Home Technical Talk
The BRAWL² Tournament Challenge has been announced!

It starts May 12, and ends Sept 12. Let's see what you got!

https://polycount.com/discussion/237047/the-brawl²-tournament

autodesk maya: busted rotation gizmo

evilmushroom
polycounter lvl 10
Offline / Send Message
evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10
how can autodesk get away with that!!
as there are bugs, and there are laughable bugs, this one falls into the later category
among all the problems that maya has, this one is the most telling about the status of the software and the conditions in which it is being shipped 

https://youtube.com/shorts/OedsQk-o9gI?si=l1Ivi2Kkyl06CVs2

Replies

  • Benjammin
    Offline / Send Message
    Benjammin greentooth
    There's a lot to complain about with autodesk, but this is just a weirdly subjective gripe about something that doesn't really matter. Its not busted, it works differently. I find a lot of Blender's UX/UI to be awful. Should I make a video about how Blender needs to get its act together and do things like Maya?
  • Eric Chadwick
    Yeah that's not the behavior I see. Did you check the Help file? The video they have is pretty instructive. https://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2025/ENU/?guid=GUID-169906C5-CBC4-45CD-8DFB-F716D51D6168

    I'm betting you have some non-default option enabled, or you have some other constraint active on the object. Some helpful tips here:
    https://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2025/ENU/?guid=GUID-6051D390-EAED-4B95-B5EB-99829835ACDE
  • evilmushroom
    Offline / Send Message
    evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10
    Benjammin said:
    There's a lot to complain about with autodesk, but this is just a weirdly subjective gripe about something that doesn't really matter. Its not busted, it works differently. I find a lot of Blender's UX/UI to be awful. Should I make a video about how Blender needs to get its act together and do things like Maya?
    no, it does not work differently, it is busted for real, you would know if you had to rotate an object past 180 degrees. awful means that it is not at your taste, but still works as intended. while busted means it does not work as intended, and that gizmo is definitely not working as intended. to reply to your question, yes if you feel like it.

    Yeah that's not the behavior I see. Did you check the Help file? The video they have is pretty instructive. https://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2025/ENU/?guid=GUID-169906C5-CBC4-45CD-8DFB-F716D51D6168

    I'm betting you have some non-default option enabled, or you have some other constraint active on the object. Some helpful tips here:
    https://help.autodesk.com/view/MAYAUL/2025/ENU/?guid=GUID-6051D390-EAED-4B95-B5EB-99829835ACDE
    thank you for the help, but the gizmo's behaviour has been confirmed to be a bug by autodesk (I sent them the video). 
    are you a Maya user?



  • Joopson
    Offline / Send Message
    Joopson hero character
    I'm not seeing this myself, in Maya, nor have I ever seen it-- this must be a bug, not a universal issue... Which version of Maya do you have?
    If I hold ctrl while dragging, I see some of that behaviour (rotating while moving mouse perpendicular), but not the stuff that feels glitchy.
  • evilmushroom
    Offline / Send Message
    evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10
    Joopson said:
    I'm not seeing this myself, in Maya, nor have I ever seen it-- this must be a bug, not a universal issue... Which version of Maya do you have?
    If I hold ctrl while dragging, I see some of that behaviour (rotating while moving mouse perpendicular), but not the stuff that feels glitchy.
    this was recorded using 2025.3
    and ctrl is irrelevant, all it does is hiding the shadow circle that shows rotation

    in max the rotation is by draging the mouse in parallel to the tangent of the point from which the axis was grabbed
    in blender its by circling around the gizmo
    in maya (on my end), its by draging along the perpendicular to the tangent of the point from which the axis was grabbed

    how about your maya, how do you use it and what do you see?
    lets say you rotate an object by 720 degree, how do you do that exactly, and what is the gizmo showing?
  • Joopson
    Offline / Send Message
    Joopson hero character
    If I drag outward, it doesn't do anything, I have to move around the object to rotate it, as is expected.
    (I'm in Maya 2024, though)


    As for knowing whether you've gone 720 degrees, you can look in the channel box, or enter in the number manually, or you can eyeball it knowing you've gone 360 degrees twice. That's never been a concern for me, but I do quite like how Blender displays it.
  • evilmushroom
    Offline / Send Message
    evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10
    this is what I see ..
    to rotate properly, I have to drag in a straight line as I explained before.


  • Eric Chadwick
    Can you upload a mb file for others to try out? You'll need to put it in a zip to attach it here.
  • evilmushroom
    Offline / Send Message
    evilmushroom polycounter lvl 10
    I think I found the culprit,
    and man that was one hell of a rabbit hole!

    when switching the "step snap" from off to relative/absolute, maya switches from arc rotation (revolving around the object) to linear rotation (going in a straight line along the perpendicular to the tangent of the point from which the axis was grabbed).
    while the shadow circle (that rotation feedback) stays tied to the arc rotation, and the behaviour in not documented anywhere!

    so if it is not a bug, it is an extremely bad undocumented and inconsistent UX with misleading visual feedback

    (if anyone can confirm that, I would be thankful)


  • poopipe
    Offline / Send Message
    poopipe grand marshal polycounter
    This still wouldn't have topped the mis-ordered transforms that 2017 shipped with anyway 

    Still makes me laugh
  • Joopson
    Offline / Send Message
    Joopson hero character
    when switching the "step snap" from off to relative/absolute, maya switches from arc rotation (revolving around the object) to linear rotation (going in a straight line along the perpendicular to the tangent of the point from which the axis was grabbed).
    while the shadow circle (that rotation feedback) stays tied to the arc rotation, and the behaviour in not documented anywhere!

    so if it is not a bug, it is an extremely bad undocumented and inconsistent UX with misleading visual feedback
    Yes indeed, seeing this once changing to absolute-- misleading visual feedback is right. I've never had the occasion to use absolute or even realize it was an option until now. Very interesting! Good job following the rabbit hole.
Sign In or Register to comment.