I’m starting with Blender from 3dsmax / Maya and have been looking for a solution to something I would have never guessed it to be an issue. I’m finding out that u can’t render the active viewport? I’m not talking about the open GL, but the actual render. Is this just not an option?
Thanks for any replies.
I’m not sure if you can do this with Blender internal renderer, but Cycles has an excellent viewport rendering system. Cycles is due for merging with trunk some time this week and you can pick up a prototype Cycles build from graphicall.org right now. 
There did used to be a “preview render” option, but I can’t find it in 2.5x/2.6x.
Blender renders the camera view. To set the camera view to be the viewport select the camera view (numpad 0) and in the Properties / View panel select the ‘Lock Camera to View’ tickbox. maximise the camera outline in the viewport just press the Home key with your mouse in the 3d view
If you press “ctrl + alt + numpad zero”, the active camera is aligned to the current “non camera” vantage point.
To switch active camera, you can:
A: select the camera and press “ctrl+ numpad zero”.
(This will switch camera and “jump into it”, but you can switch back to your previous “non camera” view by just pressing numpad zero)
B: Change the “Camera” setting in the “Scene” tab in the properties panel (the tab next to all the render settings).
I just had a minute to check cycles out. I’m not sure what it even supposed to be except a new render engine? How do I render view port with that renderer?
Thanks for the replies guys…
Just one of many youtube videos demonstrating Cycles rendering a viewport in realtime.
(Edit: This is quite obviously a timelapse, but the rendering is indeed in realtime, and this was made in a pre-release protoype build. I can recommend a hard trance soundtrack when you watch this.)
Nice Funky… thanks for that. Is there a simple way to just hit a button to render the view then cancel it when I want? The only way I can see to render any view is to go the the view port shading menu and click on the “render” option. Then I have to go the the same menu and click on material, texture or whatever to change it back to what it was before I rendered. Even a toggle for the view port shading option would be good. Is there a better way?
BTW I like cycles… NICE!!!
Just checking cycle out… Found out all the material settings changed? So I’m going back to the default renderer cuz I just learned where all the mat’l settings are recently and really don’t want to relearn all that stuff. Can I even have a perspective view and a camera view at the same time when I change to quad view? Seems like I can only change the top right view. There’s gotta be a better way to work / model in a persp view and see what it’s doing in the camera view at the same time… What am I missing?
Have you tried opening multiple 3d windows? You could have one quad view, another camera view, a third ortho view…any combination you want. And still work in any of the views. Or maybe I don’t understand what you’re after…?
I just wanted to do a quick render of the perspective I’m working ion. Apparently this is too complicated for Blender? It doesn’t matter, I gave it a shot and wanted to like it really, but I went back to max. Blender really does have a way to go before it’s in the leagues with the others.
Blender really does have a way to go before it’s in the leagues with the others.
And you worked as long with blender as you did with max to make that statement?
Some of your problems I read quickly can easily be solved in Blender, but just like any other program it’s a matter of finding out how & where. For example in quad view every view can be unlocked by going into the Properties panel (N), and disabling ‘Lock’ under Display. In the properties panel you can also find ‘Lock Camera to View’, as Richard already mentioned. This would allow you to navigate in 3d while remaining in camera view