So, lets start!

First, we open the tool and properties panels with T and N.
Then we change the timeline to the uv editor, T and N are working here too!‍

Here we will open the material tab, delete all basic objects and switch to layer list. You can switch the layers with 0-9 and ALT 0-9 or clicking in the layer box in the 3d bottom menu (20 gray boxes with one orange dot). Put objects in different layers: select object's, press M

Start configuration done, lets install addons!

Download my collection of blender addons, unzip the file before. Install them by install from file (.zip and .py) and activate them!
‍Download here: https://vinummusik.de/Skyslide/3d-creation-and-import-tutorial/files/BlenderAddons.zip

Basic hotkeys

Well you can use the buttons, but blender works best with hotkeys, here are some most used ones, atleast the ones i use often!

Note: you can write parameters while operators are active. An example: you want to rotate your selected 15degree left in z axis, you would press
R + Z + 15 + ENTER (or ctrl v, if you copied "15" before, or pi with 100 numbers)

Interesting video for 51 Blender Shortcuts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWgKrFk5gU4

General hotkeys

3D editor hotkeys

Note: Object mode is only for rotation, move, scale and location(set origin), Edit mode is the mode you need to "edit" your object!

2D / UV / Image editor hotkeys

So, lets finally start with the main thingie: Modeling

First, we decide, what we want to create! In this tutorial, we will create a Checkpoint-Booster as a platform block for stadium.

So, lets start, adding a cube, go in editmode, move it around and scale it!
For moving,  press G + Z + 1 to move it 1 meter up (z), then G + CTRL SHIFT Z to lock the Z axis, after that, hold CTRL to use the grid.
For Scaling,  press S + CTRL SHIFT Z 16, then S + Z  + 4
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You can see the values in the right panel, DImension defines the size in meters (default cube is 2x2x2). Scale defines the original size.
Example: your object has a size(dimension) of x32 y32 z8, so the scale must be x1 y1 z1, This is important for export! You need set the current dimension to defaul, press CTRL A, choose Rotation&Scale. Blender will export your object with scale 1 for every axis, so you have to say, 32 is 1!

Here we will subdevide the surface and extend a few faces up.

For that, we go in editmode, pressing CTRL R, choose the direction, use the mousewheel to choose the number of loopcuts.
Then we select the faces with RIGHTMOUSE CLICK, and SHIFT for multiple selection.
With E you can extend/extrude the selected vertices/edges/faces
Again, with CTRL you can use the grid snapping, so you do your operators in steps, like move in 1 meter steps instead of 10mm.

Now, add two more loopcuts, move them up , keep both symmetrical. Then we will use the searchbox, open it with SPACE, type bridge, choose the operator. Now you have a bridge between your selected faces, a roof for your checkpoint booster block!

If your objects gets too many loopcuts, you can select them afterwards and remove them with CTRL X, or X and select Limited Dissolve, you can select the parameters for removing method on the left panel, like keep uv island, keep mark seams.

Get the textures on the model!

Here we will unwrap the selected faces from our object in different ways. Mostly i use Smart UV Project and Unwrap, open the menu with U.
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Smart UV Project cuts the faces by the max angle of 89, you can also set the island distance from 0 to1, this way dont really need mark seams, because it splits the faces automatically.

Unwrap needs mark seam, the edges which are marked as seam are red. Those edges says, split the faces here. Select the edges, press CTRL E and then choose mark seam,

Reset unwraps every face as an single island, as big as they can get (cube = 6 seperat faces, overlapping, maximal size)

Project from View, says everything. Projects your object from your current view, i suggest you to use the 2d view, from the side , bottom or top. (NUMPAD 5 and 7/3/1)

First, lets collect the stadium textures, i have all in one folder already, download here, and install them whereever you want, i suggest you to install them in the main items folder, where the custom textures also have their forced place: Documents\Maniaplanet\Items

Second, we open the textures in the uv editor, you can open them ingame or move them in the uv editor from the windows explorer.

Now select the faces, which you want to unwrap, do it spep by step. For this kind of case, you can select them in the 2d view with the box selection, because both sides are totally flat. For that, press 1 and 5 on numpad to get in the front/side and 2d view, Z for wireframe mode, then U to open the unwrap menu, choose Project from view(bounds)

Another project from view, but faces were selected with CTRL for row/line and ALT for loop select.

