Question about parenting/grouping/ungrouping

Hello everyone. It’s great to be here. I’ve started using Blender yesterday and I’m really enjoying it - total beginner here. Although Blender is intuitive and simplistic (in a good way), I have a question.

What’s the difference between grouping objects (selecting them with right click and then hitting Ctrl+J) and parenting (selecting them and hitting Ctrl+P)? Parenting basically makes the last object selected a parent and if you modify it, you modify kids, but if you modify kids, you don’t touch other kids nor parent, right?

Which one would you consider to be better to use?

Also, I’ve encountered problem yesterday - I’ve grouped two objects using Ctrl+J, but I couldn’t find a way to ungroup them!

Could you also tell me how to ungroup both ‘group’ and ‘parents-children’ group elements?

Thank you!

For now, here’s a cup with no coffee for you all. It might seem as a usual cup, but actually it’s a big leap for my new favorite hobby :wink:


I’ve grouped two objects using Ctrl+J, but I couldn’t find a way to ungroup them!
Ctrl+J doesn’t group objects it joins the obejcts into a single mesh. When you do group (Ctrl+G) or parent obejsts (Ctrl+P) each objects stays it’s own object.
Grouping & Parenting http://www.blender.org/manual/modeling/objects/groups_and_parenting.html?highlight=parent
Join https://www.blender.org/manual/modeling/objects/editing.html#join

To unparent objects use Alt+P on the children
For joined objects select all the vertices and press P / Separate by loose parts or select the faces you want to separate and press P / separate selection

Oh, thank you Richard, you’ve made me very happy! Knowledge is power! On to exercising! :slight_smile: