Draw, Paint & Sculpting Keymap Proposal - Feedback Request

A small update to the prototype keymaps.

  • Removed Ctrl M for the Mask Overlay in Sculpt Mode
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Removing the 3D view inheritance is abolutely fine.
X kinda threw me off a little because I never used paint in sculpt mode but only in vertex paint so far. But it makes sense if sculpt mode has a vertex paint feature. Otherwise Iā€™d have proposed it for Activating symmetry.

Rest of the Keymap also makes sense to me so far. To be honest - except for R, most of them are keys I rarely use while sculpting so I am also not really married to any of these shortcuts yet. Only remarks from my seide so far:

  • Mask Lasso somehow intuitively for me would make more sense inverted - Shift + Ctrl + RMB to remove and Ctrl + RMB to paint on a mask. I know by selection logic Ctrl would remove, while shift would add a selection but to me intuitively an additional key to a Key/click combination removes from anything existing (and yes - I know itā€™s also a matter of getting used to).
  • One thing I also do seem to miss by default, is a stickey key for Mask Pen in addition to the Lasso. Mask Pen is a pretty vital tool and should, IMO, have a quickly accessible tool by default from any brush without hard switching, if desired. And it should be on a Left Click modifier because it is pen sensitivity dependent.

Overall, though, for me all of it feels fine.
Tested with LCS map.

Oh hell yes!

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Iā€™m all for it, some softwares and even video games have such form of ā€œhold a button to see a bit more controls infoā€. Though I have my doubts about ? since it requires ā‡§ Shift to type it.
It could also be something like clicking the footer where there are already shortcut infos.

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Shortcuts are a vital part of a fluid workflow and with the amount of tools artists might be using each day it is easy to forget one or get confused with muscle memory from another program - or even just forget which ones Iā€™ve set as a user some time ago.

A quickly accessible reminder that also shows the custom set shortcuts and shortcuts that arenā€™t accessible from the UI would be fantastic. Problem could be the amount of keys and how to display or structure it. But Iā€™m all for it. Guess this would be more of a separate discussion, though.

(edit)
I am not even sure if a shortcut list would actually need a hotkey at all. I think hotkeys are only necessary for actions that either need to be switched/executed in rapid succession or need the cursor to remain in place for an action (like trackball rotate). Looking up a hotkey list isnā€™t something youā€™d usually need to do on a frequent basis or that needs to be immediate. A small UI button could be absolutely fine for this, actually.
But it would also be really beneficial to see which hotkeys are still free, if Julien is already cleaning up space on the keyboard again. Often times if I want to assign a shortcut I simply donā€™t know which keys I can still use, potentially. It often results in a conflict or a bit of frustrating trial and error.

Could you go into detail on which shortcuts you rarely use (and why)? Would be very insightful!

If a sticky key is used then thatā€™s also a fully reserved shortcut for that brush. But I see what you mean.
A sticky key could be a way for mask brush usage. And you can combine it with Shift for smoothing or Ctrl for inverting.

Itā€™s possible to set this up yourself by adding these two keymap entries in the sculpt mode keymap:

In this exampe pressing and holding C (like Circle Select) would switch to to the Mask brush and releasing C will toggle back to the previous brush.
While the brush is active it can freely be used. Itā€™s just a bit difficult to press Shift F at the same time to change the Strength.


The whole discussion about the ? key is off topic yes. For now thatā€™s what the status bar at the bottom of the window is for (I agree it could be better)
If you have suggestions for improving that Iā€™m sure there are other threads or right click select proposals already out there :wink:

For that case there is the UI slider. If Iā€™m using a tool like smooth or mask pen I kinda do it on the fly instead of a deliberate thing. So I would not expect a seconday overlayed hotkey for strength or size.

It would be great if the sliders in the UI reflect the strength and scale of the brush while using the hotkey. Itā€™s kind of how the other big sculpting app does it but itā€™s really fluent to use. For example switching into smooth brush just to be able to adjust the strength of the smooth and then realizing that itā€™s a little too soft when I use the hotkey is always a hassle. If I could adjust the tool strength in the UI while holding the hotkey - that would be friggin awesome.
Sure - in most cases the tablet pressure will adjust the strength of the smoothing (or draw opacity, mask opacity etc.) but if the fine tuning is needed for a stretch of work then itā€™s usually much faster to:

  • hotkey acitvate the mask
  • adjust strength/poacity
  • try it out
  • readjust strength
  • try out with another stroke
  • adjust back a little bit
  • work

going in and out of the actual tool and back to the model works but feels super tedious.
I donā€™t know if blender is actually capable of doing it ā€œon the flyā€, currently.

As for what hotkeys I donā€™t currently use: Most of the Polygrouping and Masking.
Polygrouping because I rarely use it in Blender and masking pie menues because I didnā€™t know about them, to be honest. :sweat_smile:

My most used workflow and hotkeys consist of the major used tools:

  • Highest amount of use: Draw, Draw Sharp, Clay Strips, Grab, Smooth and Pinch.
  • Very often used: Switch active Mesh, Retopo scale (best preview ever) and remesh
  • Often used: UI for setting different types of falloffs, automasking, going in and out of mirror mode, radius and strength.
  • Honorable mention: Mask brushes, I promise myself to create a shortcut for, not do it and curse myself or Blender for not having one next time I need it :stuck_out_tongue:
    I didnā€™t know how to actually create a stick/switchback shortcut either, though. Thanks for showing.

