPU is GTX 960m?

simple math: 260s33=3960s=1h 6min, considering that not all frames are rendered in the same time add aprox. 10 min, so you have about 1h 15min. But that is not a question you should ask on Blender Stack Exchange.


text:
Extruding happens in 2D instead of 3D
I'm a noob to this so its a noob question. When I try to extrude a model it does it 2d instead of 3d. Can someone help me? I've tried looking at videos but none show what I want.

hello, you don't give enough details about your problem, what's happening, etc... please provide details, pictures...

If the object has any volume (i.e it's not a plane but e.g. a cube) then extruding will always be in 3D. It might seem from the current view point it's flat though. Note to use either Quad view or rotate view constantly to check how your mesh looks

...also be aware of your selection mode you're in, when editing (vertex, edge, or face). Extrusion works in all three, producing edges from disconnected vertices, and faces from edges or vertices which are connected along edges.

if your model has some crazy scale on one of the axes it will look flat.

When extruding you can press X, Y or Z in order to force axis along which it should extrude.
You can also press E to start extruding, ESC to reset extrusion position (but it still keeps extruded geometry selected), then you can grab any of the direction axes (3 coloured arrows) that will let you move the extrusion in any direction you wish.

If you want en extrusion of a selection of faces in more than one direction, you can either extrude a connected region along its vertex normals, or individual faces along their own face normals ..  check out the options when you hit AltE.


text:
Physics Simulation - Objects going through one another
I am doing a physics simulation and I am running into some trouble with meshes partially going through one another. I am simulating physics using constraints. I am simulating an anchor being reeled in. The problem is that the chains and anchor or intersecting at point in a way they should not be. How can I have the chains colliding with each other?
blend file

You can try disabling Disable Collisions on all the constraint empties and using the Mesh collision shape for the links.

How can I easily do it for all selected meshes, If I uncheck the box with multiple selected it only deactivates it for the active selected.

@Vader RMB on the checkbox > Copy to selected.

I unchecked disable collision but the meshes are still acting up. what shape should I use for the chains?

@Vader "Mesh collision shape for the links."


text:
Strange twisting from multi-chain armature
I am making a rig that transfers motion from one mesh to another via bones. This is for complex mesh hair strands. The base mesh has a cloth sim on it. Chains of bones are constrained to follow this mesh. Another version of the mesh is then driven by this bone armature.
It works by IK constraining the tips of bones to vertices. Their roots are locked by being Connected to the bones high up the chain. Each strand has 5 vertical loops. There are 3 bone chains per strand, on the edge and center loops.
This picture shows the armature and the mesh it is driving, but not the mesh the armature is constrained to.

All areas of this rig are working, but I am getting strange behavior in some parts. In some areas, mostly at the tips, there is twisting in the mesh being controlled by the armature. It appears to be twisted by 180 degrees. Currently, I can solve it by manually selected the three bones that converge at the tip, and then rotating them by 180 degrees on their local Y.

I would like to remove this twisting. I do not understand where it could be coming from. Inherit rotation is disabled on all bones. I've tried changing the bone's rotation mode off Quaternion, but it makes no difference. This rig works entirely by copying location, not rotation, so I do not see how there could actually be any rotation data on the bones (there is none to reset.) Removing weights from the side bones does not help. I can only conclude that the bones are fine, but the mesh is somehow flipping? What could cause this?
EDIT: Here's a link to the file. It's a .zip because it also contains the .mdd needed for it. Apparently those cannot be packed into the blend file. Load it into the Mesh Cache modifier.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/ki3slubwrpb1j9r/HairRigTwistingProblem.zip?dl=0
EDIT 2: I have found a workaround. If I make a vertex group of the loop that runs horizontal across the tail that is at the top of the last bones in the chains, and give them copy rotation to that vertex group, it seems to fix the problem. I may have to pursue this workaround as the full solution, but it does not explain what's going on in the first place.

The problem is 3 chains per hair strand combined with that you skipped many segments an created long bones over them, so the bones cannot follow the mesh strand exactly. They try their best to fit the shape, but this results in twisting at the tip:

The 2 side chains are redundant. Build only 1 chain but for every segment and set the bones like this so they rotate with the mesh:

You cannot notice any folding in the strands anyway, you will hardly see any difference.
If you really want to copy the motion exactly, rather than setting up 3 chains for each strand segmented like crazy write a script that will generate disconnected bones on every face and constrain each to that particular face with a Child Of with vertex group of that face. Child Of Constraint Set Inverse with Python
Also this simulation is not very high quality, the mesh oscillates with high frequency and you can see some nasty artifacts (but that does not cause the problem)
In the armature modifier check Preserve Volume (that does Quaternion skinning which you want)

@drudge, this is the answer, but if you need three bones per hair strand, I suggest adding a root bone at the base of each segment.

The three bones are necessary because it is possible for the strands to crumple and fold in some areas. This isn't softbody, it's a high quality cloth sim out of Marvelous Designer. So I do need to be able to capture the behavior of more than one look. In what way are they twisting it through weights? Even if I unpaint the 2 side bones at the tip and give full strength to the middle bone, I still get this twisting.
@VinceScalia What would be the purpose of the root bone in this case, and how should it be set up?

You are correct, I should have said high point density, not high quality, as this is only quick preview quality, and I purposely put it through a lot of nasty twists, tears, and clipping as I wanted to test the worst case scenario. I am going to try it with a single bony chain and copy Rot as you suggest. Thanks!

I'm trying to implement this answer, but I'm having problems with the Copy Rotation. See here: http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/30412/copy-rotation-adding-rotation-to-start-position


text:
Limit length of a bendy bone?
I am rigging some hair with Bendy Bones with the method found in this tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BsJ3Grq_3GM
I can control the hair by moving/rotating the tail bone. However, this allows me to stretch it. I would like to limit the length of the bendy bone so that it can still move and rotate, but never stretch the hair past its original length.
I can use Limit Distance constraint on the tail to stop it from stretching too far, but that does not take into account length caused by rotation of the head, and doesn't stop the length from getting compressed.

