Magnificent amount of work Michael!


> Implement view spinning - Add a script method for view spinning that can be set on a keyboard shortcut:

This is awesome!!!

It really works great as a companion to "Free Rotation" view manipulation mode!


After 'spinning', the only way I've found to reset the view back to the original horizontal-0 if this was implemented in "Rotate Around World Axis Z" mode is to switch to "Free Rotation" mode then back to World Axiz Z, where the view port will reset.


But yes! You can now rotate the 'ortho' viewports which helps you to get a better look at your work.

Reset the spin angle in ortho views by clicking on its your current view's activation button twice... (right>left>right) Cool!


Also, would it be someday feasible to implement 'Spin' with other viewport manipulation methods, such as with a View Control button for fine-tuning, or maybe a way to do it on the fly with mouse manipulation?

Thanks!

Hi Mike, I'm glad the view spinning will be useful!

> Also, would it be someday feasible to implement 'Spin' with
> other viewport manipulation methods, such as with a View
> Control button for fine-tuning, or maybe a way to do it on
> the fly with mouse manipulation?

It's possible, but re: view control button - it's good in general to avoid having a zillion buttons clogging up the screen, and re: mouse manipulation all the regular buttons like middle button drag, wheel spin and right button drag are already occupied by options so it would have to go on some kind of modifier key and I'm pretty conservative about populating those too.

- Michael

Hi Michael.


<<Hi Martin, I'm sorry I'm still not entirely sure if I understand you correctly.
** Well I know what I think I want, but it's not always easy for me to get that across :) **


<<Ok, so you're saying that when "Display hidden lines" was turned off, there would still be some hidden edge display being shown?
** ONLY on the part that is selected and along with 'Hidden edges on selected only' being turned ON. **


<<If so then that's problematic that the setting would seem to say that no hidden lines would be shown yet you are talking about showing some...
** Yes, but only in line with what seems possible under Options i.e. 'Hidden edges on selected only' is still shown as enabled. So as it stands, we can disable 'Display hidden lines' and still have 'Hidden edges on selected only' ticked, yet that option doesn't seem to work without the former being selected. **


<<I think it's pretty important to be able to turn off the hidden line display entirely, that's what happens with the first "Display hidden lines" checkbox being on or off. There is also a shortcut for that under the View palette. It's useful to be able to totally turn off the hidden line display in just one spot because if you have some hidden lines cluttering up your display it lets you definitely clear them all by going to just one control and clicking it.

That's why the new "hidden edges on selected only" only modifies how edges are displayed _if_ hidden edge display is enabled, it allows you to still totally disable all hidden lines by using the other "Display hidden lines" checkbox the same as before.

Hopefully the new option for also controlling the hidden-line display of edges only on selected objects will help to manage them in some situations without needing to do a full on or off, but I think it's still a good idea to have a sort of master on/off switch still though.

- Michael

** Basically, my thought was to remove the link between 'Display hidden lines' and 'Hidden edges on selected only', so that disabling 'Display hidden lines' doesn't stop 'Hidden edges on selected only' from working on its own with selected objects. My hope was that this would allow complex geometry to exist behind solids and surfaces without them getting in the way by being selectable.

Whilst my suggestion would need both options to be off to disable viewing of all hidden lines - and I do take on-board what you say about hiding things - I think It'd still be a useful option for isolating the object where the scene is busy with curves that can't necessarily be conveniently hidden and are hampering the workflow.

I've staged a rather unconvincing video of how some mock-complex curves show through a 3d shape and 'obstructs' me when all I really want to do is access the hidden edges of the selected solid. I hope you get the idea though **


http://screencast.com/t/4ubg7Rjr



Martin(2).

Hi Martin,

> > <<Ok, so you're saying that when "Display hidden lines" was> > turned off, there would still be some hidden edge display being shown?
> ** ONLY on the part that is selected and along with 'Hidden edges
> on selected only' being turned ON. **

Ok, but wouldn't that be weird to have a control that say "Display hidden lines" and you have it unchecked, yet still some hidden lines are being displayed somewhere? That's what could happen if it worked like you described.

It's just far more simple if the control that says "Display hidden lines" when turned off means that there are not any hidden lines being shown...


> ** Yes, but only in line with what seems possible under Options i.e.
> 'Hidden edges on selected only' is still shown as enabled. So as it stands,
> we can disable 'Display hidden lines' and still have 'Hidden edges on selected
> only' ticked, yet that option doesn't seem to work without the former
> being selected. **

Yes, that's correct and how it's intended to be set up right now - the "Hidden edges on selected only" checkbox only has any effect on the hidden line display (and only on edges in there as well), so if the hidden line display is turned off (Display hidden lines unchecked) then it won't do anything at that moment. I guess I could hide or gray out the second control when hidden lines are actually turned off, but that's a pretty small cosmetic detail and sometimes that can actually be fairly annoying to have UI that is displayed but not able to actually be set until you go somewhere else.


