Begrippenlijst

Deze pagina bevat definities voor termen die in Blender en deze handleiding worden gebruikt, met als doel dat je volledig begrijpt wat de betreffende termen betekenen. We handhaven de woordenlijst in het Engels, met eventueel een letterlijke Nederlandse vertaling ernaast en de Nederlandse uitleg van de term.

Action Safe (Veilig gebied)

Het gedeelte van de video of afbeelding dat zichtbaar is op de meeste apparaten. Plaats de inhoud binnen dit gedeelte om ervoor te zorgen dat het niet wordt afgesneden.

Active (Actieve)

Wanneer veel items zijn geselecteerd, zal het laatst geselecteerde item het actieve item zijn. Dit wordt gebruikt in situaties waar de interface alleen opties toont voor één item tegelijk.

Zie ook selectiestatussen.

Aliasing

Rendering artefacten (onvolkomenheden) in de vorm van gekartelde lijnen.

Alpha Channel (Alfa Kanaal)

Een extra kanaal in een afbeelding eventueel voor transparantie.

Straight Alpha (Onafhankelijke Alfa)

Een methode waarbij RGBA-kanalen worden opgeslagen als (R, G, B, A) kanalen, waarbij de RGB-kanalen onafhankelijk blijven van het alfa-kanaal. Dit is het type alpha dat wordt gebruikt door grafische programma’s zoals Photoshop of Gimp, en wordt gebruikt in veelvoorkomende bestandsindelingen zoals PNG, BMP of Targa. Afbeeldingen voor gebruik op het web zijn meestal voorzien van een Straight Alpha.

Premultiplied Alpha (Voorvermenigvuldigde Alfa)

Een methode waarbij RGBA-kanalen worden opgeslagen als (R × A, G × A, B × A, A), waarbij de alpha in de RGB-kanalen wordt vermenigvuldigd.

Dit is de natuurlijke uitvoer van render-engines, waarbij de RGB-kanalen de hoeveelheid licht representeren die naar de kijker komt, en alfa de mate vertegenwoordigt waarin het licht van de achtergrond wordt geblokkeerd. Het OpenEXR-bestandsformaat gebruikt dit alfatype. Daarom worden tussenbestanden voor rendering en compositing vaak opgeslagen met premultiplied alpha. Premultiplied alpha wordt gebruikt voor rook en andere volume effecten met een additieve blendmodus (bijv. vlam- en glittereffecten).

Conversion (Straight/Premultiplied) Alpha (Omzetten)

De conversie tussen de twee alfatype is geen eenvoudige operatie en kan dataverlies met zich meebrengen, aangezien beide alfatypes gegevens kunnen vertegenwoordigen die de ander niet kan, hoewel dit vaak subtiel is.

Straight Alpha kan worden beschouwd als een RGB-kleurafbeelding met een apart alpha masker. In gebieden waar dit masker volledig transparant is, kunnen er nog steeds kleuren zijn in de RGB-kanalen. Bij conversie naar premultiplied alpha wordt dit masker toegepast en worden de kleuren op dergelijke stukken zwart en gaan verloren.

Aan de andere kant kan premultiplied alpha berekeningen doen die zowel licht uitstralen als licht van de achtergrond doorlaten. Bijvoorbeeld, een berekening van transparant vuur kan licht uitstralen, maar laat ook al het licht van objecten erachter door. Bij conversie naar straight alpha gaat dit effect verloren.

Channel Packed (Kanalen samenvoegen)

Deze techniek wordt vaak gebruikt om bijvoorbeeld roughness of specular en metallic samen te voegen in één afbeelding. Dit wordt vooral toegepast in game-engines.

Ambient Light (Omgevingslicht)

Gelijkmatig licht dat aanwezig is in de scène zonder een duidelijke lichtbron die direct kan worden geïdentificeerd. Het is het licht dat afkomstig is van meerdere, verspreide bronnen en dat de hele omgeving min of meer gelijkmatig verlicht, zonder duidelijke schaduwen of richting. Ambient Light draagt bij aan de algehele sfeer van een scène en zorgt ervoor dat objecten zichtbaar zijn, zelfs als ze niet direct worden belicht door een specifieke lichtbron.

Ambient Occlusion (Omgevingsafsluiting)

Een techniek om schaduweffecten en diepte in 3D-scènes te simuleren door te berekenen hoe objecten elkaar blokkeren en minder omgevingslicht ontvangen in nabijgelegen gebieden. Dit creëert realisme en diepte in de weergave. Als een oppervlaktepunt zich onder een voet of tafel bevindt, zal het veel donkerder worden dan de bovenkant van iemands hoofd of de tafelblad.

Animation (Animatie)

Het nabootsen van beweging.

