You have to create a folder called " Mesh_Bevel"
Instructions below
To Install and enable the add-on.
In your addons folder, create a folder called Mesh_Bevel
Located here: ..\[Blender Install Directory]\[version]\scripts\addons Example: c:\Blender\2.57\scripts\addons\Mesh_Bevel
Download the files from the link above, keeping the same file structure.
The structure should look like this:
..\Mesh_Bevel\__init__.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\__init__.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\gl.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\math.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\mesh.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\utils.py
..\Mesh_Bevel\va\view.py
Be sure that you have both __init__.py files, they are not the same.
Now in Blender User Preferences > Addons > Mesh, enable the Mesh_Bevel addon.
You will now find the Bevel option in Edit Mode by pressing the "W" Key.
In the toolbar you will now find an option bevel, with a slider & a menu.
Choosing either Default Bevel or Vertex Bevel can make a significant difference to the result.
Thanks Andy, works perfect! Dunno what I was doing wrong (am a retard)
I think the BMesh developer is very dodgy IMO, he keeps citing 'health problems' and suggesting donations will make him all better... if he can't complete it surely he could let someone else finish it up... at least polish its current state and get it into the trunk.
By the way, how can I make Blender open fullscreened upon startup?
ive always thought this, i mean how long has bmesh been in development for, i think its been in development for as long as i have been modelling almost.
Thanks Andy, works perfect! Dunno what I was doing wrong (am a retard)
I think the BMesh developer is very dodgy IMO, he keeps citing 'health problems' and suggesting donations will make him all better... if he can't complete it surely he could let someone else finish it up... at least polish its current state and get it into the trunk.
By the way, how can I make Blender open fullscreened upon startup?
Glad to hear it's moving on and will be a future hold in 2.6+ (I don't know what the drama is about and don't want to get involved, nor care, just wish the best for everyone.)
Yeah probably 3/4ths of the drama was unwarranted whining from entitled bums and quad purists.
Given the level of experience of the coder involved I think he's done a pretty good job so far, especially considering he's been the only one working on the Bmesh branch for years.
Imagine working on some project for years only to be harshly criticized by much of the community you are trying to help. We're probably lucky Joe hasn't quit as no one else seems interested in actually coding Bmesh.
The only semi valid criticism of his work so far would be that he should have opened up to more communication and feedback from the community (not counting trolls).
I think what's way worse has been the way the Blender Foundation itself failed to prioritize Bmesh (no funding, no additional coders, etc...) for almost the entire time it's been in development. Admittedly though as an outsider looking in it might just be my impression of the situation rather than the truth of the matter.
Hopefully we'll see Bmesh integrated into Blender in the near future.
also, a other downside that ties into with how bmesh is handled is how the community reacts when someone asks about or suggests e feature.
for years every time i suggest or ask about a feature im told it is on the way and am pointed to some very very unstable build.
since that seems to happen to most people it kinda makes you wounder how many people use blender to get work done vs mess about with it.
since when working i don't want to put up with having to get a new build every week that will crash in a new way doing basic stuff, i just want something that works, and is consistent, and has want i need to effectively and quickly get the job done.
and this is coming from someone who 4 or 5 years back used to build his own linux distro and applications from scratch from the svn repos, and prolly ran way too much bleeding edge stuff for his own good.
and the quad purist thing just seems stupid, yes quads are generally the best to model with, but ngons can save a lot of time and have no bad effects on flat surfaces, and allow you to use new techniques like chamfering a vertex to make a hole, which requires you to temporally have 4 ngons.
I think what's way worse has been the way the Blender Foundation itself failed to prioritize Bmesh (no funding, no additional coders, etc...) for almost the entire time it's been in development. Admittedly though as an outsider looking in it might just be my impression of the situation rather than the truth of the matter.
Hopefully we'll see Bmesh integrated into Blender in the near future.
It seems like such a fundamental and important thing. nGons speed up workflow so much. The Quads only argument is a total load of shit, especially since blender make triangles so much.
I keep trying to go back to blender, but the modelling just feels outdated and awkward. its a shame because there is some epic stuff mixed in with the ancient crap.
I hear what everyone's saying. I'm not a quad purist by any means, but working in Blender exclusively the past half year forced me to rethink how I approach SubD's, and I honestly don't feel like I'm missing n-gons all that much. It's definitely a mindset you have to put yourself into though, and it kept me off fully adapting Blender to my workflow for a while. Right now, I'm just trying to play to Blender's strengths, i.e. curves, parametric modeling, some nice viewport GL, etc. It isn't all that painful after a while.
Just trying to bring some positive back to the thread. I realize if the Blender community were made of people like me, it's development wouldn't get anywhere since I prefer not to bitch and moan so much.
I think perhaps the problem isnt that people bitch and moan too much, or not enough. its just that the most vocal folks dont have a clue what they're doing.
I think they realise this though. the films they've made seem to be an effort to guide blender by production needs rather than uservoice.
I just wanted to post that Bsurfaces 1.5 has been released and its pretty outstanding. (it will be released as GLP within 5-9 months but is currently $39)
Its a modeling and retopo toolset that uses greasepaint and/or bezier curves to generate surfaces.
Its the commercial upgrade of the current Bsurfaces 0.9 that is in the Blender release, but its had some crazy improvements.
Build surfaces, extrude and bridge selections using freehand strokes.
Edit strokes as bezier splines.
Keep the strokes after building the surface to modify and/or reuse them.
Interactively modify in real-time all the settings available.
Faster algorithms for surface building to make it work real-time and be controled interactively.
Use bezier curves as input.
Use straight strokes.
Closed shapes.
Transitions between closed and open shapes.
Make surfaces cyclic, both along and/or across the strokes.
Loops on strokes for simple surfaces, extrusions, bridges, surfaces from two connected selections, and closed shapes.
Surfaces from crossing strokes.
Optional automatic join of the crosshatched surfaces to the original mesh.
Restrict the automatic joining of the crosshatched surfaces to the selected vertices.
Stretch slider to control interactively how much the borders of the crosshatched surfaces can stretch to get joined to the original mesh.
Control interactively the merge distance of the borders of sketched closed shapes and transitions from closed to open shapes.
Designate the first point of a spline, both for open or closed splines. No need to make all strokes in the right direction on the first try, they can be changed at any time.
Reorder strokes/splines using freehand strokes.
Improved interpolation of loops in bridges where the proportions of the edges of the first selection are different from the proportions of the target selection.
Improvements on detection of surfaces "along strokes" or "across strokes". Less precision needed from user, and detects well in more situations.
Context detection, and alerts when the context is incorrect. For instance wrong types of selections, or there is only one stroke and no selection, etc.
When tweaking options interactively there are available only the options that make sense depending on the context. For instance is not possible to make cyclic the extrusion of an open shape, this is automatically interpreted and the cyclic options are disabled.
Automatically filling faces where there are only edges structures.
Building surfaces from loose edges, which can be attached automatically to the original mesh.
I have been testing it out now for a few weeks and i have to say its super awesome and really fast.
I just wanted to post that Bsurfaces 1.5 has been released and its pretty outstanding. (it will be released as GLP within 5-9 months but is currently $39)
Its a modeling and retopo toolset that uses greasepaint and/or bezier curves to generate surfaces.
Its the commercial upgrade of the current Bsurfaces 0.9 that is in the Blender release, but its had some crazy improvements.
Build surfaces, extrude and bridge selections using freehand strokes.
Edit strokes as bezier splines.
Keep the strokes after building the surface to modify and/or reuse them.
Interactively modify in real-time all the settings available.
Faster algorithms for surface building to make it work real-time and be controled interactively.
Use bezier curves as input.
Use straight strokes.
Closed shapes.
Transitions between closed and open shapes.
Make surfaces cyclic, both along and/or across the strokes.
Loops on strokes for simple surfaces, extrusions, bridges, surfaces from two connected selections, and closed shapes.
Surfaces from crossing strokes.
Optional automatic join of the crosshatched surfaces to the original mesh.
Restrict the automatic joining of the crosshatched surfaces to the selected vertices.
Stretch slider to control interactively how much the borders of the crosshatched surfaces can stretch to get joined to the original mesh.
Control interactively the merge distance of the borders of sketched closed shapes and transitions from closed to open shapes.
Designate the first point of a spline, both for open or closed splines. No need to make all strokes in the right direction on the first try, they can be changed at any time.
Reorder strokes/splines using freehand strokes.
Improved interpolation of loops in bridges where the proportions of the edges of the first selection are different from the proportions of the target selection.
Improvements on detection of surfaces "along strokes" or "across strokes". Less precision needed from user, and detects well in more situations.
Context detection, and alerts when the context is incorrect. For instance wrong types of selections, or there is only one stroke and no selection, etc.
When tweaking options interactively there are available only the options that make sense depending on the context. For instance is not possible to make cyclic the extrusion of an open shape, this is automatically interpreted and the cyclic options are disabled.
Automatically filling faces where there are only edges structures.
Building surfaces from loose edges, which can be attached automatically to the original mesh.
I have been testing it out now for a few weeks and i have to say its super awesome and really fast.
I guess it depends on what you count as commercial. There have been plenty of donation based development over the past year or so, where users actively donate for the development of a feature, which is then ingratiated into the main Blender when it is feature complete.
Successful implementations of this method have been The Ocean simulation port (which was completed, but im not sure when its getting into trunk) and Node based compositor redesign (which is ongoing and has raised $7.5k so far)
I must admit that both methods are great... Anything to get better tools
Also, its worth noting that all the open movies have been driven by the need for Blender development first and foremost, rather than just making a movie.
I'm guessing it'll be made free but with commercial use restrictions or summat. I'll wait for the free release for the exact details... I think its a good system; charge for the plugin initially, then release it for free (cause it is for Blender after all) six months later. Would like to see more of this if it funds Blender development.
Im assuming that the intention is to have the new 1.5 version replace the 0.9 that currently ships with Blender, so if any other license were added to the script, it would no longer be compatible with Blenders license.
Part of the GPL licence guarantees that you are able to use the software in anyway that you see fit.
No, Looptools is a different script
The BSurfaces GPL edition is a more immature version of the commercial script above and it comes with Blender
You can eatch videos on it HERE (the name of the script changed to BSurfaces at some point)
That looks really nice and usable. andy you say you've been using it for a while, do you have any real world examples using it?
Edit, just got to the violin part, handy to watch and gives me ideas.
One question though, how is he managing his selections? In making the spiral for the head; he's pushing part of the spiral out, dropping some points, moving, dropping, etc. without going to a side view.
That looks really nice and usable. andy you say you've been using it for a while, do you have any real world examples using it?
Edit, just got to the violin part, handy to watch and gives me ideas.
One question though, how is he managing his selections? In making the spiral for the head; he's pushing part of the spiral out, dropping some points, moving, dropping, etc. without going to a side view.
Unfortunately, I dont have anything off hand. All the stuff i made was just retopo work or just having fun with the tool in general.
As for the selections, he is using the CTRL +Numpad +/-, which increases or decreases the selection.
Is bmesh supposed to be implemented in the standard releases starting with 2.60? I think I read that somewhere before, but knowing bmesh its probably been pushed back again...
Just woke up and tried to open the .Blend file i was working on last night, and this appears:
Followed by:
Clearly it is a .blend file, does this mean the file has corrupted itself? if so, have i really just lost 12 hours of work? or can i get it back some how?
I don't really know and I'm sure metalliandy will have a better answer soon but maybe you have some form of a backup in a .blend1 file in the same dir as the .blend.
Yea, you can rename .blend1 to .blend and its a backup
I would really recommend that you move over to the 2.5 series as iirc 2.49 isnt supported any more or will be dropped soon. In the 2.5 series you can set multiple backups (up to 32)
2.5 really is much better
The blend1, blend2, etc files are just your previous saves that have been renamed slightly. So everytime to save, your previous file is renamed blend1 so it stays. The next time you save, it is renamed blend2, and the more recent save file is renamed blend1, etc. So you always have your last 3 saves available to you. You can change this number if you'd like as well, but I'd recommend you save iteratively in addition to Blender's default saving. Blender also saves periodic files to the temp directory (like max's autoback), as well as a quit.blend that is automatically saved any time you quit properly.
Can you have .blend2 etc. backup automatically to somewhere else?
Always wonder what .blend1 and 2 where...
Not as far as i know. They automatically save in the same directory as your main file. One work around is to use something like synctoy to copy the files over to another directory
Replies
Instructions below
Here is the bevel folder, with all the correct goodies
Just put the Mesh_Bevel folder in your addons folder and after enabling it, it will show up in the specials menu. (W)
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2057427/Polycount/Mesh_Bevel.zip
I think the BMesh developer is very dodgy IMO, he keeps citing 'health problems' and suggesting donations will make him all better... if he can't complete it surely he could let someone else finish it up... at least polish its current state and get it into the trunk.
By the way, how can I make Blender open fullscreened upon startup?
No problem
I think BMesh is being assessed by Campbell, so it should be usuable soon (hopefully
Unfortunately no
2.49 isnt being developed or supported any more either, so you may want to learn or customise the interface to your liking.
i call shenanigans !!
EDIT:
It's had a lot of drama, but appears to be inching forward.
At least there's another developer taking a look at it now, see the links on this page for more info.
Glad to hear it's moving on and will be a future hold in 2.6+ (I don't know what the drama is about and don't want to get involved, nor care, just wish the best for everyone.)
Given the level of experience of the coder involved I think he's done a pretty good job so far, especially considering he's been the only one working on the Bmesh branch for years.
Imagine working on some project for years only to be harshly criticized by much of the community you are trying to help. We're probably lucky Joe hasn't quit as no one else seems interested in actually coding Bmesh.
The only semi valid criticism of his work so far would be that he should have opened up to more communication and feedback from the community (not counting trolls).
I think what's way worse has been the way the Blender Foundation itself failed to prioritize Bmesh (no funding, no additional coders, etc...) for almost the entire time it's been in development. Admittedly though as an outsider looking in it might just be my impression of the situation rather than the truth of the matter.
Hopefully we'll see Bmesh integrated into Blender in the near future.
for years every time i suggest or ask about a feature im told it is on the way and am pointed to some very very unstable build.
since that seems to happen to most people it kinda makes you wounder how many people use blender to get work done vs mess about with it.
since when working i don't want to put up with having to get a new build every week that will crash in a new way doing basic stuff, i just want something that works, and is consistent, and has want i need to effectively and quickly get the job done.
and this is coming from someone who 4 or 5 years back used to build his own linux distro and applications from scratch from the svn repos, and prolly ran way too much bleeding edge stuff for his own good.
and the quad purist thing just seems stupid, yes quads are generally the best to model with, but ngons can save a lot of time and have no bad effects on flat surfaces, and allow you to use new techniques like chamfering a vertex to make a hole, which requires you to temporally have 4 ngons.
It seems like such a fundamental and important thing. nGons speed up workflow so much. The Quads only argument is a total load of shit, especially since blender make triangles so much.
I keep trying to go back to blender, but the modelling just feels outdated and awkward. its a shame because there is some epic stuff mixed in with the ancient crap.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1751508/BuzzBot/buzz-01.jpg
Just trying to bring some positive back to the thread. I realize if the Blender community were made of people like me, it's development wouldn't get anywhere since I prefer not to bitch and moan so much.
I think they realise this though. the films they've made seem to be an effort to guide blender by production needs rather than uservoice.
I think the thing that attracts me to Blender the most are those epic things you mentioned r_fletch_r.
To me Blender feels kind of like a programmer's sandbox where cool things and the people behind them are popping up all the time.
Its on the way.
http://farsthary.wordpress.com/2011/05/01/unlimitedclay-for-blender-alpha-2-patch-in-321/
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?219687-uninterested-about-unlimited-clay/page5&highlight=unlimited+clay
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/changelog_258a
I just wanted to post that Bsurfaces 1.5 has been released and its pretty outstanding. (it will be released as GLP within 5-9 months but is currently $39)
Its a modeling and retopo toolset that uses greasepaint and/or bezier curves to generate surfaces.
Its the commercial upgrade of the current Bsurfaces 0.9 that is in the Blender release, but its had some crazy improvements.
- Build surfaces, extrude and bridge selections using freehand strokes.
- Edit strokes as bezier splines.
- Keep the strokes after building the surface to modify and/or reuse them.
- Interactively modify in real-time all the settings available.
- Faster algorithms for surface building to make it work real-time and be controled interactively.
- Use bezier curves as input.
- Use straight strokes.
- Closed shapes.
- Transitions between closed and open shapes.
- Make surfaces cyclic, both along and/or across the strokes.
- Loops on strokes for simple surfaces, extrusions, bridges, surfaces from two connected selections, and closed shapes.
- Surfaces from crossing strokes.
- Optional automatic join of the crosshatched surfaces to the original mesh.
- Restrict the automatic joining of the crosshatched surfaces to the selected vertices.
- Stretch slider to control interactively how much the borders of the crosshatched surfaces can stretch to get joined to the original mesh.
- Control interactively the merge distance of the borders of sketched closed shapes and transitions from closed to open shapes.
- Designate the first point of a spline, both for open or closed splines. No need to make all strokes in the right direction on the first try, they can be changed at any time.
- Reorder strokes/splines using freehand strokes.
- Improved interpolation of loops in bridges where the proportions of the edges of the first selection are different from the proportions of the target selection.
- Improvements on detection of surfaces "along strokes" or "across strokes". Less precision needed from user, and detects well in more situations.
- Context detection, and alerts when the context is incorrect. For instance wrong types of selections, or there is only one stroke and no selection, etc.
- When tweaking options interactively there are available only the options that make sense depending on the context. For instance is not possible to make cyclic the extrusion of an open shape, this is automatically interpreted and the cyclic options are disabled.
- Automatically filling faces where there are only edges structures.
- Building surfaces from loose edges, which can be attached automatically to the original mesh.
I have been testing it out now for a few weeks and i have to say its super awesome and really fast.Check out the video
http://vimeo.com/26339130
Is anyone more interesed by the fact that its a commercial plugin. Some commercial support could really stimulate blender.
Successful implementations of this method have been The Ocean simulation port (which was completed, but im not sure when its getting into trunk) and Node based compositor redesign (which is ongoing and has raised $7.5k so far)
I must admit that both methods are great... Anything to get better tools
Also, its worth noting that all the open movies have been driven by the need for Blender development first and foremost, rather than just making a movie.
Blender has a long way to go to reach 'biped' status.
Free as in liberty. It doesn't always mean free as in beer.
http://www.opensource.org/licenses/gpl-3.0.html
I'm guessing it'll be made free but with commercial use restrictions or summat. I'll wait for the free release for the exact details... I think its a good system; charge for the plugin initially, then release it for free (cause it is for Blender after all) six months later. Would like to see more of this if it funds Blender development.
Im assuming that the intention is to have the new 1.5 version replace the 0.9 that currently ships with Blender, so if any other license were added to the script, it would no longer be compatible with Blenders license.
Part of the GPL licence guarantees that you are able to use the software in anyway that you see fit.
The BSurfaces GPL edition is a more immature version of the commercial script above and it comes with Blender
You can eatch videos on it HERE (the name of the script changed to BSurfaces at some point)
It only does everything
Edit, just got to the violin part, handy to watch and gives me ideas.
One question though, how is he managing his selections? In making the spiral for the head; he's pushing part of the spiral out, dropping some points, moving, dropping, etc. without going to a side view.
Always found this feature to be criminally under-documented though.
Seems like a very easy process.
Unfortunately, I dont have anything off hand. All the stuff i made was just retopo work or just having fun with the tool in general.
As for the selections, he is using the CTRL +Numpad +/-, which increases or decreases the selection.
http://itunes.apple.com/app/ratnband/id447849266?mt=8#
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?226064-Rat-n-Band-game-created-with-Blender
http://download.blender.org/release/Blender2.59rc/
Its got 132 bug fixes and a bunch of new features
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/changelog_259
http://www.blender.org/bf/sig2011-BOF.pdf (page 24)
Followed by:
Clearly it is a .blend file, does this mean the file has corrupted itself? if so, have i really just lost 12 hours of work? or can i get it back some how?
edit: nice
I would really recommend that you move over to the 2.5 series as iirc 2.49 isnt supported any more or will be dropped soon. In the 2.5 series you can set multiple backups (up to 32)
2.5 really is much better
WHHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA?
Can you have .blend2 etc. backup automatically to somewhere else?
Always wonder what .blend1 and 2 where...
Not as far as i know. They automatically save in the same directory as your main file. One work around is to use something like synctoy to copy the files over to another directory