About 'Node Grouping'!

[Michael_Bridges]

In this video (objectives)…

1. Learn about node groups
2. Append a nodegroup into an existing file
3. Make the node group available to all new news

After watching (learning outcomes)…

Be able to create node groups and have them available in all future and past Blender Files

(Unique Video Reference: 16_PW_BEC)

We would love to know…

• What you found good about this lecture?
• What we could do better?

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Enjoy your stay in our thriving community!

[Norbert_Kupeczki]

Hi @Michael_Bridges,

I found a solution for this little issue with the group input in node groups.
It is a silly little thing, but if you attach any other nodes to the node group inputs it will work properly… at least it does in Blender V2.80.27.

I hope it helps, it is pretty annoying to open up those groups every single time if you want to change some data.

[Richard_Rayer]

I got my color height node made but included the Color Ramp. I can see after viewing the rest of the lecture that it is not quite the best way to do it. Making the Note Group “Color by Height” and connecting that to the color ramp outside the group would allow for use of many different color combinations.

I also like Norbert’s suggestion on group input on node groups. I haven’t tried it yet but I am sure it looks like it solves the problem nicely.

[Carl_Gustafsson]

Thanks for the tip of adding a “Value” node to the input. Worked well!

Also - any type of value can be affected by Object Info variables. E.g. how much noise is introduced into the texture coordinates:

[Capricas_Kirito]

At some point they have corrected the bug that plagued Michael in the video so the inputs are working properly in the Jan 28, 2019 release.

[Astradeni_13]

Hi!
I did it a little differently; instead of adding an ‘Object Info’ node in the previous lecture, I added a ‘Geometry’ node.

In this one I connected the Input of the Group to both the Subtract and Divide Math nodes (including the ColorRamp) like this:

so by adjusting the values of the Group (and a little fiddling with the ColorRamp) there can be all sorts of gradient combinations…

[ysvry]

right, my version works fine also the push tab x2 isnt neccesary no more to update the 3d viewport.

[ysvry]

great lesson , what a powerfull function that append is. never used it much but guess i better start developing my workflow around append, can be usefull for thousands of presets. thx

[Jaco_Pretorius]

Thanks for the many hints above…

Also using Geometry location and I have a reusable height-heat-map material now. Quickly tried it on a generated landscape and it just worked. Nice.

[vi.paints]

Repeatability - fantastic! I’m loving the append. Thanks to @Carl_Gustafsson regarding Object Info and @Astradeni_13 for use of Geometry node, and @Jaco_Pretorius for the heat map idea. Very useful lesson.

I played around with all of the above - a lot of happy accidents and pushing nodes around. This node group controls the level of snow and spring greenery colour on mountains. It also adds a bit of a rocky texture and noise so there are no straight lines. Probs is a way to simplify the math nodes etc. etc. always more that can be done!