text:
Call a Dialog Box without 'OK' confirmation button?
I saw that the F2 rename operator use a dialog box drawing without any OK button
is this achievable with python? Perhaps there's something i missed?

Added a new example to https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/73548/31447

The Rename Active Item dialog is actually a regular Panel rather than a confirmation dialog box which is then called using WM.call_panel(), see startup/bl_ui/space_topbar.py:

import bpy

class LayoutDemoPanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_space_type = 'TOPBAR'  # dummy
    bl_region_type = 'HEADER'
    bl_label = "Rename Active Item"
    bl_ui_units_x = 14

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout

        item = context.object
        if item:
            layout.label(text="Object Name")
            row = layout.row()
            row.activate_init = True
            row.label(icon='OBJECT_DATA')
            row.prop(item, "name", text="")

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_class(LayoutDemoPanel)

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_class(LayoutDemoPanel)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

    # Test call
    bpy.ops.wm.call_panel(name="LayoutDemoPanel")

I'd recommend just use invoke_popup() instead. It does the same thing, easier to maintain and there is no extra panel class needed to display a few properties:

import bpy

class SimplePopUpOperator(bpy.types.Operator):
    """Really?"""
    bl_idname = "my_category.custom_popup_dialog"
    bl_options = {'REGISTER', 'INTERNAL'}

    item: bpy.props.PointerProperty(type=bpy.types.Object)

    @classmethod
    def poll(cls, context):
        return True

    def execute(self, context):
        self.report({'INFO'}, "YES!")
        return {'FINISHED'}

    def invoke(self, context, event):
        self.item = context.object
        return context.window_manager.invoke_popup(self)

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        layout.label(text="Object Name")
        row = layout.row()
        row.activate_init = True
        row.label(icon='OBJECT_DATA')
        row.prop(self.item, "name", text="")

class OBJECT_PT_CustomPanel(bpy.types.Panel):
    bl_label = "My Panel"
    bl_idname = "OBJECT_PT_custom_panel"
    bl_space_type = "VIEW_3D"
    bl_region_type = "UI"
    bl_category = "Tools"
    bl_context = "objectmode"

    def draw(self, context):
        layout = self.layout
        layout.operator(SimplePopUpOperator.bl_idname)

def register():
    bpy.utils.register_class(OBJECT_PT_CustomPanel)
    bpy.utils.register_class(SimplePopUpOperator)

def unregister():
    bpy.utils.unregister_class(SimplePropConfirmOperator)
    bpy.utils.unregister_class(SimplePopUpOperator)

if __name__ == "__main__":
    register()

Code is based on: How to call a confirmation dialog box?


text:
How to bend a cylinder into a semi circle
I am wondering what is the best and EASIEST method to create a mesh for part of a hand rail which has a semi circular bend in it. The hand rail is round so I will use a cylinder?
Refer to image below where the part of the handrail has been marked in PINK with an arrow pointing to it. Yes it seems to be an irregular bend (tighter bend near the top than near the bottom) but just a regular shaped semi circle will be ok unless it is simple to change from a regular semicircle.

Use round bevel option on a curve would be a super simple way, not sure if it's the "easiest" though. It would give you a lot of simplicity to get nice rounded shapes.

Thanks  (at last I found a suitable youtube video (for what I am trying to achieve) and this is how I did it (I chose not to use 'answer you question' in case there is a better more correct method). 1 Add cylinder and set dimensions as required 2 (edit mode) select bottom face and set cursor to selected then (object mode) set origin to 3d cursor 3. Apply all transforms  4 Add Simple Deform modifier  and select Bend  5  (edit mode) set cuts to required number   6  set Angle top 180.    BUT how can I ensure that the ends of the semi circle bent cylinder are a particular distance apart?

That would be a lot easier using a curve. You could snap one end point to the other, then move it a fixed amount

Thanks.  Yes that would work but also using my mathematical memories I can calculate the height of the cylinder to be bent into a semi circle as follows (using Pi to calculate the circumference of a circle using the diameter)  cylinder height required before bending (Z axis) = distance required between ends minus half diameter of cylinder  multiplied by 22  and divided by  14. Well that worked perfectly for me.

source: Stack Exchange

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

sort: votes


text:
How to edit loop cuts
I cannot work out how to change the number of cuts after I have exited edit mode and then later wanting to change the number of loop cuts re selected edit model as the panel bottom of screen has then disappeared.
There is a small panel near top left of screen but changing number of cuts there doesn't make any changes.
Thanks

You can't dynamically alter the edits you've made after the fact. The panel at the bottom can be called back with F9 if you haven't done anything else, but after you take any other action, you either have to undo, or select your loops manually (with Alt+Shift+Left Click on edges), dissolve (Ctrl-X) and do them again.

You can't! As soon as you start some other action you won't be able to edit any previous one. If you haven't done anything else apart from clicking elsewhere in the window you can bring the dialog back with F9 but if you've come out of Edit mode you'd have to hit undo (Ctrl-Z) until you got back to a time before you did the loop cut and start again.

Once you make the cuts, they become part of the mesh. You can't directly change their count after the deed is done. But you can remove existing loops and add new ones, assuming you don't need them to be evenly spaced. If you do, then just remove each loop, and re-make the correct amount the same way you made the original ones.
To delete an edge loop, select one edge in it, and do Select edge loop, then Ctrl+X to Dissolve. To insert a new one, you can just make a single edge loop between two already existing ones.

Thanks every one. Understood. Either try F9 (key) or delete edge loop or start again. I my situation (creating a cylinder bent through 180 degrees its simply to restart it.   BTW once I have bent a cylinder into a semi circle is it possible to distort the bend by selecting one loop cut and dragging?

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


text:
How to create a mirror which reflects other objects
I have watched 3 different Youtube videos one using Cycles and Evee and 2 using Evee only.
try as I might and watching and copying every 'move' in each video of which I have tried at least 4 or 5 times I just cannot get5 my 'mirror' to reflect other objects (eg a sphere mesh)  placed in front of my 'mirror'.
I create my mesh (simple cube with dimensions changed to look my a sheet of mirror glass.
Add material with Metallic = 1  and Roughness = 0
I then see reflections of the 'environment'.
I then add the reflection plane and move it just over the 'mirror'
Add a mesh sphere and the mirror I created does not reflect it.
What else needs to be done

Turn on "Screen Space Reflections" under Render Properties. In the case of a reflection plane, you will also need to "bake" the reflections (also under Render Properties > Indirect lighting).

Thanks Chris. Yes I already had 'screen space reflections' turned on and 'half res trace' turned off (the video showed that) but forgot to mention that in the question. Strangely when I 'redid' the exercise I now see the reflection correctly (I had tried multiple times before without success) and wonder if it has something to do with the order of applying each step. I have since had contact the author who advised that he too sometimes doesn't get the reflection to work. Also maybe this time I increased the 'scene light strength' (under viewpoint shading scene lights) from 1 to 2. Thanks again.

does it answer? https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/190642/how-do-i-get-proper-reflections-eevee

@moonboots  Thanks for the link. As my object is a mirror I applied Light Probe > Reflection Plane as mentioned in that link but still could not get full reflection.  Many hours later I redid the 'exercise' and this time the (full) reflections worked. Maybe I 'applied' things in a slightly different 'order'. Also I increase the strength of the 'scene lights' (Viewport Shading) from 1 to 2 but when I reset it to 1 the (full) reflection remained so can't see how that caused my initial problem. As the author of the tutorial advised that he has experienced the problem occasionally it is a mystery

Maybe its just that the positioning of the reflection plane was the cause as I know that one almost needs a 'verier caliper' to position it just right, its positioning seems to have to be within something very small (1mm?). Even holding down the shift key when moving it back and forward is 'touchy'.

Hello, maybe share your file with just the light, the object and the mirror object so that we can test?

I assume that you mean when there is no full reflection with the reflection plane in place  (if I can now reproduce that)? I will try tomorrow as it is now 10pm.


text:
Is it possible to create a 'see through' mirror object
I have created a 'glass' object (eg a window) with metallic = 1 and roughness = 0 and alpha = 0.2 and blend mode set to alpha blend which results in the glass being see through as well as reflecting the 'environment' but wondering if it is possible to have a glass a see through glass object which also reflects nearby objects. When the blend mode is changed from opaque to alpha blend the reflection of nearby objects is lost and only the 'environment' reflection remains.
I am trying to 'imitate' a full glass cabinet (seen in museums) which can be seen through but also (partially) reflects nearby people.

just try using alpha hashed instead of alpha blend.
i got this:

Thanks. Yes that works but leaves a 'speckled' look (tiny white spots).

alpha hashed is always a bit more noisy option, it will make those dots that you want but maybe denoiser can solve it?

Thanks. Not sure if I am applying denoise correctly even after watching a video tutorial (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iD1Y1D-KTMI). I changed to Cycles and denoising render to NLM then selected the RENDER 'button' (top of viewport) and didn't see anything but maybe I wouldn't as it is glass. My (original - no denoise) blender file is at https://mega.nz/file/38IEiQRB#S-O8hGs14s8XZjc5_F7gkhoD6gQwAEjzCA3CzWmTROg


text:
How to apply diffeernt materials to different faces created using extrude tool
I have done this before to mesh models NOT created with the extrude tool but cannot work out how to apply a different material to some selected faces only.   I created my very simple SHED mesh object starting with a cube and then bisecting and extruding to create a roof which overhangs the 'shed' (see image below). I have applied a COLOR material (not the material I will ultimately use but this is an example) to the whole of the mesh object. Now I want to apply a different color to the 'fascia boards' so in edit mode I select all the faces and regardless of what I do the entire shed gets changed (in the image those meshes have been selected - show as gray). I can't even select only those parts of the 'shed' for a material without including those meshes for the 'fascia'.  Features such as a door will come later.

i'm not sure to understand, if you want to assign a different color to the sides of the roof you need to create a new material in the Material panel and assign it to the selected faces

@moonboots  Thanks but how do I do that? In edit mode I select a 'face' (ie one of the fascia) and then I selected the 'new material add a new material' but that didn't work for me. It still changes the material for the entire 'shed'. So I then tried removing the material from the shed (ie no material for any part of the 'shed' and then select just ONE FACE and then (material) NEW and the entire shed gets the material.

