Geo-C-Thru 3.0 Documentation

Requires Blender 4.2 or newer. Tested with Blender 4.2 LTS, 4.5 LTS, 5.0, and 5.2 LTS.

Overview

Geo-C-Thru is a viewport-focus extension for Blender. It changes supported object display properties and active 3D Viewport settings so you can keep scene context visible while making the current selection easy to read. It does not change final render output.

Installation

1. Download Geo-C-Thru.zip. Do not unzip it.
2. In Blender, open Edit > Preferences > Get Extensions.
3. Open the menu in the upper-right corner and choose Install from Disk.
4. Select Geo-C-Thru.zip and confirm the installation.
5. Enable Geo-C-Thru if Blender does not enable it automatically.

Open a 3D Viewport, press N, and select the Geo-C-Thru tab. Favorite presets are also available from the 3D Viewport header.

Fast workflow

1. Select the object or objects you want to focus on.
2. Choose a built-in look, a favorite preset from the header, or configure the Object Look and Viewport Look panels.
3. Continue selecting and working. Geo-C-Thru updates the owned display properties as the focus changes.
4. Use Bypass to restore the recorded pre-Geo-C-Thru state. Use Reapply to bring the look back.

Object Look

Selected and non-selected objects have independent controls. A look may own any combination of the supported components below:

• Transparency and alpha
• Wireframe display and wire opacity
• Object color
• In Front display
• Related supported viewport display properties

Geo-C-Thru supports modern Blender object types where those display properties are available, including meshes, curves, surfaces, metaballs, and text.

Viewport Look

Viewport controls apply to the active 3D Viewport. Available components include X-Ray, overlays, outlines, cavity, shadows, lighting, background, projection, and related Solid shading options. An overlay-only change does not force the viewport into Solid shading.

Each viewport keeps its own captured state. If you work with multiple 3D Viewports, apply or bypass Geo-C-Thru in the viewport you intend to affect.

Behavior

Use the behavior controls to decide when Geo-C-Thru updates and how selected versus non-selected objects are treated. The extension coalesces rapid scene updates and processes only relevant dirty objects, which keeps selection-driven changes responsive in larger scenes.

Preset libraries

• Built-In: signature looks included with Geo-C-Thru. Built-ins cannot be overwritten or deleted.
• User Library: reusable presets stored for your Blender installation and available across projects. User presets do not contain scene-specific Collection Rules.
• This Project: presets stored in the current .blend file. Project presets can include Collection Rules because their Collection references belong to that scene.

When saving a preset, choose which components it owns. A component-scoped preset changes only those areas and leaves unrelated Geo-C-Thru settings alone. Mark frequently used presets as favorites to place them in the 3D Viewport header menu.

Use preset import and export to move User Library presets between Blender installations. If a preset has unsaved edits, use Revert to return it to its stored values.

Collection Rules

Collection Rules apply a chosen object treatment to members of a referenced Collection.

• Rules use direct Collection pointers, so Collection renames do not break them.
• The first enabled matching rule wins.
• Rules higher in the list have higher priority.
• Drag or use the ordering controls to make priority explicit.
• Disable a rule to keep it without applying it.

Membership is evaluated from the referenced Collection. If an object belongs to several matching Collections, order the rules from most specific or important to least.

Bypass, Reapply, and restoration

Bypass restores only the supported properties Geo-C-Thru owns, using the state captured before the current look was applied. Reapply returns to the active Geo-C-Thru look. Shift-click the header control for quick access.

Safe Restore is the normal recovery tool. It attempts to restore captured object and viewport state without flattening unrelated settings.

Emergency Reset Display is a separate, confirmed repair action. It overwrites supported object display properties and basic Solid-view settings. Use it only when Bypass and Safe Restore cannot recover a damaged viewport state.

Saving and recovery

Geo-C-Thru prepares owned state before Blender saves the file and restores its working state afterward. If a save is interrupted or fails, the extension includes recovery handling for the pre-save transition. As with any production file, keep normal incremental backups.

Moving from 2.x

Version 3.0 is a new extension-based architecture rather than an in-place patch to the 2.x add-on. Remove or disable the legacy add-on before enabling 3.0. Recreate important custom looks in the User Library or This Project. Version 2.1 remains available for Blender 4.1 and older.

Troubleshooting

• The panel is missing: confirm the extension is enabled, then check the N-panel in a 3D Viewport.
• A favorite is missing from the header: confirm the preset is marked as a favorite and the header has enough space.
• A rule does not apply: confirm it is enabled, points to the intended Collection, and is above other matching rules.
• The viewport does not look restored: run Bypass in the affected viewport, then Safe Restore if needed.
• A preset changes too much: edit its component ownership so it controls only the intended Object Look, Viewport Look, Behavior, or Rules components.

What changed in 3.0

• Ground-up Blender extension rewrite
• Built-In, User Library, and This Project preset libraries
• Explicit component ownership, favorites, import, export, and revert
• Ordered pointer-based Collection Rules
• Per-viewport shading snapshots and clearer scope
• Reversible Bypass and Reapply workflow
• Separate confirmed Emergency Reset Display
• Modern object-type support and performance-focused update scheduling