3ds max 2017 viewport orbit point changes erratically

[o_blob]

I have 3ds max orbit mode set to just "orbit".

Sometimes the point of orbit suddenly changes and its causing my camera to move out of position when i try to change the angle. Its really hurting my workflow. I havent managed to figure out what causes this, it seems to happen randomly. Most often when im zoomed in very close, but it could be that the problem is just more noticable when it happens when zoomed in close.

[o_blob]

nobody else experiencing this?

ive been doing more research and apparently this problem has been around in one form or another since max 2015 (i used 2014 before 2017). I had a problem where the zoom scroll increment would skyrocket if i had my mouse over the background instead of on top of my model, but I fixed that with adaptivenavigation=0 in 3dsmax.ini, but still experiencing the orbit point changing randomly.

As far as i can tell, the orbit radius changes to the distance to the center point of the object you recently selected/deselected. So basically if you just have a 1mx1mx1m cube its not very noticeable, but if your object is long, and the object center point is far from the area of the object youre currently working on it becomes a big problem.

[o_blob]

http://3dsmaxfeedback.autodesk.com/forums/76763-small-feature-requests/suggestions/5830447--new-intu...

this thread seems to be of the same problem (although they also discuss different but related problems to the adaptive navigation thing) but there is no solution in this thread.

I have made a screencast to illustrate the problem. A description of what is happeing in the video can be found in the screencast description.

https://knowledge.autodesk.com/community/screencast/4f82d635-0ea0-437a-a768-c2ed75a74403

[StephenMF]

We are all experiencing this!

But I think you and I are the only ones that are complaining about this.

This is a major reason to why I am thinking about starting to learn maya. (or something else).

It is totally reproduceable and happens when you start to edit/move subobject ellements, like veretex and edges in edit poly mode. Very disruptive to any modeling workflow.

Below is a screenshot from Maya. (I don't know maya very well).

It shows that maya has a concept called "center of interest". Not sure what it is called in max, but the "normal orbit tool" is the same in max... except it has been broken in past releases, like you mentioned.

In maya it looks like you can sort of visuallize the center of interes too see what point you are orbiting around.

This is not the same as the new max 2017 "orbit point of interest" because in that tool you define a point to orbit when you click the viewport.

I susspect that this tool was introduced as a misunderstanding of the proplem you are highlighting.

makes sence?

Not sure if there is a bugreport that we can upvote or soemthing for this prblem.

Enjoy

Stephen

[o_blob]

Finally a reply, I was beginning to think I was the only one having problems with this issue.

And yeah this bug is small, but its extremely detrimental to efficient workflow and it keeps getting in the way CONSTANTLY. Its just the most infuriating thing ever and makes max completely unusable.

"except it has been broken in past releases, like you mentioned"

If its true that viewport navigation has been this broken for 3 whole releases (last version I used was 2014 which worked fine) then ive got absolutely no confidence Autodesk is going to hotfix this anytime soon, and our best bet is one of the service packs, but even those are unreliable seeing as 6 service packs for 2015 and 2016 have already failed to fix this.

Waiting a few months for a service pack isnt an option, I'd tear my head off with this bug. Guess that means im downgrading back to 2014 and working on learning MODO.

[emcguirePHZX3]

Hi o_blob, what is your graphic card?  We have the same bug here at our studio and I can't understand Autodesk is not jumping in.

[lightcube]

I'm not 100% confident that I'm clear on the issue. I watched the video and it looks to me that this is just the standard behavior of standard Orbit mode. I've not used that mode (on purpose) in years because it's not very useful to me. I've always stuck with Orbit Sub-Object. The new Orbit Point of Interest Works very well for navigating scenes. For editing sub-objects, it's best to stay in Orbit Sub-Object mode.

The current quirk with Orbit Point of Interest when working up-close on sub-objects is that if you pick a point that is not part of a model surface (Say, the viewport background) you are picking a point often far behind the object (often even below the current working grid). I added a feature requst to make that less likely to happen with some options http://3dsmaxfeedback.autodesk.com/forums/76763-small-feature-requests/suggestions/13716282-orbit-po...

However, you can generally avoid this with Orbit Point of Interest if you are careful to pick the surface of your object instead of clicking on an empty part of the viewport.

[o_blob]

I have a Nvidia GTX 780

[o_blob]

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[o_blob]

Orbit sub object doesnt work for me because the orbit point switches to the object's pivot point if I deselect my subobject selection, and the objects pivot point is almost never what I want my viewport to orbit around.

How the plain orbit mode is *supposed* to work is there is an invisible point in the middle of the viewport which acts as the focus point of the viewport. The focus point should only move when panning, as it should stay in the middle of the viewport. Its distance from the viewport camera can be changed by zooming (which moves the camera closer or further from the focus point, but does not move the focus point). The beauty of this is that the focus point doesnt do its own things. It operates by a very simple set of rules, going to where you tell it to go, and then it stays there until you move it again.

The new Point-of-Interest orbit differs from this in how it gets defined every time you click to orbit so you have to be very deliberate with your clicking or the camera will do something you dont want it to. It will also always be defined on the surface of an object, which isnt always what you want.

So thats how its supposed to work, but as previously stated, its broken.

Marmoset Webviewer and Sketchfab are both software where orbit works like this, if you want a 3rd party example. (and actually that orbit works even better than max 2014's where the feature wasnt even broken yet, but there was still some problems when zooming in extremely close to the focus point the focus point would move away from the camera as there seemed to be some sort of minimum orbit radius)

[bob.bernstein]

FWIW, its happening to me.  Orbit is a constant tool for me, and worked for the most part until this version.  Seems extra flaky in 2017.

