When you're working with blend shapes, it's good to understand the terminology that's used. There are several different objects and shapes involved, depending on how you're working.
- The base object is the original object that you're deforming. This is the object to which you apply the Blend Shape deformer.
- The base shape is the neutral pose for the base object, before you start to deform it.
- Target objects are usually duplicates of the base object. You modify each one to be in a unique pose (such as different facial expressions). You don't need to create target objects because you can also modify the base object directly.
- Target shapes, sometimes called targets, are the shapes that are derived from the target objects. You can also modify the base object directly into different poses and save each pose as a target shape. The offsets of vertices from the base shape are saved in each target shape.
- The blend shape is the shape that results from the target shapes being applied to the base object. You can change the weight of each target shape to change the amount of influence it has on the blend shape.