Anti-Aliasing (Randvervaging)

Is de techniek om Aliasing te minimaliseren, bijvoorbeeld door meerdere samples per pixel te renderen.

Armature (Armatuur)

Een Object die Bones bevat. Dit om karakters, spullen (props), etc te Riggen.

Asset (Hulpmiddel)

Data-blocks die je wil hergebruiken, meestal opgenomen in een Asset Library. Zie ook Asset Libraries.

Merk op dat er andere betekenissen zijn van het woord “asset” - soms wordt dit meer generiek gebruikt en verwijst het naar iets bruikbaars, zoals afbeeldingen, modellen, materialen en meer.

Asset Catalog (Assetcatalogus)

Een container voor assets, vergelijkbaar met wat een map is voor bestanden. Zie ook Asset Catalogs.

Asset Library (Assetbibliotheek)

Een asset library is een map op je schijf die is ingevoerd in de Preferences als een asset library. Het invoeren ervan betekent dat je de bibliotheek een naam geeft (zoals “Sprite Fright”) en de locatie op de schijf opgeeft (zoals /home/sybren/projects/sprite-fright/assets).

Asset Metadata (Asset metagegevens)

Asset-gerelateerde informatie, zoals de catalog (cateloges), beschrijving, auteur, voorbeeld en tags. Zie Asset Details Region.

Attribute (Attribuut)

Een algemene term om gegevens te beschrijven die per element zijn opgeslagen in een geometrie data-block.

Axis (As)

Een referentielijn die coördinaten definieert langs één hoofdrichting in bijvoorbeeld een 2D vlak of 3D ruimte.

Axis Angle (Rotatiehoek)

Rotatiemethode waarbij X, Y en Z overeenkomen met de asdefinitie (lijn tussen de origin (de oorsprong) en het X,Y,Z punt), terwijl W overeenkomt met de hoek om die as.

Baking (Bakken)

Het proces waarbij het resultaat van een mogelijk tijdrovende berekening wordt uitgerekend en opgeslagen om te voorkomen dat het later opnieuw moet worden berekend.

Bevel (Afschuining)

Het proces om de hoeken of randen van een object af te schuinen of af te ronden.

Bézier (Bézier)

Een techniek voor het genereren en weergeven van krommen.

Bit Depth (Bitdiepte)

Ook wel kleurdiepte genoemd. De exponentiële waarde (met als basis twee) voor het aantal kleuren dat binnen een enkel kleurkanaal kan worden gerepresenteerd. Een grotere bitdiepte zal meer mogelijke kleuren toestaan, banding verminderen en de precisie verhogen. Echter zal een grotere bitdiepte het geheugengebruik exponentieel verhogen.

Blend Modes (Mengmodi)

Color Blend Modes (Kleur Mengmodi)

Methodes om twee kleuren te mengen met elkaar.

Zie ook de documentatie over Mengmodi van Krita.

Blender Session (Blender-Sessie)

Session (Sessie)

Een sessie begint wanneer de gebruiker Blender opent. Een sessie eindigt wanneer de gebruiker ervoor kiest om Blender te sluiten of af te sluiten.

In some cases, loading a new file may be considered beginning a new session. If so, the documentation should mention that.

Bone (Bot)

Botten worden vaak georganiseerd in een Armature (Armatuur). Deze hiërarchie geeft aan hoe botten met elkaar verbonden zijn en welke bewegingen van invloed zijn op andere botten. Dit is cruciaal voor het animeren van complexe objecten zoals personages. Maar kan ook voor simpele objecten gebruikt worden. Een bot bestaat uit een Head (Kop), Tail (Staart) en Roll Angle (Rolhoek).

Bone Collection

Collection of bones of an Armature, identified by its name. Bone collections can be used to organise bones and toggle their visibility. See Bone Collections.

Boolean (Booleaan)

De Booleaanse meetkunde is een tak van de meetkunde waarin vormen worden gemanipuleerd met behulp van Boolean operaties, zoals vereniging, doorsnede en verschil, om complexe vormen te creëren of analyseren. In programmeertalen wordt een Boolean ingezet als een binaire status: true/false (1/0).

Zie ook :doc: Boolean Modifier </modeling/modifiers/generate/booleans>.

Bounding Box (Begrenzende Balk)

Is een eenvoudige rechthoekige of kubus- of balkvormige omhulling (box) rond een object, set van objecten, of een deel van een ruimte. De box is uitgelijnd op de local space van het object.

Bump Mapping (Bultmapping)

Is een techniek om lichte variaties in de hoogte van een oppervlak te simuleren met behulp van een grijswaarde “hoogtemap” texture.

