As many of you might already have seen in the daily builds of Blender 2.8, we have been working on a new toolbar and widget system for Blender. I thought it would be a good idea to tell you why, and what our plans are.
The Goals
We set out with a few goals that we wanted to achieve for the tools & widgets:
- We want more consistency across the various Blender modes.
- We want to allow for manipulator widgets for many more tools – not just for Move, Rotate, Scale.
- We want to make it possible to use Blender in a more visual way, not just via shortcuts.
- We want to sweat the details, and set a higher bar for the fit and finish of the tools interface. Using tools should be slick, gratifying and pleasant.
- Very important: We are committed to keeping Blender’s efficient keyboard-focused workflow.
The problems
- As many people have no doubt experienced, our old toolbar never really worked well. In Blender 2.79 and earlier, try and hit the Translate button in the toolbar to move your object. It basically doesn’t work, because it immediately starts interpreting your cursor movement as input, and so you can’t move objects to the left. Same goes for many of the other tools. We want to fix that.
- We also have been lacking consistency in how we tackle the kinds of tools that users want to stay active, such as Grease Pencil tools, Sculpt tools, Paint tools and so on. These have been working in various different ways that were incompatible with one another, and we would like to unify and streamline the way these kinds of tools work.
- The old toolbar used up a lot of screen space. We want to make sure that the UI chrome always defers to the user-created content, and doesn’t take up unnecessary room.
The Design
We’ve landed on a design which doesn’t disrupt Blender’s beloved hotkey-oriented workflow, while still allowing the use of widgets for many tools. We are building something that can work in a consistent way in all of Blender’s modes, and we will have a toolbar that is both slimmer, while being more communicative.
Here’s a sneak peek of what we are working on:
Here you can see the new toolbar vs the old one. The new one is simpler and takes up much less screen space. The old toolbar mainly replicated commands that were already present in the menus, and most of it was not necessary.
As you can see, we have a way to either display the toolbar as a single icon row, as a dual-column row, or as icon+text:

Here are a few examples of the toolbar in various modes:

Icons designed by Aslam Cader
Technical note: the side bar is still a complete region in Blender, which is being drawn transparent here, but it can be made solid as well to give a different looks.
The tool settings are now in the top bar. This has many advantages: It allows us to have active tools in more than just the 3D View, and it can still keep working even if you hide the toolbar completely. Here are some examples of the top bar with various tool settings:

A few examples of widgets we are working on for various tools:
We are still working on it, but we feel confident we can build something that is consistent, easy and delightful, while not hampering or conflicting with the Blender’s famous hotkey driven workflow.
Most of the development work is being done by Campbell Barton, who knows Blender’s tools and code in and out. Icons are designed by Aslam Cader, and I am working on the user interface. We are very excited about this project, and we all can’t wait to finish this stuff so we can give it to you, our users.
Cheers
William Reynish
Important note: Blender 2.8 is work in progress. What you see in the daily builds of Blender 2.8 is not finished. Many parts are still half done or not done at all.
i like toolbar icon and topbar icon have color like in this page it very good but now blender2.8 have only flat icon
3dview topbar icon color is need for new user it help user see vertice ,edge ,face select and transform orientations easy
dose any one have 2.8version with color like in this send to me please
[email protected]
Despite blenders awesome new features UI/UX really sucks and is step back to 1.49 uncomfortable UI.. Very regresive workflow… Old tool bar was more useful than a drop down menus to use single option like smooth or remove duplicate vertex. Transformation manipulators was better next to vertex edge and polygon selection. Overal it looks like it is made for newbies not for proffesionals. Nodes was useful more when they was all i nthe same place, why separate shader group? It is just minor things i can critisize, many of anoying changes are already complained by other people.
Seghier: There’s a proof of concept tool called Add Cube in the toolbar. This is still a bit wonky, but later on we can add all the object types there and create a much nicer way to drag inside the viewport to add new objects.
Where is the toolbar of objects ? It is the most important thing
pablo: Those icons didn’t work well at small sizes, were too complex, could not be themed, used too much geometry and were hard to extend down the road.
gd: You can still use shortcuts as you could before. The only difference is that now it’s actually possible to use Blender without the shortcuts. Some users use devices without keyboards, and for occasional users, learning all the shortcuts wasn’t worth it. But for veteran users, you can continue to use shortcuts as before.
Shane: The gizmos are part of the tool. Simply switch to the Transform tool and keep it on. You can even save this configuration as your default if you want.
Two things from a Blender amateur:
1. I already miss the gizoms being “on” by default from 2.7. I dislike having to go the extra step of opening the toolbar and selecting “move” to make the gizmos appear. A “classic auto gizmo” option in the user preferences would be great.
2. “a” selects/deselects all but it seemed to have changed in 2.8 to “a” to select all and “aa” to deselect all. Another great user preference option would be “single click a for select/deselect all”.
Both of these things are very minor, but they both introduce extra steps into my workflow. Cheers on all your hard work on Blender!
I won’t be downloading Blender 2.8. It appears to be taking a lot of the things I hate about Maya and forcing them onto a program that used to be much better, which I find highly disappointing because it looks like Blender 2.8 will have some pretty cool features that I was looking forward to trying out until I saw the new interface.
The actuality icons it’s in my opinion bad choice.
Back to the old version publishing on header to this page.
the first icons for blender 2.8 it’s pice of art!
There seems to be some confusion. The last comments make it sound like you can no longer use hotkeys to execute actions or tools. This is not the case.
I really really hope there will be an option, like a separate mode – at least somewhere down the road – to use something similar to 2.79 UI / controls. They may be not perfect, but this dumbed down version with few bloated “beginner-friendly” icons and messed up hotkeys and workflow is truly terrifying.
here comes the inevitable watering down of, and mediocracy of the blender interface… just so that it can be more comfortable to the beginners. hate it when an incredibly intelligent tool gets dumbed down to cater to the lcd. too bad.
Changing the position of some toolbars is now so unintuitive that I had to look for some options for a few moments.
Soon all programs of this type will have the same interface. AutoCad, 3DsMax, Revit, Maya etc. – the same childish icons…
Please keep the old interface as an option. The kids will be able to play with the buttons and the pros will not waste time learning this sucking interface.
To those worried that you won’t be able to use hotkeys in 2.8: Don’t worry, there will still be hotkeys like before. E key will still extrude, and so on.
Hey Guys, You people are doing a splendid job keep going. Waiting for this exiting software update
I realize the last post may have sounded too complainy, so instead I’ll ask for help.
I am used to speed modeling using primarily keyboard shortcuts and rarely use click buttons.
What is the new way to keep doing that if basic shortcuts are now removed?
For example the new method is 3x slower:
Enter/Exit Edit Mode BL2.7 = Tab
Enter/Exit Edit Mode BL2.8 = Tab > Popup Wheel > Click on Mode
Display between Wireframe/Shaded BL2.7 = Z key
Display between Wireframe/Shaded BL2.8 = select the object that you want to view in wireframe and enter Edit Mode > Overlays option at the 3D View header > Hidden Wires > Disable the Limit selection to visible > Repeat
Extrude BL2.7 = Click Vertex, Edge, or Face > E key
Extrude BL2.8 = Click Vertex, Edge, or Face > T menu > Click Extrude button
Etc…
Whether I’m using a mouse or a pen tablet/touchscreen, click editing is slower by a factor of 3x.
I like everything else you guys did with the update so far feature wise, even combining redundant UI menus or placing elements into the same section.
But the removal of known shortcuts or viewing modes completely wrecks speed modeling for me.
Can someone please enlighten or educate me (if they have the time) on how to model entirely with shortcut keys in BL2.8, or how to re-enable these shortcuts myself?
Thanks.
Sorry but I hate the new interface. I have been testing it and it slows down the workflow. I am used to working with keyboard shortcuts to instantly edit instead of button clicking crayon buttons. This is why I chose Blender over Maya, because it is much faster to model this way than the old 90s icon modeling method. Pushing tab to go in and out of edit mode now I get a slow in between Maya mode selection wheel from hell. Pushing z to quickly cycle between wireframe mode, now I get blurry xray mode instead making it slower to select vertexes.
Meanwhile the new cycles and eevee engines render beautifully fast and better materials than modo and arnold.
Please dont turn blender into maya, or get into the microsoft school constant and redundant UI changes.
I’ve been with you since 1.0 at NAN and these children’s buttons mode sucks.
I fully agree!
Will we have the option to turn off these cursors and use the current UI or will 2.8 users have to relearn the entire interface?
22233
Glad to see that Blender is updating their GUI! It is a much needed update. Judging from the talent of the people involved and the work you’ve done in the past this is going to be awesome!
I like what you are showing here, but what gets me really confused as a user is the inconsistency between the different windows that pop up using the various shortcuts, specifically {space} {ctrl+a} {shift+a} {u} ….I really do not want to suggest something that messes with existing workflows so could I make a suggestion to use {space} as a general command pulling functionality?
Why not apply transforms, add objects, uv unwrap etc…when pressing {space}? Keep existing shortcuts as they are but append all the existing tools into one search bar that pops up (as it does now) using space. You can even have content aware results, so if I am on the modeling environment I can add a primitive sphere but when I am on the nodes editor I can add an output node etc…
This is a very common pattern see also: Autocad/Rhino3D.
Thank you for reading it. Just my two cents.
Hey I know this is a long shot, but would it be possible in 2.8 to add a toggle to turn off rounded button corners, it is the one and only gripe I have with blender haha. Makes it look childish in my opinion. Keep up the amazing work guys and gals.
File>User Preferences>’Widget Toolbar/Editor’
Create a mockup of Startup Interface, tailor made by individual user… up to and including widget placement (allowing a user to set tools to header,footer, sidebar L, or Right or any combination)
Think of word processors with the ability to modify visible buttons and customise thier placement. Or your Desktop screen….
Amazing work, this facelift and function enhancement does Blender really well and makes it more likeable for me as a Cinema 4D user.
I have never quite made the leap from Cinema4D to Blender but it is getting better and better
I also would enjoy it if Blender had better descriptions when hovering over a tool for a while, instead of a Python location of the component. On top of that, it would be great to have the hotkey (combo) (if there is one configured) also show with the description, so that we can know how to do something without having to click it if it’s applicable. Part of the difficulty in learning these things is that there is no indication from the UI how to get to it, unless you find it in the spacebar menu or one of the dropdown menu options in the head or foot of the viewport, and occasionally, some options don’t show up in those places. As someone who is learning how to use Blender every time he opens it, it would enable newer students of the industry or just to Blender be able to adjust to efficient workflows Blender has.
