Generate modifiers (Mesh)

Generate modifiers are available for mesh objects, curve + text objects and volume objects.

Array

The Array modifier creates an array of copies of the base object. Each copy can offset from the previous one in any of a number of possible ways. Vertices in adjacent copies can be merged if they are nearby, allowing smooth Subdivision Surface frameworks to be generated.

Multiple Array modifiers may be active for an object at the same time. This allows to create complex three-dimensional constructs.

Hint for Offset Calculation. The transformation applied from one copy to the next is calculated as the sum of the three different components (Relative, Constant and Object), each of which can be enabled/disabled independently of the others. This allows, for example, a relative offset of (1.0, 0.0, 0.0) and a constant offset of (0.1, 0.0, 0.0), giving an array of objects neatly spaced along the X axis with a constant 0.1 unit between them, whatever the original object’s size.

Shape

Method used to arrange the duplicates.

Method Line

Randomize subpanel

Randomize the copies.

Scale Axes

Merge subpanel

Merges the vertices below the given threshold. Realize Instances needs to be activated.

Distance

The threshold distance. Everything below this distance will be merged.

Method Circle

Sweep Angle

Just with method Arc. The sweep angle for the arc.

Align Rotation subpanel

Rotate instances based on the circle shape.

Randomize subpanel

Randomize the copies.

Scale Axes

Merge subpanel

Merges the vertices below the given threshold. Realize Instances needs to be activated.

Distance

The threshold distance. Everything below this distance will be merged.

Method Curve

Distributes the duplicates along a selected curve.

Align Rotation subpanel

Rotate instances based on the circle shape.

Randomize subpanel

Randomize the copies.

Scale Axes

Merge subpanel

Merges the vertices below the given threshold. Realize Instances needs to be activated.

Distance

The threshold distance. Everything below this distance will be merged.

Method Transform

Randomize subpanel

Randomize the copies.

Scale Axes

Merge subpanel

Merges the vertices below the given threshold. Realize Instances needs to be activated.

Distance

The threshold distance. Everything below this distance will be merged.

Array ( Legacy )

The Array modifier creates an array of copies of the base object. Each copy can offset from the previous one in any of a number of possible ways. Vertices in adjacent copies can be merged if they are nearby, allowing smooth Subdivision Surface frameworks to be generated.

This modifier can be useful when combined with tillable meshes for quickly developing large scenes. It is also useful for creating complex repetitive shapes.

Multiple Array modifiers may be active for an object at the same time. This allows to create complex three-dimensional constructs.

Hint for Offset Calculation. The transformation applied from one copy to the next is calculated as the sum of the three different components (Relative, Constant and Object), each of which can be enabled/disabled independently of the others. This allows, for example, a relative offset of (1.0, 0.0, 0.0) and a constant offset of (0.1, 0.0, 0.0), giving an array of objects neatly spaced along the X axis with a constant 0.1 unit between them, whatever the original object’s size.

Fit Type

Controls how the length of the array is determined.

Fixed Count

Generates the number of copies specified in Count.

Fit Length

Generates copies to fit within the fixed length given by Length.

Fit Curve

Generates copies to fit within the length of the curve object specified in Curve. You need to select a curve object.

Fit Length uses the local coordinate system length of the curve, which means that scaling the curve in Object Mode will not change the number of copies generated by the modifier.

Applying the scale can be useful for both.

Relative Offset

Factor X/Y/Z

Adds a translation equal to the object’s bounding box size along each axis to the offset, multiplied by a scaling factor. X, Y and Z scaling factors can be specified.

Constant Offset

Distance X/Y/Z

Adds a constant translation component to the duplicate object’s offset. X, Y and Z constant components can be specified.

UV's

Offset U/V

Shifts UV's of each new duplicate by a settable amount.

Caps

Cap Start / End

Adds a chosen mesh at the start and end of the array. The start object is added at position -1. The end object at position +1. When Merge is activated, and the cap vertices are within the Distance threshold, they will be merged.

Bevel

The Bevel modifier bevels the edges of the mesh. It is a non-destructive alternative to the Bevel Operation in Edit Mode.

Affect

Vertices

Only the areas near vertices are beveled, the edges remain unchanged.

Edges

Bevels both edges and vertices.

Width Type

Defines how Width will be interpreted to determine the amount of bevel.

Offset

Value is interpreted as the distance from the original edge to the edge of the beveled face.

Width

Value is interpreted as the distance between the two new edges formed by the bevel.

Depth

Value is the perpendicular distance from the new bevel face to original edge.

Limit Method

Used to control where a bevel is applied to the mesh.

