Blender Publisher can render as PNG.

global widgets.

i dont understand why some widgets are on the 3d window. like editmode, that should be a 'global' widget, there's no use in having it on every 3d window header. same with transforms. well, maybe they can be on all 3d windows, if they serve as translation constraints. It might be nice to have a max/maya like 3d transformation 'icon' in the 3d views themselves. Mouse cursor feedback would be nice too.

true box/polygon modeling

take a good look at wings3D. How intuitive it is. Maybe we can implement some of it in Blender. I can't see why you can only select vertices in editmode. we must be able to select edges and polys as well. of course once you select those we need some stuff we can do with it too of course. People say the Blender interface is wonderfull, but i think once we implement a lot more functionality we will have troubles putting it all in. We'l have to think hard on how to better it without taking away it's good aspects.

Tool similar to Lightwave's edgetool plugin (download 12mb Face detailing with edgetool.p video )http://www.presetcentral.com/browse/93.html. That makes modelling more powerful.
_________________
<Sig under construction>

I am still somewhat new to blender, so I may be wrong; but blender seems to be needing the following:

Critical Features:
1.Relational modeling (aka: history, procedural modeling) (operators, modifiers, etc..)
2.UI command feedback line (prints the script commands for each UI action) (Listener window in 3dsMax)
3.Can not inspect and change properties in Oops window. If the Oops window is not meant for this, then we need a good schematic view like Maya or Softimage has.
4.Expressions
5.Arbitrary sliders (not scripted sliders), just simple sliders that can be created within their own node; expressions must be able to attach to these sliders like any other object.
6.Context sensitive command bar. Blender is heavily driven with hot keys, and if you don't know the hot keys, your out of luck. We need to have something for new users, just a simple tool bar on the side that displays all available commands for the current mode the user is in.
7.Floating windows. As blender grows all the features are not going to fit within the Button View. We need to start moving some of these object properties into a object sensitive window that can: refresh automatically, stay pinned, refresh only on similar options. XSI's property editing floater is a good example.
8.By each object, or any property that can be animated should be a “key icon” that allows you to set and delete new key frames, or drag and drop from other “key icons” to create new expressions or links. XSI has a great implementation of this that is also color coded, so just by looking at the color you can tell if it is animated, if there is a key frame at the current frame, etc...
9.View translation icon: We need a gizmo that is displayed on top of the object that allows for move, rotation, scaling; and has axis picking. But don't kill the gestures of blender, that is a great feature. Maybe have an option for the move gesture, to gesture the direction to pick a different axis.

Needed Features:
1.Spline deform operator
2.Better documentation of scripting features
3.Polygons: edge mode, we need a mode for working with edges
4.Proportional modeling within the UV editor
5.Type-in-boxes for UV editor to enter exact values for UV points
6.We need a simple bar along the bottom that displays what the left, middle, and right mouse button do in the current context. Might as well add a time slider to that bar to.
7.Lasso select tool. It would be nice if blender automatically went into this mode when the mouse draws a selection for longer than two seconds. If it longer than two seconds then it is obvious that I am not gesturing the scale tool and that I would like a lasso selection. A button for lasso selection mode will also be needed.
8.Force openGL bitmaps to lower resolutions. If someone did not have much graphics ram, and loaded a scene with very large texture maps, they could be in trouble. There needs to be a way to set the absolute max texture size to 64, 128, 256, and 512.

Character Animation:
It's all about good character setup, we need more constraints; so far we have: position, rotation, and look-at (direction). We need the following constraints: two points, n-point, up-vector, path (curve), cluster (to vertex).

-brett
http://www.initialprairiedog.com

bhartshorn wrote:

6.We need a simple bar along the bottom that displays what the left, middle, and right mouse button do in the current context.

Dunno if we need relational feedback of the mouse, once you know what it does that would be screenclutter. we might offer an option for it though.

But what i like in this quote is ' a simple bar along the bottom '. There that 'UI command feedback line' could be placed too then. But we can give more functions to it. I strongly believe we need/will need 'global widgets', ie a icon representation of a function that is always available. We only need one of each, i don't see why edit mode and others have an icon on every 3d view. We get some place on that header then to place new 3d window fetures.

We can go even further, without altering how the blender ui works, and without cluttering the screen or creating yet another button window:

that extra bar at the bottom could be made to be dragged out, much like how you can pull the blender options window at the top down. There we can place new features , like the anticipated timeline or rearrange others that would be handy to have here. The bar 's design might be a bit changed then, i think many new users don't know you can pull that out

Is it possible to implement something that I called MetaSurf? It's like a Subsurface with metaball properties. So when 2 or more objects are close they stick to eachother but are still editable like subsufrs?

Beveling tool will also help alot...

i would like to see a cylinder spot lamp in a future blender

I think there should be some preprogrammed particle systems like rain, fire. and some others



____________
www.mattswebpage.tk

- Edge control
- Bevel command (at least!)
- cylinder spot lamp
- Gizmo
- Stack history
- All lights ability of casting shadows
- Extrude/move along sub-local axis, perpendicular, edge,...
- Radiosity without melting the meshes

I'm sure I've forgottn a lot of things.

Best thing would be having a huge interactive list where you can add and vote: that's the easiest way of having a community most wanted

Blender_owl wrote:

One of the major drawbacks in Kestji (the blender game engine) is the 8 bit texures. We in the game blender communty want at least 16 bit. And a faster game engine.

i didn't mean to quote everything here - just getting used to the new forum - anyway - i've done several texture tests in the game engine and as far as i can tell all textures are converted to 32 bit - unless the video driver is overriding to 8 or 16. the memory useage for 8, 16, 24, and 32 bit bitmaps is the same...this is on win2k v2.25

How about an "Editable EPS" input filter that will translate into 2D bezier curves? Not sure of the coding problems this will entail, but since EPSes are based on bezier curves, this may be not so hard, in a relative sense.

1) as already mentioned, support for different standart (or less standart) formats would be nice.
2) I think, that a new format containing all (or maybe a selected subset) of informations that blender has about the model would be useful. Why not an xml-based format ?
This should be easily parseable by external utilities. Writing format converter would be much easier
than writing a plugin or extending blender.

Another suggestion for more undo's. We could all use more of that regardless the skill level.

Im also for the file format compatibility.

I dont want to sound like a brat, but a customizable interface/key mapping that has a lot of pre sets to mimic other 3d packages will help people migrating from comercial software like me get a better head start getting used to the blender interface. Ofcourse, only if that could even be implemented at all.

I don't know how difficult is implementing undo,
Some easy incremental-svaving and loading buttons simulating a real undo would be helpful
and easier to implement for the beginning.