Thank you so much for this tutorial. It's surprisingly hard to find videos talking about modeling in Blender for the purpose of 3D printing your model later.
4:22 Blender supports drag and drop of images onto the 3D viewer, which you can then use a direct 1:1 reference inside of the modeler using orthographic projections in case your reference is really good and a profile sketch. Setting up the reference plane Blender creates to be axis aligned allows for faster copying of the reference with a mesh in front of it, using X-Ray/transparency. Just a different method to help bring in the hand drawn into the digital realm, instead of using the eyes to compare and contrast it turns it into tracing of what you've already created.
This was a great tutorial - I have knowledge of most of these tools but had no idea it could actually be this simple to make minis! I have subscribed for more :)
The auto merge vertices does absolutely nothing with the mirror modifier. The modifier has its own merge setting that needs to be checked (which is checked by default). That, with clipping, is what keeps those vertices connected. The auto merge is for when you move two or more ACTUAL vertices close together.
Nice, I always appreciate seeing other peoples process and honestly i never thought of loop cutting the big faces of the basemesh before subdividing, I'm sure my computer will appreciate it if I stop just spamming the subdivide button and did it the way you did it!
Why on earth would you start by placing a cube in the model's hand? The rest of your model is just going to be in the way while you sculpt. It is so much easier to just make a new object, then scale & rotate it to fit the model later.
Yes, everything that comes included with blender is free, not only are all the pre-installed add-ons free, well they're pre-installed Also a quick little tip if you press in any of the transforms [scale, rotate, translate and extrude (which is just a duplicate link and translate)] if you the shift button And any of x y or z it locks respective axis Blender has non-destructive Boolean modifiers too by the way
@@DiluvianChronicles I don't know how well the Boolean modifiers work... But yeah, and you could do some crazy stuff with geometry nodes too, though that's more advanced than anything you're probably ever going to need If you're only using blender for 3D printing.
@@DiluvianChronicles And they probably aren't really for the type of thing you're doing, but it's really cool some of the like. Procedural models you could make.. And then like any other modifier once you get it to the point where you like it. You can apply it as well...
Does poli count matter much when making minis? If I were to go crazy on details and ended up with a crazy poli count is that going to affect the print at all. Also, what about ngons, will the printer freak out if a face has more than 4 vertices. Same thing with tris, would those cause issues?
polycount doesn't really matter for a finished piece, but if you want to pose it and make multiple versions it can slow things down significantly. Also, as far as I'm aware, ngons don't make a huge difference if they are flat. I have printed plenty of capped off cylinders with no real issues. Be aware however that your polygons will be converted to tris when exporting (I think?) so large ngon panels might end up looking funky.
I love blender to make 3d printable models. Did some stuff for 1/6th Scale. The ONLY thing that annoys me with Blender. Scaling isn't easy. Also. Blenderguru is your FRIEND!
"Great tutorial, let's see if that one model I made a while ago can be printed. I'll just check with the 3D-Print add-on" "Non-Manifold edges: 898" "Bad contig edges: 2934" Well that's gonna be fun to clean up
@@DiluvianChronicles It really was easier tahn I expected! One question tho: the "bad contig edges" number has gone up to 6290. Will that be a problem down the line?
Try recalculating normals. You might have faces on both sides or opposite sides. Make sure each object has all of its faces on the outside. Do you have a lot of separate objects?
@@DiluvianChronicles Yeah, the model is made from about 20 different objects and when I made it I did so without the bool tool. I'll try to recalculate them later and say how it went!. Thank you so far for helping me!
i previously made a model rigged for animation and i wanted to know if the topology need to be all in one mesh, or can the meshes just be joined together? the heads are joined to the model but are not the same mesh. i also wondered if the same thing applied to clothing.
Thank you! If they are part of the same object then yes. After some experimenting, I have found you can overlap separate objects and export them together as a single stl, but each object needs to be manifold, including overlapping/double faces and stray verts. That said the repair tools on some slicers are getting pretty good, so you might be able to get away with it
@@DiluvianChronicles thanks for the reply! Do you generally pose the model first before combining everything? Or do you usually combine first and then pose?
