Object and Animation Basics - Blender Foundations: The Essential Guide to Learning Blender 2.6 - page 55

Figure 3.29 shows the Data Block view
of an Outliner window. From this, you
can browse every data block and every
aspect of Blender, seeing how they
relate to one another and their basic
properties.

With that in mind, let's rephrase what
you just learned about creating dupli-
cates and instances. When you duplicate
an object with Shift-D, you create a new
object data block and new mesh data
block, which are copied from the origi-
nals. The material data block of the new
object just points back to the same mate-
rial data block as the original. This is
why changing the material on a dupli-
cated object affects the first one as well:
They are actually the same material data
block.

On the other hand, creating an instance
with Alt-D generates a new object data
block with links to all of the various data
blocks that make up the original. Every-
thing is linked, so any edits show up on
every single object that is similarly linked
to those data blocks.

Summary
It wouldn't be a bad idea to stick a
bookmark in this page for reference
during the work in the next few chap-
ters. This is bedrock material, so hope-
fully it will become ingrained in your
fingers and mind before too long.

● New blend file: Ctrl-N
● View manipulation with the mouse:
● Pan: Shift-MMB
● Zoom: mouse wheel
● Rotate: MMB

Figure 3.29 Data Block view in the Outliner.