Thanks @Wazou@Stromberg90 for the awesome work. I've tweaked the script a little to allow it to be called by itself. I also adjusted the hotkeys a little to my personal preference which is shift merges at center and ctrl merges at last. Alt at this time does nothing. Download 'Connect-Merge Tool' Here.
Thanks for extending it, @Waz0@Jakro feel free to send me your names or add them to the author section of the script, so I can upload the new version to github
What do you mean by, "I've tweaked the script a little to allow it to be called by itself." it sounds interesting
@Stromberg90 I basically just merged the newest version that Wazou made with your original version that is called via the spacebar menu. I didn't really code anything just made sure the latest version worked on it's own without the RMB pie menu. I knew that a few people including @Michael Knubben, wanted the tool on its own No need to add me to the author section I really didn't add anything aha, just made sure there was a version available for those people that wanted to call the tool in a custom pie or hotkey
Your code is quite interesting, I tested to make a retopo modal and it's in fact possible It's just a test but I can with shift, ctrl, alt, etc make some operations and even call other modals like the loopcut. The possibility to comeback in the modal allow us to make differents operations whithout having to enter or exit operators or modals.
There is an example.
On this example, I can extrude faces, move components, call the F2 addon, delete faces and add loopcuts. This is funny ^^
@wazou Cool In your gif after the loop cut do you have to press a hotkey to get back into it, or does it return control back to the script? Cause I've been trying to be to switch between loopcut and the knife tool without leaving the modal script, but with no succsess
"I tested to make a retopo modal" "even call other modals"
What do you guys mean by "a modal" ? I see this term mentioned quite often in Blender discussions but I don't understand its meaning. I understand "mode" (edit mode, pose mode ...) But what does "a modal" mean ?
the knife tool is a modal, you are in the tool until you exit it. In the modal you can make several operations. If you look at speedflow, it's modals, the addon allows you to make a lot of operations in it.
Example with the Array modal
You can add other directions, remove them, edit them etc, all of this in the modal. No need to go in the properties to add modifiers etc. Modals are extremely powerfull
Heya - I've seen these big text UI widgets in some recent plugins indeed. I suppose that under the hood they function similarly to the way one can perform "screen.redo_last" to edit the properties of, say, GridFill, or the parameters of a primitive directly after the fact.
I still don't understand the term "modal" itself though, since it is usually an adjective and not a noun. Or is that a recent made up term that add-on creators came up with, and something got lost in translation ?
Yeah, I guess my problem is that the knife tool is modal, since I want it to exit when I press ctrl and start the loop cut tool then exit that when I let go of ctrl and so on
Like I said, the base of the modal must be different to be abble to use other keys instead of only shift, ctrl alt and oskey. I will ask to jeremy, the guy who work with me on speedflow and asset management, he is much better than me.
Modals are not new, the simple bevel is a modal since you can make changes in the tool befor applying it. Modal is the name in the API, you can try the modals template in the text editor.
Haaaaaaaa - so you actually mean "a modal operator" ! Well that makes much more sense.
I think you used Maya before, right? We have "Contexts" there that work in a similar way. Might be easiest to think of it as a "mode" you are currently in, and I think it's more abstract than just an operator in Blender.
Oh I totally understand the mechanics - my confusion came from the odd shorthand of omitting "operator". Technical topics are only made more complicated when the terms used to describe them are not quite proper english
Does anyone know if there is a way to turn on backface/hidden polies/edges/verts selection without turning off "Limit Selection to visible"? I'd like to be able to select everything under my selection box without have to turn on x-ray vision . I haven't been able to find a good solution for this and it's a bit annoying
Hello guys. Just a quick question. Do you know how to align a selected UV edge along X or Y while also aligning the entire UV island with it? It's similar to the Align to Edge tool in 3ds Max UV Editor.
Good Idea. I'm gonna repeat this action to dozens of UV islands. The best way for me to do it is to create a script that aligns the selected UV vertices, pin the UVs, select the island, do an unwrap, and then unpin the UVs.
You can also use the proprtionnal editing with constant falloff to rotate the unselected island with the edge but it won't be as precise as the pin technic.
Wowowowow.... Blender has eventually got a manipulator 0.0 ?!?!?
ookkeeeyyyyy..
Checking out 2.78 now and this is a totally not what I was using back in 2014/2015 ?!
@rollin Blender definitely had a manipulator in 2014, and as far as I'm aware exactly the same ones as they have now. Blender 2.8 will have redesigned manipulators, though. What is true is that Blender's come a long way.
@TheGabmeister I've actually got a script that does the UV island alignment, I'll upload it here because I can't immediately find it online, but check if it isn't just included with the 2.78 install first. (Remove .txt from the end and drop it in AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\addons)
edit: @Peris Box selection might have an option for select through, but if not I'm fairly sure you could set it up so that your hotkey toggles it momentarily. I'd use Pie Menu Editor for that, if you've got that, but then again: You can actually write code so it might be easier to handle it that way
So I'm using the maya navigation in blender, which means I can't navigate the view when using modal operators. does anyone know a workaround for that, or would I have to switch back default navigation?
@rollin Blender definitely had a manipulator in 2014, and as far as I'm aware exactly the same ones as they have now. Blender 2.8 will have redesigned manipulators, though. What is true is that Blender's come a long way.
Might be true but I was certainly not aware of it. 2.8 Manipulators are even nicer and makes me believe they are finally listening to all the usability rants.
@pior Thanks, it's a good video Unfortantly it doesn't help me in this case. the "issue" is in the code for the modal operators, for example using the knife tool left click puts down a new cut, and it doesn't check if alt is held down before doing that.
Ha ! For that you can use scrollwheel-based camera rotation. There is a handful of modifier key combinations one can use to rotate and tilt the camera that way, it's pretty handy in these cases. I use it occasionally for grease pencil.
what are you guys using for pie menus or quad menus like in max? i found the pie menu editor, is it any good or should i just dig into python to edit my own?
and is there a way to have a more classic gizmo handle to work with?
also if i set the RMB select to LMB why on earth is the lasso select on RMB now?
@Neox Pie Menu Editor is fantastic, and the support (in his thread over at blenderartists.org) is always great. It's really made customising Blender a much more enjoyable process for me.
also if i set the RMB select to LMB why on earth is the lasso select on RMB now?
You can change that if you go to File -> User Preferences (Ctrl Alt U) -> Input, search for "lasso" and scroll down to find the "3D View" category in the search results. Open the two Lasso Select entries. Change the type of action from the "Action" value to either "Left" or "Select" (both seem to do the same), letting you lasso by holding Ctrl and left-clicking (and using Ctrl+Shift left-click to lasso-exclude).
Box selection might have an option for select through, but if not I'm fairly sure you could set it up so that your hotkey toggles it momentarily. I'd use Pie Menu Editor for that, if you've got that, but then again: You can actually write code so it might be easier to handle it that way
I can't find any options for it unfortunately . I haven't gotten into the scripting part of blender yet, still setting it up "out of the box" as much as possible. Can't wait to unleash that python power though
I've been toying with deforming geo through modifier stacks.The end result looks very convincing and the process is completely non-destructive due to it's procedural nature Here's how I'm using the technique
I've been toying with deforming geo through modifier stacks.The end result looks very convincing and the process is completely non-destructive due to it's procedural nature Here's how I'm using the technique
That's awesome, I can think of many great uses for this workflow!
I've been toying with deforming geo through modifier stacks.The end result looks very convincing and the process is completely non-destructive due to it's procedural nature Here's how I'm using the technique
I used a very similar method before, but without the data transfer modifier and had a bit of seams. Your solution looks perfect, are you transfering normals?
Hey guys, I haven't dared to test Blender 2.8 from the "Bleeding Edge" daily builds, because of the unstableness, but I'm wondering is Eevee engine's viewport rendering good for previewing the transparency of haircards when adjusting them?
Because normally the alpha is quite buggy in Blender's original Blender Render engine. And Cycles is just too slow, noisy and it's a hazzle to set up things with nodes for quick hair editing.
I couldn't get sorting to work on the viewport with "Material" viewport shading, but "Rendered" works, but that's not what I want. Too slow to get samples going up to get rid of noise, even with GPU rendering enabled. Even though that's okay-ish for previewing.
I got a nasty coloured (white by default, but I can change the color in the Transparent BSDF node) border on the transitions between opaque and transparent areas. Especially visible when meshes are top on each other (sorting). Tried different blend modes. Some of them had even harsher borders and some slightly less visible, but not bearable enough.
So, what's your trick here in the material settings/nodes?
Replies
I added it in me rmb pie menu, 2.1.0.
What do you mean by, "I've tweaked the script a little to allow it to be called by itself." it sounds interesting
It's just a test but I can with shift, ctrl, alt, etc make some operations and even call other modals like the loopcut.
The possibility to comeback in the modal allow us to make differents operations whithout having to enter or exit operators or modals.
There is an example.
On this example, I can extrude faces, move components, call the F2 addon, delete faces and add loopcuts.
This is funny ^^
In your gif after the loop cut do you have to press a hotkey to get back into it, or does it return control back to the script?
Cause I've been trying to be to switch between loopcut and the knife tool without leaving the modal script, but with no succsess
It's the beauty of your code
I think the code must be different to make it possible. Right now it's working, but it's not perfect, we cannot deselect components.
Haven't tryed more than that, but the possibilities are really great.
"even call other modals"
What do you guys mean by "a modal" ? I see this term mentioned quite often in Blender discussions but I don't understand its meaning. I understand "mode" (edit mode, pose mode ...) But what does "a modal" mean ?
I'm probably doing something wrong atm, I'll keep looking into it.
In the modal you can make several operations.
If you look at speedflow, it's modals, the addon allows you to make a lot of operations in it.
Example with the Array modal
You can add other directions, remove them, edit them etc, all of this in the modal.
No need to go in the properties to add modifiers etc.
Modals are extremely powerfull
I still don't understand the term "modal" itself though, since it is usually an adjective and not a noun. Or is that a recent made up term that add-on creators came up with, and something got lost in translation ?
I will ask to jeremy, the guy who work with me on speedflow and asset management, he is much better than me.
Modal is the name in the API, you can try the modals template in the text editor.
ookkeeeyyyyy..
Checking out 2.78 now and this is a totally not what I was using back in 2014/2015 ?!
Blender definitely had a manipulator in 2014, and as far as I'm aware exactly the same ones as they have now. Blender 2.8 will have redesigned manipulators, though.
What is true is that Blender's come a long way.
@TheGabmeister
I've actually got a script that does the UV island alignment, I'll upload it here because I can't immediately find it online, but check if it isn't just included with the 2.78 install first. (Remove .txt from the end and drop it in AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\addons)
edit: @Peris
Box selection might have an option for select through, but if not I'm fairly sure you could set it up so that your hotkey toggles it momentarily. I'd use Pie Menu Editor for that, if you've got that, but then again: You can actually write code so it might be easier to handle it that way
does anyone know a workaround for that, or would I have to switch back default navigation?
the "issue" is in the code for the modal operators, for example using the knife tool left click puts down a new cut, and it doesn't check if alt is held down before doing that.
and is there a way to have a more classic gizmo handle to work with?
also if i set the RMB select to LMB why on earth is the lasso select on RMB now?
Pie Menu Editor is fantastic, and the support (in his thread over at blenderartists.org) is always great. It's really made customising Blender a much more enjoyable process for me.
About the gizmo, blender 2.8 is getting more traditional ones with plane handles, I'm excited for it
Change the type of action from the "Action" value to either "Left" or "Select" (both seem to do the same), letting you lasso by holding Ctrl and left-clicking (and using Ctrl+Shift left-click to lasso-exclude).
i started using blender a while ago and starting to like it a lot!
i recently made a character with large amounts of hard edge modelling, so i made some non-destructive macros to speed things up a bit.
it doesn't work flawlessly or perfect in any way, but at least you don't have to fiddle around with support loops which saved a lot of time for me.
Here's how I'm using the technique
Because normally the alpha is quite buggy in Blender's original Blender Render engine. And Cycles is just too slow, noisy and it's a hazzle to set up things with nodes for quick hair editing.
I got a nasty coloured (white by default, but I can change the color in the Transparent BSDF node) border on the transitions between opaque and transparent areas. Especially visible when meshes are top on each other (sorting). Tried different blend modes. Some of them had even harsher borders and some slightly less visible, but not bearable enough.
So, what's your trick here in the material settings/nodes?