How to bend objects in Blender with the simple deform modifier without going insane

[@TijgerPapa]

Never expected that bending objects would be so un-intuitive and it's called "simple deform" 😂. Thanks for the clear explanation, saved me a lot of frustration.

[@leonaraya2149]

Totally Agree!

[@dubtube6691]

as a Maya user this is horrible in Blender, a simple bend fck your brain. In Maya one gets a simple gizmo for the bend modifier and you can clearly see what it is doing

[@MH-rb2mh]

Yeah, blender really just needs a basic widget transform where you can just bend an object through a button press. Crazy something as simple as bending an object is so involved.

[@MH-rb2mh]

@@dubtube6691 Seems like more and more it's worth just saving up the money for Maya.

[@Valzack]

I'm losing my mind with this, good thing I had nothing else to do today because after like 8 videos I still can't do it.

[@DreyzieArt]

Thanks so much for this workaround! I was shocked to see how overcomplicated this modifier was when every other modeling package handles bending so easily.

[@allengawlik94]

This works great! I just tried it on Blender 4.2, two years after you posted your video, and it still works. Thanks. Much appreciated.

[@aaronvdw]

Thanks, nice to know it's still holds!

[@colinboyle322]

Thanks Aaron - I have been trying to bend objects for a frustratingly long time. Two watches of your very helpful video and I now have leaf springs that bend! Thanks so much it is really appreciated.

[@aaronvdw]

so glad to hear that!

[@galvanizeddreamer2051]

Something else is that it is tied to the object's local axies. So in object mode, if it is how you want it, you can move it with impunity; it is only in edit mode that you start running into issues. You can also resolve this by altering the actual object's rotation relative to global rotation to get what you want, rather than using an empty sphere.

[@faisalrahman9860]

The most helpful & clean instructions on simply deform on internet, Thanks! You earned a new sub!

[@aaronvdw]

Happy to hear when it helps someone, thanks for the feedback!

[@Tosiphus]

My god, I cannot thank you enough. I have struggled with this for days. I despise blender so much and you made my life easier.

[@heckensteiner4713]

In Maya, geometry modifiers give you a preview of what the modifier is doing happening by drawing a curve that represents the modifier which you can move, rotate and scale by default. If Blender added something like that it would make it much less confusing, but this is a great workaround to give you control of those attributes. Thanks so much!

[@aaronvdw]

Happy it helped! That would be great if Blender had a feature like that for this deformation modifier, though.

[@HeinerS]

Thanks, was about to go insane. I tried the empty but without the 90° trick without success, though I did find out that it seems to always work when bending around the z-axis. In any case when I looked for an explanation I found this video and now I know how to work around the problem. Thanks again for sharing this.

[@aaronvdw]

So happy to hear it helped 🙌

[@Red-zv2xt]

Your video helped me so much, it was driving me nuts, but good to know it's not just me finding it frustrating! Managed to finally get my screw to curve in blender in the right way, thanks!

[@aaronvdw]

Awesome, glad it helped!

[@kenwincel]

I found this very helpful. Definitely demystified how this deform works. I'm no longer in the dark about bending.

[@xilto9551]

the main thing i was losing my mind over was moving it around, still pretty new and didn't think of parenting the empty to the object 🤦‍♂ Thanks!

[@HabitatHomies]

Went to several other vidoes first. This is a no nonsense way to bend my objects. Thanks!

[@tiramika]

thank you so much, i wish every blender demo video was this simple to understand

[@alanpwilk]

Thank you! Been banging my head against the wall with this.

[@vrmsali]

Finally get some idea on how it works. Always used other methods to achieve the bending goals.

[@mattyb8641]

Thankyou thankyou thankyou this has been driving me crazy. Rotating 90 degrees fixed it!

[@vrmsali]

Not sure how to thank you for this video. I have been trying to bend an object since last few hours. Cheers 😊

[@RosellaDesignWorks]

Still relevent thank you so much! I have 3d relief sculpts for printing and I wanted to turn them into cylinders and this method of adding the empty sphere and bending around it works perfectly without any distortion and it was so easy!

[@Swarley-bu7mt]

Awesome little trick... I'm new to blender and this has been by far the frustrating tool I've used, I don't know why this work, I don't pretend to understand it, but thankyou for showing it.

[@aaronvdw]

Glad it helped! To be honest I don't use this modifier anymore. I try to find other ways to achieve the same result.

