Hi Steve, you wrote:

> I note you did not mention "move", having any
> form of widgets (IMHO) should have rotate/scale and move.

Like Petr mentions, this is already handled in V1 by dragging directly on an object, so no extra widget is needed for this.


> Firstly, having these widgets outside the object, well, it could
> be too easy to click the widget instead of an intended object
> selection that is behind the widget, or the other way, an
> intended click on the widget may select an object behind.

Yup, this is definitely one problem area - when the area around the widgets gets busy with a lot of other objects there can be problems like this. This is a fundamental problem with widgets in general.

Right now the way I have it set up, is that the widgets will never interfere with object selection - they will only be targeted if there was no object otherwise in range of the mouse. This goes along with the "low profile" goal, but I'm not so sure it is the right thing to do, it seems that with other systems it is more common for the widget to take precedence.

It will take some time messing around with them before I can figure out which is a better default.


> Also, a rotate around where? If as in your example you have
> 3 objects selected, then the center of rotation is going to be where?

Those corner widgets are framing a rectangle - the center of rotation will be at the center of that rectangle. I will be doing some more work on rotation soon, I haven't quite got to that part yet.


> Having a 3D application with 2d widgets, that can scale in 1D
> or 3D, but not directly in 2D (2 steps would be required),.... strange.

Like Petr mentions, the 3D scale when applied to 2D objects all on the same plane will have the same end result as a 2D scale.

In general it is a lot more common for people to use a 3D scale on 3D volumes so that really has to be the primary scaling method if you just drag the corner and move it around.

If you do need to do a 2D deforming scale on a 3D object, the existing Transform/Scale/Scale2D will still be available for doing that.


> Also, with widgets, I would normally expect to see them in the 3d view.

I actually haven't totally ruled this out yet, but it is difficult for 3D objects since this new grip system is fundamentally a 2D plane.

I have thought a bit about an 8-corner frame in the 3D view... But possibly the center-tripod more standard style manipulator is a better way to go for that view. I'm not really sure if I will be able to get to that for v2 yet.

My plan is to nail down an easy to use 2D manipulator for the 2D views first.

- Michael