I’m torn on the idea of also being able to switch which panel you’re focused on (instead of only what the mouse is hovering over at that moment) so that you can quickly switch to the properties panel from the 3D viewport. On the one hand, having it allows you to switch & tab through the entire UI/Properties panel to get to the thing you want, and when that panel is active, you can use the hotkeys for that panel. On the other hand, you could be disrupting the workflow in order to do it. I’m not sure how it would work exactly, but that is something that I wish was an option.
On the subject of key combinations, I wouldn’t mind a multi key-combination UI of sorts. I know in my experience in web development, I have enjoyed key combinations on top of another key combination (such as in the Visual Studio family of products, there are several key combinations that only start another set or mode of key combinations (e.g. CTRL + K, which then allows you to press CTRL + C right after to comment out a line or selected lines of code, as well as CTRL + K and CTRL + U to uncomment)). Since many who work in Blender aren’t code-oriented, however, having a very small piece of UI in the footer of the application to let you know you’re in a different mode doesn’t really help. If there was a multi-stage key combination like that implemented, there would have to be some UI to match it, something noticeable and also useful, such as all of the secondary options (if there are few enough) or some popular suggestions (or recent suggestions) of secondary options. ESC would in that case be used to escape the extra key sequence just like a lot of other operations in the Blender interface.
Thanks for the wonderful post information, very useful guide.
Blender is the best modelling suite. But only one have to get adapted to its key topology.
Right key to select,…
What will be the expected size of setup / package of upcoming blender 2.8 ?
Only that is the size what matters. 2.79 and other older verson setups are less than 100mb, by seeing this users think that this is a lol software. And compared to others like maya/3ds which has >1GB setup size.
Whatever- till today blender is my favourate and best 3-D suite. and I SUPPORT IT. Blender can easily beat Maya; that i believe.
Do you agree friends??
The low size is a super plus to Blender in my opinion. Blender can do all this with +- 100mb. I show a model to my friend (who is a 3DSMax user) directly on my pen drive and he was amazed: Blender only 100mb!? And doesn’t need to be installed!? whoa!
I love the changes, but the colors of those icons are all over the place. Should be toned way down if you want people to be able to actually use it without seeing rainbows.
I don´t think so Kristian, I work with Cinema 4D and the icons are similar and it works well…
Can I still used 2.7x interface in blender 2.8? just eevee, not need more, the whole ui is very discordant
This is amazing.
newbies need an intuitive and easy to grasp UI.
this will Bring Soooo many new guys to the blender realm and the industry will have to accept blender.
Great move devs.
im 100% behind you on this
It’s easier to read text the button than to guess what the icon means. I’m against icons. Simplicity should dominate. Steve Jobs was a genius, because he knew how to make complex things easy to use. Skeuomorphism is already in the past, and children’s skeuomorphism is even worse.
3D Cursor
Why don’t you treat the 3D cursor as almost a normal point-like scene object: you can translate, rotate, even scale it with the standard transform tools, drag, drop and hide it from the Scene as a normal object with the exception that it is a 3D cursor and you cannot delete it. This will make it much more easier to manipulate.
First off I really like the GUI and improvements being made, I do however an issue with three of the icons.
The translate, rotate and scale toolbar icons aren’t very clear as to what they are. I feel that they could be improved to follow a more ‘standard’ design, where you have an object and simplified control widget as the icon.
This would make them instantly identifiable and as a user I’d know what they do, but currently they look like icons for wind direction, boolean and extrude.
What a circus. Baby UI, large and multi-colored elements. When strictness and brevity as Lightwave?
https://docs.lightwave3d.com/download/attachments/1859661/2018-LW2018.0.2_Modeler.png
newbies need something easy.
blender needs more and more people to join.
im sure devs will add the option to turn off the icons or even change them in themes.
It’s already good news
When I saw the new toolbar I got a little shocked and disliked, but now I’m loving it!
I am really excited about this next release… Everyone has been doing a remarkable job… I’m really excited to see how much my workflow is gonna improve and boast in the face of my friends that Blender not only is cool, but can compete with the “big 3” and hold its own.
Love that theme!
The green-ish minimalist theme you are using in some of these example screenshots, is this a default theme, or a custom one? And if custom, would you like to share it? Look so awesome and clean!
What’s with the new ‘RGB’ color sceme being used on these new icons? I’m open to learning new icon and toolbar UI styles, but one of the nice things about Blender is that is isn’t excessively flashy. Though there are numerous UI style themes, they are optional for the user. I totally submit to developer prerogative, and am grateful regardless, but I would submit I would perfer a simpler color scheme for the UI if possible. I would think many would find this in line with our uber customized Blender workflow style.
Loving the new direction and the ideas behind it. Great to see so much thought going into the way blender will function.
Not a fan of the work in progress icons at all. They just don’t intuitively read as what they are supposed to represent. I know they’ll change and they’re just a work in progress, just wanted to chime in as one more vote for “the icons need improving”.
I love how things are getting streamlined and consolidated. Should really improve speed of workflow. Thanks for all the hard work!!
These improvements are great. Do you guys have any plans of adding a scrollbar to menus? I noticed that scrollbar functionality exists almost everywhere in blender except in menus like the special operation menu that you access by pressing ‘w’ in edit mode. Blender remembers which option you had previously selected allowing you to quickly repeat an action several times but this often fails if your mouse cursor is too high or too low on the screen because the menu is restricted to the viewport area. Have you guys considered allowing menus to go off screen and adding a scrollbar so that the previous tool can still be actively selected regardless of where the menu is called? I think this would be a great quality of life improvement.
I really appreciate that the blender developers are taking the time to respond to so much questions and suggestions here. It’s a lot to read through.
I have a proposal myself: I unsuccessfully tried utilizing the presets system in Blender 2.7 to save and load presets for tools (operators). Since you’re still testing things out, I suggest you try implementing the save/load preset widget in the tool settings (topbar) for the operators. I’d like to have well defined tool settings that I often switch between.
This would already be great. What would make it even greater was if I could assign keyboard shortcuts to those presets, or one universal shortcut that cycles through the active tool’s presets.
Case 1: Imagine I add 2 new shortcuts in the preferences, one that initially executes an extrude operation with 1 unit, let’s just take something arbitrary like z+lmb, and another that uses the preset which was set to 3 units, e.g. z+rmb.
Case 2: I activate the extrude tool and hit the universal preset cycle shortcut until I arrive at the settings I want to use.
You guys should consider merging the scale move and rotate widget in to one. It would allow for a streamlining of the bottom page panel, as only an on and off button for the widget would be necessary. Instead of 3 that we currently have. Kind of like rhino’s gumball
In Blender 2.8, we have a tool called Transform, which works exactly like that: Move, Rotate & Scale merged into one.
I love the use of tabs, is there a hotkey for quick switching between them?
Icons are a great addition, but they shouldn’t come at such a big cost. The toolbar, especially in sculpting and painting modes, was much quicker in 2.79. I know that most of it can be found in menus and at the top toolbar, but these two aren’t as efficient as having all the tools in a single place.
I’d like to suggest that you keep the old toolbar and move the icons to the top bar, that way you add more options without losing efficiency.
It would look something like this: https://imgur.com/a/zX3FpWZ
I like the overlay options, but I think it’s missing the options to use different overlays for different shading modes and to limit the distance of the grid.
Another few changes I find worse than the original are the removal of the triangle in the corner of the windows (the one used to divide the window into two) and the arrow on the sliders, as well as the wider “add” menu when using Shift+A.
There are a few things I don’t understand:
-We had icons before. They were roughly four times bigger than now.
-In the old toolbar, users had to first click the tool icon, then select a different tool. It was a multi-step process. in 2.8, switching to a tool is a single click on a tool. So, it’s actually much quicker to switch between tools than it was before. Also, we will still allow users to use keyboard shortcuts.
As for the tool & brush settings themselves, we plan to allow for a way to make them persistent, so that everything is immediately available if you want it.
I was referring to icons in general, the sculpting mode was just used as an example. In object mode, for instance, there are only six icons, so a lot of space where the tools used to be, as well as the entire top toolbar, are wasted. I just think it’s better to have everything in one place separated into tabs rather than spread it across menus and leave the toolbar area with almost nothing in it.
The brushes in 2.8 right now are okay, but the brushes hidden behind other brushes (e.g. Clay > Clay Strips) should either be visible at all times, or have a better way to access the drop down menu than holding down the LMB.
The thing I was worried about the most was the tool & brush settings, so it’s good to hear that that’s going to change.
I hate the idea of an active tool. I have left mouse set up for specialty pie menu so the whole tool bar is pretty much useless if it modifies left mouse behavior. I agree that something needs to be done with the toolbar area, I need another row of tabs for addons and hate having to move the divider for the last used operator options back and forth to find buttons on the toolbar but atleast they are located in the same area as tools, not on a top header that you have to scan across to find what you need. Seriously, how many experienced users actually use anything in the default tabs anyway? Most of those operators are hot-keyed. The toolbar is useful for awesome addons like bPainter and SpeedSculpt and Retopoflow, don’t take that real estate and give it to some clunky beginner buttons. The new icons remind me too much of how I despise Adobe tool layouts. Don’t get me wrong. I appreciate all that you guys do, but atleast give the seasoned users a way to keep their workflow as well.
Changing tools via a toolbar isn’t efficient for experienced users, OTOH – having a toolbar doesn’t *prevent* us from having faster alternatives.
Why not hide the toolbar and access it through a menu (maybe a pie menu can be used here).
We’re going to look into a Blender compatible way to use key bindings to switch tools.
How do you plan to resolve the issue of information lost from the immediate view? The information in the drop down can’t be checked without clicking it, only one drop down can be active at a time. I think this is a serious step backwards for working in blender… Also information is really split now…
Anything planned to ease my worries?
Humbert: yes, something is planned to solve that. More later :)
Great job ?，thank you guys! I can’t go back to 2.7 now ?