[@Swarley-bu7mt]

I'm only a month into my blender life and bending stuff has been a real issue. I see there is a paid tool you can add on that appears to be a good options (but to be fair I have no clue) but I want to learn and develop skills before I start paying for stuff that I may never use. This tricks seems a little inconvenient to be fair, but it works and my morning is better for it, so thanks heaps.

[@aaronvdw]

It is a rite of passage. I've since avoided using simple deform to bend meshes altogether. It's just too fussy.

[@TouchofDepth]

THANK YOU SO MUCH! After a long night of frustration your video finally made things make sense!

[@joachimderavenbel212]

Thank you for such an enlightening video 🥰! To add something, you can also take the angle between the radiuses at the endpoints of the curve (at the centerpoint of the curve).

[@jackbauer9901]

You saved me! I would have never figured this out. Thank you very much!

[@kevinhouse7143]

Super frustrating (simple) bend modifier. Thanks!

[@Highcastle_of_Geek]

Lifesaver...this seems like a bug or a programming oversight but thanks bunches for putting in the hard work to figure this out.

[@johnstevens6063]

This was really helpful, it didn't solve my issues but sure put me on to the right path!

[@aaronvdw]

Hopefully you got it worked out 🙏

[@joe_fabricator]

I really like the use of the restrictions. Very cool.

[@ralphmoreau2768]

Wow you answered all my questions at once. I needed that limit portion, and you came through at the end too. Amazing. Thank you!!

[@OleksandrPlotnyk]

thanks for explaining!

[@romsarelis]

Super useful & honest reactions. Thnx bud

[@aaronvdw]

Glad to hear it helped out!

[@2moovinon]

Thanks, that simple demo earned you my sub, and I look forward now to checking out all of your vids.

[@aaronvdw]

Thanks for the support! I hope to make more soon.

[@mhd112211]

My god, finally someone with a good fix!

[@glennpeterson1357]

great video - thanks!...i was equally impressed by your straight line free draw ability! 😄

[@ondrejvencovsky6834]

Great hack. Thank you. For me it's very surprising question why such a great and capable tool like Blender keeps soooo stupid and unintuitive way of one of the most basic things that can be done within a few clicks in every competitive 3D package...

[@PrefoX]

the answer is, it is not that intiutive and doing a lot of things different than other dccs... you cannot even select backfaces polys in normal viewport. you cannot constrain moves to edges or faces.... its still far behind other programs, yet I use it.

[@malefico3d]

Finally some sense to this modifier! thanks a lot!

[@ronwatson3237]

Nice detective work Aaron!

[@PaulBeckham]

bro I cant thank you enough, that was driving me crazy. THNX!

[@busyman7571]

how many times i thank you for this great tutorial... bless you God

[@joe_fabricator]

Nice work around that makes sense, thank you.

[@JotoheKian]

Thanks for this. I'm trying to individually bend about 40 narrow planes, each in its own direction, so Blender sure is making me work for it :D Kinda miss "Bend" modifier in Max. Oh well. Thx for the video!

[@aaronvdw]

Sounds like a job for geometry nodes if you're deforming that many individually. Have you tried that approach?

[@JotoheKian]

@@aaronvdwOh, thank you for the idea! I'm not familiar with geometry nodes, so I will look these up and learn. I have already finished what I needed with those planes, but geometry nodes sound like a useful concept for the future. Thanks!

[@Bluejohn]

This method works very well but like you I don't know why. There is a paid for version called the 'simple bend' add on which does the job without the hassle but really the developers should take a look at this and sort it out once and for all.

[@TitusTorres-Miller]

You good sir just made my life sooo much easier! Thank you so much!

[@appidydafoo]

You also need to use the empty trick to make the Array command work in a circular fashion. It's not "intuitive" but it does make sense after a while.

[@aaronvdw]

True. Though for some reason I can make way better sense of how that empty is impacting the array through its offset and rotation. It's kind of saying "for each iteration of the array, add the empty's transform to it"

[@Animacores]

Omg thank you so much lol I couldn’t believe how different this is in blender hahaha nice I appreciate you’re video

[@johnpandolfino8663]

Well done....👏👏👍😎💪🔥🦫how long did that take for you to figure out that work around.....

[@aaronvdw]

Thanks - I’m not sure. A couple years of being frustrated and basically avoiding it!

[@AlphaOmegaLPstudio]

THANK YOU SO SO MUCH, OMG. This literally fixed all my problems. thanks for the amazing explanation.

