These activities are sequenced to help you learn the core functionalities of VoxEdit, and will help you learn some workflows to make great Assets!
Once you've learned the basics, see other helpful Resources to create your own projects.
1. 🎨 Paint a Block to Learn Camera & Tools
This is an EASY activity anyone can do, which will teach you how to paint in VoxEdit. We'll show you how to build shape in the next activity.
Start
Open VoxEdit, then create a new project in the Block Editor.
Camera Movement
First, let's practice basic VoxEdit camera controls to move the 3D block in the Viewport. Notice a white arrow points from the front face of the block.
Controls
Keys/Mouse
Pan camera
Rotate camera
Zoom in/out
Focus (center)
F key
Essential: The scale of a block is 32 voxels in every dimension, which translates to 1 metre in the real world.
About Palette & Material Panels
The Palette panel is filled with different coloured square swatches. The colour that is selected is highlighted by a white square. It also appears in the Material panel with the RGB, HSB, and HEX codes included.
Paint Voxels
By default, the pen tool is active and applies the colour in the selected swatch. Left click on the block surface to edit individual voxels or left click, drag, and release to edit multiple voxels.
Practice painting voxels with the pen tool using at least five colours. Use camera controls to pan, rotate, and zoom as needed.
Undo/Redo
Often, you will need to undo/redo your actions as you create in VoxEdit (paint on colour, change a colour, rotate/flip your design, etc).
Practice using these controls, which are also available in the Edit menu.
Undo (up to 10 operations): Ctrl+Z
Redo (up to 10 operations): Ctrl+Y
Select Colours from Your Design
This makes it easier to find and change colours used in your design.
Change Colours via the Palette
A swatch is a location for colour information. If you replace a swatch's colour or load a different palette, the colour will change everywhere it was painted on your block.
Test each method below to change each colour painted onto the block:
Copy & Paste: Right click to copy and paste one swatch's colour into another swatch location to change the colour in the block
Hold, Drag & Release: Click on a colour swatch until a small square appears inside it, then drag it and place it in another swatch to replace that swatch's colour
Saturation: Drag the circle in the Material panel and move it left to right
Tint: Drag the circle in the Material panel and move it up and down
Hue: Drag the triangle slider on the hue bar
(Optional) Codes: Enter RGB, HSB, and HEX codes
Sample Colours from Your Screen
Colour Blending Swatches
To blend two colours in the Palette panel, first copy and paste them in swatches that are spaced apart the number of colours you want to generate between them. Select one swatch, drag, and let go on the other swatch. Then right click and select Blend in the menu. Done!
This makes it easier to create colours for light, shadows, and texture that will blend well with the main colours in your design.
Practice using blended colours to add light and shadow to your design.
Be careful not to overwrite colour swatches you plan to keep in your project. Remember, if a used swatch colour changes, it will change in your design.
About Tools
The Block Editor only allows tools to work in paint mode. You will learn to use the other modes in combination with these tools in the next activity about the Modeler.
Tools are like brushes. In the Tool bar on the left, click a tool to practice painting different block faces while moving the camera as needed.
Top Bar Buttons
Test the buttons below while painting with different tools. Try to create a pattern on one face.
Blocks Side Panel
This panel allows you to select a block face and flip, rotate, export, or import with its buttons. You can also drag a block face into another face slot to duplicate it.
Try using these to create a pattern across all block faces with minimal painting.
You can import (or export) a 32x32 pixel image with less than 256 colours. Image colours must match the palette, or they will replace it and affect block colours.
Follow Up
Follow instructions in Upload Assets to Workspaces to add the block to your inventory. Once you've completed the upload process, your creation will be ready to build with in your Game Maker library.
See Using Blocks to learn about different block types and in Game Maker to test your creations
Now you have the foundation to use the camera, color, and important tools to create in VoxEdit. You can also view your block in your inventory on the website and use it in Game Maker.
In the next activity, you'll learn to create 3D models by combining tools with different modes in the Modeler.
This is an EASY activityanyone can do. It builds on controls, tools, and panels introduced in the previous activity and explores other modes and the basics of a model. The next activity will deepen these basics using the Animator with templates.
Start
Open VoxEdit, then open the Modeler
Create a new project
The Basics
Essential: The Sandbox has a universal scale, where the smallest unit is a voxel. Game builders can NOT resize assets.
Tip: Design assets with a medium human (64 voxels/2 blocks/2 metres high) as a guide. Learn more: Asset Scale.