BVH (afkorting)

Bounding Volume Hierarchy (Hiërarchie met BegrenzingsVolumes)

A hierarchical structure of geometric objects.

Zie ook Bounding Volume Hierarchy op Wikipedia.

Caustics(Lichteffecten door breking van licht)

Een optisch fenomeen van geconcentreerd licht dat gevormd wordt door reflectie en/of refractie van gebogen oppervlaktes. Bijvoorbeeld zichtbaar wanneer licht door een glas water op een tafel valt of het patroon op de bodem ontstaat van een zwembad door de zon.

In renderen verwijst dit naar het verstrooide weerkaatste licht na een glanzend oppervlak of lichtbreking.

See also Caustics on Wikipedia.

Child (Kind)

Een Object dat wordt beïnvloed door zijn Parent (Ouder).

Chroma (Kleurzuiverheid)

Chrominance (Kleurinformatie)

In het algemeen, een resulterende kleurontbinding van een afbeelding, waarbij zijn (L of Y) luminantiekanaal wordt gescheiden. Er zijn twee verschillende contexten waarin deze term wordt gebruikt:

Video Systemen

Dit verwijst naar de algemene kleurontbinding die resulteert in Y (Luminantie) en C (Chrominantie) kanalen, waarbij de chrominantie wordt vertegenwoordigd door: U = (Blauw min Luminantie) en V = (Rood min Luminantie).

Matte Compositing (Matte Samenstelling)

Dit verwijst naar een punt in het kleurenspectrum omgeven door een mix van een bepaald spectrum van zijn naastgelegen RGBkleuren. Dit punt wordt Chroma key genoemd, en deze key (een gekozen kleur) wordt gebruikt om een alfamasker te creëren. De totale hoeveelheid ruimte in het kleurenspectrum voor dit chrominantiepunt wordt door gebruikers gedefinieerd in een cirkel of vierhoek.

Chromaticities (Chromaticiteit)

De coördinaten van de Primaries op het CIE 1931 xy chromaticiteitsdiagram. Het verwijst naar eigenschappen van kleuren, zoals hun tint, verzadiging en kleurintensiteit, binnen een kleurenspectrum.

Clamp (Beperk)

Clamping (Beperken)

Beperkt een variabele tot een bepaald bereik. De waarden boven of onder het bereik worden ingesteld op de constante waarden van het minimum of maximum van dat bereik.

Collection (Collectie)

Een manier om objecten binnen een scène te organiseren. Het is een groeperingsmechanisme waarmee je verschillende elementen, zoals meshes, lichten, camera’s en andere objecten, kunt organiseren en beheren. Zie ook Collections.

Color Gamut (Kleurbereik)

Een gamut verwijst normaal gesproken naar het bereik van kleuren dat een specifiek kleurmodel/-ruimte kan omvatten. Vaak wordt dit geïllustreerd aan de hand van een 2D-model met behulp van CIE Yxy-coördinaten.

Color Model (Kleurmodel)

Een kleurmodel is een abstract wiskundig model dat beschrijft op welke manier kleuren kunnen worden weergegeven als getallen op vaste posities in een groep, zoals in RGB.

RGB (Rood, Groen, Blauw)

Een additief color model (kleurmodel) waarbij drie primaire kleuren, rood, groen en blauw, worden gecombineerd om andere kleuren te maken.

HSV (Tint, Verzadiging, Value (Helderheid))

Dat is het HSV (Hue, Saturation, Value) kleurmodel. In dit model worden kleuren op een manier weergegeven die nauwer aansluit bij hoe mensen kleuren waarnemen en interpreteren. Hue (Tint), Saturation (Verzadiging) en Value (Helderheid).

HSL

Similar to HSV except the colors are represented as Hue, Saturation, and Luminance.

YUV

Luminance-Chrominance standard used in broadcasting analog PAL (European) video.

YCbCr

Luminance-ChannelBlue-ChannelRed component video for digital broadcast use, whose standards have been updated for HDTV and commonly referred to as the HDMI format for component video.

Color Space (Kleurruimte)

A coordinate system in which a vector represent a color value. This way the color space defines three things:

• The exact color of each of the Primaries

• The White Point

• A transfer function

The color spaces supported by Blender depend on the active OCIO config. The default supported color spaces are described in detail here: Default OpenColorIO Configuration

sRGB

A color space that uses the Rec .709 Primaries and a D65 white point, and 2.2 gamma correction value as the transfer function.

Concave Face

Face in which one vertex is inside a triangle formed by other vertices of the face.

See also Convex and concave polygons on Wikipedia.

Constraint

A way of controlling one Object with data from another.

Convex Face

Face where, if lines were drawn from each vertex to every other vertex, all lines would remain in the face. Opposite of a Concave Face.

