So before we dive into explaining the data structure
and more abstract concepts that geometry nodes depend on.
I want to start out by showing you the very basics that
you need to know to get started using geometry notes right away.
That means mostly just navigating the Ui and learning
the very fundamentals that geometry nodes are based on.
To get most of the functionality that you need into one view.
It's best to use the geometry nodes workspace.
The workspace is equipped with a three D view ports,
a spreadsheet editor and outline and properties panel
and then most importantly the geometry node editor
to add a geometry notes system on an object.
You will first need to add a geometry nodes modifier.
You can add it just like any other modifier from the list in
the modifier tab or you can click the new button in the node editor
which will automatically create a modifier for you.
That modifier itself is then just a container for a notary.
You can customize however you want. Using the node editor
with a data block picker.
You can pick between different no trees that are available in your blend file.
That way you can reuse the same
geometry nodes modifier on several different objects.
You can also stack multiple geometry knows modifiers just the
same way as you can stack any other modifier.
A modifier just takes the geometry from the previous one as an input modifies
it somehow and then passes it along to the next one as an output.
That works the exact same way with geometry nodes as with any other modifier
Just now you're in precise control of what that modifier actually does. Exactly
the geometry nodes modifier is also where you will be able to
see the different custom parameters that you can control the modify with
just as you can any built in modifier.
And each instance where you use the no tree and
a modifier has its own set of input parameters.
The no tree that belongs to the currently active
modifier will be displayed in the geometry note editor
here,
you can control all of the operations that
the geometry nodes modifier does on the geometry,
Make sure that when you have multiple modifiers in the stack,
the right one is selected before you can edit the notary.
When you create a new notary.
It comes with only two nodes that are connected to each other.
The group input node and the group output node.
The group input
passes in the geometry of your object coming from the previous modifier
and the output
passes it back out to the next one.
So by default
a new notary does simply nothing with the geometry,
it just passes it along in the modifier stack.
And so if I just cut this connection, you can see that the cube disappears
as now no geometry is passed to the outside anymore.
But of course
the cube still exists
as everything in modifier does is nondestructive.
We can just bring it back by simply
reconnecting the input geometry to the group output.
Now inside of the notary,
you can pass around the geometry of an object between the different notes.
And this is also how you can make custom modifications of the geometry using notes.
As a simple example,
let's just add a transform node with the shift a menu
to move the cube by a vector.
Now the cool thing here is
that both the group input node and the transform node
output their own geometry
that we can use again in the notary.
So instead of just connecting one of them to the group output,
I can also join the transformed cube and the un transformed one
together
And see them side by side. In one geometry.
In other words,
the transform node
does not actually alter the geometry from the group input.
Instead
it creates its own copy of the data and provides the result of the transformation
as its own output.
And these two geometries can be used separately.
You can still access both the transformed
and the UN transformed geometry and use it however you want inside of the notary.
This already shows one of the main strengths of the geometry notes system.
Over the modifier stack,
you can easily branch off the geometry and have different operations in parallel
rather than operating in a single stack.
The same of course is also true for any other note that has a geometry in and output
for example, the joint node.
It also creates its own new geometry output that we can use
just as well as any other geometry output in the notary.
You can see what data each geometry output contains by hovering over the socket.
So here you see that the result of the joint operation
results in exactly double of the data from a single cube.
I have shown before that you can use multiple geometry knows modifiers in the stack.
So let's just duplicate this one a couple of times
this way,
the result of the previous one
is piped through the same operation again and again.
And because all of these modifiers share the same notary that they are using,
they're all controlled with the same notes.
So as I make changes to the parameters of this transform node,
you can see how the changes propagate to every time that the cube is being duplicated
and it affects all of them at the same time.
But actually
we're not only creating a single new cube with every step.
Each time we are creating a full copy of the input.
So there are a couple of extra cubes
that are hiding in plain sight.
If I add another transform rode into the mix
that reveals all of the additional copies of cubes
that we have been creating.
The number of cubes
actually doubles with every modifier.
And so the number rises exponentially
that gives us this cool fractal effect that
we can control with just these two transform nodes
and there you go.
That's already your first abstract art piece created with geometry notes.
And the input geometry can of course still be exchanged for anything else
but the cube we can for example also get a Suzanne in there.
One interesting thing about the no trees
that you reference in the geometry nodes modifier
is that they are also regular note groups.
That means
that they can be nested as single nodes in other notaries.
This way you can make full use of a procedural system
and combine different custom geometry node operations
in one bigger geometry nodes modifier.
That also means
that sharing geometry nodes modifiers
works the same way as sharing node groups between different bland files and people.
You can simply link or pending the notary from another file
and reference it in your geometry knowns modifier
to benefit from this.
We can give you a note group. Custom inputs and outputs
that are exposed to the outside.
These node group inputs are also what is shown
in the modifier interface in the Properties panel.
This is very powerful
as these parameters can be set differently each time that
the no tree is used in another modifier or another note
these in and outputs work the same way as you
would expect from the other notes systems in blender.
You can adjust their settings in the group tab of the node editor Properties
So any geometry nodes. Note group can be referenced in the geometry nodes modifier
and all of its in and outputs are exposed directly in the user interface.
That makes the modifiers quite customizable and looks
very similar to the built in ones.
And that way you can make your own custom modifiers,
you can share between projects and with others.
I recommend you to play around a bit with the note groups that I'm providing
in the file section and the notes that have been showing in this video.
That's the thing with geometry notes,
even with a relatively limited understanding of how exactly they work,
it can be a lot of fun and very powerful to build something with them.