The Modeler is used to:
Create a simple asset, or model (explored in this activity)
Modify a model in a complex asset made of multiple models (explored in another activity)
A Model Includes:
a collision box (for interaction)
3D shape (voxels)
colors (solid or emissive)
a pivot point (an "anchor" for placement and movement in a 3D world)
(optional) a frame surface to display images/video
Collision Box
1️⃣ The Viewport in the middle of the screen is your workspace, with a grid for your model's collision box.
2️⃣ The volume size for your model can be set with X, Y, and Z values. The default is the size of a block (32x32x32).
Practice: Set the values to (46, 35, 46) to prepare your model to become a table.
3️⃣ The Volume Resizer Tool allows you to adjust the collision box in any direction with a mouse.
4️⃣ The Trim Volume button shrinks the collision box to its smallest size based on the outermost voxels in every direction. This makes assets feel more natural for game world interactions.
Modes are what you will do to your model (Select, Create, Paint, and Erase voxels).
Tools are how you will do it. They're your set of brushes to use with each mode.
From this point on, you'll practice mode and tool combinations and move your camera to visualize, build, and paint a 3D model (remember that the white arrow is the front).
Shape
1️⃣Create mode allows you to add voxels inside the collision box.
2️⃣Erase mode allows you to remove voxels.
3️⃣ Tools are the brush shapes for the selected mode.
Quick Practice:
Select Create mode and use the Pencil tool (default mode) to "free draw" voxels into the collision box. Change to the Face tool to add a layer of voxels to any surface.
Select Erase mode and use the Face tool to remove a layer of voxels. Select the Pencil tool and remove individual voxels.
CREATE/ERASE SHORTCUT
Hold SHIFT when in Create or Erase mode to temporarily use the opposite mode.
COPY/PASTE & MOVE VOXELS
Now that you've practiced these basic methods, press CTRL + A to select all voxels and press DELETE to remove all voxels from your collision box to begin building your asset.
DETAILS: REDUCE 3D, INCREASE 2D
Build simpler 3D shape so Experiences run faster and allow for more assets and logic.
Add visual depth to 3D shapes with 2D texture (colour).
Activity: Build a Basic Table
Select a base colour for your table from the palette panel.
Table top:
Set to Create mode and choose the Face tool.
Right click and move your mouse forward to tilt your model upward (revealing the top of the collision box).
Click twice to add two layers of voxels as your table top.
Table legs:
Keep the camera pointed at the underside of the table top you created.
In the top bar, turn on the Mirror X and Mirror Z buttons (explored in the previous activity).
Choose the Box tool and draw the shape of one of your table's legs under the table top. This creates four copies because mirroring is turned on.
👀 Notice the tool tips bar on the bottom left! As you click and drag, the coordinate of the starting coordinates and the delta (change) for each axis appears so you can use your tools with precision.
Switch back to the Face tool and click on the shape created many times to extend the leg all the way to the bottom of the collision box.
Turn off the Mirror X and Mirror Z buttons to return to normal mode.
Your table has taken shape! Now let's give it some colour.
Colour
1️⃣ Paint mode allows you to change the colour of voxels in your model (it is the Block Editor's only mode).
2️⃣ Tools are the brush shapes for painting.
3️⃣ The Picker tool allows you to show a voxel's colour in the Palette and Material panels.
4️⃣ and 5️⃣ The Material and Palette panels were introduced in the previous activity to explore colour selection, changing, etc. Remember the colour sampler button in the Material panel can be used to add any colour from your screen to your palette.
Activity: Colour Your Table
Tip: If you're a beginning artist, use fewer colors and focus on practicing basic techniques.
Note: You may prefer a different order to create a sense of material, light, and details.
Decide what material your table is made of:
Glass/Metal/Polished Stone - with a few colours, make chunky angled lines to create shine.
Wood - use a few similar natural colours to create wood grain designs (avoid patterns).
Concrete - use many colours in random small dots (Pencil tool) to create rough texture or one color for a smooth, matte look.
Choose a light source and decide how intense it should be:
Tip: Light and shadow colors make it easier to understand what your asset is than using voxels to create shape. Without this, your asset will look flat even with the shadows created from the sky or point/spot light used in Game Maker.
Add highlights and lowlights in the same colour family based on where you want to create the illusion of a light source and shadows from it in your model.
Use colours close to your base colour for soft light and colours far from your base colour for shine or harsh light.
Practice:
Tilt the camera to view the table from the top. Click the Voxel Edges button in the top bar to view a grid.
On the surface of the table, paint a design of your choice that is 3 voxels wide on the outer edges. Tilt and rotate to carry the design down around the sides. Modify as needed for the material and light techniques you decided to use for your model.
1️⃣ The Pivot tool allows you to move the anchor point that determines how a model will be located in the game world as an asset or how it will be located in a rig when you use it in a compound asset built in the Animator.
