RJ Wattenhofer

Tech writing, 3D model building and game design.

March 19, 2024

Blender Snippets | The Most Useful Commands (Notebook)

A tutorial demonstrating Blender commands needed for 3D modeling

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General Blender Commands


Add Armature

Shift + A  > Armature > (var A*)
* --- Single Bone
   --- Human (Meta-Rig)
   --- Pitchipoy Human (Meta-Rig)

blender commands 01

Apply Transformation

Ctrl + A  > (var A*)
* --- Location
   --- Rotation
   --- Scale
   --- Rotation & Scale

blender commands 02

Parent Mesh to Armature

01 Right click mesh object, hold down Shift and then right click the armature.

02 Ctrl + P  > (var A*)
* --- With Automatic Weights
   --- Bone

blender commands 03

Parent Mesh to Specific Armature Bone

This is used to parent additional meshes to an armature after the primary mesh has already been parented. EX: Soldier mesh has been parented to Meta-Rig and now you would like to parent rifle to wrist bone.

01 Right click the armature and then switch to 'Edit Mode'. Right click the target bone.

02 Change to 'Object Mode', right click the new mesh, hold down Shift and then right click the armature on any bone.

03 Ctrl + P > Bone

blender commands 04

Clear Parenting

Click object you would like to clear and then:

Alt + P  > Clear Parent

blender commands 05

Select Large Area

Click B and then left click in the upper left-hand area of the Blender viewport & drag SouthEast.

blender commands 06 blender commands 07

When the desired area is covered release the mouse button. Editable area on the mesh will turn orange.

blender commands 08

Select/Unselect All

Toggle A  to select and unselect all faces of a mesh while in Edit Mode.


Join Two or More Meshes

01 Right click first mesh object, hold down the Shift key and then right click the second mesh object.

02 Ctrl + J

Unlike parented objects, joined meshes cannot be unjoined.



Add material to model (texture)

RE: blender.org

Click on header menu drop down and change 'Blender Render' to 'Cycles Render'.

blender add material 01

Click on Material tab (right column), click [Add a new material slot] and then click 'New' [Add a new material].

blender add material 02

Rename the material [Material datablock] and click 'Color'.

blender add material 03

Click 'Image Texture'.

blender add material 04

Click 'Open' and proceed to upload your texture. Textures are typically in .tga format for games.

blender add material 05

Switch to 'Edit mode' (button located beneath viewport) and then click the button directly to the right of that to change to 'Texture' [Viewport Shading]

blender add material 06

Toggle the 'A' key to make sure all faces of your mesh are selected - everything should be highlighted orange. Then click the 'Assign' button (back in the right column).

blender add material 07

Click 'Mesh' and a menu will appear. Hover over 'UV Unwrap...' and then click 'Unwrap' when the submenu pops up.

blender add material 09

It is possible your texture will look correct at this point (EX: applying a square texture to a perfect square model). If it is not aligned correctly then click the button next to the word 'Default' (header menu) and then select 'Compositing' from the drop down.

blender add material 10

Click the image icon on the bottom menu and import your texture. Use the tools on the left: (Translate (move), Rotate, Scale and Shear to manipulate the orange square until your image is perfect.

You can view your changes to the mesh surface by clicking on 'Texture' [Viewport Shading] in the window to the right.

blender add material 11

Change Object Origin

This will change the rotation/pivot point.

Right click the object, click the Space bar and then type in 'set origin'.

Choose the desired option (1-4) from the dropdown menu.

blender set origin

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