1. For the Top Bar:
We can make the Top Bar float like the Tool Shelf region, with transparent background color, and hide/show with shortcut like `@` /`#`
2. For the Tool Bar:
We can make icons for each add-on with its name’s first two or three letters automatically, and then we need options to change the letters’ color manually. Furthermore, we need a shortcut to switch back to the tool used lastly(such as C4D’s SPACE key)
https://i.imgur.com/ujby0A7.png
https://i.imgur.com/3RDCGnj.png
PLEASE can we have a way to set transform modes with hotkeys? (I’m not talking about g, r, and s. I’m talking about switching gizmos in the 3d view.)
It’s such a basic function and it’s really, really helpful to have when you need it.
Even if it isn’t set to anything by default, all I want is an option for it.
We plan to do this.
im in love with you guys
Hi, is it possible to add one small detail to interface elements, such as lists? Namely, the ability to change the selected value by hovering the cursor and scrolling the mouse wheel. How it is implemented in many GTK applications.
This is already supported https://docs.blender.org/manual/en/dev/interface/common_shortcuts.html#properties
Questions for devs:
1. Whats the purpose of having the tool settings hidden behind a popup window in the exact opposite direction of the tool buttons? (extra: Shouldn’t it be something that you want always ON for the operation you are currently doing, why the extra click every. single. time.?)
2. What happens to the other commands? I’m pretty sure no one ever uses all of them, but some of them are now a pain to use behind menus. What alternative are you offering? (ie: shading flat or smooth)
3. Why is the object mode dropdown button in the topbar? The are many cases where the thing I’m doing is not related with any of the provided options. (ie: compositing, node editor, etc, I don’t need to change between any of them)
3.5. I get it that you want a place for tools and settings to exist on multiple windows but why a topbar? It feels forced to have things that naturally are better vertically in a horizontal bar. I feel like its only an horizontal bar because you want to avoid two vertical ones or grouping in one.
Rant:
I have no issues with the idea of making blender more user friendly and standardize with the industry but this feels like one step forward and two steps back. I don’t understand the mentality of removing clutter to add empty unusable space. Just focus on giving everyone the option to make blender their own tool and provide a solid default. I wonder how many of the people commenting here actually use blender every single day. Surely someone that has to execute similar tasks all the time wouldn’t be too happy to go from one single click into 3 or 4. Unless you are now expected to code your own blender in order to actually use it.
1) we’re also concerned about this, we are considering ways to keep this visible. There is a fine line between making something like this accessible – and having it get in the way of users who may not want to change options for a majority of their actions.
2) menus are currently too deeply nested, making some things feel hidden. We could have more toplevel menus (since some 3D header items are now in the topbar or in popovers). Tools in menus should not be hidden anymore than toolbar items are hidden in tabs. We could also have a place where frequently accessed commands can go, ideally user editable.
3) it’s been moved back into the 3D header as part of making an editors primary mode selector left of the header menus (something we can keep consistent between many editors). This decision isn’t final though.
3.5) The topbar is something we’re testing out.
re: Rant) I think you’re jumping to too many conclusions based on work-in-progress. Not that I ignore your concerns, just that you make assumptions about a decisions before we know ourselves how the designs will play out exactly.
Ultimately if some choices simply don’t work out – we’ll change course.
Fair enough
Thx for the reply.
Just a question… The object mode seems to be missing a lot of the old options… Where can we find them back?
This is very much work in progress, we didn’t yet attempt to make the toolset complete.
Instead of trying to make the icons big to fill up space in the side why not just move them to the top also please remove the rounded coroners from the sliders
The toolbar and it’s icon are completely scalable already.
Yes I agreee with this. The line width in 3d-editor is definitely to big.
If one has a high poly mesh, the whole object gets black in edit mode because of this.
Just recover the former minimum line width when the value is set to 3
If someone want’s it to be bigger he can increase the value.
This is more importand than fine tuning the roundness of fields (even if it’s nice)
Please reduce the line WIDTH for EDGES in 3dviewport
This is awful
The’re way to FAT !! Looks not profesional and can’t be changed in UserPrefs, because the value (3) is the same as in 2.79 but leads to theese fat lines and reducing it to 1 let the vertices disappear
Can we have orange as primary color for the icons instead? At the moment it looks too Modo’ish…
As someone who uses multiple addons with lots of operators and information in the tool shelf, and as an addon maker myself that’s used Blender practically daily for 8 years, this is an absolutely horrific change. :( This feels utterly gimped and makes Blender practically impossible to use for someone who already knows what they’re doing.
Not everything can be done with hotkeys, and cramming Tools into the tiny top bar is a terrible choice because not everything is a small simple icon, and you have to go up and click more to change any options.
The old toolbar also managed to convey itself better while taking up only slightly more space, AND fit more in at the same time. You’ve got to make the new toolbar every bit as big as the old one to get the button labels on it, and then wonderful, you’re managed to turn a space that could hold an entire menu section into something that fits 4 Fisher Price-sized buttons.
And…also…will it be a “Remove double” button ? It`s a feature i also use a lot in modeling and with 3d models i import in blender.
I`ve downloaded “blender-2.80.0-git.c052346-windows64”, but i`m kinda frustated because i can`t find the wireframe view: “Display objects as wire edges” ??? Where is that ? I`m using very very often.
It’s not yet supported.
Are the widgets/gizmos still going to be defined in Python as was in the “wiggly-widgets” branch? Have been looking forward to being able to write our own widgets.
Yes, there is already an API and templates accessible from the text editor showing how to make Python manipulators.
Hi Guis, all in all you’re doing an amazing work. thank you for that !
But please make the ICONS SMALLER or/and the size editable in prefs. Its way TOO BIG !
And what happend to the handle for creating / closing editors ??
It’s hard to find the small sized position where the cursor get’s a cross
I really liked the striped triangle, was a more clear function.
The icons can already be scaled, try press the + and – keys.
This is a bit hidden so we may have a more obvious way to do it.
I can not wait to get out Blender 2.8 :D
Wow, this comments section is exploding. Hats off to developers still taking the time to read, consider, and respond to feedback in midst of busily developing.
I like the idea of the new “pop up” menus for the top bar when hover over them. However, one ability we lose from the T-panel is having certain properties be persistent.
So two questions:
1. Will it be possible to “pin” certain menu items so they don’t disappear upon mouse removal?
2. Better yet, could the menu items be “pulled off” to make floating windows? With user ability to resize and place anywhere, and even add/remove different menu elements, this would be a really powerful workflow feature.
It’s one thing to not make a UI design not dependent on floating windows, but it’s a whole other thing to integrate that as user-controllable option.
It’s a valid concern. We have discussed this issue, and here’s our current thinking:
The concept of floating panels that can be dragged out from the top bar sounds nice, but we don’t think it works in practice, because the available panels differ between the various tools. This means that as users switch tools, panels will open and close, and overlap with each other in random ways. We don’t believe that will enable a good user experience.
Instead, we would like to introduce a separate ‘Tool Settings’ editor type inside of Blender. This would include the same options you see in the top bar, but expanded into panels. This way, for things like sculpting, users can simply have the Tool Settings editor open on the side for persistent tool settings. In the Sculpting workspace/tab, we can even hide Properties altogether, or make it very small, because Properties has almost no utility while sculpting anyway, and replace it with Tool Settings.
I hope that answers your concern.
Right, that makes a lot of sense. The “Tool Settings” sounds perfectly logical and I shall excitedly wait its implementation. =D
How about the different editors though?
Since they’re not reliant on a mode, I could see floating windows working well for them (e.g. Outliner). In fact, you may even be aware of this desire surfacing in the forums in the 2.8 thread.
For it to work, a reliable “pin on top” method is desirable. Right now, it’s too easy to “lose” popped out windows behind active windows. This behavior alone prevents users like me from creating popped out windows.
Worse still, it prevents using a different editor on a different monitor. It’s been painful for years to have multiple monitors and having Blender be the only production software I actively avoid taking advantage of them.. when it’s the one software I really want to.
So in summary:
1. Would floating windows for editors be possible?
2. If so, could they stay on top and be active with the windows of the same Blender instance?
The tool and properties regions already fit those needs, why come up with something else ?
Well, the manipulator widget looks nice… And Eevee will be nice, but otherwise, i hate the new ui plans… and pretty much everything else about the update. :(
Hi everyone, I liked everything about the toolbar but i didnt like the “Spin” icon, at first sight it seemd for me like some kind of translation because the arrow isnt ’round’ enough imho.
I came up also with a quick proposition of what might be in my humble opinion, an icon that communicate easily the meaning of the operation. You can see that the arrow indicate a rotation and the cylinder is incomplete, so it hints about a rotation that constructs a full cylinder : https://imgur.com/a/qtIcN7k
Cheers and bravo for the excellent work.
The tabs panel is moving with menus when we open a lot of tabs, it’s annoying.
Too large icons, the second bar at the top is too wide, did you think about small screens? at 1366×768 it is wasting space.
A good idea would be to integrate the program name bar with menus or tabs like in Opera or Chrome
Blender is a work program, not a beauty contest… Workspace is an important thing
Game engine is gone! Nooooooooo! give it back :(
What he said ^^
Two columns tollbar with small icons is good, I like it.
Are there any plans to improve the design in other menus? Right now this one seems a little inconsistent with the rest of blender
It look very good and i´m impressed to see that on Blender!
And, if I may say so, that Blender is already better as other 3D programs.
Greetings to all the creators of Blender. I want to congratulate you for everything you do in Blender …
Well my contribution. I like Blender a lot since I follow it from its v2.56 up to v2.79 now with its new contribution that I present with this (Tools, Toolbar and Tool Widgets) my opinion is that I do not like it much since it makes Blender see very basic as a software for beginners and at the same time creates slowness in the PC of low resources, so little I do not like its new graphical interface for my opinion I really liked its graphical interface that I had before, now congratulations to EEVEE for its new engine of PBR rendering I congratulate your compilations thanks to everything that has been achieved with this free software that in my evaluations I give 10/10 better for my case than 3DMax, Maya and Cinemax 4D ….
If I have to choose between the new version, I choose the unanimous 2.79 unless I get good optimizations in the graphical interface. greetings to all the programmers my opinion I give it only to take Blender to the best software Diceñografico y Animación
I’m from Venezuela Diceñador grafico thank the google translator because with the and I could take my opinion to English
The current slowdown in the 2.8 builds has little or nothing to do with the icons or tools. Many areas have been changed, and haven’t been optimized yet. That will happen over time.
I don’t like this too, It looks more like a toy, but I can’t change anything, 2.7x is good enough for me, just hope it not too bad
That sounds mostly like fear of change. I had that as well in the past. Often. And I still do. It’s natural to have it for things that feel very new in a product one has come to get used to for a long time.
First and foremost it was stated already that this is a proposal and everybody is very welcome to come up with different mockups and ideas. Just not with a “it’s bad – do it different”. Coming up with a consistent and usable UI is a hell of a large and time consuming task. Maybe you do have a better idea – then by all means SHOW IT to us. We want to know. :)
On the other hand the proposed style is nothing completely new. There are other very professional 3D packages out there that use a similar style to these Icons. And are not a toy, for sure.
Point in case (I’ve been repeating over and over in these comments) – the style is very Modo-ish and Modo was very prominently used in many of the new Wolfenstein games. Tor Frick, who is a super cool artists – really, check him out – uses Modo as his tool of choice. It’s not a toy by all means. And actually I’ve never heared anyone say that about any major program (including Blender) purely based on seeing some icons.
thanks for the attention … that the best idea wins greetings to all who post
Greetings Brother, 2,79 The best
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE incorporate right click menus! I know a lot of people hate these but I think it would add so much efficiency! I personally made my left click the default select and I’ll be honest it only took a week or two before I was using it perfectly without making mistakes. If you make the cursor placement something like… ctrl+left mouse and use the right click for a menu… Oh my gosh it would save me so much time during modeling and such.
Quick menus is much quickly than right menus, e.g. W key, Ctrl +V/E/F, Shift+S, quickly with double hand.
Certainly but it means that everything requires a hotkey which means that beginners need to remember things like the specials or edge menu. Besides, whats the harm in adding a right click menu for mode specific properties? it would just allow for more ways of doing the same thing which is helpful in workflow expansion. In modes like sculpt mode, I also feel like it would be beneficial to structure the system similar to substance painter where you can use the mouse to change the size/hardness/rotation/opacity of your brush. I think there could also be an additional right click menu after that to open up something like a brush selection gui. I think one thing that separates substance tools from other tools is the amount of presets that they come with. Now with the new asset management system I think it would be nice if Blender started adding some solid preset brushes and such to allow for faster prototyping and all. Sorry I know my comment sort of… derailed off topic.
Thanks though
Everything in those menus can be found using the spacebar. Learning all the hotkeys is what separates the men from the boys if you will, and it’s part of Blender’s learning curve. Blender needs to stop copying the competition. They’re copying all the wrong parts anyways… They need better simulations, more sculpting tools, more texturing tools… Look to the specialty programs. Blender mastered modeling, although it needs more/better modifiers and the like. It’s trying to be an all in one software, so get more texturing tools like painter, more nodes to work with like designer, more brushes, settings, the ability to handle higher poly meshes in sculpt mode like zbrush, etc…
Thank you. I absolutely agree that Blender needs to improve those areas which are absolutely lagging behind Substance, Zbrush etc. But I think the GUI and usability need to be fixed first. The last thing we want to do is build a building on a bad foundation so to speak. No matter how beautiful, polished, powerful, or refined we make the top of the building, if it’s built on the back of a UI that isn’t built for long term progression then things might come falling down. We need a strong system for the GUI. Using right click menus isn’t copying other programs it’s simply freeing up a whole mouse button. I think selection should 100% be the left mouse button. This is standard stuff that ranges throughout almost all software packages and computer tools alike. I don’t think I have ever found a program with the right click set as the default select other than Blender.
Wish I had more hands so I could give it 4 thumbs up!
This looks amazing!!! Blender is about to become even more awesome. Thank you for all your great work, Blender devs/designers!
Hi guys
a comment I see that the icons are very well done I congratulate you, I just have a question, the black background window, which comes out when placed on the icon, will bring the short cut of the tool, it is very useful for those who do not know some short cut ?, and I think it is much needed, because I consider anyone who uses this software the first place where you look for the short cut is there, I guess you have already thought, because the word appears, but only says action mouse .
In advance, Thanks for your effort
Are there any floating panel plans in the future? This could be useful.
As someone who previously suggested that for inspiration, the designers take a look at the innovative icon-and-widget-based interface of the old trueSpace program (which became free a bit before it was discontinued), I’m glad to see that Blender’s UI may be evolving in a similar direction. I definitely agree that the user should hace the ability to disable the graphical control methods, if he or she chooses – an option which trueSpace lacked – but I’m confident the designers are sincere in their assurances that that will be the case. I’m very eager to see where this leads!
My god, it’s looks great, icon is beautiful, save more space than before. but how about vertical space, really no interesting on top bar, the layout in drop-down list(2.79) is more nice, now looks so crowd. option setting on right is very strange.
Balalala…, still don’t like top bar, take much vertical space. it’s lets me saw the photoshop, modo, c4d and max. I can’t believe I must shaking my headwhen I used blender(search parameter settings from left to right ) , where my loved Blender, I hate autodesk, : (
you can drag and hide it, its not completely fixed.
Great work. I’m actually getting super excited for 2.8.
First round of questions from me:
1. Where will the Scene Statistics (Version name – Vert count – Edges – Face – Tris, etc.) go?
2. Can you make the buttons/ dropdowns like Scene, Viewport, Mode, Command on the top bar (or any horizontal bars) SHORTER? Or at least give users the option to do so. It’s better here comparing to current version (2.79) in which the Layout and Scene buttons take up about 1/4 of the header. *Triggered
3. Can the menus (File, Render, Window, Help) still be collapsed?
4. Is the 3d view header still there? With the top bar, more horizontal space is used now. But I see many of its items on the top bar in the images above. So maybe there’s no need for the header anymore.
5. Will we be able to add buttons and menus the Top bar via addons?
6. Ok. This sounds a bit contradictory, but can the top bar be flipped to the bottom? Not that I want that, just curious.
1. They will go in a new area called the Status Bar, at the very bottom, a long with some other things.
2. Not really sure what you mean?
3. Yes, they can still be collapsed
4. The 3D View header is still there. In the mockup it is transparent – I think we may want it like that so we don’t waste screen space.
5. Yes, Addons can define their own active tools, tool widgets, icons and top bar settings.
6. Currently, the top bar cannot be anywhere other than the top. But you can hide the bottom part of it with tool settings it you want, by dragging the divider line up.
2.
I meant these
https://imgur.com/a/waZhGXl
and from the image of the top bar in this post.
https://imgur.com/a/5hK7d2c
Did the concept of the statistics to be displayed in the viewport in a table format similar to 3ds max come across the team? Personally I prefer this as I find it more readable & easier to discern object information compared to Blender’s current infobar horizontal configuration.
Are you familiar with Silo’s tweak mode? all the manipulators used the CTRL key to activate them and put them directly into screen space mode. You could hover over a face and press CTRL to activate the tool then release it to commit it. It made for a very very nice workflow.
Wooow,
I would love to see this simple and efficient interface, Blender 2.8. I hope it would make lot of changes in experiencing Blender…
Keep it up the good work!
Will I still be able to drag the ‘top bar’ to the bottom (right-click, ‘Flip to Bottom’)? For all my Blender life I have had the ‘top bar’ at the bottom of each window.
This is great, I like the new direction the UI is taking although it might take some time getting used to. ^^’
However I get the feeling the new icons might be a bit overdesigned? they’re quite big and have all those effects on them, outlines, gradients, colors, shading, perpective… they’re all very busy. It kinda defeat the purpose of an icon and doesn’t look modern at all imo. I guess it’s functional but I hope we’ll get a more minimalistic approach down the line, or at least a way to have custom Icons.
Agree completely. These icons look like a child’s playroom (which will be great for the 101 project), but crucially, having stared at them for ages, for about 80% of the icons I could not work out the functions they represent! For example, the ‘Spin’ icon uses an almost universal symbol for drawing a pie chart. There must be a ‘Text only’ option so all the eye candy can be hidden.
Thank you for your hard work. It looks wonderful.
simply incredible
The icons are too desaturated and looks dull. The original colors were much better in my opinion. and please dont remove the shadow, it will loose its 3d-ness.
As Blender 101 project is about making Blender usable for everyone, you will have to really emphasize
on usability and aesthetic. Please don’t make them those old school crapy on color icons. Colors are great way of provide information.
People who don’t like these icons, just close the tool shelf and go on with your hotkeys.
>>Colors are great way of provide information.
However, color should just be an helper, not the only way to provide that info. Please keep in mind color blindness affects about 4% of population. For these people (including myself), a difference in Value is way more relevant than a difference in Hue or Saturation.
The proposed icons do the job quite good! It’s obvious that color blindness has been taken into account, that’s really pleasant (and unfortunately unusual…) Thanks!
On icons like Bevel or Inset for example, the green faces are also darker, so they’re still readable (Maybe a little more contrast would be nice?). Thats true for every icon (apart from those mentioned below).
The Grab/Rotate/Select are more problematic, but the shape of the tool define the action so colors aren’t strictly necessary.
The widgets suffer the same problem every 3d application suffer, identifying XYZ with RGB will always be problematic. To be honest I have no idea how we could do better, unless you write the letter of the axes, which is uneasy on some widgets (rotate) and quite unaesthetic.
You can test yourself what different color blind people can see by using a tool like this one : http://www.color-blindness.com/coblis-color-blindness-simulator/
…or simply by desaturating the picture in Gimp, which is a bit extreme but cover the “worst-case scenario” ;)
I agree the design should count color blind people. How about saturated icon as default for 96% of people, and desaturated icon option at startup for color blind people.
strongly agree.
too desaturated, overdesigned
Readability is more essential than the step by step explanation of the tool. Also the colors and shadow and cartoony nature are really not necessary.
Looking good William and congrats to all involved. These are very exciting times for Blender!
FWIW, I spent a few hours on a shortcut friendly and minimal UI interface, that may help spark some extra ideas?
https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-f5dbTwrq28Q/WuZ8bnI2uaI/AAAAAAAACeQ/irG7ufK5UO8-iTgbIaXRzrc3v9beeVfpgCLcBGAs/s1600/blender%2Bui%2Bmockup%2B2b%2Balt%2BWIP%2B-%2Btimothy%2Bjack.png
To view original image size, replace s1600 with s3840 in my url above. Thanks :)
I have been a Blender user since about 2011. I have to say that the UI update is one of the most exciting things I have heard about Blender. I am very, very, very excited to hear about icons and other modern standards coming to the UI. I think this has the potential to skyrocket Blender usage since seeing an icon or graphic of what the tool does makes it far easier to understand and use the software.
