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Camera and Object tracking
I want to track one particle in a video and have some questions:

What data files are compatible with the program?
What data (position, Velocity of the particle,…) will be obtain?
Is the software for free or are there some costs?

Hi, welcome to the site. Please focus your post on one question. You are welcome to ask as many questions as you need, each as a separate post.

Start with https://www.blenderguru.com/tutorials/introduction-to-camera-tracking/

The software is 100% free
here is a list of supported video formats
https://www.blender.org/manual/data_system/files/video_formats.html
But as far as motion tracking it depends if the camera is moving or not.
If the camera is moving, you can find out how it was moved by tracking things in the scene that dont move.
But if the camera is stationary, and you simply want to track a moving target.
Then you can do some simple math by finding out at what frame rate the video was recorded,
then checking how much the particle moved over how many frames.

The camera is stationary. But is it also possible to track a bigger particle? (3-5 cm)

Well, motion tracking is recorder by using "markers". A Marker is a tiny box that tracks a pattern of pixels. You can change the size of the marker to cover more pixels or less pixels. And the more markers you have per object/particle, the better tracking result you will get.


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Adding objects in a different scene than controller's
I have a number of scenes in my game; main, overlay, and underlay. I am currently attempting to use scene.addObject() to add an object in the underlay scene.
Both the argument objects, the object to be added, and the object to be used as position reference, are located in the main scene, along with the controller object which is running my python module.
What I have tried:
I have attempted calling [underlay].addObject() which does not work.
It tells me that the blender objects are not in an inactive layer.
    empty = self.scene.addObject('Empty', 'Origin')
ValueError: scene.addObject(object, other, time): KX_Scene (first argument): object must be in an inactive layer

the output of calling scene.objectsInactive on the main scene immediatly before calling addObject is
[Empty, Origin, Placeholder, Lamp, Camera, PHolderCam, Lamp, Camera, StarSphere1]

likewise for the underlay scene it is
[]

I have also tried locating one and both of the objects to be added in an inactive layer of the underlay scene, however this gives me a different error;
ValueError: scene.addObject(object, other, time): KX_Scene (first argument), requested name "pri_underlayEmpty" did not match any KX_GameObject in this scene

I am looking for either a solution to this problem or alternate means to be able to add objects into that other scene, from the controller in main. Help is appreciated, thanks in advance to any answerers.

Its been a while since I used BGE but I think the objects need to be inactive in the scene where you want to add them. So the empty needs to be inactive in the underlay scene?

You can't duplicate objects that are not present within the scene you want to have them in.
If they are not present already you might load them into the scene via LibLoad. I suggest to do that only when you need dynamic loading.
The easier way is to link the object (or mesh) from the original scene to the other scene. This means when you edit the object in either scene both objects get updated. Be aware: they are only linked in Blender not in the BGE. in the BGE they are two different objects.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


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mirrored mesh not showing up in edit mode
Basically, I have added a mirror modifier to my mesh but it is only showing up in object mode and I was wondering how to make it show up in edit mode too

In the Properties Window > Modifiers Tab > Mirror Modifier look for the button on the top that reads Display Modifier in Edit Mode, the one with the cube with four vertex highlighted.

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


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I want to animate this motion - Hula hoop
I want to make a character move their hips but keep the feet "locked" in place.
I asked this question on Blender Artists but didn't get very many
replies... (.blend file included).
https://blenderartists.org/t/posing-example-hula-hoop/1371842/

it just looks like the hip goes from left to right and also gradually down?

if you use IK for the legs then the feet will stay locked in place

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


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model disapper when i press "P"
I TRIED TO USE FLIP NORMALS AND I STILL HAVE THIS PROPLEM

This title sounds like a duplicate of This Post  However, the question itself sounds like a different problem all together.

@Rick Riggs no not the same i know im in the game mode look the diffrent between the two pics how the building damadged when i run  game mode

This is a Z-sort issue, caused by objects having transparency, and the game engine not quite knowing how to deal with it.
In the material settings, objects should be set to the first one that gives the result you want:

Opaque
Clip Alpha
Alpha Antialiasing
Alpha Blend or Alpha Sort

ie: if you have something that does not need transparency, make it opaque. If you have something that only has clear bits and opaque bits, make it clip alpha, and so on down the list, each giving a slighly more 'advanced' but more processor intensive alpha.

Take a look at all your materials and make sure they are not set to transparent. Even if they are 100% alpha, it will sometimes act weird when turned on.


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Mesh deforming when add bezier modifier
I´m trying to model a race track using a bezier curve, but, when I add modifiers -> array -> curve I get this :

What should I check for to get the mesh following the curve correctly ?
Thankyou

can you upload the .blend?

Such offsets are often related to origins mismatching. Could you show where is each object's origin?

As mentioned by Carlo, looks like the mesh and the curve don't share the same exact origin coordinates in the scene.
Make sure the have the same origin, and that the origin of the mesh object is sanely placed relative to it's geometry.
With the mesh object selected Shift + Ctrl + Alt + C > Origin to Geometry, or manually place it where you want it using your 3D cursor and then Shift + Ctrl + Alt + C > Origin to 3D cursor
After that make sure your object is aligned with the curve by selecting the bezier, Shift + S > Cursor to Selected, then select your mesh Shift + S > Selection to Cursor.
Optionally if you want a simple circular section consider using the bevel option directly on your track curve, or for more complex shapes perhaps a 2D bezier curve in the shape of the section of your road/track.
EDIT Upon further inspection to your file there seems to be something wrong with that bezier curve object, not quite sure what it is exactly, but whatever it is it's messing up the curve modifier.
Anyway to solve whatever problems you are encountering follow all the above steps, make sure your track curve has its origin at the scene center (world coordinate 0,0,0) by pressing Shift + C to center the cursor, then Shift + Ctrl + Alt + C > Origin to 3D cursor
Now clear all the transforms on or "section" mesh with Alt + G and then clear scale with  Ctrl + A > Scale. Make sure it is centered in the scene origin just like the track's origin.
To "fix" your bezier curve track, whatever is messed up about it, just add a new spline object, Shift + A > Curve > Bezier and join the original to this new one (not the other way around) by selecting the track spline, then the new one and pressing Ctrl + J.
Then enter edit mode and delete the new small unwanted segment. If you now rebuild your modifier stack in the mesh now it should work ok.

eromod, yes I could upload the .blend. Is it possible here ?

Duarte, I follow your instructions, but I got a even more weird result... This is making me crazy.

You can upload your file using http://blend-exchange.giantcowfilms.com/

Ok, updated my answer, you should edit your original question and add the file link to it.

Perfect !!!!! That did the trick perfectly. Thankyou so much Duarte !!!!!!


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How can I map two dissimilar objects to the same UV border?
I am trying to minimize texture seams and distortion in order to use a tiling detail normal map on top of a diffuse map on a humanoid mesh for use with Miku Miku Dance.  I believe that if I use two different UV maps sharing the same silhouette, I can avoid visible seams and that the distortion will be acceptable.  I have separated my model into a front and back half (two different objects) rather than seaming it in Blender while trying different solutions.
Because the front and back half have dissimilar surfaces (but share a border), Blender UV maps them to different silhouettes, which will create visible seams on any map tiling over their surface.
Is there some easy way that I can get Blender to use the same silhouette for both halves?  I would prefer not to join and reseam my mesh, but if that's necessary, I'm willing.

Nathan, in fact it's more often the other way, meaning if you have two UV islands of the same model that share the same texture space it's much harder to avoid visible seams, even if those UV islands are exact copies of each other. It's quite impossible to have no visible seams at all if the two UV islands are only somewhat similar.
The next big disadvantage of sharing texture space is that it's nearly impossible to paint away the seams, since you'd paint both parts instead of one.

Thank you.  After reading what you wrote, I thought more deeply about what it would do to mirror a normal map across a seam, and decided you were correct.  I placed seams as well as I could and was happy with the result.  Nevertheless, I'm still interested in if there's an automated way to do this in Blender, as I can imagine situations where it might be handy.


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What are the benefits of Extented-, Substract-, Inverts-, Intersect- existing selction icons im Viewport Editor
.
Can you please explain, what practical use the symbols have.

"Selecting Modes" at the bottom of this page in the Blender manual should explain them. Hover over each icon to see the descriptive text and then read the description in the manual.

Thanks for your advice, I have read and understand the text in the manual, but I do not see the benefit or when do I use the individual selction. Sorry, but I've never needed, I don't get it. I do not have any clue.

I doubt many people do use them to be honest. I've been using Blender off and on for several years now and don't think I've ever needed to use any of them!

have now understood what the icons are good for. So you don't always have to hold down the extra keys or the mouse button when selecting each mode. Had just not understood it because I had never tried the icons.
Thanks for your help

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


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Created a StickMan with the skin modifier but his shoulder acts weird in pose mode

I was expecting his upper arm to stay straight but it seems to flex to try to satisfy the bend. How can I get it to straighten out?
Thanks!

it should be sufficient to edit bone weights, that I guess were automatically created by the "create armature" modifier button...

You need to adjust the weight painting, you can find a lot of tutorials on the subject on youtube.

Yes, thank you to you both! Because my mesh was so simple, the easiest thing to do was to restart the process from scratch. I think if there is a way to clear weights that would work or reweight them like Otto said.


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How come I can't see my bones in orthographic view?
i'm trying to model a rig using x mirror but I can't see the bones even though i'm in editmode. i want to extrude a bone on x axis so that two bones extrue using x-mirror. it donest work in persp view and in tutorials they use ortho view.

Adding screen shots or attaching .blend file will help you get more accurate answers

please attach a .blend file

x-mirror is not view dependent, and is dependent on the bone names (i.e. ending with .L, .R)
+1 screenshots or .blend


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Steel material nodes in blender
I would like to apply a steel material to plate &fork which i have modelled. Doea anyone know nodes for thos kind of material?

Chocofur always has cool ideas: http://www.chocofur.com/4-metal-shaders.html

This Blender Artists thread has some great ideas. One of the best (created by IkariShinji) produces Img 1's result using Img 2's node setup. A decent scratches map can be found by Googling "scratches map."
Img 1:

Img 2:

Awesome! Thanks allot, will be really useful.

authors: Смаль Смаловичь


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How to animate only the camera?
So  i have a scene with a few objects, and a water simulation in the scene. However I want to animate the camera turning around in the scene, while the water simulation is frozen in time. So something like a time freeze effect. But when ever I try to render an animation it renders the water simulation too. I just need one frame of the water simulation. Is there a way to do this?

Copy the scene to a new one (you can call it "freezed"), then choose the frame you want to freeze, select the fluid object and apply the simulator modifier.
At this point you can do every animation you need without affecting the shape of the fluid.

One thing to keep in mind is whether this affects the original scene.  You might want to click the [2] next to the object's name in the object panel to decouple it from the object in the original scene.  (linking of datablocks is an often-overlooked tool/pitfall in blender).

Can i do the same with particle system? There is only a "convert option" instead of apply for particles.

Nevermind I found a way to fix it (sort of), just increased lifetime and start/end values.


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Best graphics card for Blender Cycles rendering
I want to build a system with a graphics card that can render scenes fast. I have heard people saying gtx 780 ti is great because of its high cuda cores. Im not sure what I should go for. Also what would be a good processor to handle such graphics card?

This is hard to say, because there are not relevant benchmark for cycles. (If someone know one, please let us know).
You can look at http://blenchmark.com/gpu-benchmarks. Keep in mind than this is not accurate results, because results are affected by CPU speed quite enough.
And yes, you are right: more CUDA cores are better for Cycles. "x80" and "Ti" have also wider bus (384bits) and that is the reason why 780 is little bit faster than 970 (with 256bits) in rendering. But 780 have almost double power consumption. Good for 970 is also 4GB RAM.
In my opinion the best what you can do is buy one GTX 970 now and second one (or better) later. In Blender you can use multiple CUDA card and can be different.

although i'm commenting too late, but for new readers. 970 is not with 4GB that is 3.5GB. That doesn't make any difference as compare to 3GB or 780 and 3.5GB of 970. it's better you get 2 older 780 ti in sli if you can't buy two 970 in sli.. still 780tiSli is better then 970sli

The 780ti is quite old now. Nvidia has just released the 10x0 series, and as a result the 9x0 (eg 980ti) are quite cheap now. For hobby use, a single card is fine. I've got the gtx970 and it motors along quite well.
If you're doing heavy work and have lots of money, SLI (multi-gpu) setups can be used.
While the 780ti and 970 are about the same speed, the 970 is cheaper, more power-efficient. Source

please don't run gpu's in SLI for Blender.


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How can I reproduce the same mesh many times 9000 (seriously)
So, I'm working on a project where I have to create a front panel of an LED light. The front layer is made up of little diamond shaped surface, the light passes through this, and these tiny diamond shaped front panel helps illuminate and spread light evenly across. Anyway, the problem I'm having is that I tried the easiest way i know to create this panel, which is to make it using a plane mesh, and duplicating it. However for the size I needed, I ended up with over 9000, yes over 9000 (9435) separate duplicates put together. It has the look I want, but its impossible to edit or render it out because there is obviously too many of them and blender keeps freezing. So I'm stuck. How can I fix this without blowing up my PC. If anyone knows an alternate way to create this, please help me! :> I would really appreciate it.

How can i do array modifier?

Ok thanks! I will look into using arrays. But will these methods such as using arrays improve rendering and editing speeds? :>

Using instances also speeds up the viewport and rendering, as well as lowering memory usage and sync time.

Ok so array and instances both speed up viewport and rendering speeds? Also do you know any instance tutorials that can help? :)

45000 (9000*5) verts isn't unrealistically massive for a single object. Try joining all your objects together with Ctrl J, or using an array modifier

Already had them joined with ctrl+j but was stiill laggy, i will try remaking the whole panel using instances and arrays :)


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How to fix bright pixels around light sources?
I'm working on a scene in blender and i have applied emission to a plane as main light source(which is located on the right hand side) and also emission coming from the tip of the candle light object. However when i render it i get these orange dots around the candle emission as you can see in the image. I have tried to up the sampling but they are always there. Any ways to fix this?

Those are called fireflies, and there are several easy ways to get rid of them. Fireflies are often present in low-light renders. The following are the three easiest.
Clamping
This is probably easiest and best way to combat fireflies. Turn the Properties panel > Render tab > Sampling drop down > Clamp Indirect: value to 3.

Filter Glossy
Turn the Properties panel > Render tab > Light Paths drop down > Filter Glossy: value to 0.5. This blurs all reflective/refractive elements just a bit.

Samples
Sometimes you just need more samples.
All ideas and images from here.

Thanks, i always wondered what filter glossy was for anyway!

I just tried this but saw no difference, any more advice?

@Ulus Can you add a .blend file to your question or comment it? Those should have worked, and if they didn't, I can try some other stuff once I have the file.

How can I attach .blend file? :)

Upload one to Blend Exchange. Is a free, long term site made specifically for blender stack exchange.


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How can I make a hole in a hole in a hole?
How can I make  of a hole in a hole in a hole by using Blender?
There is an image from this book.(page 22)

You learn basic modeling techniques like extrusion. That's how.

Related  and possibly better images here  http://www.kleinbottle.com/gallery/Hole-through-a-Hole-in-a-Hole

Given that this is topographically equivalent to a three-holed torus, I wonder if there are any solutions which take advantage of that...

Add a UV Sphere SHFT+A > UV Sphere with 48 Segments and 32 Rings.

TAB into Edit Mode and select 97 verticies on the top and press X to delete them.

Select one vertex on the side and press X to delete it.

Select the vertices that make up the edge of the newly created hole and press SHFT + ALT + S and drag the mouse to round them.

EDIT: I noticed that after add a SubSurf Modifier when I was finished that there was some puckering around the hole on the side. In order to fix this with the newly rounded still selected press E + SHIFT + X and Extrude in just slightly.

Add a default Torus by pressing A > Torus. Scale it down by pressing S.

Select a vertex on the side of the Torus and press X to delete it.

Select the vertices that make up the edge of the newly created hole in the Torus and press SHFT + ALT + S and drag the mouse to round them.

Add the hole in the Sphere to the selection and press Space Bar type in "Bridge" and select "Bridge Edge Loops.

Press 1 to go into Front View and delete the vretices on the left half and on the bottom half.

Add a Mirror Modifier check the box next to "Clipping" And Z

Select the vertices that make up the edge of the hole at the top of the Sphere and press E + Z to Extrud them down on the z axis.

With some Loop Cuts in the shafts and some Proportional Editing and a  Subsurf Modifier and Smooth Shading.

In Front Ortho View create a circle with 18 vertices, align to view. Use F6 to enter the values. Keep the 3D-Cursor in the center.

Switch to Edit Mode and delete the right half including top and bottom verts.

Select the new top and bottom verts. Connect them with F and subdivide the edge, number of cuts: two.

Move the middle verts a bit towards the middle. Select the two leftmost verts, duplicate them. Then extrude along the X axis. Then select the face and remove the face.

Select everything, go into Top View and use Spin, 10 segments, 360°. 3D-Cursor still in the center?

Select everything, remove doubles and use ALTB to cut a narrow corridor out.

Adjust the view, switch to Face Select Mode and Select the two faces shown. SPACE Bridge Edgeloops.

Repeat for the other side.

Get rid of the Clipping Border with ALTB, select everything and hit CTRLN to recalculate the normals.

Add a Subsurf Modifier with CTRL2 and set the shading to smooth. Adjust the Subsurf to 3 render levels in the modifier settings.

Done.

Sphere
Add Cylinder
Boolean Modifier on Sphere Difference out the Cylinder >> Then Apply
Add Taurus + 2 Cylinders

Boolean Modifier on Taurus (Times 2 - 1 for each cylinder) Difference out each cylinder >> Then Apply
Select the faces indicated in step #5 from the image above >> X >> V
Select ring of vertices at hole >> E >> 1.00 Then S >> 0.00 >> Enter (repeat this step on opposite side).
Move Sphere from step #3 over shape from #7.
Set Boolean Modifier on Sphere >> Difference out the shape from #7.

Here is the result:

It would be nice to see what you have tried so far.
Anyway I try to give you an idea how it works.

Crate a UV Sphere.
Go into Edit Mode and select the point at the top where all the segments meet each other. (Simply the "highest" point on the top of the sphere)
Delete those vertices and also select and delete the vertices at the bottom of the sphere.
Select an endge from the top ring and the corresponding edge from the bottom ring and create a face between them by pressing F.
-You can select the edges quite easy if you go to Top-View (Press
NumPad 7) and Ortho-View (Press NumPad 5). Then uncheck "Limit
section to visible" and use the Box-Select Mode (Press B) to select
an edge and the edge directly underneath it.

Now you should already have the vertical hole.
The process with the horizontal hole is quite similar but you should be able to do it if you watch some Youtube videos on basic modelling.
I hope I could help you.

https://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/26207/how-can-i-format-as-keyboard-keys

@  Ray Mairlot - Thanks! I've been wanting to know how to do that for a long time.


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Bevel is flipped
I'm using bevel on a curve but it keeps coming in reversed.

I tried adjusting the tilt on both objects.
I tried messing with the Transform Orientations a bit.
I've redrawn everything.
Is there a better way to sweep a rail?

Go into edit mode of the your bezier curve (not the one used as bevel object).
Switch direction by pressing: W > D


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How can i animate multiple objects to give an explosion effect?
I have an object with multiple separate parts and i would like to know how i can animate the object to open up (explode) and show all the different parts inside. Is there a way to do this? :>

For a 'dumb' explosion effect, you could try keyframing the objects, then scale their centers, so they all move away from the center. This would give some control over the speed of the 'explosion'. But, this technique has no dynamics. So, the shrapnel would not react to other objects. but it might work well for mechanical drawings.
make sure the 'Manipulate Cneter Points' button is checked.

select all the objects. (I used Cube, applied 3 array modifiers, and separated loose parts.)

Add a keyframe with I-Key. select location.

Move to a later point in the timeline and Scale larger.

Add another keyframe.
The objects are 'exploded'.
If you have an object on center (0,0,0), it will not move. You can change this by scaling from the 3d cursor.


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Help with Duplifaces
I have used a plane and a diamond shape to duplicate ths diamond on a plane. It has worked successfully using Ctrl+P and duplication>faces however i want to get rid of the big diamond which was used for duplicating, is there a way to get rid of it? I have tried going into: object > apply > make duplicates real but it makes viewport and render slow again.

I would also like to know how to solve this correctly.
As far as I know it is a limitation of the current system and there is no way around it at the moment like shown here and here
From my experiments moving the original to another layer or hiding it also hides their duplicates.

One workaround is making duplicates real, but that slows things down as you already mentioned.
Another workaround as mentioned in the Blender manual is moving the duplicator object's center away to some place it doesn't bother you, and move the duplicate original along with it to the same position. It wont really hide it but you can move it out of view.
The way I generally do this is by using a particle system instead, make it emit from faces with the Unborn and Died option enabled in the Render panel, and manually match the particle count to the object's number of faces. This way you can hide the original particle, move to another layer or even put in anther scene without ill effects.

Maybe someone here has a better workaround than this, and I sure would love to hear it.

I think i might have found a solution. I was curious and just did a render test, before and after making duplicates real, and i got the same render times for both before and after. Ofcourse after making duplicates real, it got rid of the parent, and i used Ctrl + J to join up all the duplicates into one. And it works at the same speed in viewport and render as it did before.

Yes, that works too, but you loose all the advantages of having duplicates or instances in the first place, like editability, modularity, memory savings and optimization


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How to join group objects into one
I have imported and duplicated a mesh from a group instance. But now I have many of them on my list under scenes tab. How can I put them all in one place( like a folder , to select them all at once).

If you just want to organize them conveniently, you can simply group them into a new group (or several, if needed). To select all objects within a group, first, switch the Outliner's Type display mode to Groups, then click on the icon(s):

If you want to remove them out of those empties, you can press Shift Ctrl A to make all selected duplicates real, instead of instancing:

There is no standard way to do that in Blender, but you can create an empty and then parent them all to it. That will place them all inside the empty's listing in the Outliner, out of the way. After creating the empty, just click and drag the objects into it in the Outliner. You should also give the empty a good name to distinguish what it's there for, so you don't have to remember when you come back months later and wonder where all your objects are.

Just checked my answer to make sure it actually works. I realized that you need to parent the objects with the Keep Transforms option.


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How to texture a model in blender?
I'm playing around with applying texture diffuse, normal maps and speculars to 3d models. So I have downloaded a premade one and tried to play around with it. However i can't seem to apply the textures properly to the model.
I found it here http://tf3dm.com/3d-model/katarina-70638.html
Everything is in the zip file, just need some help with applying the texture, normal & specular in blender. Thanks.

See my answer here and see if this helps http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/55232/how-to-properly-hook-up-various-maps-types-together-in-cycles/55251#55251

See my answer to How to properly hook up various maps types together in cycles?.

I'm even more confused now lol. Do i not need to unwrwap it or something first? And theres only 3 things I have to add to it, main texture, specular and normals. I dont see any specular nodes. Care to explain?

You have to unwrap before applying textures, but my guess is the file you downloaded is typically already unwrapped to match the textures it comes with. See my answer, it explains how to use a specular map, see glossiness


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Cant see keyframes in dope sheet

As you can see in the attached image, I add keyframes but i cannot see any change in the dopesheet. Just for info: I have 3 object selected, 2 are from another layer in the same scene and are group instances. Where as one of them is just made in the current layer of the current scene. Could this be the problem?

I cant upload the blender file, its for work. Cant share that much sorry. I fixed it anyways. I just had to click on the little ghost icon to the right of "summary" at the bottom of the dope sheet.


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How can I achieve a "painted" effect in my scene in blender?
I would like to model some rooms and offices and achieve this sort of look when in done:

Im fine with modelling, but how can i go by in getting it to look like the style on these images? Is there a way to add a painted effect in blender to objects or even to the whole render? Or should I consider getting this look in post production in another program by applying effects?

not sure, but have a look at this: https://studiollb.wordpress.com/2013/01/05/ink-watercolor-effects-in-blender/

The filters in Photoshop are your best bet. Gimp or Krita which are both free might also have such effects, but looking at the Blender compositon nodes i couldn't find any solutions. One thing that can be done in Blender are the lines using Freestyle. This will have the edges of all models show up and there are many advanced features regarding to this.


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BlenderGIS import call from python script
My goal is to import a .shp file into blender within my python script. I found the add-on BlenderGIS that offers this functionality. I can add the add-on to blender make it work "manually", but I want to call the import function from a python script.
I am new to Blender and I cannot find what the right way is to import a add-on/BlenderGIS into a python script.
Among other things, I tried the following:
import bpy
import sys
import os

dir = os.path.dirname(bpy.data.filepath)
if not dir in sys.path:
    sys.path.append(dir )

import io_shapefile

file = "path/to/file.shp"

bpy.ops.importgis(file)

This gives the error:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<blender_console>", line 1, in <module>
TypeError: 'BPyOpsSubMod' object is not callable

Can someone point me in the right direction on how to import a .shp from a python script?
Thanks in advance

"bpy.ops.importgis(file)" is not a function. The right way to import a .shp file with BlenderGIS is:
bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile("EXEC_DEFAULT", filepath=file)

where the first parametere can be one of these options:
'INVOKE_DEFAULT', 'INVOKE_REGION_WIN', 'INVOKE_REGION_CHANNELS', 'INVOKE_REGION_PREVIEW', 'INVOKE_AREA', 'INVOKE_SCREEN', 'EXEC_DEFAULT', 'EXEC_REGION_WIN', 'EXEC_REGION_CHANNELS', 'EXEC_REGION_PREVIEW', 'EXEC_AREA', 'EXEC_SCREEN'
So, the following code will import a .shp file:
import bpy
file = "/path/to/file.shp"
bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile("EXEC_DEFAULT", filepath=file)

Have a look at the operator name when you mouse over it, in this case bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile()
Now in the python console type in command and using autocomplete ctrl-space
>> bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile(
shapefile()
bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile(filepath="", filter_glob="*.shp", useFieldElev=False, fieldElevName="", useFieldExtrude=False, fieldExtrudeName="", extrusionAxis='Z', angCoords=False, separateObjects=False, useFieldName=False, fieldObjName="")

You get the operator call and the parameters.  Testing with a local filepath
>>> bpy.ops.importgis.shapefile(filepath="/mnt/.../GDAL/contour.shp")
Read shapefile...
Feature type : PolyLine
DBF fields : ['id', 'elev']
0%
10%
20%
...
90%
100%
Imported mesh had some problem, check the result!
{'FINISHED'}

>>>


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Rendering freezes
when I try to render my animation (I am using blender render) after a certain frame the animation itself freezes. Even if I just render an image beyond a certain frame it is in the same frozen pose. What can i do?


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Blender 2.79 screencast keys do not display rotation axis
When I enter a command like R followed by an axis e.g. X, only the R is displayed by the screencast script. All of the other expected functionality is there. Is there a way to force the display of the axes?

The original Screencast keys addon is depreciated and one of the reasons is, it does not collect the events during a modal operation like Grab or Scale. But I found a completely new screencast keys addon that does capture everything. To install, download the zip file, give it nicer name than master.zip and use the blender addon "install from file..." button.  https://github.com/chromoly/blender-ScreencastKeysMod - drat! that url is dead. Maybe someone knows where it went.

Chromoly took down all their add-ons, author's decision. The only problem with open source scripts not being forked imo.


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cycles material for marshmallow "peeps"
Does anyone have ideas for this material? Especially the sugar on the surface which I'd like to model as small cubes rather than rounded bumps as in Voronoi? Thanks!!!

If you are using Cycles render engine you could probably achieve a simplistic setup quickly using a mix between a diffuse and a translucent shader node. A voronoi texture for displacement or bump could help with the rough surface.

My diffuse color was setup for a quick random colors for display purposes, but you can use any solid color instead by removing the ColorRamp node and the Object Info radom output

Kinda looks as if it's a render with low samples. But i feel it's the right direction.

It is in a way, it was just captured from the viewport preview, not a lot of samples were used. But you can then adjust the scale/intensity of the bump or displacement to your liking, or eliminate it all along if you dislike the effect.

One more thing, you could change the voronoi type from "Intensity" to "Cells" if you want a more "angular" type of bump instead.

Ah, see. Personally i'd feel as if Cells may look better, and i'd personally choose that.

@Duarte That looks way better than I got when I tried it! Thank you.

@DuarteFarrajotaRamos why did you use a divide node instead of just changing the scale of the texture to 10?

The divide node where it stands affects the intensity or strength of the bump, not it's scale


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Array along the curve keeping rotation and equal steps along an axis
Is there a way to control a position of arrayed objects by a curve keeping the rotation mode and equal steps of the array along an axis?
(Detailed explanation at the screenshot applied)

Thanks!

Related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/68039/how-to-scale-objects-along-the-length-of-a-curve-and-keep-them-all-facing-the-sa/ Can't see any obvious way to achieve what you want natively, withour some sort of addons

Here is a workaround using native tools, unfortunately it is destructive, so save a copy of your curve before proceeding.
Make an array of a simple plane object with the desired spacing.
Make a copy of you original curve (for safe keeping) and extrude it slightly in Z so it can encompass your plane size, then convert it to a mesh object.
On the arrayed plane add a Shrinkwrap modifier set to the mesh-converted curve. Adjust its settings to Project (so spacing remains even) and both Positive and Negative if necessary.
Now place your cubes using a particle system, adjust Count as necessary to match the Array Count$+1$ (due to a bug). Pick the cube as rendered object and turn on Unborn and Died.
Under Rotation set it to None so the cubes always face the same direction.


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Blender 2.78 release doesn't start in ubuntu 14.04
I usually use the PPA: thomas-schiex/blender for installing Blender. I had never problems before with it. In September 2016 I used Blender 2.78 RC, and it worked well. But in October I've installed Blender 2.78 release (using apt-get install command), and my Blender is not starting now. What to do? Thanks!

well, without any proper error messages, I don't think you won't get any answer on that. Besides... If it already ran under your system and you did not do any major changes to it (like a new gfx driver, upgrading ubuntu to a new major release...) it's most likely a problem with the build you get from the repo.

@metaphor_set- big thanks for answer! I don't receive any error message. Just see the launcher in the pannel (KDE in KX Studio 14.04 (it's based on Ubuntu14.04)), after about 30 sec., the launcher disappears and that's all. May be there's some way to display in linux what is going on? Could you or somebody give advice?

P.C.: I returned the state of system to where the Blender 2.78 RC had a place. I used Systemback program -  Blender launches good. After installing Blender 2.78 release - it doesn't start again.
Also, I tried to delete Blender program using 'sudo apt-get remove blender' - command. After installing Blender 2.78 release - it doesn't start.

Try the tarball from https://www.blender.org/download/ . Extract it somewhere in your home directory and see it it starts. If it does, then it's most likely the build you have from the repo, that causes the failure.

Did you copy over the settings from your previous Blender version? If so (just an idea), maybe try removing Blender's settings folder? I imagine it's possible some settings or add-on data intended for an older version is causing a conflict.

@metaphor_set: I downloaded the tarbal and lounched file 'blender.desctop' - it's not starting Blender. BUT if I launch 'blender' file - it works well. May be the problem has relations with launching icons?
I've made some screenshot:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3wLXUcKN8LAekNqcnpub1VSMjA/view?usp=sharing

@Mentalist: Thanks for answer! After removing through 'sudo apt-get remove', I deleted folder "/home/cooltehno/.config/blender" - is it right? But this hasn't  resolved the problem :(

Sorry but I'm not sure about the exact steps on Ubuntu, I only know how to do it on OS X. And I don't know if doing this would resolve the problem - I guess it's also possible that the origin of the problem is within the settings of the OS. If you really suspect that the problem is caused by a difference in Blender's code between the RC version you used successfully and the official release, maybe you should submit a bug report.

May be this will help to understand something:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3wLXUcKN8LAQkk2STk1M01XZkk/view?usp=sharing
I've run in console 'Roor>usr>lib>blender' - file. This has given me massage:
/usr/lib/blender/blender: error while loading shared libraries: libosdGPU.so.3.0.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

The additional question. Does anybody know other PPA(s) for stable Blender 2.78 release? (I mean instead of 'thomas-schiex/blender')

You don't need to use apt-get at all! Just download the zip from blender.org, extract it somewhere, then run the blender executable you will find inside the folder. That's what I did and it worked from the first time!

I found the solution: I had to upgrade the Open SubDiv (OSD) library in Synaptic (Linux Ubuntu) to 3.1.1
This is how the line looked in Synaptic:

I've made the next attempt 'sudo apt-get upgrade' of my system today. Blender 2.78 was upgraded successfully and now it's starting well. I suppose the problem was really as @metaphor_set told - "the repo, that causes the failure". I think they finally fixed the build.


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Access array modifier index in shader
Is it possible to get the array index of an array modifier in the shading editor?
I need to shift the UV of every array segment by a certain amount. I can't apply them because the number of segments keeps changing.
I also can't use the segments position because the segments are places alongside a curve (curve modifier)
Any way with Python? Or drivers?

You can simply check a checkbox in the modifier settings under UV section to achieve this effect

@sulu00 What checkbox? In the "UVs" section I only have sliders "Offset U" and "V" and that applies same offset to all copies which is useless.

You can specify offset UV in the modifier settings under UVs section to achieve this effect. See the attached picture.

Is the offset, which should be less than one.
Is the UV map that is smaller that the texture.
Shows how copies get the different fragments of the image texture. Each instance has a texture shifted by value specified in 1.

Another example (in case you really need the index in your shader):
Use gradient texture, mapped to UV and then use Map Range node with Stepped Linear mode (see picture). This way each instance will have a single number assigned to it. However this requires that all of unwrapped instances fit a single texture. n my case I have 15 instances and each of them has the U offset set to 0.066667. This is also a reason why number of steps is set to 14 - so that I convert the linear gradient into 15 steps, having different color. And each steps fits exactly one UV map instance.


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Snap to cursor on only one axis
How can i move selected edges/vertices to the cursor on only one axis?

The selected edge in the image should have the exact Y position like the cursor while retaining the X of the two vertices.
I know i can copy the Y information over to the vertices but this seems tedious. Is there a more simple solution?

Have you tried to press X while dragging?

Yes. This limits movement to one axis but doesn't give me the ability to stop at the x value of the cursor

try not use the cursor as reference: set snap element to "vertex" and while sliding the 2 vertices on X, you can snap to the reference vertex position on the other axis...

With cursor positioned as desired and vertices / edges selected scale it while choosing axis which you'd like to affect on scaling (in this case Global X):

Select vertices, set Pivot Point to 3D Cursor.
Press S to scale, then X to scale to 3D Cursor by X axis axis.
Enter amount of effect of scaling. In this case it will be 0.

I thought about it at first, but I guess it can't be done in this situation, both vertices will be scaled on Z axis, so they will overlap.

You are right, I'm sorry, I thought he's trying to move the edge to have the same Z axis as the cursor, meaning, keeping the edge unchanged, and getting the lower vertex to the position of the cursor on Z, so scaling it wont work, I've been trying to do this, so I thought this is the same situation, sorry for that!

@Georges that example still had problems, probably it's better now (although it became really basic situation).

my question is, following your example, is it possible to move the selected face without distorting it, to be on the same value of 3D cursor Z? I mean moving it down, rather than from right to left in your gif.

@Georges aside from Selection To Cursor (Offset) it could be simple snapping to some geometry located where 3D Cursor is (I don't think scaling is viable solution in this case). Still if you'd like to learn more about that I think it's best to ask a new question (if such doesn't exist).


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How do I select all coplanar vertices?
I'm trying to use a Wireframe modifier on a Geodesic Dome shape made of hexagons. When I added the shape, it included vertices in the centers of all the hexagons, which don't show up in Object mode because they're coplanar with the surrounding vertices.
They are affecting the Wireframe modifier, though. How can I easily select them all so I can dissolve them?

Did you try Shift+G menu? (and in this case Amount of Connected Edges) It won't select co-planar ones, rather than those selected on your screenshot

Yes, I did. Unfortunately, they all have 6 surrounding edges of approximately equal length. Limited Dissolve turns out to do exactly what I was looking for, though.

Apparently you can just use Limited Dissolve for this (removing them, not selecting them).

to make this answer more useful for others, if possible try to add some "solution" step, to explain what to do (keystrokes, menus), optionally an image of the result after using that command...


text:
How to remove connected intersecting geometry?
I'm using the Skin modifier to make the base mesh for a creature, to sculpt on later. But I have some self-intersections, and would like to remove all the internal geometry -- kind of like a boolean union on itself.
Here's a small example, created by using the Skin modifier on three edges of a plane:

I tried the Remesh modifier, but it just kept the internal geometry.
The Intersect (Knife) tool in Self Intersect mode easily selects the boundaries of the interior geometry, but I don't know how to go from there to the interior faces I want to delete.

(I'd upload the .blend file of this example, but I'm not comfortable with blend-exchange's terms. Yes, with this file it doesn't really matter, but it's more of a statement than anything else. I uploaded it to Github's Gist service, but I had to Base64-encode it which means Windows users are out of luck.)

You could box select only the visible vertices, duplicate them, separate them (or invert the selection and delete) and then remesh it to fill the holes.

ah yes nice solution  ;)

Good idea, thanks! Unfortunately, that works for this test, but not very easily for more complicated geometry. I should probably post another picture illustrating that.


text:
How can one have axis-view?
I can't find a single guide/tutorial or any reply to help me out on this one.
So how to reset your view so that you can see the selected and focused object from "axis view" so that you can inspect it from x,y,z axis, and i'm not looking for close enough view. But 100% axis view.(for example behind you is x- and infront of you is x) (focused by numbad ","). So you can see it in "2D", meaning if it's a 3D square (with no self-rotation) you can be able to see only 1 side of it.

Not sure, but it sounds like you're describing Orthographic view. Press NumPad 5 to toggle between Orthographic and Perspective views.

Z axis:
Numberpad 7 for Top View
CtrlNumberpad 7for Bottom View
X axis:
 Numpad 3 for Right View.
 CtrlNumpad 3 for Left View.
Y axis:
 Numpad 1  for Front View
CtrlNumpad 1 for Back View
Toggles
Numpad 5 toggles between Orthographic and Perspective view.
For best results, go into File -> User Preferences..., "Interface" tab, and make sure there is a checkmark on on Auto Perspective.  If that isn't set, you may end up with a perspective (instead of orthographic) view along the selected axis.
If your view isn't centered on the selected object, press the Numpad . (period) key.
More information on the manual page: Editors » 3D Viewport » Navigating » Navigation
Axis Gizmo
In Blender 2.80 and higher, an axis gizmo can be clicked to get Orthographic views:

Also useful is the control key for the above views:

Ctrl + Numpad 7 (bottom view)
Ctrl + Numpad 1 (back view)
Ctrl + Numpad 3 (left view)


text:
Where is the brush selector of grease pencil?
I do not find the brush selector of grease pencil described on the manual.
(https://www.blender.org/manual/en/interface/grease_pencil/drawing/brushes.html)

Link is outdated.

The manual is for 2.78 which is not official yet...but can be test driven. Check your version before looking for functions that might not be in previous builds.
Brushes become available once you start drawing, or click on one of the drawing buttons in the Grease Pencil Tab - in the Tool Shelf.
You can adjust the colour on the other side in the Properties.


text:
Why is my rendered low-poly object so blobby? It's rendering with polygons that aren't in the model
I'm not just new to Blender, this is actually my first Blender project that was good enough to try to render. Unfortunately, the render went poorly.
I'm on a fairly new M1 Mac Mini. I used GPU rendering, in Cycles. (Also tried it with CPU rendering, same result.)
Here's my car as it looked in the working viewport (Object Mode, I think):

And here's how it looked when rendered:

The body doesn't have nearly as many faces as seem to be rendering. Here's a wireframe. (Looks like I could afford to simplify the bevels on the tires.):

The car body seems to be the only messed-up part of the render. I built it from a Cube mesh, extruding parts, insetting parts...nothing fancy. (I can't do fancy.)
Again, it's my first time rendering anything, so maybe this is a common error I'm just seeing for the first time.
I can provide more info about the object and the render settings if it will help. I'm not sure how much or what to include.
Have I accidentally applied a modifier or filter to the car body? If anyone has a clue, please tell me!

Most likely, you have a subdivision modifier. By default, its subdivision levels are different for viewport and rendering. Check that.

I think I found it. I'm not sure how it happened, but the material ("black tires") I used for the tires was also applied to the cube, along with the intended materials ("orange" and "glass").
I'm not sure what kind of crazy selection I had going that could apply a material invisibly (or without me noticing), but there it was. I removed it from the car body cube and it fixed the problem.
I guess this will be the answer unless someone has a more complete one, but if someone knows how I was able to assign that material to the cube by accident, lease tell me.

when you join objects, the modifiers of the active object will be applied to all joined parts (and you'll loose the modifiers of the non active parts).


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Render gpu use 1 core cpu!
There are things that I do not understand. When you use gpu only uses 1 core. Solution or explanation?
Blender 2.78 release 1475052116

Amd fx 8120
ram 16gb 1600
ssd 120 kingstone + hdd sata3 500 gb
gtx 970 sc evga
linux mint 18

@David Not sure this is really a duplicate; it looks to me like this is asking why only one CPU core is used during GPU rendering, and the other questions is asking why only one GPU core appears to be used.

When rendering an image using the GPU, the data somehow needs to be loaded from your disk, preprocessed, pushed into RAM, from there into VRAM where the GPU finally starts doing its job. Everything up until the point where the data enters VRAM is done by the CPU.
If your GPU is working at 100% there is simply no need to push more data into this pipeline, so it's actually a good idea to not occupy more of the CPU's cores than necessary. In fact, this one CPU core won't even reach 100% unless your system runs out of RAM. In this case the CPU starts swapping the content of the memory onto the hdd, which ultimately will rise the CPU load.
So there's no solution needed, the system manages its own resources quite fine.

Sorry that not speak well english.
But the question is that this does not generate bottleneck?.
The cpu usage is almost always 100%, but I sense that need more. To be an amd fx 8120 uses shared resources, if you see the cpu3 - 35%. What worries me is whether use of a core only Rendering GPU for a long time.
In addition when begins blender to work with the GPU core that you touch, is responsible to end the process. And does not share the burden in other cores or to be rotary switch.


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How can I remove a node group from my startup file?
I wanted to import some node groups into a new project to save as my startup file so that I will always have them. I accidentally imported one of the nodes I wanted, as well as a junk copy that I had created. I've tried everything I can think of to delete it, and haven't found anything helpful online. The node was originally a copy of the Rectangular to Polar node group, but is now empty and has been renamed Untitled. I suppose I could simply use it next time I need a new node group, but I'd rather just get rid of it. Is there any way to do this?

If you have already saved that group into startup file then you should be able to make that group orphan. Delete the material where the group is added, save the startup file (because you've saved it with group) and reload. See http://blender.stackexchange.com/q/45992/1245 and http://blender.stackexchange.com/q/7826/1245

I don't think the node is being used anywhere, but I can't get it to be "orphaned." My understanding is that the "F" should be an "Ö" when it's orphaned.

If you mean that 0 number should appear next to the group name then no, it won't show number of users in that way. The group will become orphan as long as no materials use it; so if you have one material using it, Shift click on X button to drop it entirely. The group will become orphan and will be deleted (after reload). In you case it's necessary also to save startup file after deleting material and before reload.

Steps:

Open up a new Blender file (aka. the startup file)
In the Outliner, select "Data-Blocks" from the drop-down menu
Find the "Node Groups" section, which should contain the node groups that you are trying to remove
Expand one of the node groups and uncheck the "Fake User" field
Repeat this for all the node groups that you want to remove
Save the file as the start up file, close and open a new Blender file

The node groups that do not have any users will not be saved and thus will not be there when the startup file is loaded. If you have multiple node groups to remove and they have dependencies upon each other, then it may be necessary to save the startup file, close, open new, and save again a couple of times. Each time, the node groups without any dependencies (leaves) will be pruned and eventually you can remove all unwanted node groups.

To permanently delete your nodes, collections, meshes, and materials in your blend file, follow these steps:

Open your Blend file
In Outliner hover to Display Mode
Select Blender File
Right click and select Delete


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Why isn't my node setup working to create a smoke effect in cycles?
I looked up how to do smoke in cycles, and ended up here. Following their setup, I ended up with a completely transparent object. I tried to apply the material to a cube, and placed a Suzanne head (with no material applied) behind it to better see the effect. I have attached images of the scene in solid view and rendered view, as well as an image of my material nodes. If other screenshots or info are needed, just ask.

I don't see a screenshot of rendered view...please post your blend here.

Did you setup/run a smoke simulation?

Thanks pycoder and Duane Dibbley. I feel pretty foolish for not researching enough before asking the question.

@FoitGuy That's alright, just consider it a lesson learned for future Q's ;-)

Alright, I'm a fool. Thanks to pycoder for pointing out my error. I forgot to add the Quick Smoke Simulation. It seems to work now. I have lots of smoke! Thanks!

Please don't add "thank you" as an answer. Instead, accept the answer that you found most helpful.  - From Review

I his defense, I didn't actually leave an answer, and this sort of answers the question anyway :-)

But note that @ShadyPuck's comment is a canned response put there by the review system, so don't worry about it too much :)


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Blender Object Visibility Controls at version 2.80+
At Blender versions prior to 2.80, it was simple to toggle and keyframe the visibility - either in the viewport or the render by manipulating the buttons in the Outliner.

Those buttons aren't present in Blender 2.80 - how do I control the visibility as before?

It’s certainly similar, @Gorgious, but I think it’s coming from a different angle in that this is a change to the interface rather than loading files from an earlier version.

You are right. This one is a duplicate though : https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/141144/86891

It is - well found!

It took me several minutes to find it :) but I was sure I saw this question asked and answered several times before but couldn't figure the keywords (damn stackexchange search !!)

Yeah - it’s something I’ve wondered for a while and only today happened across the ‘fix’ and so created the Q with and A to share the knowledge. Good that it’s already been answered - that had passed me by!! It’s a bit confusing losing those icons IMO. Seems a big loss for very little saved screen space.

The visibility options are still available in the Overview window and operate as before, but are hidden by default. They can be re-enabled via the 'Filter' drop-down which provides various toggle buttons for the various additional controls :


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Multiple variables in Driver Scripted Epxression
How do I combine multiple variables (more than two) in the scripted expression using the IF function? Compare the two images below (first works, but second one throws an error and does not seem to compute)

In the screenshot that is failing you need to rename your variable to match the if statement, or you need to rename your reference used inside of the statement to match your variable name.
ALSO
As a good practice put the multiple AND portion of the statement in parenthesis like so:
Without Renaming your variable:
0 if (var > -0.5 and var < 0.5 and var_001 > -0.5 and var_001 < 1) else 2

With renaming the variable:
0 if (var > -0.5 and var < 0.5 and var2 > -0.5 and var2 < 1) else 2


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how do you open an FBX file on blender 2.49?
i have quite a difficulty on opening an FBX on the old version of blender. help

2.49 is quite an old version--at least 8 years, and while I don't know how much support, either natively, or via add-ons there was for import of files in fbx format, is it possible that you are trying to import an fbx file compliant with  newer version of the fbx standard than is supported by 2.49?

why the need for 2.49 specifically? you could try the oldest 2.5+ version that imports that fbx, then try to save as .blend and open that with 2.49. Blender is somewhat forward-compatible, and so was 2.49, but some feature could be not supported though.


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Can I bake normals and diffuse to combine in a single image
My target output is low poly md2 and low poly dae files.
I'm using the high-poly normal map to low-poly object trick.
Looking for a way to bake a final texture that combines the look of the normal map and the color texture into a single image.
Been trying many things. Been having many failure.
Any clues on if this is even possible? I know md2 are ancient. But that is my target.

I think a normal map can get by with just red and green channels, as blue always exports at 0.5 I think (correct me if I'm wrong) This makes it easy to recreate a normal map from just red/green channel information. This way, you have the blue channel to pack your diffuse texture, and you could probably use the alpha as well if you enable it.

I don't have any control over the gaming engine rendering. It doesn't have normals. It just has a single surface graphic. I was hoping to borrow the detail from the high poly model into the low poly that is used in the actual engine by baking the normal map and the color map into a single image.

In blender, you could plug the normal map into an Ambient Occlusion node and then use the Ambient Occlusion node to darken cavities in your color map by using a MixRGB node and setting it to Multiply, which would give the illusion of highs and lows in just your colour map without the need of a Normal Map. You just need to bake the new color map to export it with your mesh after that. If this sounds like something that might work, then let me know and I'll make an answer here with images.

It would be nice if you show the example (image?) of what you wish.

Mark Jackson, that sounds very promising. I will give that a try tonight and check the results. If it works, I'll let you know.

I ran a test following Mark Jackson instructions as best I could. The results were promising. But, I think my noobishness may have contributed to it not being 100%. Still it was promising. Thanks

@MarkJackson didnt test it, but normal map is quite colorful for multiply, dont you mean heigh map (bump map)?

FYI, the way I got it to work was to put the image into Photoshop and totally de-saturate the image. I was expecting there is a node trick that will convert from color to BW. Don't know nodes well enough to know if there is or isn't. Hence the photoshop.

@vklidu Perhaps I didn't explain that well, but plugging a normal map output (from the Normal map node) into the Ambient Occlusion node will affect the ambient occlusion. So the Ambient Occlusion will take into account the normal map adding shadows where the normal map drives the direction of light bounces in crevases from the normals from the Normal map node. Then you multiply the output from the Ambient Occlusion node with your Colour to add darker areas, giving the illusion of depth using just the base colour once the colour texture has been baked.

@MarkJackson ah, thank you, don't you wanna create a full answer with example?

I'm just answering this because the bounty is almost up and so far there are no accepted answers.
As others have mentioned above, it is possible to bake the "simulated height data" in the form of Ambient Occlusion from a Bump Map being multiplied into the BaseColor.
EXAMPLE:
I made an image of a sphere as it will eventually (truly) be - smooth with no real height data.

I then took the same sphere and added "height" information provided by a Noise Texture and a Bump Node.

From here, you can "add" (multiply) that data to the BaseColor by using an Ambient Occlusion Node.

Before baking, make sure your object has unwrapped UV's As per the baking process,  create a new image, un-check "use alpha" but DO check "32 bit float". Make sure the image is at least 2K (2048x2048).Load the image as a new image texture and have it selected (but not attached) in the material graph for the object.

Then, making sure you're in Cycles, under the Render Properties tab, and under "bake" Set bake type to "diffuse" (since you only need one color image), and click to de-select Direct, and Indirect influence, leaving only Color selected. I also recommend lowering the margin size. Hit the bake button when ready.

Once the bake is complete, go to the UV tab and select "Image > save" to save your image.

You can then load and connect it as a basecolor as you would normally.
The final result looks like this - note the only texture attached is the new BaseColor containing the "impression" of the previous height information:

You can bake your final material into a single diffuse image. Assuming you have a final model with an UV map and material already set up for it, this is how you do it.

In the Shader Editor, add an image node and create a new image at desired resolution. Make sure it remains selected! This will be the final baked output.
In the Render Properties panel, change the render engine to Cycles and go to the Bake submenu.
Press the Bake button, the default settings should be fine in your case.

Of course, this leads to very PS2 looking graphics, and you might or might not want to paint over it once exported.


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Same animation to different objects
Say I've got a dozen meshes and I want to animate some features that any mesh can have, regardless of their topology: render visibility, number of subsurface iterations, intensity of a displace modifier, Loc Rot and Scale, etc.
But I would like the same set of pre-determined effects, expressed in terms of keyframes (e.g. "enable visibility, then rotate Z by 30 degrees while increasing the decimate ratio"), to be applied to each object at a different (controlled) time.
Is this what the NLA editor is for? What would be a step-to-step way of doing this?

Yes the NLA editor can achieve some of your goals.  There are many possible approaches.  I will make no effort for a [step-to-step] explanation. Of some relevance is   https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/60398/moving-all-keyframes-in-a-scene-at-once/60399?s=6|10.2050#60399  .  Keyframed data is a curve which can be copied and translated (moved) in the frame x direction.  Also modifiers can be copied from one object do the other.  Yes the numerous options can be confusing.  You may want to see full tutorial videos on the site which has a name that rhymes with noonoob.

I suggest as a small learning example you place two keyframes in the object [A] position and copy it to object [B].  Then in the graph editor move all points by some number of frame positions.  Copy, Paste, Translate.  This will help you to think about the flexibility of Blender.

Once you have animated the first object, select the other objects, then the animated object so that it is the active object (highlighted a brighter orange). Then press ⎈ CtrlL and choose Animation Data, this will give each object the same action.
You could also select each object and set the action in the action editor.

In the NLA editor, click the double down arrows for each object to turn the action into an NLA strip for each object.

You can now select and move G each NLA strip so that each object is animated at a different time. You can also set the start and end frames in the properties region N.


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By using the CLI on Linux, can I make a running blender instance save its current scene to file?
I have a desktop machine that has been baking a physics (rigid body) simulation. I am now from another computer, and I have ssh access to the remote one. In the remote /tmp folder the last autosave is from before "bake" was invoked.
Is there a way to send a signal in order to make the existing blender instance save its current scene to file, or to trigger its autosave?

No. Blender accepts cli options when starting that can include a python script to automate tasks but once started it no longer accepts commands from the cli.
The autosave, if is hasn't been disabled, should save a temporary copy, even the unmodified startup file will regularly autosave a temporary copy. If your autosave file is old then it may indicate that the copy of blender is no longer running.
If you can't get back to the machine (or get someone else) to close it properly then the only option I can think of trying is x11vnc that can connect to an existing xorg desktop. See if you can download a copy to your home folder and run it without admin permissions.

If you want to connect to a Linux desktop from outside, use x2go, it is the most functional project for it, install x2goserver on the machine you want to connect to, and x2goclient on the source machine, which can be Linux, Windows or Mac and it will allow you to open a desktop even over a slow link, via ssh and it uses existing users. It allows also sound, printer and file sharing and session resume.

I don't know how to do it via ssh, but there is a simple method: using https://www.teamviewer.com It's cross-platform, gui-based, and easy to use. And you can access to blender gui from over OS and even from smartphone.

Thanks for the suggestion. However, this would require having prepared the remote machine before (by installing teamviewer on it). Also, I'm not sure I could install it since I am not root on the remote machine


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Can I define variables to be used in number buttons across the interface?
In previous versions of blender, it was possible to use mathematical expressions containing "#frame" within - if I remember correctly - any number button. Every value controlled by #frame would then be updated frame by frame with the result of the formula.
By generalizing this concept, I wonder if it's possible to define (keyframe-able) variables in one place and then use them as inputs across the entire interface. For example, it would be handy to be able to define a "#clay" variable that simultaneously controls the factor of several Mix Shader nodes, but also determines the intensity of a couple of light sources, and possibly do other things such as reducing render samples and so on. This way, I could switch from realistic to clay render (or an in-between version) by adjusting that slider from 0 to 1.
Is it possible to do this without writing a script?

And if it's not, where do I file a feature request?

This is what drivers are for. You can use them to take some mathematical expression (or a bit of Python code) to determine the value of settings.
For more information on this topic, see the Drivers section of the Blender manual.


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Move a soft body/cloth after baking
Is it possible to move / scale / rotate, and possibly keyframe, an object after baking point cache (soft body or clothes simulation data) to its mesh?

I feel like this must be a duplicate question, but I can't find previous questions on the topic. This one deals with rigid bodies, where the solution is just to parent the object to an empty and move the latter around. It doesn't seem to work for clothes and soft bodies though.

Something like this might help : https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/106400/29586 - convert the soft body into animated shape keys. Once it’s shape keys you should be able to move/scale/rotate the mesh normally.

oh nice, it would work indeed! However, that's a rather inefficient use of the object's shape data, with every single frame exposed to the GUI as a different data block D: (I know it's not your fault!)

Yes - it’s quite cumbersome to manipulate all those shape keys too. It seems to be the only solution at the moment.

In order to move/rotate/scale the result of a baked soft body or cloth simulation you can export the data to a suitable format and either Import it (into a set of shape keys) or use the exported point data to drive a Mesh Cache modifier. This can be achieved via the MDD Importer/Exporter which is available as an addon (User Preferences/Add-ons).
Shape Keys
For the 'shape key' method, simply select your bakes soft body/cloth mesh and select File/Export/Lightwave Point Cache(.mdd) from the menu. This allows you to create an MDD file containing the data from each of the vertices in your mesh.
Now select File/Import/Lightwave Point Cache(.mdd) to re-import the point data and the add-on will automatically generate animated keyframes to animate your object between frames. At this point you can remove the Soft Body physics as the animation will be purely keyed.
You can now move/rotate/scale your mesh and the animation will still be applied.
See https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/106400/29586 for a further example of this.
Mesh Cache Modifier
Another option is to access the exported MDD data via a Mesh Cache Modifier. The modifier reads the exported MDD data and applies it directly to the mesh. This has the advantage of avoiding the complexity of keyframed shape keys and allows the animation to be more easily 'tuned'.
This can produce the following result :

Here the centre cloth falling on the cube is the original simulation. The point cache has been exported to an MDD file and the mesh duplicated (without the simulation) and Mesh Cache modifiers used to re-apply the simulation on each of the copies - at different start frames and orientations.
A further example of this can be found here https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/10661/29586

I haven't tried it yet, but the second approach seems to be perfect for the job! It's still a pity having to use an external file just to move an object origin, but the proposed workflow still seems intuitive and fast (and also uses tools that are made for this kind of application, unlike shape keys). Great, thanks!


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Why is my water not rendering nor in preview nor in final?
I tried a simple water tutorial and followed it step by step, but my water just won't render, not even in the preview. I already checked questions that were similar to mine but nothing worked: I already checked that the water is in fact renderable (the camera icon is activated) and the maximum draw type is set to solid or textured.  Here's the file: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7-B85l-ySrhOG16RVExUXJ1cEU/view?usp=sharing
I started blender just yesterday, I'm really new to this, so any kind of help is really appreciated!

"FLUID" object is your actual Fluid Domain and it has 3 material slots assigned to it. First one is pure transparent material and this is why your fluid isn't visible. Remove "TRANS" and empty material and you are good to go.
Also, you have "dOMAIN" object which is doing nothing. Consider deleting it or hiding.

Oh I really didn't think that would influence the water, thanks a lot!


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Baking procedural material
So the problem i have is that when baking a procedural material, i get an inconsistent output for the image.
This the procedural material

This is the baked material:

Any ideas on how to resolve the issues would be much appreciated.

What resolution have you baked to? Is there an opportunity in your case, to make a tileable texture instead, giving you a higher resolution per tile?

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

Here's the blend file, it's not the same one as I used in the image above, but still the has the same issues.

The quality of your bake depends on the number of render samples you have configured for your renders, the resolution of your target image and the size of your texture's features. If the 'lines' making up the crosses on your texture are very thin and/or the number of samples in your render are quite low then there is an increasing chance that the baking will miss those features. Also, there will be blurring resulting from the resolution of the image that you are baking to.
Try increasing the number of samples and/or increasing the resolution of the target image to see if that produces a cleaner bake.

Increasing the resolution of the target image resolved it. Much appreciated for the pointers.


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How to export duplicate bone instances as an FBX?
I'm trying to get this model I'm working on to export properly into Unity with no luck. Everything is exporting properly except the actual bones of the model, which aren't exporting at all (I have 'armature' checked on export settings.)
After a lot of failed attemps at exporting and re-exporting the model, I read a tooltip on the export settings menu that said I can't export 'duplicate instances' of armatures, which I am fairly certain is exactly what I have.

See, I was trying to make a model for my 3D game that looks 2D (like in Paper Mario) out of planes, so I took individual bones and attached them to each part I wanted to animate (arm, leg, hand, ect.) rather than applying a traditional armature.
This is also why I can't use a program like Rigify to rig my model: the parts each need to move individually of one another, and a regular humanoid rig won't cut the job.
Do you have any suggestions for what I should do? When I import the .blend file into Unity, it looks like this:

And she still has all of her bones in the model.
But when I export the FBX, it looks like it should, with all of her limbs connected to her body, but the bones aren't there and I can't animate her.
Do you have any advice? I've been fiddling with this for days and have made very little progress; this is the first time I've animated a moving, human model.
Thanks so much.


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Glass issue, trasparent vs holdout shader
I have a problem with the transparency shader.
I need to use it combined with the glossy one, mixing using a fresnel factor.
Unfortunately I keep getting the same result...an annoying black area.
ON the other hand, with Holdout shader everything seems to work correctly.
I'm attaching 4 screenshots that I hope will explain better the issue.

I've already seen a discussion about this theme:
"How to render semi-transparent objects with transparent background as a png with cycles"
but it's two years old and I don't know if something has changed in the meantime.
And all this, because I need to resolve an issue that I have in a scene.
I have a big surface made of glass, that is in front of all, this surface affects to much the render time and the level of noise.

Is there some sort of trick to resolve that problem?
I have already  play with light path, but nothing seems to work.
I think that the noise is caused by the refraction properties of the glass shader.
Can someone help me?
Thank you


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Complex lighting situations issues_light intensity decreases > number lights increases
I’ll try to explain the issue as best as possible, I’ll attach some pictures to better explain the problem.
I have noticed that the more “lights” are introduced in a scene (both interior and exterior) the more the intensity of each lamp is reduced.
I’ve notices the same issue with HDRI images. Again, adding more sources of light into the scene, results in a decreased intensity of the HDRI image itself.
Clearly, the problem becomes extremely limiting especially in situations where multiple sources of illumination are required.
In the attachments I’m showing the aforementioned issue, as you can see the source of lighting (in this case a simple Point lamp) decreases its intensity as the number lights increases. On every picture I’m adding one or more lamps.

Can you try rendering again without clamping? That could be the cause for your issues but not 100% sure.

The default "Path Tracing" integrator is coded so that for each sample, it will bounce light from a randomly-chosen lamp.
My suggestion is that you change the integrator to "Branched Path Trace", which you can change from the Sampling sub-tab.
Using Branched PT will make cycles take bounces from every light for each sample.  This comes at the cost of increasing render times, but with the added benefit of reducing noise.
More info here: https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/render/cycles/settings/integrator.html
EDIT: As a further note, Blender 2.79 will feature probablistic termination of lights based on contribution.  Basically, it will randomly skip sampling from lights if their contribution to a sample would be below a certain threshold, causing it to spend less time computing bounces for lights which make little or no difference for a given sample.  This provides speed gains in complex lighting setups, particularly where some of the lights are distant or occluded.  More info here: https://developer.blender.org/rB26bf230

Well, first of all thanks for answer!
In another discussion  came out that the problem was due to the clamping, as indeed @GottfriedHofmann supposed.
Stefan Werner write:
"Try setting the clamp direct/indirect render settings to 0, that might make it go away. Stochastic sampling of many lights can lead to very bright individual samples, and when those samples get clamped before added to a pixel, energy (light) is lost."
...and again:
"Setting clamp to 0 does not make fireflies.
Setting clamp to values other than 0 imposes a maximum brightness limit on individual samples. In many cases, limiting that brightness hides fireflies, but in cases like this, it can take away important contributions.
A simple case to demonstrate this is if you take an object with a bright and sharp specular highlight and have that reflection be blurred either by depth of field or motion blur. Setting a clamp value on direct light very quickly dims what otherwise is a bright spot/streak.
With many lights and path tracing, the following situation takes place:
In standard path tracing, only one light is being sampled per pixel sample, all other lights are ignored. To compensate for that, the contribution of that light must be divided by the probability of that light being sampled, that is, divided by the number of lights. With 100 light sources, that means any given light source will be considered for only 1 in 100 pixel samples, but its contribution to that sample will be 100 times that of what it would be if it were just one light source. When that sample is now being clamped, this brightness gets limited and the appears darker than it should be."
I think that Stefan has nailed the point, the problem in that and, i think, in many other scenes with a lot of light source should be the clamp. In particular, the one that contributes the most at this issue is the "direct clamp".
As Stefan says, it isn't the "0 Clamp" that produce fireflies, contrarily, the scope of Clamp is to avoid it. But in this particular case, increasing the number of light sources seems to influence the overall intensity of each light.
However, the most fireflies seems to come from indirect bounces, so I resolved the intensity issues in this scene setting only clamp direct to 0 and leaving the indirect clamp to 4.
As @Gottfried suggest, I've rendered again the scene with direct clamp set to 0.
I'll attach an explaining screen.


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Play midi alongside animation
my goal is to play exact midi note in a certain frame, so i thought the only way is to use a midi in/out python library, and execute a certain python command line or script in the required keyframe, so from here my question becomes: is there any way to keyframe a python script?
of course if there are any other easier ways for my goal, it would be better

There is currently no intuitive way to use Midi in Animation Nodes. But the the developer has done some testing of such system: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhUS13dzF5A
So there might be support of midi data in AN at some point.

I don't know if you can do that, but you shouldn't need to. Try simply exporting the MIDI to a sound file, and using the Video Sequence Editor (I think) to align it with your animation.

i saw it implemented here on this video
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LFUtjWTIOEM
he says he used blender's game engine, but i have no clue how to start, as he gave no further explanations. and of course i considered the idea of saving it to a file and aligning it to video, but it doesn't suit my project

Oh, like in real time? Interesting! Well, I have no idea how to do that. (: But if you want that, you shouldn't really need keyframes—you just need to have a MIDI note trigger an animation.


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Hooking Computers Together
I have a fairly top end iMac, but might have access to a couple basic windows computers. I was wondering if I could hook up the windows computers to do my 3d rendering, and leave my iMac for video work (AE, PP)? How would I do this, and is this logical?

It depends on your needs, expertise, time, money and probably a few other factors I forgot.

Look at the Network Render addon that is already included in Blender.

Which render engine are you planning to use, Cycles, Blender Internal, third part engines? That makes all the difference.

Possible duplicate of Can Blender use a GPU's remotely? (over a network)

Mostly Blender Internal, but occasionally Cycles.

What would I need to buy in order to set up a network render?

Could I send it over network from the mac to the windows to render it?

If you wanted to go to the trouble of setting up a SSH into the Windows computers, you could control them over the network from your Mac. The problem is that it takes a lot of work to set up a Unix-Windows SSH. You can find resources for doing that here. If you are comfortable with the working in the Unix shell and do get that set up, then you can put together a "pseudo" network render that doesn't need the Blender Network Render. I use a similar method to render on Linux servers since they don't have a GUI.

Install Dropbox on the Windows computers. Make sure that you know where the Dropbox folder is.
In the .blend file you want to render, under the Output panel in the Render settings, uncheck "Overwrite" and check "Placeholders".
Upload the .blend file to Dropbox, so that it automatically is copied to both of the Windows computers.
Run Blender on each of the Windows computers from the SSH shell. You can use the command <path to blender> -b <path to file> -o <path to Dropbox> to run Blender in the background and render whatever file you specify. Both of the Windows computers will render whatever frames you specified in the .blend file to the Dropbox folder.

The advantages of this method are:

You don't have to use the network renderer (no "Slave" and "Master" configuration to worry about)
It is really easy to add in another computer: just install Dropbox, SSH in, and run the command.
You can see exactly where each of the working computers are from the terminal on your Mac.

Disadvantages:

It requires a basic knowledge of the Unix shell (command line)
Could possibly be an extra bit of a pain since the Windows computers would have to have extra programs installed to be able to communicate in that way with the Mac.
Every time you cancel mid-render, each computer will leave a blank image file (the one it was in the middle of rendering). This isn't a big deal as long as you remember to delete it, so that the computers will pick up where they left off.

Basically, there isn't a simple way to do what you want. In spite of that, it is possible. Hope that this helps!

You could try sheepit https://www.sheepit-renderfarm.com/
Just run the sheepit client on your mac. If don't want to render other users stuff to get points, just turn on the only render my own stuff setting.
Keep in mind that sheepit is better for animations.

Can I use this from mac to windows?


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Can blender be used as non-linear editor easily?
I am making a music video, greenscreening 1 person 14 times into a cathedral. How easy would it be to do this, with lots of moving shots from person to person, etc.(because I need to lip sync with an pre-recorded audio file).
Or would it be easier to render animation out of blender and track greenscreen footage in AE or Prpro?

Welcome to Blender.SE! Could you please give us a bit more information? What exactly do you mean with greenscreening a person "14 times" into a cathedral? What have you tried so far?

So there is 14 parts, each will be filmed separately (because it is the same person). And I will have to put each movie clip into the cathedral model. I have the subject in blender, and I would like to know if I can listen to audio for lip sync, and how to get the movie into the cathedral after I have taken out the bk. Thanks

The video editor in Blender (the VSE) does not have a Chroma Key effect. However you can set up another Blender Scene so that the video you want to "key" is sent through the compositor, which does have chroma keying ability.

Then this scene is used in the Video editing timeline instead of the original vision. You could also add the sound in that Compositing scene so that it is available in sync with the keyed media. Assuming that the media you are keying from doesn't change much but you could always animate the key settings to accomodate it.

OK, I know how to key in the compositing mode. What I'm wondering, is how easy this would be, doing this in blender versus exporting animation and working in AE and Prpro. Also, how can I footage from the compositing mode, into the 3d model mode? Thanks


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problem while exporting the model to unity
Hey guys i'm new to blender and recently i was working on my model but i'm facing a problem when i export it has fbx and load it in unity

This is how the object looks when i'm in blender
and This is how the object looks in unity

Thanks in advance

Recalculate normals. Read http://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/3606/why-are-some-faces-in-my-mesh-darker

Yep, looks like a normals issue

authors: Денис Кулешов


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Blender Game Engine Python Flipper Animation
Okay. I've been working on this 2D Platform game in the Blender Game Engine lately. I've added some basic motion functions (in Python code), and now I'm getting to animation. I'm using the Blender playAnimation() function, and it works. But, I've found with logic bricks that the animation type that works best in my game is the flipper type. playAnimation() has no flipper mode.
Here's my script so far: (without playAnimation() function in it)
import bge
import math

def main():

    cont = bge.logic.getCurrentController()
    own = cont.owner

    keyboard = bge.logic.keyboard

    xyz = own.localOrientation.to_euler()
    xyz[2] = math.radians(180)

    if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events
       [bge.events.RIGHTARROWKEY]:
       own.applyMovement((0, 0.08, 0), True)
       own.worldOrientation = (0, 0, 0)

    if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events
       [bge.events.LEFTARROWKEY]:
       own.applyMovement((0, 0.08, 0), True)
       own.localOrientation = xyz.to_matrix()

    if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events[bge.events.SPACEKEY]:
        own.applyMovement = ((0, 0, 0.08), True)

main()

So, how could I allow flipper animations in this script? Thanks!!
P.S. This code is for a public game project (or several). While I'll really appreciate any code or tips offered, I may or may not be able to give credit for it.

The flipper mode belongs to the action armature. This makes the actuator play the animation forward on activation and backward on deactivation.
The actuator uses the internal animation system to play the action in response the the current status (activated or deactivated) and the animation status (playing, reaching end).
The internal animation system can only act according to the animation status.
The simplest solution is to activate/deactivate the action actuator in flipper mode.
E.g.:
import bge
import math

controller = bge.logic.getCurrentController()
owner = controller.owner

keyboard = bge.logic.keyboard

xyz = owner.localOrientation.to_euler()
xyz[2] = math.radians(180)

if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events[bge.events.RIGHTARROWKEY]:
    owner.applyMovement((0, 0.08, 0), True)
    owner.worldOrientation = (0, 0, 0)
    controller.activate("turn right")
    controller.deactivate("turn left")
    controller.deactivate("jump")

if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events[bge.events.LEFTARROWKEY]:
    owner.applyMovement((0, 0.08, 0), True)
    owner.localOrientation = xyz.to_matrix()
    controller.activate("turn left")
    controller.deactivate("turn right")
    controller.deactivate("jump")

if bge.logic.KX_INPUT_ACTIVE == keyboard.events[bge.events.SPACEKEY]:
    owner.applyMovement = ((0, 0, 0.08), True)
    controller.activate("jump")
    controller.deactivate("turn right")
    controller.deactivate("turn left")

Do I replace the words in quotations with the name of my animation? I have a single animation named "Run" How, would this look for such an animation?

activate() and deactivate() expect a connected actuator or the name of a connected actuator. In the sample "jump", "turn left" and "turn right" are the name of actuators.

In general I would separate physical motion (moving, turning) from animation (walk cycle). While the first one alters the position/orientation within the scene the second one makes it look nice. Both operations should run synchronous to appear as a single task.

And what would be the logic brick setup for the "Run" actuator in my case? I tried connecting it to the python controller, and then leaving it all to itself, and neither worked.

When should the "run" animation be played? [playing it is controller.activate("run") - assuming you have an actuator with that name]

It would run whenever the left key or the right key were pressed. I was just wondering how to connect the run actuator to make it work. I made an actuator named "run" and that didn't seem to make it work with the code (which I edited)

Make sure the actuator is connected to the python controller (executing the above code). Make sure the actuator names match.

Okay, I'm getting progress. I added an actuator named "run" and set it as a flipper animation. When using a sensor, it worked. When using the Python activate() command, it played the animation, but not as a flipper animation. It played the full thing instead of only when I had the key pressed down.

Do not forget you need to explicitly deactivate actuators too.

Well, currently "run" is the only actuator I have. So when I only activate "run," it still only plays the animation once and not as a flipper. When I put the activate code line and after that the deactive("run"), it does just the same. What's wrong?

A walk cycle should never be played as flipper. It is a cycle (=loop). After deactivation you should immediately activate a followup action (e.g. standing). To make that smooth you can have the "blend" parameter set.

I did as you said, but my blend file still isn't working right. I'm so sorry to have to keep bugging you, but if you don't mind, I will supply a blend file showing what I've done so you can maybe point out how to fix it: https://www.dropbox.com/s/r7lfbr5xhvrhjb3/test.blend?dl=0

ok, now I understand your concept. You want to make the character run left on left key and run right in right key. I thought you want to turn the object that way.  There are a few points: A) remove main() it makes no sense here. B) Avoid  deactivate and activate of the same actuator at the same time. Deactivation will be the result. C) Avoid activating two action actuators with the conflicting aimation setup - you do not need that -> either it is running or it is idle but not both. This is the reason why it does not play the run action.

All done. But, the animation still doesn't play as flipper, only as a loop animation - I can't get over that.


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Adding Random Noise to Rendered Images
I know that in Cycles we can have as much noise as we want, but it's not the right type of noise.  I'm inserting an object into a video taken with a DSLR.  The video has some ISO noise in it and it makes the object that I rendered stand out.
I tried using my photo editor but it doesn't use a random seed for the noise so it's always the same pattern.  Does Blender have a way to do this in the compositor (preferably not Python)?  This would also be nice for adding realism to scenes.

Using @cegaton's excellent idea above, I was able to generate the noise texture and use drivers as input for the offset of the texture:

The result:

This is added at @cegaton's request to detail the driver creation for the random value generator (in the edit above) in case others have need of this.
Essentially, the texture that cegaton created above is random in nature so it's tile-able... meaning there are no detectable seams.  Because of this, you can offset the position randomly with each frame and it will appear to be random digital noise or film grain.  The texture will automatically wrap the offset.
This requires a simple driver to be added to the offset values.  Ensure the Scripted Expression option is selected in the Drivers menu and multiply an integer by noise.random().  I used 100 as the multiplier in the X direction. You can also offset it in the Y direction but, going on the assumption that the texture is random, it's theoretically unnecessary.


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Blender 2.77 Bone Constraint
I have a question about 2.77 blender, I cannot find the bone constraint so I cannot have one object track another. What should I do?

Select a bone, switch to Pose mode and you will find all the bone constraints in the properties window.


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How can I create a pure black-white brick texture node?
I'm new to Blender.
I need a texture with offset 'bricks', so I found the brick texture node to be exactly what I needed, the only problem is that it works by blending two colors/textures, whereas I'd like to keep the inputs 'pure' (not mixed).
This is because my brick color inputs are two textures of the same tile, with the only difference being their x-offset in a mapping node (one of two is offset by 50%).
Almost like a checker texture with brick-like offsets.
I need this to make a flooring material starting from a 1-tile sample.
Starting tile texture:

Desired result:

I've tried a few solutions but I'm ultimately unable to solve this.
I'd like to make it without any additional hand-made textures to keep the result procedural.

You need to understand how UV coordinates work for this. Every vertex has such a pair of two numbers that get interpolated across the mesh. Suppose you have a square made out of four vertices with the shown UV coordinates:

The bottom left of your image will always get mapped to (0.0, 0.0) and the upper right to (1.0, 1.0). If the UV coordinates exceed these bounds, the image will get tiled, which means copies will get mapped to (1.0, 1.0) -> (2.0, 2.0) etc. This means, you can simply multiply (scale) the the UV coordinates by using a mapping node and your texture will get projected onto the mesh multiple times:
.
The only thing missing is the shift. For this, you want to copy your mapping node and input some value in the location x field. Then, create a MixRGB node which will choose when to use which mapping depending on some parameter. To create this parameter, you want to devide the scaled V coordinate by 2, take the fraction of it (which bastically is the rest when devided by 1) and see at which points it is greater than 0.5:

All that is left to do is to plug this output parameter into the MixRGB node, connect the two mapping nodes to it, if you haven't done so already and change the location x input of the second mapping node to your liking.

There is "understand UV coordinates" and then there's this :). Great answer, learned a lot here :).

And since you're here, this question could really benefit from your experience :).

This is a fantastic answer!! Thank you so much


text:
Fill key not working?
When I try to fill some faces in they either turn black or don't fill at all (other times it works, being finicky), any idea why this could be?

You selecting vertices, edges or faces when you say it doesn't work? Because the functionality is a bit different. Often I have the F key make the face, but it's pointing in the other direction so you don't see it.

^I was wondering if that was why. Would I need to flip the normals if that were the case? I select edges usually.

When they don't fill in, could it be that the :Backface culling" box. has somehow got itself ticked? (N-->Shading)

Yes when you are in edge select mode and you fill a face there's no visual cue for the face actually being created if the normal is pointing away from camera and you have backface culling on (as you should always have IMO). If you tab into face select mode you should see a dot in the middle if face was created. Of course if the normal is pointing the wrong way you can do CTRL-N in edge select mode too to flip it.

It is because you might be in edit mode, change back to object mode and try it