Now we select the faces, where the car should spawn, this is not needed, but why not? For that, we select the two faces, unwrap with project from view, and mirror them in the UV. Rotate it before, with R 90. To mirror selected, you should use the cursor as origin, choose it in the menu at the bottom, then CTRL M Y to mirror it in the vertical axis(Y) from the cursor, which is in the middle, if he is somewhere else, you have to set the cursor coordinates on the right panel(N).Choose normalized and the put X 0.5 and Y 0.5, or choose the middleedge,SHIFT S and cursor to selected, you should choose edge select mode before at the bottom. You can download the stadiumcar as reference for size here, import at the top left FILE, IMPORT, FBX

Well, we forgot the boosters, but thats not a problem, just some things to say: the booster physicid is based on the -Y axis, so you need to rotate your object properly. You can see the axis cross in the left bottom corner, the green one is the Y axis, be sure your booster shows in the opposite direction from the green arrow (the green arrow should look to the left if you want to boost to the right)

As you noticed, the textures dont look thaaaat great on the object, thats because the aspect ratio is wrong, if you unwrap a square and the unwrapped face has a aspect ratio from 1:8. it looks stretchet on the object, so keep it 1:1 like in the 3d view. If you can not go outside the texture area, you have locked it, you can disable the lock in the bottom menu, UVs, Constrain to image bounds

Fine, now our object is almost textured.But we still need a bar which marks this object as a checkpoint, since mp4, we have a nice texture for it.
Lets create a cube, scale it, add round edges (bevel) with CTRL B. Select the edges before.

Ok, now we delete the double vertices, use the button at the left. Then we unwrap both sides with U, Unwrap. Choose the texture, and get it in the right place and mirror it with the steps above.

Fine, BaseMaterial is done! ... BaseMaterial? What is that? Well thats the main uv layer, every object for maniaplanet uses two uv layers, single one in special cases (projected textures only). So, we need to create BaseMaterial and Lightmap layer, please take attention for capital letters.

Ok, we have one uv layer already, lets call it BaseMaterial. Now we need a second one, create it (its a copy of basematerial) and name it Lightmap.
Select everything (AA) in the uv editor and remove the textures, we dont need them here, and its easier to work without textures.

Lets get to the hard part, making the lightmap. The lightmap is used to preview the shadows, its important, to keep distances between the islands, also keep in mind that every object gets only a few pixel from the lightmap (2048x2048jpg). If any crazy mapper uses 1000 blocks, like in rpg maps, the block gets only 1/1000 from 2048x2048 pixels, also the percent of the space which each block has on the lightmap is also based on the size. Imagine a block which is as big as the stadium, it would get the half space of the lightmap. Thats my knownledge, i may be wrong on some things.

So, lets get started! The fastest way to make a lightmap is using the smart uv project, it will split the faces which are over 89 degree, works fine, but just for easy blocks like a cube, works badly for spheres! Since this method is not the best way, i make all my lightmaps with mark seam.

Here a demonstration of smart uv project:

As you can see, they dont look that bad, but the cylinder is splitted in several islands, and that is wrong.
Also, there are two small circles, we dont have circles on out object! So, those are faces, we dont need, they are not visible also, so delete them.
You can also select them in the uv editor, just click on the cube with the mouse at the bottom.

You can repack the islands, change their place and their distance to other islands with CTRL P, select everything before.

Almost everything looks fine, just not the cylinder, you can fix those faces by yourself, but for this section, we will unwrap the entire object with unwrap.
For that, we need seams, select the edges and add seams with CTRL E mark seam, the edges are marked red afterwards. I suggest you to split the faces at 90 degree, so you have the faces which should share the lightmap bounded, and the islands which probably get other shadows seperated.

Unwrap with U, select everything before. Pack islands with CTRL P. Voila, Lightmap done!
As you noticed, one island looks weird at the start, that was the case because we forgot to set all needed mark seams.

Last words ... This is my way, there are a lot other ways how you can do uv mapping, and work with textures, but this is my way, and im used to it, so you can do it however you want, adding textures to materials in blender and work only with material and wireframe shading instead of solid or etc...

Materials: assign textures to faces

Well, you see your object textured in blender, aslong you select the basematerial layer, but thats just for blender, it is not enough for maniaplanet, we have to say, this face should have this texture, for that, we create materials. Materials contain the infos which face gets which texture. In blender, we assign some faces to material1 and some to material2, in the xml, laters, you define the texture (material1 = texture YXZ)

But for now, we just create the materials, give them a color and assign the faces to it. You can steal the materialnames from the xmls.