[@sebastianmurra]

Thank you! Is there a way to apply the bend deformer to the parent object and all children be affected as well?

[@luizfelipefigueiredo223]

Amazing ! Very important to me. Thanks !

[@watchman1015]

7:30 ish .. thanks iv been going bonkers trying to figure this out in Blender

[@ARTMUUV]

Very helpful, thanks so much!

[@petebateman143]

In Simple Deform one axis is effectively bent around another axis. The axis you select in the modifier is the axis to be bent around, not the axis being bent. If you select X or Y to bend around, the axis being bent is implicitly set as Z. But, when you select Z and the axis to bend around it makes no sense to bend Z around Z. So the implicit axis being bent is changed to X. The manual is effectively saying Z bends around X, Z bends around Y, but it's X that bends around Z (because Z bending around Z makes no sense.)

[@stringercorrales6627]

So now it won’t get all twisted up when you animate it rotating around a point behind it more than half way?

[@aidenix5130]

Cool video! Too bad my blender has own rules and it doesn't work for me (at least first part) :(

[@andyr9654]

My cube does not do that at all, I import it, follow your instructions and I get a tapered cube, and then bending it, I get a triangle type bend, that's it. I deleted and imported a cube numerous times, I don't even MOVE the cube once it's placed. I then go straight to cutting it, which after I add the simple deform and use the "z" axis, I tried the other axis's as well. It only transitions to a triangle. Extremely frustrated. I don't know if it's a specific import style of the cube I have a setting on? Why would the cube go tapered to one end or at other times create a bevel when I add the simple deform? Maybe the angle of the cube? which I simply don't mess with the angle, I go straight to your instructions, no luck.

[@jim754]

Hi, Thanks for your explain, A question, Is there a way to bend one side but don't affect another side(Imagine bending into a fork) ? I had to adjust the position of empty object and the limits of modifier to match now, but it's not precise

[@aaronvdw]

Moving the empty would be my first guess. You could also try using the limits within the Restrictions panel. Lastly, you could try using a vertex group so the modifier only gets applied to that part of the mesh.

[@jim754]

​@@aaronvdw Thanks for your suggest. And the curve modifier is another choise

[@M.I.F..]

Interesting! Maybe the blender Devs should know that!😂

[@usefullprintables]

isnt that called a "bug"? in the program?

[@verte5519]

Great tutorial

[@smburzynski]

Is there a way of placing the origin of the object at the center of the bend. I am trying to bend a plane into a ball which then should roll along a path but, the rotation of ball resulting from the bend is centered around the origin of the plane. Can this be done with an empty as well?

[@busyman7571]

thanks you save my life

[@ubertcoolie8694]

Thanks 4 the great tips.

[@aaronvdw]

No problem!

[@keithhenery-x6p]

Huge. Thank You!

[@richeeze]

Life saving! Btw, have you figured out yet, why does it happen?

[@aaronvdw]

I haven’t figured out why yet 🤷‍♂️

[@ZigbertD]

Reading the documentation, one senses that trying to make bending conform to the same logic as the other deform operations was not a good choice by the developers and it may have been better to just make bend its own modifier. I wonder if bending could be achieved more intuitively building a modifier in geo nodes...

[@redmosquito50]

Very Nice but shame can't see what you pressing and not saying what you pressing as you move along, how you get rid of the empty once you done the bending please? What you press, as I can't get rid of it..thanks

[@aaronvdw]

The empty needs to stay there if you want the ability to change the bending parameters. Or you can apply the modifier and then delete the empty after that.

[@owen6223]

bless you my brain was about to explode

[@CGCharacterArtist]

What if i need to bend paper one corner? like a calendar paper!

[@aaronvdw]

For something like that I would probably avoid the deform modifier altogether and use maybe a lattice modifier or use shape keys to move the vertices directly to bend the corner of the page up.

[@CGCharacterArtist]

@@aaronvdw Thanks, I am new to Blender, and would love to see in practical how you will do it, please can you share a file or a quick video for that?

[@williamwidjaja850]

work like magic, look like only z axis can bend properly ?

[@Fabi0laa]

Thank you!! 👏

[@Tocinobody]

Thaks for this man!

[@2moovinon]

yes, your opening comments were right on

[@Ohshirho]

Bending is very confusing in blender. I usually mess with origin axis/geometry in edit mode to get a desired result.

[@aaronvdw]

Yeah it's honestly the most confusing modifier in Blender. This trick isn't airtight, so sometimes avoid that modifier altogether and use other methods to curve a mesh.

[@themysteriousunknownrevealed]

thank you!

[@KB-nt7eg]

When a tutorial starts with 'Im still confused' you instantly close the page.

[@aaronvdw]

But not before commenting 🤗

[@frankleachjr.8338]

Hmmm... this simply does not work for me in Blender 4.2. The loop cuts aren't "applied" to the mesh after I make them. The mesh deforms as if there were no cuts. When I go into Edit mode, the cuts are present. I'm clearly missing a step. I love Blender, but it can be SO damn frustrating.

[@pml2307]

Thanks you! but still my mind is struggling on finding the logic behind it.

[@hiro9440]

very cool👍

[@dmitryandreev7498]

Great!

[@HRosenberg]

THANK YOu

[@samdavepollard]

i love blender and those who develop it, but i can't lie - it drives me insane that we have geometry nodes getting all kinds of love, and ai denoising etc etc, but a simple deform modifier that is nowhere near fit for purpose

[@EinErmino]

man it still does not work for me. it distort it to a hourglass shape

[@pngCOATS]

god bless you

[@bartjongeling8264]

How is it possible that other open source programmes like tinkercad work so much easier? I understand that blender can do so much more, but why making the simple actions so utterly complicated?

[@testtube1842]

Why did they not copy what 3D max does :(

[@ItsMyRule]

Hey I hope this comment section is still active. If I have a child to the object that I want to deform, how do I make sure the child follows the parents' deform? Example, a curved piece of jewellery (parent) with diamonds on it (child)

[@aaronvdw]

Alive and well! Parenting doesn't work that way. Children only inherit their parent object's transformations (scale, position, rotation) - not their modifiers. So the deform modifier will only affect the geometry of its owner, not its children. Join the geometry of that child to its parent if you want its vertices also affected. Hope that helps.

[@ItsMyRule]

@@aaronvdw I see. Tried joining one of the diamonds and it messed up the mesh. Also a thought, would materials be affected later on if I were to join the objects?

[@ItsMyRule]

My apologies to have to bother you here, tried scouring reddit, youtube, and discord but to no avail.

[@aaronvdw]

@@ItsMyRule Yeah when you join an object to the one that has the deform modifier on it, it'll continue to apply to that whole mesh which now includes the new geometry you added, so things are going to instantly look different and probably messed up. Materials you had assigned to the parent object you're joining into would probably look different yeah, depending on how you set up the material (if it was uv mapped, had generated coordinate mapping, etc).

[@dubtube6691]

they should attach a gizmo or how one would call it automatically to the deform modifiers. some things are really great in Blender, deformers are not

[@AdamNakonieczny]

Thank you very much! So it is not me, it's Blender.

[@aaronvdw]

It's not you!

[@fergadelics]

I’ve been using a gn group instead of screaming

[@usefullprintables]

i really think this thing,simple deform, doesn't work at all .I tried everything .This function has to be reformed completely in the new versions.Sorry this isnt normal.

[@EyeballsStudio]

Exactly my thoughts. It is unpredictable and simply useless.

[@deiniou]

Usually I prefer the way blender does things as opposed to maya or whatever but in this case... To create hair I cant do it in blender because the bend modifier in blender sucks and in Maya works like a charm, as I hate it, I would prefer to stay in blender.

[@GamingZONE-mt9dj]

Increase your display

[@TopofTheHill3D]

still isnt working for me, im about to lose my mind

[@bartjongeling8264]

Went I try to bend something, my object disapears. I give up. The bending function is designed by a person who hates to bend things.

[@prototype9000]

in the usa we dont say zed

[@aaronvdw]

call thw z police

[@prototype9000]

@@aaronvdw i have jail time is waiting

[@X-mordred-X]

Nice video! We think that the center of the modifier is the pivot of the object, but it's not. Those Angles are really the result of a Radius. Blender will calculate how far away to put a "new center" so you can get that angle in you actual pivot. Yes, a complete piece of shit... I know... but engineers have shit for brains, normally, anyway.

[@alexandersuvorov2002]

Thanks for sharing. “Simple Deform” is oxymoron - nowhere near of simple.

[@aaronvdw]

Glad to know it helped!

[@alexandersuvorov2002]

@@aaronvdw It did! 😎👍🏼

[@No1001-w8m]

Yes I am very confused and angry. F Blender !

[@bumbolini]

Hindenberg!!!!!!