I am an educator and trainer by day, so I can confirm that the type of enhancements planned for in the UI based on these posts will make it far easier to understand Blender, and drive usage of it through the roof. I will also be using it more.
Continue the good work and thanks to everyone.
Hi, it’s nice to see some work on the UI, I really like the toolbar design.
The only thing I’d like for Blender 2.8 to have is a cleaner API for contributors.
I’d love to contribute add ons and tools, but the last time I spent time with Blender and Python I was quite shocked by how messy and poorly documented it is.
Let’s say I wanted to implement a retopo tool, with custom in-viewport widgets (just as an example).
In Godot : I can directly link my C++ retopo library to Godot thanks to GDNative (no overhead, fast). Then I use EditorSpatialGizmo to add widgets in the viewport (once again from whatever language I want). It’s (relatively) simple and the API to build the gizmo is clean and well defined. Everything is unified trough the clear notion of a Node.
In Blender : I’m forced to use python (maybe I can still my C++ library from python ? No doc on that, still an overhead), then I’ve no idea how to create a tool with custom widgets. If you take the official Archipack plugin, it does some hacks to create a fullscreen (ugly and half broken) menu in the viewport. Then once a floor is created you’ve got those nice in-viewport widgets to set the size of the floor, but it’s using I-don’t-know-which API to create those. But as soon as you’ve unselected the floor, you loose the possibility to use those widget, until you realize there is a “manipulate” button but on the opposite pane of the viewport while the “operator” are on the left side. Everything feels so messy when you implement or use an addon in Blender.
I hope you’ll take some time to think about all those : https://code.blender.org/2015/09/the-custom-manipulator-project-widget-project/ API, this new toolbar design, bpy.context, bpy.operator, Blender 101, the areas, the new “workflows”, etc… and come up with a clean and unified re-written API to add new tool to Blender. It’s now or never time to break things and rewrite a clean API
Keep up the good work ! Can’t wait to see more progress :)
The icons are pieces of art and the UI in general looks amazing!
One small thing though, in the toolbar, drop down menus could be replaced with “button groups” (like the add|subtract in the sculpt toolbar) where possible since they require less clicks. Especially the move and rotation tools have lots of space that could be utilized for expanding the pivot, proportional editing and snapping options.
Question will 2.8 have a way to enable the old view port if after launch if someone decides they don’t like the new one, secondly I’d like to check I remember hearing in a interview that blender was getting a system similar maya’s where you can change change the work flow which shows new things and disables others if this is true will there be a way to disable this because I know personally that’s one of the main reasons I hate Maya because it screws up my workflow
I like the direction the UI is currently taking.
It will be a big step forward in helping beginner understand the program.
I find the two column icon grid to be the best option but I would still choose the text and icon as default for the sake of beginners.
Maybe I’m nitpicking but I think it would be nice if you made the icons smaller when there is text next to them so that you can also put a shortcut reminder after the text.
If there is text, there is no need for the icon to be so big.
It will end up taking too much space an looking a little childish.
I also find the new icon design a little lacking in color coherence and if you really end up making the icons smaller maybe they are a little too detailed to be readable.
Is there also a plan to update all other icons?
Don’t forget architectural visualization. I use blender a lot for it and am so, so, so glad for collections and a better modeling environment. 2.8 may just save my sanity!
I use FreeCAD a bit, but it does my head in – I am much more comfortable with blender, I guess I just know it better.
Architectural visualization and conceptual design are two areas that I feel blender could lead in even more. For little freelance designers like me it is a “god send” to have something you don’t have to pay a zillian dollars for!
There is one killer feature I would like you to implement.
More interaction space around the widget handles!
It’s frustrating to miss when trying to translate objects.
So I read enough comments to understand how most people see the new UI design, some excited others not so much but the real factor that really counts is productivity. I was a Maya, 3ds max, zbrush…etc user so I can compare the positive and negative things. but even so everyone has his approach at using a software some use shortcuts others use icons some need more viewport space .. and so on. Nobody is going to be 100% satisfied in the end.
For the sake of productivity people should learn to use shortcuts, I never used icons while using maya always shortcuts and radial menus which blender have in Pie addon and thanks to it my blender workflow became lightning speed.
another thing useful is tearable menus, often you need menus from different sections to be opened at the same time instead of going vertically and horizontally searching for them while consuming time and effort, just like Softimage had them …may it rest in peace…
Anyhow the devs work is highly appreciated and I know that with those new ideas blender is going to attract more users who feared it’s UI (like I did a few years ago ). Blender’s future is going to be very bright indeed :) .
Wow, this is really exciting! Keep up the good work.
Beautiful!
I am excited how blender emerges.
Absolutely brilliant! Blender is becoming an artist’s tool at last.
Hello, here is my list of improvements for Blender 2.8
I do not like and misunderstand the direction proposed by the first additions of Blender.
I propose some changes.
I am french, sorry for the Google Translate
http://www.valentinwagnon.fr/blender-improvements.png
I know this is just a draft.
While I would love to give more objective observations I need to point out new icons are heavily influenced by Maya (maybe, it just reminds me of:). I chose to learn 3D through Blender 2.5 over Maya because the mainly monochromatic, 2D, flat iconography with text on buttons was actually easier to navigate. Maya used MS style toolbar full of icons and seemed like a flower garden after a unicorn orgy in comparison – as colourful as confusing. I think colour could be used sparingly, maybe to hihglight tool categories in dulled tones. RGB combination could be used in universal tools. Colour grouping is a great idea, just the number of tools gets too high eventually. Perhaps subgroups or dependent subsets of tools could use a set of colours interchangebly – signifying a subset or work within an active group of tools.
Nevermind, got carried away in details. I like what you are doing in general and am sure you will polish it well, I just added my 20p.
This is absolutely amazing! I can not describe how excited I am!
Although I fear of convenience or productivity loss.
The current ui is really “functional” so the most common mistake (from experience with other programmers) is the sacrifice of functionality over looks or excuse of “we’ll polish it later” and leave it in a half usable state.
We certainly don’t want to leave it half finished. We are committed to making this all work really well, and also to not sacrifice keyboard-driven use.
Blender is now literally a god!
Hi! Keep up the good work. I have some random questions.
Where will most of the non-active commands go in the UI? How will the commands and current toolbar addons be integrated? Because some users prefer to use the toolbar for commonly used things, while others prefer it for unfrequent things, as a better alternative to menus.
I reckon that most addons and other tools won’t have icons for a while, how will text buttons and icon buttons, commands and active tools, coexist?
I saw a design in developer.blender.org that uses a dropdown menu instead of the vertical tabs to switch categories, will there be other options for switching tool categories?
Could commands use the main part of the topbar for settings, or is that exclusive for active tools, while the command settings get relegated to that button to the right? Are there other plans for active tool settings and command settings to coexist and be accessed quickly? (The F6 floating panel not dissapearing would be a nice alternative)
My request, which many may object to, is to make it so g, s, r bring up the grab, scale, and rotate WIDGETS instead of just going into a freeform translation. Having to hit an extra key to specify an axis is inefficient to me, when a widget would allows us just to click on an axis and change the object along that axis visually.
Of course, you can add this command in the back end, but so many keyboard commands are spoken for already that you have to choose an awkward key combo, which defeats the purpose of assigning it to the most-used commands.
Kudos to the team, this is a step in the right direction for blender.
Do you guys have any plans to modernize the 3D cursor tool to be more interactive (it stays under the mouse cursor while the button is being clicked for example, visual feedback (colors/shape)when it is being snapped, with added ability to be snapped to vertices, etc)
Also any chance we get drag and drop tool reordering in the toolbar? it could be handful that users can to move up their most used tools when doing a repetitive task
otherwise keep up the good work
We might support re-ordering. We can see how it would be useful, but it’s quite tricky to do well. It’s not the first priority.
As for the 3D Cursor, we have no plans to change it, but we haven’t looked into it yet. What you suggest might be a good idea.
Also a good amount of functionality relating to the 3D cursor in the could be moved to the tool for more consistency/less scattering in the ui.
thx for the reply, nice to hear that reordering it is on the way it could be really useful cheers
eeh, not sure we will support this.
– Tools can be dynamically generated (from brushes for eg).
– Addons can add their own.
– Tools can be grouped inside other tools.
Re-ordering will need to save, (probably in the workspace?).
It’s possible, but its not trivial to sync dynamic/static data like this, I’m also not convinced its that important – many applications don’t support this for eg.
OTOH, a custom place to have user-actions would be handy, just not sure this should be integrated w/ the tool-system.
if it’s a hassle to code then it might not be worth it then, A more general solution like you propose ) , sounds even better !
A dedicated floating panel that lives in the 3d/2d views perhaps ? ( invokable like F6 panel)
or a way for users to quickly bind/unbind actions to a pie menu without having to code it maybe ?
yeah i agree this could be better in a system on its own ? ?, anyway thx for your time Campbell and good luck with 2.8 you’re doing great so far
side note: I always wondered why primitive creation was not an option like so:
https://i.imgur.com/Vi6xHIS.gif
The 3D curser has so much potential over Modo to actually KNOW where in 3D depth you are going to be creating your new primitive. A fast creation tool could speed up prototyping quite a bit.
Also (from my own experience but this really takes it far away from the UI now), Ctrl-C / Ctrl-V / Ctrl-X for polygon copy pasting from one object to another is one of the most overlooked features in most applications, if someone asked me. It’s an intuitive and fast way to rearrange and split up models and could be really beneficial with the new “multi-object editing”. Buuut I digress. Sorry :D
We plan to try out something like this.
Coming from Modo I really like the new UI proposal so far.
What i really like about Modo’s approach is the use of color coding to see which mode you are currently using on a tool (poly in gree, splines and edits in purple, deep blue for polyCopy, pinkish for instances and green for Layer/item duiplicates). It helps navigating unknown and rarely used tools by being much quicker to grasp. The style is also obviously modo (I personally also like this as I was going to transition from Modo to blender in the future anyways) but I would of course be also absolutely fine with a flat design. The color coding is the thing I like and which I hope for to stay.
Regarding the text-icon discussion I don’t *really* have much input because I like both. It’s good if you are able to turn text off but it also helps for things that simply don’t have an Icon.
What I really, REALLY … R-E-A-L-L-Y hope for in regards to text, though – have the option shortcuts be displayed in the icon if there is room in the layout (meaning: if the button is set up to be large enough to display it).
Example: https://i.imgur.com/IsfVYcG.png
This helps memorize shotcuts and ultimately bypass the buttons so much!
I saw you already added a right-click “add shortcut” button as well! SUPER. COOL.
Love it! It’s probably in the agenda already but it would probably help if it displays the current shortcut in the dialogue and spits out a reassignment warning if the shortcut is taken already. :)
One thing that is a little beyond the UI (but has to do with usage conventions) is my love at third sight: Modo’s convention that if nothing is selected the tools are used on everything. So – nothing selected means everything’s selected (virtually). For people from other software packages this probably sounds alien but it really is a super cool thing to have. Once you are used to it it’s one of those weird features that you don’t want to miss out on any more.
So from my side: All around positive reaction. I’m really excited for this one. You guys are all doing a fantastic job! :)
Heh … never realized that “Add/change shortcut” was already there on right-click! My bad. -_-“
That nothing-is-selected-means-everything-is-selected feature actually makes a lot of sense to me. One problem came to my mind was doing a heavy operation with this, like, I accidentally hit the shortcut and the program just freezes. Is it a real problem?
In Modo not so much, actually. I work on a daily basis with heavy CAD meshes reducing them to Unity models. Usually when you activate a tool by shortcut you still have to make an input with the tool itself, so there isn’t always an immediate reaction. Actually I probably did it once or twice but I really can’t recall that I ever had a problem because of invoking a certain tool on everything by accident.
Maybe that’s because Modo is otherwise a rather unstable thing to work with in early major releases ;)
Brilliant! This brings Blender up to scratch with compeditors and really improves the workflow. Great job and keep up the Code Quest!
WOW, Blender suddenly went from the lamest UI to the best in 3D applications.
When can I try these please?
This is a Quest that is universal.. To express a same conceptual reality across all cultures and languages, using one single icon !
Very complex but necessary today as Blender as become a global 3d tool that is used in all regions of Earth by anybody willing to create and realize in 3D..
Great work done and you will get certainly oppositions and hard comments, but in the final, I am sure a common consensus will emerge .. I hope.
Great work anyway!!
Please don’t underestimate how important a decent default layout and theme is. Most users won’t differ too much from it, people will record tutorials on it. So it gotta be great, sentences like “don’t worry it’s a theme option” should be said with care
I am super excited about all of this! Lately I am excitedly checking builds daily which are giving me smiles every morning. :) Love where all of this is heading! Hope the properties panel is gonna get some love, too. :)
Just some small detail input that I am convinced is gonna improve things on a more atomic level:
All the labels featuring colons should drop those. They just add avoidable clutter of which there is enough unavoidable one already due to the applications complexity. With sliders it is clear that those are labels, in other cases you should employ formatting (read: bold text) or colors to highlight things. The lack of visual hierarchies is one of the key factors contributing to how messy for instance the properties panel looks. Labels should be visually loudest and they should follow a clear visual hierarchy if they are nested. Again and again have I heard clients say that data is more important than the labels which seems to be the guiding principle for Blender, too. But nobody scans an interface for random values but for what they constitute which is described in the labeling.
Long story short, I quickly put together a small example with hints at what I think could be improved on a more granular level: https://www.dropbox.com/s/4ovjawvjc7b9jmb/details.jpg?dl=0
Perhaps you are aware of these things already, but I thought it might be worse pointing these things out while there is such a great effort still ongoing
.
Hope this might help making things maybe even more awesome. :)
“… might be worth …” of course. ;)
I am happy to see all the progress, but I am a bit worried about additional customizability on top of what Blender already has. The UI design should be an average of all the user feedback instead of a granular DYI kit.
For example, creating a new Blender theme currently takes about 5-6 hours of work, if we are talking about all the editors. Having that customization further fractured by adding UI element rounding per individual element adds to the already overwhelmingly big bag of customization option.
Keymap is even worse. There, from my experience, it takes at least 70 hours of fulltime work to fully customize hotkeys of each editor. I’ve gone though that process.
No one will want to put up with 5 hour theme customization and 70 hour keymap customization.
I think Blender 2.8 is finally a chance to stop fracturing and start unifying. Remove per-editor theme settings, link many theme color settings together so that they enforce a single visually consistent design language. There should be just a few color swatches, few opacity sliders and a few checkboxes that propagate the look across entire UI.
For keymap, introduce a concept of a global keys, where all the key mappings for a same or equivalent feature shared by two or more editors reside. So that for example 3D view and Graph Editor don’t have each their own “Toggle properties panel” input mapping, but instead they just carry a reference to query global key mapping for “Toggle properties panel hotkey.
This will also help making things like selections more consistent. If you were to make this happen, you would quickly find out how dusty and full of cobwebs keymap is. For example, pretty much every single editor has an unique, different and non shared implementation of box and lasso selection modes.
Ludvik: Yes, internally we have discussed these kinds of issues, and would ideally like to improve keymaps and theme creation. We do understand that these things are a very laborious task currently. Hopefully, by including better built-in themes, as well as some keycap adjustments, we can alleviate issue somewhat. But, we know this issue exists and it’d be great to improve in this area.
The plan to make Blender more accessible is commendable! On difficulty I find is as a casual user, relying on visual recognition is quite difficult. For this reason I like the idea of making aesthetically pleasing icons. However, I was not able to identify the fundamental tools (Move, Rotate, Scale) before reading what they were representing. I think this is partly due to the 3D nature of the icons as the cylindrical sections look like areas to grasp.
I did a simple test by asking someone who is not a Blender user (but knows of the program) what the icons seem to represent. The answers were: Move icon = ‘a paintbrush’, Rotate icon = ‘model building (e.g. from primitives)’ and Scale icon = ‘add cube / object’.
Perhaps the icons could match more with the action they represent e.g. 3 axis arrows for move, 3 looped arrows for rotate, a cube increasing in size for scale.
I hope this feedback helps, and keep up the great work during the code quest!
Agree icons could be much more simple and descriptive. This is a first pass, be patient. :)
Yes, we have gotten this comment quite a lot. It’s actually surprisingly hard to make clear icons for these basic things. We may investigate alternative depictions, and try out several variations here.
Honestly you’re not that far off, current icons look really good, except they’re probably much less reasable at a smaller scale – because of drop shadows and thin outlines, whereas the current icon set has quite thick outlines, no shadows and generally a lesser number of elements.
Good icon design is hard, it’s like a good logo but you only have a handful of pixel to play with, for every one of them. In my opinion, these icons are way too colourful, not enough self explanatory and break consistency of style with current icons (which are in my opinion some of the best icons I’ve ever met, really neat and I pray to all the gods they won’t be ditched because they do the job with style). This being said, I wait o see the next step. Is there a way to get in touch with the developer/designer team?
I have tested out new toolbar and gizmos of 2.8 and I have one critisms for new gizmos.
So problem is that I’m using Gizmos to move and rotate and scale objects, however new version of blender for some reason have dead zone in center of gizmos what makes grabing that small circle in middle of gizmos harder, I wish it would be more like old one where no matter where you grabbed it in center it always moves it and there is no dead zone in vary center of gizmos ..
Is there any way to maybe have a setting for this ?? This seriously impacts my modeling speed because I need to be more precise to grab a gizmos . Is there a fix for this ???
I’ve not yet begun implementing the new manipulators design – only the new API’s and making sure they work on a technical level (continuing the work from Psy-Fi & Severin).
We plan many changes needed to make them more usable.
Love it! I think especially the flexibility here is amazing, great great job. Looking forward to seing it :D
Some really great work going on here…kudos for going in this direction! The new widget design is looking very useful. I hope that there are plans for widgets to interactively move the 3d cursor and object centers/pivots. It has long been a nightmare to accurately move object centers and especially to rotate the center. Most other 3d apps allow you to do this interactively, so hopefully this will be added to 2.8!
This new interface is exactly what I was hoping for. It makes perfect sense to have a dynamic toolbar that changes according to which mode you select. There is no more need to collapse panels or drag the operator panel just to view extra options.
Guys thank you for all your hard work. Blender 2.8 is going to be EPIC!!!
I am looking at the design above:
https://code.blender.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/BlogpostTools_topbar.png
the controls are actually smaller than the borders! Just make the controls fit better – bigger controls or smaller borders.
For example “Sculpt” is about right (it could be a little bigger though) but “command” – why is it short? Just make it fill up the space. There is not point of having a control take 50% of the available height. It should take at least 96% of it.
The above image has been fixed now. The height was taller than what we intended. Cheers
“We want to make it possible to use Blender in a more visual way, not just via shortcuts.”
FINALLY! This will make it so much easier to learn Blender!
I like maybe 10% of this… I like the way that the toolbar is getting more out of the way of things, but im concerned about the way the settings are being presented. it looks like a backstep from the way layouts currently work? for new users this could be really good, but for people like myself who’ve been using blender close to 10 years, im really not sure how well my current workflow is going to be impacted by changes like these. I use keyboard shortcuts more than buttons in the tool shelf, the last thing I want is widgets getting in the way of the spontaneity of shortcuts.
I also have to ask how the toolbar would handle custom brushes for sculpting/textrepainting.
As said already, the goal is not to impact workflows for users who run tools from shortcuts.
Widgets can be disabled, so unless you explicitly activate them. I think we can keep experienced users being productive.
Could you please consider the following:
Whenever you want to change a value in an input control it jumps from right to left. If the control (slider) supports dragging as means to change the value – the mouse cursor disappears. Or the control just has to very tiny arrows which are difficult to click.
When entering a new value the control shouldn’t change to a completely new view. Values should be changed in-place. Sliders should support also the arrow keys for precise control.
If the text of a button is not completely visible: Add the text to the tool-tip not just the description.
Also the rounded corners look like wasting space and are not that visually pleasing.
This is a theme option now.
Could you make a more detailed proposal and post it here?
https://blender.community/c/rightclickselect/
Also some description of what this solves, post a link here once you’re done.
