Merger - Your Tool for Simplifying Complex Blender Scenes

Dealing with Thousands of Parts and Complex Groups When Importing Models into Blender?

Importing detailed CAD models, SketchUp (SKP) files, or assets from other 3D software can often clutter your Blender scene. You might find yourself with thousands of individual mesh parts and a complex structure of "Empty" objects used for grouping, sometimes nested many levels deep.

This can lead to:

• Slower viewport performance.
• Difficulty in selecting specific components.
• A hard-to-navigate Outliner.
• Challenges in texturing, rigging, and animating.
• Time-consuming manual cleanup.

Introducing "Merger": Your Tool for Simplifying Complex Blender Scenes.

Merger is a Blender addon designed to help you manage and organize these complex scenarios. It provides a set of tools to join meshes, declutter hierarchies, and bring clarity to your projects, allowing you to focus more on your creative work.

What You Can Do With "Merger":

• ✅ Reduce Object Counts: Join numerous mesh parts based on their existing structure (Parent Empties) or collection membership, which can improve viewport performance.
• ✅ Simplify Hierarchies: Consolidate meshes within complex nests of Parent Empties into more manageable structures.
• ✅ Improve Selection & Workflow: Work more easily with consolidated parts instead of hunting through countless tiny objects, making tasks like texturing and animation smoother.
• ✅ Organize by Material: Group and join meshes based on their materials, including a distinct grouping for objects that use multiple materials.
• ✅ Clean Your Scene: Quickly remove all unused, childless "placeholder" Empties from your entire scene.

"Merger" Tools Explained:

"Merger" provides a clean, straightforward panel in the 3D Viewport's Sidebar (N-Panel) under the "Merger" tab. Operations are grouped for clarity:

I. Selected Object Operations:
These tools work on the "Parent Empty" (an Empty object that has other objects parented to it) you currently have selected.
1. Button: Merge All
This tool joins all meshes found within the selected Parent Empty into a single new mesh. If your selected Parent Empty was part of a larger structure (had its own parent), the new mesh will keep that parent.

2. Button: Merge by Materials
For the selected Parent Empty, this tool joins its child meshes based on their assigned material, creating a new mesh for each material found. Objects with multiple materials are grouped based on their unique combination of materials. Your original selected Parent Empty is kept and becomes the parent for these new material-specific meshes.

3. Button: Merge by Groups
This tool looks inside your selected Parent Empty for any direct child Empties (sub-groups). It then joins all meshes under each of these sub-Parent Empties into its own new mesh. These new meshes are then organized under the Parent Empty you originally selected.

II. Active Collection Operations:
These tools operate on all relevant objects within the currently active collection (and its sub-collections).
4. Button: Merge All in Collection
This joins all mesh objects found anywhere within the active collection into a single new mesh. Any Parent Empties within this collection tree are also neatly handled.

5. Button: Merge by Materials in Collection
This scans the entire active collection, joining meshes based on their material to create new meshes (one per material, with smart handling for multi-material objects). Any Parent Empties within the collection tree are also tidied up.

6. Button: Merge by Top-Level Groups
This identifies Parent Empties that are directly inside the active collection. It then joins all meshes found under each of these "top-level" Parent Empties into new, separate meshes. These new meshes will be unparented. All other Empties in the entire collection tree are then cleaned up.

III. Scene Cleanup:
This tool affects the entire Blender scene.
7. Button: Delete Unused Empties
This scans your entire scene and removes any Empty objects that are not parenting anything. This helps tidy up leftover placeholders from imports or previous organizational structures.

"Merger" is particularly useful for artists and designers who frequently import complex 3D data into Blender and need to efficiently organize and consolidate their scenes.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ):