None

No limit, all edges will be beveled.

Angle

Only edges where the adjacent faces form an angle smaller than the defined threshold will be beveled. Intended to allow you to bevel only the sharp edges of an object without affecting its smooth surfaces.

Angle

The angle above which to bevel.

Weight

Use each edge’s bevel weight to determine the width of the bevel. When the bevel weight is 0.0, no bevel is applied.

Edge bevel weight can be set in Edit mode in the Edge menu with the Edge Bevel Weight tool.

Edge Weight

The geometry attribute that is used for the weight method. The geometry attribute is bevel_weight_edge, but you can use any attribute defined by Geometry Nodes here.

Vertex Group

Use weights from a vertex group to determine the width of the bevel. When the vertex weight is 0.0, no bevel is applied. An edge is only beveled if both of its vertices are in the vertex group. See here about adjusting vertex group weights.

Profile subpanel

The profile defines the shape of the bevel. Profile has no effect if the number of segments is below 2.

Super Ellipse

Defines a rounded bevel corner.

Shape

The shape of the rounded bevel corner. A value close to 0 bends the roundness to inside. A value towards 1 bends the curve to outside. A value of 0.5 defines a radius around the center point of the bevel.

Custom

Here you can define a custom shape profile for the bevel.

Miter Shape

The shape of the custom bevel corner. Has no effect when the miter type is sharp. You need to set it to Arc in the geometry section.

Custom Profile

Choose and adjust a custom bevel profile. This feature needs more than one segment to work.

Preset

Choose some profile presets.

Tools

Reset View

Resets the zoom factor of the curve view.

Reset Curve

Resets the curve to the defaults. This means when you choose a curve preset to reset it to the values of the latest chosen preset.

Curve view

Adjust the profile curve.

Left click where no point is adds a new point. Left click at a point allows you to move it.

Holding down Shift while moving a node point activates precision movement.

Holding down ctrl while moving activates temporary snapping.

When a point is selected then the curve view reveals a sub menu at the bottom.

Geometry subpanel

Miter Inner

How the inner miter is set. Miter is how the bevel rounding at a corner is done.

Sharp

Creates a sharp miter.

Arc

This replaces the vertex of a miter with 2 vertices, joined by an arc. A separate Spread parameter says how far to move the vertices away from their original position.

Outer

How the outer miter is set. Miter is how the bevel rounding at a corner is done.

Sharp

Creates a sharp miter.

Patch

This replaces the outside vertex of a miter with 3 vertices. And uses a patch pattern there.

Arc

This replaces the vertex of a miter with 2 vertices, joined by an arc. A separate Spread parameter says how far to move the vertices away from their original position.

Intersections

If a bevel corner is filled or not. Needs minimum two segments to have effect.

When the inner corners of the cutoff profiles faces meet at the same location with a three way intersection, then no center face is created.

The direction of the cutoff faces depends on the original vertex’s normal.

Shading subpanel

Harden Normals

Match normals of new faces to adjacent faces.

Autosmooth needs to be enabled for this feature. And the shading needs to be smooth.

Face Strength

Set the Face Strength on the faces involved in the bevel by the mode specified here.

This face strength then can be used in conjunction with a following Weighted Normals modifier (with the Face Influence option checked).

Boolean

The Boolean modifier uses one of the three available Boolean operations to create a single mesh out of two mesh objects. Union, Difference and Intersect. This modifier needs a second object to be the target of the operation.

Boolean operations may or may not deliver useful results. And requires nearly always manual cleanup afterwards since it tends to create N-Gon geometry and can create micro triangles. You should also avoid co-planar faces. Manifold meshes works best.

Operation

The Boolean operation to use.

Demonstrated at a cube with the modifier applied, and a sphere as the target object.

Intersect

Keeps the intersecting geometry, removes the non intersecting geometry.

Union

The target mesh is added to the modified mesh.

Difference

Keeps the non intersecting geometry, removes the intersecting geometry.

Operand Type

Solver Options sub panel

With solver method fast

Overlap Threshold

The threshold for overlapping geometry. This value determines above which value a boolean operation happens.

With Solver Method Exact

Materials

Method for setting the materials on new faces.

With Solver Method Manifold

Materials

Method for setting the materials on new faces.

Build

The Build modifier lets the faces of the mesh object to appear or disappear one after the other over time when you play the animation.

By default, faces appear in the order in which they are stored in memory, which follows the order how they are created. This face/vertex order can be altered in Edit Mode by using Sort Mesh Elements in the Mesh menu.