@@MCHammer0000 I typically keep clothing and armor separate until the end. They don't always follow the armature quite how I want, so I can adjust them at the end once I have the pose set. (Make sure to make a backup copy first though!)
Its a long process. I learned just from watching some videos and lots and lots of practice. Don't let it get you down when things look off, just power through, get to a decent point and try again. just like drawing!
I've never tried fusion, but my understanding is that its better for more hard surface modeling. I'm so used to blender at this point it might be hard to switch, though!
@@DiluvianChronicles Awesome 🤗 I am just completely new, so everything is confusing. Blender doesn’t have any official support so I’m dependent on awesome people like you that spends their precious time trying to help newbs like myself 😅 Thank you for your help. I appreciate it. I will subscribe and check in the future if there’s more good stuff. 👍
My printer is down hard. Wasted $1000 on a printer thanks to a blob forming and wrecking everything it hardened around. Well, it was fun while it lasted.
@@DiluvianChronicles Yep, fdm. My printer has wires exposed to any kind of blob forming, which got surrounded by it. In trying to fix it the wires broke away from the sensors, which were sealed due to the blob. I did find that someone created a 'sock' that sort of protects parts. I think non-stick electrical tape might work, but not sure how it would handle the heat. The only thing I've heard about resin catastrophes is if the the FEP tears and the liquid resin runs in the screen or printer. We're in the Wild West of this relatively new tech, so there's always something exciting happening... ;)
@@samualwilliamson1187 oh man! I have been considering an fdm printer to try out some larger prints but that sounds rough! And I am nervous about the sheet breaking but I think the worst case would be getting some resin on the glass. You are right about the wild west though!
@@DiluvianChronicles The sheets are usually spring steel, which allows for bending to help remove the creation. FDM (PLA anyway) is pretty tidy. It does require babysitting, at least until you are confident that it won't detach due to too much cooling or other factors. I might try a glue stick to help. There are ways to remove blobs, but they don't always work, especially if the blob got in and around the wires, housing, etc. It's like someone pouring cement on the steering column of your car. I'll get it running again. If you do decide to get an fdm printer, I suggest a Creality Ender model. You can buy one for less than a 1/3 of a Prusa. They both use many of the same parts.
It’s a decent tutorial but you didn’t explain how to do the steps just showed doing them, like when you resized the cube, you didn’t say what you clicked on to get that window.
@@DiluvianChronicles ok cool, I really look forward to it. Thanks for the tutorial. I just bought a resin printer and am really excited and overwhelmed.
Thank you so much for this tutorial. It's surprisingly hard to find videos talking about modeling in Blender for the purpose of 3D printing your model later.
I'm glad you liked it!
4:22 Blender supports drag and drop of images onto the 3D viewer, which you can then use a direct 1:1 reference inside of the modeler using orthographic projections in case your reference is really good and a profile sketch. Setting up the reference plane Blender creates to be axis aligned allows for faster copying of the reference with a mesh in front of it, using X-Ray/transparency. Just a different method to help bring in the hand drawn into the digital realm, instead of using the eyes to compare and contrast it turns it into tracing of what you've already created.
Didn't realize! Thank you!
There are so few blender 3d printable videos thank you for this.
Thank you for watching! I'm still learning myself so glad to help!
This was a great tutorial - I have knowledge of most of these tools but had no idea it could actually be this simple to make minis! I have subscribed for more :)
Thank you for watching! I hope you make something great!
Oh my gosh, thanks so much for this tutorial! This is going to be so useful for actually getting your hands dirty.
I'm glad I could help!
Nice tutorial with good pacing and over all production.
Thank you!
Thanks for providing the example scale stls! I was working on a base mesh of my own, and your model made it easy to scale appropriately.
No problem! I'm glad it helped!
Thanks, very useful as I get started. Have bounced off of learning Blender a couple times. Trying again.
Don't give up! It definitely has a learning curve. I bounced off myself a few times. But once you get used to it it's very rewarding!
Love and Appreciation for giving out that huge information !