Here is the constraints setup, that will solve the issue. I used naming convention from the tutorial, so constraints visible on the image are added to the tail bone.

authors: Мелени Каллерман

authors: Сергей Рычков


text:
Get pose from bones that get motion from parent objects
I have various rigs with bones following physics items using the Child Of constraint with Set inverse (although this issue isn't really specific to that constraint, but to any issue where bones follow objects in any sort of way.) What I want to do is run my simulation, which puts my rig into a certain pose, then save this position as a pose that I can later restore without running physics.
However, I cannot do this, as bones that inherit rotation or location from parent objects do not show any rot or loc changes, so there is nothing to save. But there must be some way to get the current positions and convert them to a pose?

You can walk the bone's parent-tree up until there is no parent and accumulate the total transformation I think

You're looking for a kind of "pose baking" no? I don't think Blender has this function yet. It would be a really great tool, for sure!

You need to Bake the pose into an Action using visual keying:

Pose > Animation > Bake Action
You can bake 1 frame by setting the start and end to the same frame
Set Visual Keying ON
Set Clear Constraints ON
Set Clear Parents ON
Bake Data to Pose

Now you should have an action with desired pose keyed.
You can load this action into Pose library (make it suitable for pose library with help ring icon)


text:
What is the best way to make glass in blender 2.92?
I know this question has been asked before, but it's for different versions. This material setting does not seem to exist anywhere I look.
For a project of mine I need a glass that is transparent but also reflects some light. The results in the answer linked above seems to look really nice but as mentioned, the setting does not seem to exist anymore.
I've tried using a Glass BSDF, but the settings aren't nearly as deep and I can't seem to get it to reflect anything.

Although questions with "best" in them tend to call for opinions, there is an exhaustive factual answer to this question.  Unfortunately the TL;DNR is "there isn't one because what's best depends on what purpose the glass serves in the scene." And, these days, it also depends very much on what render engine you are using.

@MartyFouts Any render engine works for me. The glass should reflect something quite clearly but let some light through.

For Eevee you could try Ryan King's recent tutorial here.

Try the principled shader with transmission set to 1 and roughness set low.  You can experiment with the IOR value. In EEVEE be sure to set the material's Blend mode to one of the Alpha modes.

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/47851/how-can-i-make-a-more-realistic-glass-shader https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/2558/how-to-illuminate-the-darkness-inside-glass-objects-in-cycles

Hi :). Keep in mind reflections/refractions will depend mostly on your scene lighting. Glass BSDF shader is physically accurate for most uses.


text:
Is it possible to select multiple poses from Pose Library and assign to animation at a given time frame through a blender script?
I have recently started using Blender, and I am wondering if I can do this... I have multiple poses selected from the Pose Library. I want to assign them to a given timestamp in animation. Is there a way I can do that through Blender scripting? Any guidance?

Check the code of the Pose Library add-on shipped with Blender 3.0. It should have 90% ofg what you need.


text:
I cannot fill the 2d svg image
I am following the youtube video below
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PeXu0Kkoaqg
In video at 2:49 he fill the image with f
I wanted fill the custom image like that way
So I converted curve to mesh and pressed f

But f did not work and alf + f did fill the face bit but did not work properly

You’re in object mode. He was in edit mode. Also, F creates edges or faces, and if the selected edges do not form a solid loop, things may get goofy.

Thank you for your commen but I also tried with edit mode(with tab) and I double checked if it creates solid loop edit: I solved the problem with selecting specific dot and pressing f


text:
Breaking up a large texture used by multiple meshes
hoping someone can help us come up with a workflow for a problem we're trying to solve.
We've created a model with 3 materials with highly detailed, high resolution, textures. Each of these materials also contain a high resolution normal texture.
We have broken the model up into 100 unique standalone meshes which will be exported from Blender individually and head off on their own to different locations. Each of these individual models share the same UV mapping and three materials as the original uncut model but obviously contain only a portion of the original mesh.
Here lies our issue.Because all of the 100 standalone models use the full high resolution texture maps (which we love, because they're beautiful) their export sizes are almost as large as the original.
Does anyone know a streamlined workflow we can use on the exported models to cut down the textures to what's being used by the model and resize the UV Map accordingly?
Everything I've looked into seems to involve a complex rebaking process, which repeated 100 times, could be the death of us.


text:
How to fix the shrink and flatten tool mistakes in this chair model?
I wanted to model a simple chair for a blender exercise, I loop cut a cube then scale it to be flatter. But after using shrink and flatten tool, my "chair" looks like this :-

But what I wanted to make it look like this :-

Anyone got any ideas why the middle sections are scaled along with the selected face?

if you want it to look like your second image, use extrusions, not shrink/fatten

Ah, silly me. Should have known that extrude is the right tool to do it

You have no reason to use Shrink/Fatten here, instead use extrusion, for example AltE > Extrude Faces Along Normals:


text:
posibility to let panorama camera follow object so you can always see all sides of object when it moves
Is it possible in blender to position the panorama or other camera in a way so you can see your object/character always from every side in a 3d environment?
I want the user see a movie but let them decide if they want a back front left or right view of a character.
Hope somebody already did this and can tell me how to setup.

you could just add 4 cams - and constraint their movement to your objects movement.

The problem isn't setting up the cameras, but creating the 3d video that the user will see. There are a handful of 3d output formats, like the one from Apple and the one Facebook uses, but they're mostly proprietary and Blender doesn't have a way to output them.

Probably you have to render 4 videos and merge them with a specific software.


text:
Generated Rig is small and distant from Armatures
I know i can scale it and reposition it. What i want to know is what is causing this problem, why i am not getting exact scale and position of my rig as of armature. Here is SC

You need to apply scale (and potentially other transforms) in Object Mode to the metarig first.

