• 🍪 Blender Basics Explore Library Guided Playlists Live Streams Articles Podcast Downloads Collabs Educators: Blender Teaching Guide What's Coming Soon Upgrade your membership
  • Questions & Answers Student Gallery Discord Channel YouTube Channel Citizen Membership Perks ✨
  • Kent Trammell Jonathan Lampel Wayne Dixon Paul Caggegi
    • Full Library

    Stubbornness bite back, send help - Wacon + customized navigation issues

    Daira
    posted to: Basic Blockout
    Hello! I am having trouble to set the interface to work with my Wacom pen. I customized my navegation shortcuts cos I hate Blender standard navigation system. I migrated from Autodesk stuff. Anyway, the thing is, everything it works fine to model with the mouse, but when I am using the wacon it just doesn't work. If I set the Wacon pen's main click to be just a "left mouse click", it will sculpt BUT won't rotate/Pan/zoom the interface. If I set the pen click to be "middle mouse click" (which is the one I set for navigation) it will navigate the screen properly, but it won't sculpt on the mesh. What I need is something like Zbrush I think, when you click on the mesh it will sculpt and when you click outside the mesh it will navigate but I couldn't find any option like that. I know the easiest way would be to start using the standard UI for Blender, but seriously, it is really not intuitive and I hate it haha, so if anyone had a similar issue and found a solution that does not give in to the Blender? Thanks for the help!
    1 love
    Reply
    • Omar Domenech replied

      I haven't tried a tablet like that, but I have become used to Blender's UI. Just give it a shot, it'll suck at the beginning but it'll pass. It's like moving to a new house or starting a new job, it's weird at first, but after a while you're all used to it.

      2 loves
    • Kent Trammell replied

      First, I really appreciate the awareness to call it "stubbornness bite back".

      The good news: Everyone that transitions from any 3D app to another 3D app experiences this same pain. Literally everyone. Take heart that you're in good company!

      13 years ago I was a 3D software nomad, taking pride in jumping from max to maya to zbrush to mudbox then finally to Blender. Haven't had to switch since.

      The bad news: Omar is right about getting used to Blender's default UI. Though we have full control to change hotkeys as we please, the domino-ramifications to those changes cannot be predicted fully. As you're experiencing, anything not default will cause functionality issues at some point.

      Thus the best advice is to embrace the temporary pain of hotkey/UI unfamiliarity for the long term benefit. Having used so many 3d apps myself (among a handful of video editors, photo-manipulation software, etc), trust me that the pain is very temporary and worth it; for all apps, not just blender.

      3 loves
    • Daira replied

      yeah, I imagined you guys would tell me something along those lines, haha I will probably do that, thank you. :)

      • 🤟🏼
      1 love
    • Dwayne Savage(dillenbata3) replied
      Solution

      You can use the navigation Gizmo. It's perfect for pen tablets. The axis orbits. The color spheres on the axis is the view. Hand icon for panning. Magnifying glass icon for zooming.  Camera icon for camera view. 

      Also you can assign one of the pens buttons to be middle mouse button. Left click/. Left drag should happen when you press the tip down. 

      1 love
    • Daira replied

      Oh that seems promising, thanks Dwayne I will give it a try :)


      1 love
    • Omar Domenech replied
      But the payoff is better if you just let the software grown on you. Give it an opportunity, it's the plot of all the movies, at first then can't stand one another and by the end they are best friends, like Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker.
      1 love
    • Nathi Tappan(nathitappan) replied

      I haven't watched this lesson yet (starting after work today), so pardon me if the tip is somewhere in it. But on the same Wacom tips topic:

      Blender is my first 3D app so I have no problems with transitioning there, but I have terrible joints and tendons and recently picked up a wacom tablet to be a full time replacement to my mouse. So far I have found alternatives to everything I needed except one: proportional editing.

      I have one of the pen's buttons as my middle mouse button but when I try to scroll to increase or decrease the proportional editing area it just doesn't work. Can't figure out why. I can't use page up or down because I have a smaller keyboard. I tried assigning a shortcut for the page up and down but somehow haven't worked it out either? Any tips on that? 

      Also, I'll take any insight on your "must haves" wacom shortcuts. I know it's very personal, but I learn a lot about workflows by trying some of those personal preferences.

      Thanks for any input.

      Can't wait to tackle the shark!! 

    • Omar Domenech replied

      I have never used a tablet to fully replace my mouse, so I wouldn't really know. Maybe there is a way to put proportional editing just like when you change the brush sizes? F and then make it larger or bigger? Maybe it would involve some Python scripting or just changing things around in the key assignments. 

    • Nathi Tappan(nathitappan) replied

      That would be the best way for sure! I'll do some digging, thank you!