13/10/2020
BLENDER WINDOWS ICON
BASIC OPERATION IN BLENDER
ADDING OR DELETING OBJECTS
Here we shall try to add some objects and delete them. Objects are some geometric figures like a Plane, Cube, Sphere, Cylinder, Cone etc.
To begin with, click (RMB) on the cube displayed in the middle of the 3D window. Once it is selected an orange coloured outline will appear around the Cube. Next hold down the Shift key and then press X key. A window will appear with "OK ?" and Delete Shift X. Click on the blue button to delete the Cube.
This is the standard procedure to delete any object. Select the object by clicking the RMB, once the object is selected, press Shift+X and click on the blue button.
To add an object to the 3D window, click within the 3D window. The 3D cursor will move to the point where you clicked(LMB). Try this out a few times. Next press Shift+A, you will see a list of objects like Plane,Cube, UVSphere, Cylinder etc appear. Click on any object name and the object will be added to the 3D window.
Try out this procedure for adding a few more objects in the 3D screen.
At any point of time, a list of all the objects in the 3D window will be shown in the Outliner window, which is at the top right corner of the display.
To select all the objects in the 3D window press "A " key. All the objects will have an orange outline around it. You may delete all the objects.
SELECTING OBJECTS.
To select a particular object, position the cursor on the object and click RMB. To select all objects hit "A" key. Two other ways to select objects are Box select and Circle Select. To use box select, keep the cursor in the 3D window, hit "B" key. Hold the LMB and draw a box to enclose the objects you want to select. To use Circle select, in a similar way, hit "C" key. A circle will appear. Re-size it by scrolling the MMB(Middle Mouse Button) to enclose the desired objects, then click LMB.
DIFFERENT VIEWS
One way of classing view type is the direction from which you view an object. Here we normally talk about Top view,Front view and (Right) side view.To change to different views, use the Number pad keys. Hit 7 for top view, number 1 for front view and number 3 for side view.
Another way of classifying view type is as Orthographic and Perspective view.In Orthographic view, all objects appear at the same scale,irrespective of distance or depth. A pair of railway line would appear as two parallel lines. In perspective view ,objects at a distance appear smaller. It adds depth to the view. In perspective, as in real life, the railway lines may look like they are getting smaller and closer as we see, more farther away. To change between the two views use number key 5. It toggles between the two views.
The current view type is displayed at the top left corner of the 3D window.
BASIC BLENDER VOCABULARY
OBJECT
Any 2D, 3D geometric figure is called as an object. As mentioned earlier, Plane, Cube,UVSphere ..... all these are objects. Here Camera, Light everything is an object. It is like a character in a play. You work on it to make it do what ever you want.
OBJECT AND EDIT MODE.
We normally work with both objects and meshes. Consider a Cube. If we want to move the Cube from point A to point B, we select it and drag it to where ever we want and leave it there. If you want to change the shape of the cube, either you want to change it into a rectangular cube, or you want to distort it into into an irregular shape, we will work in the Edit mode.
Object and Edit mode is displayed at the bottom of the 3D window as shown below.
To change between the the two modes , hit the Tab key. It toggles between the two modes.
CENTRE OF AN OBJECT
In Blender all objects have a geometric centre. Its location and angle of rotation is specified with reference to this centre and the 3D origin.
3D AXES IN BLENDER
In Blender we work on any object in object or edit mode with respect to the geometric origin (0,0,0) for locating an object. Its angle of rotation is with respect to the x,y,z axis. These three axis are shown in Red, Green and Blue colour respectively.The orientation of the x,y and z axis at any instant is shown at the bottom left corner of the 3D window.
GRAB, ROTATE AND SCALE (G, R,S - Keyboard shortcut)
To move an object from point A to B, first select it by clicking on it with RMB. Next hit "G" key to grab it. Move the mouse. The object will move in the direction of the mouse movement. Where ever you want to position the object click the LMB.
To rotate an object, select it by clicking RMB. Hit "R" key to rotate. Rotate the handle with double arrow heads by moving the mouse. The object will rotate. At the desired rotated angle, click the LMB.
To Scale an object, select it by clicking RMB. Hit "S" key to scale. Pull the handle with double arrow heads. The object will scale up or down to grow bigger or smaller. At the desired size, click the LMB.
To move,Rotate or Scale an object, it can be done to a specified distance,angle or size.First select the object and hit G to grab the object.
To move an object by 3 units along X axis - hit x then 3 and Enter key.
To move an object by 3 units along Z axis - hit z then 3 and Enter key.
To rotate an object 90 degrees,around x axis, hit R then X then 90 and then Enter key.
To rotate an object 120 degrees,around y axis ,hit R then Y then 120 and then Enter key.
To scale an object 2 units along x axis ,hit S then X then 2 and then Enter key.
To scale an object 3 units along z axis ,hit S then Z then 3 and then Enter key.
NOTE: In Blender, for any feature to be used, the cursor must be within the particular window. Let us say you want to move an object from point A to point B. Then the cursor should be first clicked within the 3D window.
NUMBER PANEL
When you are working with an object in 3D window, we can get access to the current position of the object with respect to the x,y,z axis. Further you can also access the object's angle of rotation with respect to the x,y,z axis, its scale and dimension in Blender units. To activate the Number panel, hit the N key.To close it, hit the N key again. It toggles between the display / hide mode for the Number panel.
BLENDER KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS AND MOUSE CLICKS
Blender has defined numerous key board shortcuts which would help us to speed up our work. We need to quickly learn and use such shortcuts regularly. A few of these shortcuts and mouse clicks are listed below.
- Object/Edit mode Tab key (Toggle)
- Add object Shift+A
- Select/Deselect all objects A (Toggle)
- Grab an object G
- Scale object S
- Rotate object R
- Number panel N (Toggle)
- Tool panel T (Toggle)
MOUSE CLICKS
Left mouse button clicked LMB
Right Mouse button clicked RMB
Middle mouse button clicked MMB
