Blender is an impressive program for visualizing. A picture says more (...) and a visit to the Blender gallery shows you what you can expect. See http://www.blender.org/features-gallery/

<<TableOfContents()>>
= Before you continue =
== Some abbrevs ==
LMB, RMB: Left and Right Mouse Button. MMB is scroll-wheel pressed.
== Some settings ==
Often the screen is split into four viewports in a quadrant, RMB on viewport edge > split.
= Move Rotate Scale =
 * Invoked by G (grab), R or S
Amount of change:
 * Freehand
 * Numeric value
 * Gizmo
 * Ctrl > snap values
= Grouping =
== Joining ==
 * Ctrl-J joins objects. Unjoining: select joined objects > edit mode (tab) > select vertices you want to split > P.
 * Ctrl-P parents objects. Select child objects and as last object the parent object, then do ctrl-P. parent teers childs too, childs don't steer parent.

= Points =
== 3D Cursor ==
 * Placement loosely from orthogonal viewports: LMB 
 * LMB, Shift-s, Cursur --> grid, etc..
 * Numeric, View > view properties > 3D Cursor area
== Pivot ==
Setting: see viewport toolbar.
== Object Center ==
 * Object > Transform > Center Cursor
= Import, export =
== How to get Pro/ENGINEER solids into Blender ==
There may be other ways but the concept described here works at least. If you no better ways, [[http://www.vanderworp.org/Wiebe_van_der_Worp_(Dutch)|let me know]]. Feel free to move this information to a better place under a CCBySA and or GFDL and let me know so I can link from here and remove the text.

 * Get your model exported from Pro/ENGINEER in stereolithography STL format in ASCII, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/STL_(file_format) for more info on STL.
 * Import the file in Blender, File > Import > STL...
 * Do your lights, build your virtual studio, attach a material and since the chance is big it is a metal object you can change Mirror Trans and continue fine tuning your environment.
 * If you follow normal procedures you may run into problems because you can't get the object smooth. This is caused by a so called 'non manifold' mesh. Such a mesh is characterized by more than two faces sharing one edge. Think of a 'Y', it has three legs. If you extrude the Y-legs in Z-direction you get three faces sharing one edge and it becomes impossible to calculate an outside, try it yourself by assigning an outside to one side of a face and go round... You end up with one face having two outsides! So how to clean up this mesh/mess? The strips below show the results of the steps, first is not smooth.
  * Select object RMB
  * > Edit Mode
  * > Select > Non Manifold
  * > Mesh > Vertices > Remove Doubles
  * > Object Mode
  * > Editing (F9) > Set Smooth (second picture)
  * > Tab Modifiers > Add Modifier > Edge Split (third picture)
 * Add material properties, etc. (right example).
{{attachment:stl1.png}} {{attachment:stl2.png}}

The above pictures are citations according to copyright law with rights of [[http://www.biocomp.eu|Biocomp]], [[http://www.promaton.nl|Promaton]] and ViaISN.