by emptybraces·Workflow
Images © emptybraces. Used for product review; image policy.
Essential Brush Saver earns its place in the Blender Extensions library by addressing one specific annoyance: brush settings that reset on restart. Its scope is deliberately narrow, running its save and restore steps at startup and on save.
By default, Blender resets essential brush settings such as strength, size and blend mode, along with many others, each time it restarts. Essential Brush Saver, developed by emptybraces, keeps these values intact by automatically saving and restoring them. It covers brushes in Texture Paint, Sculpt, Vertex Paint and Weight Paint modes.
The add-on runs its save and restore operations both at Blender startup and on file save, writing the data to a JSON configuration file on disk. Because of this, the developer notes that loading times may be longer than usual.
Version 1.1.3 is compatible with Blender 4.3 and newer and is released under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later. This release fixed a case where Dyntopo restoration did not work correctly and an error that occurred when saving with no objects selected. Source and issue tracking are available on the developer's GitHub page.
Essential Brush Saver is best for blender artists who paint or sculpt and want their brush settings preserved across restarts and file saves.
Essential Brush Saver is completely free to download and use.
Essential Brush Saver lists compatibility with Blender 4.3 and newer, so it runs on 4.3 and later releases. The current version, 1.1.3, can be added by dragging and dropping it into Blender or downloading it and installing from disk. The add-on is a small download and installs like any other Blender extension. For the exact range of supported versions on your setup, check the developer's page before installing.
Essential Brush Saver supports brushes in four modes: Texture Paint, Sculpt, Vertex Paint and Weight Paint. In each of these, settings like strength, size and blend mode, which Blender otherwise resets on restart, are saved and restored automatically. If you work across several of these modes, the add-on preserves the brush configuration for each one without needing manual re-entry after every session.
Essential Brush Saver performs its brush save and restore operations both at Blender startup and on file save. The developer notes that, as a result, loading times may be longer than usual. This is expected behaviour for the add-on rather than a fault. It writes its data to a JSON configuration file on disk, which it reads back to restore your brush settings when Blender starts or a file loads.
Essential Brush Saver is listed as free here and is released under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later. That open-source license governs how you can use, modify and redistribute the add-on, and it applies to the current version, 1.1.3. For current licensing terms and any updates, check the developer's page or its GitHub repository, where the source code and issue tracking are also available to review.
Also in Workflow for Blender.
by FlailingFog
Clear Filepaths is a Blender add-on by FlailingFog that removes personal filepaths from your .blend file. It saves a cleaned copy with filepath strings replaced by a dummy string, plus a text file listing what was cleared.
by 小T_sune
LODify is a scene optimization tool for Blender built for massive scenes, managing textures, geometry, shader details, and viewport performance across architectural visualization, large game environments, and complex kitbashing projects.
by Oliver J Post
Nature Clicker is a free Blender addon for placing nature assets with more control than particle systems. Copies are added as instances by default, keeping memory usage light, and it works with libraries like Grasswald and Botaniq.
by Trukas
Link Parents is a Blender add-on by Trukas for parenting objects and bones. It copies an object's parent and transformation matrix, exposes the Matrix Parent Inverse in the Relations panel, and handles bone constraint inverse matrices.
by Shuimeng
Auto Sort Collections is a Blender add-on by Shuimeng that automatically organises objects into collections based on their type. Version 1.0.3 adds support for excluding specific objects and collections, and sorts non-selectable objects too.
by Salt Media
BlenderAe2 by Salt Media transfers 3D data and objects between Blender and After Effects in both directions, covering vertices, 3D layer transforms, camera data and layer synchronization.
by MACHIN3
Machin3Tools is a continuously evolving collection of tools and pie menus for Blender, gathered in a single customizable package. It ships in two base variants, Prime and DeusEx, with the DeusEx variant adding more advanced tools.
by MikhailRachinskiy
3D Print Toolbox is a Blender add-on with utilities for 3D printing. It analyzes mesh volume and surface area, checks and fixes geometry, hollows shapes, aligns models to the print bed, and exports to STL, PLY, and OBJ.
by glukoz
UVPackmaster 4 is a UV packing engine for Blender that packs UV maps on the CPU and GPU, using the Cuda and Vulkan APIs, and can run on the CPU and all system GPUs at once.
by MMD
MMD Tools is a Blender add-on for editing MikuMikuDance (MMD) models. It handles importing and exporting model, motion and pose data, along with chopping and joining parts, plus rigid body, material and motion editing.
by HaughtyGrayAlien
SimpleBake brings PBR and traditional texture baking to Blender from a single panel. Select objects, choose maps, and bake — no special node groups or new workflow, working with whatever materials you've already built.