Coplanar

Refers to any set of elements that are all aligned to the same 2D plane in 3D space.

Crease

Property of an Edge. Used to define the sharpness of edges in Subdivision Surface meshes.

Current File Asset Library

Asset library that is not a directory on drive, but only reflects the assets in the current blend-file. This library is available regardless of the location of the blend-file. See The Current File Asset Library.

Curve (Curve)

A type of object defined in terms of a line interpolated between Control Vertices. Available types of curves include Bézier, NURBS and Poly.

Curve Segment

The part of a curve connecting two adjacent control points.

Cyclic (Cyclisch)

Often referring to an object being circular. This term is often associated with Curve.

Data User

An existing Blender object, which is using its own data, or linked data (data owned and controlled by another Blender object).

Dielectric Material

A material for real world objects that are electrical insulators such as plastics, wood, glass, ect. Essentially this summarizes any material that is solid and non metallic.

Diffuse Light

Even, directed light coming off a surface. For most things, diffuse light is the main lighting we see. Diffuse light comes from a specific direction or location and creates shading. Surfaces facing towards the light source will be brighter, while surfaces facing away from the light source will be darker.

Directional Light

The light that has a specific direction, but no location. It seems to come from an infinitely far away source, like the sun. Surfaces facing the light are illuminated more than surfaces facing away, but their location does not matter. A directional light illuminates all objects in the scene, no matter where they are.

Displacement Mapping

A method for distorting vertices based on an image or texture. Similar to Bump Mapping, but instead operates on the mesh’s actual geometry. This relies on the mesh having enough geometry to represent details in the image.

Display Referenced

Refers to an image whose Luminance channel is limited to a certain range of values (usually 0-1). The reason it is called display referenced is because a display cannot display an infinite range of values. So, the term Scene Referenced must go through a transfer function to be converted from one to the other.

DOF

Depth of Field

The distance in front of and behind the subject which appears to be in focus. For any given lens setting, there is only one distance at which a subject is precisely in focus, but focus falls off gradually on either side of that distance, so there is a region in which the blurring is tolerable. This region is greater behind the point of focus than it is in front, as the angle of the light rays change more rapidly; they approach being parallel with increasing distance.

Double Buffer

Technique for rendering and displaying content on the screen. Blender uses two buffers (images) to render the interface, the content of one buffer is displayed while rendering occurs on the other buffer. When rendering is complete, the buffers are switched.

Edge (Rand)

Straight segment (line) that connects two Vertices, and can be part of a Face.

Edge Loop

Chain of Edges belonging to consecutive Quads. An edge loop ends at a pole or a boundary. Otherwise, it is cyclic.

Edge Ring

Path of all Edges along a Face Loop that share two faces belonging to that loop.

Elastic

Objects that are able to spontaneously return to their original shape after all outside forces are removed from the object.

Elasticity

The amount a material is elastic versus inelastic.

Empty

An Object without any Vertices, Edges or Faces.

Euler

Euler Rotation

Rotation method where rotations are applied to each of the X, Y, Z axes in a specific order.

Euler orders in Blender are most intuitive when read backwards: XYZ Euler is similar to rotating around Local Z using the Rotate tool in the 3D Viewport, followed by Local Y and then Local X.

F-Curve

A curve that holds the animation values of a specific property.

Face (Vlak)

Mesh element that defines a piece of surface. It consists of three or more Edges.

Face Loop

Chain of consecutive Quads. A face loop stops at a Triangle or N-gon (which do not belong to the loop), or at a boundary. Otherwise, it is cyclic.

Face Normal

The normalized vector perpendicular to the plane that a Face lies in. Each face has its own normal.

Fake User

A special Data User, a program construct that is used to mark an object (e.g. material) to be saved in a blend-file, even when no Real User is using the object. Objects that are not used by any Data User are not included in saved blend-files.

Field of View

The area in which objects are visible to the camera. Also see Focal Length.

Fireflies

Rendering artifacts encountered with path tracing resulting from improbable samples that contribute very high values to pixels.

FK

Forward Kinematics

The process of determining the movement of interconnected segments or bones of a body or model in the order from the parent bones to the child bones. Using forward kinematics on a hierarchically structured object, you can move the upper arm then the lower arm and hand go along with the movement. Without forward kinematics the lower arm and hand would disconnect from upper arm and would move independently in space.

See also Inverse Kinematics.

Focal Length

The distance required by a lens to focus collimated light. Defines the magnification power of a lens. Also see Field of View.

Frame Types

In video compression, a frame can be compressed by several different algorithms. These algorithms are known as picture types or frame types and there are three major types: I, P, and B frames.

I‑frames

The least compressible but don’t require other video frames to decode.

P‑frames

Use data from previous frames to decompress and are more compressible than I‑frames.

B‑frames

Use both previous and forward frames for data reference to get the highest amount of compression.

Gamma (Middentonen)

An operation used to adjust the brightness of an image.

See also Gamma correction on Wikipedia.

Geodesic

Relating to the shortest possible path between two points on a curved surface.

Geometric Center

The mean average of the positions of all vertices making up the object.

Gimbal (Gimbal)

A pivoted support that allows the rotation of an object about a single axis.

See also Gimbal on Wikipedia.

Gimbal Lock

The limitation where axes of rotation can become aligned, losing the ability to rotate on an axis (typically associated with Euler Rotation).

• See also Gimbal lock on Wikipedia.

• See also Gimbal lock on Stack Exchange.

Global Illumination

A superset of Radiosity and ray tracing. The goal is to compute all possible light interactions in a given scene, and thus, obtain a truly photorealistic image. All combinations of diffuse and specular reflections and transmissions must be accounted for. Effects such as color bleeding and caustics must be included in a global illumination simulation.

Global Space

See World Space.

Glossy Map

See Roughness Map.

HDRI

High Dynamic Range Image

A set of techniques that allow a far greater dynamic range of exposures than normal digital imaging techniques. The intention is to accurately represent the wide range of intensity levels found in real scenes, ranging from direct sunlight to the deepest shadows.

See also HDRI on Wikipedia.

Head

A subcomponent of a Bone. The point of rotation for the bone has X, Y, and Z coordinates measured in the Local Space of the Armature object. Used in conjunction with the Tail to define the local Y axis of the bone in Pose Mode. The larger of the two ends when displayed as an Octahedron.

Hue (Tint)

A shade of light out of the color spectrum.

IK

Inverse Kinematics

The process of determining the movement of interconnected segments or bones of a body or model in the order from the child bones to the parent bones. Using inverse kinematics on a hierarchically structured object, you can move the hand then the upper and lower arm will automatically follow that movement. Without inverse kinematics the hand would come off the model and would move independently in space.

See also Forward Kinematics.

Interpolation (Interpolatie)

The process of calculating new data between points of known value, like Keyframes.

IOR

Index of Refraction

A property of transparent materials. When a light ray travels through the same volume it follows a straight path. However, if it passes from one transparent volume to another, it bends. The angle by which the ray is bent can be determined by the IOR of the materials of both volumes.

Keyframe

A frame in an animated sequence drawn or otherwise constructed directly by the animator. In classical animation, when all frames were drawn by animators, the senior artist would draw these frames, leaving the “in between” frames to an apprentice. Now, the animator creates only the first and last frames of a simple sequence (keyframes); the computer fills in the gap.

Keyframing

Inserting Keyframes to build an animated sequence.

Lattice

A type of object consisting of a non-renderable three-dimensional grid of vertices.

See also Lattice Modifier.

Light Bounces

Refers to the reflection or transmission of a light ray upon interaction with a material. See also Light Paths.

Local Space

A 3D coordinate system that originates (for Objects) at the Object Origin. or (for Bones) at the Head of the Bone.

Compare to World Space.

Luminance

The intensity of light either in an image/model channel, or emitted from a surface per square unit in a given direction.

Manifold

Manifold meshes, also called ‘water-tight’ meshes, define a closed non-self-intersecting volume (see also Non-manifold). A manifold mesh is a mesh in which the structure of the connected faces in a closed volume will always point the normals (and their surfaces) to the outside or to the inside of the mesh without any overlaps. If you recalculate those normals, they will always point at a predictable direction (to the outside or to the inside of the volume). When working with non-closed volumes, a manifold mesh is a mesh in which the normals will always define two different and non-consecutive surfaces. A manifold mesh will always define an even number of non-overlapped surfaces.

MatCap

Stands for “material capture”, using an image to represent a complete material including lighting and reflections.

Matte

Mask (Masker)

A grayscale image used to include or exclude parts of an image. A matte is applied as an Alpha Channel, or it is used as a mix factor when applying Color Blend Modes.

Mesh (Mesh)

Type of object consisting of Vertices, Edges and Faces.

Micropolygons

A polygon roughly the size of a pixel or smaller.

MIP

Mip-map

Mip-mapping

‘MIP’ is an acronym of the Latin phrase ‘multum in parvo’, meaning ‘much in little’. Mip-maps are progressively lower resolution representations of an image, generally reduced by half squared interpolations using Anti-Aliasing. Mip-mapping is the process used to calculate lower resolutions of the same image, reducing memory usage to help speed visualization, but increasing memory usage for calculations and allocation. Mip-mapping is also a process used to create small anti-aliased samples of an image used for texturing. The mip-mapping calculations are made by CPUs, but modern graphic processors can be selected for this task and are way faster.