There are 3 options  Location, Origin parent in metarig transform properties in tool options  on top right side. Where to check Scale options

top left, object menu

It Helped, Thank you!


text:
Everything Was Fine Then Brushes stopped affecting mesh
I was sculpting my first ever object in blender. It was working fine no issues, then i switched between object & edit modes and came back to sculpt mode when applied my brushes those did not affected my mesh. I checked all settings again if everything is correct like Dyntopo, Start and end clipping, symmetry, Brush stroke, Brush Radius everything was selected and enabled. I surfed through internet for to find out people facing same issue to solve my problem. but could not.
Maybe, i am still wrong at something. If you guys check my file and see through that would be the most help for me today.

You've masked the whole surface, you can't sculpt on the masked surface, press AltM to unmask.

Thank you, it helped! It is so dumb of me applying mask and then forgetting.

I don't do sculpting, so can't help much...
But here's a video where it explains how to configure the hot keys of each of your brushes so they work correctly:
https://youtu.be/eGuDCgU_4os
And this is an old video that solves some common problems of sculpting:
https://youtu.be/DAdYQ4xpNo0
If nothing of the above helps, then save your project file, and try uninstalling and reinstalling blender again, or use a portable (zip) version of blender... Then open your file and check if the brushes are working again

Hi. Link-only answers are discouraged, if the link goes down so
does the answer. Please help us making this site a real
knowledgebase and add all relevant steps to your answer. Thanks.


text:
transform.rotate in Blender 2.8
The below script for blender 2.7x is not working with 2.80
How could I fix it? I got the message - "TypeError: Converting py args to operator properties: : keyword "axis" unrecognized".
bpy.ops.transform.rotate(value=wheel_rotation_angle , axis=(wheel_rotation_x_axis, wheel_rotation_y_axis, wheel_rotation_z_axis), constraint_axis=(False, True, True))

Use orient_axis instead of axis as the argument name. Check the ops documentation here.

"axis" has 3 floating values, however, "orient_axis" has 3x3 floating values.

Select the object in the 3D window ; key in r,x,30    to rotate 30 deg about the x-axis ; Visit the info window to see and copy/paste the equivalent python code.
I forgot which is local and which is global, i.e. experiment with r,x,30 or r,x,x,30
Note also the use of degrees with the keyboard, but radians in the script:
bpy.ops.transform.rotate(value=pi/6, orient_axis='Z',\ orient_type='LOCAL') verified with Blender 2.8
We have left off the numerous optional arguments in this example


text:
Instancing Objects infinte ammount of time?
I have modeled a modular kit wich consist of 9 objects and togethter around 1127 faces. Togethter places with some instancing of the objects i get one big Module. This Module consists of two floor pieces (all togethter around 25 objects, polycount is still 1127). I have to instance this Module now over 4000 times in my scene.
Shift-D is not an option since it creates a new object and only raises the polycount. Same goss for the array modifier.
Alt-D increases the memory aswell after a time, not the polycount but the procedural shaders are raising the memory. (I guess...)
Either way the viewport gets really laggy...
Procedural shaders are required to randomize location and effect ammount of the material on each new instance. So i cant use Image texture Based shaders.
According to this Post there is a Methode with duplication, but where is that in blender 2.8?
What techniques have been used to repeat geometry or other detail to the infinite horizon?
Any ideas or methods to solve this problem?

In 2.8 it's not called Duplication anymore but Instancing, you need to create a mesh and the object will be duplicated on its vertices or faces depending on the option you choose. But I'm not sure you save memory compared to alt D, and also maybe you should find a trick to lower down the amount of objects in your scene, depending on your storyboard, for example you could create a low-poly version of your object when close shots are not needed

thanks for the reply, thats exactly what i did. I took my modular kit and parented it to a new mesh. I used an array modifier to offset the mesh. and saved a ton of memory in the viewport.


text:
Set xyz-position of a single vertex
How do I do this? I want a little menu like when you move a whole object with an absolute x y and z value for the position of the vertex. I want to move a vertex to exactly be on (xyz) (1.5, 0, 1.5).
I Found this thread online but it's not clear what they mean and the shortcuts don't seem to work anymore on blender 2.8: Link (what is the N-key panel and how do I open it?)

This is very easy to do.
You can adjust the vertex position in the Transform panel.
Just type the values into the x,y,z fields.

If you cannot see the Transform Panel, it's in the Sidebar.
Shortcut: N


text:
How to realize Geometry Nodes instances and boolean here
Here's an answer to a question I posted (It's down in the comments)
Derived from this video
Blender file
The only thing missing is the ability to Boolean the spheres, cubes, cylinders.
I think that involves realizing instances via the Realize Instances node, but, it's not covered in the tutorial, and nothing I've tried works.
This is what it looks like before and after attempting to apply a boolean Difference.

This is me attempting to apply a boolean (Difference)

What it should look like if it worked (imagine it all around) instead of just the top face:

what do you mean by "boolean the spheres!?" -> i think because this isn't clear you aren't getting answers here. Best is often to include screenshots how it should look like.

I did include the blend file.  The objects:  sphere, cylinder, or cube are intruded into the dodecahedron, but, won't boolean (Difference) because they're not realized mesh.  Any attempts to cause them to disappear.  Download the file and try it yourself to get a better idea of what I'm talking about.

So if i understood it right, you want this:

Yes.  Here's what I tried.  It didn't work:  https://imgur.com/a/QGhKkzE - Something you're doing that I'm not.  There's a rest of the story that's missing.

just rebuild my node tree...as i showed in the answer

Figured it out.  Fixed it.  Nevermind.  Problem was in the Join Geometry connections.  Deleted and reconneccted Join Geometry as shown in your example.

