[Bf-funboard] A few suggestions concerning mainly the modeling workflow

[Hadrien Brissaud]

Hello all,

First of all thanks to all developers involved in this 2.69 release.
Amongst other things, it makes modeling a breeze... once again. Since 2.7
is the next step, I thought now would be an appropriate time to suggest a
few things, minor things really, probably quite realistic even. For what
it's worth, here they are !

1. Merge extrude and inset
Blender has few modeling tools, but they're all doing quite a lot, through
modal functionality (instead of going the Modo way, which is having a
dedicated tool/operator for each and every situation).
A. I think this behavior is great and could be extended to extrude and
inset operators, since they're basically the same thing. The modal map
would be that of the current inset operator, except the "inset" value would
be mapped to ctrl+drag in place of the "depth" tweak.
B. If the previous proposal seems inappropriate or hardly feasible, another
solution would be to map the inset operator to a double-tap of "e" key, so
that it's more accessible to the left hand (the same way edge/vertex slide
are mapped to double-g).

2. Have extrude work on normals
It has been suggested before, and I feel like it's worth insisting on : the
usual behaviour of extrude in other 3D programs is pretty much this one :
http://www.pasteall.org/pic/61729 (Wings 1.5.1)
Now I don't suggest dropping the current behaviour, since it does have its
uses, but the one shown in the screenshot is quite handy too, and cannot
always be replicated through a combination of extrude + scale on normals
("fatten" in Blender).

3. Add "clamp" option to edge slide
The vertex slide operator has this very cool option, which allows one to
extend edges past their bounds when alt is held down. The only problem is
each vertex slides in their own direction, and it is pretty much impossible
to have them slide altogether if they're part of a complex, crooked
edgeloop (hard to explain, please try it for yourself).
The edge slide operator would benefit a lot from this very functionality,
without having the same shortcomings as "vertex slide".

4. "Preserve volume" for edge slide
This one would be a bit of a luxury to have, since it can generally be
achieved through a combination of edge slide + fatten, but it might be
feasible (it's already there in "loop cut" as even though there's no visual
feedback), hence my asking :
Modo has an option to "preserve curvature" when sliding an edge, which
basically does what it say : instead of sliding linearly from one side to
the other, it slides along a curve so that once subsurf'd, the area keeps
its precious bulge. I would've grabbed a record of it in action, but I
don't own Modo. I hope my explanation makes enough sense.

5. More seamless workflow with "loop cut"
Sometimes I have to repeat a loop cut (same number of cuts, different
place), and I wish I could use shift+r to make this happen. As of now it
cuts just above the last made cut, no matter where the user wants it done.
Would it be possible to have Blender take the mouse cursor position into
account when repeating the action ?

6. Make proportional edit a simple toggle, with "connected" and "projected"
as options
I'd already raised that one and was backed by quite a few people, with
differents designs being made here and there to suit the recent and very
welcome "projected" mode.

Plus, if anybody feels like tackling this problem :
http://lists.blender.org/pipermail/bf-committers/2013-April/039746.html -
At the time, Psy-fi suggested that it was a particularly difficult task to
pitch into (
http://lists.blender.org/pipermail/bf-committers/2013-April/039747.html),
and I acknowledge that.

7. Tweak pivot point location in "last operator"
This one is not only about modeling : I use the "last operator" very often,
it's a pleasant way of tweaking past operations without having to worry
about nodes created in my wake every second (Maya, Houdini...). What's to
follow is absolutely not necessary but I feel would make a nice addition to
this workflow : being able to change the pivot point location, as xyz
coordinates (or a dropdown list including 3D cursor, median point, etc.),
from inside the "last operator" region.

8. Display "last operator" contents after a re-do
I agree this one probably goes deep into how Blender handles events, and is
not exclusive to modeling at all. However, I've long been frustrated how I
can't go "undo, redo, undo, redo..." in order to bring to light the
operation I just did, and tweak it afterwards.

9. Make "pivot point" a menu so that it can be called through a hotkey
CoDEmanX kindly helped me out on this :
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?314450 - but it would be
nice to have it out-of-the-box, wouldn't it ? -> Same suggestion for
switching between modes.

That's it for the "small annoyances and hurdles" compilation. I hope this
letter makes it to a kind ear, who will take pity in the modelers kind. :)

Thanks again for all the work, take care,

Hadrien