See the mip-map option present in the System Preferences.

MIS

Multiple Importance Sampling

A process of estimating the direction of light rays to improve sampling quality.

See Multiple Importance Sampling and also Importance sampling on Wikipedia.

Modifiers

A non-destructive operation that is applied on top of some sort of data.

Motion Blur

The phenomenon that occurs when we perceive a rapidly moving object. The object appears to be blurred because of our persistence of vision. Simulating motion blur makes computer animation appear more realistic.

Multisampling

Rendering multiple samples per pixel, for Anti-Aliasing.

N-gon

A Face that contains more than four Vertices.

NDOF

3D Mouse

A general term used to describe a 3D mouse, or any input devices which supports more degrees of freedom than a conventional 2D input device, see: Touchpad.

Non-manifold

Non-Manifold meshes essentially define geometry which cannot exist in the real world. This kind of geometry is not suitable for several types of operations, especially those where knowing the volume (inside/outside) of the object is important (refraction, fluids, Boolean operations, or 3D printing, to name a few). A non-manifold mesh is a mesh in which the structure of a non-overlapped surface (based on its connected faces) will not determine the inside or the outside of a volume based on its normals, defining a single surface for both sides, but ended with flipped normals. When working with non-closed volumes, a non-manifold mesh will always determine at least one discontinuity in the normal directions, either by an inversion of a connected loop, or by an odd number of surfaces. A non-manifold mesh will always define an odd number of surfaces.

There are several types of non-manifold geometry:

• Some borders and holes (edges with only a single connected face), as faces have no thickness.

• Edges and vertices not belonging to any face (wire).

• Edges connected to three or more faces (interior faces).

• Vertices belonging to faces that are not adjoining (e.g. two cones sharing the vertex at the apex).

See also: Select Non-Manifold tool.

Nonlinear Animation

Animation technique that allows the animator to edit motions as a whole, not just the individual keys. Nonlinear animation allows you to combine, mix, and blend different motions to create entirely new animations.

Normal (Normal)

The normalized vector perpendicular to a surface.

Normals can be assigned to vertices, faces and modulated across a surface using Normal Mapping.

See also Normals on Wikipedia.

Normal Mapping

Is similar to Bump Mapping, but instead of the image being a grayscale heightmap, the colors define in which direction the normal should be shifted, the three color channels being mapped to the three directions X, Y and Z. This allows more detail and control over the effect.

NURBS

Non-uniform Rational Basis Spline

A computer graphics technique for generating and representing curves and surfaces.

Object (Object)

Container for a type (mesh, curve, surface, metaball, text, armature, lattice, empty, camera, light) and basic 3D transform data (Object Origin).

Object Center

Object Origin

A reference point used to position, rotate, and scale an Object and to define its Local Space coordinates.

Octahedron

An eight-sided figure commonly used to depict the Bones of an Armature.

OpenGL

The graphics system used by Blender (and many other graphics applications) for rendering 3D graphics, often taking advantage of hardware acceleration.

See also OpenGL on Wikipedia.

Operator

An executable action that is completed the moment they’re initiated. See Operators as described in the user interface section.

Overscan

The term used to describe the situation. when not all of a televised image is present on a viewing screen.

See also Overscan on Wikipedia.

Panel (Paneel)

A user interface element that contains buttons. Panels are collapsible to hide there contents and can often be rearranged. See Panels (Panelen) as described in the user interface section.

Parent (Ouder)

An Object that affects its Child objects.

Parenting

Creating a Parent-Child relationship between two objects.

Particle System

Technique that simulates certain kinds of fuzzy phenomena, which are otherwise very hard to reproduce with conventional rendering techniques. Common examples include fire, explosions, smoke, sparks, falling leaves, clouds, fog, snow, dust, meteor tails, stars, and galaxies, or abstract visual effects like glowing trails, magic spells. Also used for things like fur, grass or hair.

Phong

Local illumination model that can produce a certain degree of realism in three-dimensional objects by combining three elements: diffuse, specular and ambient for each considered point on a surface. It has several assumptions – all lights are points, only surface geometry is considered, only local modeling of diffuse and specular, specular color is the same as light color, ambient is a global constant.

Pivot Point

The pivot point is the point in space around which all rotation, scaling and mirror transformations are centered.

See also the Pivot Point docs.

Pixel

The smallest unit of information in a 2D raster image, representing a single color made up of red, green, and blue channels. If the image has an Alpha Channel, the pixel will contain a corresponding fourth channel.

Point Cloud

A list of points in 3D space.

