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I've recently discovered blender as a solution for my rendering and animation needs as an aspiring product designer since these tools in traditional pd software such as Fusion and Solidworks is very basic at best. However, I've noticed that forming shapes in blender seems to be done from primitives such as cubes, planes and spheres rather than a sketch as I am traditionally used to. This method seems very roundabout for making something even relatively simple such as a table or chair which I would otherwise just sketch,extrude and modify. I would like to know if this is just a matter of not being used to it, or whether I should stick to other software for modeling product and import it to blender for rendering and animation. If so, the mesh seems to be very distorted when imported are there any addons I should look into for solving this problem.

Ray Mairlot
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shakthi sairam
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  • I think you should dive into polygon modeling theme, to have a better understanding about differences between NURBS and polygon modeling. I think, this tutorial series is a good point to start with https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hf2esGA7vCc – Crantisz Jun 21 '20 at 12:33
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    all the 3D softwares work the same and propose primitives, but you can begin with a simple vertex, you can also draw curves (bezier or grease pencil) and convert them to mesh afterwards if you feel more comfortable with drawing. – moonboots Jun 21 '20 at 12:44
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    Hi. What do you mean by a 'sketch' in this context? – Ray Mairlot Jun 21 '20 at 12:57
  • @Crantisz Yes, I actually thought of this difficulty while doing that exact tutorial. :) – shakthi sairam Jun 21 '20 at 16:40
  • @moonboots Wow. Thanks! I did not know I could do that, will look into it. – shakthi sairam Jun 21 '20 at 16:42
  • @RayMairlot As in, If I were modelling something that doesn't closely resemble a primitive shape, like a star shaped object or some other weirdly shaped thing, It would be much easier to sketch the side or front profile and extrude it as a sort of free form body as I would in fusion rather than to modify a primitive to my desired shape. I just wanted to know if there was a way to achieve this in blender. – shakthi sairam Jun 21 '20 at 16:49
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    if you want to draw your shapes use a vector drawing program like Illustrator or Inkscape where you can create curves and paths. Then export those as SVGs. Import the paths in blender and take it from there. https://blender.stackexchange.com/questions/183131/any-suggestions-on-how-to-model-it-i-tried-few-but-couldnt-find-the-perfect-on/183188#183188 – susu Jun 21 '20 at 17:48

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How to (sort of) do a CAD sketch in blender:

  1. Add a single vertex. This can be done by deleting all the other vertices in the default cube, or enable the "Extra Objects" addon an press ShiftA and choose "Single Vert".
  2. With the vertice selected go into edit mode and orthographic view from the desired side.
  3. Press E to extend into the shape you want. It will create a bunch of points in the shape you like.
  4. When you want to close off a shape, select the two vertices you want to connect and press F to automatically join them, in this case with an edge.
  5. Now fill in the shape. Select something to fill in and press F to automatically join them, this time with a face.
  6. Now select everything (or something), and press E to extrude them into the desired height.
Eric Xue
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