Boxcutter has received an update as part of our continuation of the 2.79 series.
It is with great pleasure that I release Boxcutter 688: GhostScythe. There were quite a few new additions and refinements to classic ones.
Even with 2.8 on the horizon it is our goal to continue as normal until the future of Blender is ready and stable. With modifiers present we are on our way but there are still some missing items.
Without further ado let’s begin.
The top file on the market is the latest. The top file is always the latest. The files below are always legacy support going back a couple of versions.
It is also worth noting that Buildbot appears to no longer have Carve present as a boolean solution. As a result the hard mode Bmesh may be the only algorithm going forward. But Carve will be missed.
RedFrost has been a new member of the team this release. AR continues to be the shadow boxmaster enigma. RF is special because he does my ideas even if they make no sense. AR is special because he’ll make an idea make sense and take it so far I don’t even recognize the core. Hard Ops / Boxcutter is nothing without the team so rest assured they were compensated for their efforts and continued contributions.
Installation
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Shift Mod Live
While drawing a box if you hold shift the box will be kept live. This is essential for situations where you want to cut but decide mid cut you want to keep it live.
Try it out! Hold shift while drawing a red box. It will remain live, allowing you to edit it after the fact.
Multi Object Cut
This was a big feature addition and one that really adds to the BC experience. With multiple objects selected you can now cut them with Boxcutter.
Also slicing is supported.
Now Boxcutter can live up to its name and Slice and Dice with multiple objects.
Edit Mode Cutting
Now edit mode supports all cutters instead of just blue.
In edit mode if you press X , Z or A the type of box will be changed.
This is another feature I am very excited about and am happy to announce is a part of Boxcutter. So cut anytime… anyplace.
*some conditions apply
Circle: Center Cut
While drawing a circle the center can be toggled to spawn at the 3d cursor with D.
This is useful for times where the circle has to be in the perfect center with 3d cursor precision.
This feature was a personal long time request of mine and am glad to finally have it in Boxcutter.
Custom Depth: V1
Too long have we been restrained by the 3d cursor when cutting to depth. How would you like a constant depth?
Cut depth is in the D menu and will allow you to use the 3d cursor differently than before.
In the old version cutting to depth was done by using the cursor as the depth indication.
The previous mode is still viable and usable however cut depth changes the approach a bit. The goal was constant cutting without realigning the 3d cursor.
Help System Improvements
Thanks to CGcookie our help system has improved. As a fan of retopo I always had my eye on their help and wanted to try something dynamic with it in BC.
Right clicking the help box closes it. The help box is also a good indicator of BC being activated.
RMB was used to prevent from accidentally moving the 3d cursor. This might be toggle-able in the next version.
You are also able to fine tune the corner and padding.
*some users have been reporting issues with this so a bugfixed has been pushed as the file at the top Boxcutter 0688 (zip). So this should be resolved.
Right Click Logo Snapping
Being able to toggle snapping without the D menu was an objective for touchscreens.
Right clicking the BC logo will turn it red. When the logo is red snapping is enabled. Hopefully in the future it will expand to cycle between grid and custom snapping but this was a final touch that was requested.
Orthographic Jump while Cutting
There is a pref that will make boxcutter jump into orthographic while cutting. This is useful for situations where numpads aren’t available and perspective cutting is not desired.
Notice that for every cut the view is jumped into ortho. Making it much more predictable. This drove me crazy when using Boxcutter on a laptop.
Hotkey / Color Coding Tab
Boxcutter now has a hotkey tab. In addition to hotkeys there are also UI prefs for color coding your cutting workflow.
This has become a common trend with our tools.
Also you can set a color for any alternate shape.
The defaults are as follows.
Red – cut (normal)
Yellow – slice (X)
Gray – null box (no selection / can also be toggled with A)
Blue – Edit Mode Knife (edit mode)
Purple – thickness slice (Z)
Region Respect
Alt + W starts Boxcutter. However now it loads up in the correct 3d view.
alt + ctrl + Q – quad view.
From Imagination To Creation 
I updated to this version today, but I don’t see the help button in the bottom right corner. And I didn’t touch any option. It’s unfortunate because I need it.
Also right-clicking the icon does nothing.
Finally what’s the difference between “draw screen buttons”, and “enable/disable bc” they do almost the same for me, except one needs escape to leave BC.
redownload it. There was a small bug that has been resolved. Now it should behave properly.
It’s working as expected, thanks!
A few things I noted however:
– RMB on the logo doesn’t do anything for me
– help text for the roll/orient view should say “wheel” instead of “MMB”
– shitf + ctrl + wheel does the same thing to the camera for me as ctrl + alt + wheel
– ctrl + shift + alt + wheel does nothing, but shift + alt does roll the view
– the help text while the cutter box/circle/ngon is visible does not say that holding shift while releasing LMB will keep the boolean live
I’ll let you know if I notice anything else.
excellent. We’ll update the help with these notes! The vigilance of the users help make these products great.
More things I noticed:
– in my previous comment I said to replace “MMB” with “wheel”. But not for “Orient view” because I just learned today that you meant “Align view to face”, and shift + alt + MMB on a face does work!! So perhaps change the explanation text a bit to better reflect that.
– if I reload the addons with F8, neither boxcutter nor hardops reload properly
Blue border and Help it’s not drawing in the 3d view. Lots of errors in the System Console.
Blender 2.79b and buildbot.
File “C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\Boxcutter\graphic\drawingbuttons.py”, line 21, in draw
draw_hud(self, context, xy_start, xy_scale)
File “C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\Boxcutter\graphic\draw_hud.py”, line 51, in draw_hud
draw_help()
File “C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\Boxcutter\graphic\help_info.py”, line 91, in draw_help
over = help_button.hover(mouse_pos[0], mouse_pos[1])
File “C:\Users\xxx\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\Boxcutter\graphic\textbox.py”, line 52, in hover
right = left + self.width
UnboundLocalError: local variable ‘left’ referenced before assignment
there might have been a glitch. Try the latest zip that has been uploaded this morning. It should resolve this.
I updated with BoxCutter v.688(3) and it’s not drawing Help
File “C:\Users\jieme\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\BoxCutter\graphic\drawingbuttons.py”, line 21, in draw
draw_hud(self, context, xy_start, xy_scale)
File “C:\Users\jieme\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\BoxCutter\graphic\draw_hud.py”, line 57, in draw_hud
draw_help()
File “C:\Users\jieme\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\BoxCutter\graphic\help_info.py”, line 91, in draw_help
over = help_button.hover(mouse_pos[0], mouse_pos[1])
File “C:\Users\jieme\AppData\Roaming\Blender Foundation\Blender\2.79\scripts\addons\BoxCutter\graphic\textbox.py”, line 52, in hover
left = (self.x – self.width/2)
UnboundLocalError: local variable ‘left’ referenced before assignment
we’ll check into this but V3 should have fixed this.
Hi No matter how I install any of the versions of Box Cutter I keep getting this error
SyntaxError:(unicode error)\Nescapes not supported (cant load unicodedata module)
ill check into this and see what is causing this. You’re the first to report this issue.
Are you using a particular blender build or buildbot?
joe email me at masterxeon1001@gmail.com and lets fix this. please
Hi there!
I have just downloaded this addon and using it for the first time along with hardOps. I can’t get the mirror mode to work, there is no access to it through pie menu or through tools, not even a single ghostly presence of this mode. What am I doing wrong?
Pie menu is D. When boxcutter mode is active which is the alt + W shortcut. You know youre in BC when the border is on screen.
During draw 1, 2, or 3 would toggle mirroring as well.
Hope that helps.
PS. Hard Ops also has a boxcutter option for assistance.
Here are the screenshots, one is from one of your tutorials, another one is mine. I don’t get the mirror options in the pie menu.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1r3r5gJKWjYWfEq4Rv9JRTuqzLxUwJWnm
https://drive.google.com/open?id=1jCJkuaWmvvOzPgGGRus2xdJdAvz3obqk
Also I tried to press 1, 2 and 3 while holding Ctrl +LMB to draw a square and it didn’t toggle the mirror mode.
youre using a very old version of boxcutter. Get the latest zip from the product page of whichever market you used.
Hi i buy BOXCUTTER this morning (BOXCUTTER689) ,everytime i do a 3d box cut, the blender always crashes,blender is updated 2.79b
https://builder.blender.org/download
Update blender from here. 2.79b is still too old.
Hi guys … I have a small issue installing boxcutter in blender 2.8 all I get is a warning message “update to 2.8x required ” I `ve placed version numbered 690_2
Boxcutter 7 is for 2.8 you will need to download the proper zip.
Latest version is Boxcutter 7_0_2
thanks ! its working …. but 😀 can`t find that menu you turned on by pressing D in previous and searching hot to use ngon selection .. its a great tool I love it ! awesome job
oh I see.. quote : “After the last Boxcutter release it was apparent that a rewrite would be needed for the end goal of being able to use all shapes in 3d and also allow for custom shapes to the level that we want.”
so we need to wait for better selection methods ? (like ngon in the previous version) ?
btw… You are releasing new versions for free ? when someone bought the boxcutter once ? or how that works ?
i am running Blender 2.80 I am running through your first tutorial for Boxcutter. and so far everything is working as expected. except when I left click to make my cut and start dragging it to where I want to make my cut I only get a flat plane with no way to expand my cut down the z axes. if I click to place the cut it takes a huge chuck out of the object I am cutting. am I missing something?
to further complicate matters, as soon as I do that no more cuts can be made, the box shows up and looks to be parented to the first cut, except it changes direction and goes in whatever direction the view is on perspective wise. I hope this makes sense.
id make sure on the object there arent any modifiers enabled that arent shown.
This application is good for capturing gifs.
https://getsharex.com/
But i refer to my previous response on recommended setup process.
I’d have to see what is happening.
Usually one would have to click and drag and thats it really.
When it comes to setting up boxcutter.
Hope that helps.
This video is a popular introduction.
But if you want to start at square one. I would start with this video.
working on sending you the screen grab now.