Reference/Release Notes/3.0/Asset Browser

= Blender 3.0: Asset Browser =



Blender 3.0 includes a new editor: The Asset Browser. It makes working with reusable assets much easier and more visual. Supported asset types in 3.0 are: More asset types will be supported in future.
 * Objects
 * Materials
 * Poses
 * Worlds

Quick Start
The following gives a quick overview on how to use asset functionality.

Regular Data-Blocks
For objects, materials and worlds, the following sections explain the workflow. For pose assets, the workflow differs a bit and is explained below.

Creating Assets
The Mark as Asset operator makes data-blocks available for easy reuse via the Asset Browser. It can be found in multiple places:
 * Context menu in the Outliner. Allows marking multiple data-blocks as assets at once.
 * Context menu of the material slots list.
 * For objects in the 3D View: Object >  Asset > Mark as Asset.

Save the file! Otherwise your asset edits won't be available to other files.

Register an Asset Library


Save the file into a directory that you want to use as your asset library. This directory then has to be registered as an asset library in the Preferences: Preferences > File Paths > Asset Libraries.

Using Assets
Assets can simply be dragged into the 3D View, and in some instances, into other editors. Objects will snap to the surface under the cursor or to the grid. Materials will be applied to the material slot under the cursor.

Editing Asset Metadata


The Asset Browser has an Asset Details sidebar in which the metadata of assets can be edited if the asset is stored in the current file. Such assets are displayed with a special icon:



Poses
The Pose Library system has been revamped to make use of the new Asset Browser. Read more in the manual.



More Documentation
All Asset Browser related functionality is documented in the manual.


 * Asset Browser
 * Asset Libraries and Asset Catalogs
 * Asset Library Registration
 * Pose Library (based on the Asset Browser)

 Mark Asset or Outliner > ID Data > Mark Asset. This way you can also select multiple data-blocks and mark them as assets.
 * Right-click a button that represents a data-block (e.g. a data-block selector or material slot) > Mark Asset.
 * Search menu in the Outliner.
 * Save the file, if you want the new asset data-block to be available in other projects.

There's also the Clear Asset operator. It removes all asset metadata and turns an asset data-block back into a regular data-block.

Mounting Asset Libraries


It is possible to select any directory as asset library. This can be done in Preferences > File Paths > Asset Libraries.

There is a default library pointing to the following paths:

Using Assets


The Asset Browser is a new, regular editor.

In the Asset Browser, you can: Most display and filter options won't work yet, that is expected.
 * Select an asset library to browse in.
 * Choose a category of assets to show.
 * Drag collection, object, image and material assets into 3D Views.
 * View metadata of the active asset.
 * Edit metadata of the active asset in the Current File asset library.



Catalogs
Assets can be organised in catalogs. These are independent of the blend file the asset is stored in, providing great flexibility.

Additional Features

 * Support for generating object previews.
 * Support for loading custom images as data-block previews.
 * Operator to regenerate automatic data-block previews.
 * Asset data-blocks show a asset icon in the Outliner and search menus.
 * Various Python API additions, check the dedicated release notes.
 * Only Assets options for link and append.


 * Support rendering previews for Action datablocks . It uses the scene camera and renders the current frame with Solid shading (i.e. the Workbench engine). It assumes the scene is already set up properly for preview rendering, i.e. it does not apply the Action itself to whatever is rendered. To configure the look of the preview, set the scene render engine to Workbench in the properties panel, and configure the shading options there.
 * "Frame Selected" operator to scroll to the selected files or assets . This has shortcut `Numpad .` in Blender's default keymap, and `F` in the Industry Compatible keymap.

Pose Libraries
The new Asset Browser also was used as a base for a new approach to Pose Libraries. For further info, refer to the notes on the Animation & Rigging page or to the Pose Libraries v2.0 blog post for a throughout explanation.

About Milestone 1
For the first milestone, the user takes the role of the asset manager and is in charge over where and how assets are stored. The Asset Browser gives a view into user-managed asset libraries.

Use-Cases The main use-case is local user asset libraries. That is, a user can store data-blocks for own reuse in self defined locations on the hard drive, and conveniently access them from any project. For simple projects that may also be enough, where all .blends are in a single directory or in few directories (which can individually be mounted as asset libraries in the Preferences).

Notes
 * Data-blocks are not automatically assets. They have to be explicitly be marked as such.
 * An asset library is a directory containing .blend files. Each of the .blend files can contain asset data-blocks.
 * To make an asset library available in other projects, it has to be mounted in the Preferences.
 * Asset creation and metadata editing can only be done for the current file.
 * I.e. you can't just drag a data-block into an asset library, or move assets between asset libraries from within Blender.
 * So to edit an asset library, you have to open one of its .blend files and do the edits there.
 * This way, Blender doesn't automatically have to decide how the asset will be stored inside the asset library and how to deal with dependencies (e.g. the image texture of a material). The user is fully in charge of managing that.
 * Save the file to make the edits to the asset library available elsewhere.
 * The Current File asset library is special: It always shows the assets of the current file (no manual refreshing or saving needed) and it is the only asset library that allows editing of asset metadata (e.g. name, preview, description or tags). So like for asset creation, to edit the metadata of an asset, the file that contains the asset has to be opened, edited (via the Current File asset library) and saved.
 * For when an Asset Browser shows an external asset library that was edited, there is a refresh button next to the asset library selector.

More Information For more high-level design information, refer to this design overview or this blogpost.

(In old documents about the Asset Browser/Manager project, the term "repository" may be used for libraries still.)

--->