More shortcuts

[benjiwolff]

Description

I find myself having to move my mouse away from the viewport a lot to switch between tools and change the brush size. I think that the following common actions would benefit from having shortcuts:

• selecting a tool
• changing the brush size
• changing the brush strength

I imagine the shortcuts to work something like this:

• when the terrain node is selected, each tool can be selected with a single key-press, similar to the QWER shortcuts in the Godot editor.
  • ideally, the keys can be configured
• the brush size/strength can be changed with either
  • clicking and dragging with the mouse while holding down multiple modifier keys (photoshop)
    • fast and accurate
  • the mouse wheel while holding down a modifier key (gimp)
    • slow for large changes and inaccurate for small changes
  • a shortcut like "[", "]", "{" and "}" (gimp)
    • requires taking my hand off the mouse

[TokisanGames]

What keyboard scheme would you suggest given the current keys listed in the documentation, and Godot reserved keys?

[benjiwolff]

Since

• 3d editor modes (select, move, scale and rotate) can't be used with Terrain3D
• tools cannot be used in free look mode
• locking transformations to the axes can only be used during a transformation
• local space is not relevant for terrain sculpting

I would suggest suppressing the actions mentioned above in favor of something like this:

• R: raise
• S: smooth
• E: slope
• H: height
• B: base texture
• T: overlay texture
• A: autoshader
• C: color
• W: wetness
• X: holes
• N: navigation
• I instance meshes

These shortcuts should be easy to reach with the left hand with the exception of navigation and instance meshes which are probably switched to less often.

For changing the brush size, I imagine placing the mouse somewhere on the terrain, holding down D, and while holding it down, moving the mouse to the extent of the brush (drawing the brushes radius essentially). This would allow showing a preview of the brush size as well.

For the brush strength I imagine holding down G while using the mouse wheel to make relative adjustments. Here, the camera zoom would have to be turned off.

These suggestions are ignorant of industry standards and implementation difficulty/possibilities. I just made them up and personally feel they are intuitive as a terrain beginner who is not very familiar with other terrain and modelling tools. :)

[nan0m]

An actually tested workflow that I like from blender is to press F, to start the brush scale operation, and then confirm the brush size by left clicking.
It's the same for opacity, but here you start the operation with Shift + F, then drag the mouse cursor how far you want it and confirm with left click again.

I prefer this to the mousewheel personally, because it's very very fast as well as precise.