by gesture they mean move the mouse in the direction of the button you want. Radial menus have a set of buttons which are arranged in sectors of a circle. When the user presses and holds their hot key they open centered on the mouse. releasing the key closes them.
A user can select an option in 2 ways
1: hold the hotkey and press a button
2: hold the hotkey and drag the mouse in the direction of the button they want to activate and release the hot key.(with a small dead zone in the middle so you can release the key without doing anything).
So say in maya right clicking(and holding) on a mesh opens a 'components' menu: Vertex on the right. Edge is at the top and face is on the bottom. if you click them the component level changes. if you drag the mouse in their direction and release they also activate.
You can only store something like 6 or 8 commands in the radial or it would be too cluttered so maya has sub radial menus that open if you hover over a button and also just a regular list of buttons below the radial.
Hi Guys, just wanna bump this thread for small update. Istonia and I worked together to do some workflow optimization.
We've fixed some bugs, although there are still more to come
The viewport navigation has also followed the standard alt+lmb,mmb,rmb
Some of the buttons are removed (regarding rigging and animation), focusing on modeling first.
Enhance the streamline engine. More customizable keys.
There are few things that I requested:
- Turbosmooth/subdivision toggle
currently it's not possible to go back and forth, the only workaround is to undo.
- Realtime symmetry
- UI rehaul, allow more customization like drag and drop repositioning.
Please throw some of your suggestions and thoughts.
I just downloaded it and played around a little bit, and its actually quite easy for me to get started, took me like 10 -20 seconds to figure out how to navigate, select edges, faces, verts, modify stuff and just the basics.
Here is a re-design Interface article that a german did for Maya as a personal project: http://www.pixtur.org/project/show/37
there can be learned a lot about it especially for someone who is not that strong in the visual area or who does not know all the small details in Maya or a similar big package.
Thanks renderhjs,
Yes we're awared of UI rehaul but we want to get the workflow and basic tool done first.
I've seen pixtur UI proposal but IMO some part I found tedious and complicated for new users, although seasoned artists can benefit from it. What I'm proposing to Istonia is a modeling software that's easy to learn and get used to.
Urm btw, There is new build today, here's the changelog:
*The move and rotate manipulators have more functions.
*Some SreamLine tools have been improved.
For example, extrusion, user presses and hold the hot key then move the mouse to create extrusion without pressing any mouse button.
This behaviour is copied from Silo. People may like it. I think people may feel less stressfull if they don't have to press down something on both hands at the same time.
The down thing is changes to the model could be made without noticed.
*Selection at point can now be made by LMB click.
*Ctrl:ExcludeSelection, Shift:ToggleSelection, Ctrl+Shift:IncludeSelection. Maya style, but can be customized too.
*Q selection mode is added. When it is on, hot key can be used to change region selection style.
*1 2 3 4 5 mapped to vertex/edge/polygon/mesh/object, hit second time will toggle back to where the mode was before.
*Menu bar changed.
*New tool button are added into each viewport.
Notes: .netframework 1.1 does not have the interface to detect how many cores in the local computer, so I use "set number of processors" function to let user do it manually. Only relax operations in UV mapping and map baking operations can benifit from this.
Good going elte, glad to see someone helping out the author like this.
New viewport navigation and no installation (useful for testing) are both great addition.
One thing that bothers me a ton about this package is that the viewport navigation 'snaps', like it doesn't recognize you want to rotate the camera till you've already gone 5° or more, and after that it rotates in something like 1° increments (I'm not sure how to describe this better). This is true for panning and zooming as well. Is their any plans to fix this?
You mentioned in the changes that lmb could be used for selection now, but seems to still be mmb here...
I hit a glitch when using undo which has made it now so I cant see any wires/verts in the viewport, and I cant get it to show them anymore even after deleting and re-extracting the program. I deleted everything referring to voidworld I found in the registry (most of which was remnants from the install) but that didn't solve it. So I'm not sure where its holding this type of configuration info...Either way cant test anymore because of this.
@PolyHertz I can't seem to understand your explanation regarding the viewport navigation. I tried to navigate both VW and maya, they both look the same with very very little cursor movement.
lmb is marquee selection (ignore backfacing checked in max or camera based selection On in maya), mmb for raycast selection/paint select (you have to highlight the component first), otherwise it performs marquee select (ignore backfacing unchecked or camera based selection off)
I haven't been able to reproduce your undo glitch, mine is working good so far.
Well it happened from an undo, but I have to assume theirs some sort of show/don't show wires setting file/registry entry somewhere that's messing it up now. Finding out where these remote settings are is what's important, because they're certainly not being held in the folder...
polyhertz : thanks for the testing! there are some component visibility control buttons in the new built in each viewport. hope that helps. also if click the viewport type label which could be "Perspective" or "Orthagraphic", you can bring up a context menu where you can have more control over the component visiblity. as for the navigation problems, i actually have no good idea what's the reason, looks like fps drop caused by somthing some where between dx9 and graphic card.
Just tried the newest version (same version number but new features), and with the visibility control buttons was able to turn back on the shaded wires
For the viewport issue, its not consistent, sometimes it'll pick up what I'm doing right away, and then other times it'll take a moment to realize that I'm trying to navigate the scene before snapping to correct location. So its a sort of input lag.
Something else, for backfaces It'd probably make more sense to have it as a 50% darker shade then jet black. Also what does the hide/show texture button do? afaik theirs no materials or texture capabilities in the app (not even sure if you can change the objects default color)?
PolyHertz: from what you described about the viewport navigation behaviour, It seems could be threading inconsistant issue. I would check into that, but since it works fine in both my two machines, it may not easy to fix it.
The app does have material and texture abilities. For material tool, the default hot key is M, and U for uv mapping tool, or hit the tool buttons under polygon mode control panel.
Well the "u" and "m" hotkeys work, but I dont see buttons for getting into these anywhere in the UI? The secondary windows all seem to be set to float over all windows btw, so if you go to firefox for example without minimizing the material/uv/etc. windows will stay at the top instead of falling behind the newest opened/maximized app.
