from Lightwave to Blender ?

Support Basics & Interface
#1

Hi all,

I just decided to move from Lightwave to Blender with the aim of using mainly free softwares. I need some advices/answers to set up Blender :

  1. I don’t really understand the interest of having 2 modes (“Object Mode” & “Edit Mode”). For example, in Lightwave, there isn’t any “Object Mode” because working on the whole object can be done simply by selecting nothing or by selecting every polygones or vertexes (It replaces the Object Mode). Furthermore, it would be better to have 2 modes for selecting vertexes OR polygones… Lastly, there are layers in Blender as in Lightwave, so you can place 1 object per layer for a better organisation.
    Is there a way to set up Blender like i explained above ? If not, could you give me another opinion about the usefulness of those 2 modes ?

  2. What is Ctrl+A (Apply scale & rotation) for ?

Sorry for my bad english…
Thank you very much.

Best regards,

tyblender

#2

The M key changes selected objects layer, up to 20 different layers can be chosen from.
There is a button panel in object mode were you can select the layer you want to see, hold shift key when selecting multiple layers.

#3

In Object mode you add an Object to the Scene; In Edit mode you link the selected Primitive to the Geometry of the Object you are Editing.

In Object mode you Translate or Manipulate the Object; in edit mode you Edit the geometry linked to that object (verts/edges/faces for Meshes, CV’s (control Vertices) for Curves etc).

In Edit mode Ctrl-Tab pops up a menu that allows you to select which Element you want to use for editing.

One useful concept for the two states is that IPO (interpolation) curves can be assigned to the Object in Object mode for animation, and in Edit mode to the Geometry (Shape Keys or RVK’s [Relative Vertex Keys) to morph a shape without changing the Location of the Object proper.

Ctrl-A resets Scale and Rotation settings back to 0.0.0 after the Object has been manipulated (see results in the Transform Properties tab by pressing N)

Armatures (attatched to objects as Modifiers that behave like skeletons) have three modes; Object mode whith which you can move the armature from one point to another, Pose mode with which you can move and pose individual bones to wave arms and bend knees etc and Edit mode with which you set the positions of the bones relative to one another, their lengths, Roll-Angles and connections.

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