Checked and Done.


text:
Remove Doubles in Blender 2.93.1 Not available? How to remove double vertices
I was creating Bowling Ball Pin with bezier curves when i spinned the curves to make the pin out of it there are some double or overlapping vertices which i want to remove but i am unable to find remove double vertices option there. Is there any alternative option? Please don'tr recommend one by one selection and merge to center option. Thank you.

Merge by distance

as Allen Simpson says it is now Alt M > Merge by Distance (or Vertex panel > Merge > By Distance)

It helped, Thank you guys!

Does this answer your question? Blender 2.80 Remove double vertices option gone  https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/123185/2-8-remove-doubles-has-changed-to-merge-by-distance   https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/141172/how-do-i-find-remove-doubles-in-2-8


text:
Blender is becoming increasingly unresponsive and Vanished line nodes
I am facing following 2 problems.
My blender works fine on modelling and sculpting. But when i try to create new materials it starts helding/irresponsive and takes 5- 10 minutes to responding and quite often gets crashed. Blender version is 2.93.1
It already don't show Node lines which i had posted in another question here a few weeks back.
People said it is a bug so i reported it to blender. To solve my problem i tried different versions of Blender from previous to Beta but it did not help and also tried to change screen resolutions but still node lines get disaapeared once those are connected, i have explained this particular issue in detail in my former question. So, I am convinced that there is no bug but some issue on my end which i am unable to understand/diagnose.
My System Specifications are:
i5 2400
4 core 4 thread
12 GB RAM
SSD installed.
Later Graphic Drivers of intel are already installed.
I have no Graphic Card attached.

It may still be an issue with your hardware/drivers, which makes it unsuitable for this site, I'm afraid...

This is what i fear too. Thinking of buying Xeon e5 2670 duel processor and then see how it fares


text:
Pose Library preview Material-Less
I am using Blender 3.0 and Creating my first pose Library. While saving poses i see that preview images of poses in blender 3.0 does not show colorful image for my poses. I have searched on Youtube but could not find a relevant solution. So, here i am asking if there is any setting to save render preview image in pose library. Or how to force blender to pick up render view version for pose library preview.
Here is Example

Blender 3.0 uses the workbench render engine to render the pose library previews, so to get color in your preview thumbnails all you need to do is make sure workbench is set to output color.
So, for example:

Open the Render properties tab.
Change "Render Engine" menu selection
to "Workbench"
Under "Color" tab, choose "Texture"
Re-generate the
thumbnail using "Generate Preview" (circular double-arrows icon) in
the N-panel of the asset browser.

You can switch the Render Engine back to Cycles or Eevee if you want, and Blender will still use the display settings you've chosen for workbench behind-the-scenes, so to speak, for thumbnail previews.
Also, Blender uses the active camera for this render, which isn't necessarily the angle shown in the active viewport, a behavior which might not be obvious at first.

It only picks random color option for other options Re-generate preview does not give textured/colored preview. Must be something more with my settings

Not sure why they decided on workbench for these thumbnails. So much of my work relies on procedural node-based texturing, and workbench does a bad job choosing what color those materials should be. I wonder if blender is aware myself and others are unhappy about this?

@Tyler I mean, it’s open source, so you could theoretically fix it yourself.  Realistically though, I know not everyone’s a programmer, so it’s more about convincing the people who are to make a change.

@JasonConrad yep! I've actually almost finished implementing the change in my own branch. I'll be submitting it for a merge request with the source for the devs to review soon.

@Tyler what change did you make on your branch? for the thumbnail to work using eevee material preview? I too, heavily use procedural materials on my assets and would love for my thumbnails to have colour without messing around with the object colour viewport display thing.


text:
Keyframes/poses are not being interpolated armature/mesh
I created poses and then apllied different mouth poses on different keyframes but it is not working.
Let's say i want my object to say "HAPY"
At keyframe 0 applied pose "BMP" for closed mouth

At keyframe 5 applied pose "H"

At keyframe 10 applied pose "A"

At keyframe 15 applied pose  "P"

At keyframe 20 applied pose  "Y"

At keyframe 25 applied pose  "BMP" for closed mouth

When i play animation it only plays from keyframe 20 to 25 and remains still.
I don't know what is causing this problem Here is my File

You need to enable the Animation: Pose Library addon, then in the 3D view, press on the N panel > Animation tab, choose the pose you want. As you've enabled the Auto Keying option in the Timeline, it will do it automatically insert keyframes.

It is weird that single click adds a keyframe from animation tab but does not interpolate between them but a double click does solve the problem.

I'm not sure what you mean, it works fine for me


text:
Some bones not saved in pose library
I have a character rig that I am posing (specifically, the MakeHuman rig.) I make a pose and then save it in my pose library with all bones selected. If I then later reset the pose, and then re-apply it from the pose library, certain bones turn out to have not been saved (specifically, chest-1.)
I also notice that when I make my pose, there is no entry for the missing bone in the Action editor. So it's just not getting saved into the pose action at all.
What could cause this?


text:
Get glossy shading but no reflections (Cycles)
If you use a glossy/shiny material, it will have certain shading. It will also reflect the world environment color, and nearby objects in the scene. Is there a way to make it so that you still have glossy shading, but that you don't get reflections?
EDIT: Picture for clarification. Here we have a sphere with Diffuse and Glossy mixed based on fresnel, with no roughness. So it is a very shiny, reflective sphere. We can see that it is shaded by the glossy node, being lighter towards the edges (as fresnel does.) It is also reflecting the blue cube. I would like it to keep its shading, but not pick up reflections of nearby objects. If I increase its roughness, it still reflects the cube, it just looks more blurred.
The purpose of this is to be able to do non-photorealism where I can control what my shading looks like without it also increasing reflections. For example, the settings that you would use it have large, hard-edged toony specular highlights would also result in those areas being very reflective, which is not how they behave in toon styles.

