Documentation
3D BlinkLab
Design a siren pattern and watch it play on your own vehicle model in 3D.
3D BlinkLab is Blink Lab with your vehicle in the room. Paint a siren pattern on the grid and it plays on the actual car model as you work, so you can check direction, color and timing before anything reaches your server. It is included with the Studio plan.
Workflow
- 1Click Load your car and select the car's .yft together with its .ytd textures. Add the carcols.meta too if you want to start from an existing pattern.
- 2If you imported a carcols.meta, choose Full pattern to bring in everything, or Siren rotations only to keep the pattern you already have.
- 3Pick one of the six colors (or press 1–6) and drag across the grid. Each column drives one siren and each row is one step. Right-click erases.
- 4Click a column to open Selected Column(s), where you can set its rotation in degrees, recolor it, copy it, or reset it.
- 5Press play and set the BPM to control speed. Drag the preview to turn the car, scroll to zoom, and double-click to reset the view.
- 6Fix any red notes in the status area, then click Create carcols to save or copy your carcols.meta.
Saving your work
- Save to My Projects stores the full editable project and its vehicle files in your Workshop account. Open project brings it back.
- Export project ZIP and Import project ZIP move a complete project between machines as a .blinklab.zip.
- Save selection as pattern keeps a set of columns you can reuse in later projects.
Only working on the timing? The 2D editor at /blinklab builds the same kind of pattern without loading a vehicle.
Frequently asked questions
Which files do I need?
The car's .yft is required. Select its .ytd textures at the same time so the model isn't untextured, and add its carcols.meta if you want to bring in an existing pattern. Liveries load separately as PNG, JPG, DDS, or YTD.
Why does it say my car has no lights it can use?
3D BlinkLab drives each siren from a bone named Light1, Light2, and so on, inside a part bone. A model without those bones has nothing to flash. Load the regular .yft, not the _hi.yft.
What does it export?
A carcols.meta. Create carcols asks for the model name, a numeric carcols ID between 10000 and 99999, and the scale factor, then saves the file or copies either the siren block or the whole file.
How many sirens can a pattern have?
32 — one per grid column, with 32 steps per pattern. If you import a carcols.meta with more sirens, only the first 32 are kept.
Who can use 3D BlinkLab?
It is included with the Studio plan. Regular Blink Lab, the 2D pattern editor, is available on other plans.
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