Hi Kalthorn,

> but Shift+RightClick gives me panning in the 3D View so
> I guess my problem is solved.

Yeah there are quite a variety of ways to handle view manipulations, so that people who are used to other programs can just do it the way they are accustomed to.

So in addition to the "normal" way (right drag for rotate, middle drag for pan, scroll wheel for zooming), there are also:

Alt + Left drag = Rotate
Alt + Shift + Left drag = Pan
Alt + Ctrl + Left drag up and down = Zoom
Ctrl + Right drag up and down = Zoom
Alt + Right drag up and down = Zoom
Shift + Right drag = Pan

Then also the buttons at the bottom of the viewport...


> Whenever I pan enough away from the grid or don't
> have geometry nearby for reference, I feel like my rotation
>has suddenly switched to first-person mode.

It tends to be easy to get disoriented when your pivot point is not located at a familiar location or when there are not any objects nearby the pivot point.

You can set the pivot point to a particular spot by using the Zoom Area button (at the bottom of a viewport) - the center point for the area will become the new pivot/target point. Also if you get disoriented use the Reset button to recenter your view on the selected (or all) objects.


> I assume panning along z also raises the point of rotation

Yeah when you pan up/down/left/right, your pivot point comes along with you - in MoI the pivot point is always set up to be along a line straight through the center of the screen.

 

> so my guess is that I'm rotating around a point that is close
> to the camera and without close by objects to let me know I'm
> "swinging" around a point, it instead feels like I am turning in place

It sounds like you may have zoomed in quite a bit so that you are now at only a very short distance away from the pivot point - try zooming out a bit which will step you away from it somewhat.


> Would it be possible to have an option to lock the camera point of
> rotation within the extents of all geometry (perhaps just along Z)?

I would like to experiment with some options for the rotation pivot point in the future.

But one big problem with this method would be that it would become pretty difficult to work on one small localized area of the model that was not nearby that center point.

Currently you can set the pivot point to a the center of a single object by selecting it and using Reset, or also set it to a particular small location (like the end of a particular edge, etc..) by using zoom area, and then that allows you to work in that small area in a more natural way, including pivoting around it. If your pivot point was not settable in this way it would be hard to work on localized areas like that.

- Michael