@moonboots Here is the 'shed' building mesh  (yes it is 'floating' in the air as I removed lots of other meshes for simplicity

Create the new material, keep it selected in the list, select the faces, click on the Assign button:

Thanks I have never needed to do that before. Something new I have now learned


text:
How to change Texture properties via python?
Changing texture data properties via python seem impossible because the properties are inherited from the texture Type
for example texture.noise_scale don't exists yet if texture.type is currently "IMAGE" because texture.noise_scale is a child property of some subclass types
so if you are starting from an image type
the following code won't be able to work
texture = bpy.data.textures["MyImgTexture"]
texture.type = "MARBLE" #changing type
texture.noise_scale = 5.5 #changing noise scale from this new type

What can we do to refresh the child properties? bpy.context.view_layer.update() won't help here

Recast the type
For objects that can have their types changed can recast the types using type_recast
>>> tex.type_recast(
type_recast()
.. method:: type_recast()
Return a new instance, this is needed because types
such as textures can be changed at runtime.
:return: a new instance of this object with the type initialized again.
:rtype: subclass of :class:`bpy.types.bpy_struct`

try it out in console.
>>> tex = D.textures.new("Tex", 'STUCCI')
>>> tex.name
'Tex'

>>> tex.type
'STUCCI'

>>> tex.image
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "<blender_console>", line 1, in <module>
AttributeError: 'StucciTexture' object has no attribute 'image'

>>> tex.type = 'IMAGE'
>>> foo = tex.type_recast()
>>> foo.image is None
True

>>> foo.name
'Tex'

>>> foo
bpy.data.textures['Tex']

Notice too the two instances keep there type
>>> str(tex)
'<bpy_struct, StucciTexture("Tex") at 0x7f89ff16b448>'

>>> str(foo)
'<bpy_struct, ImageTexture("Tex") at 0x7f89ff16b448>'

btw, if while checking this out in console the properties area is open on same screen, it is being done automatically for us.

It's a bit unintuitive but refetching the Texture after changing the type works for me :
import bpy

texture = bpy.data.textures["Texture"]
texture.type = "MARBLE" #changing type
texture = bpy.data.textures["Texture"] # This one has noise_scale attribute
texture.noise_scale = 2  #changing noise scale from this new type

speculate this is what is happening too if running py console code with properties editor open in same screen, when it sets context.texture  making the prop behave as tho it has an update method when changed.


text:
How to get the operation history via python?
I would like to know if the user has used bpy.ops.wm.append or bpy.ops.scene.new operations in order to modify properties in my plugin.
Is it possible to somehow get subscribed to these operations when they happens (via msgbus?), or alternatively access some sort of history of all operators used by the user?
Bests

I think what you want is bpy.types.WindowManager.operators. As far as I can tell it keeps a history of the different operators that were used. You may leverage this to peek into the operator history. You can get access to the last used operator by checking the last element in the collection. You can for example keep a parallel list of operators to check which ones have been run since you last checked.
The docs are not really clear about the maximum length of the operator history but since it's an attribute of the window manager I would expect it to be invalidated on UNDO / REDO, SAVE / LOAD and maybe when rendering.
import bpy

# This will give a list of operator history :
print([o.bl_idname for o in bpy.context.window_manager.operators])

def check_operators():
    operator_history = [o.bl_idname for o in bpy.context.window_manager.operators]
    new_operators = operator_history[len(check_operators.operator_cache)::]
    check_operators.operator_cache = operator_history[:]
    print(f"new operators since last call : {new_operators}")
    return 1.0  # Check time interval

check_operators.operator_cache = []

bpy.app.timers.register(check_operators)

Note you can also check which properties the operators have been called with.
import bpy

# This will print a history of operator and their properties :
print(
    [
        [
            o.bl_idname,
            {p:v for p,v in o.properties.items()}
        ]
        for o in bpy.context.window_manager.operators
    ]
)

that is awesome! thank you so much, i did not knew this existed

@Fox Cheers. FWIW you can also inspect the properties the operator were called with, see edit to my answer.


text:
Change region width/height ? (read only)
i'd like to change width of T,N or other type of panel in blender with python, but it seems that it is impossible ?
for ar in bpy.context.window.screen.areas:
    if ar.type == 'PREFERENCES':
        for reg in ar.regions:
            if reg.type == 'NAVIGATION_BAR':
                reg.width = 5 #nope -> read only

is it really impossible ?
(by the way there's also no operator to toggle the navigation bar. it's kind of annoying as i use my addon pref as a little asset management system.


text:
Possible to give a shadow a different material?

Hello.
Let say that in a this image, i'd like all shadows to be rendered as an red emissive material, is this possible in render ? procedurally, witouth any modifiers, just by the shader editor ?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/86775/make-light-paths-only-pass-through-non-emitted-areas/86787#86787

ok so it's impossible then

cool but this is a work shader option, i can i will not change the material :(


text:
How to avoid material duplicates when appending multiple assets?
i just found a really odd behavior in blender:

Actions:

1) append an object that have the material named "Red"
2) append another object that have this same material
3) same with another.. ect..

Result:
you have now multiple material data: "Red" ,"Red.001" ,"Red.002" ect...
even tho all thoses assets had the same material "Red" at the first place..

This is a really odd behavior, any ways we can append while not dupplicating a material ? the only idea i had is making a script that handle the mess it create afterwards, but well, this mess shouldn't be there at the first place, so i'm sure there's a way to avoid this.
Is it ?

https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/155091/script-that-delete-duplicated-materials-from-appending-objects-and-reassign-th

Append creates copies completely independent of the original project. Therefore multiple appends create separate materials copies. You can link the material if you don't want to edit it (only reference the material from the other project). Library overrides would allow you to modify them locally without affecting the original. We would need to know what you're trying to do in order to recommend an approach. Perhaps you don't need to use append.


text:
Create an adaptive description for an Operator that take an attribute?
Sometimes the attributes of an operator can change quite dratically the output for the end user.
is there a way to make the description of this operator adaptive to the attribute ?
exemple in the script below:
class SCATTER_OT_print(bpy.types.Operator):
    bl_idname      = "scatter.print"
    bl_label       = ""

    pref : bpy.props.StringProperty()
    bl_description = "print: " + pref #Adaptive desctiption ?

    def execute(self, context):
        print(self.pref)

Can you give an example of how the operator will change it's functionality in such a way that the original description will no longer be informative?

Albeit the dupe listed is attempting to change label rather than description, the same answer applies.  Somewhat related https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/56727/changing-tooltip-for-menu-entries-which-use-the-same-operator


text:
How to prevent a duplicated mesh getting same material
I have created a duplicate mesh using shift D.
I can move the duplicate mesh and also modify the duplicate mesh without affecting the original HOWEVER when I apply a material to one of the meshes the material is applied to both. Can't work out how to prevent this happening. Doesn't seem to make sense.

You need to give a new material to the copy, it seems unavoidable

@moonboots  Thanks that is really weird. So I applied a material to the original and it also was applied to the copy, then I removed the material from the copy and gave it a new material. THAT is a real TRAP IMHO.

I guess this is because by default it makes more sense to keep the same material than to give zero material or to give a brand new material to the copy

@moonboots. I agree. I also have now noted if a material is applied to the original (or copy) and then removed then the problem doesn't happen.

I can't reproduce. If the material is shared  by the objects, then naturally, modifications to the material will affect both. If I Shift D before assigning materials, then the material is applied only to the selected dupe.

I understood the question as @RobinBetts did, it reads like first you duplicate the object, then you give it a material. In this case the material wouldbe  on one object, not both. But if this happens in your Blender, I cannot reproduce it. If you simply mean you duplicate an object already with material, and the new object has the same - yes, of course it works like that by default. Duplicating an object first of all means getting an exact copy of the original object. How should the Duplicate tool know if you want to change something afterwards and what? Modify the mesh? Change the material?

@Gordon Brinkmann. NO I have NOT duplicated a mesh which already has a material applied. I have uploaded a very simple blender mesh file (link below). It is a cube which I duplicated (shift D) then dragged it away from the original. Then I select the original and apply RED colored material and it 'paints BOTH meshes.

Sorry I didn't cut ad copy the url correctlly for the example. Here it is     HEY I now notice what the cause is. The original cube already has a material applied to it. I was using the cube which is displayed when Blender starts up. When I CREATE a new cube mesh there is NO material. That is annoying. I must remember NEVER to use the cube mesh which is there when you start up Blender Grrrrr!

Can't edit my last post as more than 5 minutes old. The problem I had seems can be reproduced by duplicating the mesh cube which displays on Blender startup which already has a material applied even though it is the same neutral color as with mesh ADDed. Why  then can't the 'default' mesh cube which gets displayed on Blender startup NOT have a mesh attached?  Grrrrr!

@JohnArnold You can edit the startup file... just open a new scene, delete the material from the cube, then go into the File menu, Defaults > Save Startup File.

@GordonBrickmann  That Gordon that's what I did yesterday although it may never bother me again now that I know the cause. I am still wondering what benefit there is in having the 'default' cube come with a material applied with no color etc.

@JohnArnold Because it has been like this for ages and nobody bothered to change it? Because most people who model things might in the end want to put some material on it for rendering anyway? And if you argue about some people not wanting this by default... why stop complaining about the material? The default scene has a cube, a camera and a point light. What if I don't need any of this, because I just model raw meshes, starting with a plane, no camera needed because I export them for Unity? And here's the thing I mentioned before: you can change the startup file if you don't like it.

...and by the way, it's not "with no color", it's a light gray, almost white, at a value of 0.8, and it just so happens that they made the look of an object without any material the same, or else (like if they chose pure black for example) it would not show very much detail in the viewport if you decided to model without material. Also if you think it would have made more sense if a default material had "a color", which one would be "correct"? Blue? Pink? Yellow? What's wrong with a neutral light grey? Giving it a material by default is a starting point, like adding a cube in the first place.

