Primal — User Documentation

Primal is a powerful quad remesher for Blender that converts triangulated meshes into clean, quad-dominant topology for better modeling, sculpting, animation, and optimization workflows.

📦 Installation

Getting started only takes a minute.

1. Download the Primal .zip file.
2. Open Blender and go to Edit → Preferences → Add-ons.
3. Click Install.
4. Select the downloaded .zip file.
5. Enable the checkbox next to Primal.

✅ Done — Primal is now installed and ready to use.

🧭 Opening the Primal Panel

1. Select any mesh object in your scene.
2. Open the N-Panel inside the 3D Viewport (Press N).
3. Click the Primal tab.

You’ll now have access to all remeshing controls.

⚡ Basic Workflow

Using Primal is simple and fast.

1️⃣ Select Your Mesh

Choose the object you want to remesh.

2️⃣ Adjust Resolution

Set the Resolution value to control mesh density and detail.

3️⃣ Enable Symmetry (Optional)

If your model is symmetrical, enable the desired symmetry axes.

4️⃣ Click “Remesh”

Primal will generate a new quad-based mesh.

5️⃣ Review the Result

After remeshing, you can:

• ✅ Apply — Keep the remeshed result and permanently delete the original.
• ↩️ Revert — Restore the original mesh and discard the remeshed version.

🎛️ Controls

🔹 Resolution

Controls the density and quality of the output mesh.

💡 Lower values generally produce cleaner topology and better quad flow.

Recommended Ranges

✅ Recommended Starting Point

Start with 0.7 for most models and adjust from there.

🔹 Symmetry

Enable mirroring across one or more world axes.

Available axes:

• X
• Y
• Z

When enabled:

• The mesh is bisected along the selected axis.
• A Mirror Modifier is automatically added after remeshing.

Perfect for characters, vehicles, weapons, and other symmetrical models.

🔹 Remesh

Runs the remeshing operation on the selected mesh.

During the process:

• The original object is safely backed up.
• The backup is moved into the Primal — Originals collection.
• The remeshed version replaces the original in the scene.

🔹 Apply

Permanently keeps the remeshed result.

⚠️ The original backup mesh will be deleted permanently.

Use this only once you are satisfied with the output.

🔹 Revert

Restores the original mesh and removes the remeshed result.

Useful when experimenting with settings or testing different resolutions.

ℹ️ Apply and Revert only appear after a remesh operation has been performed.

⚙️ Settings

Open the Settings section for additional controls and advanced remeshing options.

🔹 Sharp Features

Helps preserve hard-surface details during remeshing.

When enabled:

• Sharp edges are detected automatically.
• UV seams, boundaries, material borders, and face-set boundaries are also preserved.

Angle

Defines the edge angle threshold considered “sharp”.

Default: 35°

Recommended Values

🔹 Post-Process

Additional cleanup and optimization steps applied after remeshing.

✅ Convert Tris to Quads

Attempts to dissolve remaining triangles into quads.

Equivalent to Blender’s built-in Tris to Quads operation.

✅ Smoothing

Applies Laplacian smoothing to relax and smooth the mesh surface.

Useful for organic meshes and noisy topology.

🔹 Mesh Cleanup

Automatically performs cleanup operations after remeshing.

Includes:

• Merging nearby vertices
• Removing degenerate geometry
• Recalculating normals

Merge Dist

Distance threshold used for merging vertices.

Default: 0.001 m

🔹 Smoothing Passes

Controls how many smoothing iterations are applied.

Default: 4
Range: 1 – 20

🔹 Debug Mode

Prints remeshing statistics directly into Blender’s system console.

Includes:

• Vertex count
• Quad count
• Triangle count
• Polygon statistics

Open Blender Console

Go to:

Window → Toggle System Console

🗂️ Outliner Organization

Primal automatically keeps your scene organized.

Every time you remesh:

• The original object is moved into a hidden collection called:

📁 Primal — Originals

This helps keep your outliner clean while safely storing backups.

After Applying

Once you click Apply, the backup mesh is permanently removed from the collection.

💡 Tips & Best Practices

⭐ Use Lower Resolution Values

Values between 0.5 – 0.8 usually produce the cleanest topology.

🏗️ Hard-Surface Models

Enable Sharp Features and use lower angle values (15° – 30°) to preserve creases and edges.

🌿 Organic Models

Disable Sharp Features and increase Smoothing Passes for smoother edge flow.

🪞 Applying Symmetry

The generated Mirror Modifier can be applied afterward using:

Ctrl + A → Apply All Modifiers

📊 Inspect Output Quality

Enable Debug Mode to monitor quad/triangle ratios and remeshing statistics in Blender’s console.

🚀 Final Notes

Primal is designed to make remeshing fast, clean, and artist-friendly while staying fully integrated inside Blender.

Whether you're working on:

• 🎮 Game assets
• 🧍 Characters
• 🏗️ Hard-surface models
• 🌿 Organic sculpts
• ⚡ Optimization workflows

Primal helps generate cleaner topology with minimal setup and fast iteration.