Two modes:
Click the Pivot tool button to reveal the gizmo to move the point.
Right click the button to open a menu of options to Set to Floor or Set to Center.
Remember to adjust the pivot point if you change the collision box of your model.
Activity: Setting the Pivot Point
The location of the pivot point affects how builders using Game Maker can place the asset and use logic to make it move during gameplay.
Test the gizmo
Click on the Pivot tool and click and drag the blue arrow on the gizmo to move the pivot point to the center back of the model (along the red axis).
Hold SHIFT to lock to a grid of 0.5 voxel increments when moving.
👀 Notice that coordinates appear as you move it to calculate its location precisely.
Tip: A pivot point centered on the back of a model is great for pictures, cabinets, etc.
Find the center faster
Right click the Pivot tool button and choose Set to Center.
Tip: A pivot point in the very center of a model may be used frequently for compound assets that combine multiple models in the Animator (explored in another activity).
Quick drop to the floor
Right click the Pivot tool button and choose Set to Floor.
Tip: Most assets have a pivot point set at the center then at the floor for easy placement.
Your pivot point is set at the center and floor of the model. Let's explore a special use case for your model.
Frame Surface
You can display a 2D NFT you own on walls, tabletops, and more in an Experience!
The NFT must be:
2D (still or animated GIF)
In the wallet that is connected to your account at The Sandbox
On the Ethereum, Polygon, or Goerli blockchains
1️⃣ The Frame tool defines a surface that can be used to display an NFT images when NFT Image Display logic is applied in Game Maker.
Currently, displaying videos on frame surfaces is limited to select partners.
Activity: Create a Frame Surface
Note: NFT images come in many shapes and sizes. Our example uses a common square shape.
Click the Frame tool button.
Inside of the design you painted, click from one corner to another to add a frame surface. It will highlight voxels in pink while dragging and in green when you release.
To change the area, click and drag again in the correct area to "redraw" it. In our example, we are creating a square shaped frame surface.
To keep the frame surface, click the Frame tool button to close this mode.
To remove a frame surface, click the Frame tool button, click anywhere in the viewport to remove the green highlighted area, and click on the Frame tool button again to close the mode.
It's up to you if you want to keep the frame surface on your table and test it out in Game Maker or remove the frame surface and paint in that space.
Follow Up
Now you know the basics to create a simple asset in the Modeler.
Upload your asset to Workspaces and test it in Game Maker for collisions, size, shape, colors, pivot point, and (if applied) your frame surface for displaying an NFT image.
In the next activity, we'll dive into customizing templates to introduce VoxEdit's Animator basics. Everything you need is seamlessly integrated so it's easy to quickly make animated assets!
This is an EASY activity that requires knowledge of the Modeler since you'll go back and forth between that module and the Animator to customise an Animated Template. It's easier than you think, and the customisation options are endless once you learn the basics.
Get Started
Open VoxEdit
Open the Templates tab and choose any template to explore and edit.
Find your animated entity in the Game Maker Library (search by name)
Place your entity in the game world
Add the "Animated Decoration" behavior and choose the animation you want to test
Press TAB to test in play mode and see the selected animation show
Test as many times as you like (or duplicate the object you placed and set different animations to see them display all at once)
So much is possible with templates since you can change color, shape, and even the pivot point of each model included.
You can even unlock templates to add nodes and motion keyframes, but we recommend learning to build a rig in the next activity and learning to add keyframes in the next two activities before modifying a template.
4. 🧩 Build a Rig in the Animator
This is a MEDIUM difficulty activity to build your first rig by positioning multiple models together. A rig can be still or animated and can have a simple to very complex structure.
In this activity you'll learn a lot about the spatial relationships of the models in your compound entity and commonly used workflows to build a skeleton from scratch.
Get Started
Open VoxEdit
Select the Animator module in the menu on the left
Select voxels and use "Save Selected Voxels" in the Edit menu to create new models
Repeat this until you have all of the pieces you want to assemble
Where you had symmetry in your "sketch" model, only save one new model
Decide which model makes sense to be linked to a parent node for this build (when it moves, all child nodes move with it)
Link (drag and drop) it to an empty node
Drag and drop a node into another to make it a child, position it:
Link another model you saved to an empty node, drag and drop the node onto the parent node, and move and rotate it into position to match your "sketch"
Test and observe the parent/child relationship:
Move and rotate the parent node to see both models move, undo
Move and rotate the child node to see that only it moves, undo
Save time where there's symmetry:
Link the same model to empty child nodes of your parent node and position them
Test and observe modifying the model linked to more than one node:
Open the model and edit the color in the Modeler, save and view it in the Animator
Observe how every instance of the model linked changes
Clone the model and paint it differently, then drag and drop it in one of the nodes to link it and see how you can quickly create varied looks in your creations
Feel free to swap back to reuse the same model or edit colors as you lik
Assemble the rest of your design
Import a model you've already made into the Animator Library panel and link it to a node (drag and drop) and find a position for it in the design
If you don't like it, remove it from the library
Quality Check
View your creation from all angles for quality, making any adjustments needed
Find your model in the Game Maker Library (search by name)
Place your compound entity in the game world
Press TAB to test in play mode
Observe:
Every model in this compound entity has its own collision boundary because there are no animations, making it feel more realistic in the game
This activity empowers you to build a custom rig for anything you like: buildings the player can enter, spaceships with sleek angles, robots you'll animate later, and more!
