Orbit pivot point is still weird when using 3D Space Explorer

[kb9ydn]

This is a spinoff thread from my other thread about the orbit pivot point behavior when using a mouse/trackball.

Now I'm using a 3D mouse (3DConnexion Space Explorer) but the problem is still the same.  The orbit pivot point is not well behaved when you zoom in close to a large model, or you don't have the model centered on the screen.  When the entire model is visible the pivot point is located on the model roughly at the center of the screen.  This is OK, but when you try to zoom in close to a particular part of a model, like somewhere towards the edges, the pivot point stays where it was relative to the model before you zoomed in.  So now when you try to orbit, the detail that you want to look at flies off the screen.

Also, when the entire model is visible and you don't have the model centered on the screen, the pivot point is still located roughly at the center of the screen.  So when you try to orbit the model it moves in an arc, which feels very odd and is unpredictable.  It would be much more intuitive if the model would orbit around its approximate center of volume instead of some random point outside of it.

Here's a screencast of me trying to orbit a model under various conditions.

http://autode.sk/1NycxzO

And here's the model if anyone wants to play with it.

http://a360.co/1ShyppB

I was really hoping the 3D mouse would eliminate this strange orbit behavior, but instead it has only made it more obvious.  For reference, here is a screencast of me orbiting the same model in Solidworks.  You can see how when I zoom in on a particular ball, I can easily orbit around that ball without it going off the screen.  It automatically knows that I want to pivot around the object in view.  And if the model is entirely visible but not centered on the screen, the center of volume is used as the pivot point instead of the center of the screen.  This is far more intuitive than what Fusion currently does.

http://autode.sk/1ShzHk9

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[Phil.E]

I think what you are seeing is not related to the orbit behavior of Fusion. That is the orbit behavior of 3d Connexion which is highly customizable and could probably be tuned in your case to provide better results whilst orbiting around objects like that.

I've never known any other experience with 3d Connexion than what you show. Do you have an example of the same model in SW with a better result? That would help show the difference you see.

Here is a more realistic video showing 3d Connexion navigation around a mechanical assembly. Notice that I have no trouble getting to, and orbiting around things  about 0.125" across. At the end there is a great orbit around one of the rubber feet. It's all about control of the device and tuning it to your desire. I never change the default settings, just adapt. One more note, for years I used these things with Inventor and the Fusion experience is exactly what I expect based on that.

[kb9ydn]

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@Phil.E wrote:

I think what you are seeing is not related to the orbit behavior of Fusion. That is the orbit behavior of 3d Connexion which is highly customizable and could probably be tuned in your case to provide better results whilst orbiting around objects like that.

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I was really hoping there was some way to tune this in the 3dConnexion panel, but I have yet to find it.  I also see the exact same behavior when using a mouse or trackball so it's definitely something with Fusion.

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@Phil.E wrote:

I've never known any other experience with 3d Connexion than what you show. Do you have an example of the same model in SW with a better result? That would help show the difference you see.

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Yes, check out the last link in my first post.  Specifically pay attention to the little blue dot that shows in the middle of the screen whenever there is movement.  That dot is indicating the pivot point location and it resets itself every time there is a break in movement input.  This constant pivot resetting makes zoomed in navigation much easier and smoother.

I'm not sure if the video is going to convey very well what I'm talking about (I hope it does).  I think you really need to experience it yourself to truly get it.

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@Phil.E wrote:

Here is a more realistic video showing 3d Connexion navigation around a mechanical assembly. Notice that I have no trouble getting to, and orbiting around things  about 0.125" across. At the end there is a great orbit around one of the rubber feet. It's all about control of the device and tuning it to your desire. I never change the default settings, just adapt. One more note, for years I used these things with Inventor and the Fusion experience is exactly what I expect based on that.

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I can see in that video you have exactly the issue I'm getting.  When you zoom in close on something specific it's hard to keep it in view because the orbit pivot is relatively far away from what you're looking at.  You can sort of compensate by carefully panning and orbiting at the same time (like with that long slow orbit around the foot), but it's much more difficult to do than it needs to be.  This is also not possible to do with anything besides a 3D mouse because they don't allow you to pan and orbit at the same time.

I do understand your point about just adapting to the way things are, but when you've experienced something significantly better it's really hard to go back.  Things like different key bindings and reveresed zoom direction are slightly annoying but are fairly easy to get used to.  This orbit thing is not.

Since you have 3D mouse of your own, let me see if I can find another application besides SWX that has the behavior I'm looking for (that you could try out).  From some google searching I know this issue is fairly common with other modelling applications and it goes back quite a few years.

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[Phil.E]

My apologies, I missed the connexion on that last video link. I guess I've been missing out all these years. Thanks for showing me the difference.

And YES Fusion does exactly that now. NOTE: this is a development build and there is no set date for the release of this functionality.

[Anonymous]

How are you getting that "Set Orbit Center" option? I don't see that when I right-click an object.

The current orbit behavior is a real PITA with a regular mouse. I would prefer that Fusion just always orbits around the center of the screen or around the location of the cursor when the orbit was started. 

[Phil.E]

I edited the response.

This is a development build. We are talking about improving Fusion 360, but the improvements are not yet released to production. There is no set date for this, and much testing and bug fixing needs to be done before we put it out there.

This would be yet another example of how we listen to you and strive to implement your suggestions. 🙂 Thanks to the whole community for your feedback.

[kb9ydn]

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@Phil.E wrote:

My apologies, I missed the connexion on that last video link. I guess I've been missing out all these years. Thanks for showing me the difference.

And YES Fusion does exactly that now. NOTE: this is a development build and there is no set date for the release of this functionality.

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Ok, that's a step in the right direction and I definitely appreciate it.  But having to set the pivot point manually really misses out on the best part of the experience, which is that it's done automatically without you even thinking atbout it.  It just works.  I can imagine that the automatic part is maybe more difficult to implement than you would think.  Is automatic pivot point determination something that might be added in the future?

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[kb9ydn]

Ok, so if you want to experience what the automatic pivot point does you can try it out with the 3DConnexion viewer.  On Windows it's in the demos that were installed with the driver.

The viewer is a little different in that it's showing a perspective view but the ease of orbiting when zoomed in is far better than what Fusion does currently.

And from some google searching it appears that Inventor does not have this functionality either, which is surprising and unfortunate because it works so well.

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