So is BSurfaces the way to interpolate a curved surface between two bezier lines? Could someone respond to my post #14?
Well, first of all thank everyone very much for the input that they have provided. I have struggled with certain aspects of tutorials for Blender, and have almost finished building up the practical abilities I want to have for the program. I thank the community very very much. 
I am using the key commands to mention shelves and areas because I’m memorising the key shortcuts as I go, which I do confess might be offputting to purists and experts who know all the official sub menu names.
I have divided the only things that I want to do that I don’t understand quite yet, despite previous responses covering things, into tasks, and I have just been asking questions about then, particularly if I have struggled to correctly interpret and act from responses that have gone before on this thread. What I have left is the following:
-How do I alter the 3D angle of the edit window to which freehand grease pencil lines are relatively planar parallel?
-Apart from using extrapolate <e> when doing lines or curves, is there any other way to add points, ie separate points, one at a time, by not converting a plane, line, or cube?
-One may shift (x,y,z) points one at a time. How do I alter the relative axes [X,Y,Z] away
from the default locations (and default back to the default again) when doing this?
-How do I convert edges and bezier curves to Grease pencil, when constructing things by virtue of the add menu?
-I can click convert under the <n> menu to give me anchors and red reference lines
for what I have drawn with a grease pencil. Is there a way to make all the guidance red lines
look the same as when going add bezier? After using <e> to extrapolate and continue more curves end to beginning, how do I lock one control point end to join with another beginning point from a line, so that they join and engage my curves continuously? Is changing the (x,y,z) value of the end and beginning point in the <n> area enough for full continuity?
-It is stated here that BSurfaces works with grease pencil curves. What is the keyboard shortcut key the for convert button in the <n> area, if there is one? How do I convert an edge between two vertices, in a 3D solid, into a bezier curve, and then the curve required for BSurfaces, from a 3D or 2D item to start? How do I do BSurface extrapolate my new surface between two separate grease pencil lines? What are the keyboard and click steps involved?
-Having finished my knife action using the <k> key, I find that I have spurious points left. I go to delete the vertex only, but find myself loosing edges and surfaces in the process. There is a behaviour called “dissolve”, which I in fact don’t want happening. If I don’t want surfaces eliminated, how do I get rid of the old surface internal points and lines only (when in <tab> mode)?
-By the by, is there a way to disable the recording and frame position menu entirely that appears at the bottom of the screen, so that I can have the extra space if I only want to create static 3D objects in the edit area?
-By the by, is there a way to disable the recording and frame position menu entirely that appears at the bottom of the screen, so that I can have the extra space if I only want to create static 3D objects in the edit area?
Drag the triangle widget at the bottom of the 3d window down and into the timeline window so that an arrow highlights, and it will merge. Or you can mmb on the edgeof the 3d view and choose to split or merge and area.
Just a concern that those were instructions from some tutorial. As instructions, those would be bad.
But you’re not telling what it is that you want to accomplish. If you’re jumping from tool to another and trying to memorize keypresses, you’re going to be doing that for ages and in the end, you would still be asking what to press to make a model of anything.
Modeling in Blender is mainly focused on polygonal modeling and when you construct a mesh, there are many approaches to get to the finished model. If you ask questions based on what you assume you want to do and only ask instructions to do what you assumed, you might get the answer but it’s not helpful at all if the assumption was wrong in the first place.
For example, when you ask “how to get a surface between two bézier curves”, the (precise) answer is that you would use Bsurfaces to get a mesh surface, because there is no other kind of surface that you would get with bézier (fill in curve 2D mode and bevel object doesn’t count). It doesn’t behave like NURBS path.
Now that is the answer to your question but is it the best way to do whatever it is that you’re trying to do? Probably not.
When you’re constructing a mesh and the focus is to get some step done, say filling an area between two or more edge loops in your mesh, Bsurfaces is not the first and only option. You could use W -> bridge edge loops, looptools (addon) -> loft function, or ctrl+F -> grid fill. http://www.blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?309154-Extrusin-alon-a-path&p=2472717&viewfull=1#post2472717
That is also assuming that filling that area in your model would be the right thing to do, which is another reason people would have to see what you’re doing, topology is very important.
I would suggest to forget Bsurfaces and grease pencil for now.
In edit mode, ctrl+LMB gives you an extrusion of what you have selected. If you don’t have anything selected, it gives you one handle point (curves) or a single vertex (mesh).
You can left mouse button click and drag the striped corner over the window edge to join areas, or you could right click on the edge and choose “join areas”. If you merge 3D view and timeline and want that to be the default, you could set that layout as default with file menu -> save startup file. The thing to note is that it saves everything you see as default, including the model that is in the 3D view and the viewport camera position, so it would be best to do that kind of change on a new Blender window or load new (ctrl+N) first.
-How do I alter the default view angle
-Apart from using extrapolate <e> when doing lines or curves, is there any other way to add points, ie separate points, one at a time, by not converting a plane, line, or cube?
-One may shift (x,y,z) points one at a time. May I alter the relative axes [X,Y,Z] away
from the default locations (and default back to the default again) when doing this, just temporarily?
-How do I convert edges and bezier curves to Grease pencil, and vice versa, when constructing and adding various items to an object under construction?
-I can click convert under the <n> menu to give me anchors and red reference lines
for what I have drawn with a grease pencil. Is there a way to make all the guidance red lines
look the same as when going add bezier?
-If I <ctrl +j> two points with identical (x,y,z) values, which are coincident, am I left with only one point?
-
What is the keyboard shortcut key the for convert button in the <n> area, if there is one?
-By the by, is there a way to disable the recording and frame position menu entirely that appears at the bottom of the screen, so that I can have the extra space if I only want to create static 3D objects in the edit area?
You can control the viewing angle with the numberpad keys. E (extrude, not extrapolate) is how you add verts. There is no ‘add a single vert’ command. If you want disconnected verts, just use Delete>>Only Edges and Faces. That will leave the vert behind when the edges and faces disappear. If you have two vertices that are coincident, you can ‘remove doubles’ to make them into one vertex. If they are not coincident, you can ‘merge vertices’. I think ctrl+j joins different objects, but does not affect their meshes. The ‘recording and frame position menu’ is actually an editor window, and you can drag it’s top border to the bottom to make it go away.
By the way, there are plenty of Blender Interface tutorials out there, some text, some on video. I’d recommend taking a few of them in.
How do I alter the default view angle
Look up view navigation In the wiki for details. There is no default view angle. There is a camera, and there are axial views.
-Apart from using extrapolate <e> when doing lines or curves, is there any other way to add points, ie separate points, one at a time, by not converting a plane, line, or cube?
Ctrl clicking adds verts in edit mode if all other conditions are met. This is unlikely to be of any practical use to beginner modeling.
-One may shift (x,y,z) points one at a time. May I alter the relative axes [X,Y,Z] away
from the default locations (and default back to the default again) when doing this, just temporarily?
Look up transformation orientation in the wiki. The drop down or up menu that starts with global is the place for this.
These short answers are not going to be much help to you and no one really wants to copy large chunks of the documentation into the forum… read the wiki!
-How do I convert edges and bezier curves to Grease pencil, and vice versa, when constructing and adding various items to an object under construction?
There is a convert to option in the object menu. The grease pencil panel allows you to convert GP strokes to curves. Also not a beginner tool IMO. Read the wiki about grease pencil usage to learn more.
-I can click convert under the <n> menu to give me anchors and red reference lines
for what I have drawn with a grease pencil. Is there a way to make all the guidance red lines
look the same as when going add Bezier?
Normals display is in the N panel? You have many more when converting GP strokes.
-If I <ctrl +j> two points with identical (x,y,z) values, which are coincident, am I left with only one point?
No. Use alt M instead.
-
What is the keyboard shortcut key the for convert button in the <n> area, if there is one?
If you need it that often right click it and add shortcut lets you put one in. Note that you may destroy some other shortcut in so doing.
-By the by, is there a way to disable the recording and frame position menu entirely that appears at the bottom of the screen, so that I can have the extra space if I only want to create static 3D objects in the edit area?
Look up joining frames in the wiki for all answers to this. One way is to hover over the separator until the cursor changes and then right click to get the options.
I see Orinoco has answered your questions while I was playing a quick game of chess. before finishing this post.