> Whilst my suggestion would need both options to be off to disable
> viewing of all hidden lines - <....>

From my point of view this is a very significant drawback... Enough so that the negatives of what you are proposing to me seem to outweigh the positives, sorry.


> I've staged a rather unconvincing video of how some
> mock-complex curves show through a 3d shape and 'obstructs' me
> when all I really want to do is access the hidden edges of the selected
> solid. I hope you get the idea though **

If you have a whole bunch of stuff getting in your way you fundamentally have to hide some of it so that it won't be in your way... This new setting is not some cure-all to totally avoid that - having stuff littering your view is more of a demo of not doing enough object visibility management really.

When I first watched your video I thought that you were actually trying to draw some things on the front of the solid and getting snaps onto the hidden-line curves behind it by accident instead - that kind of problem is precisely why it's good to have a single control that can globally disable hidden lines...


Maybe in the future I could add another setting yet that would control whether curves will be part of the hidden-line display or not, I guess that would do what you are describing. But I also don't really like having too many zillions of options for people to have to wade through as well, when things get to a certain level people end up not being able to find anything in the mess.


- Michael

Hey Michael,

Here's the screenshot script I'm using :)

script: /* Custom screenshot */ var prev_background = moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor; moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor = 0xFFFFFF; moi.view.lineWidth = 1; moi.grid.display = false; moi.grid.showXYAxes = false; moi.view.showAxisIcon = false; moi.view.meshAngle = 4; moi.ui.getActiveViewport().renderToClipboard( 4200, 2970 ); moi.view.lineWidth = 1; moi.grid.display = true; moi.grid.showXYAxes = true; moi.view.showAxisIcon = true; moi.view.meshAngle = 8; moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor = prev_background;

Thanks a lot !

Hi Michael,

I've been following what Martin has been describing with Hidden Edges and I sort of agree with him, you have Hidden Edge options in two separate places where I think they should be together.
If I understood what Martin is getting at this is how I see it;


Hidden Edges not shown.




Display all hidden edges.




When 'Hidden edges on selected' is checked 'Display hidden lines' is automatically unchecked and vise-versa.



-

Thanks for taking the time to reply, Michael and Danny.

Michael.

What I wanted to highlight in the videos is that MoI has the ability to exclude curves from displaying through selected solids (by keeping the mouse button pressed, so the effect didn't just flash by) whilst at the same time being able to display the hidden edges/wireframe of that selected solid, and this is something I would have liked to have seen when ONLY 'Hidden edges on selected' is enabled.

<< Ok, but wouldn't that be weird to have a control that say "Display hidden lines" and you have it unchecked, yet still some hidden lines are being displayed somewhere? That's what could happen if it worked like you described.

** I agree that would be odd, but as 'Hidden edges on selected only' is the only one enabled, then it seems quite clear to me that is precisely what I should expect to see, so I'd find it pretty intuitive. **


Danny.

Thanks for summing up and improving the point I was trying to make ;)




Martin(2).

Hi DesuDeus,

> Here's the screenshot script I'm using :)

Here is how it would be modified to do double the current viewport pixel size:

script: /* Custom screenshot */ var prev_background = moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor; moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor = 0xFFFFFF; moi.view.lineWidth = 1; moi.grid.display = false; moi.grid.showXYAxes = false; moi.view.showAxisIcon = false; moi.view.meshAngle = 4; var vp = moi.ui.getActiveViewport(); vp.renderToClipboard( vp.pixelWidth * 2, vp.pixelHeight * 2 ); moi.view.lineWidth = 1; moi.grid.display = true; moi.grid.showXYAxes = true; moi.view.showAxisIcon = true; moi.view.meshAngle = 8; moi.view.viewportBackgroundColor = prev_background;

- Michael

Hi Danny,

> you have Hidden Edge options in two separate places
> where I think they should be together.

Well, the 2 checkboxes are together in options.

It's not particularly a goal to take every single thing in Options and put it into the side pane as well - it's better to only have things that are used more frequently in the side pane, and things that are more one time configuration options are intentionally only listed in the Options dialog and not in the side pane to prevent clutter and bloating of frequently accessed UI.

This new setting is something that I think is likely to be used as a configuration option, meaning something that you'll set one time as a preference for how hidden lines should function. Turning the hidden line display on or off is not like that, it's something that you may need to do many times just in the course of regular modeling. It's things like that which are good candidates for putting in the side pane.

- Michael

Ok, well I haven't managed to get the release notes set up for multitouch or nsided yet and I'm traveling for much of the day tomorrow so it may be a couple more days yet before those parts of the note are actually all finished.

- Michael

Perfect it works !

Thanks a lot :)

Where is the Mar 18 download? I've downloaded the Mar 17 a few days ago, but I don't know if there is a later one or not.

Michael T.

<< Where is the Mar 18 download?

I believe that here is the latest version ;)
http://moi3d.com/download.htm (last line)

Thanks Pilou!

Michael T.

Hi Michael T - oops that's a typo in the title of this thread, the Mar-17 one is the actual current one. I'll update the title.

- Michael

Thanks Michael G.

Hope you have a good weekend, and thanks again for a great tool!

Michael T.

The new Mar-17 beta is not working properly on OSX 10.6 - if you're running 10.6 "Snow Leopard", there are some stability problems there with the new multi-touch handling stuff. You'll need to disable the multi-touch functionality in MoI by deleting one particular file to avoid sporadic crashes.

To do that, make sure MoI is not running, and then right-click on the app and choose “Show package contents”, then inside there go into drive_c/moi and there will be a file there named moi_touch.dylib – delete this file and that will then disable the new multi-touch event handling which does not seem to get along properly with 10.6 .

For the next beta I’ve automatically disabled the multi-touch handling when running on 10.6 .

This only applies to OSX version 10.6 Snow Leopard specifically, 10.7 and 10.8 are not affected.

Thanks,
- Michael

Finally got some notes gathered up for the new multitouch view navigation stuff:



Multitouch view navigation - use multitouch gestures (pinch or drag fingers) to do zoom/pan/rotate view manipulations. This works on Mac OSX 10.7 or 10.8 using a trackpad or on Windows 8 using a touch screen. There's a demo video here: http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=5731.1

The supported gestures are:

   Pan by 2 fingers dragging left/right/up/down

   Zoom by pinching index finger and thumb together or apart.

   Rotate left/right/up/down in the 3D view by dragging 3 fingers.

   2 finger double tap for view reset (zoom to selected objects or zoom to all if done a second time).

   Twist thumb and index fingers for 2D ortho view spin or 3D view tilt if those are enabled under settings.


Zooming in and out with multitouch can be easier to control in the 3D view if you have a parallel view projection rather than perspective. You can set a parallel projection under Options > View > "3D view projection". To set the default projection on startup, save a 3DM file with a parallel projection set and then put that 3DM file as the startup template under Options > General > Template file.

On OSX, 3 finger dragging for rotation in the 3D view will not work if any 3 finger swiping is already being used for OSX system functions. Check under System Preferences > Trackpad > More Gestures. If "Swipe between full-screen apps" or "Mission Control" are set to use 3 finger swiping, change them to use 4 finger swiping instead, then MoI will be able to receive the 3 finger dragging events.

There are some options available for changing multitouch behavior under Options > Rotate/Pan/Zoom options > MultiTouch options (in lower-right area):

   Reverse rotation checkbox - when enabled the 3D view rotation directions will be reversed.

   Rotate ortho views checkbox - when enabled thumb/index spin will spin the 2D ortho (top/front/right) views.

   Swap 3D rotate and pan checkbox - when enabled 2 finger dragging in the 3D view will do rotation and 3 fingers will do panning instead.

   Allow 3D rotation tilt - when enabled thumb/index spin will tilt the 3D view left or right.

   Rotation speed, Pan speed, and Zoom speed - a scale factor can be entered in here to adjust the speed of these movements, for example putting in 0.5 will make that operation half speed, putting in 2 will double the speed.


There are also a few additional settings available in moi.ini under the [MultiTouch] section:

[MultiTouch]
SingleFingerRotation=n
TiltSpeed=1.0
TiltCenterMode=0

SingleFingerRotation can be set to =y on Windows to make just one finger dragging do 3D view rotation instead of 3 finger dragging. This will prevent things like window selection from happening with touch so you should probably only try this if you also have a mouse or pen to use for selection.

TiltSpeed can be set to a scale factor to speed up or slow down thumb/index finger spin action in 3D views.

TiltCenterMode can be set to 0, 1, or 2 and controls how the center point works for 3D view tilting.
   With TiltCenterMode = 0 the current centroid of the touch points is used for the tilt center. With this one the tilt center moves right along with your fingers.
   With TiltCenterMode = 1 it will use the centroid between the 2 fingers just at the initial start of the 2 finger gesture, it won't update as you move your finger around, only when you start a new gesture.
   With TiltCenterMode = 2 it will use the center of the viewport as the tilt center, it won’t make any difference where on the screen you are at as far as tilting goes.


Thanks to William Knop for implementing OSX touch event handling code, and Isaiah Coberly for testing the Windows version.


- Michael

Does this yet exist in the link beta http://moi3d.com/beta.htm
or will be in the next release ?