3. Tool Controls Panel

The Tool Controls panel adapts to the currently selected tool with slightly different options. The common controls are described below followed by the tool-specific variations.

3.1. Common Controls


Shape
Drag on the white Shape to change from a pointed to a flat effect. This controls the falloff of your brush or tool.
3.1.1. Check boxes
Mirror
Turn on to sculpt on left & right side of your model at once. Duplicates the effect of sculpt tools to both sides of your model.
Polish
Smooths and evens out the mesh as you sculpt. Very helpful when sculpting an Adaptive Subdivision Mesh. You might want to turn this off to get a crisper result with Noise and Pinch sculpting tools.
Divide
Turn on to use Automatic Subdivision while sculpting to add mesh detail where needed.

N.B. Requires an ASMesh and is not active when sculpting a regular Mesh.
You can tell which kind of mesh you have by looking at the bottom right of the viewport, and can convert to ASMesh by pressing J.

ASMesh selected


Fold Pinch
This toggles between two different Pinching styles that are used both by the Pinch brush, and by the other brushes when they are set up to pinch as they sculpt with the pinch slider.

The original pinch squeezes the mesh together creating a look like two forms pressing up against each other with a sharp crease. Fold Pinch allows for a different type of edge to be created that looks more like a fold in a single surface where two planes meet at an angle rather than squashed flat against each other.

Pinch Mode Comparison



3.1.2. Buttons
Smooth
Smooths the current curve or mesh. Adjusts the shape to create a smooth result.
Relax
Spaces triangles evenly on the surface of a mesh, with minimal change to the overall shape.
Polish
Evens out curvature. Subtly improves the flow of a mesh's surface.

3.2. Soft Move Controls


Scale
Controls the size of the soft move tool's effect on Curves. Set as a percentage of the length of the curve.

Defaults to 100%. This lets you move the whole curve - while leaving the endpoints still. Or if you drag an endpoint moves the whole curve with the opposite end still.

N.B. For soft move of meshes Scale is set by the Sculpting Tool Size

3.3. Sculpt Controls


Intensity
Strength of the tool as you draw on the surface. This is also modified by the Tool Size, so for example sculpting with 1/2 Size Tool by default produces 1/2 the displacement.

Some tools become unstable if Intensity is too high, e.g. Inflate works best with an intensity under 25%.
Pinch
As well as the dedicated Pinch Tool, you can make the other sculpt tools Pinch as you draw. This is great for adding creases with the Sub tool.

3.4. Paint Controls Panel


Size
When using the texture paint tool, Size refers to the radius of the brush in pixels on the texture image.
Opacity
Opacity controls the flow of paint onto the image - much like an airbrush.
3.4.1. Redraw Stroke
The Redraw Stroke controls at the bottom of the Sculpt Panel let you tweak the effect of a sculpting stroke after it is drawn.
You can change the shape, intensity, pinch or even use a different tool and repeat or redraw the last stroke.

3.5. Redo Stroke

Removes the previous stroke, and then draws it again with the new settings.
Useful for trying out different values on the same stroke.

3.6. Redraw Stroke

Repeat the same stroke over the top of the last one giving a stronger or different effect if you change the brush settings.

3.7. Redraw Fade-In

The new stroke tapers in from the start

3.8. Redraw Fade-Out

The new stroke tapers off to the end