Point taken. I had previouslyremoved the light and camera and saved as default startup (as I don't use them) but did NOT realise there was a 'light gray' material already applied as looking at how it is represented on my monitor it doesn't look any different with no material.  This would never have been a problem if I had realised there was a material attached BEFORE I created my multi-sided mesh by collapsing the default cube to one vertex and then creating the mesh using extrude and how can there be a material attached to a mesh with only one vertex I wonder (I am still learning heaps).

When all is 'done and dusted' its only 'horses for courses'. It is an example I guess and in many ways it should include a material although a material which is visually different from no material IMHO would be better especially as the user would want to change the material color anyway. It's just my mind and assumption.

@JohnArnold Well, I often heard people having problems understanding why duplicating an object not automatically makes the material on the new object independent from the first, but never complaining about there being a material in the first place. But anyway, actually there is a difference between default or no material if you look at it in Rendered view with a light source - the Principled BSDF has a semi-rough glossiness, whereas no material is completely dull like if you would put a Diffuse BSDF on it (I think this was the default material before the Principled BSDF existed).

@JohnArnold And how a material can be attached to a mesh with only a single vertex is quite easy: it is not attached to the mesh. You misunderstand the concept of an object and a mesh. An object is a container, and the object type determines what it contains. For example, a Curve object cannot hold mesh data, while a Mesh object cannot contain curve data. A mesh object can hold mesh data, but there most not be any data present. So you could even delete all vertices in Edit Mode, but the object would still be there.

@JohnArnold It would have its origin point that can be moved, it can keep modifiers that will manipulate a mesh if there was any, and it can hold materials in its material slots. The first slot is always the base material. This will be put on all parts of the mesh that are not assigned with a different material. Of course it will only show up if there are faces, because single points or edges without faces are not visible in render.

@JohnArnold The advantage of material slots by the way is, you can add slots without having any materials in them, and assign those to faces. Which means, you can determine parts of the mesh where you know you want to have different materials than the base material, without having to decide immediately in the beginning of the modelling process what these materials should be. Later you can create all necessary materials and use them in the according slots.

@JohnArnold One thing I completely forgot to tell you, you can change the startup file to one with a default cube without material... or in the Preferences you could go to Editing > Duplicate Data and check Material. If you do that, duplicating an object will give the new object a new material which is not the same as the original. Problem with this setting is, it will then always do that. Which means, if you place 10 objects in your scene by duplicating them and afterwards you decide to change the color, each object has to be changed individually (or you use Ctrl+L to link materials).

Thanks for that suggestion Gordon.  I decided to give the cube a distinct easily seen color (NOT 0.8 0.8 0.8) to remind me that it already has a material. IMHO not sure why that color (above) was chosen  regardless of the advantages or not of having a material on the default cube as who would ever not change remove it or change it anyway.


text:
How to rotate a mesh which is part of a multi meshed object without losing original origin
I have a complex object (building with a ramp to the front door) made of many meshes and the origin and 3D cursor are at a position I don't want to loose (not sure how I set them to where they currently are).
I want to rotate a mesh (it is the ramp) with its origin set to the end which intersects with the building) however if I reset the origin to that position I will loose the original location of the origin.
I can set the 3d cursor and the set the origin to the 3d cursor but then I have lost both the original 3D cursor and the original origin.
I guess what I am asking is  - is it possible to save an origin?
How do I do this?

You can add an empty object to the current cursor location to save that position. You can then parent multiple objects to any empty to rotate them about that coordinate without changing their true origins

Thanks Duarte. That worked well. I was starting to wonder if I should 'extract' the 'ramp' to a separate blender file, make the rotation and save then append the blender file into the original - not sure if that would work though,   Anyway I now have achieved what I wanted to do, thanks again.


text:
Can't remove a particular part of an object
I have a model of a bulk carrier (ore/gravel) which includes an excavator which I am trying to remove. I select the object then go to edit mode and 'lasso' the excavator then 'hit' Delete and select delete vertices. I do this until I am satisfied I have removed all the vertices yet there remains what appears to be the glass in the cabin which cannot be selected.
What do I need to do to remove this.  Refer following images the first showing the model complete with the excavator and the second after I have deleted all the vertices for that excavator and showing what appears to be the glass from the cabin which cannot be selected.

Maybe it's not part of the same object, it's another object?

What @moonboots says. Look at the mesh icon (the orange triangle) in the outliner, there is a little 2 indicating node0 has two meshes under it. Expand node0 and you should see the glass mesh.

@taiyo Exactly, I was just about to comment on this. Since the glass cabin does not show any black outlined edges or center dots of faces like the other parts in Edit Mode it is most likely (or I would say certainly) a separate object. If this was rendered preview, another possibility would have been that the faces of the cabin are hidden in Edit Mode, this way they would get rendered but not show any outline markings for vertices, edges or faces. But it's Material Preview, so it should simply be a separate object.

STUPID me.  I just thought of that before reading your replies. That is EXACTLY what it is and can be deleted on object mode.    Sorry.

It's not part of the same object, it's another object, switch back to Object mode, select this object and remove.

Yes that is the answer and what I discovered before I read these posts. My brain is still in 'low range' coming to terms with my current emotions.


text:
How to retain original origin point
I have a model which I had the 3D cursor and origin set up to a particular position which allowed me to use the exported (gLTF) model in Flight Simulator without having to reposition it's position above ground level (the origin point naturally aligns with the ground level).
I noticed that when I added some more mesh cubes where I had to set the origin to the center to allow for good rotation, that the original origin point for the entire model was 'lost'.
Is there a method to 'store' the origin point so that it can be 'restored'?
Thanks.

Please give more information. Did you add the cubes in Edit Mode or Object Mode? If there are several objects, how did the new cube origins affect the origin of the original model? And if you join the cubes with the model with Ctrl+J, then the combined model will always take the origin (and also the name) of the active selected object, the one with the brighter outline. So maybe you should join the cubes to the original model, not the model to the cubes?

Oh, and if the cubes are added in Edit Mode: you can select a cube inside the mesh, set the 3D cursor to its center with Shift+S > Cursor to Selected and then set the Pivot Point for rotation to the 3D cursor. This way the cube can be rotated around its center without the need to change the origin.

Thanks. All in EDIT mode. And yes  joined cubes (select all meshes and ctrl J) into a single mesh. I can't remember where the origin of the original model ended up as I decided to remove everything except the new bits create a separate blender file containing just the new bits reload the original and append the new.  I have learned something new (ie if the cubes are added in Edit Mode: you can select a cube inside the mesh, set the 3D cursor to its center with Shift+S > Cursor to Selected and then set the Pivot Point for rotation to the 3D cursor. ). Thanks again

So if you don't have the model with the correct origin anymore, don't know where the original origin point was and it wasn't something like a certain vertex or the center of a certain part of the mesh, then there is no way to retain the original origin point - because you are free to change the origin on objects and Blender doesn't store where they were before (apart from the Undo function of course).

if you still have a copy of the original object you can use its origin location to move the new object's origin

I did NOT save the project with the origin in the wrong place. When I added the new meshes I noticed that the origin for the model had moved so did not save. I then removed all the bits which were the original model and saved the then new meshes only as a new blender file then (re)loaded the original blender file and appended the new blender file and moved the object to where I wanted it to be. So I didn't have a problem BUT I just wanted to find out how to maintain the original origin in the future instead of creating two 'projects' and appending as just described.


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What causes color change with two adjacent mesh cubes with same material
I am creating a model of a floating dock and have two adjacent mesh cubes both with the same image texture material and uv wrapped the same way yet the color looks different on each. One appears a gray color and the other more brownish. What causes that and how do I rectify?

It could be the light source/HDRI

Thanks Emir, the same thought just came to me after viewing the model from different angles.

Strange though that both meshes are on the same plane (and joined together) so I would have thought the light falling on one would fall from the same angle on the other one.

@JohnArnold could be the differing interpolation of normals. Is there any topology in the meshes we can't see? Could you show us the wireframe / share a sample on https://blend-exchange.com/ ?

if you provide a blend file - you would attract more people (e.g. me)

Sorry Chris.    I tried to upload the blender file after doing a pack resources but the resulting blender file was over 340Mb yet without doing the pack resources it is less than 2Mb and the only texture image (material) is quite small so I don't understand that. Anyway I uploaded the blender file to the 'cloud' (Mega) and the download link is here  https://mega.nz/file/Krh3kJ4J#eBd9l4qDwSk4pQNlnj8CdGdtk5rap7uCGaajWdwoz5A


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Is there a method to find a blender project which contains a particular named mesh
I seem to have forgotten the name of a blender file I worked on a few weeks ago and I have too many blender files to wade through.
I know that it contained a mesh with a particular name.
Is there any method how to find a project which contains a particular mesh name?

That's not really a Blender question, more about the PC operating system that you're using. If it's Windows I'd uses something like the free version of Agent Ransack with 'Look in:' set to the folder where you keep your Blend files, the 'File Name:' as '*.blend' and the 'Containing text:' set to your mesh name.

Sorry John. I wasn't sure if such 'text' names would be 'modified' (eg compressed or whatever) within the Blender project file and that there was a function within Blender to do such a search. I have seen files in the past which when edited are just a maze of undecipherable (hexadecimal) characters.

No the object names aren't modified if you save your blend files uncompressed (the default). Any data file seems to be undecipherable code if you look at it with a text editor. However, if you searched within that code for the object name in a Blend file you would see it in plain text.

Hi :). This should be possible by linking all of the blends into one file, and then searching for that specific name. The resulting search should give the name of the linked file.


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Can't mark seams and other strange things
I have a model of a lighthouse.
When I select a material for the roof as soon as I click on the 'ball' next to Base Color and select image texture, before I even select a texture image the roof goes black - that is the first thing I noticed which is different and may have a reason.
I then select the texture image and the roof is 'painted' with the image selected as expected.
I then go to Edit mode and notice that the edges and vertices are colored black when I expected them to be yellow.
I then press Ctrl - E and select mark seam - the edges and vertices do not change to red as expected suggesting they have not been marked.
I press U twice to unwrap and go to UV editing. The faces are not displayed.
What have I done wrong?
I have attached the blender file which does not have any materials so please use whatever you have as that is not the issue.