5. 🎞️ Create Animations & Add Motion Keyframes
This is an ADVANCED activity that requires a pre-built rig so you can add motion keyframes to animations, which can be still poses or have movement.
While you can add motion to your rig before you're completely satisfied with how you've built it, you'll save a lot of time by deciding on the rig first. Pose your models in static animations to decide if you need to divide or combine models for the motion you'll add later.
Get Started
Open VoxEdit
Open your compound entity from Activity 4 to add motion to an animation (duplicate your project first if you want to keep your unanimated rig as a separate project)
Practice 1
Select a node you want to have motion and open the timeline at the bottom of the Animator
Position the playhead to where you want the first period of motion for that node to end (this is all based on time, where each tick mark is a frame and every 24 frames is one second)
In the Global Space, move the node to the position you want it to reach by that time
Press spacebar to test - NOTE: the position of the playhead is important to check each time you move a node, because it will create keyframes of motion
Modify the keyframe you made:
Drag the end to increase the time for the movement, press spacebar to test
Position the playhead at the end of the keyframe and move the node, press spacebar to test
Practice 2
Modify zoom area in the timeline to have more room to add more keyframes
Add a new motion keyframe to follow the first one:
Position the playhead in the empty space after the existing keyframe
Move the same node and test with spacebar to see how the two keyframes blend together to create motion
Add nuance to motion in the second keyframe with a quick adjustment of keyframe interpolation
Copy a keyframe and paste after the ones you created normally and then in reverse, test with spacebar and undo if you don't want to keep them
Complex movement:
Create a keyframe for a parent node and a keyframe for a child node, press spacebar to test this as a combination
Make adjustments and test the results a few times.
Move the playhead to the final frame of your animation and press the empty diamond button at the top of the node list in the timeline - this is a critical step to make your animation work properly
Test thoroughly with the spacebar
"Upload to my Workspace" - you've created an animated entity from scratch!
Test in Game Maker
Install and/or open Game Maker
Find your model in the Game Maker Library (search by name)
Place your animated entity in the game world
Press TAB to test in play mode
Observe:
Every model in this compound entity has its own collision boundary because there are no animations, making it feel more realistic in the game
Now you can animate any rig you can create, but keep in mind this creates a collision boundary around the whole entity. Your next step with VoxEdit is to learn how to name the animations for your entity to match up with the behaviors in Game Maker so they activate properly during play. Learn more about Animation in The Sandbox to see how it works.
This is a MEDIUM difficulty activity to explore colour and texture to make more attractive voxel art with depth and apparent shape without adding voxel noise.
This hands-on activity will explore how to create higher quality art with 2D texture, which can help you optimise your assets.
This is an ADVANCED activity to explore essential 3D design methods including breaking down models to compose compound assets faster and creating clean angles and 3D structure for better performance in the game world.
This hands-on activity will cover common 3D techniques and best practices to construct more complex rigs or smooth curves.
VoxEdit is easy to learn fast! Hover your mouse over almost anything to see a tip in the bottom left. Click the keyboard button near the top right for a list of controls.
ALT + Move ↕️ ↔️ OR
Hold + Move ↕️ ↔️
Hold + Move ↕️ ↔️
scroll wheel OR
CTRL + Hold + Move ↕️ ↔️
Select the Picker tool in the Tools panel on the left. Now you can click on any colour in your block to select it in the Palette panel.
Emissive: Click the star to switch a colour between normal and emissive (glow) modes
In the Materials panel, click and hold the colour sample button , move your mouse over the colour on your screen that you want to select, and release. This replaces the selected swatch.
/ Show/Hide Voxel Edges: Add and remove guide lines to use tools more precisely and create patterns.
Mirror: Apply the same edits around the selected axis or axes.
Flip: Flip the entire block 180 degrees around a selected axis.
Rotate: Turn the entire block 90 degrees around a selected axis.
Use Select mode to select voxels in any tool shape and copy/paste or move them.
