Hi Steve,

> obviously not good documentation/ step-by-step if:-

Unfortunately it just isn't possible for me to force people to read the documentation.

Some people don't read the documentation, and for those people it doesn't matter how good the documentation is.

Definitely experience tells me that documentation, although certainly helpful to many many users, is not a direct replacement for making the software easier and more expected to use.

Believe me, my job would be a lot easier if it was!

- Michael

Works for me - I'm ready to try it.

I'm glad you're enhancing the 2D capabilities. When I first purchased MoI I was drawing 2D Corel Draw (out of habit and familiarity) and importing into MoI. Now I'm more comfortable doing the entire design in MoI.

I agree with wanting intuitive controls. An application should allow you to do all the basics without opening a manual. Bizarre UI's just frustrate the user - I never did get any use out of TrueSpace for that reason.

Ed

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

Hi Ed,

> Works for me - I'm ready to try it.

What I'm going to try and do is finish up this object frame thing, see if I can also add drawing directly on planes, and also incorporate an update to the geometry library.

Then once I have that stuff ready (wild guess - 3 more weeks?) - I'll put out the first v2 beta with that batch of new stuff in it.

Then I think I will focus on some object properties / object management stuff for the one after that.

- Michael

Hi Michael.


>>Are you talking about for scaling or rotation here?

Yes. In Adobe software, you can move the pivot wherever you like, and all transforms will center around it (scale, rotate, move, shear, taper) So i think it would be good in MoI as well. Of course, you will have to add in those last 2 features... ;)

Also i would suggest some method for 2D scaling. I actually use 2D scaling A LOT. Perhaps you could add an invisible grip on the interior portion of the corner grip. I have another suggestion, but maybe you will think i am crazy. But here goes anyway...

As you mouse over one extension of the corner bracket, the mouse icon actually points in the direction of the potential scaling direction. And if you mouse over the interior corner (the hidden grip), then a double arrow icon will replace the mouse arrow to indicate the potential 2D scaling... crazy?

jonah

Hi Jesse,

> I like the idea of having a more versatile way of scaling objects,
> it enables you to do some more free-form modeling stuff.

Here's another aspect that I think you may be interested in - you know when you want to kind of cinch together 2 symmetric points, how you can do that with Scale1D but it takes quite a few picks to make it happen?

Now that kind of editing will be immediately available. Like say you've got this object:



And you would like to symmetrically narrow one pair of points. You can select those 2 points, and a frame will appear around them:



Then dragging a corner of that frame inward will do the 1D scale in that direction:



So you can make this kind of adjustment really quickly by Select then Drag, Select then Drag, etc.., you don't have to fire up Scale1D and pick the center, etc... each time.

I do want to eventually have an even better method for symmetrical editing, but this is definitely easier than what you currently have to do.


> If there was some kind of unobtrusive dialog box that let you type
> in precise x,y,z dimensions to scale a single object with this method,
> that would also be great...or would that complicate it too much, and
> be better suited for another type of scaling tool?

I want to make this kind of numeric editing possible by using the object properties panel, which is another thing that I want to add for v2. This will be a dialog-like panel that will show up in the upper-right area of the window (where command options usually go) when you are in selection mode and not in a command.

- Michael

Hi Jonah,

> Yes. In Adobe software, you can move the pivot wherever you like,
> and all transforms will center around it (scale, rotate, move, shear, taper)

I'll have to take a look at that - that must be something relatively new in Illustrator, in versions up to 11 (CS0) it does not seem to work like that.


> ... crazy?

:) Sounds kind of crazy to me...

How about if I enable 2D scaling if you hold down some key while dragging the handle?

- Michael

Hello again...

>> I'll have to take a look at that - that must be something relatively new in Illustrator, in versions >> to 11 (CS0) it does not seem to work like that.

It's there in CS0, i haven't upgraded since


> How about if I enable 2D scaling if you hold down some key while dragging the handle?

That was my first thought, but i know how MoI users are partial to eating donuts and such as they work, so i had to dig around in my skull for an alternative... :) Really i think it should be possible though...

jonah

Hi Jonah,

> It's there in CS0, i haven't upgraded since

I can't seem to get it to work, can you please describe how this works in Illustrator a bit more?

I see that you can place the origin point for scale using the special "Scale tool", but that is a special mode you go into, similar to the scale command in MoI or Rhino - it is not the same thing as the 8-point bounding frame that shows up in selection mode (Arrow tool in far upper-left corner of the Illustrator toolbox).

I tried placing an origin point in the scale tool, and that has no effect on scaling using the 8-point bounding frame when inside the Select tool.

Here is some documentation for the most recent version of Illustrator:
http://www.adobepress.com/articles/article.asp?p=1016097&seqNum=6
There is no mention in there of any method to place an arbitrary scale origin with the bounding box scaling (you can hold down Alt to use the center instead of opposite corner).

Are you sure that you were not thinking of the dedicated scale tool in Illustrator instead of the selection mode bounding box?


> but i know how MoI users are partial to eating donuts and such as they work,

Well, for simple 3D scales that would still work fine, you could eat BBQ ribs or something... :)

I don't think it is a problem if standard "most frequently used" stuff works without modifier keys, and then there are some modifier keys for some more specialized advanced things.

- Michael

Showing the Carrara Widgets in both 2d and 3d views.

This Modelling Room view may be more "MoI"?

Sorry, it seems just so logically perfect to me!

Sorry Michael. You are right. The pivot point works on the dedicated rotate and shear tools, not on the basic bounding box transform. If you can consolidate all this into one, then more power to MoI. And yes, BBQ ribs are MUCH better than donuts while modeling. It's good training to break the habit of one hand on keyboard, seeing as the other one is covered in sauce...

jonah

Hi Brian,

> Sorry, it seems just so logically perfect to me!

It looks great for manipulating stuff in the 3D view.

But as a replacement for the bounding-frame type editing in a 2D app like Illustrator / Xara / etc... ? It really doesn't seem like a good fit there.

For instance scaling would be handled by clicking and dragging on a point that shows up in the center of a shape? Is that really how you would expect to scale an object in Illustrator?

- Michael

Hi Jonah,

> If you can consolidate all this into one, then more power to MoI.

It's just kind of a tougher fit to have corner-type widgets and also allow the origin to be freely placed, it would mean adjusting the frame or something like that. Like for instance here:



It doesn't really make any sense to have that frame situated like that, but to scale around some other point outside the frame like the point on the left there. I would have to move that frame to be around that point or something like that.

A freely centerable scale I think needs a different style widget, something more like a line that has one end as the scale origin, and the other end as the scaling grip. Something more like the kind of 2 line type thing that happens with the regular scale command.

I'm not really sure about doing that right now, I think I'd better do something for rotation first.

- Michael

Michael have you used it in the 2d views of say Carrara?
Yes I would like it in Illustrator or whatever.

If you have Carrara , in the Vertex Room or Hexagon, resize/adjust/scale whatever against a grid or drawing in the background--it's pretty good for me.

Somebody will say this is not a good example---I want to fit the cube object to the background oblong size/location.?

In say Carrara I can do that without moving away from that small gizmo in the center of the cube.

Hi Michael,

That symmetrical kind of editing a control points is fantastic!

What currently happens if I click & release a mouse on the rotate icon?

And is there also a "feature" which allow mirroring/flipping when you drag the point cursor from one corner frame widget towards one of the opposite one like for background image manipulation?


Petr

It may be me wishfull thinking!

But I must make my point.
(ps- the gizmo works in relation to selected or grouped points, et, etc)

The difference between clicking to select an item in MoI compared with my normal click on an item in Carrara.

(I don't think my idea is going to win but I tried!)

> What currently happens if I click & release a mouse on the rotate icon?

At the moment nothing, I don't have any kind of rotation working on this one yet.

But I would like to show a tri-ball rotater like the background images have, but with the additional feature of being able to have a grabbable center point so you can move the center of rotation when in tri-ball mode.


> And is there also a "feature" which allow mirroring/flipping when
> you drag the point cursor from one corner frame widget towards
> one of the opposite one like for background image manipulation?

At the moment no - but I had a feeling you weren't going to let me get away without doing this... :)

I've been looking over a few different 2D apps and this isn't really consistent between them, some allow mirroring and some don't do it.

- Michael