WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.010 --> 00:00:02.520 Okay, welcome to chapter two. 2 00:00:02.520 --> 00:00:06.480 In this chapter, I want to show you a few different things that you can do to customize 3 00:00:06.480 --> 00:00:09.240 Blender to fit your workflow. 4 00:00:09.240 --> 00:00:12.800 Since you already are familiar with other applications or are likely familiar with other 5 00:00:12.800 --> 00:00:17.820 applications, there's a very good chance that you already have a preferred interface layout, 6 00:00:17.820 --> 00:00:22.680 some preferred hotkeys, and by customizing some things in Blender, it will allow you 7 00:00:22.680 --> 00:00:24.840 to get up to speed faster. 8 00:00:24.840 --> 00:00:28.040 So the first thing I'm going to show you is how to customize the Blender interface. 9 00:00:28.080 --> 00:00:31.420 So luckily, Blender's interface is very, very customizable. 10 00:00:31.420 --> 00:00:32.960 We can use any layout we wish. 11 00:00:32.960 --> 00:00:37.920 We can switch between quad view and regular view or any other number of things. 12 00:00:37.920 --> 00:00:42.000 So the first thing to understand is windows inside Blender. 13 00:00:42.000 --> 00:00:44.680 Windows not in the normal sense of a different window. 14 00:00:44.680 --> 00:00:50.000 There's no floating windows in Blender, but window types in Blender are every single one 15 00:00:50.000 --> 00:00:51.280 of these panels. 16 00:00:51.280 --> 00:00:55.000 Every single one of these panels, including the viewport, the outliner, the properties 17 00:00:55.000 --> 00:01:00.280 panel, and the timeline, and even the top header bar right here, each one of these are 18 00:01:00.280 --> 00:01:02.000 different window types. 19 00:01:02.000 --> 00:01:06.440 And you can change the window type of any active view by using the icon in the bottom 20 00:01:06.440 --> 00:01:07.440 left corner. 21 00:01:07.440 --> 00:01:11.640 So if you choose this icon here, you'll notice that we then have all of our different editor 22 00:01:11.640 --> 00:01:13.880 or window types that we wish to choose from. 23 00:01:13.880 --> 00:01:17.880 So if we wanted to switch the 3D viewport over to the graph editor for our animation 24 00:01:17.880 --> 00:01:20.200 curves, we can simply change that. 25 00:01:20.200 --> 00:01:24.140 Or if we want to change our timeline over to the dope sheet, we can change that. 26 00:01:24.140 --> 00:01:28.980 So any one of these can be changed to any view that we wish. 27 00:01:28.980 --> 00:01:33.660 If you want to add multiple views, so let's say if we want to do a dual viewport layout 28 00:01:33.660 --> 00:01:38.500 here or maybe one side we want an image editor and the other side we want the viewport. 29 00:01:38.500 --> 00:01:40.300 There's two different ways you can do that. 30 00:01:40.300 --> 00:01:44.980 One is to use the split handles that you'll find at the bottom left right here and top 31 00:01:44.980 --> 00:01:47.340 right of every single window. 32 00:01:47.340 --> 00:01:51.360 If you just hover your mouse over these and then left click and drag in the direction 33 00:01:51.360 --> 00:01:52.360 that you wish to split. 34 00:01:52.360 --> 00:01:56.480 So in this case, if I want to split this view here and I use the top right handle, 35 00:01:56.480 --> 00:02:01.800 I can just left click and drag and draw across there and it will split that view duplicating 36 00:02:01.800 --> 00:02:04.780 whichever region that I currently used. 37 00:02:04.780 --> 00:02:07.040 So now I have two separate viewports. 38 00:02:07.040 --> 00:02:11.640 Each one of these are independent, but of course show the exact same content. 39 00:02:11.640 --> 00:02:16.200 If I then change this view over to the UV image editor, I then have two different views 40 00:02:16.200 --> 00:02:19.540 that again I can use for different purposes. 41 00:02:19.560 --> 00:02:23.560 The other way to split views, let's just assume for a moment that I wanted to get a graph 42 00:02:23.560 --> 00:02:28.960 editor in here, is to hover your mouse over the dividing bar between those views until 43 00:02:28.960 --> 00:02:33.300 you have the double ended arrow and then you can simply right click and choose split area 44 00:02:33.300 --> 00:02:34.300 or join area. 45 00:02:34.300 --> 00:02:39.400 So if I choose split area, I'll get a new line and allows me to move where I wish before 46 00:02:39.400 --> 00:02:40.400 splitting. 47 00:02:40.400 --> 00:02:44.560 If you wish to change the orientation, just middle click and it will change the direction 48 00:02:44.560 --> 00:02:45.960 of the split. 49 00:02:45.960 --> 00:02:50.400 When you're ready to split, just left click and you now have two views again, again which 50 00:02:50.400 --> 00:02:52.760 you can then change the type. 51 00:02:52.760 --> 00:02:57.540 If you want to merge these back together, so if I want to just get back to one view, 52 00:02:57.540 --> 00:03:01.480 I can either use the handles here again or by right clicking. 53 00:03:01.480 --> 00:03:05.200 So if I wanted to use the handles, the way that you do it is you drag towards the window 54 00:03:05.200 --> 00:03:06.660 that you want to merge into. 55 00:03:06.660 --> 00:03:11.060 So if I want to merge into this view, I'm going to click and drag here, left click up 56 00:03:11.060 --> 00:03:12.280 and I'll get an overlay arrow. 57 00:03:12.280 --> 00:03:16.080 At this point, I could actually reverse the direction but I'll just go ahead and confirm 58 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:19.960 over that and I'll just release my mouse and it will merge those two together. 59 00:03:19.960 --> 00:03:23.120 The other way to do it is by right clicking with the double ended arrow, I right click 60 00:03:23.120 --> 00:03:27.640 and choose join area and then you can choose which one you want to merge over. 61 00:03:27.640 --> 00:03:31.440 So I'll just merge over here, giving me back to my 3D view. 62 00:03:31.440 --> 00:03:35.760 Now once you're done customizing this, you want to go ahead and save your defaults. 63 00:03:35.760 --> 00:03:40.040 The way that you can do this is by going up to file and save user settings. 64 00:03:40.040 --> 00:03:45.400 The one thing to be aware of at this point in Blender 2.63, now I'm actually using a 65 00:03:45.400 --> 00:03:52.520 release candidate since this will be available very soon, but in Blender 2.63, any scene 66 00:03:52.520 --> 00:03:56.800 that you currently have up will also be saved in your default settings. 67 00:03:56.800 --> 00:04:01.280 So if you had an active scene that you are working on here and you go to file, save user 68 00:04:01.280 --> 00:04:05.700 settings, that scene will then become your default file that will be loaded anytime you 69 00:04:05.700 --> 00:04:07.980 create a new file or open Blender. 70 00:04:07.980 --> 00:04:12.120 So anytime you change these settings or to set your defaults, you're going to want to 71 00:04:12.120 --> 00:04:17.060 load up a default scene first and then change your settings and save your user settings.