Maniphest T72986

Broken Metaball functionality
Closed, Duplicate
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Assigned To
None
Authored By
David O'Neil (David_ONeil)
Jan 9 2020, 3:15 AM
Tags
  • BF Blender
Subscribers
David O'Neil (David_ONeil)
Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk)

Description

System Information
Operating system: Win10
Graphics card: GeForce GTX 960M

Blender Version
Broken: 2.81a

Short description of error
Unable to create discrete metaball groups correctly

Exact steps for others to reproduce the error
Not exact, but hope it helps figure out the issues.

All I'm trying to do is to create a metaball rig of a base hand for quick modeling. I want the palm/hand to be one metaball assy, and each finger to be an individual metaball assy, including the thumb. So in the end there would be two cylindrical metaballs in the thumb, three in each finger, and one metaball or ellipse for the palm.

The first thing to report is that often when creating a family, the second part added to the family is no longer able to use the full gizmo scaling feature correctly. If you create a cylinder and add another cylinder to it, moving it in some direction to make them into two connected cylinders, you can't hit 'Shift' when using the scale gizmo on the second cylinder and scale the second cylinder in the two non-constrained dimensions (ie, trying to change the y and z dims by shift dragging the x handle).

Also, after creating one 'finger,' if all three metacylinders are selected and 'Shift-D' duplicated, then the root of them is renamed 'FingerB', and the others to 'FingerB.002' and FingerB.003, things get weird really fast. The attached file is the result of three fingers, and the individual objects somehow got really confused.

If this description doesnt' help, just try to create a hand assy with the goal of being able to adjust each finger individually. Use 'Shift-D' to create copies of the original finger once one is done. Good luck!

Hope this helps get to the bottom of everything.

Oh, it would be nice to allow numbers at the back of the name's root. It took 30 minutes to figure out that isn't allowed, because the balls immediately disappeared, and I thought I was doing something fundamentally wrong. 'Finger1' is an example - the objects just disappears off the screen, but renaming it to FingerA makes it reappear. Very disorienting to a beginner, especially since the documentation doesn't do a good job stepping beginners through this type of work flow.

Thanks!

junk.blend1014 KBDownload

Related Objects

Event Timeline

David O'Neil (David_ONeil) created this task.Jan 9 2020, 3:15 AM
Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk) changed the task status from Needs Triage to Needs Information from User.Jan 9 2020, 12:32 PM
Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk) added a subscriber: Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk).

Yeah, there is something strange going on when renaming metaballs [this also happens on duplication].

One thing that usually helps is rectifying the names (in your junk.blend these are not set up the way the families are supposed to -- not your fault, I know, but...), then copy them and paste them into a new file [sometimes copying, deleting and then pasting again also works...], see

junk_corrected.blend553 KBDownload

(however be warned! this is not a magic bullet, sometimes also here weird things happen, like wrong pointers ob object IDs to their mballs...)

The naming/renaming issue is already reported in T66715: Metaball names with digits in the end are invisible (also issue with renaming/duplicating metaballs)

If you create a cylinder and add another cylinder to it, moving it in some direction to make them into two connected cylinders, you can't hit 'Shift' when using the scale gizmo on the second cylinder and scale the second cylinder in the two non-constrained dimensions (ie, trying to change the y and z dims by shift dragging the x handle).

Cannot really reproduce this part of the report.

  • Are you talking about adding a capsule? And adding another capsule in editmode? (if we are talking about capsules in editmode, they only have a SizeX, you cannot change Y & Z...)

Soo, the naming/renaming/duplication issue would really be a duplicate of T66715: Metaball names with digits in the end are invisible (also issue with renaming/duplicating metaballs) (and I would merge these reports), but will wait for an answer regarding the scaling issue...

David O'Neil (David_ONeil) added a comment.Jan 9 2020, 2:39 PM

Fortunately, I had made a screen recording and was able to figure out what was happening on the scaling issue. It is real simple.

Add a metacylinder to your scene. Immediately toggle to edit mode. Bring up the scaling gizmo. You can scale this in the X without shift held down, but it won't do constrained scale with shift held down. This is due to being in edit mode instead of object mode. It feels like a bug, but a case might be made that it is by design? I don't know. I do know that when it first occurred I never realized that whatever I had done had put me in edit mode, and not being able to use the handles made me extremely frustrated because it certainly felt like a bug.

Playing with it more, using a ball, when in edit mode you can't use the X, Y, and Z handles even unshifted.

Hope this helps.

David O'Neil (David_ONeil) added a comment.EditedJan 9 2020, 4:11 PM

OK, have a basic hand done which brings up another bug. With the attached file I can't see any way to mirror the metaball assembly without having the individual metaballs weirdly rotated. All I'm trying to do is mirror it to make it into a left hand instead of a right hand. If they are solidified into real objects first, then they can be mirrored correctly, but that isn't the desire. It would be nice to be able to mirror it as a metaball assy, then pose it, then turn it into real objects, join them, remesh them, and start sculpting.

MetaHand.blend1022 KBDownload

Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk) added a comment.Jan 9 2020, 4:30 PM

Add a metacylinder to your scene. Immediately toggle to edit mode. Bring up the scaling gizmo. You can scale this in the X without shift held down, but it won't do constrained scale with shift held down. This is due to being in edit mode instead of object mode. It feels like a bug, but a case might be made that it is by design? I don't know. I do know that when it first occurred I never realized that whatever I had done had put me in edit mode, and not being able to use the handles made me extremely frustrated because it certainly felt like a bug.

Playing with it more, using a ball, when in edit mode you can't use the X, Y, and Z handles even unshifted.

See my comment above:

  • capsules only allow for changing SizeX with the scale gizmo (because thats the only axis you can do this on)
  • balls have non of these specific axis scaling
  • for both of the above you can still alter radius (red ring selected) and stiffness (green ring selected), but only on all axis at once

So all of this is by design, yes

OK, have a basic hand done which brings up another bug...

Please report this separately, it is not practical chasing multiple issues in one report...

Sooo, since the scaling issue seems to be a "non-bug" afaict (and the other - new - issue should be reported separately), this leaves us with the renaming/duplicating issue, which I will merge into T66715: Metaball names with digits in the end are invisible (also issue with renaming/duplicating metaballs).
Thx for the report again!

Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk) closed this task as a duplicate of T66715: Metaball names with digits in the end are invisible (also issue with renaming/duplicating metaballs).Jan 9 2020, 4:30 PM
David O'Neil (David_ONeil) added a comment.Jan 9 2020, 7:35 PM

So all of this is by design, yes

Has someone already asked for a UI change, to grey out the disabled handles for those that aren't available for the current object? It is annoying to find the gizmo isn't working as expected, because edit mode has been triggered. (No visual clue indicated edit mode activated.) You guys have made HUGE improvements in 2.8, so thank you for that! This change would continue the great trend. (If it hasn't been asked for, do I just open another thread here?)

Please report this separately...

Done!

Thanks!

Philipp Oeser (lichtwerk) added a comment.Jan 9 2020, 8:10 PM

If it hasn't been asked for, do I just open another thread here?

For user requests and feedback, please use other channels: https://wiki.blender.org/wiki/Communication/Contact#User_Feedback_and_Requests

David O'Neil (David_ONeil) added a comment.Jan 9 2020, 8:20 PM

Thanks! Have a great one! (Whatever 'one' is that you want!)