Can you be more specific with what you mean by, "Is there a way to make it so that you still have glossy shading, but that you don't get reflections?". Are you trying to make it not reflect the environment and certain objects?.

@Wyvernul Correct. I want it to respond to the lighting, and form highlights on the object, but not pick up reflections of the environment or objects.

Can you upload your .blend? If you simply increase the roughness on a glossy BSDF you can get non-sharp highlights from light sources but I am not sure that is what you are trying to achieve. What is the end result material you are trying to create?

@Wyvernul Updated with a picture.

"We can see that it is shaded by the glossy node, being lighter towards the edges (as fresnel does.)"  I am a little confused with how you are using the word shading here. Do you want the object to be lighter towards the edges but with no specular reflections?

Here I have a sphere reflecting the two objects and environment.

If you don't want an object to be reflected just select it, go to the Object header and uncheck the Glossy box in the Ray Visibility panel.

If you want to see the objects reflected, but without the reflection of the environment, go to the World material settings in a Node Editor and set up the nodes as pictured below.

Thanks, this is very close to what I need, but I actually need the reverse. This lets me make an object not show up in reflections, but then it doesn't show up in ANY reflections. I want to be able to have a material that doesn't reflect objects, but I may still need other materials to reflect them.

If i (hypothetically) am following correctly, you want an object not to be reflected on a certain glossy object, while still retaining its reflection on other glossy objects. If this is correct and also needed for an animation and or single frame render(s) and not other programs such as unity or unreal, etc. Than could you not render in layers and use the video sequencer and compositor to create the scene from two separate layers?. Example being render one scene with no reflections and high roughness on gloss shader, than render full environment shader with scene giving reflections on objects. Than use editing programs to layer the scene to refeclt where u want reflections or not.
P. S. I am fairly new with modelling and game engines, so this question would be a lot cooler if it gets an answer. ( sad Matt mack in Dazed and confused reference.)


text:
Performance of mixing colors vs mixing colored shaders
Is there a performance difference between these two setups?
I imagine on a material this simple, there's not going to be much of a difference. But on a complex material, it could. If you had a choice between a simple mask between two different complex shaders, or a bunch of masks between different properties of the same shader, is there an advantage?

If there is, it's a pretty subtle difference.
I rendered 5 frames without the mix shader setup and 5 frames for the mixRGB node setup, and averaged the times for each. The results:
Mix Shader: 23.021
Mix RGB: 22.78

Yeah, it's probably too simple to see much. Have updated question.

is the result also the same?

This is not a direct answer to your question, but I think it is still relevant.
I experimented a bit with the materials from your question. I made two render layers with a cube, both identical except for the material. I rendered them, used a math node set to difference to get the difference between both layers, and multiplied the result by 20000000. This was the final result:

In short, there is no visible difference between both materials.

authors: Даниил Разумовский


text:
Blend close shades of colors together in compositor
I have some mesh that is intersecting with itself in some areas. To reduce the visibility of these intersections, I want to somehow blur, blend, flatten, or otherwise smooth out the area. This will probably need to be done in the compositor.

The picture shows a basic setup of two mesh pieces intersecting. The material is simple diffuse mixed with gloss based on fresnel. They have slight color variation due to the highlights and fresnel. You can see that in areas where one overlaps the other (yellow) the edge of the foreground piece is dark due to the fresnel, and stands out. I want to keep this.
In the red area, the meshes are intersecting but not near the edges. There is just enough color difference due to their shading for the intersection to be noticed (whereas a flat shaded material it wouldn't be.) I want to somehow change that area so that the intersection is less visible, but without losing detail in other areas, or losing the edge detail in the yellow area.
The bottom half of the image shows what I'm going for (done in photoshop with water droplet tool.)
EDIT: I am happy to use methods outside the compositor, such as mesh changes, etc, or even workflows that involve other programs. I just need to be able to automate it, and avoid having to hand paint/mask/edit things too much. I need a method that will work on a lot of pieces. They are animated in a simulation, so what areas are intersecting will change every frame.

Hi, you can create mask in VSE which can be animated and support feather. Use this mask for blur selected area only in compositor.  To be honest: I never use it and know this only from some tutorials, so I can't write you how exactly do this. Second way can be manipulate with meshes using boolean modifier - union as first. After you may need use subdivide and/or smooth or remesh for achieve nice results. Just my ideas I don't try it:)

You could use an AO pass to mask intersections, and then blur/soften/whatever based on that.

I guess the following can be adjusted to your needs.
Two mesh objects, partly overlapping will be mirrored at intersections, RGB independant.

Compositing nodes create a mask of the intersections. (This part is highlighted in red.)
Enable the Z and Object Index Pass of the render layer. (Properties Window > Scene > Passes)
Assign two different pass indices to the objects, in my case 1 and 2. (Properties Window > Object > Relations > Pass Index)
After dilating the objects masks, their overlapping part will the border between them. Multiply both masks to only retain the boundaries. If both parts are in the same mesh, you can get this mask with the Material Boundary of Freestyle (which will have correct anti-aliasing).
To exclude the parts, where the meshes overlap but are apart, check differences in the depth channel. The Prewitt or Sobel filter will give us the difference between close pixels. Where this z - difference is larger than a certain value (0.05 in my case) there is space between the objects (which we dont want to blur). Multiply the "edge" mask with Z-Difference lesser than the min value (0.05) to get the intersections.


text:
Multiresolution subdivide modifier on a mirrored surface causes a visible seam
I've been following a tutorial by Daniel Kreuter on Youtube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdsY4BtlcpQ), modelling a body using a mirrored surface.  I thought I had followed his actions fairly accurately, but I'm getting a weird seam on the mirrored plane in my model when I apply a multiresolution subdivide.  Oddly enough, it doesn't appear when I use the subdivision surface modifier.

