[Bf-funboard] Curves creating

[Matt Ebb]

On 22 Dec 2004, at 3:07 AM, Chris Burt wrote:

> But I know you're referring to the way you click and drag to define 
> the control points etc. I can't see how this would be better... More 
> familiar yes... but not better.

Curve editing is one of Blender's weakest areas. A more 'standard' 
approach (oh no! standards! they're so evil and oppressive!) as in 
other vector drawing apps is better because you can precisely define 
the shape when you're creating it in a simple, efficient process. 
Instead, in Blender you Ctrl click, Ctrl click, Ctrl click only to find 
out that with Blender's default 'auto' handles, the curve looks nothing 
like you want it to look like (especially since all handles are created 
as 'auto' - you can't specify the 'vector' style handles when created).

Then you have to go back over the whole thing, tweaking and tweaking to 
get it to look the way you want. And even this is a chore - in 'real' 
vector drawing apps like Illustrator, you can use the "open triangle 
icon tool" (can't remember what it's called) to simply drag a control 
point to get the desired rotation, with equidistant tangent points for 
a nice smooth curve. In Blender this requires repeatedly pressing, R, 
S, R, S, to get it the way you want it. And of course you can't do that 
to any control point, even in the default state as they are created, 
you have to press H before this is possible at all! That's right, you 
can't even go through the repetitive process of rotating or scaling a 
control point that has just been created by extrude or Ctrl click, you 
have to convert it to something else by pressing H before this 
fundamental operation is even possible. How intuitive!

Oh, but wait, if the control point in question is on an open end of a 
curve, you *still* can't scale or rotate it, even after pressing the 
make-my-application-work-properly key, H! The only thing you can do is 
move one of the tangent points, ruining the symmetry of the control 
point.

And then if you select one of the tangent points of a control point 
that hasn't had the magic H key treatment and press R or S (of course 
rotating or scaling a single point is geometrically impossible, and 
should do nothing), it does something completely unrelated and converts 
the control point as you would by pressing H. Wow.

Then I've spent 10 minutes drawing a simple curve and scratching my 
head, when I could have done it properly on the first try in about 30 
seconds in an app like Illustrator.

Seriously... If you don't back up why you think doing things a certain 
way is better with solid reasoning, then you're no better than people 
who request features because "this other app has it". The purpose of 
this list is to be creative, constructive and to be positive about 
finding  ways to improve Blender.. All this "Blender r00lz and is 
perfect in every way!" hand waving and snide comments like "hur hur, 
RTFM stupid luser, this feature already exists! lol!!1111 (even when 
it's completely unobvious and requires a user to jump through hoops 
while playing the banjo)" is helping nobody. It's also pissing me off 
to no end.

Matt
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