Usage of the Program

How to use it:

Import a model with the Import model button and use the other functions of the programm to change the scene. See below for more information about what you can do.

Overview of the interface:

Let's start by explaining the main sections the interface is divided into.
Remember that this is only a basic overview, please read on for detailed explanations on how to use each feature. The letters A-D describe the main sections:

• A) The left sidebar is the basis of your work. It has all the controls related to import/export of models and renders, and all the general program controls like Settings and an update check (top part).
  Additionally, in the lower part, there are also controls for camera animations and the rotation of the model.
• B) This is the preview window. Here you'll see a low quality render of how the final result will look like.
• C) The right panel is the main working space for adjusting properties of the model and the world. Controls are provided for a lot of different properties, adjust them to your liking. For an explanation of what each control does, read more below.
• D) The bottom panel contains everything related to the camera. You can rotate, pan and move the camera, as well as adjust the frame it is currently at and the background that is displayed.

File operations:

• Import model opens a file explorer with which a 3D model can be selected to be imported into the scene. Works with these file types:
  • .obj
  • .ply
  • .stl

• Export model exports the model/scene as a .blend project file to the selected destination
• Save render renders the current scene and saves it as a .png image at the selected destination
• Save video renders the current scene as an animation and saves the render as a .avi file at the selected destination

Actions:

• Settings opens up a window where settings can be changed. For a list of all settings, read https://github.com/garvita-tiwari/blender_render/wiki/Settings
  • Aspect ratio of rendered image changes the aspect ratio of the rendered image (i.e. aspect ratio 2:1 means the image's width is twice its height).
  • Time limit for preview render sets how long the preview render is allowed to render in seconds

• Check for updates checks whether any updates are available. If so please refer to Releases
• Help brings up the Wiki for this Project

Frame

• setting the frame of the current active animation in the preview

Camera Controls:

• The four arrows below Rotation can be used to rotate the preview camera around the selected object
• The four arrows below Panning can be used to move the preview camera up / down / to the left / to the right
• Pan in and Pan out can be used to move the camera closer to or further away from the object
• Reset camera angle resets the camera position to the default position it is in at program launch

Model Controls:

• The Rotation arrows can be used to rotate only the object in the scene, not rotating the preview angle or background with it.

Background:

High Dynamic Range Images (HDRIs) can be set as 3D environment around the object, serving as background and affecting reflective and translucent materials accordingly.

• Here are a few preset example HDRIs to select from
• Import custom HDRI opens a file explorer to select a custom HDRI to be imported

Look

• Color: pick opens an RGB picker to set the model's base color.
• Vertex color: If checked, the color of each of the model's vertices is chosen randomly. (Note: Vertex color and Texture are mutually exclusive. Activating one will automatically deactivate the other)
• Plane: If checked, a flat plane will be added under the model.

Material selection

The material section provides sliders and checkbox controls to adjust the surface properties of the mesh. These include:

General properties

• Metallic: Surface will be made more reflective the higher the value (0-100%), creating a metallic look
  Decreasing the roughness will also improve the metallic look.
  EXAMPLE:

• Roughness: A high roughness value spreads light more evenly in all directions, with low roughness you will get better shadows around edges.
  Roughness needs to be very low (<5%) if the material is transparent

• Transmission: Adjusts how much light is let through the object, is equivalent to Transparency

Emissive properties

Whether the object should emit light by itself.
Light will have the same color as the object, but still appear white at the maximum because it is too bright.

• Emission strength: Adjust the brightness of the emitted light
• Glow (checkbox): Whether a halo should appear around the object, making it appear glowing

Bumpiness

Bumpiness uses random noise to create uneven irregularities on the surface (bumps). (can be enabled with the checkbox)
You can adjust the properties of the noise with the following three sliders:

• Noise scale: The higher the scale, the smaller will the bump structure get
• Noise detail: Used to create more fine grained bumps if set to a high value
• Noise distortion: Adds curves to the noise, can be used to create a wave like structure (e.g. in the water preset)

Presets

Additionally, the material section provides a few preset materials, that adjust the sliders to create different looks.
You can select them in a Dropdown menu:

A comparison of the different presets below:

Preset	Default	Stone	Glass	Thick glass
Description	Resets everything except the color	Creates bumps with size X and detail Y to create a rough stone look	Glass is transparent, keeps the color	Another type of glass, more transparent for simple object
Image
Preset	Water	Emissive	Gold
Description	Wavy surface (bumpiness), transparent, sparkling (Glow) and light blue color = Waters	Object emits light in its color and has a "Glow" halo around it	Metallic look in golden color
Image

Difference between "Glass" and "Thick glass": Some meshes such as the cube only don't have a surface which has thickness (like glass in the real world), so light might refrace in strange ways. If you want to achieve a thick surface, you can use "thick glass", which applies a Solidify modifier to the surface of the model.

Texture selection

• The Import-Button sets the Image-Texture, which you want to render to your model. In oder to render it, you should choose the filetype ".png", not ".jpg".
• The Select:-Button can cancel and rerender the model with our some normal Texture, like "wood, bricks, iron".

Lighting

• The Brightness-Slider sets the brightness of the light sources (only available if day, night or lantern is selected)
• The Lights off-Button deletes all lights sources (background brightness is not affected)
• The Default-Button sets a default light source
• The Day-Button sets the day light (position of the sun depends of the time-value; Time=0 means 6:00 am and Time=12 means 6:00 pm). Moon light is not active. There also exists dawn light
• The Night-Button sets the night light (position of the moon depends of the time-value; Time=0 means 6:00 pm and Time=12 means 6:00 am). Sun light is not active
• The Lantern-Button creates a yellow lantern light over the model
• The Day Night Cycle Animation-Checkbox creates an animation, where sun and moon light interact with each other and create day night cycles. One day is 120 frames long. The time-value sets the starting time (Time=0 means 6:00 am and Time=12 means 6:00 pm). Unchecking it will create the default light
• The Time-Slider sets the time (only available if day or night is selected)
• The Background Strength-Slider sets the background brightness

Camera presets

• There are 3 Preset buttons which can be used to animate the camera with 3 different presets:
  • Preset 1 pans the camera from left to right along the object
  • Preset 2 zooms onto the object from far away
  • Preset 3 starts in front of the object and then flies over it while turning
• The Preview buttons next to each preset plays a short video demonstrating each preset
• In the Set frames box the duration of animations can be set
• Track object toggles whether the camera is facing the object or not
• Animation preview toggles between the image rendering camera and the video rendering cam that is animated

Pointcloud settings:

Convert Object

• A object can be converted into a Pointcloud by selecting the Pointcloud button in the Pointcloud Object tab (bottom right).
• If the object should be converted back into a normal mesh, just deselect the Pointcloud button.

Point size

• The size of the objects instanced by the point cloud can be changed with the slider, moving the slider left is going to decrease the object size, and moving it to the right is going to increase the size of the instanced objects.

Display type

• There are two different ways to display the Pointcloud, the points can be instanced by either putting a smaller object onto every vertex in the original mesh, or the points can be instanced at random locations. It is up to the user to decide which type of point display he prefers.

Select Object

• The object that is instanced to be a Pointcloud can be chosen, there are 4 different settings: cube, sphere, disk, or money. Each of these will display said object as the object the Pointcloud is instancing.