So I am new to Blender and I need help with how to install a texture. Basically I downloaded a glass texture from a site called Blender Materials. The file came as a .blend file type, but I am not sure how to open this material in blender. I know how to open the materials properties menu and I can create a new material but don’t see where I can select the file I downloaded, so I can use it in my project. The closest option I see is to use an image texture but that only allows me to open JPEG files. I tried looking for some tutorials online, but I am still confused on what I am supposed to do.
Not sure what you mean. If I go to file > Append then it opens the file viewer and I can navigate to the file however when I select the file and click append it just treats the file like a folder and opens it up in the viewer like there is something else inside the file I need to click on, but no files show up. If I click append from there I can an error that shows the file path and says nothing indicated.
You have to append the material into the file you want to use it in. You do not append the whole blend file just different components.
For example from the default file.
Go to file menu and select append.
Navigate to the file that contains the material.
Click on that file and yes, you will see that it contains several folders.
A blend file contains different sub solders for Objects, materials, armatures, etc You can append all these things seperatly.
One of those folders is called materials open it.
You will now see a list of the materials which you can append, choose one (you have to know it’s name, in your case probably “glass”) select it and then press the append button.
Now select the default cube and go to the material properties tab, delete the default material.
Click the browse material icon (round thing) and you will find the material you appended in the drop-down list, you can now assign it to your cube by selecting it.
I’m probably doing something wrong, but this is what I see when click on the file from within the append menu. I don’t see any other folders to click on.
Hmm, I am not sure why you should see the blend file’s sub folders. It looks like an empty file maybe it did not download properly.
Try to do the same with any other file you have, you should see a list of folders like this:
Edit: I see that you have clicked in the recent menu on a folder called “grass.blend”. In the recent menu of append only folders show up. The individual files should show in the striped dialogue window.
I would say you have an empty folder called “grass.blend” instead of an actual blend file.
So I tried downloading 2 other materials from that site and get the same thing. As you can see below I didn’t click on anything else this time. I guess I can go with the other method and use image files to apply a texture, but I really liked the glass material on the site I was using.
Anyways Just want to make sure I say thanks, and that I appreciate the help.
One thing you can check is that you have not used any “advanced filters” in the append dialog, underneath the “recent” locations (scroll down the sidebar) there are advanced filters (they should be all blue by default) if they are grey that will hide the folders inside the blend file.
It should look like this:
You are welcome.
I downloaded one of the files (bottel_glass) and you are not doing anything wrong, there is something wrong with the file. It only has 40.1 kib, even if you save the default file you will get at least 753.1 or similar.
You can check your workflow by making your own material in a file and appending it to another file, but as I say the files on that site seem empty. (at least the one I downloaded).
The glass materials that are shown look very basic, I suggest you watch some basic tuts on blenders material nodes, you do not need an image texture to create glass, glass is all about reflection, refraction and transparency, there is a glass material node that works ok to make things simple.
Edit:
If you want good glass for eevee (it is more tricky than cycles) I recommend reading through this thread, there are example files for you to download.
Thanks. I thought the file sized seem kind of low but being new to Blender I wasn’t sure. I will definitely check out your suggestions as it sounds like the best way to go is to make it myself. The main reason I was going to use that texture was because I downloaded a pre-made 3D model of a house that I downloaded from CG Trader that was supposed to include the textures but didn’t. I after looking into in I thought maybe I could figure out how to add textures to the house. I don’t need HQ textures as I am just using the house for a personal project. For some reason it came with some image files but not all of them.
It is well worth looking into how to make materials. For house window glass you can get away with simply mixing a glossy shader with a transparent shader. For more complex materials with image textures (for bricks stone etc) you can check this thread there are many free resources:
