Modo - Maya style ALT+LMB+MMB viewport/camera interaction

FelixL

Hi,

I'm new to modo and just trying to find my way around the interface. I'm looking for ways to use it with a tablet. Which means, I have to zoom without a mousewheel.

I tried the maya mouse presets but ran into a problem. Basically, the viewport snaps to weird positions when using LMB and MMB simultaneously.

To see what I mean, go to system -> preferences -> remapping and choose "maya" under mouse input presets. There will be a dialog box asking you if you want to utilize ALT+LMB+MMB for zooming. Click yes.

Now, hold ALT+LMB+MMB for zooming, move the mouse around a bit to zoom. Then let go of MMB, but stay on LMB. If you now drag the mouse, the camera will suddenly snap into a different orientation, which is very annoying.

I believe modo keeps reading the horizontal mouse movement while you're zooming and "adds" it on top of your camera orientation as soon as you let go of MMB. Is there anything to be done to keep this from happening?


If nobody can solve this problem, I'd be interested to hear about how other tablet/cintiq users have set up modo in regards to viewport interaction.

WarrenM

I just the standard camera controls. Zoom works great there ...

I like how everything drives off the left button.

ALT + L_DRAG - rotate
ALT + SHIFT + L_DRAG - pan
ALT + CONTROL + L_DRAG - zoom

WarrenM

Oh, and hit 'O' and turn off trackball rotation. It's terrible.

Farfarer

Yeah, I used the default as Warren posted. Works well with a tablet.

FelixL

I have trackball rotation off.

I've tried the defaults you suggested, but they have the same problems.
If I stay on ALT+LMB the entire time and occasionally hit control to zoom, all the while dragging the mouse/pen around, the mouse will snap around eratically
Do you guys let go of LMB or ALT every time you switch between zooming and panning?

FelixL

I just noticed that this behaviour only occurs when modifier chording is on (off by default). It's under input->remapping.

If it's off, modo ignores if you press control additionally while already holding down alt. So I guess you guys let go of LMB before going into zoom mode.

Looks like I have to get used to this

Farfarer

Hmm... I don't actually know. I keep trackball rotation on, I don't think I lift alt...

Hated it at first but Greg told me to give it a proper go and get used to it and I find it much easier to navigate in with a tablet now.

WarrenM

Yeah, just keep ALT held down ... works smoothly. But I just paid attention to myself and yeah, I lift and drop the pen back down every time I change a modifier key. Just habit but it seems to work well. If I don't it ignores you, as you said.

Count Vertsalot

Allow Modifier Chording is for the mouse buttons. If you have it turned on you should be able to just hold Alt down and smoothly switch between LMB and MMB and holding them both at the same time.

Bek

WarrenM wrote: »

Oh, and hit 'O' and turn off trackball rotation. It's terrible.

Never! Trackball rotation is pretty great imo, it helped to read this:

modo uses a rotation method known as ‘trackball rotation’ by default. This is by far my favorite way to work, and I highly recommend getting used to it. Basically it means that when you drag to rotate the viewport, the behavior is based on where you drag. Imagine the viewport is overlayed with a giant trackball. If you click and drag the middle of the trackball, things rotate from the middle. If you drag the edge of the trackball, things pivot sideways, as if you’re turning the trackball from the side, like a steering wheel. Click anywhere in between, and the effect is somewhere in the middle. The beauty of this system is that it works perfectly from any angle: you can flip your model upside-down, and work on it the same as if it were right-side-up. People who are not used to trackball rotation find it difficult to control simply because they’re not used to it: give it time, and you won’t want to go back! — Adam OHern

and spend some time with it. I greatly prefer it on. And yes I will quote the above every time Trackball Rotation comes up :poly124:

Dataday

Side note: When you click the maya keymap, and the window pops up... click NO! if you want the normal maya setup.

FelixL

Thanks for your input everyone.

@Count Vertsalot: actually, button chording is always on for the mouse buttons, even with the box unchecked, with it checked, it's turned on for keys as well. If you enable it and try what I described, you will notice the camera snapping around as well.

I'll just have to get used to it I guess. I like it in maya/max because simply touching the tablet with the pen tip counts as click, so you only need one additional pen button instead of two. And pressing two at a time like this is not uncomfortable at all.

@Bek: The trackball seems neat, especially the flicking, but is there any trick to make it faster? Even orbiting 180° around a selection takes me a full sweep across my cintiq, which will get tiring very quickly. Or do you simply use flicking/freewheeling in such cases?

Bek

FelixL wrote: »

@Bek: The trackball seems neat, especially the flicking, but is there any trick to make it faster? Even orbiting 180° around a selection takes me a full sweep across my cintiq, which will get tiring very quickly. Or do you simply use flicking/freewheeling in such cases?

Don't think so, no. The idea is that if you drag from the left to right will be at most 180 — you've dragged the left end of the sphere to the right end. But you could also try flicking with alt + RMB to continue the rotation once you release RMB. (I use trackball rotation with a mouse)

WarrenM

and spend some time with it. I greatly prefer it on. And yes I will quote the above every time Trackball Rotation comes up

Yeah ... how much time is enough? Every time a thread like this comes up, I turn it back on until I can't stand it anymore and flip it off again.

WarrenM

Oh, and can you speed up the trackball rotation? I turned it back on, as I always do, and I just find it so sluggish compared to having it off.

Bek

I can't exactly remember! I think I left it on as default when I first installed. I just tried turning it off; what the fuuuuck. How does non-trackball even work. When you're looking at Y being straight up everything just gets weird. I assume you're meant to work with Y always being up; whereas in trackball rotation it doesn't matter where your up axis faces. You can turn any side to any other side at any time.

WarrenM wrote: »

Oh, and can you speed up the trackball rotation?

Not that I know of, max 180 rotation (per axis, if that makes sense) at any one time. But you can use alt+RMB and let it spin, but I haven't found that necessary. And non-trackball seemed super twitchy to me :poly124:

WarrenM

When you're looking at Y being straight up everything just gets weird.

Haha ... every one is different. That maps perfectly for me because it's what EVERY OTHER 3D app does.

Yeah, trackball rotation is just too sluggish. It drives me batty. Going to turn it off again...

fr0gg1e

WarrenM wrote: »

Haha ... every one is different. That maps perfectly for me because it's what EVERY OTHER 3D app does.

Yeah, trackball rotation is just too sluggish. It drives me batty. Going to turn it off again...

Imagine that when you click is acting as a handle. If you click on the left side, just a bit off center, then it's gonna move slow, IE more click needed to rotate, but if you click way left then it's faster because of more traction. Not saying that it shouldn't be configurable tho

I wish all software had this option. I LOVE it. 1st thing I turn on in mudbox 'cause I can only draw straight lines diagonally (if that makes sens hehe), and the option to rotate the view when hovering on corners saves me a lot of CTRL+Z time.

WarrenM

But if you click way out to the side, you're spinning the view - not rotating around the model. So it changes functionality.

Bek

Only if you're clicking below and imagined axis that quarters the viewport. If you're exactly on that axis you'd be doing a perfect rotation. Of course, you never are, so you're always correcting by moving the mouse close to that line, but it is close enough that you can rotate around the model endlessly by dragging left to right or right to left. Same for up/down, and that never changes based on the current direction of your 'up' axis. After using this a bit it's quite intuitive and you'll be dragging at any angle to view what you want.

The more out to the side you click just affects the total amount of rotation you can do in that one stroke before you hit the other screen's border. Thinking about it now, perhaps there could be a way to 'speed up' trackball rotation by having the mouse re-appear at the lefthand side one passing through the right (...you know, like pac man or asteroids) rather than catching on the side and going into that screen-space rotation mode you get from MMB. Then you wouldn't have to do a 360 spin in two strokes; but it would still be at the same 'speed' or distance of mouse movement.

edit: So it turns out in the options under input > remapping there's a trackball speed multiplier, but it only lets you slow the trackball rotation; you cannot go above 100%.

Count Vertsalot

FelixL wrote: »

Thanks for your input everyone.

@Count Vertsalot: actually, button chording is always on for the mouse buttons, even with the box unchecked, with it checked, it's turned on for keys as well. If you enable it and try what I described, you will notice the camera snapping around as well.

Yes you're right. I had it backwards. I don't think that snapping should be happening. You could file a bug report as see if they look into it.

WarrenM

edit: So it turns out in the options under input > remapping there's a trackball speed multiplier, but it only lets you slow the trackball rotation; you cannot go above 100%.

Yeah, I saw that. It's the perfect troll ... "Oh hey, I can adjust the speed ... 100% max?!"