If you don’t want to influence professional users or skilled users, don’t make us click where we didn’t have to. Topbar is hiding information that was readily available at all times before (say, am I currently using dyntopo? At which level? Is symmetry active? How many vertices did the cylinder have that I just added?). Also drop-downs are a messy solution. Overlapping, clunky, very unfriendly to tablet users (hover that pen precisely or try hitting that button again…).
Also information is now split a lot. Top left corner, top right corner, 3d view header… Before I had way less cursor distance to be travelled aswell as eye movement.
With kind regards,
I hope you can see my concerns.
I am an industrial designer, and I would like to commend you on the great new UI improvements; especially the new icons! They are very intuitive and easy to visually understand quickly. I wonder if the “widgets” should take a slightly more “Dimensional” approach similar to the icons; which look like actual 3D solids. Rather than thin lines. Just a thought, but either way; it is looking great!! Autodesk Alias has some interesting Widgets in their program; as well as Fusion 360. Might be worth some research for inspiration. In Alias; specifically look at the Align tool, and the dimensional arrow sliders that appear on the geometry that is currently being aligned.
It’s very nice, some question I want to know:
1 Can we hide top-bar through hot keys? that will be quick get more space.
2 Can we custom top-bar? like we can drag others panel onto it. that very very useful.
3 Can we unfold tools group by hot keys on the toolbar ? like use A to unfold, hold LMB not quick ways.
4 Does the modifier and constraint will show to top-bar? like users to quick add and setting modifiers.
Very Thanks
re: 1 – yes, most likely – default keymap is another issue though.
re: 2 – probably not drag-and-drop customization. It’s not a toolbar, we need it for Blender’s own operations.
re: 3 – An equivalent should be possible – we’ve been discussing how to use keys to switch tools in a way that fits nicely with existing keymap & workflow, but isn’t cryptic/hidden either.
re: 4 – I don’t think so. If you really wanted an addon could add to the top-bar, but by default I think we’ll keep modifiers and constraints where they are.
Thank you for your careful reply to everyone. I find in new day-build version, the toolbar is light color in default, I must to say, gray is more better and contrast obvious with active tool. by the way, does the W menu will update in 2.8 ? now it’s so poor in object mode. some idea that I suggest:
https://blender.community/c/rightclickselect/Hjbbbc/
Thanks
Blender 2.8 development is more exciting than expected. So glad to have bought a rocket!
While it’s still a work in progress and nothing’s set in stone as to how it’ll end up, I have to say I really appreciate all the effort being put into making the UI/UX effective and modernized. I do agree the icons look a bit cartoony (could be the thick outlines), but still, they’re looking great!
Some questions:
1 – Will the top bar have transparency option like the sidebar?
2 – Will themes support custom icons? Or custom icon packs that can be changed independently from themes if desired, would be really cool.
3 – Will there be support for custom sidebar/top bars? With drag-and-drop support? Maya had this functionality since over a decade ago and it’s quite powerful and useful.
4 – Speaking of Maya, one of its more powerful features (for non-programmers) is the ability to drag-and-drop a selection of the operation history from the script editor into the top bar. This would automatically create an icon that essentially is a script to do the same operations again (and could easily be modified later). Could something like this be considered for development?
I really like your suggestion of creating something similar to the Maya “Shelves”; where Users can drag and drop the tools they use into a saved shelf. Something to note for the developers, is that the user can make multiple instances of the same tool; each with different preset option which load each time the preset tool is used. This is very powerful and can save loads of time when working all day; especially in some repetitive tasks.
I don’t use Maya; though I’ve been an Alias user for years. These products were originally created by the same developers in the 80’s. In Alias, when you create a Vertical Shelf; the items in each panel operate as a drop down menu with the items listed, but inly when using the right mouse button. I use this daily.
re: 1 – currently no (not sure we would event want that?)
re: 2 – currently this can be supported since the icons are external files.
re: 3 – custom yes, drag and drop – we’ll see. That means you need to store tools in the workspace, which conflicts a little with addons that want to manipulate the tools too. It’s possible but not sure about this one.
re: 4 – Better macro support would be great, but is out of scope for this project.
> re: 2 – currently this can be supported since the icons are external files.
This is great news, allows for easy modding! Perfect! :)
Thanks for the quick reply!
>> re: 1 – currently no (not sure we would event want that?)
I only suggest it because while having immediate access to the tool settings looks useful, the examples show so much dead space. If the bar could be transparent, the user still has the immediate access without having a long blank stretch of horizontal space.
Blender developers best! Blender 2.8 looks incredibly good, a new age! Thank you!
While this looks like a step in the right direction, I think the main problem with the UI is there is too much uncontrollable clutter and no way to customize what’s visible.
What I’d really like to see is some way to customize the interface, regardless of the visuals (icons could be themed). At the very least some way to completely close sections, like those that addons add, would be nice. But detailed customization would be nice. For example, if I’m used to certain shortcuts for commonly used commands, I would like the ability to completely hide those from the toolbars, they’re just clutter at that point. Toolbars and such should only contain commands I more rarely use imo. Though for beginners it could be set to the reverse (common shortcuts only).
Also while I like that Blender is shortcut driven and you can assign a shortcut to nearly anything, I use a completely custom set of shortcuts and the actual shortcut editor is a nightmare to navigate (editing a config and then importing it is not a solution due to some bugs). Not all buttons allow setting a shortcut (and when they do there’s no option to set the context). Contexts are also confusing. And addons have the ability to force shortcuts which mess with mine, just like they can inject themselves into the interface however they want (imo, addons should ask for certain permissions: shortcuts, ui, etc OR user settings should always override them).
Are there any plans to tackle any of this?
Give this man a mic please!
It’s gonna be impossible to please everyone, let people customize their toolbar with the things they want the most. 10 year old software like autocad already had that what is stopping you?
Thanks. Although as a programmer I understand sometimes trivial things like this can be hard, I’d rather a solid base be built, than a new UI on top of existing problems, though both would be nice.
I would like to add to my initial comment though regarding the shortcut editor, I’ve been wondering, I know the reason we can’t have a set list of commands to choose from is the fact they can change (because they are just pointers to some property path and addons can register additional ones), but then why not implement autocomplete for addons like in the python console. That would be amazing. Specifically though I envision the shortcut editor as a sortable, filterable (by context, command type, etc) list. Though the real holy grail would be something like Adobe Premiere’s shortcut editor that let’s you see the shortcuts mapped on a keyboard. I would have no complaints at that point if there was no UI at all! lol
One other thing, somebody brought up theming problems in one of the comments and I second it. I wanted bigger points and different colors for selections and edges, etc, not even UI stuff, and it’s just so convoluted.
I think the incredible amount of careful thought you guys are giving the UI redesign is amazing.
I spend all day in various 3D packages (mostly commercial, but also some open source), including blender, and I really like what I see in these new design documents. You clearly know what you are doing and have obviously given it a great deal of thought.
I can’t wait to start using 2.8 whenever it finally ships.
Kudos to you all.
this is so good, i love the way you’re tackling ui/ux problems !
2 things tho,
i wish if you could have left click select as standard, i think most of the users have to use blender with others app like substance or unity or UE4 or aftereffect or Marvelous or any another soft, and having right click select on blender is quite problematic when you jump between different apps. I have changed to left click select BUT some selection are now reversed, with left click select i need to right click select to move in the timeline u_u
the second point is just the 3d cursor, are you guys going to change it’s look ?
Anyway, keep up with the good work :D
Nizar: Yes, the short answer is that we would like to support using left click selection in a good way too. In practice, left click select was always suboptimal in Blender, and so we will need to do some work to make it feel like a first class citizen. This is still to be done, though, and will likely happen after we get the main features in place.
I’m SOOO glad to hear that left-click select will be added (hopefully soon!). I don’t think there’s anything that would help new users more. Icons and stuff is great, but until the left-click-select is added, it’s still going to be very hard for new users. This is really great news. Thanks for the update on this feature.
rotate/move/scale icons are not good; try to create better design
This is the common linux and open source UI desighn problem – the icons are huge. Blender was avoiding it but now I see it coming to the 2.8 UI too. So what’s the point in having such huge icons and wasting time on creating this elaborate icons? It actually makes Blender more cartoony and much less a serious tool for many new users coming from commercial software like Modo, Nuke and so on. I do appreciate the work Blender developers do but this new UI design makes Blender 2.8 look amature so far. PS: UI panels rounded corners? Seriously? )))
This. So much this.
They are actually smaller than in 2.79 and earlier. The icons for sculpt and paint brushes were quite big, and we wanted to make them smaller. The new ones are not generally larger than most commercial 3D apps. Plus, you can now resize them to make them even smaller still. It’s not always easy to create readable icons for hundreds of tools if they have to be too minuscule, but we’ll try to do our best to make sure they are readable at small sizes, and will likely change/tweak the ones we already have with that in mind. Cheers
Ofcourse its not easy but its needed unless the amount of tools/brushes is not going to get bigger. Also the idea of having two columns for the toolbar is superior because most monitors are widescreen these days and you can abuse side space way more than you can top and bottom that you made bigger for no reason(simply because the icon at the top is too big).
Also for extendibility purpose in the future it would be nice to add more columns for tool panel when you click/hover some triple dot area for it to show additional tools/brushes. This way we wouln’t need to scroll alot and at the moment you pick a tool/brush there is no need for you to look at the model anyway since you’re looking for tool/brush.
As I mentioned in another comment, the point of having such huge icons can be made using Fitts’s law. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitts%27s_law
It speeds up the time you need to hit the icon.
Incredible, you are really getting to give consistency to the interface and the tools. The icons are great, I do not understand some criticisms. I think you’re going in the right direction, I think you’ll satisfy novice and more experienced users. Congratulations and thanks for the great work and effort you are doing.
it will be great if u could integrate CAD modeling .. something like Revit or rhino with grasshopper … :))
Take a look at these Plugins:
http://nikitron.cc.ua/sverchok_en.html
This one is much like grasshopper and also allows parametric modelling.
https://www.blendernation.com/2015/07/10/archimesh-1-1-adds-flexible-editing/
This one has most all of what you’d expect for traditional Architectural Modelling. It is now included in the official releases (2.7x), and just requires you to activate it in the Add-ons panel in settings.
This looks amazing, thanks for doing all this work. I encourage you to consider the perspective of people who don’t speak English and/or don’t have a localized version of Blender available. The more visual tools will help a lot.
I think, that the good idea will be if the toolbar and property bar will be able movable in the 3d view.