Some things on selection: When using marquee I've noticed that the selection isnt actually made untill the user moves their cursor after releasing the lmb, so just releasing it doesnt make the selection, or at least the viewport doesnt update until then. And are their hotkeys for ring/loop?
This is looking great. I LOVE the way the pivot centers on the screen if it goes out of the viewport! Genius
im missing not having a connect tool. If it could be merged with cut like silo does it that would be awesome. if your not aware of how cut in silo behaves it has 2 modes.
1:if there is a selection it connects them with an edge. This works for Edges faces and verts. Its very very usefull.
2: if there is no selection the cut tool starts. if you strart a cut on geometry it works like VW's cut tool. if you start the cut in open space you can drag a line across the mesh and it will work like the slice plane in max but aligned to the view.
The selection is great. But it would be nice to be able to drop the current selection by clicking in open space. that speeds things up alot.
Is there some way of setting the viewports pivot point? in max/silo you automatically rotate around the pivot of your current selection in object mode and around the selected sub object in sub object mode. its much easier to navigate this way
The Silo style Extrude is nice but its missing 1 thing. Silos tool works on the selection hi-lite if there is no selection. If this could be added to the tools in general it would be awesome.
Tools like bridge could be a little more intelligent. If you look at bridge in max/silo it does what VW does if there is no selection. if you have faces selected or edges then they get bridged rather than starting a picking session. the only time i usually want a picking session in any tool is if i dont have anything selected.
PolyHertz: Have a look at the screenshot taken by elte, you should see those tool buttons under the object mode panel on right handside of the image. If the polygon mode is on, you should be able to see the Material and UV Map tool's control buttons there.
I haven't realize the second window is a problem. I'll give it a try to see if i can improve it. Thanks for pointing that out.
I would see if i can create realtime selection.
To select a loop, the simplest way is to LMB/MMB double click the same edge.
For more control on loop/ring selection, you can use the StreamLine Engine tools, edge_loop: G key, edge_ring: H key, polygon_ring: G key. You should be able to pickup these tool from the Smarttips that drops down automatically when you idle the mouse in the active viewport for a second or two. If you can't see the SmartTips, activate it through menu Edit > SmartTips Options > 0.5 seconds. When a StreamLine Engine tool is activated, you should see the Instant Help tooltips that drop down from top screen. If you can't see it, go and check menu Edit > Show Instant Help. All these should be available by default, but since you remove the registry manually, that could cause trouble. As i have noticed, that for new window version, even if you have remove the registry infos, window still have a copy of that hidden some where and when a programe ask for a registry value, window will get it from that hidden place. It is funny enough.
We've just finished with basic selection workflow. I'll try to propose how loop and ring selection behave next on selection todo list. Once they're done we can start on optimizing or enhance the basic function.
@r_fletch_r Indeed, Silo and modo are our inspiration and reference
The selection is great. But it would be nice to be able to drop the current selection by clicking in open space. that speeds things up alot.I thought u could do that by simply lmb open space?
Thank you for your suggestion
r_fletch_r:Thanks for bringup these good points.
To change the view pivot point, Ctrl+Alt+Shit+RMB at a point on the object. You can also pickup this tool's instruction in the SmartTips in view tool group.
For ring/loop their should be 2 methods beyond the currently implemented Full and grow/shrink: path and gap/dot.
For path you'd get two selected components and select the shortest distance between them. If you store the last selected component you could also have it so multiple path selections can be made one after another. For gap/dot, I'm sure you know all about this with Modo being a reference point, else here's an example from max.
A path gap loop/ring would be great too, but I've never seen it done. This should be doable without going overboard on hotkeys too.
elte: Right you are, the thing is when you use a tablet for modelling there is often a small delta when you mouse down. VW sees a marquee selection and doesnt do anything. If an empty marquee could clear the selection that would be great.
lStonia: awesome. I should have spotted that myself, thanks . could this perhaps become a default behaviour when a selection is made? I find when im using maya(which works like this) i continuously have to keep refocusing where Silo/max just does it by default every time the selection changes. 1 little checkbox could make a lot of folks happy also Its nice when these commands dont transform the viewport. giving a seperate frame selection command is better
I haven't read through what other folks have suggested and I've only used it for ten or so minutes, but here are a few notes:
Selection seems a bit wonky for me, sometimes it requires two clicks to select / deselect something.
A way to cancel placing a new primitive? Escape perhaps? This could also apply to canceling the use of a tool such as the cut tool.
Similar to the above, a way to finish using a tool? Enter perhaps? This would be good for the chamfer / extrude / cut tools for example. I find it quite annoying having to click on the tool button again to finish it off!
A way to take a step back with the cut tool? Backspace perhaps? I'm pretty sure maya has this. It's a really useful feature.
Ignore backfacing toggle? Having this enabled basically doesn't allow you to select anything "hidden" from view when selecting with the selection marquee. Exactly how you have it now, actually. But a way to turn that off would be nice. If you've used max you'll be familiar with this.
Adjusting the values in the spinner boxes for the extrude / chamfer / bevel tools doesn't give a preview of what it'll look like before applying, is it possible to change this? I know that you can preview by clicking and dragging your selection, but this would be a cool addition!
Right-clicking a tool brings up its option box if it has one? For example, right-clicking the "Loop Insert" tool would bring up the option box rather than left-clicking as it is now? Left-clicking would simply insert one loop or however many are defined in the option box.
Being able to snap by a vert (or group of) to another vert / edge / mid-point / grid point (Whatever snapping options are toggled). Image required! Maybe a toggle to enable / disable snapping? Hopefully you're able to decipher what I mean!
That's all I have for now, I hope you find them useful!
Thanks Szark.
There is a Selection Mode tool, its hot key is Q, its tool buttons is at the upper-right corner of the window with an cursor arrow image. This tool can be used to cancel tools being used. It can also be used to change region selection style marquee/circle/etc.
If use lmb marquee do selection, the backfacing components won't be affected. But if use rmb, the components will be affected.
For ring/loop their should be 2 methods beyond the currently implemented Full and grow/shrink: path and gap/dot.
For path you'd get two selected components and select the shortest distance between them. If you store the last selected component you could also have it so multiple path selections can be made one after another. For gap/dot, I'm sure you know all about this with Modo being a reference point, else here's an example from max.
