Menus and Window Screens in Blender

David AultAdrian Kirts

Jarron Sledge

The Space Menu

• Open by pressing the space bar• This is it

Options

• The Space menu allows you to:– Search for missing files– Add new objects– Create parent/child relationships– Join objects– Import objects– Or use any other Blender command you could need– There are 200+ commands you can use by using the

space menu

Context Sensitive Menus

• Some menus only available in certain situations

• Specials menu (W) key is only available in a 3d window while in edit mode

• While using Blender, remember what mode is on so you know which hotkeys work

Panel Uses• Panels can have multiple menus grouped

together on them making for easier location of tools

Panels

• This is a panel

Panels contd.

• Panels can be scrolled, zoomed in/ out or moved

• They can also be collapsed by clicking the solid black triangle on the left side of their header

Toggle Buttons• Toggle buttons are a bunch of tick boxes

Addons

• Addons (add-ons) are mini programs that can be downloaded and used on Blender

• Addons can include: Curve Character, Mangle Tools, Orphan Cleanup, Random Face Color, and Particle Tracer

How to install an addon

• Open the space menu• Search addons• Select install addons

Cascade Buttons

• Some buttons reveal additional buttons• Ie: the ramps panel has a button called ramp

reveals additional buttons dealing with colorbanding

Window Screens and Layouts• Default screen shows 4 windows

– 3d view, object tools, timeline and outliner• Animation

– Allows you to make objects move• Compositing

– Combine different parts of scenes• Game logic

– Create controls to your game• Scripting

– Make objects perform certain actions• UV editing

– Insert pictures and graphics

Screen selectors

Adding a new screen

• Click the add button(+) and a new frame layout and a new frame layout will be created based on your current layout. You don’t have to name all the screens if don’t need to.

Add screen

Deleting screens

• The person is able to delete a screen by using the delete data block button(X).

Rearranging a layout screen

• Use the window controls to access the frame borders, split and consolidate windows. When you find a layout that you like, please press CtrlU to update your user defaults. Be careful as all the current scenes become part of those defaults.