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Getting from KiCad render to Blender

A project log for Remoticon: KiCad to Blender > PCB renders

Learn how to go from KiCad 3D exports to photorealistic renders in Blender

anool-mahidhariaAnool Mahidharia 11/10/2020 at 17:482 Comments

Here are the notes I made to go along with the workshop. I updated some parts and elaborated others. Ideally, these notes ought to supplement the workshop video, but until that gets released, folks can try and see if just the notes are sufficient. Let me know.

Everything I used for the workshop has been shared on the project repository on Github

https://github.com/Hack-a-Day/Remoticon_KiCad_Blender


REMOTICON :: KiCad to BLENDER workflow

If you are recording a video showing Blender workflow, enable the “SCREENCAST” option to show keyboard / mouse events.

PRE-PREPARATION

BLENDER INITIAL SETUP AND OVERVIEW

BLENDER PROPERTIES SETTINGS (Properties TABS, left side of screen)

GETTING THE WRL PCB into BLENDER

About Materials and Textures

https://medium.com/@chunaik/texture-mapping-in-3d-6dffd54d3a54

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkU0-QeWUcU&feature=emb_logo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rzXNZkEoTAk&feature=emb_logo

Diffuse = Albedo = Colour

IOR = Index of Refraction (related to Frenel effect)

AO = ambient occlusion

When using nodes, CTRL + H will hide unused parts of a node to make visibility better

CTRL + G groups Nodes

CTRL + L to link materials

H, SHIFT + H, ALT + H to hide / unhide

PBR = Physics Based Rendering

F3 = search

RENDER properties > COLOR Management > VIEW transform > Filmic / False Color

(to check exposure etc)

PLANE

Use UV unwrap if Texture doesn’t appear on Plane

You can IMPORT “images as planes” (needs add on enabled)

POLIIGON Material converter (to use texture maps)

https://help.poliigon.com/en/articles/2540839-poliigon-material-converter-addon-for-blender

Discussions

Daren Schwenke wrote 11/11/2020 at 02:58 point

Thank you!

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ishotjr wrote 11/11/2020 at 02:07 point

thanks so much for providing this!! <3

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