Pole

Vertex where three, five, or more edges meet. A vertex connected to one, two, or four edges is not a pole.

Pose Bone

Pose-specific properties of a Bone, such as its location / rotation / scale relative to the Armature’s rest pose. Its properties are stored on the Object, and thus can be different for each user of the Armature. The Pose Bone also stores constraints.

Pose Mode (Poseermodus)

Used for Posing, Keyframing, Weight Painting, Constraining and Parenting the Bones of an Armature.

Posing

Moving, Rotating and Scaling the Pose Bones of an Armature to achieve an aesthetically pleasing pose for a character.

Premultiplied Alpha (Voorvermenigvuldigde Alfa)

See Alpha Channel.

Primaries

In color theory, primaries (often known as primary colors) are the abstract lights, using an absolute model, that make up a Color Space.

Primitive

A basic object that can be used as a basis for modeling more complicated objects.

Procedural Texture

Computer generated (generic) textures that can be configured via different parameters.

Projection

In computer graphics, there are two common camera projections used.

Perspective

A perspective view is geometrically constructed by taking a scene in 3D and placing an observer at point O. The 2D perspective scene is built by placing a plane (e.g. a sheet of paper) where the 2D scene is to be rendered in front of point O, perpendicular to the viewing direction. For each point P in the 3D scene a PO line is drawn, passing by O and P. The intersection point S between this PO line and the plane is the perspective projection of that point. By projecting all points P of the scene you get a perspective view.

Orthographic

In an orthographic projection, you have a viewing direction but not a viewing point O. The line is then drawn through point P so that it is parallel to the viewing direction. The intersection S between the line and the plane is the orthographic projection of the point P. By projecting all points P of the scene you get the orthographic view.

Proxy

For video editing, a proxy is a smaller version of the original file, typically using an optimized video codec and lower resolution version (faster to load) that stands in for the main image or video.

When proxies are built, editing functions like scrubbing and scrolling and compositing is much faster but gives lower resolution and slightly imprecise result.

Quad

Quadrilateral

Quadrangle

Face that contains exactly four Vertices.

Quaternion

Quaternion Rotation

Rotation method where rotations are defined by four values (X, Y, Z, and W). X, Y, and Z also define an Axis, and W an angle, but it is quite different from Axis Angle.

Quaternion values can be interpreted geometrically as defining a point on a unit sphere in 4D space. Moving along any great circle of the sphere represents rotating around a fixed axis, with one full circle matching two full rotations.

Radiosity

A global lighting method that calculates patterns of light and shadow for rendering graphics images from three-dimensional models. One of the many different tools which can simulate diffuse lighting in Blender.

See also Radiosity (computer graphics) on Wikipedia.

Random Seed

Seed

Blender uses pseudo random number generators, which produce numbers that appear to be random, but given the same initial condition, they will always produce the exact same sequence of numbers.

This is a critical feature to get reproducible and/or stable effects (otherwise e.g. your hair simulation would change every time you re-run it, without any way to control the outcome).

The seed is a number that represents the initial condition of a random generator, if you change its seed, it will produce a new sequence of pseudo-random numbers.

See also Random seed on Wikipedia.

Ray Tracing

Rendering technique that works by tracing the path taken by a ray of light through the scene, and calculating reflection, refraction, or absorption of the ray whenever it intersects an object in the world. More accurate than Scanline, but much slower.

Real User

A Blender object, which is a Data User. Opposite of Fake User, which is only a program construct.

Refraction

The change in direction of a wave due to a change in velocity. It happens when waves travel from a medium with a given Index of Refraction to a medium with another. At the boundary between the media, the wave changes direction; its wavelength increases or decreases but frequency remains constant.

Render (Render)

The process of computationally generating a 2D image from 3D geometry.

Resource

External files such as images, sounds, fonts and volumes files that can be packed into a blend-file.

RGB (Rood, Groen, Blauw)

A color model based on the traditional primary colors, Red/Green/Blue. RGB colors are also directly broadcasted to most computer monitors.

Rig

A system of relationships that determine how something moves. The act of building of such a system.

Roll (Rol)

Roll Angle

The orientation of the local X and Z axes of a Bone. Has no effect on the local Y axis as local Y is determined by the location of the Head and Tail.

Rolling Shutter

In real CMOS cameras the sensor is read out with scanlines and hence different scanlines are sampled at a different moment in time. This, for example, make vertical straight lines being curved when doing a horizontal camera pan. See also Rolling Shutter on Wikipedia.

Roughness Map

A grayscale texture that defines how rough or smooth the surface of a material is. This may also be known as a Glossy Map.

