Three suggestions

[Skaruts]

1- Zoom the 2D views toward the mouse location. I couldn't find any option for this in the settings, so I'm assuming this isn't in DR at all. This would make zooming in and out much easier.

 

 

2- A search feature on model/skins/texture/etc browsers. I noticed that in some cases if you press Space a text field appears, and it seems like that's some form of search thingy, but doesn't seem to work very reliably.

 

This would make things much easier to find, regardless of how they are organized in the folders. You could always just search for it.

 

Find "by name" might be enough for most purposes, and would be golden in itself, as far as I'm concerned. Although if more could be suggested about this, I'd say it would be something like how Hammer categorizes things with tags that allow for search filters (can also use material keywords for filtering textures).

 

 

3- Simplified wireframe on models (optionally just a bounding box). So that models wouldn't turn the 2D views into incomprehensible messes so quickly, but it would also help more easily seeing where model boundaries are exactly, for positioning/alignment purposes and such.

 

 

Also one more, that I forgot:

 

4- Add an acceleration factor to the camera movement speed. Since there's no quick way to change it back and forth between fast and slow (have to press P, click camera, change speed, click ok, every time) this would make it easier to do small adjustments to camera position while still keeping the speed high enough to taste, and so that if you kept the movement key pressed you still quickly fly away to that far place you want.

 

This is how it works in Hammer. I think its acceleration factor must be pretty high, so that small taps barely move the camera, but a continuous press almost instantly accelerates you to max speed.

Edited October 5, 2018 by Skaruts

[peter_spy]

2- A search feature on model/skins/texture/etc browsers. I noticed that in some cases if you press Space a text field appears, and it seems like that's some form of search thingy, but doesn't seem to work very reliably.

 

You just need to start typing, use up and down arrows to jump between results.

[Skaruts]

Oh! I hadn't realized that. Thanks.

[Obsttorte]

You know that there is a Wishlist for DarkRadiant thread pinned at the top of this subforum?!

[Destined]

3: It helps a lot to use different layers for seperate buildings, floors, etc. That way you can quickly blend out all the stuff you are not working on. Another option is the regular hide fucntion; especially hide everything except your selection (ctrl+shift+h, if I remember correctly). That way you can select two brushes/models/etc, hide the rest and positon one relarive to the other.

 

4: For moving the camera across longer distances I would suggest to use ctrl+middle mouse button, to set the camera dirctly to a point in the map rather than flying there with higher speed.

[Skaruts]

You know that there is a Wishlist for DarkRadiant thread pinned at the top of this subforum?!

 

Yea... sorry about that. If mods want to merge this with it, I'm fine with that. (If that's possible.)

 

Or should I just copy/paste my post there and ignore this one? I don't mind doing it. I have a few more suggestions to make anyway, so I could do that.

 

3: It helps a lot to use different layers for seperate buildings, floors, etc. That way you can quickly blend out all the stuff you are not working on. Another option is the regular hide fucntion; especially hide everything except your selection (ctrl+shift+h, if I remember correctly). That way you can select two brushes/models/etc, hide the rest and positon one relarive to the other.

 

4: For moving the camera across longer distances I would suggest to use ctrl+middle mouse button, to set the camera dirctly to a point in the map rather than flying there with higher speed.

I know I have options. I'm just making suggestions that would make things a bit more comfortable for my personal workflow, but which might also do so for others. Ctrl-MMB is very useful actually, but it requires zooming out and finding the place, etc (I'm using one 2D view only). Little things that add up, and in some occasions I'd like to be able to just turn and fly to where I want. Sometime I just want a quick birds-eye view of the whole thing I'm doing, but that's tough when I just set my camera to a speed under 10 for close-up brush work or something. And with Ctrl-MMB we're also back to my suggestion 1 because then I'll have to zoom back in somewhere.

 

A problem with layers though is that if you have the same thing in more than one layer it won't disappear until you hide both. Like if you have a floor on Floors and also on Room1, if you want to hide all the floors, or if you want to hide only Room1, that floor will stay visible either way, until you hide the other layer too.

 

Maybe that's something I could also suggest being tackled too.

Edited October 6, 2018 by Skaruts

[Destined]

I understand your problem, but this an be solved by how you choose your layers. I have usually one room/floor without its roof in one layer per building (if there are more than one). It adds a lot of planning, though, so a generally cleaner 2D view would be a good thing...

[Skaruts]

That I know of there's no way around it, so it doesn't matter how you choose your layers, you can't solve that problem. You can't specifically hide all the wall models in Room1Walls at the same time that Room1 is checked, if Room1 includes those walls too. Using the hide functionality for this kind of thing is not preferable as it's an unwieldy tool: when you unhide, you unhide everything you've hidden. I didn't make that layer thing a suggestion but I will on the wishlist. Used that kind of thing extensively for years. It's a simple functionality that can boost your workflow by a ton (maybe not simple to implement, though).

 

I'm just suggesting useful extra stuff here, stuff I think are good ideas, not arguing that the existing ones are crap or that the lack of these can't be worked around. It's just that certain tools are more handy for certain situations and it can't hurt to have them, if the devs are able and willing to get them in. Although if what I suggest already exists (as it was with number 2), then I'll be glad to know about it.

 

And by the way, about number 3, that's a problem with triangulated models themselves. Some of them are hard to make sense of on their own, and that's what I'm talking about. Layers and hidding stuff are irrelevant in this. And tbh I don't know if there's anything that can be done to simplify the wireframes, I'm just throwing it out there.

Edited October 6, 2018 by Skaruts

[greebo]

4- Add an acceleration factor to the camera movement speed. Since there's no quick way to change it back and forth between fast and slow (have to press P, click camera, change speed, click ok, every time) this would make it easier to do small adjustments to camera position while still keeping the speed high enough to taste, and so that if you kept the movement key pressed you still quickly fly away to that far place you want.

 

The camera speed is adjustable, I think the default shortcuts are the +/- keys on the numpad. The assignable commands (see Edit > Shortcuts...) are called CamIncreaseMoveSpeed and CamDecreaseMoveSpeed.

[Skaruts]

 

The camera speed is adjustable, I think the default shortcuts are the +/- keys on the numpad. The assignable commands (see Edit > Shortcuts...) are called CamIncreaseMoveSpeed and CamDecreaseMoveSpeed.

Well that helps a lot. Thanks. (I need to spend some time looking at all the shortcuts...)

 

Although, there is a little nuisance -- not sure if it's a problem with my keyboard -- that when I'm pressing WASD and press + or -, it stops moving. It would be nice to be able to change the speed as I go. Might also be nice to have some visual feedback on how fast the camera is going (I don't see any, at least).

[RPGista]

DR is a lot like playing chess. I too came from a modeling background when I first started using it, and missed the intuitive building workflow I had in sketchup, where you build as you go directly from perspective view. But once you get used to its core mechanics, you start to apreciate some of the wisdom in this building methodology as well, and kinda switch gears whenever you are using the tool. Its very very feature rich.

 

Its all about spending enough time with it, limitations and all.

 

Luckly Greebo is still around mantaining and improving DR, so yeah, the more suggestions the merrier.

Edited October 12, 2018 by RPGista