It looks like you forgot to select or something like that

I select the roof and it is highlighted suggesting that it was selected. I am sure I am doing exactly what I have been doing for months to uv unwrap etc.

It sounds as if you don't actually have any edges or verts selected when you're trying to mark the seams. The edges won't be marked unless they are selected (yellow) but you say that they are black which means they are not selected. You also have to select everything ('A' in Edit mode) before unwrapping or nothing will happen.

Thanks John. That is the answer. Strange that in the 18 months since using Blender I have never needed to do that (select all in edit mode). I have never used select all in edit mode only in object mode. Whenever I have applied a material and then did an unwrap I have never done or needed to do that before. Also I have never seen a mesh get 'painted' black when selecting a texture image to apply before either.


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How do I move collections/meshes
I forgot to select my original collection before 'appending' some other blender 'projects' and also before I imported some gltf's.
Now my collections are 'messy'.
How do I fix my initial collection so that all added collections are at the same 'level' see attached. All the original meshes can be seen at the bottom and added blenders and gltf's at the top top of the list

You can select objects and hit m to move them to some other collection, Shift+m to just link objects to another collection(objects can be in multiple collections) and you can also just drag the objects from one collection to another in the Outliner in View Layer mode(Ctrl + drag to just link instead of moving) and there is also Collections panel in the Object Properties tab of the Properties Editor in case that's somehow convenient to edit what collections the object belongs to.
See more in the manual.

Thanks Martynas. Something else I have now learned although I must be more careful in future to select the object before appending etc.


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I can't work out how to use the mask modifier
I am trying to create a very simple model using a mesh plane and texture image taken from Google Earth. I used a paint program to 'erase' parts of the edges to be transparent (alpha channel) but when I use that as a material the transparent areas show and won't work as a scenery object in MSFS. Someone (at a MSFS forum) suggested I use the mask modifier to remove those areas but I cannot find out with youtube tutorials how to do that as they all seem to use vertex groups and there are none in my model.
The blender file would be too large too attach here due to the large .png image file but can be downloaded from  https://mega.nz/file/3ipV0DDA#QsBMqImKzPtadapXhv2OAuxIKMjCwyr_KL7ZbIVzGH8
Here is the image (it is a retangular image and the edges and transparent areas are not displayed.-

Difficult to work out precisely what you're trying to do, but if you simply want to remove the part of the plane which doesn't have the image on it, just use the Knife tool to mark round the edge of the image then go into Face mode and select and delete the surrounding faces. Incidentally your Blend file is only just over 12 Meg in size even with the image packed into it so could easily have been shared via https://blend-exchange.com/.

You say that "the transparent areas show", what do you mean by that? First thing plug the Alpha output of the Image Texture into the Alpha input of the Principled BSDF, then in the 3D view, in Texture Paint mode use the brush in Erase Alpha mode

Thanks John.  Oh the knife tool. That's a good tool to do what I want (ie remove the areas of the 'model' which are 'transparent' in the material texture image). It's been a while since I last used Blender and the knife tool slipped my mind.   And moonboots thanks also for your response. The transparent areas which show only show when the blend mode is set to opaque and when I set it to alpha blend it does not show however when I add a spot light (a feature for MSFS) the whole object is only lit (at 'night') if the blend mode is set to opaque. I have not tried your method.


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How do I increase all sides of an area created with extrude along normals
I want to create an object which basically is a cube on to top of another (rectangular) cube (to copy an object - see below).
I know that I could simply create two meshes and join them but I was sure it could also be done by starting with one mesh and extruding the top face along normals and then increasing side facing faces to be wider and deeper.
I created the rectangular shaped mesh and then used extrude along normals vertically which creates the 'top' which I want to increase its width and depth (X and Y).
I have tried selecting faces and then Scale and also G (drag) and extrude and I cannot get it to increase the faces along the X and Y axis.

Select the top face and hit E then S (without ⏎ Enter in between). Scale it as you wish then hit E again and drag upwards. You can then select the front and rear faces of the top box and scale them on the X axis to increase the width.

I didn't know you don't have to right-click for 0-displace extrude, nice

@MarkusvonBroady Really? I've been using that method for years! :^)

Thanks John.  I should really have thought about working on the top face first and the extruding upwards to create my larger 'box' on top of the 'post' (instead of creating the top 'box' and then trying to enlarge it on the X and Y axis.

Well you could have done it that way! Just select the ring of faces round the pillar using Alt-Click on one of the edges then use Alt-E > Extrude Faces along Normals, but my way creates cleaner topology.

Thanks John.  I felt that it should have been possible the way you explained above but either didn't know or had forgotten about using Alt-E

I used both methods and prefer your first method (which you also do). It creates a few less edges.


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Get Window Handle from blender api?
is there a way to get the window handle value from python API?
i know about
user32 = ctypes.WinDLL('user32', use_last_error=True)
user32.GetActiveWindow()

But that's how to get the active window and not from a bpy.types.Windows API call
I can’t find a proper way to identify blender windows.
basing ourselves on height and width of windows won’t work because this blender windows area always a few pixels large than what win32 is telling us

update
there's no garantuee you'll get the first window. if e.g. you have the preferences window open it could return that one. Since both main window & preferences have the same title "Blender"
original answer:
To get the handle of the first (main) blender window use these 2 functions. (code from bqt)
def get_process_hwnds():
    # https://stackoverflow.com/questions/37501191/how-to-get-windows-window-names-with-ctypes-in-python
    user32 = ctypes.WinDLL('user32', use_last_error=True)

    def check_zero(result, func, args):
        if not result:
            err = ctypes.get_last_error()
            if err:
                raise ctypes.WinError(err)
        return args

    if not hasattr(wintypes, 'LPDWORD'):  # PY2
        wintypes.LPDWORD = ctypes.POINTER(wintypes.DWORD)

    WindowInfo = namedtuple('WindowInfo', 'title hwnd')

    WNDENUMPROC = ctypes.WINFUNCTYPE(
        wintypes.BOOL,
        wintypes.HWND,  # _In_ hWnd
        wintypes.LPARAM, )  # _In_ lParam

    user32.EnumWindows.errcheck = check_zero
    user32.EnumWindows.argtypes = (
        WNDENUMPROC,  # _In_ lpEnumFunc
        wintypes.LPARAM,)  # _In_ lParam

    user32.IsWindowVisible.argtypes = (
        wintypes.HWND,)  # _In_ hWnd

    user32.GetWindowThreadProcessId.restype = wintypes.DWORD
    user32.GetWindowThreadProcessId.argtypes = (
        wintypes.HWND,  # _In_      hWnd
        wintypes.LPDWORD,)  # _Out_opt_ lpdwProcessId

    user32.GetWindowTextLengthW.errcheck = check_zero
    user32.GetWindowTextLengthW.argtypes = (
        wintypes.HWND,)  # _In_ hWnd

    user32.GetWindowTextW.errcheck = check_zero
    user32.GetWindowTextW.argtypes = (
        wintypes.HWND,  # _In_  hWnd
        wintypes.LPWSTR,  # _Out_ lpString
        ctypes.c_int,)  # _In_  nMaxCount

    def list_windows():
        '''Return a sorted list of visible windows.'''
        result = []

        @WNDENUMPROC
        def enum_proc(hWnd, lParam):
            if user32.IsWindowVisible(hWnd):
                pid = wintypes.DWORD()
                tid = user32.GetWindowThreadProcessId(
                    hWnd, ctypes.byref(pid))
                length = user32.GetWindowTextLengthW(hWnd) + 1
                title = ctypes.create_unicode_buffer(length)
                user32.GetWindowTextW(hWnd, title, length)
                current_pid = os.getpid()
                if pid.value == current_pid:
                    result.append(WindowInfo(title.value, hWnd))
            return True

        user32.EnumWindows(enum_proc, 0)
        return sorted(result)

    return list_windows()

def get_first_blender_window():
    process_windows = get_process_hwnds()
    return process_windows[0].hwnd


text:
Does a cylinder have to be at world origin to bend?
I want to add a 90 degree bend to a cylinder which is placed on the side on my 'main' object.
I have watched and noted a couple of videos on how to bend a cylinder including using the deform modifier but they all start with adding the cylinder to the world origin.
Try as I do I cannot get it to work and my cylinder sometimes 'jumps' to another location and so I am wondering if the cylinder has to be at world origin?
I have been able to bend a cylinder in the past but it has always been at world origin.
Thanks

No, the mesh won't bend depending on its global location, it's the object origin that will be taken into account

Thanks.  I have now worked out how to bend a cylinder using the spin tool which I previously haven't been able to master.

The spin tool will use the 3D cursor, maybe show some pictures or screenshots of what you're trying to achieve...

Sorry to add to this but using the spin tool I cannot see how to (say) ensure that I get a 90 degree bend using the spin tool. To achieve the bend the vertice? is dragged around using the mouse but I cannot see any 'properties to ensure the face (being dragged) 'faces' 90 degrees away.

Sorry forgot to notice the 'parameters'? box bottom left of screen where the angle can be set.

The axis are also available at the top left of the 3D view

Simple Deform offers options to:

Restrict the deformation to a vertex-group
Use a secondary object as a pivot, instead of the object's own origin

On the left, a single object comprising 2 cylinders, showing its own object origin's location and orientation. On the right, with the cylinder on the right assigned to a target vertex-group, and using an Empty as a pivot, in the orientation shown. The object has been given  a Simple Deform > Bend around Z.
Bend is not the most intuitive modifier, it's often simpler to use an Empty as pivot in any case, just to make life easier. You can see the effect of moving and rotating the axis of deformation without editing the modified object. I nearly always bend around Z, because then I know the extent of the deformation is along X.
But, frankly, I think Bend is best suited to animation. For more control in modelling, I would rather deform geometry along an adjustable curve, using a Curve modifier.

Thanks Robin for the tutorial on use of simple deform > bend.  For my application (eg a bend in a pipe joint such as a water pipe) I prefer the 'look' which the spin tool gives. Still it is great to have more than 'one trick up one's sleeve'.


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How can I highlight better the edges I select
I am wondering is there a setting where I can choose to 'thicken' the selected edge in edit mode.
I want to do a FILL in a particular area which has multiple edges and so I hold the shift key and try to select all the edges around that area to fill.
Problem is (for me) is that with my poor eyesight I find it difficult to see what edges I have already selected - see image below with some edges already selected but hard to see.

Edit > Preferences > Themes > 3D viewport.... scroll all the way down to see "Edge Width"

As far as I know you can only set the colors differently, but the edge width only in general no matter if selected or not...

Thanks.  Yes can change the color but couldn't not see how to change edge width (only outline width which has no effect) although other eg vertex (size) can be changed.  It would be good if edge (selected) width could be changed.  Is that be possibility in a future version?

What Blender version are you using? mine is 3.6 and there is an Edge Width See the image https://imgur.com/a/CwFOyow

I am using 3.1 and AFAIK certain addons (for output of MSFS gLTF) only work up to  version 3.1.  I will check with the MSFS (Blender) forums.


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How do I change the origin for one mesh to be at the same point as another mesh
I have a project which consists of two 'parts', a hydraulic cylinders and their pistons. They are NOT joined. I have set the origin (marked with a red X in the image) for the cylinders to be where I want to pivot the entire assembly (cylinders and pistons) which works for the cylinders but not their pistons. I know that I could Join both together and the entire assembly would pivot but then I would not be able to move the cylinders (in and out of the cylinders) separately (marked with red double ended arrow).
What is the way I can achieve what I want to do? Is the only answer using an armature (don't know much about them).

You could press Shift S and choose Cursor to selected given that the selected part is the one you want to copy the origin. Then select the object whose origin you want to change then go to Object/Set Origin/ Origin to 3D cursor.

Perfect.  Something else I have learned.  Thanks   That begs another question which perhaps I should start another question for maybe? Is it possible to extend the 'piston' in or out of the cylinder on the same 'plane' without having to rotate the whole assembly temporarily onto either the X or Y axis and then select the piston and use G X or G Y to extend the piston.?

Just select one of the faces that point to the direction you're looking for then set the transform orientation to this face. If you then move the cylinder along the Z axis, it will follow the direction of this plane.

Thanks again.  Just found a youtube video which explained just that seconds and then came back into the forum to advise and you answered seconds earlier. Thanks


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How to add an edge to one side of a cube only
I am attempting to model a refueling shed (see image below with timber framing I want to add using an edge) and want to add an edge across 2 sides of the 'cube' only (the side in the image arrlowed and the opposite side) which I will expand later to form the timber 'framing' seen on the image between the windows and the bottom half of the wall. I tried doing it with loop cut and then selecting and deleting the edges drawn on the other two sides (but that of course removed a lot more. I tried using knife cut but had too much difficulty.
What is the answer please.

Maybe do an edge loop cut on the face with parallel sides (which aligns the edges with the bottom edges) and then select the edges not required and right click and dissolve edges? That seems to work but is it the preferable method?


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Bevel does not work correctly on one edge only
Back to my shed (which I am modelling on an existing shed).
I am trying to create faces for the timber framing on the corners of my shed using the Bevel 'tool' (select edges with segments set to 2 and shape set to 1). It works correctly on 3 of the 4 corners but on the fourth corner it goes crazy. I have found that I have somehow got two edges on this corner (I can select an edge, press X and select dissolve edges and an edge remains) but even selecting one and removing it (dissolve) bevel still won't operate correctly.

You have duplicate vertices in your mesh, A to select all, then M > Merge > By Distance. But do it before you try to bevel the edge. By the way, do you have a new profile pic? :)

How easy was that. Thanks heaps Gordon.  Now I wonder how I ended up with duplicate vertices. I could see I had (what appeared to be) duplicate edges but obviously that was because of duplicate vertices. Tricky. Thanks again.    Can I sneak in another question please? I would like to add short 'legs' at the bottom of each corner. How can I do that without adding extra meshes (one for each 'leg')? Easier to add the extra meshes?


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Mirror modifier prevents me from weight painting
Disclaimer: I am NOT asking how to apply a mirror modifier for weight painting.
I have a low-poly model that I rigged and I am wondering why I can only use weight painting on half of my model, the right-side of it. I think that this is because I have a mirror modifier on the 3D object but am I supposed to apply it anywhere? I don't see such thing in the modifier window.
Another related-question: is it because my model is very low-poly that weight painting is very imprecise? I feel like I can only apply a weight to a vertex, but I saw several examples of smoother paint on low-poly models, I was wondering how.

The smoother paint on low-poly models, was that Weight Painting or Texture Painting?

@GordonBrinkmann It was weight Painting, maybe it used a gradient? I don't know

i just tried it out - and it worked exactly how i would have expected it: yes, you can just weight paint on the one side, like everything you can do only on the one side of the mirrored object. That's why it's called mirrored....you can also just change the vertices on one side...and so on.
You can apply the mirror modifier (just in object mode):
You don't need to apply the modifier, only if one side should not be mirrored anymore or you wanna change something just on one side.

"just in object mode", four words that saved me from 2 days of headache, so simple yet I always forgot this. Thank you!
PS: Do you have any thought related to my side-question?

yes, you can paint only on vertices, so the more vertices you have the more precise you can paint.

Okay! Thanks :)


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Rotate all bones in rig by 90 degrees
I want to create an animation with a rigged model, but it appears as if the bones are all rotated 90 degrees:

This is best visible in the tail; I would expect the tip of the left bones meet the head of the right bones, as is the case with most rigs I've seen. For example:

While the rig does work correctly and is posable, I'd like to rotate the bones back so they look like you'd expect. Of course this can be done manually, but is there a way to do them all in one go?

Have you imported the rig? Here is a similar question https://blender.stackexchange.com/q/222291/107598.

@Blunder thanks for the link, tweaking the import settings solved it!

This problem can be solved by tweaking the primary and secondary bone axis in the armature tab when importing. (In case of a .fbx)


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Why does exporting to FBX only include one NLA track?

I have an armature with a bunch of NLA tracks/actions on it that I would like to export to FBX. However, when I try to do so the animations in the resulting FBX are all copies of whichever NLA track was selected at the time of exporting. Meaning I get the same animation ~16 times, with varying start and end frames. The export settings are shown below. How can I get Blender to actually add all individual NLA tracks/actions to the FBX?
It looks like the actions are stored correctly and contain no invalid paths, but maybe I'm missing something.
This is on Blender 2.92.

Apparently the exporter does not unstar the starred track before baking, hence the starred track overrides every action it tries to bake. It works if you unstar the track before exporting though doesn't it?

That was the problem, thank you so much! If you post this as an answer I'll mark it as the solution.

The FBX exporter does not appear to unstar starred track for you, so any starred track will remain starred while it bakes animations ie. all the animations will look like the starred track.
To avoid this, unstar any starred track before you export.


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Edit each individual extrude made by Curve to Mesh node
I'm working on a tree root using geometry nodes. It currently looks like this:

A circle gets extruded over a jagged curve with a set radius and tilt, which all works as expected. The circle itself has some noise on it to make the root less uniform. Here's how it looks without the size and tilt variation to better show how it looks:

I would like for there to be less uniformity along the root as well. To do this I would need to introduce variation into every circle that gets extruded by the Curve to Mesh node. In short, my question is: If I create a mesh from a curve using Curve to Mesh, can I edit all the created extrudes individually? And, can I still use spline parameters such as the Factor when doing so?
The node setup looks as follows:

Could you tell us a bit more about it? What exactly do you want to do with it and how do you want to select the individual circles along the curve? By index? By factor? ...and which Blender verison?

The procedure is that you first capture the index/factor of each individual point on the base curve using Capture Attribute (this must be done after resampling!).
These values are transferred to the individual cross-sections when using Curve to Mesh.
After converting to a mesh, you can use these values to select and change certain parts.
In this example, I simply move the segment/cross-section with the index number 2 a little on the Y-axis, but along the tangents of the original base curve:

PS: In the same way, you can of course capture any other value (e.g. the factor) in the base curve and then continue to use it, as each value captured in a point is transferred 1:1 to the segment/cross-section.
(Blender 4.0.2+)

Sorry for the late reply (I forgot), this works! Thanks!


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How to hide 3D viewport settings
Is there a way to hide these 3D viewport settings? I use this small panel as a preview for the camera, but it is obscured by settings that I don't need here.

Hello :). View > Sidebar (N)

@JachymMichal Awesome, thank you!

if you wanna have even more space: uncheck show header   [1]: https://i.sstatic.net/pNGMP.png


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Is it possible to add child bones to a Rigify subrig?
I'm new to Rigify, so maybe I'm not doing this the way it's supposed to be done. I had a look around but couldn't find an answer to what I was looking for.
Here's Rigify's limb.paw subrig:

As expected, the rig compiles when it is generated:

However, let's say I want add another bone to the end of the paw to control the toes:

The new bone is marked as a basic.pivot, but it looks like Rigify still assumes I want it to be part of the limb.paw and errors on it:

Is it possible to add child bones to Rigify's build-in subrigs?
(I realize there is a limbs.rear_paw that includes toes, but this is more about me trying to learn Rigify and wanting to know why this doesn't work.)

After generating the Rigify rig, you can add in edit mode any bone, child of an appropriate bone (could be thoose DEF deforming bones on 29th bone Layer, or ORG Original bones on layer 31 (counting from 00 to 31)).

Clear parent from your bone on metarig (Alt+P). Then in bone properties of your bone choose either basic.raw_copy or basic.super_copy rig type, then enable Relink constraint, after it in "Parent:" field you can enter name of the bone of generated rig (Foot.l for example or DEF-foot.l) you want your bone to be child. If you want basic.pivot you can create new bone and parent it to your bone and then choose rig type basic.pivot as usual.


text:
Can't see the alpha/texture of sculpting brush when changing size
Very new to blender, so I don't even know what the name is for what I'm describing, or how to find the name, will attach pictures.
Basically, have been watching some tutorials for sculpting in blender, and notice that when the tutor adjusts their brush size, they can see the alpha(?)/texture projected into in the viewport.
Like this

But when I load up a new sculpt, I can't see the texture, it just looks like this.

Might the tutors have just uploaded a different texture prior to the tutorial, or is there some setting that I haven't found to make your alpha/texture visible?

you mean the dark area? if so, it's probably the brush strength (SHIFT + F)

I do, but I don't think that's the answer. Changing the brush strength changes the inner circle radius, but the dark area still doesn't appear

You need to enable the Falloff visibility in the Tool settings. You can access it in the header of the 3D view while sculpting or in the Tools properties in the properties editor.

Arguably the tooltip and the panel in which you access the overlay properties are misleading.
You can also change the opacity there. Enabling the Brush icon button will remove the overlay once you have clicked so it doesn't cover your mesh while sculpting.

Thank you! Do you also happen to know of a way to make a brush texture visible when resizing or rotating the brush? The brush texture is only visible when NOT adjusting size or rotation. Thanks

@Copperplate Unfortunately I think it is not possible. It would make sense though. Maybe worth adding a feature request on RCS if you're motivated

Ah, I see. Thanks for the info. For now, I guess using the "Stencil" feature comes the closest to this. Indeed, it would be a great feature to have. :-)


text:
How can I convert data from camera data node(view distance) into a file output(image or CSV or anything)?
I am trying to extract the location(x,y,z) of the objects from the camera in my scene(highway scene -autobahn).
Note: I have imported the .obj file as my scene (obtained from elsewhere, not created by me) into the Blender and therefore the objects in my highway scene (like a car, tree, etc) do not show any values for location (x,y,z) in the viewport.
problem 1: But I need a sophisticated way to obtain the distance of all the objects of the scene elements from the camera, pixel-wise, to use it as ground truth for further application.
Methods I tried so far :

to create a driver that calculates the distance between two objects but unfortunately, it does not work because the location of the objects does not show as they are imported. it is always (0,0,0). Also, I cannot obtain pixel-wise distance.

use the depth render layer of the cycles render in Blender using the composting nodes and creating a node tree that calculates the distance writing it to the output file. This works! But I do not need a converted value, all I need is the Z-component of the distance to the camera. I followed the solution of using shader in this link How to get Z-distance (not depth) from camera to object for every pixel in the frame?. I am stuck in one place :

problem 2: While using shader nodes, I am unable to see the output of it. How can I extract the pixel-wise output into a file? I can build the node tree as shown in the image below, but I do not know how to proceed further. Please guide me on how to obtain the output into a file. Also, problem 3: I do not quite understand why I am multiplying the view vector with view distance? I followed the solution in the link but unable to understand this point.
This might be a trivial question but as I am a newbie in the computer graphics field, any leads would be extremely useful. Thank you in advance

Why don't you just use the Z pass in the RenderLayers, and render it as an Exr image?

@Secrop thnk you for your response. Actually I do not want to render the image. I want the values of the z pass into a file. Will the above method contain the z pass value that is not alteredn

Don't know what you mean with unaltered Z pass value.. Putting the z values in a file, is just a matter of looping all pixels, extract the distance and write the value in to a file (using python). Could you detail what kind of file structure you need, and what do you plan to do with it?

@Secrop I want to do exactly the above-described procedure. I want an exr or png file or a CSV file will also do. this will act as ground truth for the scene that I export from blender and process for depth in mitsuba renderer(which has a custom depth integrator). As I am new to the field, i am confused if something will change if the Z values are written to OpenEXR format. Also, I am confused on how to extract it with python. I do know my starting point. Any leads would be very helpful.

taking the example of your nodes setup, here's a simpler version, which does the same as the z pass: VectorMath.Distance between TextureCoordinate.Object from 'Camera' and Geometry.Position (the only thing that needs to be set is sampling to 1, because you don't want to interpolate the distance). I could later today write a small python script to turn the image into a cvs file.

@Secrop that would be of great help. thanks a lot in advance.

Here's a small script that renders the scene and stores the Z_Pass into a CSV file, with {X, Y, Distance} in each entry.
All you need to do is paste this in the text editor and execute.
import bpy
import numpy as np

dest = 'C:/tmp/z_data.csv'
backgroundD = 10**10

def getCoordFn(x):
    def gc(i):
        return i%x, i//x
    return gc

def getpixelz(image):
    arr = np.array(image.pixels)
    pix = arr[0:-1:4]
    gc = getCoordFn(image.size[0])
    zpix = [(gc(i), d) for i, d in enumerate(pix) if d < backgroundD]
    return zpix

def writeCsv(data):
    with open(dest, 'w') as file:
        for p in data:
            file.write(f'{p[0][0]} , {p[0][1]} , {p[1]}\n')

def prepareRender():
    rn = bpy.context.scene.render
    rn.engine = 'CYCLES'
    rn.image_settings.file_format = 'OPEN_EXR'
    rn.image_settings.color_depth = '32'
    cl = bpy.context.scene.cycles
    cl.samples = 1
    cl.pixel_filter_type = 'BOX'

def prepareOutput():
    scn = bpy.context.scene
    scn.use_nodes = True
    bpy.context.view_layer.use_pass_z = True
    nt = scn.node_tree
    nt.nodes.clear()
    r = nt.nodes.new('CompositorNodeRLayers')
    v = nt.nodes.new('CompositorNodeViewer')
    nt.links.new(r.outputs['Depth'], v.inputs['Image'])

def execute():
    prepareRender()
    prepareOutput()
    bpy.ops.render.render()
    image = bpy.data.images['Viewer Node']
    writeCsv(getpixelz(image))

execute()

Note that this overwrites any setup you have in the compositor.


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Blender model keeps squishing my vertices
I am working on a arch viz model for work and this is my first time doing arch viz in blender aside from a few tutorials.
I have been trying to UV unwrap my model but every time I do it squishes some of my vertices together on a flat plane which messes up my texture mapping.
I am relatively new at this and I don't know how to fix the model so I can texture it properly, I've tried manually unwrapping it with seams and it has the same issue.
Any help would be appreciated thanks!

Hi Dominik, what exactly do you mean with "it squishes some of my vertices together on a flat plane"? Are you talking about the seemingly displaced vertices in your UV map?

@Joachim I'm mostly talking about how some of the faces look like they've been twisted in the UV map, I don't know what's causing this but whenever I try to a texture it doesn't map correctly to the model.

How did you unwrap your model?

@Joachim I tried adding edges as then pressing U --> Unwrap but that caused what is shown here.

select lighmap pack wich has less overlap then check UV sync selection button in top left corver(arrows) in uv editor then select>select overlap to find what is causing problem fix with scale down the uv or adding seems or seprating object(sometimes helps)

It looks like there are some places where the distortion is focused.  There's someplace where Blender just can't give us a flat map, and it's distributing the distortion across the map a bit to make it so that no one place is awful.  If we enable sync-- those doubled diagonal arrows in the upper left corner on my UV editor below-- then select the distortion plus a bit more, and hide everything else, we can get a closer look at the problem area:

So when we look more closely, we can see that there are some places where we have what amounts to an unseamed box, at this particular doorway.  Let's seam appropriate edges so that we can unwrap this without distortion:

The selected areas are places that need seams.  One way to think about seams is where we'd need cuts if we were going to wrap this object up for Christmas. For things that are roughly box-shaped, sometimes I think about making fold-up dice as a craft project as a child.
Now that we've created a few more seams, we can unwrap and see how we did.  Don't forget to unhide everything if you don't want to create more islands than you need.

Much better!  There are still a few issues which you didn't ask about (those lines stretching across the UV map).  You should take a look at those as well, using UV sync to find them and then hiding stuff so you can see what's happening.  (Hint: they're due to non-manifold geometry.  You can find non-manifold geometry by using the "select non manifold" operation and learning what its options do.)


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Life would be easier if the Blender version was always visible in the interface so one can always know which version to use for tutorials
This is probably the wrong place to submit this but anyway.
Sometimes the author of a tutorial mentions the version he used but very often they do not. I have been frustrated beyond imagination by this issue. It already says "Blender" top left corner of interface would it be possible to add the version number to this as well so one can know at a glance what version was used for a given tutorial?
Thanks and apologies if this is the wrong place for this post.

Hello and welcome. This is Q&A site run by volunteers, we are not programmers nor in any way associated with the Blender Foundation, decision making nor development process of the software. For suggestions and feature requests use https://blender.community/c/rightclickselect or https://blenderartists.org. Before doing so consider that ideas are a dime-a-dozen, what we lack is manpower. Every single one of the millions of users have their own long list of personal wishes and desires, while comparatively very few people have the skills and knowledge to actually implement them.

Agreed and I am a dumb ass at least part time anyway. Thank you for your thoughtful reply.

The version number is displayed in the bottom right corner:

Unfortunately some tutorials have the tutor's image in that corner blocking out the version. - Not Blender's fault, I grant you!

Ok, thank you! The blind idiot will now humbly slink away never to complain again and go back over all those frustrating tutorials with renewed enthusiasm.


text:
Can you add a spine bone to an existing (deformed and animated) character rig without repainting weights and having to redo old animations
I understand you can go into 'Edit Mode', Shift+a to add an armature bone but does this work for adding bones along the chain such as adding a new spine bone or can you only add to the end of the chain such as adding fingers at the end of an arm? And once done do you have to repaint the skinning and redo all old animations? If this is not possible be default is there e plugin that makes it possible?

Does this work for adding bones along the chain such as adding a new
spine bone or can you only add to the end of the chain such as adding
fingers at the end of an arm?

What makes bones into a chain is parenting.  So you can make a bone and then change the parenting of other bones so that, now, that new bone is sandwiched in.
An alternative is to use the subdivide operation on a bone, which splits an existing bone in two, and leaves any children parented to the new bone created (which is parented to the original bone that was subdivided.)
There are a lot of different ways to make bones, and a lot of different ways to edit them.  Anything you can make in an armature, you can edit in-- after all, editing a single bone armature is how you make complicated ones!

And once done do you have to repaint the skinning and redo all old
animations?

In general, yes.  Any new bones you make won't deform any mesh until they have weights.  Any new bones you make won't be animated until you animate them.
There are plenty of exceptions.  A bone that changes parenting can affect the mesh indirectly, even without weights.  A bone that is part of an IK chain will be animated by the IK target, even if it doesn't have any animation data itself.

If this is not possible by default is there a plugin that makes it
possible?

What you're asking about is extraordinarily general.  Are there plugins that weight bones?  Sure-- so does out-of-the-box autoweights!  Are there plugins that generate animation?  Sure-- so does out-of-the-box rigid body physics!  But you probably have some particular kind of animation and weighting in mind.  There is no single way to animate or weight new bones, so there is no single, press-one-button plugin to animate and weight new bones.

Thank you Nathan. That's everything I needed to know.


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Color mapping not displaying in viewport display
Good day,
currently making an explosion in blender and i need to enable color mapping in order to display the smoke. But i dont see them in the viewport display setting.

Color Mapping was recently renamed to Grid Display. In your screenshot you'll find it just at the bottom border of your drawn frame.

thank you so much


text:
How do I confine a boids particle system to a volume?
Is there a way to have boid particles be generally confined to a volume? For example, if I were to make a fish tank or fish net, and would want schooling fish to be animated throughout but wanted them to stay within the confines of the volume, is there a way to tell them to flock, but do not exit the volume?
I'm trying to figure a way to make a large school of fish remain in the background of a shot without letting them go all over the place. I've tried having them follow the leader and having the leader move, but it sprays fish across the camera view and all over. Once they start to flock, they just end up spiraling in a cylinder type thing. I'd ideally have them be in a sphere.

Just use avoid/avoid collision for your surrounding box. Of course you need the right values to make it work. And AFAIK there is no thing like "stay in that volume" for boids.


text:
How do I smooth or sculpt eye sculpt? (stylized character)
I've been working on my character following this video: (I'm stuck at 16:24)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qLWGfbkAb54&t=877s&ab_channel=Dikko
When he does it the result is smooth (16:34)
When I try to do it I can't seem to smooth my mesh-like he does. I followed everything he said to do. I Ctrl j to join the head mesh I model with the eyelid mesh I model, then in sculpt mode, all I did was use smooth and grab tool. Everything was fine until I used the clay strip. I would get these folds and creases that would not smooth out but deepens not matter how much clay I add and smooth out.
This is what mine looks like which I can't seem to figure out how to fix to match his.[1.

That is an awfully lot of topology. Unfortunately, I can't help you with 2.90 as I am not sufficiently up-to-date with that version or beyond. Some hotkeys are changed — initially, that confused me, as I was long used to the old ones like those for smoothening mesh and merging vertrices. You can google for cheat sheet for Blender 2.90 hotkeys.


text:
Im new to blender and I'm having issues with colour differences in solid mode and render mode

In the pictures theres quite alot of difference in colour, is it an issue to do with light or material?
help ;-;

nvm found it its in colour management and filmic to standard

You may want to take a look at the comments under this answer: https://blender.stackexchange.com/a/222587/60486

Might be lighting. In solid mode (depending on the settings used) colors can pop out more, which is why the material viewport is used for texturing and shading and such. You can try using a brighter light and use compositor or curves (under color management in render settings) to bring out the colors more.

This is Eevee
It may have to do with the lighting and or HDRI viewport settings see pic

thank you I tried changing the engine to cycles aswell as changing the settings it's alot better but still not as vibrant as the one on the left, do you kno any fixes for that


text:
My object is keeping its original shape aswell as adding the additional movement
I was trying to add the droop you see but the original shape was not changing when I did so. I checked and made sure I had no other duplicates and I don't.

Caught green handed. Your subdivision surface modifier is set to 0 subdivisions in the viewport (though the render levels are at 2). Also, it is animated. Right click -> clear keyframes, or any manual change will be cleared if you accidentally switch frames.

and i see you are on frame 144 on the timeline, make sure you are always on frame 0 to not complicate other things

@FernaldyWiranata Correction: frame 1

Odd... i did what you said and cleared the key frames so it set to 1 level of viewport and the problem still persisted... no it isn't animated so i changed the frame to 0 as well. Anything else it could be?

@user124268 I lost track of who you’re talking to. The property was green, which means it was animated. If it is not green now then it is not animated.

ok. so it's not animated and the property is no longer green. but the problem with the mesh keeping its original shape and also adding the edit is still happenening (see the photo)

@user124268 I notice an odd fold in the icing on one drip, which makes me think something else is going on as well.

yes that's what I wanna fix is there anything that you think might be happening there?


text:
Build modifier not applicable in any mode
I am having a strange problem, in blenders 2d animation interface I can't apply the build modifier, it doesn't matter if I am in object mode, draw mode, or edit mode, other modifiers apply with not issue but the build modifier "apply" button remains greyed out no matter what I do.
I am not getting any error messages and am at a loss.

can you share screenshots


text:
Involuntary duplicating node windows
This is Blender 2.9, inside the Shading tab.
I am trying to move the (yellow) Noise Texture but whenever I try to it creates a duplicate (green).
Ive tried to move (yellow) by pressing G as well but same thing happens.
If I select multiple nodes including (yellow) and move those, (yellow) still gets duplicated.
The duplicate only happens the first movement, after it gets duplicated once I can move around both without any further duplicates being made.
Yellow is a shift-D copy from (blue), it would be odd if it has something to do with it but I mention it anyway.
I can easily just delete and re-add (yellow) but this bugs very a lot and I take its valuable to learn now before I get complicated with nodes.

Do you box select or just click on the nodes before duplicating them ? There may be a stacked copy of the blue noise node under it that you accidentally copied too. Otherwise it may be a keymap problem. you can look in the preferences and reset the node interface keymaps if they have been modified

I was just suggested by another person that it might be a copy as you say. How can I for sure verify this before moving?
If I click select I duplicate, if I box select I move.

It should only select one node if you click select (unless you somehow activated the circle select with a very low radius but there should be an indication on screen that it is active). Be aware also that if you use SHIFT D but cancel the operation (with right click or escape), the node still gets duplicated but stays at the same place.

I cant tell if I select 1 or 2 since supposedly they are on top of each other, but I take this is the answer that they are stacked. So Ill just move the top one out and delete it then re-wire.
Ill remember to be wary of how I use shift D next time. thank you bro


text:
Cannot paint gradient with TexturePaint
So I'm just baffled how weird the texture paint is in Blender, it's the most non intuitive about the software Ive yet encountered. I almost take offence in feeling this stupid for not figuring this stuff out, coming from Photoshop and similar.
I chose Gradient under Colour Picker, paint and there's only one colour.
I try the Line from Stroke Method instead of Space, obviously I assume the line I paint should be gradient, no. I try repeat, I try clamp, I try swap the gradient colours, I try change strength. bla bla bla.
What possibly more should I even have to fiddle with to make it work? It's preposterous. That's all there should be to it! Ive looked around in the other options, theres few of them but none seem to make a difference in any way.
I have no problem painting "normally".

It's the default values of the brush settings which are unlucky chosen for the mouse users. (I had to consult the manual to get it to work.)
If you have a mouse (no pressure sensitivity) then you need to increase the value for Gradient Spacing (which is 0 by default) and set Gradient Mapping to Clamp (or Repeat).

thank you for assisting me with settings. After reading under clamp and gradient in the manual you linked I would not have connected the dots myself.
The manual made me interested in Color Ramp Widgets HSL/HSV too.


text:
How to snap faces of two objects perfectly
I'm trying to align the "rope handles" foot to the plank, so that the two faces are perfectly aligned, I believe its called.  This is tricky because there might be answers in forums but I really don't understand if they are relevant, outdated or too explained poorly. I'm disappointed that the Snap-Face doesn't do it for me but I guess its doesn't snap to a face FROM a face. Well I guess it does but only if I select the bottom face in Edit mode.
Note that the bridge is an Array of 1 plank following a Path/Curve and the Array modifier has not yet been applied.

This may be hard to explain but I'll try to explain how I'd do it..
0. ALWAYS save before following advice, in case it doesn't work out for you.

Make a copy of the plank, without the array modifier.
Cut the square area into it using ruler/knife whichever you feel works better for you
Select that new face, press CTRL+I to invert selection and delete inverted selection
Extrude the face you created/have left. This way it'll be at the angle you need it to be
Now connect that to your rope as the new handle and see if that works.

I recreated your issue: select the foot object, go to edit mode, selct the bottom face you want to be aligned, press Shift S > cursor to selected. Back in object mode right click and choose "Set origin to 3D cursor".
Now you can activate the face snapping otpion, ticking "Align rotation to target", and easily place your objects.

Working on your file I did 4 actions:

enable affect rotate in the face snap options (so that the snapping acts even when manually rotating the object)

Applied scale of your foot object (Ctrl A)

The most important: selecting a foot and pressing Alt G, Alt S, Alt R resets the object's transforms: in its rest position the object has to be in the center of the world (0,0,0), with no rot (0,0,0) and with unity scale (1,1,1).

Untick this transform option that make your object locked on rotations.

In this state your object wasn't straight and centered. The face snap acts on the whole object, based on its origin; you can think the of the origin as a ghost vertex which is parent to all the others vertices. Snapping gives to the origin the loc and  rot of the underlying face, and this is reflected to the whole object, if this object is straight vertical in rest position.
So you have to change your object in edit mode so that it fits the requirements (as in photo quad view).
At this point simply move (G) and duplicate (Shift D) with the face snapping option to easily place the feet.

Easy explanation to follow but I dont get any results at all almost, maybe I have some other setting activated elsewhere. I haven't really changed a lot much though since Im beginner level.
https://imgur.com/a/viHoi9X
Pic 1 I tried on the same plank, I couldn't get a better result.
Pic 2 I tried the plank to the left and as you see it looks as if my rotation is locked. The foot never rotates.
I used the exact settings from your photo.

The results above are if I activate array and curve modifier. if I DO NOT, then it looks like this https://imgur.com/a/MutXTnS
Actually I uploaded the blend and blend1 file here https://www.filemail.com/d/vvlaeldplxpuxvl if maybe its easier.

I think you'd better upload your blend file, to see what's causing the issue https://blend-exchange.com/

Ok I just edited my above comment :P Ill link again - https://www.filemail.com/d/vvlaeldplxpuxvl thanks for your time

I edited my answer.

ok thanks interesting, some of the theory there is new or ive not done practically enough of it yet.
Will mark finished in about a days time when ive got a bit more time to fiddle.

Sorry but thing just doesnt work for me.
First off I cant rotate the object in object or edit mode, no idea why. Never happened before.
And if I reset location and rotation to zeros the object is still tilted. I just dont get this.
sorry that im wasting your time. i wish it wasnt this bothersome for such a simple thing.

Also I dont understand what you mean by "So you have to change your object in edit mode so that it fits the requirements (as in photo quad view)." because its not possible to change the loc and rot in Edit mode.
heres my tilted object: https://i.imgur.com/mPDVwZJ.jpg

I also dont know what keybinds you refer to with Ctrl G, Ctrl S, Ctrl R . Because by standard ctrl+s is used to Save. My guess is you mean the equivalent of Apply->All Transform?

My fault: It was Alt G, Alt R, Alt S, which simply bring loc rot and scale to reset (000, 000, 111). Then I forgot to mention that you had activated the option "Affect only Location" in the "N" toolbar, which probably is causing your headache. To reset the tilt you can do it in two (exactly equivalent) ways: one is rotating all the vertices in edit mode, the second is rotating in object mode, then applying the rotation (Ctrl A).

To fully understand the difference between Applying (Ctrl A) and resetting (Alt G Alt R ALt S) make this experiment: move, rotate and scale the default cube (which consist in 8 vertices + one object origin). Then try the two options (Applying or resetting), checking the relation between the origin and the 8 vertices. When you read the loc rot and scale values of an object, they are related to its origin, no matter where the actual vertices are, and so do all functions like snapping.

Thanks for the help but I am unable to make the face snap. I also can't rotate in Object mode. Im clueless.  I think I've had enough because I really dont understand this. thanks again but I will put this on ice sadly.

Did you untick the "Affect only location" preference in the "N" Panel?

Ok yes I did. from the screenshot I saw Location was [V]. It seems i can do this now. very clutch.
I will continue to study the alt keybinds, because I think I thought Apply Transformation was the same thing. While rotating back the pole to straight and alt-r brain clicked a little more.  i can now continue and be happy.


text:
Blender 2.92, Show gizmo move Keybind
I'm unable to find the show gizmo move keybind. So what I specifically want is to see the XYZ-arrows when I press G to move, just like they show up when I press Move on the toolbar to the left.
Apparently it was shift+space+g in Blender 2.8.
When I try it, shift+space starts some animation frame instead.
I searched in the keymaps but theres nothing relevant on "gizmo", so that leaves me overwhelmed.
I found this thread but its not the answer Gizmo missing in version 2.90.1

Space (pressed on it's own) starts the animation playing. With shift depressed, press space to bring up the tools menu. then pressing  G will invoke the move gizmo .

Not for me. My Space is set to search. Shift+space starts animation playing.

what shortcut do you see if you hover over tool as suggested in answer below?

None, no shortcuts in any tooltip.

Even if I changed space from Search to Tools, I still play with Shift+Space.
If I at the same time remove the keybind for Play Animation (which says Shift+Space) it's still not solved.

Ok, what do you get for Prefs > Keymaps > Search > Name    search for "Toolbar"  For me I get the default Shift Space (under Window context)  Could answer re how to set up this keymap?

What I refered to above is the Spacebar Action, which I have set to Search.
anyway, well if I search for "Toolbar" I only find "Fallback tool pie menu" which is Alt+W.

btw to turn on tooltips Prefs > Interface > Display  Did you bring keymaps over from a previous version of blender?

Here is the keymap https://pasteall.org/media/1/7/1706b91868968a7093908e096558c244.png  to bring up toolbar menu.

No, I am a new user since less than a month back.
I have User Tooltips already checked. I tried the Python Tooltips but that made it just look like actual code.
It says I can force to show if I hold Alt but that doesnt work regardless of checked or not.
Without changing anything yet, this is what mine looks like >> https://imgur.com/a/exA75eW

And this is what I get if I search for toolbar, how come you can find it but I cannot? >> https://imgur.com/a/H7E22Dh
are you using another version than 2.92?

I get same as my image above for both 2.91 and 2.92 on ubuntu. Showed image because you can easily add the keymap.

ok thanks Ill see how I want to set it up. Apparently its due to me using Right click. Its quite defeatening how everything in Blender seem to change over just 1 or 2 versions.
And the keybind dont show in the tooltip but Ill just accept it doesnt work for me.

Bit the bullet at 2.8 and started fresh with new defaults. Was hard to get head around left click select at first, but... must admit always thought it should have been this way round in first place as it matches most software.

If it's missing add a new keymap.
By default ShiftSpace brings up the toolbar menu. Can search for it's keymap via Prefs > Keymaps > Search > Name  "Toolbar"

As you can see, for me it is there, but for you it isn't, in which case will add a new one.
At the bottom of the window context, click on the add new button.

Fill in the properties as above (Bit silly as for me as above is literally as above...)
Should now be able to press ShiftSpace and bring up the toolbar menu,

and if so save preferences.

Ah now we talking! Now as I added my own keybind for "wm.toolbar" then also "toolbar" can be searched for. So this means the toolbar does not have a keybind with the Right click configure. I had to remove the Play Animate which is no problem.
Im very content with this. The key was the wm.toolbar, that part I would not figure out even if I knew how to change an existing keybind. Excellent. Vielen dank, grazie, kiitos and thank you.
Its too bad I cannot give you my upvote.

You could mark this answer as accepted, that helps a lot

If you only want to turn on and off the move tool, by default is by Holding down Shift + Spacebar , G.
If you don't see anything, hover your mouse over the move tool and you will see the shortcut appear

I thought about that too but none of my tooltips show the shortcut like yours does.
Is it because I use Right for select? Does that change so many things in the keybinds?
If I could find this gizmo in the Keymap, I could see it. But I dont know how to find it as mentioned

I changed Right to Left but that didnt change the supposed outcome of the keybind.

try with factory reset... File > Defaults > Load Factory settings and also inside the preference settings... Edit > Preferences > click the three lines in the bottom left corner > Load Factory Preferences

Okay this helps but only for Left click setting. As soon as I go back to Right click, things change.
So while it answers, im not satisfied but I dont blame you instead Blender.


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Import an image as a reference to a plane but the image i am getting is lying on a another plane
I import an image as a reference on a top ortho plane,but the image i am getting is on a another plane and the plane which i selected is blank.What i do to get it on a reference plane.

I don't know if that helps but usually when you insert reference Images they get inserted the way you are looking right now.
So let me explain.
If you tap 1 on you Num-Pad and insert a reference Image it should appear in the XZ-Plane.
So maybe toggle to your desired view and try to insert your reference that way.
I am not sure if it is possible to get a reference Image to a plane...
You could assign the image to the Plane as a Material but I am not sure if that is what you want.

With Shift + A > Add > Image you can choose from 1. Reference, 2. Background or 3. Images as Planes.


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How to restore Alt-Middle mouse to view snap mode?
In the new Blender versions Alt + Middle mouse now changes frames in the timeline. I'm used to using it in the previous default where I could drag between different view positions with Alt + Middle Mouse. What settings in keymap do I need to change to go back?
I've been looking but it's not obvious!

In my case the issue was that I had enabled the "Grease Pencil Tools" addon, which uses this hotkey for scrubbing the timeline.
If you still want this addon enabled, you can rebind that action by going to Preferences -> Addons -> Grease Pencil Tools -> Timeline Scrub and choosing a different hotkey. Alt + Middle click should now zoom the camera to the cursor, and Alt + Middle drag should snap to views again.

I think it's a little bug: the function you're looking for is called "Center view to mouse". it looks correctly setted, but it doesn't work: looks like it works as if the dopesheet window was the active one.
I could restore it adding the shift modifier (Alt Shift MMB).

Still seems to be ignoring the input for me. Even if I use shift modifier and disable change frame in the dopesheet keymap. Could be a bug like you say. The Blender 3.0 alpha also did this.

Did you add the shift key in the preferences Keymap panel? Tested in 2.93.


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boolean and mirror problem
I am learning Anvil tutorial by Blender Guru (here) and whenever I try to mirror the anvil after using boolean I am able to do it but for some reason, I am having the base of the anvil as it is and there is no face where boolean is used. here is the blend file.
P.S this object is in a collection named "2nd try" and my blender version is 2.92

Just move your mirror modifier before your boolean modifier like this:

Then it works:

UPDATE:
ok, then just add a mirror modifier for your cut object (cylinder) too like this:

result:

blend file:

it's solving my one problem but creating another i.e it's not mirroring it to the other side where I want the same cut

i updated my answer

it's the same there is no difference in your answer.

quick ques. if I use mirror first then boolean then won't the anvil will be mirrored then boolean is applied but what I want to do if use boolean to add cut to anvil then mirror the cut part to the opposite side of the anvil as well

sorry, forgot to save. now.

can you share the blend file?

sure. done.......


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How to "apply" Rotation to a armature bone?
I have the following "controller" bone added to my rig:

The problem is, that if I add a "copy rotation" constraint to the bones I want to control, they apply the rotation which I have made to position the controller as well:

I have already tried different options of the constraint (Mix Replace, Add, Before origin, After origin) but none gives the result I expect. Basically I want "apply rotation" to the controller bone and then constraint only relative movement from there. How would this be possible?

Maybe what you want is to set the Target and Owner to Local/Local, this way the bone will keep its default rotation until you rotate its target: