I've been using Blender for about a month. I have been going through the course by Neal Hirsig. I am creating the Martini Glass in lesson 5. I am having trouble with the gin. (No, I didn't try to drink it!)

In the tutorial we...

1. select the inside faces of the glass and then hit Shift-D
2. Move the duplicate up and away from the glass.
3. Select the top vertices and move them down.
4. Select the entire gin object and move it back into the glass and then scale it fit.
5. Select the top vertices and press Shift-F to create a cap on the gin object.

That's where the problem begins. Shift-F doesn't create a face. It seems to put you in grab view mode. If you aren't careful, it will throw you model completely off screen. (Believe me, I know!)

I found that Alt-F will cap it, but for some reason, it isn't completely smooth. It looks messy in Edit mode with triangles. And in object model, it isn't completely smooth. I undid that and then I drew rectangular faces myself. But it still wasn't smooth. And some of the faces had transparent hatch patterns on them. Also, I was unable to select all the faces with circle select after I drew them. (I was going to delete them since they weren't right either.) I ended up deleting the entire gin object.

Is it because the normals aren't facing the right way? Could there be multiple vertices in the same place? (Not sure why that would be. After we spun the wine glass, we had to remove duplicates.)

Anyway, after all this, I needed the gin!....Just kidding.

I'm actually liking Blender. There are a lot of good tutorials out there.

Thanks.

Hello MeinOhio

First welcome to the Blender forum. Now from rereading that tutorial which I think is the one in the Blender 3D design course when you attempt to do Shift F are you sure you are in Edit mode and not object mode? I have found a few of Neal's courses to have a few missing steps or it is easy to accidentally hit tab key and return to object mode instead of edit mode Especially when using a one of the newer Blender releases instead of the version he is using in the tutorial.

Please show us a screencap of the object before you attempt to cap the edges. In current versions of Blender, you have the F2 addon, which helps with situations like this. Just press the F key to create a single face cap. However, there are better options, like CTRL+F > Grid Fill. Grid fill will usually quad cap any border, if it's possible to quad cap.

The Grid fill is an excellent tool for this operation but in earlier versions of 2.6 I do not think it was yet available and Niel's tutorials he tends to do them with just the present tools with out activating additional addon's which I have experienced getting thinks to not turn out just right. I stopped trying to figure out his castle tutorial because what I had on screen never matched his screen shot and saw that edges were over lapping where they shouldn't have over lapped. they are great tutorials do not get me wrong but have seen steps omitted I am sure by accident that just did not jive right. Just my personal observation.

Prior to being able to answer or assist it is important to know which version of Blender you are using because the different versions have vastly separated tools and functions. In older blenders just selecting a group of verts and pressing F would ask AUTO, MAKE F GON, CLEAR F GON, SKIN FACES/ EDGE LOOPS. In that case you cannot complete any of the commands because there are too many connective verts. In the version of 2.69 that I use if you do the SHIFT+D to duplicate and then press SHIFT+F it shifts the focus of the camera but CTRL+F it will give you face options but just F will auto fill the face. I have not gone above the original 2.69 as of yet but I did just test render a basic vessel and liquid and based on your sample instructions and the F I had no problems after I separated the liquid from the glass as separate objects in object mode. Perhaps a screen shot or rendered image would help.

Thanks for the help. I am using version 2.75

I have the newer version, but have not installed it yet. Not sure if it over-writes 2.75 or installs it along side any previous versions.

I went back and tried it again and I was able to cap the top of the gin object. I had to use Alt-F to do it. It made some random triangles. When I tabbed into object mode, the surface was smooth though. Hurray! Shift-F did not work for capping. When I pressed that key combination, there was a line of information that appeared near the bottom of the screen. The first thing it said was to left click to confirm. It also said Right click to cancel, WASD: Move around. If I moved the mouse the work area moved and I could easily slide the entire model off the screen if I moved the mouse too quickly.

I tried creating a new scene. Then I added a circle, tabbed into edit mode and extruded. Then I selected the top veritces and pressed Shift-F, but the same thing happened as I described above. I had to use Atl-F to cap. Shift-F seemed to be some kind of pan for the workspace. I tried to do a screen shot, but PrtScrn didn't capture anything and I couldn't stay in that "mode" and select the snipping tool.

I assume you can customize Blender, but I haven't changed anything. Don't even have a clue about doing it. I seem to remember you can drag the panels around, but so far I haven't even done that.

In any case I go it to work. I was able to cap the gin object.

I think as you said Unroken-fighter, Shift+F is shifting the focus of the camera.

I also had some problems with the castle tutorial, as Lobo3433 has said I restarted a number of times but after a while some things would start to look or act differently. Eventually, I just pressed on and completed as best I could. Still I have been learning a lot from the videos and the tutorials.

Thanks again.

I just went back and I tried Cntl+F and that opened a menu. The make edges/faces (F) created one solid face and Alt+F created some triangular faces.

I must have had something wrong with the original gin object that I created because I wasn't getting the same results the first time.

When you CTRL+F, you can select Grid Fill from the menu. That should close the hole with a clean, quad cap, if possible. Obviously, in some situations, you can not mathematically avoid having at least one triangle in the cap.

shift+F puts u in fly around mode (like you get in games )

grid fill is the best way to do what your after but I like to extrude/scale in once or twice.......gives better control over edges

first shorts to learn....... in edit mode ctrl+V ertex +F aces +E dges..........that will bring up menus for you to pick from and W brings up a menu too lots of good stuff and most importantly U for unwrapping

heddheld posted at 5:02PM Sat, 24 October 2015 - #4235105

shift+F puts u in fly around mode (like you get in games )

grid fill is the best way to do what your after but I like to extrude/scale in once or twice.......gives better control over edges

first shorts to learn....... in edit mode ctrl+V ertex +F aces +E dges..........that will bring up menus for you to pick from and W brings up a menu too lots of good stuff and most importantly U for unwrapping

I agree. Inset once or twice before using Grid Fill, for optimum results.

Thanks again for you help and thanks again for the tips. I hadn't heard the W short cut yet.

MeInOhio posted at 8:20PM Sat, 24 October 2015 - #4235119

Thanks again for you help and thanks again for the tips. I hadn't heard the W short cut yet.

I have a series of tutorials up on Youtube that might interest you. These vids are a series of modeling exercises based on techniques translated from my 3dsmax tutorials, which tend to introduce various modeling shortcuts and techniques useful in overcoming a variety of topology issues, and complex shape creation. They cover a vast number of tools in the Blender modeling arsenal in a relatively short time. Most of the videos are no longer than 15 minutes, but might help to quickly get yourself up to speed with many useful features.

Blender Modeling Playlist