A path gap loop/ring would be great too, but I've never seen it done. This should be doable without going overboard on hotkeys too.
also i'd like to add a point to point select, very handy for selecting loop
also for the which point to rotate around, i'm pretty used to and like the way zbrush and 3dcoat can handle this, just take the last clicked point to orbit around, really a nice option i would like to have in max as well
@Neox IMO your workflow can be done faster by just click the first edge, shift double click the 2nd point edge, and double click the 3rd point edge, and so on instead of firing another command.
Anyway guys here's the latest build with changes log as follows:
Summary of changes
*Two concepts are applied to each StreamLine Engine tool whenever is possible..
1.When the tool is activated or an operation is started, the programe will attempt to use the existing selection, the highlighted component and cursor poisition. The purpose is to reduce mouse button click selection/activation.
2.When an operation is started, its hotkey can be released if possible and the tool is still live. The purpose is to free finger pressure, the downside is the operation may need an extra LMB click to finish.
*Selection cut tool and slice tool are merged into StreamLine Engine cut tool. Object can be sliced with split or no split.
*Viewport rotation navigation pivot uses selection center if any. If it is out of screen, the screen center will be used instead.
*Empty marquee selection will clear the existing selection.
*Tow bugs in edge selection fixed.
*Edge gap loop/ring selection now available in StreamLine Engine tools. Edge path selection tool has been added with gap capability, but it is put in the traditional tool group.
*Realtime selection implemented. It can be disabled through menu "Edit > Realtime Selection Enabled" incase performance is too low.
*Step backwards/forwards in cut tool (not the one in StreamLine Engine) can be performed by using undo/redo.
*A Vertex Snap tool is added into the StreamLine Engine tools to allow snapping a vertex into a snapping position together with other selected vertices being transformed the same time.
*Snapping can be enabled/disabled in two ways: 1. Through menu "Edit > Snapping Enabled" 2. Right click the snapping option buttons.
*Many modify operations are realtime symmetry capable. extrude/bevel/chamfer/bridge/cut/weld/remove/etc.
This build is focused into streamlining action<->tool workflow. I hope in the next version we could see subdivision toggling.
Firstly thanks for making marquees deselect, thats great The viewport navigation also seems much more natural. Everything seems nice apart from a couple of things.
2.When an operation is started, its hotkey can be released if possible and the tool is still live. The purpose is to free finger pressure, the downside is the operation may need an extra LMB click to finish.
This is pretty annoying. Maybe a quick key tap would be better here. at the moment you have to hold down the key and drag to engage the extude opp.
A tap to engage the modal tool and a key hold/release to engage and drop the tool would be nicer.(see Silo/XSI)
The cut tool is starting its cut when you engage it and not when you do your first click, this is really hard to work with.
@Neox IMO your workflow can be done faster by just click the first edge, shift double click the 2nd point edge, and double click the 3rd point edge, and so on instead of firing another command.
if that is possible, sure thing
good thing about the tool in max is, that it uses pathfinding and finds its way it doesn't have to be on a loop to find the way, we had a tool for that in a production i worked on years before which used a better pathfinding algorythm, it even found a way to the closest possible point, when you click on a "target" thats not connected with your source.
its the same point as in unwrapping? selecting edges fast and easy, how would you select sucht a combination inside max? you would possible select one start/end loop and from there on you would have to select the other edges by hand, the example might not be perfect, as its perfectly quadbased - what if you want to select a loop that goes over a pole into other loops and you want to select them all but not everyone from the beginning to the end, so you'd either have to select them all from the start to end and deselect what you don't want or you'd select one loop and from there on select every edge you want to chamfer for example by hand
Does that mean you wish for something like that and it´s not in max already? Because i have such functionality in max for unwrapping but not for the modelling part itself and i would love to just click from one point to another so select the connecting edge itself.
At the moment I try to get the same with Steploop and manual edge selection which needs quite some time depending on the model and topology.
i had that feature in max once but it was a plugin and never ported for newer versions, of course i would start using it again if i had the possibility to
I wish I was better at maxscript, the math behind that stuff is not that difficult, if i know how the vertexes/edges are stored in max(are the connections stored somewhere or does max handle this itself?).
Does anyone know some good resources about learning maxscript?
Already doing so atm(thx nevertheless, the maxscript manual is very good) and searching for functions i could need, currently prototyping things on paper(pathfinding algorithms with slight changes to work for this kind of thing) and trying out some things for fancy things which only add to visual quality and better usability(this will be added when i have something working).
Summary of changes
*StreamLine Egine tool closing style reverted.
*The Cut tool won't start cutting until the first click made.
*Subdivision stack implemented. Once a mesh is in subdivision stack, only selection and transforming operations can be performed on it.
*Radial menu system built. (Marking menus/Pie menus) using RMB, it's still a mess rite now, next build should be able to customize.
*The bounding box color changed back to yellow.
*Subdivision hot keys changed. `+1/2/3/4/5 = sub0/1/2/3/4
*Command break hotkey changed to "Esc"
*Some bugs are fixed along the way.
Please throw some suggestions or requests if you like, and bugs if you found any.
It's becoming quite interesting, i will be watching this with attention...
One crit though: if you go for the silo useability (i saw sticky keys which are really nice), the "selection radius" is low, a bit like 3ds max, it would help tremendously if it were more tolerant. It's very important i think, it's what still bugs me after using 3ds max for a few months, coming from silo (mainly)
Radial menu is already nice i would add a bit more space between the items as it's easy to select something by error.
-V+lmb: tweak mode of vertices would be cool as a toggle (extremely useful function). And i think, only my opinion, it would be cool to have an option for it to be global (affect vertices, edges and polys), or suboject dependant, cause right now you have to be really precise to select what you really want (and that defeat the point of a tweak tool i think).
-v+mmb should be used in slide tool
-connect/cut serve almost the same function i don't see why not merge them.
-We need a collapse too, same way, collapse multi selected edge/verts with selection already made, and with visual tools.
-weld vertex: it would be more logical if it would weld when you let go the S key, not clicking.
-normal move would be a usefull addition.