Decimate

The Decimate modifier allows you to reduce the vertex/face count of a mesh with minimal shape changes. The result is just displayed in Object mode. In Edit mode the unaltered mesh is shown.

Mode

Collapse

This algorithm uses progressive merging of vertices, taking the shape of the mesh into account.

Ratio

The ratio of faces to keep after decimation. 1.0 is not altered. The lower the value the stronger the reduction.

This means that if your mesh contains quads or other polygons, the number of remaining faces will be larger than expected, because those will remain unchanged if their edges are not collapsed.

This is only true if the Triangulate option is disabled.

Symmetry

Maintains symmetry on a single axis.

Un-Subdivide

This algorithm tries to unsubdivide divided faces.

Iterations

The number of times to perform the unsubdivide operation. Two iterations is the same as one subdivide operation, so you will usually want to use even numbers.

Planar

This algorithm reduces details by unioning adjacent faces that are below an angle limit.

Face Count

The face count of the decimated mesh.

Edge Split

The Edge Split modifier splits single edges into two independent edges when the adjacent faces are below the defined angle. Or when the edge is marked as sharp. Which can be done in edit mode in the Edge menu with the Mark Sharp tool.

Splitting an edge affects vertex normal generation at that edge, and makes the edge appear sharp. So this modifier can be used to achieve the same effect as Auto Smooth. And make edges appear sharp when their angle is above a certain threshold. It can also be used for manual control of the smoothing process, where the user defines which edges should appear smooth or sharp (see Mesh Smoothing for other ways to do this). If desired, both modes can be active at once.

Mask

The Mask modifier allows to hide vertices of an object dynamically based on vertex groups or an Armature.

Mirror

The Mirror modifier mirrors a mesh along its local X, Y and/or Z axes, across the Object Origin. It can also use another object as the mirror center, then use that object’s local axes instead of its own.

Clipping

Prevents vertices from moving through the mirror plane(s) when you transform them in Edit Mode.

If it is enabled but vertices are beyond the mirror plane and outside of the Merge Distance, the vertices will not be merged. But as soon as the vertices are within Merge Distance they are snapped together and cannot be moved beyond the mirror plane.

Data subpanel

Mirror UV

Mirror the UV texture coordinates across the middle of the image.

Multiresolution

The Multiresolution modifier, in short “Multires”) allows you to subdivide a mesh similarly to the Subdivision Surface modifier, but also allows you to edit the new subdivision levels in Sculpt Mode.

Workflow

Add the modifier. Switch to Sculpt mode. Click at the Subdivide button. The Levels sculpt slider will now turn to 1. Do some sculpting. Click at the Subdivide button again. The Levels sculpt slider will now turn to 2. You have added a second sds layer now. Do some sculpt now. Click at the Subdivide button again, and you have a third sds sculpting level. Do some sculpt now.

To work at level 1 SDS simply change the Levels sculpt value back to 1. Or to 2 when you want to work at layer 2.

Subdivision Subpanel

Shape subpanel

Generate Subpanel

Rebuild all possible sds levels to generate a lower resolution base mesh

Save Externall

Saves displacements to an external .btx file. The Multiresolution sds information is then stored externally, so that the blend files doesn't become too big.

File path

Once saved you will see the path to the btx file below the save external button. The save external button has turned into Pack external then.

Advanced Subpanel

Quality

How precisely the vertices are positioned. This settings becomes active when you have an edge crease applied. This can be done in edit mode in the edge menu.

Remesh

The Remesh modifier generates new mesh topology. The output follows the surface curvature of the input. But its topology contains quads.

The output and also the settings of the three basic modes Blocks, Smooth and Sharp is almost identical. Except the smoothing.

Screw

The Screw modifier takes a profile object, a mesh or a curve, to create a helix-like shape.

The profile should be properly aligned to the cardinal direction of the object.

Merge

Merge vertices that lie on the axis of rotation. Closes off end points with a triangle fan.

Merge Distance

Vertices under this distance to the axis are merged.

Stretch UV's

Stretch the UV coordinates from (0.0 to 1.0) when UV's are present.

Normals

Skin

The Skin modifier uses vertices and edges to create a skinned surface. The output is mostly quads. But intersections can also produce triangles.

You can use geometry with faces as the base geometry. But the modifier just uses the vertices and edges information.

Create Armature

Creates an armature modifier below the Skin modifier. Each edge becomes a bone. And the generated mesh of the Skin modifier is assigned to this armature, with automatic weights. Deforming the armature will then deform the mesh.

Mark Root

You need to be in Edit Mode to make this tool active.

Marking a vertex as root causes that vertex to be used for calculating rotations for connected limbs. Root vertices also affect the armature output, they will be used as the origin for the root bones.

