An introduction to blender 3D software interface

In this article, you will be able to learn the introduction to blender 3D software interface. Knowing the blender software interface will get you familiar with blender software and boost your interest.

If you take a look at the above blender interface picture, you will notice that blender software was structured and arranged in different windows. In which it has:

  1. Tool Shelf
  2. 3D window
  3. Properties
  4. Outliner window
  5. Properties window
  6. Timeline window
  7. Window header
  8. Window footer

Tool Shelf

The Tool Shelf displays the information/settings of both follow-come addons and the user installed addons, in which the addons are represented by several tabs at one side of the Tool Shelf. The more addon you added/install, the more the tab you will have at the side of your tool shelf.

3D window

The 3D window is the main window where your major activities are performed. It is like a workshop, in which the other windows are like the workshop store room.

The 3D window comprises:

  • Lamp – to light the scene
  • Camera – to record the scene
  • Default cube – object to manipulate
  • Coordinate system – to give magnitude and direction to both your scene and your objects
  • The grid floor (graph) – representation of units and dimensions

You may be wondering why blender software do load lamp, camera and a cube as default. It is so because it symbolizes the scenario of how God created the light to separate darkness, in which the camera symbolizes the eyes we use to see.

To change the default cube and other objects in the scene, Go to ‘Add

Properties

The properties (can be toggled by pressing ‘N’ on your keyboard) comprises of part of Properties Window and other windows. From the properties, you can do part of transformation setting, part of camera setting, grid floor setting, 3D view setting, and others. It also displays part of addon.

Outliner Window

The Outliner window displays everything you have on your scene in terms of parent-children relationship. The ‘Scene’ is the parent, while the other objects below it are its children.

At the front of each objects is the

  • 3D view visibility on/off – to disable an object visibility in 3D view but visible during rendering.
  • Object selection on/off – to disable an object selection in 3D view. It can be applied if you want to exclude an object while doing batch selection.
  • Render visibility on/off – to hide an object from rendering but visible in 3D view.

Note: You can create many scenes at the ‘Window Header’ by clicking on the ‘+’ sign, depending on what you are aiming at. At the header of the ‘Outliner window’ is an options to toggle the visibilities of the objects you wish to display in your Outliner window.

Properties Window

In the ‘Properties window’, the properties window header comprises of: Render tab, Scene tab, World tab, Object tab, Object Constraint tab, Modifiers tab, Object data tab, Materials tab, Textures tab, Particles tab, and Physics tab.

The Render Tab

The ‘Render Tab’ is unique among all the tabs in the ‘Properties Window’ because the settings in the Render tab varies depending on the ‘Render Engine’ selected at the ‘Window Header’. You have the option to choose the Render Engine of your choice at the Window Header.

Timeline Window

The ‘Timeline Window’ is the summary of your animation. It is used to preview the animation, set keyframes, set markers, and to set the duration of the animation.

Window Footer

The ‘Window Footer’ is embedded with a lot of tab like Section selection mode, view settings, selection settings, add objects, objects settings, object mode options, display options, pivot options, coordinate system settings, layer options, proportional editing setting, snapping settings, and others.

Window Header

Window header consist of File settings, part of Render settings, window properties, Help, Section selection mode, scene tab, render engine selection tab, and information about your blender software versions and information about the objects in your 3D scene.

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