-Hotkeys: It would be helpful if hotkey could assigned to only one item, right now you have to find the other occurence of the hotkey you're trying to assign to deactivate it. A message stating it's already used asking if you want to overwrite would be perfect.
-subdivisions: I think it would be more logical to have only two hotkeys: increase and decrease subdiv, less hotkeys taken and more functionality.
-we need a smooth/average/relax (whatever you call it)tool
BTW, I don't understand your choice to deactivate export and all at such an early dev cycle. It will only make the testers less interested in giving you feedback... since they can't use your software only "test" it.
But please, don't stop, I'm surprised how well it works so far and see great potential if you listen to your users like you did so far, and then I would probably be one of your customers
@Beat I have yet to explain to Kun the programmer about soft selection workflow and hopefully we can see it soon. It's already there, just need to be optimized
Yes, the radial menu is the first implementation and we're still improving it, for example the ability to go back to previous 'level' and customization of course.
I agree, connect/cut will be fixed/merged.
Can you explain or elaborate 'collapsing with visual tools', I don't really get your idea.
Is normal move and local move in modo the same operation?
subdivisions:
Here's my suggestion over the old `+1,2 method
` = toggle subdiv on/off
`+1= set object to subdiv 1
`+2= set object to subdiv 2
`+3= set object to subdiv 3
What do you think?
smooth/average/relax, I'll ask him
Please understand that VoidWorld was used to be a modeling and animation package, therefore some of the menus are still there and confusing... I've suggested Kun that we could focus on the modeling suite first, because there is a potential. Silo is a good modeling software, but abandoned and lots of bugs, blender is free but hard to use(IMO), wings is free but there is no manipulator?, modo is another cool modeling and rendering software, but its modeling workflow are still unfamiliar to some users already familiar with max or maya.
We need more users like you to give feedback. VW is developed by one guy while I'm just a tester and giving suggestions, so please understand if updates comes slow :P
The save function is always enabled, but you need to create some folders to hold the object to be saved. Here is the steps of how to do it.
1.In the starting radial menu, select "Add Object" menu to bring up the "Object management Form".
2.Choose "File > New studio folder" to create a new studio folder.
3.Right click the created studio folder to bring up a context menu and choose "New project folder" to create a project folder.
4.In the same way to create a group folder under the new project folder. This is the folder where you can save models into.
5.Create a model.
6.In the starting radial menu, select "Save Object" menu to bring up the "Save Object" Dialog. Highlight the destination group folder and click the "Save" button.
To export object.
1.In the starting radial menu, select "Add Object" menu to bring up the "Object management Form".
2.Navigate to the object you want to export and right click it to bring up a context menu. You should know how to do it from here.
3.The exporting is limited if the software is not registered. To registered the software, In the main app form, choose "Help > Register Product" to bring up the "Product Online Registration" dialog. Paste this code SSTUAPFADFDADNDNRFAQYFSSOYRTTQMNIFI into the key field and click OK button. The programe should fully function afer the registration completed. This registration code is also available in my websites since it is currently a free ware.
Well it's still complicated at the moment but I'll ask him to simplify it.
In this version, most tools can work on subdivision objects. I also have added preview feature for some tradition tools extrude/bevel/chamfer/hinge. They could be useful for hard surface modeling, as it is suggested in the forum.
@Beat I have yet to explain to Kun the programmer about soft selection workflow and hopefully we can see it soon. It's already there, just need to be optimized
Yes, the radial menu is the first implementation and we're still improving it, for example the ability to go back to previous 'level' and customization of course.
I agree, connect/cut will be fixed/merged.
Can you explain or elaborate 'collapsing with visual tools', I don't really get your idea.
Is normal move and local move in modo the same operation?
subdivisions:
Here's my suggestion over the old `+1,2 method
` = toggle subdiv on/off
`+1= set object to subdiv 1
`+2= set object to subdiv 2
`+3= set object to subdiv 3
What do you think?
smooth/average/relax, I'll ask him
Please understand that VoidWorld was used to be a modeling and animation package, therefore some of the menus are still there and confusing... I've suggested Kun that we could focus on the modeling suite first, because there is a potential. Silo is a good modeling software, but abandoned and lots of bugs, blender is free but hard to use(IMO), wings is free but there is no manipulator?, modo is another cool modeling and rendering software, but its modeling workflow are still unfamiliar to some users already familiar with max or maya.
We need more users like you to give feedback. VW is developed by one guy while I'm just a tester and giving suggestions, so please understand if updates comes slow :P
Thank you Beat. I'll pass this to him
ps. I love your silo crash video
When I'm talking about selection radius, i'm not talking about soft selection. In silo if you click slightly around the vertex (example), you have a hotzone, where you can still grab it being off (its adjustable in settings). In 3ds, you have to be exactly on the point or nothing happen. I've yet to find a software where selection is as tolerant as silo, imho it's one of the things that make it so easy to use, it's error tolerant (hum, not in stability like you saw in my vid).
For collapsing, it's for letting those who like visual tools, i'm not fond of them, i like to select things and apply a tool without futher interaction. But i agree, i don't know what kind of visual tool you could create for that, stupid idea
Normal move/local move, I don't use modo, but I think it ca be similar.
For subdiv, it's not a great deal for me, but I kinda like to be able to go down and up in subdiv (even off is sudiv<1) with two keys but that's a silo habit.
For the end: I agree 100% with you.
New update: I was wondering if it was because it was difficult or a choice to not be able to work in subdiv, but I see I were underestimating your programmer, nice evolution
Btw it's a detail, but I really appreciate that bridge work between two edges that share one vertex.
Thanks so much guys, very appreciate your directings.
Hi BeatKitano, there is a hole cap tool in the tranditional tool group under edge mode. You should see its tool button on right hand side of the window.
I will make the selection radius customizable, currently it is 4.
I shall also make the tap key available for cusominzing.
Wouldnt it make more sense for the selection radius to have a falloff, so in screen space the center is 0x0 and if multiple components are within the radius when the user clicks it gets the one closest to the 0x0 mark? Traditionally I think selection radius is more like a solid block which means that in some apps slicking while zoomed out or in dense areas single clicks can result in multiple selections, or if the selection box is too small to compensate it'll just not select anything unless the user is perfectly over a component. This is actually real problem in Maya. Example:
Turning to voidworld, I think the more traditional your hotkey setup the beter for user uptake. Right now (seeing as the user documentation is outdated and incomplete) finding a lot of shotcuts is trial and error, and not really where would expect them to be.
