Blender

Blender Interface and Workflows

Workspace Layout

3D Viewport

Main viewport for modeling and scene manipulation

Outliner

Hierarchical view of scene objects

Properties Panel

Object, modifier, and material properties

Timeline

Animation timeline and playback controls

Graph Editor

Animation curve editing

UV Editor

UV mapping and texture editing

Shader Editor

Node-based material and shader creation

Navigation

Orbit

Middle mouse button

Pan

Shift + Middle mouse button

Zoom

Scroll wheel

Numpad Views

1 (front), 3 (right), 7 (top), 5 (orthographic/perspective)

Frame Selected

Period (.)

Frame All

Home

Object Modes

Object Mode

Manipulate entire objects

Edit Mode

Edit mesh geometry

Sculpt Mode

Digital sculpting

Vertex Paint

Paint vertex colors

Weight Paint

Paint vertex weights for rigging

Texture Paint

Paint textures directly on model

Pose Mode

Animate rigged characters

Modeling Tools and Techniques

Primitives

Mesh Primitives

Cube, Sphere, Cylinder, Cone, Torus, Plane, Monkey

Curve Primitives

Bezier, NURBS curves

Surface Primitives

NURBS surfaces

Metaballs

Organic blobby shapes

Edit Mode Tools

Extrude (E)

Extrude faces, edges, or vertices

Inset (I)

Create inset faces

Bevel (Ctrl+B)

Bevel edges

Loop Cut (Ctrl+R)

Add edge loops

Knife Tool (K)

Cut custom geometry

Bridge Edge Loops

Connect edge loops

Merge (Alt+M)

Merge vertices

Dissolve (X)

Remove geometry while maintaining shape

Modifiers

Subdivision Surface

Smooth subdivision

Mirror

Mirror geometry across axis

Array

Duplicate geometry in patterns

Boolean

Combine, subtract, or intersect meshes

Decimate

Reduce polygon count

Remesh

Retopologize mesh

Shrinkwrap

Project mesh onto target surface

Solidify

Add thickness to surfaces

Sculpting and Retopology

Sculpt Mode

Brushes

Draw, Clay Strips, Crease, Smooth, Inflate

Dyntopo

Dynamic topology for sculpting

Multiresolution

Subdivision sculpting

Masking

Protect areas from sculpting

Falloff

Control brush influence

Stroke Settings

Spacing, jitter, smoothing

Retopology

Shrinkwrap Modifier

Project new topology onto sculpt

Snap to Face

Snap vertices to surface

Poly Build

Manual retopology tool

Bsurface

Automatic retopology add-on

Quad Remesher

Automatic quad-based retopology

Blender Rigging and Weight Painting

Armature

Bone Creation

Add bones to create skeleton

Bone Editing

Edit bone position, rotation, scale

Bone Layers

Organize bones into layers

Bone Groups

Group bones for organization

IK Constraints

Inverse kinematics setup

Bone Collections

Organize bones in Blender 4.0+

Rigging Tools

Rigify

Auto-rigging system for characters

Auto-Rig Pro

Commercial rigging add-on

Human Meta-Rig

Humanoid rig template

Constraints

IK, Copy Rotation, Limit Rotation, etc.

Weight Painting

Weight Paint Mode

Paint vertex weights

Brush Settings

Brush size, strength, falloff

Weight Tools

Normalize, blur, smooth weights

Vertex Groups

Assign vertices to bone groups

Mirror Weights

Mirror weights across symmetry

Weight Gradient

Create smooth weight transitions

Grease Pencil and Animation Tools

Grease Pencil

2D Drawing

Draw 2D strokes in 3D space

Object Mode

Manipulate grease pencil objects

Edit Mode

Edit stroke points

Draw Mode

Draw new strokes

Sculpt Mode

Sculpt stroke thickness

Vertex Paint

Paint stroke colors

Materials

Assign materials to strokes

Animation

Keyframing

Insert keyframes (I)

Timeline

Scrub and playback animation

Dope Sheet

Overview of keyframes

Graph Editor

Fine-tune animation curves

NLA Editor

Non-linear animation editing

Action Editor

Edit animation actions

Blender to Unity/Unreal Export Pipelines

Export Settings

FBX Export

File > Export > FBX

Scale

Set to 1.00 for Unity, 0.01 for Unreal

Forward Axis

Set to -Z forward for Unity, -X forward for Unreal

Up Axis

Set to Y up for both engines

Apply Transforms

Apply scale, rotation, location before export

Include Selected

Export only selected objects

Unity Export

Scale

1.00 (Unity uses meters)

Forward

-Z forward

Up

Y up

Apply Transforms

Ctrl+A > Apply > Scale, Rotation, Location

Export Selected

Check to export only selected objects

Unreal Export

Scale

0.01 (Unreal uses centimeters)

Forward

-X forward

Up

Z up

Apply Transforms

Ctrl+A > Apply > Scale, Rotation, Location

Export Selected

Check to export only selected objects

Common Export Issues

Scale Mismatch

Ensure correct scale factor for target engine

Rotation Issues

Check forward and up axis settings

Material Export

Materials may need to be recreated in target engine

Animation Export

Ensure animations are baked and exported

Texture Paths

Use relative paths for textures