Autodesk, please fix for sd1

[aon.914858227]

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@o_blob wrote:

Orbit sub object doesnt work for me because the orbit point switches to the object's pivot point if I deselect my subobject selection, and the objects pivot point is almost never what I want my viewport to orbit around.

How the plain orbit mode is *supposed* to work is there is an invisible point in the middle of the viewport which acts as the focus point of the viewport. The focus point should only move when panning, as it should stay in the middle of the viewport. Its distance from the viewport camera can be changed by zooming (which moves the camera closer or further from the focus point, but does not move the focus point). The beauty of this is that the focus point doesnt do its own things. It operates by a very simple set of rules, going to where you tell it to go, and then it stays there until you move it again.

The new Point-of-Interest orbit differs from this in how it gets defined every time you click to orbit so you have to be very deliberate with your clicking or the camera will do something you dont want it to. It will also always be defined on the surface of an object, which isnt always what you want.

So thats how its supposed to work, but as previously stated, its broken.

Marmoset Webviewer and Sketchfab are both software where orbit works like this, if you want a 3rd party example. (and actually that orbit works even better than max 2014's where the feature wasnt even broken yet, but there was still some problems when zooming in extremely close to the focus point the focus point would move away from the camera as there seemed to be some sort of minimum orbit radius)

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How would you calculate the focus point distance? Is it a fixed length? Or a homegrid intersection? You say it should change with zoom, so would the fixed length be  multiplied with the zoom factor?

You see, your examples have a very narrow focus and a single object, but try this implementation and navigate a big city.

I would assume that both your examples are using homegrid, [0,0,0] for calculating focal point distance.

[o_blob]

Focus point distance is just the distance between the focus point and the camera. The focus point is an invisible point in the scene which moves when you pan. scroll zooming moves the camera towards or away from the focus point, thus changing the focus point distance.

The focus point doesnt have to be on a grid.

[aon.914858227]

Still don`t understand.

So the focus point(->pivot of camera rotation) is placed a fixed distance from the camera?

If you pan the pivot moves with the camera, (which makes sense) but if you zoom, you just move closer or farther away from this pivot(which is placed at an arbitrary distance from the camera)?

[o_blob]

The pivot point distance from camera is not fixed. It changes when you zoom. Zooming in moves the camera closer to the pivot, and zooming out moves the camera away from the pivot.

The distance is not arbitrary, it stays the same until you zoom in or out.

[StephenMF]

A good example of the perspective view "view port pivot" (not a camera) is that if you press z, the the view pivot is placed at the center of your selection. If you zoom in you zoom closer to the pivot if you zoom away, you move away from the pivot.

You can move this pivot by panning.

At present, if you move around a bit and especially if you edit an editable polys subobjects, this invisible pivot point MOVES UNPRIDICTABLE to somewhere else in space.

One day I will make a video.

I'm just a little busy! 

Enjoy.

Stephen

[aon.914858227]

So all i can do to navigate the scene is to pan? Because following your idea it`s the only way to move the pivot with the camera.

If i zoom the orbit pivot stays where it is and just the camera moves closer to the pivot?

So let`s say i have this large scene would like to fly over, using zoom i move the camera along the sightline of the camera.

Following your idea at some point i am reaching the origin of the pivot (Distance camera to Pivot=0)(Because just the camera moves when zooming,right?)

But i would like to continue with my navigation (zoom), so now what?  We need to find a new pivot position, correct? And where would that be?

[aon.914858227]

This

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@StephenMF wrote:

A good example of the perspective view "view port pivot" (not a camera) is that if you press z, the the view pivot is placed at the center of your selection. If you zoom in you zoom closer to the pivot if you zoom away, you move away from the pivot.

You can move this pivot by panning.

At present, if you move around a bit and especially if you edit an editable polys subobjects, this invisible pivot point MOVES UNPRIDICTABLE to somewhere else in space.

One day I will make a video.

I'm just a little busy! 

Enjoy.

Stephen

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Thanks Stephen,

that`s exactly the point i am trying to make: You NEED to place the pivot of rotation of your camera somewhere,(i use camera here for perspective mode also)  center of selection, homegrid, arbitrary surface.

Your example is using the center of the bounding box of your selection,this makes totally sense.If selection is changing the pivot changes to and gives you a new center to orbit around.

[o_blob]

no thats completely the opposite of what should happen. When you make a new scene, the focus pivot point is in the middle of the scene. From there you move it with pan, and it stays wherever you put it. As Stephen said there is a hotkey Z which moves the pivot point to your object or subobject seleciton, and also zooms the camera to fit the selection in view. This is a very handy hotkey in certain situations, but the pivot point should not change automatically when you change selection (there are object orbit and sub-object orbit modes which do exactly this).

As for your earlier question, yes. Panning is the only way to move the camera focus point (besides the Z hotkey). Its not clumsy at all though, you can orbit the camera to change its direction, and therefore change the direction it pans, so its not like you can only pan on a certain plane.

For bigger objects I usually zoom out, center the area I want to focus on in my screen, orbit camera 90 degrees, center again, then I can zoom in and the focus point is exactly where I need it.

Getting back to the original problem, the camera pivot point is not staying where I leave it. It jumps erratically when I change selections and I lose my focus point, forcing me to refocus my camera to continue working.

[aon.914858227]

So you place the pivot at the scene origin at default. Now that`s something i can work with. And i have to use pan to move the pivot, well it might work. I remain rather sceptical until i see it implemented.It might work for small/medium scenes like those model viewers.

And no freeflight mode, well that`s just fine if you want the for std  orbit mode. And as for Stephens example with the selection center as pivot, i just used it to illustrate that the pivot has to be placed somewhere.Hotkey or not wasn`t my point.