Home Animation Blockbench is a versatile modeling tool for 3D artists and Minecraft mod creators

Blockbench is a versatile modeling tool for 3D artists and Minecraft mod creators

Blockbench is a versatile modeling tool for 3D artists and Minecraft mod creators

Blockbench puts all the tools at your disposal to make the creation process of low-poly models as easy as possible. Use cuboids to get that Minecraft aesthetic, or create complex low-poly shapes using the mesh modeling tools.

Texturing Tools

Create, edit and paint texture right inside the program. Create or import palettes, paint, or draw shapes.

Blockbench can automatically create a UV map and template for your model so that you can start painting right away.

You can paint directly on the model in 3D space, use the 2D texture editor, or connect your favorite external image editor or pixel art software.

Animations

Blockbench comes with a powerful animation editor. Rig your model, then use position, rotation and scale keyframes to bring it to life. Use the graph editor to fine-tune your creation.

Animations can later be exported to Minecraft: Bedrock Edition, rendered in Blender or Maya, or shared on Sketchfab.

Plugins

Customize Blockbench with the built-in plugin store.

Plugins extend the functionality of Blockbench beyond what it’s already capable of. They add new tools, support for new export formats, or model generators.

You can also create your own plugin to extend Blockbench or to support your own format.

Free and Open Source

Blockbench is free to use for any type of project, forever, no strings attached.

The project is open source under the GPL license.

What’s New

Key Features

These are the key features of Blockbench 4.12. You can read more about each feature at the bottom of the changelog.

Collections

Collections are a new feature in Blockbench. A collection can hold a selection of outliner groups and elements, regardless of their hierarchy.

Collections allow you to better organize your project, and create partial exports.

The Collections panel can be enabled from View> Panels> Collections.

Added Collections
Added Collection Panel
Added options to export Collections using enabled codecs (#2235)

Physically-based Rendering

This update adds physically based rendering options to Blockbench textures. This adds the concept of “Materials”, which are optional and are an extension of texture groups.

PBR materials are currently optimized for Minecraft: Bedrock Edition formats, support in other formats is planned for the future.

Added materials as an extension of texture groups
Added “Material Preview” view mode
Added option to generate PBR maps from existing textures
Added import and export support for bedrock texture_set.json files
Added Tone Mapping setting with 6 tone mapping presets

Group Multi-select

You can now select multiple groups at once in the outliner!

Lasso Selection Tool

The lasso selection tool lets you select a free-form area of your texture. You can either drag to create a shape, or click multiple times to move in straight lines.

Click back at the start position of your shape to complate the selection. Press Escape to cancel.

UV Navigation Arrow

Navigating UV maps can be complicated, especially on large models. The UV Navigation Arrow makes this easier.

It’s a blue arrow in the UV Editor that points to the selected face. Click it to navigate to those faces. Hold Control while clicking to zoom in on the selection as well.

Modeling

Added Vertex Snap Rotation snap mode (#665)
Added option to ignore axis in vertex snap
Added Apply Mirror Modeling action
Added direction options for extruding
Add “even extend” option for extruding
Add unit option to Loop Cut amend edit menu
Mirror modeling option to not mirror UV
Option in template generator to disable UV mirroring (#2218)
Optional modifier for “Delete” action to keep edges or vertices

Image Editing

Added lasso selection tool
Added line tool snapping
Added image export option in File menu
Added ‘Overlay’ blend mode for brush and layers
Optimized rendering of 3D brush outline (#2559, thanks @Nestorboy)
3D brush outlines now properly aligns to stretched and sheared UVs (#2529, thanks @Nestorboy)

Animation

Added timeline scrubbing audio preview
Made timeline audio preview no longer clickable
Menu option to edit animations and controllers externally (#1899)
Added ability to rearrange animators in the timeline by dragging
Keep bones in timeline when switching animation

UI Improvements

Added linked ratio toggle for vector form inputs (#2521)
Increased start screen thumbnail resolution
Added Panels menu under View
Panels can now be hidden in specific modes from the View menu
Moved mesh tools to new independent menu
Made proportional editing option visible when no meshes are selected

Minecraft Features

JPM import and export is now based on JEM submodels (fixes #456)
Detect if texture is applied and not export as default in JEM (#2457)
“Goat Horn” Reference Model for Item Models (#2248)
Bedrock display settings now only exports modified slots
Added Fit to Frame option in bedrock GUI display settings (Fixes #2592)

Settings & Controls

Added classroom mode – Mode for teachers and educators to enable on classroom computers. Restricts some features and removes social media bannera.
Added setting to track selection changes in undo history
Added navigation sensitivity settings
Added setting to adjust 2D editor zoom speed
Added pop-up to offer restart if changing a setting requires it
Added selection tolerance setting (for vertices and edges)
Optional modifiers: Add inverted option for all modifiers
Center on Selection: Optional zoom modifier (#1447)
Added gamepad navigation support

Miscellaneous

Tool config system with custom forms, currently implemented by
Mirror Painting
Tiled View
Image Editor Onion Skin
Animation Onion Skin
Proportional Editing
Mirror Modeling
Added option to sync GIF turntable speed to animation length
Element property toggles (visibility, export etc.) now display their state in the icon (#952)
Using undo now switches edit modes
Added Bluesky to About window

Technical changes

Added forms as a standalone UI element that can be used outside of dialogs
Added inline multi select form option
Updated font-awesome
Upgraded electron to 33.3.1
Added PSA start screen section ID
Added plugin contributors metadata field
Option to get alt tri normal for face in face.getNormal()
Add format property node_name_regex
Added ‘num_slider’ as form input type
Outliner toggles now support all Blockbench icon strings
Added Group.first_selected to get group that was first selected
Added Group.multi_selected to get all selected groups
Group.selected currently works as before, but will be changed to return an array of selected groups in the future.
Project.materials no longer exists, materials are now saved per texture. texture.getMaterial() still works
When editing PBR materials, texture.getMaterial() will return the displayed material of each texture involved, while texture.getOwnMaterial() will return the individual material of each texture.

Fixes

Fixed #1185 trackpad viewport zoom too sensitive
Fixed texture bleeding when using anti-aliasing (#2518, thanks @Nestorboy!)
Fixed #2563 Image reference rotation isn’t applied for color picking
Fixed #2588 Blender keymap conflicts
Fixed shift clicking face in UV editor selecting it multiple times
Localization string for toolbox menu (#2544)
Fixed #2568 UV not updating when applying a texture from menu
Fixed issues with cluster select mode
Fixed #2555 pasted selection layer appears outside of canvas
Fixed #2603 cannot select custom macOS app to edit images externally
Fixed #2593 bedrock block GUI display preset has incorrect rotation
Fixed #2594 support for “.” and “-” in bedrock bone names
Fixed #2590 animation molang properties are stored as numbers
Fixed plugin loader console error
Fixed UI issues when editing animation controller transitions and animations
Fixed X-ray Outlines setting not working with meshes
Fixed Move Texture with UV issue
Fixed box UV template generator issue
Fixed #2623 Paint Bucket broken in 3D view with an active selection area
Fixed console error when hovering over cubes while mesh selected with knife tool

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