You are so welcome! Thank you for watching!
Please more vids on this topic!
Don't worry! I have another coming soon 😁
The auto merge vertices does absolutely nothing with the mirror modifier. The modifier has its own merge setting that needs to be checked (which is checked by default). That, with clipping, is what keeps those vertices connected. The auto merge is for when you move two or more ACTUAL vertices close together.
Blender is such a good software, I really don't know why more people don't use it.
agreed!
U.I.
Thanks Gru!
lol
Nice, I always appreciate seeing other peoples process and honestly i never thought of loop cutting the big faces of the basemesh before subdividing, I'm sure my computer will appreciate it if I stop just spamming the subdivide button and did it the way you did it!
Hahaha! I know that feeling! My first few models would screech my PC to a halt while posing.
Why on earth would you start by placing a cube in the model's hand? The rest of your model is just going to be in the way while you sculpt. It is so much easier to just make a new object, then scale & rotate it to fit the model later.
🤓☝️ this is what you sound like
You can lock out an axis by pressing shift and the axis you don't want to scale on
Oh nice! I didn't know that. Good advice!
Yes, everything that comes included with blender is free, not only are all the pre-installed add-ons free, well they're pre-installed
Also a quick little tip if you press in any of the transforms [scale, rotate, translate and extrude (which is just a duplicate link and translate)] if you the shift button And any of x y or z it locks respective axis
Blender has non-destructive Boolean modifiers too by the way
Nice tips! Thank you!
@@DiluvianChronicles I don't know how well the Boolean modifiers work... But yeah, and you could do some crazy stuff with geometry nodes too, though that's more advanced than anything you're probably ever going to need If you're only using blender for 3D printing.
Agreed. I have put off getting into geometry nodes because they haven't really seemed necessary yet.
@@DiluvianChronicles And they probably aren't really for the type of thing you're doing, but it's really cool some of the like. Procedural models you could make.. And then like any other modifier once you get it to the point where you like it. You can apply it as well...
But yeah you can implement full-on particle systems in Geo nodes...
Does poli count matter much when making minis? If I were to go crazy on details and ended up with a crazy poli count is that going to affect the print at all. Also, what about ngons, will the printer freak out if a face has more than 4 vertices. Same thing with tris, would those cause issues?
polycount doesn't really matter for a finished piece, but if you want to pose it and make multiple versions it can slow things down significantly. Also, as far as I'm aware, ngons don't make a huge difference if they are flat. I have printed plenty of capped off cylinders with no real issues. Be aware however that your polygons will be converted to tris when exporting (I think?) so large ngon panels might end up looking funky.
I love blender to make 3d printable models. Did some stuff for 1/6th Scale. The ONLY thing that annoys me with Blender. Scaling isn't easy.
Also. Blenderguru is your FRIEND!
Oh I have definitely been taking tips from Blenderguru. Maybe not enough though!
somehow, i cant delete vertices and apply the mirror mod correctly. what am i doing wrong? maybe selecting before deleting vertices?
Make sure you aren't deleting the vertices in the middle. These will become the centerline
"Great tutorial, let's see if that one model I made a while ago can be printed. I'll just check with the 3D-Print add-on"
"Non-Manifold edges: 898"
"Bad contig edges: 2934"
Well that's gonna be fun to clean up
Hahahaha I feel that. A lot of it can be cleaned up easily though, especially if it's just some extra duplicate geometry.
@@DiluvianChronicles It really was easier tahn I expected! One question tho: the "bad contig edges" number has gone up to 6290. Will that be a problem down the line?
Try recalculating normals. You might have faces on both sides or opposite sides. Make sure each object has all of its faces on the outside. Do you have a lot of separate objects?
@@DiluvianChronicles Yeah, the model is made from about 20 different objects and when I made it I did so without the bool tool. I'll try to recalculate them later and say how it went!. Thank you so far for helping me!
No problem! Good luck and let me know how it goes!
i previously made a model rigged for animation and i wanted to know if the topology need to be all in one mesh, or can the meshes just be joined together? the heads are joined to the model but are not the same mesh. i also wondered if the same thing applied to clothing.