You really should read the wiki. All these questions are covered in detail there and I am not sure at all that the answers I have given you don’t miss some very important point.
-Apart from using extrapolate <e> when doing lines or curves, is there any other way to add points, ie separate points, one at a time, by not converting a plane, line, or cube?
You can subdivide a line/segment via the w menu.
You can ‘duplicate’ single points, select one vertex and then shift-d.
You can split an edge by pressing k, selecting a point on an edge and pressing return, will convert it into a vertex.
And it should be possible to add a single point via point.
-How may I determine what the point of intersection between two lines, lines and surfaces
and two surfaces are, instantly (I want something better than using the distance Measure tool and
my on triangulation).
-How may I add (assign) points at intersections between lines and surfaces?
-How may I alter the relative axes [X,Y,Z] away from the default locations
(to align to some plane or object) and their original positions again?
-How do I convert lines to bezier curves, and vice versa?
-How do I convert bezier curves to Grease pencil, and vice versa,
when constructing and adding various items to an object under construction?
- You are creating a new thread for each set of questions you ask.
- You are asking the same questions in more than one thread.
- You are apparently not bothering to look things up in the Wiki.
In case you don’t know where it is: http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Doc:2.6/Manual
I am happy to answer questions for items that are hard to find in the Wiki, or that are not included in it, or for procedures that are specific to some project, but I don’t think it’s a good practice to encourage new users to bypass the official documentation entirely. Others may disagree!
All your question threads merged
zachary and orinoco
creating one single vertice is possible by clicking ,<ctrl + left mouse button> in edit mode .
in edit mode (make sure you unselect [press ‘A’] all vertices first) it will create a single vertice according to your cursor’s position.
*if you have one vertice selected while creating another vertice with left clicking, it will make one vertice with an edge (line connecting between them)
- left clicking while selecting more than one vertices (like a triangle, or cube) will duplicate the selected vertices’s structure to the cursor .
i advise to all helpers to not declare of an in-exsistance of a function unless 100% sure
I have found tutorials difficult on these issues. Might there be anyone with specific answers to my posting #29 ?
“-How may I add (assign) points at intersections between lines and surfaces?”
what exactly do you mean?
are you asing if you can create a vertice at the middle of a line? or at middle of a face?
your questions are not entirely detailed enough
you can subdivide surfaces or edges if thats what you mean (?)
If there is intersection between lines or surfaces, that occurs someplace. Even if there is not a point there,
to be selected when <tab> editing, how may I
-determine where this is by some tool or button.
-and or automatically make blender to put a formal point at the location?
Why do you need a vertex at that location of intersection? Maybe it would be better to show some screenshots as examples so we can answer correctly.
i think he was specific enough.
zachary - use boolean modifier
properties panel (right window) choose modifiers icon (blue wrench), -->add modifier --> boolean.
i dont know if blender can automatically generate and calculate a vertice at an intersection within a SINGLE object.
however ,when two objects (lets take your example, a plane and a plane) intersect each other, it is possible to calculate and generate automatically by blender, using a modifier called “boolean”. once there, you choose which object the currently modified object will be interacted with.
the modifier is defaultly choosing “intersect” operation, which is i think is what you search for.
try choosing the other options as well if you are curious.
*for using that modifier you will have to make the meshes(if they are not seperated objects) into two seperated objects first.
- for seperating vertices (what you call 3d point) to be a stand-alone object, select your desired vertices, then --> press ‘P’ --> by selection.
you can also do this from the mesh drop tab at bottom of the window instead of the shortcut ‘P’.
– if you dont necceserily need an accurate resault, you can manually subdevide the two lines and use ‘slide vertex’ untill you reach your desire location which is enough accurate for your “intersection vertice”.
does this solves your question?
lol this is like a single thread documenting Zach’s education in blender.
I don’t think so - presenting pictures and blend files is the best way to keep from writing pages of documentation in each thread, all the while missing the target of what the OP actually possibly meant, and I am just cautioning from my own experience in trying to help people here. Non standard terminology and hypothetical situations are confusing enough as it is.
zacgary -“How may I alter the relative axes [X,Y,Z] away from the default locations
(to align to some plane or object) and their original positions again?”
please rephrase and explain
-what do you mean by relative axes? is it local axes? explain
-away from default locations? explain