Mouse wheel zoom in Max?

Nakur

Ok, this has been annoying me lately... I often find the mouse wheel to zoom too far, so I have to use the mangify glass to get the right amount of zoom. Is there any way to make the mouse wheel zoom in less per spin? Tried digging through the configuration menu, couldn't find anything.

MoP

Try holding down CTRL, SHIFT and the middle mouse button, then move the mouse around - that's smooth zoom, very handy.
Likewise, holding down ALT and middle mouse button will rotate the viewport, in case you didn't already know that.

Nakur

Thanks for the quick reply. Seems to be ctrl+shift+alt to smooth zoom tho.

I had been using ctrl+r to rotate. It's always good to learn other ways tho, thanks ^_^

Cubik

Holding down Ctrl+ and using the mousewheel increases the zoom amount per rotation.
Holding down Alt+ and using the mousewheel decreases the zoom amount per rotation.

MoP

Oh, heh, sorry I wasn't thinking. It's actually just CTRL + ALT to smooth zoom. I don't know where I got Shift from... it was late and I was tired :P

Nakur

hah, now I feel like an idiot... been pressing down shift for the last hour, and never figured out I didn't need to.

Delaney King

Yike MOP, I didnt know that.

MoP

YESSSSS... I knew something about Max that Dave didn't! Now how did that happen?

Volkov

Another question, I noticed when zooming in, with the mouse wheel, at first it zooms in real fast, then it gets slower and slower, until you're close enough but when you try to manuever you can't move, when you try to zoom out with the magnifying glass it won't zoom, does anyone know what cause this or how to prevent 3d studio from doing that?

rooster

I used to puzzle over this when I first got into max, but the explanation is pretty simple when you think about it. The mouse wheel zooms the view but doesnt move the 'camera', so when this happens it usually means that what you are zooming in on is actually a point in space somewhere infront of the object you are trying to view. When you try to move the camera, you are intensely zoomed in and so the camera only moves slighty.

To avoid this, before zooming rotate the camera above , to the side and to the front of the object to check it is centered in your view in 3 dimensions. This sounds a bit cumbersome but eventually you will instincively know when the object isnt quite centered and move the cam accordingly.

MoP

Or you can avoid this usually by hitting "Z" with the object you wanna zoom in on selected - it will zoom all viewports to fit the object in, then you can pan/rotate/zoom with the selected object as the "focus point".

Volkov

Thanks for the help, that mouse wheel issue use to bother me to the point of intense frustration.

rooster

aha yep that might be simpler
I was gonna complain that wouldnt work if you wanted to zoom on some small part of a big model rather than the center but it works with sub-objects too which is is neat.

I usually keep the area I'm working on centered subconsciously but I'll give this new fangled z key a go see if its faster

MoP

I use it all the time. Actually, I recently re-mapped it to only zoom selected extents in the active viewport. Still not sure if I like that better or not. I also have it set to do the same thing in Maya... I use it all the time. Really useful button, that.

Delaney King

mop, stop it... your scaring me.