I'm not really sure where to start looking for problems.  This question has an "answer" which seams (see what I did there?) to have the same problem I'm having, with no solution.  This forum post looks like they have the same problem.  One of their suggestions is to move the mirror modifier above the subdivide, as the modifiers are applied sequentially.  Unfortunately, that gives me the error "Cannot move a modifier requiring original data".  The other suggested fixes, checking clipping (it was already checked) and increasing the merge limit,  haven't worked.
Another thing I've checked, based on what I've seen on the web, is whether faces have been inserted along the mirror plane by accident.  Sadly, that's not the solution either, nor is it due to duplicated vertices.  What should I try next?

Clipping's on in the mirror already.  Thanks for the normals catch.  I noticed it as well when I went to sculp something and everything seemed to do the opposite of what I expected.

Also, please post a .blend it's easier to diagnose that way

Well, I tracked down where I differed from the tutorial.  Looks like he applied the mirror modifier for good before creating the multires subdivide.  That explains the difference.  Unfortunately, my .blend has been overwritten, so I have nothing to post up here aside from a model without the crease.

First I presumed that you did mirroring by negative scale around YZ-plane, then you have flipped normals at second half. But then I noticed modifier, so I was wrong.
I noticed similar result if Subdivision modifier placed higher than Mirror. Also Blender prevents from moving Multiresolution with subdivisions under Mirror, saying "Cannot move beyond non-deforming modifier" or "Cannot move above modifier requiring original data" for moving Mirror up.
I think it's a way Blender modifiers works with mesh data. I took a peek in official docs and found this: https://www.blender.org/manual/modifiers/the_stack.html - according to official info modifiers applied in order from highest to lowest. When I tried to apply them in this order, I also get seam in final mesh with both modifiers, but it was just crease in geometry, vertices are wielded, normals are outside, just little wrong geometry. Old edge at section at half-mesh left unsmoothed by modifier, because it processed differently areas where edges belong to just one face.

This is a common problem with the mirror modifier. Make sure you have "merge" selected in your modifiers settings.
You can also adjust the merge limit, to merge vertices more tolerantly

In this case, merge is already selected.  Aside from clipping being selected as well, I match your settings.

@jason_L_Bens I also see, that you have you modifiers in the wrong order. Try to put the mirror-modifier on the top and add the subdivisions, after that.

Unfortunately, trying to move the mirror modifier on top gives me the error "Cannot move a modifier requiring original data".

If you delete the middle face ( generated by the seam) and you apply multires, it works correctly.
I know this is an old post, but if help someone i'm happy!


text:
UV Unwrap is flipped horizontally?
Whenever I unwrap this plane, it seems to be unwrapped horizontally flipped.
It's a simple plane that is 'subdivided' because it's for a 3D pixel art experiment. Is there anyway to 'flip' the UV? (I know I can just flip the texture in photoshop, but there is something inherently wrong with backwards textures.)
Here's a screen capture to show what I mean.

Try to flip normals and unwrap again

Cegaton's comment provides the right answer but leaves out a crucial detail. First, make sure all of the vertices whose assigned textures you want to flip are selected, then switch to the UV editor window, and press the key sequence S - X - 1 - - [hyphen].
ns


text:
How can I connect two edge loops with different numbers of vertices?

I can't use the F function because the number of vertices in each circle is not same.
The big one has 48 and the small one has 32 vertices.

Found a solution. go to face then fill

You have two options, which will both provide similar result here.

Edge > Bridge Edge loops
Face > Fill, Alt+F

As @vklidu pointed out, Face > Fill gives different results in many cases, notably  when some faces are flipped.

Not a little in some cases :) https://imgur.com/a/20S5THA probably it depends on vertex indices in Bridge case … edit: moving centre part a bit up solved this twist.

Thanks, didn't know that :). Looking into this a bit more, it seems Face > Fill also works better for connecting flipped faces. I think I'll edit the answer to cover this.


text:
Why is the material looking better in the layout workspace than in the shading workspace?
What the title says. My material look lighter and worse in the shading worksapce and in the actual render. Why is that and how to change it so that the material could look like in the default layout.

The solid view uses the default shading, if you want to render it like that you can try using the Workbench render. Otherwise you'll have to setup your materials properly to render the way you want.

THe shading workspace uses lookdev by default, which automatically adds an HDRI background. It seems that this is giving your model too much light, causing it to look bad. I would just avoid using lookdev in this case.


text:
Possible to set render border exactly
I know I can set the render border with Ctrl+B and dragging a box.  But is there  a way I can exactly specify the border dimensions?

You can access the render border values via the outliner if you change its display mode to 'Datablocks':

You can then navigate through the tree structure of the outliner to the border values via Scenes> Scene (may be different depending on the name of your actual scene)> Render Data:

The border values can be set from 0-1, so unfortunately you can't set exact pixel coordinates without some maths. 0 is the left side of the camera and 1 is the right side of the camera for the 'x' values (or the bottom and top sides of the camera for the 'y' values).

Perfect, that's exactly what I was looking for.  I actually prefer this way as opposed to pixel coords.

exactly what I needed in 2022. Same location, but now the Outliner is called Collections.
Collections Panel > Scenes > Scene > Render Data > Render Data > Render Region.

@hatinacat2000 I'm glad it still helps, but the Outliner has not been renamed.

For more control I've written an Add-on which allows to set the Render Border in Camera View:

Install the Add-on via File > User Preferences > Add-ons. Once it's enabled, use Ctrl+B in the Camera View (Numpad 0), select the Camera and go to Properties > Data > Render Border.
Half size

Shifting the box

Repository: https://github.com/p2or/blender-renderborder

Helpful addon! It's still a bit clunky to set it up to render out a section of an image at a fixed size, but infinitely easier than doing it without the addon.