• What Blender versions are supported?
  • "Merger" is developed and tested on Blender 4.4 and confirmed to work on Blender 4.1. It is expected to work on Blender 4.1 and newer versions.
• How fast is it? Is there a progress indicator?
  • "Merger" is designed to be efficient and includes a progress indicator. While it handles most scenes very quickly, processing extremely large or complex scenes with tens of thousands of objects and intricate mesh data can naturally take some time to complete. The progress indicator will keep you informed that the operation is running.
• Is there an undo function?
  • Yes, all "Merger" operations are registered with Blender's undo system, so you can typically undo an operation with Ctrl+Z.
• How does the addon handle UVs, Vertex Groups, and other mesh data?
  • When meshes are joined, existing UV maps, vertex groups, and other standard mesh data layers are preserved from the original objects and combined into the new mesh. Complex scenarios like creating a single UV atlas from multiple objects are not currently a feature.
• Does "Merge by Materials" split a single object if it has multiple materials on different faces?
  • No. If an object uses multiple materials, the entire object is placed into a special "MultiMaterial" group (named based on the combination of its materials). The internal face-material assignments on that object are preserved within the merged result of that MultiMaterial group. It does not split a single object into multiple new objects based on its face material assignments.
• Will the positions of my objects be preserved?
  • Yes! "Merger" is designed to maintain the world space positions and transformations of your geometry. When objects are merged, their geometry is combined relative to the chosen origin point for that operation (e.g., a Parent Empty's transform, or the world origin for collection-wide merges at identity). The new merged object will appear in the correct location.
• What if a merge operation doesn't produce the expected result or some meshes are not joined?
  • "Merger" aims to be robust, but complex or problematic geometry (e.g., non-manifold meshes after modifiers) can sometimes prevent a successful merge for certain parts. In such cases, the addon is designed to keep the original meshes for the failed group to prevent data loss. Check Blender's System Console (Window > Toggle System Console) for any error messages, which can provide clues.

Why I Built "Merger"

In my daily work, I often import complex CAD and SKP models into Blender, and consistently faced the time-consuming task of organizing thousands of parts and messy hierarchies. It was a real bottleneck before any creative work could begin.

To tackle this, I initially developed "Merger" as a small tool for my own use – something to quickly join related objects and simplify those confusing imported structures. It made a huge difference in my workflow, saving me considerable time.

Realizing many Blender artists likely share these frustrations, I decided to refine "Merger" and make it available. My hope is that this tool can help you overcome similar import challenges and let you get to the creative aspects of your projects faster.

Support & Feedback:

I'm committed to making "Merger" a valuable tool for the Blender community. If you have any questions, encounter issues, or have suggestions for features you'd like to see, please don't hesitate to reach out.

I appreciate your feedback, and I'm open to considering feature requests that align with the addon's goal of simplifying complex scene management.

Get "Merger" and Simplify Your Blender Workflow Today!

Take the headache out of complex imports and scene organization.

Installation Instructions:

Getting "Merger" up and running in Blender is quick and easy! Just follow these simple steps:

1. Download the Addon:
   • First, download the addon ZIP file (e.g., Merger_Addon_vX_X_X.zip). Do not unzip this file. Blender installs addons directly from the ZIP.
2. Open Blender Preferences:
   • Launch Blender.
   • Go to the top menu and click: Edit > Preferences.
3. Navigate to the Add-ons Tab:
   • In the Blender Preferences window, click on the "Add-ons" tab on the left side.
4. Install the Addon from File:
   • At the top of the Add-ons section, click the "Install..." button.
   • This will open a file browser. Navigate to where you saved the downloaded Merger_Addon_vX_X_X.zip file.
   • Select the ZIP file and click the "Install Add-on" button in the file browser.
5. Enable the "Merger" Addon:
   • After installation, Blender should automatically filter the Add-ons list to show "Merger" (or you can type "Merger" into the search bar at the top right of the Add-ons window).
   • You will see an entry for "Merger".
   • Click the checkbox to the left of the addon's name to enable it.
6. Locate the "Merger" Panel:
   • Once enabled, you can find the "Merger" addon's panel in the Blender 3D Viewport.
   • Press the N key in the 3D Viewport to toggle the Sidebar (if it's not already visible).
   • Look for a tab in the Sidebar labeled "Merger". Click on this tab to access all the addon's tools.

That's it! "Merger" is now installed and ready to help you simplify and organize your complex Blender scenes.

Troubleshooting:

• Addon Not Appearing After Install: Make sure you selected the correct .zip file and didn't accidentally unzip it first. Try searching for "Merger" in the Add-ons preferences search bar.
• Old Version Conflicts: If you had a previous version of "Merger" installed, it's good practice to remove it (uncheck it, then click "Remove" in Add-on Preferences) before installing a new version to avoid any potential conflicts.
• Check System Console: If you encounter any errors during enabling or usage, check Blender's System Console for error messages (Window > Toggle System Console).