Tip: Cleaning Up Imported Models

by Jonathan Williamson

It is quite common for imported models to come into Blender with duplicate vertices and triangulated faces. This quick tip demonstrates how to very easily fix these two issues, leaving you with a model that is ready to go.

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Discussion

15 Responses to “Tip: Cleaning Up Imported Models”
  1. RH2
    Posts: 11

    What’s the difference between shift-j and alt-j?

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    1
     Dec 29, 2009 at 9:34 pm
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  2. potadotomado
    Posts: 65

    Nifty tip :)

    When will the next car tutorial be out?

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    2
     Dec 29, 2009 at 10:28 pm
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  3. sfepa
    Posts: 9

    RH2, shift+j is for transforming triungles into quads, alt+j is for joining objects and works only in object mode., you will not spoil anything with it :)

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    3
     Dec 30, 2009 at 2:08 am
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    • Tobey
      Posts: 98

      Actually, ALT-J performs Tris2Quads operation and CTRL-J joins objects in object mode, SHIFT-J doesn’t do anything, AFAIK that is. Unless you have customs keyboard mapping of course. :-)

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      3.1
       Dec 30, 2009 at 4:00 am
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      • Tobey
        Posts: 98

        Pardon me and let me rephrase:

        CTRL-J = join objects (object mode)
        ALT-J = Tris to Quads

        Blender 2.49:
        SHIFT-J = Tris to Quads

        Blender 2.5:
        SHIFT-J = nothing

        Since Jonathan demonstrated this in 2.49, Shift-J obviously worked fine. I wonder if this shortcut will be re-implemented in upcoming versions…

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        3.1.1
         Dec 30, 2009 at 6:43 am
  4. Corniger
    Posts: 40

    Cool tip! I remember importing a totally simple object for a lamp contest (a tiny tube with 2 pins) and it had about 200000000000 faces. Messy thing :) But that’ll speed things up a lot! Thanks!

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    4
     Dec 30, 2009 at 1:51 pm
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  5. Redskutter
    Posts: 1

    Nice and easy should be part of Noob wiki

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    5
     Dec 30, 2009 at 7:32 pm
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  6. RH2
    Posts: 11

    Wasn’t blendercookie going to be doing a tutorial on 2.5? I found it a little ironic that he chose the keyboard shortcut that worked in 2.4x over a shortcut that works in both 2.4x and 2.5.

    No matter, I learned another keyboard shortcut :D
    thanks guys

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    6
     Dec 30, 2009 at 9:03 pm
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    • jonathanwilliamson
      Posts: 1415

      We will be releasing our whole Blender 2.5 training series shortly after Alpha 1 is released. We are waiting until then as Alpha 1 is the released targeted to be ready for documentation.

      As for the shortcut choice it’s more muscle memory than anything :)

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      6.1
       Dec 30, 2009 at 9:20 pm
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  7. john caldwell
    Posts: 5

    Of course I will check this out for myself, but does anyone know if this will work for Sketchup files that have gone through the DAE conversion process and then imported into Blender?

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    7
     Dec 31, 2009 at 3:42 pm
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  8. ryanlegojedi
    Posts: 1

    I have some models from sonic the hedgehog 2006 and there covered with extra line and i cant get rid of them could you help?

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    8
     Dec 5, 2010 at 11:05 am
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    • jonathanwilliamson
      Posts: 1415

      Hi ryan, can you provide a screenshot or .blend file to demonstrate the problem?

      -Jonathan

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      8.1
       Dec 5, 2010 at 1:24 pm
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  9. Joshua
    Posts: 13

    Have you ever looked at the leocad models when exported as 3ds. Try minifigs, there legs are pretty tough.

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    9
     Jan 12, 2011 at 7:12 am
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  10. Joshua
    Posts: 13

    But I have never tried selecting all and removing doubles

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    10
     Jan 12, 2011 at 7:16 am
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  11. mba
    Posts: 1

    very thaaaaaaaaaanks.. I neet it too .. very very thanks

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    11
     Feb 22, 2011 at 11:17 am
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