Forgive me if this has been answered before, all the keywords to search for this topic are a bit too generic for google.
Is there a way to make custom meshes addable in the shift+a dialogue? I am forever making six sided circles and extruding them to make small nuts for details and it’s a pain. I’d like to make a mesh and have it set to the shift+a. Preferably without having to write an addon just for one mesh, since I don’t know any python. Perhaps there is a way to quick-append meshes?
There’s a nuts and bolts plugin that may help you here (haven’t used it m’self) - Open User Preferences from the File Menu, select the Add-Ons tab, click on “All” and search for “bolt”.
A more general solution is to make one part and then duplicate it in object mode with Shift+D.
You’d think that would be exactly what I’m looking for but I’m after lowpoly nuts. Simply a 6 vert cylinder closed at one end. Shift+D is an alternative but when the bolts are rotated at odd angles and such alignment can be a bitch. It seems like a pretty standard idea that should be available. Perhaps there is a plugin somewhere that allows you to set custom meshes to quick-add. It would be a big help in a lot of different situations.
I just fooled around with the Snap tool, and found that the straight magnet icon (appears next to horseshoe magnet when you turn Snap on) tells the object’s rotation to align with the snapping target. So…use ‘face’ as your snap element and ‘Active’ (…?) as the snap mode, and you can make your object roam all over a mesh, rotating to match each face’s normals.
Note: The rotation alignment won’t work if you’re in Edit Mode.
Also, you can raise or lower the object once it’s there by grabbing it and pressing the appropriate axis key twice to get to local orientation.