Custom Shapes for Boxcutter - Free Addon

This Addon is work in progress (but already working) and available for free. At the moment there are a few custom shapes for Boxcutter but the addon works already.

Download:

Installation:
Download the .zip file on github: https://github.com/NewMediaSupply/NMS_BCs
Install as any other addon in Blender

How to use the addon:
Enable Boxcutter wilt Alt+W. In Boxcutter choose custom shape and best is to snap to center of face, and draw origin at center. Switch over to NMS_BCs in the N-Panel and select a shape (custom shape). Select your object you want to cut and drag the mouscursor while pressing Ctrl.

How to contribute
The idea is that other addon-developers can contribute and the addon will stay free. Though, others can build libraries of shapes and give them away or sell them.
It’s my first time I have a project like this on Github, but I understand developers can fork (clone) the repository, adjust it, and do a pull request.

Roadmap
The idea is to create categories like O, T, U, L shapes for example. The addon should be very simple with the focus on; it’s a library of custom shapes.

ToDo

  • More assets
  • Categories (OTULS shapes).
  • Keep focus on selected object that’s going to cut
  • Delete appended object once Boxcutter has it.
  • Clear Orphans if that’s a good idea.
  • etc

Why I started this project?
Initially I thought I develop a paid addon, but the idea to share it as free addon looks more exciting. I think everyone will benefit from this:

  • Users of boxcutter will have a library always at hand for free. (If they want they can also buy libraries).
  • Even more interest in Boxcutter, so the developers of Boxcutter will benefit a bit.
  • One can build assets and give them away of sell them

So the idea is: Addon is always free. Assets could be free, but could also be a paid library.
Everyone happy with it? If not, let me know.

Regards,
Robert, (Peetie)

12 Likes

Great job! Although first bug: if it’s the first cutter in the scene, addon just put geometry nearby and not shoving it up to Cutters collection. And after pressing ALT+Z Blender crashes. Well, at least on my 2.90.1.

Oh, and apparently it’s unselecting cutting object and makes cutter active, which is not the intended behavior, I presume.

Hi, thanks for reporting. So far I didn’t have the issue you describe, but I’ll double check other Blender versions. Here some notes:

Yes, that’s right. The plan is to delete the appended object once Boxcutter has it. It’s fairly easy to code, so that could be arranged. (later this week). See also the ToDo: * Delete appended object once Boxcutter has it.

In case you still can’t get it to work, what Blender version are you using, and do you have the latest version of Boxcutter?
Regards to Ctrl+Z I thought that’s quite a common issue, not? Well, at least a month or two ago, and suggested was to use the legacy undo. Missed some news about that.

That’s what I can’t reproduce. Did you select custom shape in Boxcutter first? It’s should be filled in like here:

Shape

Yes that’s a work in progress as well, also a small thing which is quite easy to fix. That’s why I wrote in the roadmap: * Keep focus on selected object that’s (going to cut) will have a cut. Going to be cut, oh my, English is hard, hope you understand what I mean.

1 Like

Oh, I see. That’s, good to know!

No, yeah, BoxCutter picking it up, it’s just that scene is getting littered with cutters:

But looks like it’s a non-issue if getting rid of them is in roadmap already.

1 Like

Just gave it a try and had to say thank you it worked perfectly.
Look forward to your feature list getting added.
All the best!

1 Like

Absolutely love this idea - thanks! Looking forward to more shapes

Masterxeon (a developer of Boxcutter, if I say that correct), provided some shapes. If I have time tomorrow I will include them, together with the optimizations planned. Not sure though, because there are loads of other things I work on. (to much).

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Hi great idea :slight_smile: can we add and create our own shapes and save them ??

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Yes it’s an idea, and had that in mind as well. But that requires quite some experience in writing code. I can code a bit, but it takes a long time. I was hoping that some developers make a clone and do some pull request, but so far there is no activity.

1 Like