All the rest is then dependent on the type of mesh. If itā€™s just a rough clay blockout for something Iā€™m going to retopo anyways and might change with my project or mood.

Reference to my type of projects: https://mr_motionblur.artstation.com/
Roughly half of the stuff in there (mostly post 2.8x) is Blender but a lot realtime or texturing and especially most of map baking stuff is still other programs.

(edit) should also mention - even if I use all the shortcuts as described in Vanilla Blender, I also did buy an Addon on BlenderMarket for rapid pie menu access because it is much faster and friendlier than the humungous list Blender currently offers out of the box. AND also offers quick enough access for second-tier tools in a fast-enough fashion for me. :slight_smile:

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That should be doable with the keymap setup I showed :+1:

Thanks for the extra insight!

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Hm. Iā€™m not sure it actually works. I just excitedly tried it again but it currently doesnā€™t seem to switch the tool settings, though. For example, when hitting Shift to Stickey-Swap to Smooth, then the tool strength and radius keep reflecting the active tool (like the pen etc).

So it is still necessary to acively swap into the other tool to adjust the strength settings.
Am I doing something wrong or did I misunderstand you there?

Today, looking for a quick shortcut to center the view on the cursor, I discovered that this one already existed.

Center View to Mouse now has the MMB+Alt+Click shortcut

Since I have a numpad, I normally use the numpad point to center, and I hadnā€™t realized that Alt+MMB was also possible.

The solution I had configured is:
MMB+Click Drag to Rotate View
MMB+Click for Center View to Mouse

Although the change is minimal compared to the current navigation, I think it is easier and is better discovered.

I donā€™t want to go too deep into this discussion because itā€™s kinda off topic. I showed a custom setup to highlight that there is a lot of room for customizing. But I also wouldnā€™t want to put holding keys into the default keymap more than it already is.

Just to clarify: While holding Shift it doesnā€™t actually switch the tool/brush. It just udner the hood uses the smooth brush. Thatā€™s why the UI doesnā€™t change. Iā€™ll see what can be done about that.

I experimented with this for a while too. this setup leads to a lot of accidental clicking though.
It becomes quite frustrating at some point, so itā€™s better to leave it at Alt MMB imo.

For better discoverability this needs to be mentioned in tutorials and the header menu.
Itā€™s already in the documentation as a start.

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The solution I had configured is:
MMB+Click Drag to Rotate View
MMB+Click for Center View to Mouse

By the way, FreeCAD has navigation style named ā€œBlenderā€, which behaves exactly like this)
When tried, I didnt succeed to replicate such behaviour in Blender though.
I think it doesnot fit the defaults really well, because require quite precise motorics to avoid accidental clicks, but it is nice to have the ability to set it up like that.

Speaking of a trackball (mentioned in the documentation link), there was an idea discussion to enhance turntable to bring trackball flexibility with a better rolling solution while keeping turntable advantages such as clarity.
A link if is interesting:

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Throwing a suggestion out there and maybe it was already discussed, but since X is switching colors, wouldnā€™t it be intuitive if on additive/subtractive brushes X changed the mode from - to + and vice versa? So that you could flip it and work without constantly pressing Ctrl, would be nice

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Iā€™ve tried the keymap and I like everything but I would change one thing.

Alt E for stroke method isnā€™t intuitive, as everything else related to E is face sets. Instead, I would move it to Alt W, or just W, and make Alt E ā€˜Draw Face Setsā€™ brush in Sculpt mode, which is very handy

The main patch for the proposed changes here is close to being accepted for Blender 4.0.
Various other patches are close too.

But Iā€™m still considering to revert the Face Set shortcut changes. That would lead to less broken muscle memory among those who use them a lot.

The only shortcut that must be updated is the Face Set pie menu on W to Alt W.
This intentionally leaves W empty. People can assign a shortcut for the Draw Face Sets brush or any other brush/tool if they like.

If anyone has opinions on this let me know!

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We usually test keymaps in months (and sometimes years in case of a wide range workflow design) to make sure it follow relevancy mapping.
Not sure I can be helpful much here, we havenā€™t had much sculpting work recently.

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Maybe the ā€œTabā€ key could be released to use it as a function key like Shift, Ctrl or Alt so that we would have Tab + Ctrl for circular mode change menu and any combination with this key.

Entering edit mode via tab is actually useful for hiding parts of meshes via editmode direct selection tools (B or C). Ctrl+Tab already changes modes.

Most of the changes proposed in this thread are now in Blender 4.0.
You can read more here:
https://wiki.blender.org/wiki/Reference/Release_Notes/4.0/Keymap

Feedback is very welcome, especially now.

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Can you provide a direct link please, this one doesnot contain any (at least for linux)

Itā€™s in main. So 4.0.0 Alpha :smiley:
EDIT: Perhaps it takes a day for some of them to be in the nightly build from that link.