Blender 2.8 development thread

A sculpted model with millions of faces would not have a polycount fitting easily into such column.
And it would not be efficient on a collapsed hierarchy.

Polycount is only relevant in the 3D View. I wish it was there as an row/column layout as in other 3D apps. And also it could be toggled with a checkbox to show/hide.

I think this is a biased feeling because it will take months to have all operators ported to this topbar.
3D Viewport was always announced as a main target of 2.8. It is legitimate that is first editor served.
It implies to add options to operators that had none in 2.79 because they were thought without this ability of a tool settings region next to their editor.
Original idea is to have dedicated workspaces. Topbar could have a different aspect in an Animation or Compositing workspace.

Usability and workflow is supposed to be the focal point. I’m sure they’ll figure it out—but I don’t know how Blender should update the topbar in a situation like this:

1 Like

Maybe the top bar relays on active tools.

And we will be able to hide the bottom bar, great.

I think I will hide every new UI’s features on 2.8 and edit my pie menus to work as much as possible in full screen.
With everything on the center of the screen to not have to go to the top right to activate a snap etc.

With 101 it should be possible to make a pro version and share it.

1 Like

I don’t remember the name of the addon, it makes the shortcut SHIFT+Q open a menu to do some stuff related and based on materials, could be good to add it as a default.

Maybe everybody will be happy at the end, if they make it flexible enough :slight_smile:

Yes, let’s hope.

After, maybe people will have really different blender versions and it will be difficult to follow tutorials.

2 Likes

“Material Utils”

1 Like

I hope the UI changes will turn out better than the forum ones.

They are suppose to use the B2.8 for production now so they can put the changes to the test.

If a merge of edit mode and UVFace mode happened , years ago ; it was because selection of elements can be synchronized and is done with same tools.
@pitiwazou is right. Topbar displays something related to active tool.
But active tool depends of active mode and active object. It probably should be extended to active editor for operators related to animation actions and keyframes.

There is a toolbar in 3DView. But there is also one in UVeditor.
It should be consistent and work the same way with an active tool tab.
So, if you select an unwrap operator or UVsculpt , you should see UV operator, UVSculpt brushes when priority is given to UVEditor and 3DView operator only when priority is given to 3DView.
The way priority should be given has to be defined as a workspace property.

If they fix the need to activate an area with a click, the top bar could update when hover on another area.

Almost every addon uses Q as a shortcut because it is the only available shortcut in Blender. One of the problems of the current Keymap is that there are too few free shortcuts available for addons.

In the proposal is explained why that will not be that way anymore, you can have any number of layers/collections in 2.8.
I do not know if someone mentioned it, but currently “M” key has returned to functionality and you can move elements to desired collection through a Menu. I suppose that what numbers keys did in 2.79, could also be implemented with another shorcut that calls a menu similar to what M key.
Currently Collections names are following a numbering pattern that I like, Collection 1, Collection 2 … Collection n. If you create collections within “n” collection, then Collection n.1, Collection n.2 … Collection n.m. And so on.
But I still think that numbering/ordering should be fixed in Outliner stack (incremental from top to bottom) and not be dependent on names, because supposedly you will not keep Collection n.m name, but you will call them “Lights”, “Temporary objects” " Trash" or with any other name useful for you. So ordering/numbering could be shown to the left of outliner with small numbers in row of each collection. Maybe that column showing numbering could be hidden in case some user finds it annoying.
So one of the benefits of this that I propose is that you will always have a numbering/ordering in collections independent of the name you choose for them. Also If you drag collections up/down to change position, the order/numbering still corresponds to the ordering in stack of outliner, and does not depend on the name of the collection.
(sorry for my not good writing in English)

I think there are workflows where the editors will fight for the topbar and potentially get confusing. This one for instance:

10 Likes

Oh I just meant the menu is useful, it can be another shortcut, but having these options is important I think.

Collections is a global replacement of grouping by groups or layers.
And basically, view layers are defining what collections are displayed.
You choose to hide a collection for all view layers or to hide it only for one.

But basically, if you work only on one layer, disabling/enabling visibility in outliner with eye icons is similar to pressing little layers buttons in header of 2.79.
We could imagine Hide operators as numerous as Select operator to hide collections by naming pattern, by shared object. Or we could imagine a visibility switch between selected/unselected collections in outliner.

I am sure that somebody will find a smart way to speedup the process.

Currently, this situation is impossible in 2.79. Both modes are synchronized, active brush is the same in 2 toolbars.

If there is a workspace property to define which editor has topbar priority, I think that could work in 2.8.
And maybe, there could be an option to synchronize similar modes from different editors to obtain behaviour like it is the case in 2.79.
Here, topbar would not represent a lack of space. One area for same brush used in both editors.

Work on workspace has to be done. We could continue to speculate about workflows for multiple editors workspace. But reality is that currently, only UI stuff about one maximized area + Topbar + Outliner +Properties has been made and put in place.
They tried to have something working on default General Workspace.
Spring will force them to have something working for Animation Workspace etc…

We should be patient. They naturally will address these problems.

1 Like

I thought the idea of this release was to ‘bring back the tools to the viewport’ (Ton’s own words) so why are we getting new bar over new bar over new bar ? Statistics ? Show them in the viewport ! Tool settings ? In the viewport !

5 Likes

Thank you for exploring these - I have been curious but haven’t had time to dig into the paint and sculpt tools again yet since back when they reintroduced the procedural textures for brushes.

1 Like