For example, this is how I expect the shortcuts to be coming in as a new user (ie the first hotkeys I try automatically):
ring = alt+r
loop = alt+l
focus = f (or) z (currently F6)
Speaking of the 'focus' command, it's currently split into two buttons when it really should just be one. If one object is selected focus on that, if 2 or more then focus on all of them based on their bound box average.
Smoothing is sort of buggy right now, with the `+1 combo often either putting the mesh into wireframe only mode or making it disappear. Also The ` button alone should probably be a toggle for subdivision, with `+1 and `+2 being used for levels.
I noticed that its using smoothing groups also, which is a useful function for it to have, but hard/soft edges are almost universally regarded as the superior approach.
Now for the viewport performance issues have mentioned before (not the initial 'lag' before zoom/rotate/pan, but the general camera movement), I think voidworld needs frame interpolation to give it a more smooth experience when moving about the scene. Its like the user camera is rotating in 1 degree increments atm. Have tried to explain this before but still dont think its gtting across, so maybe this'll help:
Now as for the UI, it needs to be optimized alot. Icons for things that be consolidated litter the UI from top to bottom. For instance, every viewport has buttons in them for scene wide toggling of grid, wire, solid, and shaded w/wire. And then on the left menu are buttons to toggle per-object solid, transparent, solid grey (useful for...?), and wireframe. Wouldnt it make more sense to add transparency to the viewport buttons and then determin if its scene-wide or object-only based on selection? And how about only having the selected object with wires (currently impossible afaik).
I actually did a mockup for a new UI, but then photoshop crashed
Polyhertz: Thanks for the UI mockup effort.
For the viewport performance, the programe performs the navigation according to the cursor movement reported by the operating system so if the operating system reports it in a slow pace, that could cause the result you encountered. But i think that's unlikely the case. Can you check "View > Show Frames/Second" and vavigate the scene with no object in it and let me know what fps it is. It should be arround 60 or somthing because i have capped it.
I haven't come across any bug with the desubdivision command `+1 so far. If you can reproduce it, please let me know so I can follow the steps to track it down.
Polyhertz: From the fps you got, there must be something not working well some where. I made a special version for debugging purporse http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld-Aug-26.rar
Please do these steps
1. Check menu Debug > Empty Run. The programe will only paint a blue background. Record the fps from the topleft.
2. Check menu Debug > Dummy Run. The programe will not do any rendering at all. Record the fps.
Please let me know the fps results.
One more thing: It is possible to show only selected objects in wire. Uncheck menu View > Show Edges On Unselected.
Replies
A user can select an option in 2 ways
1: hold the hotkey and press a button
2: hold the hotkey and drag the mouse in the direction of the button they want to activate and release the hot key.(with a small dead zone in the middle so you can release the key without doing anything).
So say in maya right clicking(and holding) on a mesh opens a 'components' menu: Vertex on the right. Edge is at the top and face is on the bottom. if you click them the component level changes. if you drag the mouse in their direction and release they also activate.
You can only store something like 6 or 8 commands in the radial or it would be too cluttered so maya has sub radial menus that open if you hover over a button and also just a regular list of buttons below the radial.
We've fixed some bugs, although there are still more to come
The viewport navigation has also followed the standard alt+lmb,mmb,rmb
Some of the buttons are removed (regarding rigging and animation), focusing on modeling first.
Enhance the streamline engine. More customizable keys.
Here's the screenshot
And the files in rar here. http://dl.dropbox.com/u/78650/VoidWorld.rar
*Just unrar and run it, no installation required.
There are few things that I requested:
- Turbosmooth/subdivision toggle
currently it's not possible to go back and forth, the only workaround is to undo.
- Realtime symmetry
- UI rehaul, allow more customization like drag and drop repositioning.
Please throw some of your suggestions and thoughts.
Thank you
I just downloaded it and played around a little bit, and its actually quite easy for me to get started, took me like 10 -20 seconds to figure out how to navigate, select edges, faces, verts, modify stuff and just the basics.
Here is a re-design Interface article that a german did for Maya as a personal project:
http://www.pixtur.org/project/show/37
there can be learned a lot about it especially for someone who is not that strong in the visual area or who does not know all the small details in Maya or a similar big package.
Some blender notes when they did their redesign (same spot you are in now):
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Source/UI/Icon_Redesign
http://www.foro3d.com/f161/the-evolution-of-blenders-user-interface-68078.html
http://www.blender.org/development/release-logs/blender-250/updated-gui/
The other good examples that almost everyone here agrees on are Silo and Modo
http://www.nevercenter.com/silo/
http://www.luxology.com/modo/
Will give some extended feedback later
Yes we're awared of UI rehaul but we want to get the workflow and basic tool done first.
I've seen pixtur UI proposal but IMO some part I found tedious and complicated for new users, although seasoned artists can benefit from it. What I'm proposing to Istonia is a modeling software that's easy to learn and get used to.
Urm btw, There is new build today, here's the changelog:
http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld.rar
Summary of changes
*The move and rotate manipulators have more functions.
*Some SreamLine tools have been improved.
For example, extrusion, user presses and hold the hot key then move the mouse to create extrusion without pressing any mouse button.
This behaviour is copied from Silo. People may like it. I think people may feel less stressfull if they don't have to press down something on both hands at the same time.
The down thing is changes to the model could be made without noticed.
*Selection at point can now be made by LMB click.
*Ctrl:ExcludeSelection, Shift:ToggleSelection, Ctrl+Shift:IncludeSelection. Maya style, but can be customized too.
*Q selection mode is added. When it is on, hot key can be used to change region selection style.
*1 2 3 4 5 mapped to vertex/edge/polygon/mesh/object, hit second time will toggle back to where the mode was before.
*Menu bar changed.
*New tool button are added into each viewport.
Notes: .netframework 1.1 does not have the interface to detect how many cores in the local computer, so I use "set number of processors" function to let user do it manually. Only relax operations in UV mapping and map baking operations can benifit from this.
Thanks!
New viewport navigation and no installation (useful for testing) are both great addition.
One thing that bothers me a ton about this package is that the viewport navigation 'snaps', like it doesn't recognize you want to rotate the camera till you've already gone 5° or more, and after that it rotates in something like 1° increments (I'm not sure how to describe this better). This is true for panning and zooming as well. Is their any plans to fix this?
You mentioned in the changes that lmb could be used for selection now, but seems to still be mmb here...
I hit a glitch when using undo which has made it now so I cant see any wires/verts in the viewport, and I cant get it to show them anymore even after deleting and re-extracting the program. I deleted everything referring to voidworld I found in the registry (most of which was remnants from the install) but that didn't solve it. So I'm not sure where its holding this type of configuration info...Either way cant test anymore because of this.
lmb is marquee selection (ignore backfacing checked in max or camera based selection On in maya), mmb for raycast selection/paint select (you have to highlight the component first), otherwise it performs marquee select (ignore backfacing unchecked or camera based selection off)
I haven't been able to reproduce your undo glitch, mine is working good so far.
The download link for the latest version doesn't work though
SOrry was fixing very minor bug, please try again on the above link, or you can download it here
http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld.rar
For the viewport issue, its not consistent, sometimes it'll pick up what I'm doing right away, and then other times it'll take a moment to realize that I'm trying to navigate the scene before snapping to correct location. So its a sort of input lag.
Something else, for backfaces It'd probably make more sense to have it as a 50% darker shade then jet black. Also what does the hide/show texture button do? afaik theirs no materials or texture capabilities in the app (not even sure if you can change the objects default color)?
The app does have material and texture abilities. For material tool, the default hot key is M, and U for uv mapping tool, or hit the tool buttons under polygon mode control panel.
Some things on selection: When using marquee I've noticed that the selection isnt actually made untill the user moves their cursor after releasing the lmb, so just releasing it doesnt make the selection, or at least the viewport doesnt update until then. And are their hotkeys for ring/loop?
im missing not having a connect tool. If it could be merged with cut like silo does it that would be awesome. if your not aware of how cut in silo behaves it has 2 modes.
1:if there is a selection it connects them with an edge. This works for Edges faces and verts. Its very very usefull.
2: if there is no selection the cut tool starts. if you strart a cut on geometry it works like VW's cut tool. if you start the cut in open space you can drag a line across the mesh and it will work like the slice plane in max but aligned to the view.
The selection is great. But it would be nice to be able to drop the current selection by clicking in open space. that speeds things up alot.
Is there some way of setting the viewports pivot point? in max/silo you automatically rotate around the pivot of your current selection in object mode and around the selected sub object in sub object mode. its much easier to navigate this way
The Silo style Extrude is nice but its missing 1 thing. Silos tool works on the selection hi-lite if there is no selection. If this could be added to the tools in general it would be awesome.
Tools like bridge could be a little more intelligent. If you look at bridge in max/silo it does what VW does if there is no selection. if you have faces selected or edges then they get bridged rather than starting a picking session. the only time i usually want a picking session in any tool is if i dont have anything selected.
I haven't realize the second window is a problem. I'll give it a try to see if i can improve it. Thanks for pointing that out.
I would see if i can create realtime selection.
To select a loop, the simplest way is to LMB/MMB double click the same edge.
For more control on loop/ring selection, you can use the StreamLine Engine tools, edge_loop: G key, edge_ring: H key, polygon_ring: G key. You should be able to pickup these tool from the Smarttips that drops down automatically when you idle the mouse in the active viewport for a second or two. If you can't see the SmartTips, activate it through menu Edit > SmartTips Options > 0.5 seconds. When a StreamLine Engine tool is activated, you should see the Instant Help tooltips that drop down from top screen. If you can't see it, go and check menu Edit > Show Instant Help. All these should be available by default, but since you remove the registry manually, that could cause trouble. As i have noticed, that for new window version, even if you have remove the registry infos, window still have a copy of that hidden some where and when a programe ask for a registry value, window will get it from that hidden place. It is funny enough.
@r_fletch_r Indeed, Silo and modo are our inspiration and reference
The selection is great. But it would be nice to be able to drop the current selection by clicking in open space. that speeds things up alot.I thought u could do that by simply lmb open space?
Thank you for your suggestion
To change the view pivot point, Ctrl+Alt+Shit+RMB at a point on the object. You can also pickup this tool's instruction in the SmartTips in view tool group.
For path you'd get two selected components and select the shortest distance between them. If you store the last selected component you could also have it so multiple path selections can be made one after another. For gap/dot, I'm sure you know all about this with Modo being a reference point, else here's an example from max.
A path gap loop/ring would be great too, but I've never seen it done. This should be doable without going overboard on hotkeys too.
lStonia: awesome. I should have spotted that myself, thanks
i think something was lost in translation
- Selection seems a bit wonky for me, sometimes it requires two clicks to select / deselect something.
- A way to cancel placing a new primitive? Escape perhaps? This could also apply to canceling the use of a tool such as the cut tool.
- Similar to the above, a way to finish using a tool? Enter perhaps? This would be good for the chamfer / extrude / cut tools for example. I find it quite annoying having to click on the tool button again to finish it off!
- A way to take a step back with the cut tool? Backspace perhaps? I'm pretty sure maya has this. It's a really useful feature.
- Ignore backfacing toggle? Having this enabled basically doesn't allow you to select anything "hidden" from view when selecting with the selection marquee. Exactly how you have it now, actually. But a way to turn that off would be nice. If you've used max you'll be familiar with this.
- Adjusting the values in the spinner boxes for the extrude / chamfer / bevel tools doesn't give a preview of what it'll look like before applying, is it possible to change this? I know that you can preview by clicking and dragging your selection, but this would be a cool addition!
- Right-clicking a tool brings up its option box if it has one? For example, right-clicking the "Loop Insert" tool would bring up the option box rather than left-clicking as it is now? Left-clicking would simply insert one loop or however many are defined in the option box.
