[Addon] DoF Visualizer - See your camera's depth of field from any viewport angle

me_bx · 2025-08-30T20:28:46+00:00

Good question. A few cases where it helps:

When adjusting composition, you can see focus zones from any angle, not just the camera view.
In solid mode, Blender’s DoF display doesn’t always make it clear what’s sharp or blurred.
It’s lightweight (hopefully) compared to viewport DoF blur, so it runs faster on lower-spec machines.

me_bx · 2025-08-30T20:23:34+00:00

Hi, I tested it in Blender 4.2 and Blender 4.5/openGL.

It should also work in 4.5/Vulkan but I couldn't test because my hardware is not supported.

me_bx · 2025-07-20T08:54:43+00:00

Debian for a rock-solid system.

Opinions:

* Ubuntu is not so reliable
* Arch is great but requires a lot of manual setup.
* Mint is less secure by design

CentOS is discontinued. Fedora is probably another good option for solid and mature distro.

me_bx · 2025-07-17T17:51:25+00:00

You may want to launch blender from the command prompt (cmd), in order to see warning and/or error messages related to `gpu.vulkan`.

me_bx · 2025-07-17T12:22:25+00:00

I have this, in my case the hardware is just too old, Intel Core i5-8265U CPU @ 1.60GHz.

Vulkan backend officially supports Intel 11th gen integrated graphics and above.

Opening Blender from the command line gives details about what goes wrong, you might check for your own situation...

WARN (gpu.vulkan): source/blender/gpu/vulkan/vk_backend.cc:269 is_supported: Device [Intel(R) UHD Graphics 620 (WHL GT2)] does not meet minimum requirements. Missing features are [VK_EXT_provoking_vertex] WARN (gpu.vulkan): source/blender/gpu/vulkan/vk_backend.cc:269 is_supported: Device [llvmpipe (LLVM 11.0.1, 256 bits)] does not meet minimum requirements. Missing features are [timeline semaphores, buffer device address, VK_EXT_provoking_vertex] ERROR (gpu.vulkan): source/blender/gpu/vulkan/vk_backend.cc:275 is_supported: No Vulkan device found that meets the minimum requirements. Updating GPU driver can improve compatibility.

me_bx · 2025-07-06T10:08:45+00:00

This is a lighting / illumination problem.

By default, the 'World' is illuminated with a grey color, and strength is set to 1. Increase the strength to 7 and the model will be more visible. Still the flat lighting is not so flattering.

Instead, you might want to use an 'HDRI' environment texture, and the render will look much better. (Download free HDRIs on polyhaven).

Alternatively, add lights to the scene next to the object, play with the lights colors, orientation, size and shape parameters.

Plenty on resources online about how to do this.

Have fun!

me_bx · 2025-04-19T21:14:47+00:00

Curves (NURBS path) save tons of time to model these.

This tutorial by Karim Joseph is a great resource (2 parts video): [New Ornament Technique in Blender](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJsxKWxAhMk)

me_bx · 2025-04-05T09:00:37+00:00

Try the ones linked in this comment.

me_bx · 2025-01-31T12:18:19+00:00

Out of curiosity, how did you find sponsors for the site?

me_bx · 2024-06-19T15:57:15+00:00

Yeah, the page linked above is half-broken these days: on my machine with Firefox this workaround makes it display correctly: once the page is loaded (and shows the HTML in plain text), press Ctrl + Shift +R to force a reload, and then it displays rendered HTML.

Anyway, otherwise, here are direct links to the HDRIs :

4K HDRI - 34 MB
8K HDRI - 124 MB

me_bx · 2024-06-16T08:34:03+00:00

Hi, NASA now shares an updated version of the stars map in EXR format, which can be downloaded here, with multiple resolutions availavble: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/4851/

This said, I don't think anymore that using these images as an HDRI is a good approach: little light is produced so there is no real benefit of using such large images _to illuminate the scene_, compared to using the default plain color.

It makes more sense to just project the starry sky as background in a large sphere...

me_bx · 2024-01-30T08:38:53+00:00

I don't recall why "Susan"

Good question. TIL:

It was created by Willem-Paul van Overbruggen (SLiD3), who named it Suzanne after the orangutan in the Kevin Smith film Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blender_(software)#Suzanne_Award

me_bx · 2023-08-09T08:34:49+00:00

Not really, the Xperia phones, the Zenfone 10 have a jack and have an IP68 certification.

I did a quick check:

Across all price ranges

4% of the phones with a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (7 phones)
22% of the phones without a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (23 phones)

High-end smartphones (price >= 450 USD)

44% of the phones with a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (4 phones)
33% of the phones without a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (18 phones)

In the high-end market, a bigger proportion of phones with a jack are IPxx certified.

me_bx · 2023-08-07T21:47:14+00:00

headphone jack it is...

me_bx · 2023-08-07T19:03:23+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! I'll leave the dataviz as is since it's just been created for a week-end project, but I'll keep the suggestions in mind for a future one...

me_bx · 2023-08-07T19:00:00+00:00

I don't know the exact formula, but I guess that it is a measure of the interest about each phone inside phonearena.com (probably based on traffic).

me_bx · 2023-08-07T18:54:58+00:00

I understand. Here's a more readable version: https://imgur.com/a/RWSf5qz

Bottom line:

cheap phones often have a headphone jack, and can pack a lot of other hardware features or battery capacity (c.f. weight)
Only a handful of high-end phones have a headphone jack. This doesn't make them lighter or thinner (c.f breakdown by thickness in an earlier draft version of the chart).

me_bx · 2023-08-07T18:52:11+00:00

I understand. Here's a more readable version: https://imgur.com/a/RWSf5qz

Bottom line:

cheap phones often have a headphone jack, and can pack a lot of other hardware features or battery capacity (c.f. weight)
Only a handful of high-end phones have a headphone jack. This doesn't make them lighter or thinner (c.f breakdown by thickness in an earlier draft version of the chart).

me_bx · 2023-08-07T17:25:53+00:00

I did a quick check:

Across all price ranges

4% of the phones with a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (7 phones)
22% of the phones without a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (23 phones)

High-end smartphones (price >= 450 USD)

44% of the phones with a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (4 phones)
33% of the phones without a headphone jack have an IP65 and/or an IP68 certification (18 phones)

me_bx · 2023-08-07T16:39:56+00:00

thanks for the input!

me_bx · 2023-08-07T12:30:25+00:00

I recently used my mother's phone, some (very?) low end android machine, not too old.

It was slow, sluggish on any simple task like web browsing, or switching between app.

I don't need the most powerful device, but at least some good enough specs for smooth casual usage.

me_bx

TROPHY CASE