Orient your parts correctly (worst practices?)
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When I first started with Fusion 360 it seems like I heard in a tutorial, or on the forum [or perhaps I made it up in my head or misinterpreted what was said] that it wasn't really important where you place your drawings and models. It just became painfully clear to me that that is not entirely true, or I am missing a fundamental concept of position of a model and how that effects other modes like Rendering and Animation.
I have been entering many individual parts in separate files. Then, in a different file I insert all those parts to make an assembly. I know that in Fusion 360 one can model the entire assembly in one file, but there are reasons for having every individual part in a separate files in this particular project.
I typically just select the XY plane which starts me drawing from the top view. But "drawing happens" (kind of like stuff happens?) and I may extrude something in a direction that doesn't make the front the front, it might be the side or the top when that drawing is done. That works fine, it does mean that the thumbnail of a given part may show the part laying on it's side or upside down, but whatever, they are parts I can see what they are. Your parts will be in potentially random orientations in the thumbnails and in their initial state when they are opened. So, that is the first reason one may want to think about initial orientation and draw parts in their natural orientation (ie, top is up and on top).
You say, ah yes, but you can re-orient the parts at any time later to fix the orientation of the thumbnail - I'll get to that.
Then I add all the parts to the assembly file and assemble. All is good, I don't really pay any attention to their origins in general, I just create joints between parts and they go where they should. However, once again initial orientation matters, because when you add a part to an assembly it comes in in it's current orientation. In the couple large assemblies I have done I have spent quite a bit of time moving and re-orienting parts in the assembly before creating joints, if for nothing else than for my brain to see where to grab them for the joint. If I had drawn them in their more natural orientations I would have spent way less time doing that.
So now I have my large assembly. I go to create a rendering. I am playing with ground plane, etc and I am looking for the reflection of the ground plane, don't see it. I am looking for shadows being cast when moving the light around, don't see it. Why? Because the orientation of the assembly is sideways, or upside down and the ground plane isn't on the ground, it's on the ceiling or a wall. Third reason you want to think about the orientation from the start.
I spend hours creating a nice exploded animation and re-assembly of this large assembly. The initial orientation of the assembly in the animation shows the company logo on the product nicely. At other points in the animation the orientation is set so that the company logo on the product is clearly seen. I create a movie, all is well.
Forward a few days. I am working on some other things and think, I'll clear up some of those upside down and sideways thumbnails. I go into the parts, or the assemblies and I move the part/assembly to the origin in its more natural orientation. I go about my business happy that the thumbnails are reasonable now. I go to make some changes to the Animation. Help! The whole animation is messed up. The assembly is off in space somewhere, parts move through other parts in ways I didn't define. In ways I didn't define in the original orientation of all the parts - but not the NEW orientation of all the parts. Ugh.
I could go on. But instead I need to get back to figuring out how to back out all the changes I made in order to get back to the orientations that don't break the animation that I spent hours creating. I need the head banging into wall emoji...