- Being able to snap by a vert (or group of) to another vert / edge / mid-point / grid point (Whatever snapping options are toggled). Image required! Maybe a toggle to enable / disable snapping? Hopefully you're able to decipher what I mean!
That's all I have for now, I hope you find them useful!Keep it up!
No I think he's just an ahole
There is a Selection Mode tool, its hot key is Q, its tool buttons is at the upper-right corner of the window with an cursor arrow image. This tool can be used to cancel tools being used. It can also be used to change region selection style marquee/circle/etc.
If use lmb marquee do selection, the backfacing components won't be affected. But if use rmb, the components will be affected.
also i'd like to add a point to point select, very handy for selecting loop
also for the which point to rotate around, i'm pretty used to and like the way zbrush and 3dcoat can handle this, just take the last clicked point to orbit around, really a nice option i would like to have in max as well
Anyway guys here's the latest build with changes log as follows:
Summary of changes
*Two concepts are applied to each StreamLine Engine tool whenever is possible..
1.When the tool is activated or an operation is started, the programe will attempt to use the existing selection, the highlighted component and cursor poisition. The purpose is to reduce mouse button click selection/activation.
2.When an operation is started, its hotkey can be released if possible and the tool is still live. The purpose is to free finger pressure, the downside is the operation may need an extra LMB click to finish.
*Selection cut tool and slice tool are merged into StreamLine Engine cut tool. Object can be sliced with split or no split.
*Viewport rotation navigation pivot uses selection center if any. If it is out of screen, the screen center will be used instead.
*Empty marquee selection will clear the existing selection.
*Tow bugs in edge selection fixed.
*Edge gap loop/ring selection now available in StreamLine Engine tools. Edge path selection tool has been added with gap capability, but it is put in the traditional tool group.
*Realtime selection implemented. It can be disabled through menu "Edit > Realtime Selection Enabled" incase performance is too low.
*Step backwards/forwards in cut tool (not the one in StreamLine Engine) can be performed by using undo/redo.
*A Vertex Snap tool is added into the StreamLine Engine tools to allow snapping a vertex into a snapping position together with other selected vertices being transformed the same time.
*Snapping can be enabled/disabled in two ways: 1. Through menu "Edit > Snapping Enabled" 2. Right click the snapping option buttons.
*Many modify operations are realtime symmetry capable. extrude/bevel/chamfer/bridge/cut/weld/remove/etc.
This build is focused into streamlining action<->tool workflow. I hope in the next version we could see subdivision toggling.
Download link: http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld-Aug-05.rar
This is pretty annoying. Maybe a quick key tap would be better here. at the moment you have to hold down the key and drag to engage the extude opp.
A tap to engage the modal tool and a key hold/release to engage and drop the tool would be nicer.(see Silo/XSI)
The cut tool is starting its cut when you engage it and not when you do your first click, this is really hard to work with.
Has anyone got snapping working?
if that is possible, sure thing
good thing about the tool in max is, that it uses pathfinding and finds its way it doesn't have to be on a loop to find the way, we had a tool for that in a production i worked on years before which used a better pathfinding algorythm, it even found a way to the closest possible point, when you click on a "target" thats not connected with your source.
At the moment I try to get the same with Steploop and manual edge selection which needs quite some time depending on the model and topology.
Does anyone know some good resources about learning maxscript?
Aside from that go look at the manual. its very very good
Perhaps this is what you requested.
[ame]
Summary of changes
*StreamLine Egine tool closing style reverted.
*The Cut tool won't start cutting until the first click made.
*Subdivision stack implemented. Once a mesh is in subdivision stack, only selection and transforming operations can be performed on it.
*Radial menu system built. (Marking menus/Pie menus) using RMB, it's still a mess rite now, next build should be able to customize.
*The bounding box color changed back to yellow.
*Subdivision hot keys changed. `+1/2/3/4/5 = sub0/1/2/3/4
*Command break hotkey changed to "Esc"
*Some bugs are fixed along the way.
Please throw some suggestions or requests if you like, and bugs if you found any.
Thank you
One crit though: if you go for the silo useability (i saw sticky keys which are really nice), the "selection radius" is low, a bit like 3ds max, it would help tremendously if it were more tolerant. It's very important i think, it's what still bugs me after using 3ds max for a few months, coming from silo (mainly)
Radial menu is already nice i would add a bit more space between the items as it's easy to select something by error.
-V+lmb: tweak mode of vertices would be cool as a toggle (extremely useful function). And i think, only my opinion, it would be cool to have an option for it to be global (affect vertices, edges and polys), or suboject dependant, cause right now you have to be really precise to select what you really want (and that defeat the point of a tweak tool i think).
-v+mmb should be used in slide tool
-connect/cut serve almost the same function i don't see why not merge them.
-We need a collapse too, same way, collapse multi selected edge/verts with selection already made, and with visual tools.
-weld vertex: it would be more logical if it would weld when you let go the S key, not clicking.
-normal move would be a usefull addition.
-Hotkeys: It would be helpful if hotkey could assigned to only one item, right now you have to find the other occurence of the hotkey you're trying to assign to deactivate it. A message stating it's already used asking if you want to overwrite would be perfect.
-subdivisions: I think it would be more logical to have only two hotkeys: increase and decrease subdiv, less hotkeys taken and more functionality.
-we need a smooth/average/relax (whatever you call it)tool
BTW, I don't understand your choice to deactivate export and all at such an early dev cycle. It will only make the testers less interested in giving you feedback... since they can't use your software only "test" it.
But please, don't stop, I'm surprised how well it works so far and see great potential if you listen to your users like you did so far, and then I would probably be one of your customers
Yes, the radial menu is the first implementation and we're still improving it, for example the ability to go back to previous 'level' and customization of course.
I agree, connect/cut will be fixed/merged.
Can you explain or elaborate 'collapsing with visual tools', I don't really get your idea.