This looks great!
Before I start digging deep in the code: would it theoretically be possible to write an addon which lets you draw a custom shape for the render border?
My use case is as follows: I have a nice shot but it contains also a great part of a white wall. So I'd like to set an L-shaped render border which leaves out the wall.


text:
How can I enable dynamic paint in the viewport without the weight colors?
I like to use dynamic paint to manipulate vertex groups between modifiers in the modifier stack (e.g. after an Array modifier to control a particle system).
By default it visualizes the weight colors on the object.  This is good for adjusting the DP settings, but otherwise impedes the visibility of the model's topology, and is generally ugly.  However when I uncheck the Display modifier in viewport button it not only goes back to normal shading on the object but also disables the actual DP results (in the viewport).  So all following modifiers use the vertex group as per pre-DP.

Is there a way of just turning off the weight color visibility of the DP modifier without disabling it's effects entirely in the viewport?

Under the Dynamic Paint rollout of the Physics panel (on the canvas object) there is a Display surface preview in 3D views eye-button next to each DP surface slot.  This does exactly what you are looking for.

It took the millionth-and-first time of searching that menu to find it!


text:
How can I increase the space between letters in a text object?
If I just make a space with the space key it will add too much space not equal like the other letters spaces between each other. But without a space the Y and the T seems like they are glued together.

And if I make one space with the space key then the space is not equal to the other spaces between the letters:

And it's only with the last Y letter.
I tried to move the text a bit with the arrow keys like in the solution but then in the render windows CTRL + F12 the text is now too big :

In edit mode navigate text cursor before the last letter Y. Then hold Alt and use arrow keys to move all text after cursor to the position, that you want.

I did but now when rendering CTRL + F12 the text in the render window is very big too big for the sides. I added a screenshot of it to my question.  and I only moved the text with the arrows a little bit.

If you have another question, please ask it by clicking the Ask Question button.


text:
Blender Render Animation does not match Viewport Render Animation duration
I used Viewport Render Animation to see my animation and edit it in premiere pro so that my group could score it (add music). Now that I've finished rendering it, the final Render Animation does not match the Viewport Render Animation's duration. It's shorter.
My settings for the Viewport Render is as shown below:

As for my settings for the final Render Animation:

I then imported the image sequence from the Render Animation into premiere pro over the Viewport Render Animation. But the durations do not match:

The Viewport Render Animation is 00:01:00:00 seconds.
The Render Animation (image sequence) is 00:00:48:01 seconds.
I've fixed this in premiere pro by stretching it (it looks fine) but I would like to avoid this problem in the future when I make longer animations.
How would I fix this?
(EDIT: Viewport Animation is actually 00:01:00:00 seconds long)


text:
Animating Blender Poses with scripting
I am thinking of animating my pose library with blender scripting for that i been searching for video solutions but could not find something helpful. If there was any it was only moving a single bone with a script.
Is it possible to animate my pose library with blender scripting. If yes, then How?

what do you mean by 'animate pose library with scripting'?  Are you talking about assigning a pose, and setting a keyframe; then moving to a different frame, setting a different pose, and setting a keyframe; so that blender will generate f-curves to move from pose to pose?

Yes, I am talking the same. Like animating mouth shapes or Lip syncing and then implement PreAnimated Actions on different keyframes to complete the animation pipeline of a short documentary.


text:
how can i make just the arm move?
 im practicing weight painting and after parenting with automatic weights my model is all messed up and some things that shouldn't move when moving a bone do for ex those wings and bows how can i fix this?
heres a link to the blend file https://mega.nz/folder/kTo2nLbY#Dc4S5nd6z2C9Bx_dEUpc1g

Your model has 3 mesh objects. Automatic weights don't work well with separate meshes. Duplicate the model, join the objects, remesh it, and bind this to the rig with automatic weights. Unparent it again, and use the Data Transfer modifier for the 3 original mesh objects to transfer the weights. Also, Rigify has a metarig for the bone layout, But the final rig must be generated with the Generate Rig button. To have this work you must not delete any bones of the face. Or you must delete all face bones. It looks like you deleted some eyebrow bones and generation now fails.


text:
Make edges round

How can I round the mesh you can see above or make it more realistic?
Thanks in advance Max.

One approach: add a subsurface modifier and bevel the edges you don't want to be rounded.

I think u should use Bevel modifier in the Properties panel

Hi, thanks for the post. This site is not a regular forum, answers should be substantial and thoroughly explain the solution and required workflow. One liners and short tips rarely make for a good answer. If you can [edit] your post and provide some more details about the procedure and why it works feel free to restore it, otherwise it may be deleted or converted into a comment. Perhaps add a few images illustrating the workflow and final results. See How do I write a good answer?


text:
How can I avoid clipping in the object?
today I followed a tutorial and at the end of the tutorial I saw that my mesh flickers.
I don't know how I should describe this problem or how to name it, that is why I just assumed its clipping.
Here is a short youtube video where you can see my problem: Youtube Link
Just look at the mesh and you see what I mean.
Thanks in advance.

What that looks like is Z-fighting (2 faces occupying the same space - the renderer doesn't know which one to display in "front", so it flickers back and forth). Try selecting your whole mesh in edit mode then pressing M (merge) and selecting by Distance. If there were overlaps, it should show a deleted vert count at the bottom.

or perhaps you've duplicated the object and the overlapping is happening in Object mode

Thank you so much this really helped me. Turns out merging these things together was the solution. But can you tell me how I can prevent this from happening in the future?


text:
Blender wont seem to accept bridge from Daz 3D to blender (read below for more details)
Here's my problem:
I have installed the bridge from Daz to Blender into my Daz Studio, so the bridge works fine on that platform.
However, when I go into blender and do edit > preferences > addons, I can't seem to find the add on that says "Armature: Daz to blender" (or something like that)
Here's a screenshot:

As you can see there is no add on in blender that starts with 'Armature'
Do you know what the problem might be? If your confused about my question please let me know and we can talk about it. Thanks!

Presumably that's a 3rd-party addon so you should contact the addon author. It may just be that it's not been updated to install in the version of Blender that you are using.