So, every face is assigned to a material, now you have to name your materials, steal the names from the mesh.xml's or nadeoimportlib.txt.
Or, do the easy way, and name the material like the texturename, StadiumPlatform, StadiumCircuit, StadiumEtc, just remove the _D.dds. You can copy the name in the bottom menu, just select your texture and click on the name.

If you use the easy way, the convert may give error, material not found, if thats the case, you need search for your texture in the nadeoimporterlib.txt and copy the materialname inside the brackets from DMaterial, here a example: Nadeoimporterlib.txt , CTRL F, search for your texture:

DMaterial(StadiumControlStands2)
DSurfaceId (Concrete)
DUvLayer (BaseMaterial , 0)
DUvLayer (Lightmap , 1)
DTexture( StadiumWarpStands2N.dds)
DTexture( StadiumControlO.dds)
DTexture( StadiumWarpStands2D.dds)
DTexture( StadiumWarpStands2S.dds)
DTexture( StadiumControlL.dds)

You need to name your material in blender StadiumControlStands2, because thats the name of the material from this texture. (nadeo defined)

The checkpoint bar looks flat, thats because we did not use a smooth shader, you can make your own mark sharps with CTRL E mark sharp, but autosmooth angle works fine in most cases. You will find autosmooth in the right window, same place as the uvmaps (triangle). To get it working, you need to make your object smooth, you can do it in object mode for the entire object, or in edit mode, to choose only a few and not all faces.

Auto Smooth does not work for imported objects. To get it working, you need to clean the custom split data before, the button for that is right below the uv maps.

Checkpoint, Start , Finish and Multilap objects

Checkpoints need two more objects, the _trigger_nameit and _socket_nameit. The trigger is the mesh, where you have to drive through to trigger the checkpoint. I suggest you to use a single plane here, thats enough. Secondary, the socket, thats the object, which defines the start position and rotation.

Lets name your object first, then name your trigger, if you have more than 100 blocks in one blendfile, its nice to know, which trigger and sockets are assigned to which object.

So, name your object SuperCoolCheckpoint, create a plane, in the object mode, and name it _trigger_SuperCoolCheckpoint.

Now create a empty, SHIFT A, empty, Arrows. Rotate it 90 degree in x axis, or you car will spawn on 2 wheels. The Z defines the direction, in this case, its perfect aligned, now name it_socket_SuperCoolCheckpoint. Checkpoint done.

Icon for editor

So, here we create the icon for the block, which gets displayed in the editor. Since a few months, icon don't get embedded anymore, so they won't steal embed space. You can make them 256x256px if you want, i suggest 64 or 128px.

First, set the parameters for the icon in the right window: 64x64px /128/128px, shading: transparent, and export format: tga

Now, get your camera in right position, or create a camera, i use the normal viewport. Hide all objects except the checkpoint with H / ALT H
Click on the camera icon, go in the uv editor and choose Render result. With F3 you can save the image as tga, save it where the object will be exported, create a new folder called Icon, and save your image there with same same name as your object, SuperCoolCheckpoint.tga

Finally, exporting the object's

There we are, the last step. Exporting as .fbx needs some configuration, otherwise your object will be 3200x3200x3200 instead of 32x32x32 meters.
Maxis Maniaplanet Addon for blender also has a function for exporting, but that way is only useful for normal blocks which don't have equipments like checkpoint trigger, sockets and lighs, only _Lod0 and _Lod1 will be combined to one object.
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Lods are Level-of-Details objects, _Lod0 is the highpoly one and _Lod1 is the lowpoly one. This is useful for objects with high count of faces like a sphere with 4000 faces, the lowpoly version (_Lod1) should get 1000 or less. Put them behind your objecs. (SuperCoolCheckpoint_Lod0)

You should use the export selected for Checkpoints (addon, install from my collection)

So, select your trigger, socket and your checkpoint lastly, then go to the top left, FILE, EXPORT, Selected, FBX

Configure fbx exporter, choose selected objects, click on the scale button (dark grey is wrong), apply scalings; choose FBX ALL. Disable all other things like shown below is not needed, but saves space for the fbx file.
Since blender 2.79 uses a newer version of the fbx exporter, some things changed, things above should be correct.