Is normal move and local move in modo the same operation?
subdivisions:
Here's my suggestion over the old `+1,2 method
` = toggle subdiv on/off
`+1= set object to subdiv 1
`+2= set object to subdiv 2
`+3= set object to subdiv 3
What do you think?
smooth/average/relax, I'll ask him
Please understand that VoidWorld was used to be a modeling and animation package, therefore some of the menus are still there and confusing... I've suggested Kun that we could focus on the modeling suite first, because there is a potential. Silo is a good modeling software, but abandoned and lots of bugs, blender is free but hard to use(IMO), wings is free but there is no manipulator?, modo is another cool modeling and rendering software, but its modeling workflow are still unfamiliar to some users already familiar with max or maya.
We need more users like you to give feedback. VW is developed by one guy while I'm just a tester and giving suggestions, so please understand if updates comes slow :P
Thank you Beat. I'll pass this to him
ps. I love your silo crash video
1.In the starting radial menu, select "Add Object" menu to bring up the "Object management Form".
2.Choose "File > New studio folder" to create a new studio folder.
3.Right click the created studio folder to bring up a context menu and choose "New project folder" to create a project folder.
4.In the same way to create a group folder under the new project folder. This is the folder where you can save models into.
5.Create a model.
6.In the starting radial menu, select "Save Object" menu to bring up the "Save Object" Dialog. Highlight the destination group folder and click the "Save" button.
To export object.
1.In the starting radial menu, select "Add Object" menu to bring up the "Object management Form".
2.Navigate to the object you want to export and right click it to bring up a context menu. You should know how to do it from here.
3.The exporting is limited if the software is not registered. To registered the software, In the main app form, choose "Help > Register Product" to bring up the "Product Online Registration" dialog. Paste this code SSTUAPFADFDADNDNRFAQYFSSOYRTTQMNIFI into the key field and click OK button. The programe should fully function afer the registration completed. This registration code is also available in my websites since it is currently a free ware.
Well it's still complicated at the moment but I'll ask him to simplify it.
http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld-Aug-24.rar
In this version, most tools can work on subdivision objects. I also have added preview feature for some tradition tools extrude/bevel/chamfer/hinge. They could be useful for hard surface modeling, as it is suggested in the forum.
Next, I'll try the radial menu customizing.
When I'm talking about selection radius, i'm not talking about soft selection. In silo if you click slightly around the vertex (example), you have a hotzone, where you can still grab it being off (its adjustable in settings). In 3ds, you have to be exactly on the point or nothing happen. I've yet to find a software where selection is as tolerant as silo, imho it's one of the things that make it so easy to use, it's error tolerant (hum, not in stability like you saw in my vid).
For collapsing, it's for letting those who like visual tools, i'm not fond of them, i like to select things and apply a tool without futher interaction. But i agree, i don't know what kind of visual tool you could create for that, stupid idea
Normal move/local move, I don't use modo, but I think it ca be similar.
For subdiv, it's not a great deal for me, but I kinda like to be able to go down and up in subdiv (even off is sudiv<1) with two keys but that's a silo habit.
For the end: I agree 100% with you.
New update: I was wondering if it was because it was difficult or a choice to not be able to work in subdiv, but I see I were underestimating your programmer, nice evolution
Btw it's a detail, but I really appreciate that bridge work between two edges that share one vertex.
Some other suggestions:
-we need a fill hole/cap tool
I did change from modo to 3ds max, and one thing i liked alot in modo was to use the TAB key to toggle on and off subd.
Hi BeatKitano, there is a hole cap tool in the tranditional tool group under edge mode. You should see its tool button on right hand side of the window.
I will make the selection radius customizable, currently it is 4.
I shall also make the tap key available for cusominzing.
Thanks for taking our suggestion into account, this is going to be a very nifty app, I can smell it
Turning to voidworld, I think the more traditional your hotkey setup the beter for user uptake. Right now (seeing as the user documentation is outdated and incomplete) finding a lot of shotcuts is trial and error, and not really where would expect them to be.
For example, this is how I expect the shortcuts to be coming in as a new user (ie the first hotkeys I try automatically):
ring = alt+r
loop = alt+l
focus = f (or) z (currently F6)
Speaking of the 'focus' command, it's currently split into two buttons when it really should just be one. If one object is selected focus on that, if 2 or more then focus on all of them based on their bound box average.
Smoothing is sort of buggy right now, with the `+1 combo often either putting the mesh into wireframe only mode or making it disappear. Also The ` button alone should probably be a toggle for subdivision, with `+1 and `+2 being used for levels.
I noticed that its using smoothing groups also, which is a useful function for it to have, but hard/soft edges are almost universally regarded as the superior approach.
Now for the viewport performance issues have mentioned before (not the initial 'lag' before zoom/rotate/pan, but the general camera movement), I think voidworld needs frame interpolation to give it a more smooth experience when moving about the scene. Its like the user camera is rotating in 1 degree increments atm. Have tried to explain this before but still dont think its gtting across, so maybe this'll help:
Now as for the UI, it needs to be optimized alot. Icons for things that be consolidated litter the UI from top to bottom. For instance, every viewport has buttons in them for scene wide toggling of grid, wire, solid, and shaded w/wire. And then on the left menu are buttons to toggle per-object solid, transparent, solid grey (useful for...?), and wireframe. Wouldnt it make more sense to add transparency to the viewport buttons and then determin if its scene-wide or object-only based on selection? And how about only having the selected object with wires (currently impossible afaik).
I actually did a mockup for a new UI, but then photoshop crashed
For the viewport performance, the programe performs the navigation according to the cursor movement reported by the operating system so if the operating system reports it in a slow pace, that could cause the result you encountered. But i think that's unlikely the case. Can you check "View > Show Frames/Second" and vavigate the scene with no object in it and let me know what fps it is. It should be arround 60 or somthing because i have capped it.
I haven't come across any bug with the desubdivision command `+1 so far. If you can reproduce it, please let me know so I can follow the steps to track it down.
I'll try to record some videos later of the glitches I've been encountering.
http://www.digitalfossils.com/Download/VoidWorld-Aug-26.rar
Please do these steps
1. Check menu Debug > Empty Run. The programe will only paint a blue background. Record the fps from the topleft.
2. Check menu Debug > Dummy Run. The programe will not do any rendering at all. Record the fps.
Please let me know the fps results.
One more thing: It is possible to show only selected objects in wire. Uncheck menu View > Show Edges On Unselected.