John Eason is right that asking the author is probably the best course of action to get an answer, but I'll just add that questions about third-party add-ons are on-topic according to the meta post https://blender.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/464/are-questions-about-third-party-paid-addons-on-topic


text:
How to make a “reflective tape” material in cycles? Nodes Question
Question to original link: How to make a "reflective tape" material in cycles?
I'm using Blender 2.78c, any ideas on making too. Nodes look different.
I am trying make my signs Retroreflective for Farming Simulator 17.

None of the used nodes have changed. They all are still there, and named the same.

first off as I said in my first comment. "None of the used nodes have changed. They all are still there, and named the same." Make sure you really are using cycles. 2 Even if you get your cycles material set up as in the answers to my question it will not work in farm simulator. You will have to find out what farm sim is made it, what its game engine expects for materials, and then if you can even fake retroreflectiveity with just a material and some textures (I doubt it).

I just remade this material in 2.78 and it functions the same.

You seem to be new to Blender. I would suggest checking that you are using the cycles render and are in the material tab (not the compositing tab).

I don't understand why this was downvoted. To my mind your answer is fine - validating that it still works the same at 2.78 and even offering a suggestion as to where the questioner might have gone wrong. Gets my up vote

@RichSedman Thanks I was wondering the same thing.

(To remove any doubt) I did not vote either way on this post. But after coming back to the two answers, I have UVed yours.

This would be my suggestion on how to make this kind of material using a texture.
The first node tier is defining the texture with transparency as the reflective material using Fresnel (Fresnel defines the glossy to be applied only almost face on), the second mix node just mixes it with a diffuse background (or anything else) using the alpha channel as the factor.

For added realism i would probably use a hexagon texture to simulate the granularity of such a reflective tape at a close up, like here:

I fail to see in your nodes where you make the actual retroreflective part. From your nodes all you made is a material that is using an image to define what part is glossy, and the glossy is just a standard glossy node. If you lok at the answer here you will see that you need to modify the normal of the glossy node to create the retroreflective property.

No you really dont, as the fresnel node controls that property much more accurately and gives you much more control over it.
You can achieve the same result with using the Layer Weight node, using the Facing connector.

Maybe I don't understand the question correctly.
The reflective tape pictured i added as an example is what i used as the baseline for my answer, maybe some other reflective tape needs a different approach, but that was not clear from the question.

David, how can I combine your work plus an image of a stop sign? I have a stop sign image with the hexagon texture added.


text:
How can I fill this without filling the holes?
I'm trying to convert an image to a 3D object, I wanted to make it solid but I can't figure out how to fill it without filling the holes with it. Any help is appreciated.
This is the geometry I want to look like the image below. But I can't figure out how to fill it right.

This is the image, which I want to recreate in 3D:

Even though this is a common scenario, it would be better if you attach your .blend file: https://blend-exchange.com/

To my knowledge, there is no other way than (for a complex object like this, otherwise you have LoopTools) manually filling the faces by selecting 4 vertices at a time and pressing F to fill

Hello and welcome. Please use a title that matches the content of the post. It should read like a question, be descriptive but succinct, unique and identifying, summarizing the problem so that anyone searching for similar issues is likely to find this. Remove anything superfluous, avoid using words like "this", "help with", "issue" or "question about", instead describe what "it" is. Remember, your title is the first thing visitors see, answers you get depend heavily on it. See What is the problem of asking “How do I do this?"

Try AltF instead of F (if you want to simplify the topology afterwards you can press X > Limited Dissolve):

what the hell, this is a thing? First time I've seen anyone mention this in years of using blender lol

THere's a lot of hidden tools in Blender  ^^

Wow this is exactly what i wanted thank you so much

That's a good one to know! Also, pressing I to inset after doing this would be a good idea in many cases. You will then be able to do things such as extrude and place a Subsurf modifier on without artifacts from bad topology. (As we know, flat surfaces can get away with bad topo, but curvy or around-corners geometry, not so much.)

Me, too!   Alt-F maps to mesh.fill, and F maps to mesh.edge_face_add (or F2, if activated)

I'm not really sure if you are starting with an svg or what but if you are starting with a curve obj you can just go to the Geometry tab and extrude it before converting it to a mesh

You can also give it a solidify modifier tho that sometimes causes issues
If you starting from the mesh already, you can convert it into a curve and change the setting to '2D' with Fill Mode 'Both'. Then either extrude it or turn it into a mesh and give it the solidify modifier

It was a an image that i mapped through a plane and wanted to get a 3d object out of it, so i dont have those options :( Pressing alt f worked wonders for me

Blender can trace an image into a grease pencil by going to the Object->Convert->Trace image to grease pencil. You can then convert it to a curve and convert that curve to a mesh in the same menu. Make sure to merge the overlapping vertices before doing anything else with it tho. After that you can do the Alt+F or convert it into a curve again to fill it and extrude it

First up, a suggestion for a better title, like Duarte mentioned:
Fill geometry with faces, without overlapping holes, to recreate image in 3D
To the question, it should be pretty simple to fill the vertices and edges with faces. But if you will do that on a regular basis however, I would strongly recommend searching for some add on to do that or follow this tutorial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BcjPCjxsCZo
Now explaining, it will just be a bit tedious, but tracing the vertices after the pixels of the image was probably too.
When selecting two vertices and pressing F, you create an edge between those two points. Selecting three or more vertices creates a face inside that group. For your problem you will not want to select all vertices, but starting from below just the vertices that don't enclose a hole completely (I will leave example pics down below). Then you continue and select the vertices further up, again stopping before you select all vertices of an hole. Otherwise the hole will get overlapped with faces. For selecting the vertices, I recommend pressing W till you get the circle selection, which is easier for selecting multiple vertices precisely and quickly.
That's maybe what you got:

That's how I think you should do it.
Select just some of the vertices and then press F: