http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas en-us Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC QAPoll module http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/273/ I _really_ miss this feature in my modelling - in nearly every model i make (mainly mechanic stuff).

Related ideas:
"Make Thicker" Modifier
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/22/

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/273/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/278/
Now I suggest applying this behaviour to edges/vertices as well. I'm pretty sure this has come up elsewhere already, but I really can't find it.

Also: Using the individual normal of each face/edge/vertex for extruding can only improve modelling.

Related ideas:
Scale individual centers for separate regions
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/277/

Offset Tool (and modifier)
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/273/

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/278/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/299/ There are several ideas that could be done here, so I'll just list them all for now:

* Add support for "translate manipulator mode" (aka "move handles") to the 3D cursor. i.e. The move-arrows as they are used for ordinary objects right now. Grabbing the cursor by pressing [g] would also work in this 'mode' - it's still faster to just press LMB of course, but not as precise - see the next two points for details.

* Precise Move - Moving the cursor around should be possible by e.g. entering blender-units - Again this is exactly as for ordinary objects.

* Snapping - Add support to let the 3D-Cursor Snap to vertices/face-centers/object-centers/grid. Just think about the snapping in EditMode and the UV-Image window to get the idea.

Optional:

* Rotation info - Add support for a normalized vector of 3D cursor (only show if the user needs it) - This way one could use the 3D-cursor as an axis for quite a lot of tasks without aligning the view to it. Examples would be the "Spin" tool(s), any rotation, scaling/moving along that axis etc... all without extra objects, aligning the view or other helpers.

* Additional this would require support for rotating of the cursor-vector. See "manipulator mode" idea above.

Related ideas:
idea #166: Be able to treat the orgin of an object as an "object".
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/166/

Werner

EDIT: Spelling & Some more detailed descriptions

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/299/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/283/
* Selecting some faces or edges that are part of a face-loop.
* Press [Ctrl][R]
* Optional: Change number of cuts via scrollwheel
* Press LMB

Sounds pretty much like the the "Loop Subdivide" function as it is now - sans the first step.
In the first step we select the geometry that will have the new edgeloop(s).

All faces outside of the selection are unchanged (except for the new triangle-faces that are needed to create some edgeloops)

If there is a very long faceloop and you select several non-connected faces of face-islands they will _all_ be subd'ed as described above.
EDIT: As long as they cross the faceloop.

EDIT2: Just so this is made clear - I don't want to change the existing "Loop Subdivide" behaviour in any way. As long as no selection is made prior to invoking the command it'll work just as it does now ... see the comments (and images) below for more.

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/283/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/340/
So we can at least see what the socket is meant for when the node is collapsed. Nothing big (you can still expand the node) - but a "nice to have" thing.

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/340/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/351/ 1) If you select a few edges (only some of them form a polygon) and then do "Delete->faces" the selection is lost - it would be nice to still have the rest of the (not deleted) geometry selected.

2) you have a group of faces selected in edge- or vertex-select mode and delete them you need to select the resulting edge-loop afterwards to use it ... sometimes this can be very helpful if it would be automatically be selected. De-selecting is quite easy in contrast :)

3) You have an edge (or a whole edge-ring) selected in vertex mode and do "Delete->Edge". Afterwards it would be nice if the two vertices are still selected.

The exact behaviour would depend on the current select-mode, so in pure face-select mode it would not be possible to remain any selection.

* Face-select mode: nothing special
* Edge-select mode: If faces are deleted keep the rest of the selected edges or "bordering" edges selected.
* Vertex-select mode: If faces or edges are deleted keep the rest of the selected vertices or "bordering" vertices selected.

Combined select-modes would also combine the above behaviour (i.e. any extras selection is kept intact)

Werner

PS: Example images on request :)

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/351/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/365/
Imagine you've just created a group of nodes.
Now every socket in that node that is not yet used will be exposed when the group is collapsed.
This has some disadvantages (see also the images in [1] and [2]) when trying to use the node without opening the group for editing:
1) There often are many exposed sockets that you'll probably never need.
2) Multiple sockets often have the same names making it hart to tell them apart.
3) The names of the input and output sockets often say nothing about their function in the group.

Possible solution:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/63231715@N00/2470043367/

1) Can be solved by adding 2 new node-types (maybe only available for usage in node-groups?).
One defines the input-, the other the output sockets that will be used by the group.
These nodes simply forward any data trough them (we would need a way to add any number&type of sockets here) but if used in a group they will be used as the _only_ input and output sockets for this group.

2) and 3) can be solved by extending the above nodes with a custom labels for each socket.

If no in-/output node exists the sockets of the group will behave exactly as it is now.
(Optional: limit the number of input/output nodes in a group to 1 ... whatever is easier for the developers ;))

Werner

[1] http://www.flickr.com/photos/63231715@N00/2470043641/
[2] http://www.flickr.com/photos/63231715@N00/2470865278/


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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/365/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/284/
It would be nice being able to change ones vote.
Since we seem to have a "1 user = 1 vote per idea" system this should at least be technically possible.

What do you guys think?

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/284/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/360/ * Selection of vertices in a Mesh
* Selection of points on a curve (non-handle points).
* Selection of points on a NURBS surface.

Curves: You'll notice that one can not see the segments of the curve getting highlighted nor the "fadeout" towards the deselected parts.

NURBS: The "fadeout" is also not used in NURBS surfaces. Although highlighting of the selection seems to be fine here.

I think this would really help with more complex curves/surfaces if one can see the selection in the same way it's done in mesh edit mode.

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/360/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/311/
Consider the following scenario:
* You have a nice image-mask for some part your model (for use in the material node setup)
* You now transform this mask into a different one using a material-node setup.
* You now want to use the new mask for (e.g.) bumpmap - without baking the resulting mask this seems to be pretty impossible.

There where several suggestions already how to solve this, but the only ones I remember are
1) to add a "Texture Output" node to the material node editor which can be used in the material as a texture again. Not perfect but it shows how it _could_ work.
2) There was also a talk about a new "texture nodes" mode or something along this line - that may solve this as well.
Suggestions are welcome.

This is kinda hard to describe, so if you have any question please leave a comment.
I'll try to come up with a quick example image to show the problem better I find some time.

EDIT:
I've found an old thread of mine which shows an example of the problem (first node-setup image in the thread)
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?t=78265

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/311/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/285/
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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/285/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/341/
Basically if you do a [Ctrl][P] parenting this could now automatically be transformed into this new constraint ... same for clearing/applying the relationship.

This is just a random idea that popped into my mind (without thinking about every detail) - so it may not be as practical as I first thought. Do _you_ know any cons or pros? Please leave a comments.

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/341/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/382/
This modifier would join two objects at a defined number of vertices/edges (i.e. in most cases 2 edge loops).

Example usage:
You would apply the modifier to one object and then "pin" the merged geometry (so it will not ripwhile animating).
The actual "merging" of the geometry should work very similar to the merging in the Array-modifier.
Optionally you could define the used geometry via vertex-groups.

Examples:
* Attach different arms [1] to the same body.
* There are more uses - most of them involve modular (i.e. multi-parted) meshes were you want to apply certain modifiers (e.g. SubSurf or Bevel) to the joined geometry.

Note: I think a modifier like this was proposed (right after ED) to be used in the next movie, but never made it .

Please leave a comment on why this would be a good/bad idea and what could possible be made better.

Cheers,
Werner

[1] Each of them having a different geometry/topology, otherwise a different UV-map would be enough anyway :)
EDIT: Re-written part of the description.

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/382/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/393/ One can then easily animate this object and it'll auto-update the DoFDist value + display.

Werner

PS: I _think_ there is a python script somewhere that does something very similar, but i could not find it.

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/393/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/403/ The problem is that they often are anitalised and mixing them with nodes (i.e. "Mix" node) often results in mask-"halos" around some objects.
(EDIT: [Unusable] example of node-mixing http://www.flickr.com/photos/63231715@N00/2494419158)

So a way to combine them before they are converted to a bitmap (if that is even possible) would be quite handy here.

Of course a way to get a non antialised output of the "ID Mask" node might work as well and it may even be more flexible ("Mix" nodes will work correctly on purely BW images)

Example:
Combining mask 1 and mask 2 in this image:
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Image:Manual-Compositing-Node-IDMask_ex.jpg
Note: No, one can't simple take an inverted 0 mask here, because this is a simplified example and it will break if there are more masks.
The second example (with "halo" around borders") was already linked above.

Disclaimer: I'm still pretty much a noob when it comes to the compositor, so there may already be a way to do this cleanly. C&C welcome.

Werner

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/403/ http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/339/ This should include every single option in the "Map To" dialogue (examples: Ref, Hard, Alpha, emit, etc...)

I know this is possible already by manually displaying only spec/bump/etc.. and the bake these, but i think everybody know how time-consuming this can get.

I think there was a script out there that does something very similar (deactivating unneeded buttons + bake). Anybody got a link?

Optional (dunno if it's possible):
Is it somehow possible to bake multiple layers of an image? Think: Similar to the passes in the compositor.
Because if that is possible one could even bake multiple maps at once and have them all applied to the model.

Werner

Related ideas:
"Only spec" for materials.
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/52/

"No images found to bake to" - Please select an image.
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/210/

Option to auto save baked textures
http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/idea/218/

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No attachments. ]]> Tue, 07-Oct-2008 00:00:00 UTC http://www.blenderstorm.org/qapoll/ideas/item/339/