Grid Snapping Not Working

Support Basics & Interface
1

I’ve set up a grid, and have checked Absolute Grid Snap.

Several problems arise:

  1. The grid is only visible as the floor. This is no help for objects not on the floor, let alone on different axis. Is there a way to show the grid relative to the selected items?

  2. If I go into an orthogonal view (such as Front) the grid is now visible, but now snapping occurs at increments based on zoom level, and not what I’ve set the grid overlay at.

  3. If multiple vertices are selected, and I try to move them, they do snap, but not to the grid. I don’t know what they are snapping to, but it’s not the grid. This is true even if the center of the selection mathematically happens to land on a grid point.

  4. In cases where the center of the selection is NOT on a grid point, how can I move the selected items so that the vertices still snap to grid points? Some programs let you use a selected point as a reference for this purpose. How do you do this in blender? I’ve tried the 3D cursor, but it doesn’t snap to vertices either.

Just to be clear, I’m talking about snap during transform. And have enabled Snap to Increment and Vertex. (I also wish there was a way to make the overlay a little easier to distinguish between 1x and 10x lines when zoomed in close.)

95% of the modeling I’m going to be doing is going to involve vertices on grid points. Is Blender the wrong tool?

2

1.No.

2.Exact. That is something that users are requesting since 2.80. But it is not a priority for developers.

3.That is logical. Making each vert snap to grid would denature shape of selection. Snapping is only valid for pivot of selection. It is center because default pivot point is Median point.
But it could be Active Element if you choose it as Pivot Point.
4.You can use shift S menu > Selection to Grid to snap multiple vertices to grid, at once.

There is only one color in Theme relative to Grid. Subdivision lines are not customizable.

3

Just out of curiosity, what’s the use case for snapping to a grid that is not the grid you’ve defined?

Making each vert snap to grid would denature shape of selection.

It would what now? You mean change the shape of the geometry? If each vert is already on a grid point, no it wouldn’t. But still, that’s not what I said. I get that snapping in reference to the center is a logical default regardless if it starts on a grid point. But in this case, the center does happen to start on a grid point. So I don’t know how it’s deciding to snap somewhere else.

Ok, so the default Transform Pivot Point was not Median. It was Individual Origins. That’s the one that is behaving weird. I say weird, because the center of every selected face, edge, and vertex is on a grid point. Given that, it’s not clear how unchanged origins could be anything other than also on a grid point - I mean, I don’t think it’s mathematically possible to be otherwise.

I tried the other settings and they seemed to work. Well except for 3D Cursor.

Median Point, Active Element, and Bounding Box all behave as expected. Active Element is very close to being the most useful behavior, because the active element can be a vertex. It’s a little cumbersome because you have to select everything you want to move, then unselect and reselect the vert for it to be the active element.

3D Cursor doesn’t seem to center the snap in this way - it looks like it’s behaving as Median no matter where the cursor is. (But I can’t get the cursor to reliably be at a vertex anyway. Sometimes it will snap to a vert after dragging it around for a while and trying various combinations of modifier keys, but usually not. Sometimes it just disappears while dragging, too. )

You can use shift S menu > Selection to Grid to snap multiple vertices to grid, at once.

Shift+S is the shortcut for for Object/Mesh > Snap (In case anyone else comes across this) It’ll have some utility in special cases. But completely impractical as a primary workflow of moving groups of verts around. (Can you imagine having to Shift+S+6 after every single move??)

4

Sorry, I was confused by changes to units system along the years.
I thought that forced subdivisions of grid was something new, due to performance improvements of viewport. But it seems to be older.

In fact, you can change Scale value of Grid in Overlays popover.
What is stupid to me is that you can’t get rid of subdivisions of basic unit if you are using a unit system.
But I forgot that you can get rid of subdivisions by changing Unit System to None in Scene Properties.
That is not a problem for user of Metric system. By default arbitrary blender unit is equal to 1 Meter.
That is more annoying for users, thinking in imperial units.

It is impossible to make a shape with a round corner with all vertices on a grid that does not have small units.
That is more common to at least have one round corner than only shapes that are matching a grid.

Center of points separated by 3 units is supposed to be at 1.5 unit. Any mesh with an odd dimension does not have its center on the grid.
That is also the reason why Absolute Grid is not enabled by default. Default is increment.

Indeed. It is only an individual origin per island of a selection.
https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/latest/editors/3dview/controls/pivot_point/individual_origins.html

No. That is why. I use it just to set vertices at start and then, I use Active Element pivot point.

5

Sure, but I was talking about a situation where the center is on a grid point, (as well as all the other vertices) No dimensions were odd.

It is impossible to make a shape with a round corner with all vertices on a grid that does not have small units.
That is more common to at least have one round corner than only shapes that are matching a grid.

It might be more common, but I didn’t have any round corners. If I did, I wouldn’t be able to say each vertex was already on a grid point.

At any rate, Active Element seems to be the way to go despite that you need to click 2 or 3 times to get it on a relevant vertex.

6

That is possible to change shortcuts to select directly Active Element.

Corresponding operator is view3d.select operator with only Extend option enabled.

There are a lot of variants of this operator using different options used in all modes under 3D View (Global) keymap.
A part of those shortcuts are overridden in Edit mode by shortcuts present in Mesh keymap.

You have to find a shortcut that is not already used to make selection of active element in one click.
Or that implies to disable an already existing shortcut.