For example is the RetopoFlow 2.0 : https://cgcookie.com/live_streams/retopology-with-retopoflow-2-0
Problem with rotate widget is that when you are rotating one axe other two disappear and reappear only when you stop rotation. So we have no visual reference for gimbal lock.
See here good example how it should work https://i.giphy.com/3oz8xXJ5NB2owg5V16.gif
Great work!
Do not listen to whiners and just let them turn on / off the text, icons and size the whole thing.
P.S. The rotation widget must be unambiguous without a gray fill.
Good job guys, you are the best.
Blender 2.8 is too little to express the changes between 2.79 and the new one. It is Blender 3 or BLEND3R already.
Nah, just because Mozilla likes to have version 7434245455612 in a couple of years doesn’t mean everybody else should do it.
Amazing development and design work!
Amazing. Are there plans for improving sculpting tools and particle system ?
No, not as part of 2.8 development.
I’ve read about the BI textures being ported to Eevee\Cycles. Will that include, for example projection settings for image textures? Maybe a way of connecting node editor textures with texture tab? (Unless that’s already a thing)
Great! The new interface is already very popular in assemblies, and blender 2.8 is one of the few projects I’m waiting for and following the development. Will there be any changes in the panels for creating objects? Will there be any changes in the operations for creating them or, for example, the cube as before will be created only in the standard size? Will the uv editor also have a new interface?
In any case, the new interface is very healthy.
Great work, I wish I could help!
I was the one who colorized the old mockup icons just for testing but I don’t think they are right or readible enough as they are.
That said I don’t really like the new ones either. They have other problems.
I read that you made them in 3d and try to render them in svg. But it’s much harder to customize them this way and to make them really consistent. Please don’t do this and go straight to svg. Icons are meant to be drawn.
Also why is the top-bar so thick? It could easily lose ~1/3 of it’s height.
This isn’t using SVG, if we need to we can change exact method, I already tested both drawing on the GPU and in software, if one has issues we can use the other. Either way the result gets cached so performance needs to be quite bad for it to be noticeable.
Actually, I don’t like the top-bar more or less, it’s more like photoshop, take height space is stupid. the fist idea from me is how to hide it, haha, by the way, currently, the option setting is on the top-right, so when you click your mouse on tool-bar , than move your mouse from left to top-right, take long distance to move your mouse. it not good, although the old users know F6
I have necessarily bought a laptop and I do not have a numerical block … would there be a way to have a button that allows me to modify the shortcuts for each workspace and adjust them to my keyboard?
Personally find it awful toolbar design, there was already superior designs for it yet somehow it turned into this… https://i.imgur.com/sz0eXuR.jpg
Multiple layouts aren’t so hard to support, see existing code: https://developer.blender.org/diffusion/B/browse/blender2.8/release/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_toolsystem_common.py;e87dd9aa006ff8816c5c5258a91061cec299f446$240-293
Totaly agree. Icons are necessary, but now in the proposal, they are too big, too much detailed, with unnecessary shadows and cartoonish look. They are not a continuation of old blender icon style, but something really alien.
Icons should be tiny and readable. Could be colour coded to visually distinguish field of usage. @Sunbeam attached good example and comparison.
Good point! Also rounded corners, way too large borders or spaces between controls just waste space. Not everybody is using 32″ monitors to work on.
For example the current toolbars have unnecessarily wide borders on both sides. 1/2 of that is more than enough.
Screen estate is precious!
I disagree with your proposal that icons should be tiny. Having tiny interactive areas to click goes against Fitt’s law, which basically states that bigger targets that are closer are easier to hit than smaller targets further away. You can use its formular to calculate the difficulty of interface elements. Since the icons are already away at the side, so nowhere near the cursor, you would do good to compensate that with larger icons. Smaller icons will just slow you down.
Perhaps icons could zoom to a larger size when moused-over?
@SunBeam,
Wow that link on imgur (https://i.imgur.com/sz0eXuR.jpg) is cool, i prefer those icons i think. The color could distinguish the functionality of the icons. This makes them better to understand just by the color. Thats a major plus.
I dont hope all the current settings will vanish in a menu at the bottom. That would mean a lot more clicking. Perhaps a specials menu like the space bar, but then for instance shift + space would activate a more detailed tools menu.
Im not sure all the tool settings are at the correct location at the top. Horizontal menu isnt that clear as a view vertical menu. It sounds weird but your eyes need to move a lot more then with a vertical menu. Also a lot of items will never fit in that horizontal menu like brush icons, curve settings, mainly the bigger items in the current tools..
it’s cool
where do we put our addons?
I think blender should be lighter than at the beginning.
It would be advisable not to include the addons, but as we need them we will download and add them, something like a button to enable from the software via online.
Abstract the design. Readability is more essential than the step by step explanation of the tool. Also the colors and shadow and cartoony nature are really not necessary.
Listen to this guys comment.
Less is more. This is one of the reasons why I don’t like to work with Cinema 4D. It looks like a playground and is very distracting.
This icons are well done, no question, but I think it would be better you direct them to the edit mode style.
One color and several shades of gray.
Especially these reminds me the one from modo :D
Icons are indeed beneficial for finding stuff at a glance, but I’m not very fond of the current design either.
I’d also much rather see a more minimal style, with far less detail, a monochrome palete, perhaps line art drawings so they are less distracting. Color grouping is surprisingly helpful though.
I hope these are easily customizable after the fact, hopefully they are kept as discrete files upon installation, so one can mod them.
Anyway keep up the excellent work dev team, really like the direction this is taking
Hi!
Please content thousands of Softimage user out there !
-> Add a view “Only text” this is so much straight forward !
in object mode they should be adding mesh in place of the manipulators or …. as in Krita, make a menu-wheel so that the workspace is less saturated with buttons.
A different menu-wheel in each workspace …
as the Pie addon, only with visible icons like the ones that are being created now
Red Green Blue, so whole palette is required.
Artwork is nice, but I will also prefere to work without it)
Cannot wait to see more UI changes. Do the UI plans only extend to the toolbar and top bar or will the view properties panel and main properties panel get changes?
These new features is wht i’ve been waiting for so long. Thx so much blender’s devs
These look beautiful! Nice work!
I’m curious how a more flexible widget system is gonna affect add-on creators. – I bet, for instance, retopo flow is gonna benefit from those changes quite a lot.
The tool-system started as a proof of concept last year for the Blender101 project.
Recently it’s been extended to make it look nicer (suddenly people take notice once it has icons :D).
The code is quite small and I may end up rewriting it to work differently.
Having said this, the current toolbar is implemented in Python and should be easy to extend from add-ons.
See:
– https://developer.blender.org/diffusion/B/browse/master/release/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_toolsystem_toolbar.py;e87dd9aa006ff8816c5c5258a91061cec299f446
– https://developer.blender.org/diffusion/B/browse/master/release/scripts/startup/bl_ui/space_toolsystem_common.py;e87dd9aa006ff8816c5c5258a91061cec299f446
dont forget to add an option to turn those (…) icons off (just text if there is text otherwise icon) please.
+1000 …was about to write the same thing!
Looking really good! Kudos and keep it up guys!
I like the direction.
Right now my biggest worry is how will the new elegant UI mix with addons that traditionally have just dumped their controls into the toolbar as a tab. I always felt that this was a pretty poor design but there didn’t really seem to be other way.
How will add-ons be managed in this new UI scheme?
Firstly, we’re aware of this and have discussed some options but not yet settled on any.
Generally we need the ability to extend the UI for ourselves (different render engines, the up-coming grease pencil branch merge, even built-in add-ons).
The UI choices we make must account for this, so add-ons can fit into the design too.
Before considering the design complete we plan to port some of the existing UI-heavy add-ons to 2.8x UI – to make sure we resolve any issues early on.
I’ve said it on Twitter already but a lot of this reminds me of Blender in a very good way, already. No matter if the icons get flattened out or remain in a similar style to this – all the other ideas about UI and consistency improvements are so cool that it really feels like more than only one leap for Blender.
This is going to be awesome and in many ways for me feels like it has the potential to propell Blender to a commercial level image in the minds of many people who still weren’t convinced about it yet.
As rumi posted earlier – this might very well be be Blender 3 instead of 2.8.
Fingers crossed!
u could have a setting to switch between the 2.70 or the 2.8 layout.
Will the icons remain with this design? I am so worried that it will get changed to a more “flat” design look, and that breaks my heart. It’s 3D tools, they should remain 3D looking. it makes so much more sense, especially since it will match sculpt brushes, and a lot of other 3D space oriented icons.
please keep the design like this. it’s so beautiful, colorful and originally refreshing.
Personally I’d like people to start contributing addons to Blender – giving them control on them to release them as part of the greater good rather than charging users for them – Blender has been given free to us the public therefore I feel where we can give back free also…. perhaps that way Blender could control the addons integration also more easily… (just saying! :) )
I completely agree. It would be great if some of the popular addon authors donated their code/addon to the blender team for integration and general use by the community. Personally I think it would be a great way to stick it to the main stream folks, it would show just how committed our community is to the success to Blender. To bad I don’t have any cool addons to donate.
I disagree, developing should have an incentive, so if someone wants to make something for free, then that is OK and welcome. But if someone delivers quality and wants to be paid, then that should be OK as well. Otherwise you deter those developers who want /need recompense and probably gone advancement.
I agree. But still … there are some addons that would be absolutely MIND BLOWING to have in Blender by default for free. You’d just have to compensate the addon devs.
I recently had the idea that there could be crowdfunding campaigns to fund an addon being added to Blender. Like it happens for commercial programs – someone makes a great addon and then the company of the actual software buys it from them. But with Blender it would be funded by the community of that addon. (Armory Engine, although it’s more than an addon, does something similar to that – as soon as the Patreon reaches a certain amount, it will go completely free forever.)
It’s probably gonna remain a fantasy, but I’d really love that for some addons. Pie Menu Editor, Retopoflow, or some great shaders or animation system improvements/mograph addons that are out there.
Hey guys,
Are you planning on having a different cursor icon? The safety red\white booey look is getting old in the tooth :)
Would also be nice if we could control the size and shape of the cursor.
Other than that, looks good!
Yes, we talked about this – first we need to add color cursor support, after that tools could have their own cursors.
Awesome!
Incredible work! Words cannot express how excited I am to see 2.8 released.
Keep up the fantastic work you guys! :D
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