Saturation (Verzadiging)

Also known as colorfulness, saturation is the quantity of hue in the color (from desaturated – a shade of gray – to saturated – brighter colors).

Scanline

Rendering technique. Much faster than Ray Tracing, but allows fewer effects, such as reflections, refractions, motion blur and focal blur.

Scene Referenced

An image whose Luminance channel is not limited.

See also Display Referenced.

Shading (Schaduwwerking)

Process of altering the color of an object/surface in the 3D scene, based on its angle to lights and its distance from lights to create a photorealistic effect.

Smoothing

Defines how Faces are shaded. Faces can be either solid (faces are rendered flat) or smooth (faces are smoothed by interpolating the normal on every point of the face).

Specular Light

A light which is reflected precisely, like a mirror. Also used to refer to highlights on reflective objects.

SSS

Subsurface Scattering

Mechanism of light transport in which light penetrates the surface of a translucent object, is scattered by interacting with the material, and exits the surface at a different point. All non-metallic materials are translucent to some degree. In particular, materials such as marble, skin, and milk are extremely difficult to simulate realistically without taking subsurface scattering into account.

Straight Alpha (Onafhankelijke Alfa)

See Alpha Channel.

Subdiv

Subdivision Surface

A method of creating smooth higher poly surfaces which can take a low polygon mesh as input.

See also Catmull-Clark subdivision surface on Wikipedia.

Subdividing

Technique for adding more geometry to a mesh. It creates new vertices on subdivided edges, new edges between subdivisions and new faces based on new edges. If new edges cross a new vertex is created at their crossing point.

Swing

Swing and Twist

Refers to decomposition of an arbitrary rotation into a sequence of two single axis rotations: a swing rotation that aims a chosen axis in its final direction using the shortest possible rotation path, followed by a twist rotation around that axis.

This decomposition is available through Driver Variables and inputs of the Transformation constraint. The Damped Track constraint produces a pure swing rotation.

In the Quaternion representation the swing rotation always has 0 as the X/Y/Z component corresponding to the selected axis, while twist always has 0 as the other two components.

Tail

A subcomponent of a Bone. Has X, Y and Z coordinates measured in the Local Space of the armature object. Used in conjunction with the Head to define the local Y axis of a bone in Pose Mode. The smaller of the two ends when displayed as an Octahedron.

Tangent

A line that intersects a surface at exactly one point, a tangent is perpendicular to a Normal.

Tessellation

The tiling of a plane using one or more geometric shapes usually resulting in Micropolygons.

Texture (Textuur)

Specifies visual patterns on surfaces and simulates physical surface structure.

Texture Space

The bounding box to use when using Generated mapping to add a Texture to an image.

Timecode

A coded signal on videotape or film giving information about the frame number and time the frame was recorded. Timecodes are used to sync media between different recording devices, including both audio and video.

Title Safe

Area of the screen visible on all devices. Place text and graphics inside this area to make sure they do not get cut off.

Topology

The arrangement of Vertices, Edges, and Faces which define the shape of a mesh. See Vertex, Edge, and Face.

Transform (Transformeren)

Transformation

The combination of location, rotation, and scale. Can be expressed in World Space or Local Space.

Transformation Matrix

A matrix that is used to represent the Transformation of an item.

Triangle

Face with exactly three Vertices.

UV Map

Defines a relation between the surface of a mesh and a 2D texture. In detail, each face of the mesh is mapped to a corresponding face on the texture. It is possible and often common practice to map several faces of the mesh to the same or overlapping areas of the texture.

Value (Waarde)

The brightness of the color (dark to light).

Vertex

Vertices

A point in 3D space containing a location. Vertices are the terminating points of Edges.

Vertex Group (Vertex Groep)

Collection of Vertices. Vertex groups are useful for limiting operations to specific areas of a mesh.

Voxel

A cubic 3D equivalent to the square 2D pixel. The name is a combination of the terms “Volumetric” and “Pixel”. Used to store smoke and fire data from physics simulations.

Walk Cycle

In animation, a walk cycle is a character that has just the walking function animated. Later on in the animation process, the character is placed in an environment and the rest of the functions are animated.

Weight Painting

Assigning Vertices to a Vertex Group with a weight of 0.0 - 1.0.

White Point

A reference value for white light when all primaries of a color model are combined evenly.

A white point is defined by a set of CIE illuminates which correspond to a color temperature. For example, D65 corresponds to 6500 K light and D70 corresponding to 7000 K.

World Space

A 3D coordinate system that originates at a point at the origin of the world. Compare to Local Space.

Z-buffer

Raster-based storage of the distance measurement between the camera and the surface points. Surface points which are in front of the camera have a positive Z value and points behind have negative values. The Z-depth map can be visualized as a grayscale image.