Each set of connected vertices should have one root node (one is selected by default if you do not assign any manually). Mark Root enforces the one-root per set rule, so it is not necessary to manually unmark roots.

Equalize Radii

You need to be in Edit Mode to make this tool active.

Makes the skin radii of selected vertices equal on each axis.

Solidify

The Solidify modifier adds depth and thickness to the faces of a geometry.

Example. A cube with one face removed.

Mode

Simple

This algorithm simply extrudes the geometry. It does not work on geometry where edges have more than two adjacent faces.

Complex

This solidify algorithm can handle every geometric situation to guarantee a manifold output geometry. It is able to solidify shapes like Möbius strips, Klein bottles, architectural wall layouts and many more which the Simple Mode isn’t able to do.

If the special cases are not present it is recommended to choose Simple because the extra logic makes this algorithm much slower.

Rim

Fill Rim

Fills the gap between the inner and outer edges.

Only Rim

Will only leave the generated perpendicular rim

Vertex Group

Only vertices in this group are solidified. Their weights are multiplied by the thickness, so vertices with lower weights will be less thick.

Flat Faces

Just in Complex Mode. Use the minimal vertex weight assigned to the vertices of a face to make sure that new faces stays parallel to their original ones. This is slow, so disable it when it is not needed.

Normals subpanel

Flip Normals

Reverse the normals of all geometry (both the inner and outer surfaces).

High Quality Normals

Just Simple Mode. Normals are calculated to produce a more even thickness.

Materials subpanel

Material Offset

Choose a different material for the new geometry. This is applied as an offset from the original material of the face from which it was solidified.

A value of 0 means it will use the same material.
A value of 1 means it will use the material immediately below the original material.
A value of -2 means the material two positions above the original material will be used.

These values are clamped to the top-most and bottom-most material slots.

Rim

Choose a different material for the rim faces.

Edge Data

Inner, Outer and Rim are simple mode only.

Thickness Clamp

Clamp

A value between (0 to 2) to clamp offsets to avoid self-intersection. The amount is determined by the length of the shortest adjacent edge.

Angle Clamp

If enabled clamping will also consider angles in the geometry, not only lengths. Becomes active when the clamp value is above 0.0.

Output Vertex Groups

Shell

Vertex group that the generated shell geometry will be weighted to. This allows you to use other modifiers to only affect the shell geometry by using a that modifier’s vertex group influence control.

Rim

Same as Shell Vertex Group, but for the generated rim geometry.

Subdivision Surface

The Subdivision Surface modifier subdivides the faces of the mesh. With Simple it just divides the faces. The Catmull-Clark algorithm allows you to smoothen the result.

Type

Catmull-Clark

Subdivides and smooths the surfaces.

Or you can change the crease of the edges in question. Edge Crease can be adjusted in the Transform panel in the Item tab of the sidebar in the 3D view. You need to be in Edit mode.

Simple

Only subdivides the surfaces, without any smoothing.

Adaptive Subdivision (Cycles Experimental Feature Set)

Dicing Scale

Multiplier for scene dicing rate

Advanced

Quality

How precisely the vertices are positioned, relatively to their theoretical position of an infinitely subdivided mesh.

UV Smooth

How to handle UV's during subdivision.

Boundary Smooth

Triangulate

The Triangulate modifier triangulates all faces in a mesh.

Quad Method

How to triangulate quads.

N-Gon Method

How to triangulate N-Gons.

Minimum Vertices

Minimum number of vertices a face must have to be triangulated. For example, setting this value to 5, will prevent triangulation of Quads and only triangulate N-gons.

Volume to mesh

This modifier is the inverse of the Mesh to Volume modifier. It takes an existing volume object and converts one of its grids to a mesh. Only scalar grids (such as the density grid) can be converted.

Resolution Mode

How the resolution of the final mesh is controlled.

Weld

The Weld modifier merges vertices within a threshold.

Mode

All

Full merge by distance.

Connected

Just along the edges.

Wireframe

The Wireframe modifier hides the faces of a mesh, and turns the edges into four sided polygon geometry. The result then looks like you would have a wire frame view of the mesh.

The mesh needs to have faces.

Thickness

Vertex Group

Restrict the modifier to only this vertex group, and use its weighting for thickness.

Mesh to Volume

You need a volume object.

The Mesh to Volume modifier uses a mesh to create a new volume grid. All previously existing volume grids on the volume object are discarded. So this modifier is usually added to an empty volume object. The new volume grid is called “density”.

Resolution Mode

Mode for how the voxel size is specified.