2.8 Hurdles and Roadblocks

Captains Log #2: 

Met Eevee today. Definitely was like meeting a girl online, flying to meet her in person and turning out to be a nun in a church. I don’t know what to expect from her. Her sisters Workbench and Look Dev don’t know what to make of them either.

– Really confused on how wireframe works. By far the most perplexing thing until now.

– Why if I’m in wireframe view can’t I see the vertices in the back? Did dev money ran out?

– Why when I’m in “Solid View” I can see behind objects as if in wireframe?

– Why are Objects in Solid View always displayed as having “Wire” and “Draw All Faces” always on? feels like a never ending weird wireframe. I don’t want to see all the edges all the time. Give me back my slick sold view.

– Ok, I see there are now 3 render engines. Eevee, Cycles and Workbench. I have zero idea of what Workbench is.

– What in the world!? Why when is Cycles and press “Z” and select Rendered, all the wireframes and geometry are there while the viewport is in render activity? now this is some major WTF, does not feel like a Cycles Viewport render anymore.

– Really confused on what Look Dev is. Can’t seem to find its use. Also if I change to the Workbench Engine then Look Dev goes away. Why?

– Changing to Workbench, pressing “Z” selecting “Rendered” doesn’t do anything. Is this a rendering program anymore? 

– Could this be a Government run program to see how fast people can go crazy?

– I keep pressing SHIFT + Z to render only to get wireframe view. Looks like that’s wireframe hotkey now. Only if wireframe weren’t so useless.

– I was very used to SHIFT  + Z twice to get out of render viewport, doesn’t work that way now.

– I do not like the fact that Workspaces are left exactly how you left them. Very uncomfortable. 

– Oh great, the wireframe mystery deepens. There’s a wireframe slider in the Overlays drop down menu that only seems to partially dissolves the wires in solid view. 

– Feels like wireframe is not a thing anymore. Maybe working without wireframe is just an interesting new challenge. 

– Added a Subsurface modifier only to have a mess of wires on top of subsurf modifier on edit mode. Why can’t it be the slick solid look like before?

– Seems I can select vertices in wireframe even though they are occluded, I can’t see behind things yet they are select-able though the mesh .

– Crazy government theory gaining credibility.

– Face Orientation option very handy and very blue.

– Looks like things change a lot depending if you’re on one of the three render engines. The View Port Drop down has lots of different options and changes according to the engine. But why so many engines? with so many viewport options.

Biggest takeaways: Wireframe sucks now. 3 major engines that changes a lot how the viewport behaves. Don’t see the need for Look Dev. Most of the things have stayed the same on the whole right panel.  

I’m not sure why your wireframe mode is looking so strange, Omar.  Mine works just as it should:

I suggest to you, perhaps download the very newest build of 2.8 from the Blender website, and in the Preferences click Load Factory Settings (it’s in the 3-bar menu at the bottom left corner) and try to completely reset 2.8.  Then maybe it should work right.

Set Origin is in your right-click menu, when in Object Mode!

The LookDev mode is useful for making your materials – while in LookDev, Blender uses an internal HDRi map to light the object, without you having to establish one by yourself.  This HDRi will not appear in your renders, it is internal to Blender only.  There are a few different HDRi’s you can use; in the top right corner of the viewport, click the drop-down arrow next to the viewport select buttons and click the globe to change between the different environments.  You use this same method to change matcaps when in solid shading mode.

ETA:  If resetting Blender to factory doesn’t do the trick, then while in Wireframe mode, click the Show X-Ray button, which is here:

Blender should remember to turn this on every single time you switch into Wireframe mode again thereafter.

@smurfmier1985 Alright, Look Dev will get its chance once I’m into shading and texturing then.

@jakeblended X-Ray should be enabled by default, I mean who wants a wireframe that doesn’t wireframe.

@dostovel in this video Ethan goes over the new collection system and instancing, might be useful 😊

Watch the whole course while you’re at it, lots of neat stuff about Eevee which might come in handy for learning 2.8!

@smurfmier1985 No, no, no , nooooooooo! I have become one of those people. I should’ve read before I freaked out.

EDIT: Thanks Miranda, that video completely cleared up my Grouping doubt. It’s all done now through Collections, there is no such thing as group now. Question is, how do you link assets into another file now? Lets do some experimenting and see. 

@waylow Lol proxified. 

Something is driving me crazy and it’s that orange glow of selection that goes through objects. I can’t find were to turn that off. I know I can toggle off “Outline Selected” but that is not it. I would like the selection not to phase through objects. Also the super thick orange stroke is making me hungry for some reason. Please tell me there’s a way to change this. 

@dostovel You can change the thickness of the line in Preferences > Themes > 3D View > Outline Width, but 1px, which I think is the default, is as small as that line can get I’m afraid.  I don’t know if it’s possible to turn the x-rayed selection outline off.