Good question. Yes, the whole STL has to be a single unbroken mesh, including clothing. You may be able to just remesh it to fix that though.
Great video! Do you also need to fix intersecting faces?
Thank you!
If they are part of the same object then yes. After some experimenting, I have found you can overlap separate objects and export them together as a single stl, but each object needs to be manifold, including overlapping/double faces and stray verts. That said the repair tools on some slicers are getting pretty good, so you might be able to get away with it
@@DiluvianChronicles thanks for the reply! Do you generally pose the model first before combining everything? Or do you usually combine first and then pose?
@@MCHammer0000 I typically keep clothing and armor separate until the end. They don't always follow the armature quite how I want, so I can adjust them at the end once I have the pose set. (Make sure to make a backup copy first though!)
Where Stl export ?
Brilliant
Thank you!
Are those printed with resin printer?
yup! an elegoo mars 2
What kind of printer do you use.
I use an Elegoo Mars 2 resin printer. It works great! Although there are now some higher resolution options I have been eyeing.
how do i get from the cube to a full body person???
Its a long process. I learned just from watching some videos and lots and lots of practice. Don't let it get you down when things look off, just power through, get to a decent point and try again. just like drawing!
Today on slime on the scene
I feel like fusion would better suit this kind of workflow. Personally, I think I'd rather sculpt something like that.
I've never tried fusion, but my understanding is that its better for more hard surface modeling. I'm so used to blender at this point it might be hard to switch, though!
There were a lot of things you didn’t show how to do, you just said to do it. 🤔 I guess I just have to find another video
It's true. Mostly intended as motivation rather than a thorough guide. working on a new series soon!
@@DiluvianChronicles
Awesome 🤗
I am just completely new, so everything is confusing. Blender doesn’t have any official support so I’m dependent on awesome people like you that spends their precious time trying to help newbs like myself 😅
Thank you for your help. I appreciate it. I will subscribe and check in the future if there’s more good stuff. 👍
My printer is down hard. Wasted $1000 on a printer thanks to a blob forming and wrecking everything it hardened around. Well, it was fun while it lasted.
Oof. That hurts. Was it FDM? I haven't had many issues like that with my resin printer.
@@DiluvianChronicles Yep, fdm. My printer has wires exposed to any kind of blob forming, which got surrounded by it. In trying to fix it the wires broke away from the sensors, which were sealed due to the blob. I did find that someone created a 'sock' that sort of protects parts. I think non-stick electrical tape might work, but not sure how it would handle the heat.
The only thing I've heard about resin catastrophes is if the the FEP tears and the liquid resin runs in the screen or printer. We're in the Wild West of this relatively new tech, so there's always something exciting happening... ;)
@@samualwilliamson1187 oh man! I have been considering an fdm printer to try out some larger prints but that sounds rough!
And I am nervous about the sheet breaking but I think the worst case would be getting some resin on the glass.
You are right about the wild west though!
@@DiluvianChronicles The sheets are usually spring steel, which allows for bending to help remove the creation. FDM (PLA anyway) is pretty tidy. It does require babysitting, at least until you are confident that it won't detach due to too much cooling or other factors. I might try a glue stick to help. There are ways to remove blobs, but they don't always work, especially if the blob got in and around the wires, housing, etc. It's like someone pouring cement on the steering column of your car.
I'll get it running again.
If you do decide to get an fdm printer, I suggest a Creality Ender model. You can buy one for less than a 1/3 of a Prusa. They both use many of the same parts.
I was eyeing the ender printers. They seem to have a very good cost:detail ratio. I may need to get a larger studio first though haaha
It’s a decent tutorial but you didn’t explain how to do the steps just showed doing them, like when you resized the cube, you didn’t say what you clicked on to get that window.
definitely not as clear as I should have been. planning a more in depth one soon!
@@DiluvianChronicles ok cool, I really look forward to it. Thanks for the tutorial. I just bought a resin printer and am really excited and overwhelmed.
haha I understand the feeling! I taught myself everything so you can too! don't worry!