Hi

Can anyone explain to me what these 2 snapping options do. I can't find anything in the documentation:

Use apparent intersections

Project to plane in ortho views.

Thanks
Nigel

Hi Nigel,

> Use apparent intersections

This affects intersection object snap. An "apparent intersection" is when 2 curves visually cross over each other in one of the ortho Top/Front/Right views.

When this option is enabled, you can get intersections in those viewports at those visually intersecting spots even though the actual 3D curves do not intersect in 3D space.

Here's an example - here I've got 2 lines which are on different z levels, in the 3D view they look like this:



But those same lines in the Top view look like this:



When "Use apparent intersections" is enabled, that allows you to go in the top view and get an intersection snap at this point here:



The actual point that is used will be on one of those curves, the one used will be the one that the mouse is closest to.

So for instance with the mouse in this spot close to this line, it will give this snap point:



And if you move the mouse over slightly so it is closer to the other line, it will make the snap point on that other curve like this instead:



You can disable this option if you don't want to get these kinds of snaps and only get intersection snap points where the curves actually touch each other in full 3D space.

Some info on the other option in a minute...

- Michael

Hi Nigel, some info on the other one:

> Project to plane in ortho views

So this option is to make drawing in the ortho views produce planar objects for things like lines, polylines, and freeform curves, even when you grab a snap point for points after the very first picked point. It does this by projecting that snap point to a plane going through the first picked point. But this only happens when you are using the mouse inside of an ortho viewport.

The basic idea is that it makes ortho viewports generate planar objects (parallel to the same plane as the ortho view) when you draw lines and curves in them.

Here's a visual - here again I have 2 lines that are on different z levels, here you see the Top and 3D views of them:



So now I'm going to draw in a line, with the first point of the line snapped on to here:



Then when snapping the 2nd point of the line to the other endpoint towards the right (while inside the Top view), if "Project to plane in ortho views" is enabled, it will produce this result:



So note there that the end object snap was projected down to a plane going through the first point. The white line that you can see in the 3D view indicates the projection.

That makes the line that is being drawn to be parallel to the Top view. It doesn't project the very first point though, the first point can be freely placed which basically sets the level of the plane that will be used.

If you turn off "Project to plane in ortho views", you will get this result instead:



So note there that no projection happened to the 2nd point, so the resulting line is not parallel to any Top/Front/Right view, it's angled in 3D, but also the line in this case physically touches each snap point.


The way this is intended to be used is that with this option enabled you don't have to switch options on or off to get planar drawing, instead of switching options you make planar things by drawing in an ortho view, and if you need direct non-projected snaps you click those snap points in the 3D view which does not have projection applied to it.

I included an option to disable it though just in case you want to have thing drawn in to direct points without any projection in all views.

It is possible to make a similar kind of planar projected drawing happen in the 3D view as well by setting up a script on a keyboard shortcut, let me know if you want me to dig that up.

- Michael

Hi Michael

Thanks for the comprehensive answer. I'm just swatting up all of the snapping options and settings in preperation of doing a snapping tutorial video.

Cheers
Nigel

Hi Nigel, so hopefully for normal operation you would not ever need to actually mess with these particular settings.

They're mostly things that I included just in case someone is already familiar with some other CAD system and wants to make MoI work in a similar manner to what they are already used to.

But still knowing what they do kind of helps explain different aspects of MoI's snapping system as well though.

- Michael

Hi Michael

Thanks for the ortho explanation.

The ortho one is more or less similar to C4D's 2D snapping that I'm familiar with except a bit more evolved in MoI :)

Yup, in most cases I think you can leave these settings as is. One thing I like about making tutorials is doing the research to get a thorough understanding of all the various options.

Cheers
Nigel