MESHmachine

Coding Released Scripts and Themes
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21

Thanks guys!

I hope it is, thanks!

Gonna be tricky unless I do my own chamfer tool I think. Which I might do.

The docs use simple meshes intentionally to communicate the function clearly… I’ve used MESHmachine pretty heavily on the mecha I’m using for promo.

Yes, I have a number of ideas, some more far fetched than others. I don’t like promising things, until I’m sure I can do it, so you’ll have to wait until I have something concrete to show.
One thing I definitly want it custom drawn handles, maybe in an advanced mode. As much as I try to make the tools general purpose, there’s just so many weird potential edge cases, where a certain topology needs a special rule to deal with it. Having handles, that can be manipulated would allow you to deal with all cases all the time.

I’m gonna try turn the operators into modals as much as I can, but for some tools, such as Fuse it just isn’t a good idea IMO. There’s too many options to change and modals can’t have the tool properties. I’ll see what I can do. FWIW, the Re-Last addon should be able to do what you want, albeit in a slightly different way.

Also, you should really map the popup tool props to something other than F6, given how useful it is. I have it mapped to a mouse button where my thumb is. It’s 50% of the reason why I can work in full screen almost all the time(while modeling). the Hardops Helper and material list menu, and a number of pies are the other 50%.

As for bevel weights, please check out how Fuse deals with sharps. It removes boundary sharps on rail edges, but keeps sharps on sweep edges. I’m gonna do the same for bevel weights, no problem.

  1. will do
  2. I’ll see what I can do.
  3. Thanks, I thought this was possible, somehow, but didnt find anything on it, when I checked (not long enough apparently). I’ll look into it. Thanks for the pointer.
  4. to force certain “shortcuts” or rather key motions, I think it’s called. Like yr (refuse) or yc (unchamfer), or yd (unfuse), etc. All conveniently mapped to be in reach of the left hand. Is there a better way to this this?

You’re welcome, thanks for bringing this issue up. Please for the future, always supply the blend file. Saves me from rebuilding it, which migjt not produce the same issue.

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Ok! This is a fast way.
I checked now how further shortcut works > [Y+function letter].

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bought! thank you for that tool! :slight_smile:

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This is what I’ve been looking for! A one press unchamfer/unbevel button.

Thanks for being awesome!

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wrong thread, sorry.

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Did you mean to post this here?

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I can’t open guide - https://machin3.io/MESHmachine/docs/installation/. Please create video tutorials about MESHmashine on YouTube.

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Works fine for me. Run through the tutorial.blend that comes with MESHmachine, it’s on the menu(press Y in edit mode). It will open a new blend without saving, so make sure you save first if you want the file you have open.

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The site is up, Not sure why you have troubles.
MESHmachine (and DECALmachien) also come with offline documenation. It’s in the documentation folder of the extracted zip files.

I’m pasting installation instructions below.

Instructions

Install from File

  • start Blender, pressCTRL + ALT + U to open the user preferences
  • switch to the Add-ons tab and click the Install Add-on from file… button at the bottom
  • locate the downloaded MESHmachine_v0.5.zip file and double-click it
  • activate the addon by ticking the checkbox and hit the Save User Settings button at the bottom
  • in edit mode press Y to bring up the MESHmachine menu

Manual Installation (alternative)

  • extract the MESHmachine_v0.5.zip archive
  • move the extracted MESHmachine folder and its contents to your addons folder in the user scripts location
  • start Blender, find the addon in preferences in the Add-ons tab and activate it, save your user config
  • in edit mode press Y to bring up the MESHmachine menu

Addons Folder (in user scripts)

Linux: /home/name/.config/blender/2.79/scripts/addons
MacOS: /Users/name/Library/Application Support/Blender/2.79/scripts/addons[SUP]1[/SUP]
Windows: C:\Users
ame\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.78\scripts\addons

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I’ve added the preview release 0.5.2 to gumroad and blender market.

  • adds new “intersection handle method” to Fuse and Refuse (the same used in the 0.5.1. Unchamfer)
  • Fuse and Refuse now properly deal with bweights
  • the MESHmachine menu is added to the specials menu (W key), can be turned off in prefs
1 Like
31

I’ve added the preview release 0.5.3 to gumroad and blender market.

  • generally improve dealing with bweights and sharps
  • fix bweights not being properly set based on loop edges in Refuse
  • add set Sharps and set Bweights options to Unbevel and Unfuse
  • fix exception when running ChangeWidth, Fuse and Unchamfer on cyclic fuse selections (instead of chamfer selections)
  • fix leaving edit mode when running those same ops on non chamfer selections
  • add the new intersection handle method to Unbevel(), same as for Unchamfer(0.5.1) and Fuse(0.5.2)
2 Likes
32

Thanks for the addon,
Probably I am a bit impatient or expected to be able to easily turn chamfers into bevels and vice versa.
It seems I can not turn the first cube into the second cube with the addon. Can you tell me what I have to do with a minimum steps?


The first cube has a corner that is a triangle. You mean I have to select one corner, turn it in a quad, go to next triangle etc?
And is it possible to make the addon that way that I don’t have to press y and then F6 but just y ? (popup I believe I mean)

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update: it seems I was quite impatient I think and get the hang out of it. For those who start: start with one chamfer first and experiment.

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Triangular corners are bad, you need to avoid them if you want to use the MESHmachine tools. If you have them, you can use the Quad Corner tool to convert them. See https://machin3.io/MESHmachine/docs/faq/#what-are-triangular-and-quad-bevel-corners and https://machin3.io/MESHmachine/docs/quad_corner/

I will add the ability to work on multiple “selection islands” at once in a bit. For now, All tools expect you to have a single “island” selected.

You can map each of the tools to a unique keymap like any other blender tool. You can do it directly from the MESHmachine menu, by right clicking on any of the tools.

I’d question why though. Each tool can be accesed super quickly by doing yf for Fuse, yc for unchamfer, yb for unbevel, etc etc. Look at the first letters in front of every each tool. They are pseudo shortcuts. The docs also list the sequence you need to type for every tool, but it’s really self evident, just by looking at the MESHmachine menu.

As for the F6 menu, it’s just a convenient way to access the tool properties, especially when working in fullscreen. They are also available in the T panel, again, as with any other Blender tool. I suggest to everyone to map the “Redo Last” panel, to something else than F6, like a bouse button, if you have more than 3.

Same thing as the first, avoid bevelng like this. If you still do it, the Quad Corner tool will convert these as well.

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Turns out you can’t do this right now. I’ll investigate.

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Ahw thanks,
As I said earlier, I am way to impatient and got the hang out of it. Thanks for the suggestion accessing the tools quickly.
What I did at first is starting with bevelling a cube with the bevel modifier and then experiment.
Now I start with one chamfer and experiment with that and things are running as expected.

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I’ve replaced the previous preview releases with 0.5.3a which fixes a bug in the QuadCorner tool introduced in 0.5.1

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I highly suggest you check out the tutorial scene as well, in case you haven’t already!

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Also, I just want to make something clear. The MESHmachine tools do not intend to replace the bevel mod, Hardops or similar addons. For small bevels especially, these are still the go to solution.

The MESHmachine tools focus working on the geometry level - the mesh level - with bevels, these are usually bigger bevels and curved surfaces, that you wouldn’t or could’t create with a mod.

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Great. after two hours more experimenting it works flawless to me.
Indeed a magic bullet. And stuborn as I am, barely checked the manual. (the gifs helped me). (bare with me I am 50, still young, but not much time left, time flies).
After installing the addon, didn’t restart and so the link to the tutorial blend didn’t work. But figured out already.
Thanks!