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Import and Save Views are Blank
love the software, just such an incredible tool :)
One problem though... I started a file and can't seem to save it. I just get a blank "Blender File View" window. Literally nothing in there.
Any thoughts on how to fix this? I'd rather not recreate the file if I don't have to!
TIA

When saving, the File View dialog that comes up is blank unless you have a .blend file already saved in that directory. It only shows Directories (folders) and .blend files by default. To turn that off, click on the Funnel icon at the top right and disable filtering.

hey @josephhansen - thanks for the quick reply. i dont see anything in there though, this is all i get: https://imgur.com/a/Jfz8op4

oh ok you mean COMPLETELY blank haha. Yeah that's a bug, which version of Blender are you using?

haha yeah exactly. it happened right off the bat for the latest (3.1 i think?) so i downloaded an earlier version (2.8) which worked at first and now it's not... any ideas?

I got nothing, sorry. It looks like some kind of file corruption, maybe delete all Blender program files (including in AppData) and re-install?

Are you sure you meet the system requirements for Blender 3.1?

Yeah, I'll try to delete all and do a fresh install... And yeah right in between minimum sys requirements and recommended ones :\

if 2.8 was working, but only briefly, I don't think it's a system requirement issue... maybe you're using a Silicon version, when you should be using Intel? There's two different Blenders for Mac, are you using the right one?

oh interesting... how do i know which one i need?

https://www.howtogeek.com/706226/how-to-check-if-your-mac-is-using-an-intel-or-apple-silicon-processor/

okay, i tried doing a direct download for the intel version, will let the thread know if that was the issue. thanks for the help!

looks like targeting the intel download was the fix! hopefully it stays that way haha - thanks again


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"Unfolding" a low-poly mesh without distorting it. I wanna build the result from paper but after using a standard UV-unwrap, nothing fits anymore
Basically the title.
I have a Low-Poly Mesh (of an Elephant head). Maybe about 25 faces. If I UV-unwrap it and then print/cut up the result with paper, nothing fits together because it was distorted (even if I manually placed the seams).
Is there a way to stop that behaviour so that a face on the model keeps its shape in the 2D-projection? (of course I know this only works with flat faces, not curves like a globe. But as I said, my model conforms to that).
Anyone got a tip? I realize its a pretty specific problem.

there's a nice addon included in blender for that...
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/addons/import_export/paper_model.html

also this has been asked before like in this thread

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


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I accidentally clicked something and the little bar at the bottom for animating takes up my whole screen

I clicked something and now my entire "Layout" section is completely taken up by the animation bar, I have tried to simply use my cursor at the top to drag it back down, but it doesn't seem to be responsive.

Edit: I closed something and now the little GUI at the top right of my screen (The one that shows you your current parts inside the workspace, light, camera ect.) Takes up my whole screen.

Edit again: I fixed it, it doesn't matter anymore.

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


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Why is my Mesh/clothing piece unable to be moved
im new to blender so im sorry if this question is stupid. im attempting to parent a piece of clothing onto an armature but when i try moving the piece of clothing, so i can put it onto the body, it stays in the same position no matter what i do. the piece of clothing is parented to another armature but im not sure how to unparent it in order to allow me to move said piece of clothing freely. if anyone knows how to fix this please let me know. i can also give any extra info if needed :)

Hello, why is the cloth parented to another armature and not the same armature as the body?


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How to create the down part of a table?

So I need help with making the down part of a table.

Can be more specific please? Like, way way way more specific? What is "the down part" of a table? Also, asking other people to do your work for you is not what this site is for as stated in the help center

If you are asking about how to model the table legs and supports, that's just basic modelling and is not something we can help you with here. Suggest you watch a few of the Blender modelling tutorials such as these ones found with a simple Google search: https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=how+to+model+a+table+in+blender.

Idk how to make the support tho

And the tutorials on how to make a table don't have a support part

Have you tried a Boolean operation or the Boolean modifier? Place the center wooden slat in the center of the legs, then duplicate it, make it a bit shorter in Edit mode (scale) and rotate it by 45 degrees around the Z-axis. Then add a Boolean modifier.

I dont know what a boolean modifier is but I will look into it

Try a Boolean modifier. The only challenge is to place the wooden slats properly. This can be done with the 3D Cursor.
Step 1 - create the table legs and the center slat:

create an Empty object at the world origin (0,0,0) for the Mirror modifier, and create a floor plane
create a table leg and the center slat. Put them on the floor and move them to the new Bool collection (M). You need it later.
add a Mirror modifer to mirror the leg and create 4 of them.

Step 2 - prepare the diagonal slats:

duplicate the center slat and move it a bit to the side.
move it out of the Bool collection (M)
in Edit mode, set select the upper face, and move the 3D Cursor to it (Ctrl+S,2 > Cursor to Selected)
note/copy the Z value. It's the height for the slats.
switch to Object mode, keep the diagonal slat selected and set its origin to the 3D Cursor via menu Object > Set Origin > Origin to 3D Cursor. This will move the little orange dot to the 3D Cursor

Step 3 - put everything together

Select diagonal slat first, then the table leg and move the slat the to the leg (Ctrl+S, 9 Selection to Active). Alternatively, you can move and use 3D Cursor.
Select the slate, and paste/enter the height that you have copied/noted in step 2 for the Z value of the tranformation to move it down. Then rotate it by 45° around the Z-axis so it's now diagonal.
scale it along the local X-axis to make it shorter -or- just adjust the values in the side panel.
also, scale it a tiny bit along the Z-axis so the Boolean modifier works properly.
add a Mirror modifier and use the Empty for the center
for the final cut, add the Boolean modifier and use the Bool collection

If you're happy with the result, you can apply the modifier and join everything (Ctrl+J). Now you can add a Bevel modifier (the Bevel modifier doesn't work very well with the Boolean modifier if it's not applied).
Don't forget to apply the Scale, Rotation and Location (Ctrl+A).


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How to remove parts without without having the shape hollowed
I want to remove faces from a part to only keep a part of it. But the side that is left from removing the other part is hollow from one side since It was connected to the other shape. how do I fill it or add a face there after removing those faces?
This is the example I am working with. I am trying to make a bench similar to this image

Press A to select all in edit mode:

Go to Select > Select Loops > Boundary Loop to get only the outer edges:

Then press F to fill those faces.


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How to make murky water in Eevee engine?
Problem:
I want to make a water material in the Eevee engine that gets progressively murkier as objects beneath the surface get deeper.
Things I've tried:
The closest approximation I've found so far: I use a plane with the basic screen space refraction/transmission setup with 1.333 IOR (and a bump node for the small waves) used in most regular eevee water shaders with some increase of the material's transmission roughness and the edge fading of the scene all the way up, and with this material it can kind of create the murky/foggy water effect that I'm after, but only when viewed from lower angles. when viewed from higher angles, the effect falls apart because it's relying on the edge fading as a means of making objects in the water to appear to vanish the deeper they get.
Using volume scatter/absorption materials beneath the surface plane does not work from what I've tried. The water's refraction seems to make volumetric shaders on the other side completely invisible. Same goes for using a stack of alpha clip/blend/hashed planes beneath the surface which otherwise would achieve a similar effect.
Is there a way around this?

You could use the Volume Absorption node, with a Separate XYZ node on Z as factor, plug a ColorRamp in both the Color and the Density input:

If you want to add a god ray effect, mix it with a Noise Texture in 2D that you rotate in the Mapping:

Volumetrics doesn't seem to wok behind a Glass shader but you could instead mix a Transparent with a Glossy:

To reiterate, I want to keep the surface refraction. This is great for mist or smoke, but when viewed from above the water's surface, any volumetric materials become invisible. Here is a picture of what I mean

I see, so maybe you should use a mix of Glossy and Transparent with a Layer Weight as factor? (see my edit)

The issue is that there still isn't any refraction effect going on. Here is what I mean: in this picture, I have two materials mixed, one transparent, and one with screen space refraction enabled. You can see that the distortion that refraction inflicts onto the objects below the plane. This material is just to show the discrepancy.

yes, Eevee has some limitations and you can't do anything about it except find some tricks


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combining motion tracking with footage
Hi guys I want to combine a 3d motion-tracked object with some footage I plan to shoot.
-I want to film someone walking "infront and around" the 3d tracked object.
-Any ideas on how I can achieve this any links to any tutorials?
I Appreciate the help

You may want to look for Ian Hubert on YouTube.  He has a couple of tutorials that will get you started.

use a cobble floor. make sure you have floor information for what you want to track (this is crucial, you see some VFX making of use half tennis balls, you can use anything as long as it contrasts with the floor when you move your camera).
To occlude the actor (if he/she doesn't cast shadows), track your 3d object, generate the scene, use your actor as foreground and background, in the middle (of the compositing layers in the compositor) you'll use your 3d object. So when the actor pass in front of the object, it shows in front (actor is top layer, 3d object is behind).
When your actor is behind the object, make sure your 3d object is composed at the top and the actor as the background.
Then tere is the "middle zone" where you'll need to occlude certain parts first (hands, legs, head, etc..) you'll need to rotoscope them using the mask node.
Here's a short video on how to use them:
https://youtu.be/fziA1Vw4L98
You need to plan your shot and movement. If you need your actor to do interactions with the object, you'll need to green screen him/her and bring the footage sequence as image plane. Then proceed to do compositing directly on the 3d track generated scene from your footage. You need to know your sensor's size to match lens distortion.


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Render viewport material looks better than rendered
So I'm going for this stylized anime kind of look.
The problem is I prefer how it looks in the viewport not the rendered image version. The Material looks different. Im using cycles and dont want to use Evee because Im using a bevel node as part of the materials. Notice how the black outlines are less pronounced.
How do I get the materials to look like it does in the viewport?

Hello, how did you do the grey background? Maybe show some screenshots or even share your file (remove the useless objects)

The grey background is easy. Just a Background node. If you go to materials then world it should be there.

that's weird, is the Color Management standard?

Could you please remove useless object (leave a cube instead of the plane) and share your file? https://blend-exchange.com/

I am failing to reproduce your results with Blender 3.6.8 starting from a fresh file and a single cube, even limiting in Render panel Max samples to 68 as shown in your screen capture. Shading Editor view and Render window look pretty much the same. Here is my Blender file. Could you share yours ?


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How to pack movie files in blender?
I'm using a movie file as a texture for a plane in my scene. I need to pack it somehow so I can get it rendered on sheepit. I managed to do this before but cant quite remember how I did it?
Any tips?

I don't think you can pack movies within the file, you can only pack images or sounds

Basically, I have a movie file as an image texture on a plane. I want to upload it on Sheept. This is why I asked how to pack it. Since I cant pack a movie file do you have another solution for this?

can't you send a folder with both the file and the movie?

Go to the file menu and the options are all there

Basically, I have a movie file as an image texture on a plane. I want to upload it on Sheept. This is why I asked how to pack it. Now apparently you cant pack a movie file do you have another solution for this?

@Tom, I would try to convert the video into still images (You can probably do that in a separate blender file, add the video in the sequencer and render animation with output as png/tif). Then you use the "image sequence" option in your texture. Hopefully you can pack the images that way, but I'm not entirely sure, maybe you need to pack frame by frame, this should be experimented.

You can't pack movies within the file, you can only pack images or sounds. If you need to render with a render farm, check on their website how it is supposed to work.


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How do I go about making the tcurve par of this lamp?

I want to make the curve part of this lamp but I don't know how to. a youtube tutorial or an explanation here is appreciated

hello, create a torus, keep only 1/4, extrude its tips?

Import reference picture with shift+a > Image > Reference
Create a bezier curve, erase points, instead use Curve Pen tool to create  the curve you need,  in Edit Mode, adjust the handles by rotating them so the bend is correct.
Go to Curve Properties go to Bevel>Round and give it a small Depth Value.
Duplicate the curve object then in Curve Properties change the factor start and end points so you can easily create the silver ring.
(Set the materials for the objects.)

Create a torus, set its thickness and amount of vertices in the Operator Box, only keep 1/4th of it:

Extrude each tip:


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Problem while curving objects around a bezier circle

I want to curve these circles around the cylinder at the middle but when I used the curve modifier this happened. anyone knows why this is happening?

Hello, try this: put the origin of your object at its geometry (right click > Set Origin > Origin to Geometry), and make sure that the object is at the same location as the curve

I think it was because the object wasn't the same location as the curve. thanks!

Do 2 things: Put the origin of your object at its geometry (RMB > Set Origin > Origin to Geometry), and make sure that the object is at the same location as the curve (select the curve and ShiftS > Cursor to Selected, select the object and ShiftS > Selection to Cursor).


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How do I turn the extruded parts into a circle

So I want to create this cylinder and this is what I have so far. but I dont know how to make the part I highlighted look like a circle. I also dont know how to create the top part of the gas cylinder. help is apreciated.

If yoi mean that you want to round the edges you can bevel them?

I tried that but it doesnt look good

You can create an edge loop then bevel it:

Scale the central edge loop:

Bevel it:

Or if you began with this shape, select these vertices:

And bevel:


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Issue with Black Screen Rendering on Equirectangular Projection in Blender
everyone! I’m new to Blender, having started about a month ago, and I’m working on an urgent project. I need help with rendering a globe with a texture of the Earth on it, along with a rectangular legend projected onto the globe using the Shrinkwrap modifier.
Here's my setup:
I have the camera placed at the center of the globe.
I’ve configured the camera to be in panoramic mode, with an equirectangular projection.
When I render, however, I get a completely black screen instead of the expected 360-degree view of my globe with textures, as seen in this YouTube tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMv_NA_dGm8&t=468s.
What could be causing this black screen? Am I missing something in my render settings or setup?
Note: My goal is to prevent deformation of the legend when I project the final raster onto the globe in the future, so I’m experimenting with this setup to ensure the legend keeps its shape.
Here is my file: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fo/033uoo3dcvz3ybx49toyb/ADBmHRNBztWkpvM51ZNHwJs?rlkey=wlg0dd2oljqw9stnvy92z9iic&st=6676xz1k&dl=0
Thank you in advance for any guidance you can offer!

Hello and welcome. From you image, looks like your camera is blocked by your sphere, causing the black render. Before you render a scene, make sure to get the camera view by pressing NUMBPAD 0 (Zero). You probably need to make your sphere bigger.

There is no illumination inside the globe. The render is black because it’s dark in there. Replace the Principled BSDF shader with an Emission shader (connecting the texture to its Color input) to make the globe glow.
That being said, you might have an easier time just using the globe texture as a world background, and having the legend hover in space with a Track To constraint pointing it at the camera. No sphere involved. My reason for this is that shrink wrapping the legend to the globe surface might not look right on the inside.

Thanks, TheLabCat! The emission shader worked for me and gave the results I needed. The only issue is that when I use the Emission shader, my transparent legend becomes opaque. Is there a way to keep using the Emission shader while also preserving the transparency (alpha)?

Yes. Use a Mix Shader node to switch between the Emission shader and a Transparency shader node, and drive its Factor input with the Alpha channel of the Image Texture.


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Compositing Disappears in the final render Animation
Im new to Blender and I recently got the Issue that my Compositing won´t be rendered in the final render Animation when I add it to the Video editor. It will render in the compositor (is that the name of it ? I guess) but not in the Final Render.
I would really appreciate it if anyone could help me
Thanks - Jones

Sorry, but I forgot my crystal ball. Would you mind helping me out by at least showing a screenshot of how you have set up your Compositor? Maybe this is a good start for finding a solution.


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How do I realistically create cracks and scratches in object?
I'm working on this project, in which I'm trying to re-create a photo in Blender.
I used FSpy to capture vanishing points to create the scene, but I stumbled upon a problem. The marks and scratches in the wall are really hard to re-create for me. I tried to look up some tutorials, and did it procedurally, but it didn't look accurate.
Whenever I tried to sculpt, the wall would for some reason go darker, which really ruins the emersion.
Please help! I would love to know how to get around this and create these details.
Image I am referring to:

Render I have currently:

Example of wall getting darker once sculpted:

Have you tried to mix a scratch texture with your wall texture?

I'm trying to aim for a really accurate render, and the scratch textures I've tried to use weren't really good. Maybe I'm just bad at finding good textures, who knows. -edit I don't know any good texture websites for blender that aren't limited in amount or quality

Hi :). Check our local list of texture resources. I'm sure you'll find what you need there.

Oh nice! Thanks alot, I'll look into this.


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Geo nodes: object color
I've been trying to find a way to get the object color in geo nodes, but can't find a way to read or write this property. Can anyone help me out with how this could be done?

You can write it using a Set Material node but what happens if the current colour is different on each face of your object? How would you know which colour to choose?

Hey John, it's not the material color - it's the "viewport display" value, if that makes sense? Was hoping I could set it as an attribute, but now I'm not sure it's an attribute, maybe more of a property.

It's a property of a material. Unfortunately you can't read such material properties in geonodes. Depending on what's your use case, a workaround could be designed: e.g. creating a data object, with triangles each containing one unique material, and an attribute storing the material's color. Probably Python would have to be used to automatically (re-)generate this data object.

You could use Drivers. Right-click on viewport color, Copy Full Data Path, then create a driver in your geometry nodes and paste inside it the data path.

@Lutzi I think a driver here is not that great solution: it works as long as the material stays the same, but if the material is changed - the driver will point to the old material, while the intent is probably to point to the current material's color. One could ask: how often is a material changed? Well, from my experience more often than viewport display color is changed. Of course an advanced "elevated" driver can be used to get the current material color, though then an autorun script might be used as well - which would allow for a field support.

Magnuzoid is talking about the viewport color, not the material color. Plus, you can change the color, the driver is linked by data path and not by value. Drivers don't stop working when you change values. I just tested it and it works (Single Property -> Data path = "color.r" for red channel, and so on)

Would the driver allow to be used in multiple modifiers (can the driver be relative and not absolute)?

Each color field that need to be based on this viewport color should have their own driver. You can copy-paster driver (inside Driver editor). So a bit of work for each new object but it works.

@Lutzi Magnuzoid used the term "Viewport display" which is a property of a material.

@MarkusvonBroady I see. No matter which one of these properties, Drivers work the same.

Read display color inside Geometry nodes with Drivers
Here is a way of reading the display color.
Let's say you have 2 objects, A and B, and you want to read the display color of A inside geometry nodes of object B.
Get Data Path
Right click on display color of object A, and Copy Data Path. Not mandatory but useful (here we are only copying a String).

Create Driver
Then inside the geometry nodes of object B, choose where you want to get the color and right click on it, and Add Driver.

Red channel
Then inside the driver editor, select one channel (here the red channel) and reference the display color. Here are the fields you should fill.

Scripted Expression : basically we will only get the red channel as a var variable, and using it directly. But you could add math to it, for example invert the red channel by giving as an Expression 1-var. Warning : by default the expression is var + 1, which we don't want here.
Expression : you can just let var as is. It's only the name of the variable used just above.
Type : Single Property, we are reading one RGB channel of the color, here red
ID Type : Material, because the color you are looking for is part of the material of object A. Keep in mind this driver references the material and not the object !
Material name : the name of the material of object A
Path : diffuse_color.r. If you paste what we copied at the first step, you should get diffuse_color. Just add .r to it, meaning we are accessing the red-channel only. For green, blue and alpha channels : diffuse_color.g, diffuse_color.b and diffuse_color.a.

And you have successfully linked the red channel
Green and blue channel (alpha too if you want)
Then repeat the Red channel section for both the green and blue channels, and alpha if needs be.
Final result
Then your Color node (object B) will be linked to the display color of the object A.

A huge time-saver is to use the "Copy as New Driver" and "Paste Driver" functionality: https://i.imgur.com/4UaNcoP.gif

Damn ! I now understand why I wasn't able to find the Copy as New Driver. Time-saver indeed !


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Associate scene with workspace
I'm looking for an approach to have my scenes associated/linked to certain workspaces.
Say for instance, I do work in the VSE on 'scene x', then go back to 'scene y' where I continue some modelling. Each time I go from one scene to another, I have to switch workspace.
Is there any add-ons or techniques to avoid this?
Thanks in advance!

There is an explanation and an add-on here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VnsvgcgnfGE
Add-on: https://github.com/metaperson/blender_vse/blob/main/tube/20211113%231/workspace_glue-timer.py
And there is a patch, which apparently has stalled:
https://developer.blender.org/D9140

Thank you so much! I'm glad I'm not the only one annoyed by this.. :) From your last comment, you mean it used to work like this back in previous versions?


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How to measure the arc of an object
I'm going to modeling a my computer's mouse But I do not know how to measure the actual size in the blender The problem is that I do not know how to measure the arc

I want to finally print it on a 3D printer

You don't know how to measure the arc in real life or inside blender ?

@Gorgious in real life

It's not a regular arc by the look of it anyway. I'd use a reference image of it in Blender and then use proportional editing modelling against the image.

@John Eason You recommend using this image in the blender?

For the side view, yes, unless you have proper blueprint images of it. You'll also need one end-on (maybe for front and back) and from the top of course. Depends how detailed you want to get if you're 3D printing it later.

See the answer here, you can open your image as Reference in Blender, create a curve that follows the shape, then calculate the length with the Curve Tools addon (second answer): https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/116670/measurement-of-the-straightened-length-of-a-path#:~:text=Enable%20the%20Curve%20Tools%20addon,subpanel%2C%20and%20click%20Calc%20Length

Take a piece of paper, make it bend around the mouse, straighten it up, mark it with a pen, measure it with a ruler. No need for blender for that ?


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Is there an method/add-on to save render settings as image meta-data?
I often experiment when producing final renders and, currently, just make a note of settings changed until I reach the desired result.
It would be amazing if there was a way to embed the render settings into the image meta-data or even produce a text file with the same name as the image that has all the render settings used.
That way if I decide after doing 7 tests and deciding test 04 was the best, I can look up the settings used for that render and re-apply them.
Is something like this possible with an add-on or by writing a python script?
Thanks!

Could you provide some more context? What render engine are you using? Which render settings are you interested in?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/95237/custom-render-stamp-python-newline https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/199820/how-to-write-exif-data-in-rendered-images


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How to offset points randomly along a curve?
I’m wondering how we can randomly offset points we scattered along a curve
(for example after a curve to point node)

I want to create a slider that randomly offsets my scattered points following the curve (moving them backward or forward along the curve).
I also want the tangent/normal/radius attribute of the points, to still be accurate to the curve even after the offset… (because the points will be moved, their attributes won't be correct with regards to the curve)

So if I understand you correctly, you only want the points to move forward and backward along the curve - not offset from the curve? And the tangents they should carry should be the ones of their new positions or their original positions before moving?

Hello @GordonBrinkmann yes that it is!

My last question was a "this" or "that" question... so which one is it, original or new tangents? The other thing I'm not really sure about is, do you want to place the points on the curve evenly distanced and have a slider to randomize their positions along the curve or do you want them to have random positions on the curve initially and then move them around with a slider?

Yes @GordonBrinkmann the points should move following the curve line a train following a track, but at a randomly distance, forward or backward :)

...so, to ultimately get an answer to this question now asked for the third time: you just need the tangent at the current position, not of the original position?

Not expert in gn, but if you offset along the captured tangent and the curve is not straight, you get your final position outside of the curve space. This approach set the number of points and then divides the spline length by the point number. Then adding or subtracting the random value from this fraction and using the accumulate field to stack these random shifts.Sample curve node is used to get the position along the curve of this accumulated field.

Gordon's approach, same result:

The question does not say offset along the tangent, it says following the curve and keeping the tangent. I guess it means although the new random position has a different tangent, the point should output the tangent of its original position. But I'm not sure about that, that's why I asked for clarification in the comments...

Hey Filanek! Thanks that's correct, but does this technique also refresh the attributes of the points? (tangent/normal?) :)

See my updated answer, I used the Gordon's approach, it is more elegant. You should get all attributes from the sample curve node.

The Spline Parameter > Factor always goes from 0 to 1 on a curve from start to finish. So to place a point along a curve, you can use a Set Position node and read the position at a certain factor by using a Sample Curve node and getting the Position output on whatever Factor value you enter, the same goes for the tangent at this factor.
Now to place a number of points randomly along the curve, you just have to get a Random Value between 0 and 1 to plug into the Factor input of the Sample Curve node. The Position and Tangent vectors will then be the ones on this random factor.
And when you have multiple points for example from a Resample Curve node, each point gets his own random value and so you can sample for each of them a random position along the curve somewhere between start and finish.
Since resampling with a low number of points can change the curvature I would recommend you sample the original smooth curve and then resample the curve with a desired Count to get the number of points you want. But you need a Capture Attribute point to assign the values to the resampled points.
With the Random Value as Factor, the points are now randomly distributed along the curve. To move them altogether along the curve now would just be increasing the factor to move them forward or decreasing the factor to move them backwards. To achieve that, you can plug the Random Value into a Math node set to Add to move the points.
The higher the value that you add, the more points will reach a factor of equal or greater 1, but since the curve stops at 1, all points would clump together at the endpoint. Or if you go in the negative direction, once all points have a factor of 0 or below, they are clumped together at the starting point.
So to have them disappear from the curve, you can use to Compare nodes, one to check if the factor is greater than 1, the other if it is less than 0. The result you combine in a Boolean Math node set to Or and use is as Selection in a Delete Geometry node which you place after the Set Position node. This way all points that move outside of the curve range will disappear.

The result might look something like this, 8 cubes placed randomly on a curve:

And when I now animate the Add value from -1 to 1 I get the following animation:

Hi Gordon, thank you so much for your response! It seems that your answer resolve the question of "offsetting (uniformly) randomly distributed points on a curve", or the question here was to randomly offset distributed points along the curve. The random adjective is related to the offsetting action :-)

@Hellobender The movement should be random? Your comment referring to a train on a track did not really make that clear... since the wagons do not move individually at different speeds and directions  But if that's what you want, instead of adding a single value which gets multiplied, just plug a Random Value with negative Min and positive Max value into the Add node. And if you want the start positions to be evenly distributed, replace the 0 to 1 random values with a Spline Parameter > Factor. (Cannot edit my answer at the moment with screenshots etc., might do it later.)

Oh, I just saw you accepted the other answer. Well then, nevermind you get the idea from my last comment.


text:
I can't seem to make a grid fill in 4.2
Im kind of a newbie to blender. This is a new cylinder and when I try to make a grid fill
an error comes out.

I'm not sure how to see if the loops are connected or not, this kind of problem did not happen in 3.6, when it changed to 4.2 this error apeared.

here is the error list

You can typically grid fill holes in meshes, I see an ngon face already there

You can't Grid Fill when there's already a face there! Delete the top face, select the edge loop and try again. - That's the same in 3.6 by the way. - You get a brief error message on the bottom toolbar in both versions.

youre right! thank you very much!!!!!!!!

@JohnEason that appears to be an answer. Please post it as such, so the question will be marked as answered.


text:
Rig legs bending backwards
I'm trying to learn about rigging and ran into a probably common solution that I can't find answers for. See here.
I'm using the "chain" bone because I've seen it being used in a tutorial, but I probably didn't set it up correctly or it's not very useful here?

For more controlled bending direction of knee and elbow joins that bend only in one direction, usually you want to use an IK constraint on the shin bone in your example.
You would need to add another bone a short distance in front of the knee to be the pole target for the bend and you can use the foot bone as the target.
Within the Ik bone setting you have to set the chain length to two and you might have to change the roll of the bone if it doesn't work right anyway.
Here is a link to a short tutorial to clarify the process https://youtu.be/Pt3-mHBCoQk?si=zvWPnHeutMoMy8KK.


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fixing wierd black spots for animation reveal object
hi i made animation reveal for my projects but in transparent mode i saw these weird black spots on my mesh i dont know this is shodow or what , how to fix this ? enter image description here

The question has been asked many times, see this question but look my second answer there, because the accepted one is wrong (for that question): Black artifacts when looking through many transparent objects?. It is basically like this: many transparent objects need many Transparent bounces, transmissive materials like glass need Transmission bounces and many reflective objects need more Glossy bounces. And for Transmission and Glossy you have to increase Total as well.

If these are more glass-like objects rather than ones with alpha transparency, take a look at my more in-depth explanation on improving glass renders in my answer here: Glass render is black for some reason

Tnx Man   made my day


text:
Should I downgrade blender if my graphics card is unsupported?
I have a laptop with an AMD firepro graphics card, when I want to render with my graphics card on blender it tells me I can't because I need to have Radeon driver 21.q4 version and above, the recent driver for my card is 21.q2.
My question is if I downgrade blender to a previous version would I be able to use my graphics card to render cycles?
P.s
I'm currently using blender 4.0, still a newbie and I'm on a windows machine

Hey, this forum is more for asking questions about how to use Blender itself. Questions about hardware are better for the Blender Discord or BlenderArtists forums.

Okay thank you. I didn't know that

No worries, thanks again!

It may be  possible.... try version 2.8, and if that doesn't work, try 2.79 (be prepared to go vastly back in time ui-wise on the second one though).


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How to render multiple cameras as separate image sequences?
I've got a shattering physics simulation that I'd like rendered from different angles.
Using the stereoscopy method seems to be the best so far but uses suffixes to differentiate cameras.  When attempting to import into After Effects each camera is considered the next frame and it's a mess. Using explorer or cmd code to move 1500 frames into different folders is an unfortunately time consuming process.
So next I tried scenes, duplicating the original as a linked copy, assigning it a camera and using render nodes which allows you to give each camera a prefix.  This generates a usable list of png's which can be imported into AE correctly.  However not only does duplicating scenes add unnecessary complexity I've realized I also must bake physics for each scene before render.
I'm considering going back to stereoscopy method and hope I can do something tricky with file naming.  Unless someone else has a better suggestion?
Thanks!

well, i don't know after effects but Blender will name them 0001_R.png 0002_R.png and so on (if you choose R as suffix) and 0001_L.png  and so on. So pretty logic i think. So i assume after effects takes them just in the order you select them? Can't you first import all _L and then import all _R ? it's just an assumption...as i said - i have no idea of ai

The best I can think of is still cumbersome:  Add and place your cameras.  Bake the physics.  Select one of the cameras, make it active, point render file output at a particular directory and render animation.  Select another, make it active, change render file output to a different directory and render animation.  On the other hand, you can use wildcards to move the files afterwards.  (cd dir1 ; mv *_R.png ../dir2) in bash. isn't that cumbersome.

Tip 01_Search
I'm not sure about Win, but should be similar as on Mac - go to directory, let search for suffix (L/R), move all into separate folder ... done in two clicks.
Tip 02_Video Editing
Create empty Scene, switch to Video Editing, add Scene Strip, under properties specify Camera 01, duplicate strip and move after the first one, change Camera object to second one.


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z-fighting problem with hair using image planes
I'm trying to make a bush out of small videos of waving plants.  I made a mesh with hair and set it to sample the collection containing videos. It looks awesome.  However maybe 2% of the 100 hair/image planes flicker through eachother.  I'm wondering if there is a solution besides re-scrambling the group's seed and testing again.
Thanks!

You can download the G-Scatter addon for free and use it to scatter the planes. In G-Scatter's settings you can set a minimum distance between all scattered assets, so the planes won't touch.


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How to set light paths with drivers based on if the user is rendering
I am setting up a project where while in the viewport, glossy light paths must be set to 0. But when the user renders I need to set glossy paths to 1. I have no experience with blender python or drivers in general but if Im not mistaken this should be possible right?

This isn't really a task for drivers and is probably best done with Application Handlers.  I would do this by registering handlers for render.pre and render.post.  The pre handler would set glossy paths to 1 and the post to 0, of course.
To be extra careful you might want to add an additional function that blender calls at startup to ensure that glossy paths is set to 0 initially. Do be aware of the warning about persistent handlers at the start of the manual section on Application Handlers.
This all assumes this is meant for Cycles.

Ahh alright thanks so much

@ben you're welcome.  Good luck with your setup.


text:
How to achieve this bottle texture in blender?
The output I have is this

I need to look like this. Light goldish/yellow in the middle then at the side is slightly dark.

it's a glass material, the fact that it is slightly dark on the sides is due to the environment and lights in my opinion. Maybe share your current object so that we can see how you could improve

Yes. My object material properties are set to Principled BSDF and changing the transmission to 1 and roughness to 0 with a base color #E7C462. I try changing the environment and lights but it is still the same

Please pack your image if you've used some and share your file: https://pasteall.org/blend/

Is this about textures or lighting? You title mentions textures but your question seems to be concerning illumination. Could you rephrase your title to match the content? Also you tag your question blender internal render engine. What version of Blender are you using?

This is about the texture of the bottle I can't achieve the bottle glass texture. I'm using the blender 3.1

The blend file is uploading wait a moment Sir moonboots

https://pasteall.org/blend/4b752e3f3ade40b587faa3e1a61bdb84 check this file

The photograph looks like the bottle was photographed on a light table with a lot of light coming from below to blow out the highlights.  It may also have been post processed to remove reflections.  Try lighting from below with a spot and see what happens.

Here is a try, I've removed the thickness of your bottle (you have actually 2 bottle objects overlapping and a thickness in one of them, I've also removed this thickness to make things easier), changed the world, pushed a bit its Background strength value, created a plane in order to have a white surface around the bottle, created 2 Point lights, and used this material setup, which is a mix between a Glass node and a Transparent, with a Layer Weight (Facing) node as factor in order to have more transparency at the center of the bottle:

Thank you Sir it work!!


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Sub surf modifier not adding more vertices/not showing any more vertices
I'm following along blender burus donut tutorial and it seems when I subdivide, it just makes it visually smoother instead of adding more vertices.

Hi :). It does add more vertices, just won't show them. Uncheck Optimal Display in the modifier

it doesn't add real vertices unless you apply it, they are just virtual vertices for the moment

i unchecked it but it still doesn't work.

how do you apply the vertices?

@PixlBTW https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/193188/110840

That's the whole point of using a modifier! Working with a lot of vertices can be frustrating and in some cases impossible. Modifiers give you the ability to use the benefits vertices bring, without facing their problems!

THX i felt so relieved :D

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


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Where is the atomicblender utility panel?
This feels like such a basic question, but I'm just getting started with Blender. I want to use it to look at some .pdb files, so I'm using the atomicblender addon. I have successfully imported my file, but I can't find the utility panel. Where does it appear for this addon?

Thank you,

UPDATE:  The question wants this panel:

It is found in the Create tab of the sidebar (highlighted).  The sidebar's visibility is toggled using the N key.  It is only available if "utility panel" is checked, as it is in the screenshot in the question.

Thanks for the help. Maybe I wasn't clear. What I'm looking for is this toolbar shown here: https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/addons/import_export/mesh_atomic.html#measure-distances

Sometimes they add a tab to the N-panel.  Hover your mouse over the main viewport window and press N to open a side panel.

@GermanBarcenas Sorry I missed the point of your question.  I've updated the answer.  Most add-ons if they add a panel will add it to the side bar or otherwise tell you where to find it in the add-on description.

Yes that N helped a lot. Thanks!

I was unable to find the Utilities Panel either. In my case (Blender 3.1.2 on Mac) the option for the Utilities Panel was disabled by default in the add-on menu —bottom-most checkbox.
Once activated, it was there in the Object tab.
One needs to press A to select the molecule and change the atoms to tetrahedra or what-not.


text:
Model appears jagged with no anti-aliasing in viewport and material view
I was texturing my model when suddenly all the edges of all models became extremely jagged, like anti-aliasing was turned off.
I checked my anti-aliasing settings in Preference (see attached) and they seem to be unchanged.
I'm not sure if I accidentally hit a button that caused this to happen.
In material view, the same issue occurs. And in rendered view in Cycles, it looks like a complete mess.
The last step I took before this occurred was attaching a OpenGL normal map to a Normal Map node, if that is of any help.
Any ideas on how to troubleshoot this further? Thanks!


text:
Control Simulation Node bake settings in Python
I am trying to access/control these properties of Simulation node in Python (custom frame start, end):

But, seems like they are not directly exposed to Python.
Is it somehow possible to control them or expose in UI outside of Node editor?
Thanks!

import bpy
from bpy import data as D
from bpy import context as C

obj = C.object
# quick and dirty way to access the modifier, name-based is not foolproof
# but works for this example
mod = obj.modifiers['Nodes']

# the attributes you're looking for are in the
# NodesModifierBake sub-object of the modifier itself
bake = mod.bakes[0]
bake.frame_start = 10
bake.frame_end = 50

I was able to find this out by going here:

Which takes you to this page.

From this page you can poke around and see near the bottom that it seems like this is a sub-object of the NodesModifier object, in it's bakes attribute.

Wow! Thank you very much!!


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Driver Expression - Rotational Difference Threshold
Little confused on how this works, my appologies.
The need for the Driver Expression to work:

Achieve a rotational difference with a threshold of 30 degrees [for effect].
Allow the difference to still calculate even if bones or parenting objects are involved outside of the driver. Like a way for the difference to calculate regardlessly. No clue if python is required outside of the driver for this to work, though? I'm bit of a novice.

Here's the Scripted Expression of the two versions needing change:
max(0.0, 1.0 - abs(((var0 - var1 + math.pi) % (2 * math.pi)) - math.pi) / math.radians(30))

The second is a piecewise function to have control of the speed of the value [0.0 - 1.0 in this example, with a fast-slow-fast pacing effect]:
min(1.0, max(0.0, 0.3 * (raw/0.3)**2 if raw < 0.3 else (0.3 + (raw - 0.3)*1.5 if raw < 0.7 else 0.7 + 0.3*((raw - 0.7)/0.3)**0.5))) where raw = 1 - abs(((rot_A - rot_B + math.pi) % (2 * math.pi) - math.pi) / math.radians(30))

Issue: It seems to me that it's not working or reading the expression to show any results. Any ideas on what I'm missing so far? Is the math not mathing right? Or is this overthinking something super simple to achieve?


text:
Keyframes not working in blender, object is stuck at one place even after editing keyframes
Hello I'm new to blender. I am able to add keyframes and edit the location and rotation of my object but as soon as I hit play, it goes back to its original position. I was able to do it early but this started happening after I deleted all keyframes that I had created to create fresh keyframes.

Can you share a screenshot of your Blender File with the object selected ?

The correct order is  "select frame", "edit the location and rotation", then "add keyframe". Are you doing this?


text:
How to add mist to an image programmatically
I am new to blender, and have a script that generates an image programmatically. I would now also like to add some mist to it. To see which properties to change, I tried to adapt from the code used for this panel. Since I wanted to start simple, I left out the add/multiply nodes, but I think the mist should be able to work without them. I don't really understand the difference between the world's mist settings and the ones added through the composition tab, but I tried adding them both (either one separate has no effect either).
I currently have the following code, yet the image doesn't show any mist.
scene = bpy.context.scene
scene.view_layers["ViewLayer"].use_pass_mist = True
scene.use_nodes = True

nodes = scene.node_tree.nodes

mist = bpy.data.worlds[scene.world.name].mist_settings
mist.use_mist = True
mist.intensity = 1
mist.depth = 1
mist.start = 0

viewer_node = nodes.new('CompositorNodeViewer')
render_layer_node = nodes.get('Render Layers')

scene.node_tree.links.new(render_layer_node.outputs["Mist"], viewer_node.inputs["Image"])

Could anyone let me know how I am supposed to add mist programmatically? I am using Blender 3.1.2.

The viewer node does not send the image to the output file. It only shows a preview in the compositor. Are you taking this into account?

I did not know that. What should I do instead to get mist in my final render?

I’m not very familiar with mist settings yet, but I do know you need an Output node rather than a Viewer node to have the compositing go into the final image.

How do you mean that the image was generated programmatically? The mist pass works with the 3D space, so if the images is not a render of something in the 3-D space, mist pass settings will have no reactive effect on it.

I mean that the whole blender 3d scene is created by code, since it needs to be an automated process (it runs with blender in the background, so I cannot click buttons in the blender app itself). The scene itself (before rendering) does span the 3D space.

Okay, that’s good. I’ll experiment with some mist settings when I get the chance, that is if you haven’t figured it out already by then (a few hours I expect?). God help you!

Thank you so much! I have tried all variations/things I could think of (probably just missing a small setting somewhere due to my inexperience with Blender) but to no avail, really hope you manage to find something!

EDIT: I have got it to do something by ditching the CompositorNodeViewer and instead connecting both the mist and image output of the render layer to an add, which is then connected to the composite layer. This makes the image misty, but it also makes it grayscale (unwanted). I also feel like it ignores the mist.start and mist.depth settings (I need the amount of mist to be configurable). So curious what you come up with?

looks like I worked out the answer concurrently with you.  I think I'll leave my answer for anyone who happens to have a similar problem in the future.

@MartyFouts You also solved the issue with it becoming grayscale and explained it very well, please do leave it:) And thank you!

The mist pass doesn't produce an image; but rather depth data that can be used as a factor input to a mix node that mixes the image with a color based on distance from the camera.  The basic layout is

So you need to modify your code to add a Mix node and make the links shown.
Here's your code modified to do that
scene = bpy.context.scene
scene.view_layers["ViewLayer"].use_pass_mist = True
scene.use_nodes = True

nodes = scene.node_tree.nodes

mist = bpy.data.worlds[scene.world.name].mist_settings
mist.use_mist = True
mist.intensity = 1
mist.depth = 1
mist.start = 0

#viewer_node = nodes.new('CompositorNodeViewer')
compositor_node = nodes.get('Composite')
render_layer_node = nodes.get('Render Layers')
mix_rgb_node = nodes.new('CompositorNodeMixRGB')

scene.node_tree.links.new(render_layer_node.outputs["Image"], mix_rgb_node.inputs["Image"])
scene.node_tree.links.new(render_layer_node.outputs["Mist"], mix_rgb_node.inputs["Fac"])

scene.node_tree.links.new(mix_rgb_node.outputs["Image"], compositor_node.inputs["Image"])

NOTE: I have not addressed setting the color of the mist (The second input of the mix shader.)  Also, the mist output is often modified by a color ramp node or a set of math nodes.  I have not shown that either.
As a bonus, you may want to place the new Mix node between the Render Layers and Composite nodes.  This code places the left edge half way between the left edges of the two and also the top.
new_location = (compositor_node.location + render_layer_node.location) / 2
mix_rgb_node.location = new_location

Thank you so much! Shouldn't the penultimate line connect the "Mist" output though instead of the image? Also am I correct in setting the world's mist properties to control the amount/strength of mist and such? Or should I do that differently?

@Eric Yes.  that's a typo in my code.  good spot. I'll fix it now.


text:
Make huge model compatible for Unity
I have a model of Villa, which is really huge as it has 3.6million vertices.
Right now the project does not even export as .fbx file as it takes too long(took over 6hours and still nothing)
I need to get this into Unity, but I suppose I have created too high quality model. Is there a quick workaround?

Game engines more commonly use a modular pipeline for their assets, You'll almost never see one whole scene imported as one mesh.
What you should probably do is go in, select certain components of your mesh and separate it into it's own object. if you leave the origin alone then you can batch export each model into a folder, open that in Unity and drag all the objects into the scene at once and they'll be in the same exact position as they were in Blender.


text:
Add on creating in ADD menu
I started making an add on to blender but i would like to be able to access it from add menu. I only find the way to put it in the side panel what pops up with ‘N’.
Tried to put for “location”: View3D > Add > but no luck
Thank you

does this work? https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/19665/how-to-add-a-custom-object-entry-to-the-add-menu

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

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/57306/how-to-create-a-custom-ui

I want to use my add on from ADD menu. So when i press shift+A i would have my add on in the menu.

Just seen the first comment. And yes it helps. This is what i want to achieve. I’m making materials and meshes. New to pyton but will look into it.
Thank you for the help


text:
Pressure Sensitivity Not Working w/ XP-Pen Tablet (Blender 4.2)
For reference I am using an XP-Pen Artist Pro Gen 2 drawing tablet.
As the title states I am having issues with trying to use pressure sensitivity within Blender using my XP-Pen tablet. I have seen a lot of workarounds on here and through other sources mainly focused on Wacom, but I’ve tried those workarounds to see if I would be able to fix this.
This includes uninstalling and reinstalling the tablet drivers, uninstalling and reinstalling Blender, specifying what type of API Blender should use both within Blender Preferences and my tablet driver, and even doing the unplugging and plugging back in that is recommended in Blender’s User Manual.
Has anyone else run into this issue with an XP-Pen tablet, or any other tablet really,  and been able to come up with a solution? I’m really running on fumes here with trial and error and would appreciate any additional assistance!!

You have turned the pressure sensitivity on with the desired brush parameter, yes?

Yes I have the pressure sensitivity toggled on for the strength of the brush, so I toggled it off for the size of the brush.

I just managed to solve it! I went into the Task Manager for my PC and changed the administrator properties in Blender. That finally got it working for me.
So Blender should not be run as an administrator in order for the pressure sensitivity to work with my XP Pen tablet.
This was also all done after I had uninstalled the XP-Pen Tablet drivers using Command Prompts, so if the administrator change does not work immediately it may be due to drivers as well.


text:
Same Material on Different Objects Looks Different in the Scene
I've applied the same material to two different objects and the results are different. The character's skin on the left looks correct.  The character's skin on the right is too bright, like it's over exposed.

First, check for flipped normals. If that isn’t it, add a screenshot of your node setup.

Can you share your Blender project file? Instructions for sharing.

Actually it looks fine in rest mode, but in pose mode it looks wrong.  Does that make any sense?

Here is the Blender file... https://we.tl/t-vdSPXKUlze


text:
Texture Artifact Problems
The texture on my character is doing strange things.  In earlier shots, it looks fine, but now it's got this rippling effect. I'm wondering if I accidentally changed a setting or something.
Here's a link to the video:
https://we.tl/t-4eK1uNYCkI

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


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Create a render queue
I am trying to create a render queue, using the "complete_render" handler to start a new render job. I am using "bpy.ops.render.render("INVOKE_DEFAULT")". The problems is that I get this error when the second render job starts:
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/home/gras/.config/blender/4.2/scripts/addons/360_ez_spinner/operators/render.py", line 99, in render
    bpy.ops.render.render("INVOKE_DEFAULT", write_still=True, animation=True)
  File "/usr/share/blender/4.2/scripts/modules/bpy/ops.py", line 107, in __call__
    ret = _op_call(self.idname_py(), kw, C_exec, C_undo)
          ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
RuntimeError: Operator bpy.ops.render.render.poll() Missing 'window' in context

Here is my code, I have tried the sollution in the simillar stack exchange post but the method seems deprecated.
def shut_window():
    # Function to find and "close" the render window

    # Get the current screen
    screen = bpy.context.screen

    # Loop through each area in the screen
    # for area in screen.areas:
    #     # Check if the area is an image editor and is showing a render result
    #     if area.type == 'IMAGE_EDITOR' and area.spaces.active.mode == 'VIEW':
    #         # Override the context to close the area
    #         override = bpy.context.copy()
    #         override['area'] = area
    #         bpy.ops.screen.area_close(override)
    #         break  # Exit after closing the first found render editor

    # Iterate over all windows
    for window in bpy.context.window_manager.windows:
        # Iterate over all screen areas in the window
        for area in window.screen.areas:
            # Check if the area type is 'IMAGE_EDITOR'
            if area.type == 'IMAGE_EDITOR':
                # Access the area spaces
                # for space in area.spaces:
                #     # Check if the space is set to show the render result
                #     if space.type == 'IMAGE_EDITOR' and space.image and space.image.type == 'RENDER_RESULT':
                #         # Change area type to 'INFO' or any other area type to "close" the render window
                area.type = "VIEW_3D"

                return

    return

def enable_render_button(scene, ren):
    scene.spin_settings.enable_render = True
    bpy.app.handlers.render_complete.remove(enable_render_button)

def render(scene, rend):
    global output_filepath
    global output_queue

    print(output_queue)

    shut_window()
    # bpy.ops.render.view_cancel('INVOKE_DEFAULT')

    hide_render_others(output_queue[0])
    set_current_camera_as_render(output_queue[0])

    if len(output_queue) == 1:
        if render in bpy.app.handlers.render_complete:
            bpy.app.handlers.render_complete.remove(render)
        bpy.app.handlers.render_complete.append(enable_render_button)

    output_path = output_filepath + "/" + output_queue[0] + "/" + output_queue[0] + "_"

    bpy.context.scene.render.image_settings.file_format = 'PNG'  # Output file format
    bpy.context.scene.render.filepath = output_path

    # remove after render, order matters
    output_queue.pop(0)

    # Perform the render
    bpy.ops.render.render("INVOKE_DEFAULT", write_still=True, animation=True)

class OBJECTE_OT_render(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname = "object.render"
    bl_label = "Render the list"
    bl_description = "Render the list of output objects with the appropriate settings"

    def execute(self, context):
        global output_list
        global output_queue

        output_queue = output_list.copy()

        bpy.app.handlers.render_complete.append(render)
        # bpy.context.scene.spin_settings.enable_render = False
        render(None, None)

        return {"FINISHED"}


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Extremely slow playback speed Geometry nodes using large collection (+20000 instances)
I have a large collection of individual instances +20000 (not sharing the same object data), which are animated using geometry nodes. The issue is that when animating all instances at once, the playback speed becomes extremely slow (between 3-4 FPS) which makes the animation work very difficult. It doesn’t seem to be a hardware issue (since I have a pretty good PC config see below). I’ve read in a forum that playback animation speed and computing geometry nodes is a single-threaded process (so that is why it’s not utilizing my CPU fully I guess). Is it still the case today with the latest blender updates?
One option I found to increase FPS, is to split the main collection into a separate smaller collection and animate the collections using multiple geometry nodes to achieve the same result. What are the reasons behind it and do you have other optimization ideas to increase FPS?
Here are my specs:
13th Intel core i9 - 13900KF
128 gb memory
2x GPU Nvidia RTX 4090
Many thanks for your answers and help!

Are you realizing instances in your GN tree at any point or are you leaving them as instances? If you are realizing them then that will absolutely tank performance.


text:
Shading issues along seam in 4.1 but not 3.6
I recently decided to make the move to 4.1 and imported a mesh that was created in 3.6 over to 4.1. In 3.6, it doesn't have any shading issues at all, but in 4.1, there's some really odd visuals around the seam that connects the head to the body (if this helps at all, this is a Sims 4 character that was exported and sculpted). Does anyone know the best way to fix this? It shows up in all preview and render modes. Thank you!

Is Auto Smooth enabled in 3.6? It's needed when the model has Custom Split Normals. The option has been replaced by a modifier in 4.1 (https://developer.blender.org/docs/release_notes/4.1/modeling/)

@Blunder hi, I messed around with the modifer in 4.1, to no results. 3.6 doesn't have it enabled. However, I found when I did enable it in 3.6, it caused the same thing to happen that happens in 4.1. Not sure if that means anything but I figured I'd mention it!

Make sure you've got no doubled verts first off, then if that doesn't work go to the Object Data panel > Geometry Data > Clear Custom Split Normals Data.


text:
Shader blending decal system for blender
Is there any way, natively or by using a plugin that decals can be created which can be projected onto the target mesh which blend the shaders of decal and target? This is possible in video game engines but would be really useful for use in creating dynamic environments for rendering. Many thanks, Danny.
Ps. i am not personally concerned with the matching the 2 meshes, its getting the shaders to blend which i am interested in.

I believe DecalMachine (not free) can be used for something to this effect. You can use it to place decals in a non-committal way and I THINK there's functionality to bake them into the material/texture. See if it does what you need: https://machin3.io/DECALmachine/docs/

thanks that looks like it might be a good solution, one would have thought that there would be a free method out there somewhere though...


text:
Use vector pattern to cut pattern into mesh
I’m trying to find a way to cut or extrude vector patterns into an existing mesh.
Example- imprint pattern against curved mesh then extrude pattern - it however needs to follow the shap of the original mesh

I'm still not sure what you want to do exactly.  Could you create a visual example in blender or gimp?   A 'Vector Pattern' is ambiguous, do you have a mathematical vector field?

By "vector pattern" do you mean a curve? If so, you might have some success using a shrinkwrap modifier.

Maybe what you're looking of is the Knife Project tool?

.svg image of a company logo as example. Essentially import .svg image, place it directly against the mesh and somehow engrave or extrude the logo into mesh.


text:
How to reconfigure the mirror in Sculpt Mode?
I am trying to model to a fish skull or neurocranium. Below is the screenshot of what I am encountering when I try to sculpt mirror along the X, Y, and Z axes. It is not sculpting uniformly on both sides on one axis, nor the left dot does not align with my cursor. This is the first time I encountered this since previous fish skull models uniformly modeled correctly.

maybe apply the rotation of your object and symmetrize?

The mirror uses the origin of the model (orange dot in Object mode) as the center. Looks like the model's origin is at the world's origin (at least for Y) but the geometry is moved in the positive Y direction. Go to Object mode and use menu Object > Set Origin > Origin to Geometry to reset the origin.


text:
Hello, Is there a shortcut to LOOK AT?
Is there a shortcut to LOOK AT in Blender ??
for example In maya 'A' is the hotkey to Look at, or Alt+L in Alias to look at or zoom upto the model. For some reason I cant find the model or the obj, guess i messed up the zoom!  NEED HELP.
Thank you.

It's called "Frame Selected" in Blender. Should be Numpad . (dot) by default. You can look it up and change it in Preferences > Keymap > search for "frame selected", under 3D View.

Thanks ! I did Shift+c to recenter


text:
baked texture are black at edges
how to fix dark edges in baking process? i tried to disable denoising
Is there something else i can try?
here is the file

There are a few problems:

some objects have duplicated vertices. Select the object, switch to Edit mode, and remove the duplicated vertices by a M > Merge by Distance
there are overlapping faces in the meshes (Screenshot 1 (1)). Delete them.
there are extra faces that overlap the faces of neighboring objects. Delete them, too. (Screenshot 1 (2))
objects are too close and create overlapping faces, that create black areas ("shadows") in the baked texture (Screenshot 1 (3)).
UV islands are smaller than a pixel and the color cannot be baked properly. This results in the black areas in the green material. (Screenshot 2 (4)). Consider unpacking the 3D model again with a different mapping type that gives the UV island more texture space and doesn't waste so much.
Cycles uses the denoiser when a texture is baked. The denoising seems to be too aggressive at the margins. I got better results when I disabled the Denoise option, disabled Noise Threshold, and used 500 Max Samples.

Screenshot 1:

Screenshot 2:

perfect it backed as i wanted... if you can suggest some tools that can do this job because it consume time as there are will be more complex meshs inside

Make sure you have some margin:

You will also need to have adequate resolution and space in-between UV islands for that margin to work. Unwrap operator also has option for margin for this:

it just make the texture overflow the uv map


text:
how to grab two faces towards together
I'm trying to move two faces towards each other but just go along one direction

This isn't really how Transform ( G) works - it sounds like you want Scale ( S).
With both faces selected, use  S and then Y. Entering a numerical value or moving your cursor will scale the two faces relative to each other along the Y-axis, which will either move them closer or farther apart.
Read up on the difference between Move, Rotate, and Scale.


text:
Performing rotation and scale change cause object to disappear from render
I am creating an anime-based render but having a hard time with what seems like a bug. I had set up a scene in my viewport a particular way but when I went to render it out, it seemed to disappear. When I saved, closed, and re-opened it, the rotation, location, and scale of the collection causing the problem seemed to change altogether. When I tried to correct its scale, position, and rotation, it disappeared once again.
*Ignore the pink missing textures, they are irrelevant to the problem
Image on opening file, Collection should be rotated as shown in red:

After doing appropriate Scale, Rotation and Location Changes (Looking fine in render view)

Final Render output not having the clouds and shooting star:

I have checked out all the common "things not appearing in render" problems though none seem to be the reason here.
Any solutions would be incredibly helpful!
Find source file here:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1y3Y2P_sXSq35FCPvC6wNf3Jz_jNS1t8A/view?usp=sharing

Apparently I had accidentally keyframed the collection, removing which solved the problem


text:
My blender addon will work in the text editor but I keep getting an error when I try to install it with the .py file
I get this error
Python: Traceback (most recent call last):
File "C:\\Users\\username\\Desktop\\blender-4.2.3-windows-x64\\4.2\\scripts\\addons_core\\bl_pkg\\bl_extension_ops.py", line 1388, in execute
cmd_batch = self.exec_command_iter(is_modal)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
File "C:\\Users\\username\\Desktop\\blender-4.2.3-windows-x64\\4.2\\scripts\\addons_core\\bl_pkg\\bl_extension_ops.py", line 2452, in exec_command_iter
self.exec_legacy(source_filepath)
File "C:\\Users\\username\\Desktop\\blender-4.2.3-windows-x64\\4.2\\scripts\\addons_core\\bl_pkg\\bl_extension_ops.py", line 2583, in exec_legacy
bpy.types.PREFERENCES_OT_addon_install.execute(self, bpy.context)
File "C:\\Users\\username\\Desktop\\blender-4.2.3-windows-x64\\4.2\\scripts\\startup\\bl_operators\\userpref.py", line 821, in execute
bpy.ops.preferences.addon_enable(module=mod.__name__)
File "C:\\Users\\username\\Desktop\\blender-4.2.3-windows-x64\\4.2\\scripts\\modules\\bpy\\ops.py", line 109, in __call__
ret = \_op_call(self.idname_py(), kw)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
RuntimeError: Error: '\_RestrictData' object has no attribute 'materials'

and here is my code
bl_info = {
    "name": "Simple shader editor",
    "description": "adds a shader with a simple button press",
    "author": "John Doe, Jane Doe",
    "version": (1, 0),
    "blender": (4, 2, 0),
    "location": "View3D > Add > Mesh",
    "warning": "", # used for warning icon and text in addons panel
    "support": "COMMUNITY",
    "category": "Add Mesh",
}
import bpy
import mathutils

class SimpleShaderEditor (bpy.types. Panel):
    """Easy Way To Add Shaders"""
    bl_label = "Simple Shader Editor"
    bl_idname = "Shader_Editor"
    bl_space_type = 'PROPERTIES'
    bl_region_type = 'WINDOW'
    bl_context = "object"
    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        obj = context.object
        row = layout.row()
        row. label (text="Active object is: " + obj.name)
        row = layout.row()
        row.operator("sse_object.remove_shader")
        row = layout.row()
        row.operator("sse_object.toon_shader")

class toon_shader(bpy.types.Operator):

    """Adds a Toon Shader to the selected object"""
    bl_idname = "sse_object.toon_shader"
    bl_label = "Adds a Toon Shader to the selected object"
    global mat
    mat = bpy.data.materials.new(name = "Toon Shader")
    mat.use_nodes = True
    @classmethod
    def poll (cls, context):
        return context.active_object is not None

    def execute(self, context):
        obj = context.object
        Toon_Shader_ini()
        toon_material = bpy.data.materials.get("Toon Shader")
        if obj.data.materials:
            # If the object already has materials, replace the first one with the Toon Shader
            obj.data.materials[0] = toon_material
        else:
            # If the object has no materials, append the Toon Shader
            obj.data.materials.append(toon_material)
        self.report({'INFO'}, "Shader Added!")
        return {'FINISHED'}

class Remove_Shader(bpy.types.Operator):
    """Removes any material from the selected object"""
    bl_idname = "sse_object.remove_shader"
    bl_label = "Remove Material"

    @classmethod
    def poll (cls, context):
        return context.active_object is not None

    def execute(self, context):
        self.report({'INFO'}, "Shader Removed!")
        obj = context.object
        obj.data.materials.clear()
        return {'FINISHED'}

# Toon Shader code
def Toon_Shader_ini():
    toon_shader = mat.node_tree
    #start with a clean node tree
    for node in toon_shader.nodes:
        toon_shader.nodes.remove(node)
    toon_shader.color_tag = 'NONE'
    toon_shader.description = "Simple Toon Shader"

    #toon_shader interface

    #initialize toon_shader nodes
    #node Material Output
    material_output = toon_shader.nodes.new("ShaderNodeOutputMaterial")
    material_output.name = "Material Output"
    material_output.is_active_output = True
    material_output.target = 'ALL'
    #Displacement
    material_output.inputs[2].default_value = (0.0, 0.0, 0.0)
    #Thickness
    material_output.inputs[3].default_value = 0.0

    #node Principled BSDF
    principled_bsdf = toon_shader.nodes.new("ShaderNodeBsdfPrincipled")
    principled_bsdf.name = "Principled BSDF"
    principled_bsdf.distribution = 'MULTI_GGX'
    principled_bsdf.subsurface_method = 'RANDOM_WALK'
    #Base Color
    principled_bsdf.inputs[0].default_value = (0.800000011920929, 0.800000011920929, 0.800000011920929, 1.0)
    #Metallic
    principled_bsdf.inputs[1].default_value = 0.0
    #Roughness
    principled_bsdf.inputs[2].default_value = 0.5
    #IOR
    principled_bsdf.inputs[3].default_value = 1.5
    #Alpha
    principled_bsdf.inputs[4].default_value = 1.0
    #Normal
    principled_bsdf.inputs[5].default_value = (0.0, 0.0, 0.0)
    #Subsurface Weight
    principled_bsdf.inputs[7].default_value = 0.0
    #Subsurface Radius
    principled_bsdf.inputs[8].default_value = (1.0, 0.20000000298023224, 0.10000000149011612)
    #Subsurface Scale
    principled_bsdf.inputs[9].default_value = 0.05000000074505806
    #Subsurface Anisotropy
    principled_bsdf.inputs[11].default_value = 0.0
    #Specular IOR Level
    principled_bsdf.inputs[12].default_value = 0.5
    #Specular Tint
    principled_bsdf.inputs[13].default_value = (1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
    #Anisotropic
    principled_bsdf.inputs[14].default_value = 0.0
    #Anisotropic Rotation
    principled_bsdf.inputs[15].default_value = 0.0
    #Tangent
    principled_bsdf.inputs[16].default_value = (0.0, 0.0, 0.0)
    #Transmission Weight
    principled_bsdf.inputs[17].default_value = 0.0
    #Coat Weight
    principled_bsdf.inputs[18].default_value = 0.0
    #Coat Roughness
    principled_bsdf.inputs[19].default_value = 0.029999999329447746
    #Coat IOR
    principled_bsdf.inputs[20].default_value = 1.5
    #Coat Tint
    principled_bsdf.inputs[21].default_value = (1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
    #Coat Normal
    principled_bsdf.inputs[22].default_value = (0.0, 0.0, 0.0)
    #Sheen Weight
    principled_bsdf.inputs[23].default_value = 0.0
    #Sheen Roughness
    principled_bsdf.inputs[24].default_value = 0.5
    #Sheen Tint
    principled_bsdf.inputs[25].default_value = (1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
    #Emission Color
    principled_bsdf.inputs[26].default_value = (1.0, 1.0, 1.0, 1.0)
    #Emission Strength
    principled_bsdf.inputs[27].default_value = 0.0
    #Thin Film Thickness
    principled_bsdf.inputs[28].default_value = 0.0
    #Thin Film IOR
    principled_bsdf.inputs[29].default_value = 1.3300000429153442

    #node Shader to RGB
    shader_to_rgb = toon_shader.nodes.new("ShaderNodeShaderToRGB")
    shader_to_rgb.name = "Shader to RGB"

    #node Color Ramp
    color_ramp = toon_shader.nodes.new("ShaderNodeValToRGB")
    color_ramp.name = "Color Ramp"
    color_ramp.color_ramp.color_mode = 'RGB'
    color_ramp.color_ramp.hue_interpolation = 'NEAR'
    color_ramp.color_ramp.interpolation = 'CONSTANT'

    #initialize color ramp elements
    color_ramp.color_ramp.elements.remove(color_ramp.color_ramp.elements[0])
    color_ramp_cre_0 = color_ramp.color_ramp.elements[0]
    color_ramp_cre_0.position = 0.0
    color_ramp_cre_0.alpha = 1.0
    color_ramp_cre_0.color = (0.025554336607456207, 0.004008842166513205, 0.0077217575162649155, 1.0)

    color_ramp_cre_1 = color_ramp.color_ramp.elements.new(0.19431838393211365)
    color_ramp_cre_1.alpha = 1.0
    color_ramp_cre_1.color = (0.099205881357193, 0.010578623972833157, 0.023921657353639603, 1.0)

    color_ramp_cre_2 = color_ramp.color_ramp.elements.new(0.3886367678642273)
    color_ramp_cre_2.alpha = 1.0
    color_ramp_cre_2.color = (0.3910602331161499, 0.03194624185562134, 0.08225385844707489, 1.0)

    color_ramp_cre_3 = color_ramp.color_ramp.elements.new(0.650000810623169)
    color_ramp_cre_3.alpha = 1.0
    color_ramp_cre_3.color = (1.0, 0.07133930176496506, 0.1980886161327362, 1.0)

    #node Node
    node_1 = toon_shader.nodes.new("NodeFrame")
    node_1.name = "Node"
    node_1.label_size = 11
    node_1.shrink = False

    #Set parents
    color_ramp.parent = node_1

    #Set locations
    material_output.location = (844.2685546875, 277.9710693359375)
    principled_bsdf.location = (-45.90791320800781, 50.614837646484375)
    shader_to_rgb.location = (290.79669189453125, 97.51869201660156)
    color_ramp.location = (-67.09164428710938, 55.0496826171875)
    node_1.location = (568.9841918945312, 199.96200561523438)

    #Set dimensions
    material_output.width, material_output.height = 140.0, 100.0
    principled_bsdf.width, principled_bsdf.height = 240.0, 100.0
    shader_to_rgb.width, shader_to_rgb.height = 140.0, 100.0
    color_ramp.width, color_ramp.height = 240.0, 100.0
    node_1.width, node_1.height = 300.3999938964844, 266.20001220703125

    #initialize toon_shader links
    #shader_to_rgb.Color -> color_ramp.Fac
    toon_shader.links.new(shader_to_rgb.outputs[0], color_ramp.inputs[0])
    #principled_bsdf.BSDF -> shader_to_rgb.Shader
    toon_shader.links.new(principled_bsdf.outputs[0], shader_to_rgb.inputs[0])
    #color_ramp.Color -> material_output.Surface
    toon_shader.links.new(color_ramp.outputs[0], material_output.inputs[0])
    return toon_shader

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_class (SimpleShaderEditor)
    bpy.utils.register_class (Remove_Shader)
    bpy.utils.register_class (toon_shader)

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_class (SimpleShaderEditor)
    bpy.utils.unregister_class (Remove_Shader)
    bpy.utils.unregister_class (toon_shader)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

The blender addon works in the text editor but does not work when I save the .py file and try to import it using the edit import file in the addons menu. I removed any from import as statements and replaced them with just normal imports I tried to add a sleep right before any of the classes get called to hopefully make sure blender could initialize any imports before I Tried to call them. I do not know what is wrong because it works totally fine in the blender text editor Can anyone tell me what I am doing wrong

I'm not gonna rewrite your whole addon, I'll leave that to you. But your problems stems from the way you're organizing your addon and the relevant data it accesses. Creating a global mat variable in the declaration of your class is a bad idea, one because it's generally not advised to use global variables for a handful of reasons I won't get into, But also because this code has to be run at startup before bpy.data even exists in memory. Operators are meant to be like a tool you pull out, do what you need with it and then put everything back where it came from once finished. What you're doing is like trying to put the nails into the boards you want to build a house with before they've been pulled off the truck, hoping they'll still be in place when you're on the ladder with your hammer in hand.
There are a number of ways to go about organizing your operators; a lot of people put everything including new methods/functions, and hidden properties directly into the operator class declaration. This is harder to test/debug and can lead to stale data issues so I personally like putting all the actual functionality of the operator into it's own class and then instantiating that on execution of the operator. Something approximately like this:
import bpy

# put all the stuff that doesn't pertain to properties
# and execution logic into a separate class for managing the
# data for your operation. If it's not gonna be visible to the
# user in a slider or checkbox or w/e then it should prolly be in
# a separate class. This makes sense from a higher-level programming
# pov, but also prevents alot of issues with stale or restricted
# data access that can happen with custom operators.

class ShaderManager:
    def __init__(self, shader_name):
        self.shader_name = shader_name
        self.mat = self.get_or_create_material(self.shader_name)
        self.populate_shader_graph()

    # this `get_or_create_material` method
    # replaces this part of your code in your toon_shader class:
    # ->     global mat
    # ->     mat = bpy.data.materials.new(name = "Toon Shader")
    # ->     mat.use_nodes = True

    def get_or_create_material(self, shader_name):
        try:
            mat = bpy.data.materials[shader_name]
        except KeyError:
            mat = bpy.data.materials.new(name=shader_name)
        mat.use_nodes = True
        return mat

    # this replaces your function for Toon_Shader_ini()
    def populate_shader_graph(self):
        # here instead of using a global variable you just reference
        # the ShaderManager object's mat attribute

        toon_shader = self.mat.node_tree
        #start with a clean node tree
        for node in toon_shader.nodes:
            toon_shader.nodes.remove(node)

        # ... etc
        # ... etc

# follow naming conventions, not only for broad Python conventions
# e.g class declarations should use CapCase
# but also Blender specific conventions
# e.g. operator classes should follow the {CATEGORY}_{OT}_{op_name_in_snake_case}
# menus class are the same except MT instead of OT etc

class SIMPLESHADER_OT_create_toon_shader(bpy.types.Operator):

    """Adds a Toon Shader to the selected object"""
    bl_idname = "sse_object.toon_shader"
    bl_label = "Adds a Toon Shader to the selected object"

    @classmethod
    def poll (cls, context):
        return context.active_object is not None

    def execute(self, context):
        obj = context.object
        ShaderMgr = ShaderManager("Toon Shader")
        toon_material = ShaderMgr.mat
        if obj.data.materials:
            # If the object already has materials, replace the first one with the Toon Shader
            obj.data.materials[0] = toon_material
        else:
            # If the object has no materials, append the Toon Shader
            obj.data.materials.append(toon_material)
        self.report({'INFO'}, "Shader Added!")
        return {'FINISHED'}


text:
Wavey ribbon of lines animation
What is the process to model and animate a ribbon made of lines (see attached image). The ribbon of lines I want to animate doesn't have to form a circle or infinity of lines as the image attached shows, most importantly it needs to be made up of lines forming a ribbon (or flag) flowing in the wind.
Where I'm stuck...I imported the line art as seen in the attached image, thickened the curves to 'bevel round'. How do I evenly space out the 'curves' to add dimension? Right now the imported artwork is flat.

This seems to be three questions in one, but it’s so vague it’s hard to tell. This StackExchange is for usage questions on one specific problem, not imagining general workflows for an entire project.

You can create an object A that is made of several torus meshes:

Create an object B that is a simple cylinder:

Make object B invisible, give a Surface Deform modifier to object A with object B as Target, click on Bind, also give it a Subdivision Surface modifier. Give object B a Cloth physic and a Subdivision Surface modifier, cut the Gravity in the Scene panel. Create some force fields like Turbulence and Force in order to animate object B, object A will follow:

File:

Thanks for the feedback. After following these steps nothing animates, so a couple questions regarding that. 1. Does the cylinder object need to be open without the top and bottom closed as seen in your screenshot? 2. Can you give me sample input numbers to use and if I need to deselect or select any of the fields in the Physics Turbulence and Force tabs? 3. The torus rings need to be one object correct?

I've edited my answer to share the blend file, maybe share yours so that I can see what is the problem?

Oh great, I didn't see the attached blender file. Let me play around with my file using your inputs and I'll get back and reply here. Thank you

I added a camera to your file and mine, I rendered an image. The render is very different looking than what the camera is showing in the viewport. I tested to see if it's the camera causing the problem by adding a box in view. It's no the camera as it showed it at the same location and view as the viewport shows. If you add a camera to your file, you'll see what I mean. Any clue what I can do to match my viewport view to a render output?

Yes I see that, that's weird

Checking back here, any idea what can be done? Also, do you happen to know how to smooth out the animation so it doesn’t animate at a short frame rate? Because I adjusted the frame rate and it’s not doing anything.


text:
Using Geometry Node Trim Curve Output For Spline-IK Rig
I want to use an output curve that had gone through Trim Curve in GeometryNodes for spline-IK rig. Is it possible to use the curve final result for the bone's spline-IK constraint?

No, this is not possible. With the Geometry Nodes modifier still on the object, the resulting curve is a procedural object. The Spline IK constraint will only take "real" curves into account.
And to even be able to select it in the constraint, first of all you would have to add the Geometry Nodes modifier to a curve object. If you use a mesh object like the default cube for example, you cannot choose it as Target for the constraint.
But, since the output is no "real" geometry, the curve which will be used for the constraint is the basic curve which you have in Edit Mode, without any modification by the GN nodetree.
In order to get "real" geometry, you would have to apply the Geometry Nodes modifier. However if you try to apply it in the Modifiers menu you will get an error message saying "Cannot apply constructive modifiers on curve. Convert curve to mesh in order to apply."
You can still directly apply it by using the shortcut Ctrl+A in the viewport and choosing Visual Geometry to Mesh. This will apply all modifiers which are on the object at once, but also convert it to a mesh. And then you can no longer use the (mesh) curve for the Spline IK constraint.


text:
Performance drop when updating shader node field variables in large scenes through python script
for a project I’m working on, I am importing a large number of objects (on the order of 100,000 objects) and creating variations of the same material for each.
However, I noticed that the import times are not linear to the amount of objects imported as I expected. To my surprise, the biggest contributor to the increased time is changing a field in the material. I created a minimal example to demonstrate this issue, which you can find here.
Alternatively, this is a screenshot of the relevant part of the scene:

In the minimal example, if you run the script with the system console visible, you can observe the time it takes to change the field variable 1000 times. As more materials and shader-nodes are created, the time it takes to complete the same number of field variable changes increases significantly.(Node selection etc. is not timed, as that is expected to increase.)
I expected that setting a variable can be performed in continuous time, but instead the performance seems to be affected with each new material created.
I am using Blender 4.1.1 on Windows 10. Is there a known workaround or method to reduce this effect, or is this just a limitation I will have to work around?
Thanks for your help!


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How to have indirect lightning bounce properly within volumetrics?
I'm looking for a way to do bounce light without relying on light bouncing off of objects. Because normally, if light is aimed towards a sphere but there's no ground or other object for light to bounce back from, the unlit part of the sphere will receive no light, assuming there's no background light.

One thing I tried was to have a object with a volumetric scatter shader and a light-path node for camera ray connected to the factor of a mix node (and the scatter node connected to the second shader input) covering the entire scene, which did get close to what I wanted: but the issue with volumetric scatter is that the light gets weaker the farther it gets from the light source, even if it wouldn't do so without the volume. I found this issue is fixed if I turn off shadows on the light object, but that has it's own issue of well, the light no longer casting shadows on objects.
I also tried swapping the connection so that the scatter volume was connected to the first shader input, and I would get something like this:

I tried looking up if it was possible to bake lightning to a volumetric, but to no avail.
Another thing I tried was to have an emissive cone the same shape of the light cone, then hide the cone from camera rays; it works pretty well for objects outside the cone, but anything inside the cone would be lacking in shadows.
I am willing to attempt open shading language if it's the only option.

Seems to work fine without any extra effort:

That's simple Volume Scatter shader in the World node tree:

And just make sure you have enough volume bounces:

It doesn't need to be anything this crazy as 64, 3 - 8 would probably be enough for most things.
Not sure if I understand what you want to do correctly, but you can hide the volume itself if you want:

This is not too different from one of the things I tried, and it would work perfectly, but unfortunately, if I have shadows on, then light passing through a volume gets weaker the further the distance. If I turn shadows off, the previous issue gets fixed but then there's no shadows.

Sorry, but this is a question and answer platform about using Blender, not a place to complain about how physics and light works. Yes, the further something is away from a light source the less light reaches it. If you want this effect to be weaker have a very strong light very far away - that way, the distances in your scene are smaller fractions of the distance from the light and light falloff in the distances meaningful in relation to your scene is weaker. You can also fake lighting effects with other light sources in your scene - nothing wrong with that if it gives you results you want.

I believe I found a solution to my own problem.

Somehow, by connecting "Is Diffuse Ray" to a mix shader with the volume scatter connected to the second shader input, the light bounces around almost exactly how I want it to.
(Btw this requires having a diffuse bounce higher than 0. Volume bounces don't seem to make a difference even at 0, but I would put them to something like 4 anyways).


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Is it posibble to export multiple armatures in a .GLB/GLTF file?
So I have a rigged arms model, and a rigged gun model. I've tried parenting the root bone of the gun rig to the hand controller bone of the arms rig. This worked well in blender, but when exporting the model, it seems like the connection between the gun and the arms model doesn't work(the arms have gone into resting position and wiggle when the animation is played, but the gun doesn't animate(I've viewed the file using Preview, and Godot 4.). If I can't export 2 armatures together, what should I do then? Exporting the gun and arms separately maybe, or joining the armatures(I have tried this, but gave up since all my bones had gone crazy).Removing the gun rig fixes the issues, but now the gun isn't animated anymore.

To me it would make sense to include all of the animations in one Armature, with bones for the arms and gun included. I'm less familiar with Godot, more with Unreal, but I would do it that way personally. You might have to redo some of your anims, or re-parent things correctly, but thats the name of the game when you're dealing with rigging. Sometimes you do things a total wrong way and only realize later on you should've done it different, and there's no other option but to redo alot of it. I've been there many times. Live and learn.

It may still be possible to export multiple armatures in this file format; I'm not sure. I think your question is really more like "Will {target game engine} accept animated models with multiple armatures?" to which I'm inclined to believe the answer is no.

@Jakemoyo How can I join the armatures whilst keeping the bones in place? Alternatively, I could probably just add some bones to the arms rig and use those instead.


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How would I seamlessly connect parts of the same object?
So I have a model I'm working on that primarily uses the 'skin modifier' to give it shape.

How would I go about seamlessly connecting the neck to the body? (they both are part of the same object btw)

This question is similar to: Removing internal geometry. If you believe it’s different, please edit the question, make it clear how it’s different and/or how the answers on that question are not helpful for your problem. Then we can vote to re-open the question.


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Unable to pose model rigged with automatic weights
I've created an armature, parented the model with automatic weights to it, everything seems fine in processing, but when I try to pose individual bones in pose mode, the model is static.
I've uploaded a video of the issue here:
https://youtu.be/vkBK3ZknerM
All vertex groups seem unassigned in weight paint mode.
Blender version is 3.1
I've done this type of rig successfully dozens of times, any idea what I'm missing now?

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

You omitted fact that Blender freezes when you parent, and that it ends up with the error "bone heat wreighting failed".  Does this answer your question? Heat Weighting: Failed to find solution for one or more bones

thank you, seems like the model has multiple intersecting objects and I hadn't realized


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Volumetric / Atmosphere Cutoff Problem
I am rendering a landscape scene with realistic scale values (about 6000 meters) in cycles.
I need a very fine atmospheric effect, but below a certain density value the volumetric shader abruptly cuts off and is gone (s. attachment) . I can not find a cutoff setting for volumetric effects in the render settings. (And I don't want to got for the mist pass etc.) Any help?

I think the Mist Pass is exactly for these things useful.

Well Gordon, but it is a completely different approach. Surely I can do a lot in postproduction or paint in some clouds by hand. But I am looking for reliable atmospherics that catch the ambient + direct light etc.

I know, this is why I write no answer. I suspect the problem with the falloff here has something to do with floating point accuracy but since I'm no developer I can't tell. For the falloff itself I don't find a setting (although in my scene it is below 0.0275 × 0.001 that it suddenly disappears) and I'm quite sure it has to do with the real world scale - because it is not the resulting visible density. If I use a landscape of 600 m instead of 6000 m, I can use higher density values and achieve less dense mist then what I get right before it disappears at a larger scale.

Thanks for taking the time. Apperantly there is no such setting yet. Thomas Kohle put it here - let's see if some developer finds it worthy: https://projects.blender.org/blender/blender/issues/104504


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Missing layer/object when exporting
i've only been using blender for a few days. However i've been stuck trying to export a project however one of the object in there doesn't export. the only Difference with the object is that it has a 'Rigid body' physics property on it. So it starts out of frame and falls into the frame. This object is showing when I 'Render Image', however when I render using Concierge through the website it doesn't include that render.

None of the layers seem to be excluded from the renders in the collection panel.
Here is a random frame from the export process

Any help would be greatly appreciated

I think you can bake rigid body physics to keyframes (Object → Rigid body → Bake to Keyframes) and then have a renderfarm-save version of the file.

I believe this has worked! Really appreciate the help :)