Viewport navigation
Navigation profiles
VIZid Next ships two mouse-navigation profiles. Switch between them in Render ▸ Navigation. The active profile persists between sessions.
| Profile | How to orbit | How to pan | How to dolly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Studio (direct) (default) | Left-drag | Middle-drag | Right-drag |
| Maya (Alt-navigation) | Alt + Left-drag | Alt + Middle-drag | Alt + Right-drag |
Mouse wheel zooms (dollies) in both profiles.
Selecting vs orbiting in Studio mode: a short left-click with no drag selects the object under the cursor; a drag that moves beyond the deadzone becomes an orbit and does not change the selection.
Studio profile extras:
- Ctrl + left-drag — screen-moves the selected part (moves the part in the camera plane rather than orbiting).
- Double-click — focuses a part: selects it and frames it in the viewport.
Padlocked cameras: a camera that has been locked in the Camera panel freezes drag navigation and the mouse wheel. Unlock the camera's padlock in the Camera panel, or switch to Free Cam, to navigate again.
Mouse settings: Edit ▸ Settings… ▸ Viewport / Gizmos ▸ Mouse configures click/drag threshold (default 3 px), left-drag direction and right-drag direction (Inverted option).
Framing
Press F to frame the current selection, or to frame all geometry if nothing is selected.
Viewport controls
The viewport shows overlay controls in two rails. One small button at the bottom-left (tooltip: Show/hide viewport controls — Ctrl+Alt+1) retracts and restores both rails; Ctrl+Alt+2 also works while the viewport has focus.
Top / view rail
Controls run centred along the top edge and down the right edge.
Centred along the top edge (left to right):
| Cell | When shown | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Look through camera camera name | always | click → Look through list: every saved camera and Free Cam; lit while looking through a saved camera |
| Composition format (e.g. 1920 × 1080) | when the document has a composition format | click → Composition format: 1920 × 1080 — 16:9 · 1080 × 1920 — 9:16 · 1080 × 1080 — Square · 1440 × 1080 — 4:3 · 2048 × 858 — Cinema · 3840 × 2160 — UHD |
| Overview | always | toggles the Overview work view (not a camera; never rendered); lit while on |
| Frame | always | frames the selection, or everything (F); right-click → Reset view |
| Pick Target… (Esc) | a Spot or Area light is selected | arms the aim pick |
| More viewport controls | only when the centred cells do not fit | lists the folded cells by tooltip |
Light samples per hit are set in Render Settings ▸ While Editing. To reset the view, right-click Frame and choose Reset view.
Down the right edge (top to bottom):
| Cell | When shown | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Display mode (glyph shows the current mode) | once the modes are available | click cycles Ray-traced → Geometry → Performance → Shaded → Hybrid; right-click opens the full menu |
| Preview preset | once profiles are available | click cycles While-Editing profiles; right-click lists them; the tooltip reads Preview: ‹name› — click to cycle; right-click to choose |
| GPU / CPU | only when a GPU is available | click switches the render device |
| Denoise | always | viewport denoise on/off |
A right-edge cell that would run into the bottom edge is hidden. The preset button shows only its icon; the active profile name appears in its tooltip, not on the button.
Left / tools rail
Runs down the left edge.
| Cell | What it does |
|---|---|
| Select / Move / Rotate / Scale / Combined / Drag | The six transform tools (Q / W / E / R / T / Y). Active tool is lit. |
| Snap (magnet) | Toggle Snap to Increments. Right-click → snap settings (Move step, Angle step, Scale step, Precision divisor). |
| Orientation (glyph = current choice) | Shows and changes the transform orientation. Click → Orientation: Global, Local, Normal, Gimbal, View. Hidden when the viewport is too short. |
| Pivot (glyph = current choice) | Shows and changes the pivot point. Click → Pivot: Median Point, Individual Origins, Active Element, 3D Cursor. Hidden when the viewport is too short. |
| Texture / label transform group | Shown while a texture or label transform is armed: Edit texture, Edit label, Move, Rotate, Scale, Place on surface, Reset mapping, the label scope letters A (All objects), L (Linked material) and S (Selected object), and Rotate backwards / Rotate forwards. A Transform target list appears only when the armed mode has more than one texture or label to choose from. |
| Light inspector | A small draggable chip showing the selected light's key values (shown bottom-left when a light is selected and View ▸ Light Inspector is on; can be moved by dragging it). |
Bottom-right — Display Filters
The Display Filters button (Display filters) opens a popup listing every viewport overlay. The popup stays open until you click outside it or press Esc.
Right-click extras on controls:
- Right-click Frame → Reset view (snap back to the default 3/4 framing)
- Right-click Snap → Snap settings (Move step, Angle step, Scale step, Precision divisor)
- Right-click Drag → choose drag mode (Surface crawl or Surface placement (simple))
Display mode
The display mode chip (right edge) cycles the viewport picture between Ray-traced → Geometry → Performance → Shaded → Hybrid. Click to cycle; the chip glyph and tooltip identify the current choice.
Render ▸ Display Mode is a separate setting: Normal (PBR) clears the four look toggles (Wireframe, Ghost / X-ray, AO Contact Shadows, Toon / Cel), which can be combined.
Display Rung
Render ▸ Display Rung (also in the viewport right-click menu) selects which rendered picture occupies the viewport frame: Ray-traced, Geometry, Performance, Shaded or Hybrid, plus the engine policy. Use this when you want to inspect the geometry pass or the shaded pass without changing how the renderer operates.
Performance is a cheaper Shaded preview. It uses a smaller image and one anti-aliasing sample while retaining the scene’s materials and transparency. Its approximation notice lists the effects reduced for the current document. Switching back to Shaded restores the requested quality.
What the Shaded rung cannot do… lists the omissions and approximations for the current document. The submenu also lets you allow temporary Shaded preview during overload.
Display Filters
The Display Filters button (bottom-right of the viewport) opens a popup with per-element display toggles. Click outside the popup or press Esc to close it. The same toggles are also in Render ▸ Display Filters.
The popup is titled Display Filters and notes Applies to this viewport only. Each overlay row has a switch and a depth list. You can change the depth (on top, ghosted or occluded) for Transform Gizmo, Light Gizmos, Camera Gizmos, 3D Cursor, Selection Outline and Hover Highlight. Other rows show their fixed setting greyed, and Composition Guides and Render Stats HUD show 2D. Preset buttons at the bottom: All Overlays, Animation Only, Clean — no overlays (none lit = custom). New viewports start with every overlay on except Composition Guides and Onion Skin.
| Group | Overlay |
|---|---|
| Animation | Motion Paths; Path Keys (child of Motion Paths); Path Handles (child of Motion Paths); Path Timing (child of Motion Paths); Onion Skin |
| Manipulators | Transform Gizmo; Light Gizmos; Camera Gizmos; Studio Pins; 3D Cursor |
| Selection | Selection Outline; Hover Highlight; Group Cage; Face-set Highlight |
| Annotation | Notes; Dimensions & Angles; Texture Projection; Label Placement |
| Guides | Composition Guides; Render Stats HUD |
Standard views
Jump to a named ortho-aligned angle using keyboard shortcuts:
| Key | View |
|---|---|
| 1 | Front |
| 3 | Side |
| 7 | Top |
| 5 | Toggle orthographic / perspective |
The Camera panel ▸ Framing ▸ Standard view list offers Front / Back / Left / Right / Top / Bottom / 3⁄4 View. These are disabled while Smart framing is on.
Render ▸ Standard Views (4) queues four render shots (front, side, top, three-quarter) at the current framing and then restores your working view. The status bar reads "Queued 4 standard views — press Render All". This is a render-queue action, not a navigation shortcut.
Render ▸ Reset View returns the viewport to the default 3/4 framing.
Output frame
Render ▸ Output Frame dims the viewport outside the final render's aspect ratio. Nothing shows when the final height follows the viewport exactly.
Composition guides
Camera panel ▸ View ▸ Guides: Off / Thirds / Center / Golden. This is a viewport display setting and is not saved per camera.
3D cursor
Shift + right-click places the 3D cursor at the point under the pointer.
- Edit ▸ Cursor → World Origin — move the cursor to the scene origin.
- Edit ▸ Cursor → Selection — move the cursor to the centre of the selection.
Fullscreen
F11 expands the viewport to fill the window. Press F11 again, or click the exit button at the bottom-left, to return.
While in fullscreen:
- Camera selector — bottom-right corner.
- Play / pause — bottom-centre (Space to toggle; Left / Right to step).
- Cache fill progress bar appears above the play button while the playback cache is filling.
- Orbit, pan and dolly work normally using the active navigation profile.
- Selection, object dragging and other editing tools are suppressed.
The dock layout is preserved; returning restores all panels exactly.
Status bar
The status bar runs across the bottom of the window. It has two zones.
Left zone (message line) — shows temporary messages from every operation in the app: selection counts, error details, measurement results, command confirmations. Any "status bar reads…" note in this guide refers to this area. It can be covered by transient application messages.
| Cell | When visible | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Message line | Always | The most recent status or result message from any operation. |
| Retry | Only when the live preview renderer has stopped after repeated failures | Click to restart the live preview renderer. Disappears when the first new frame arrives. The tooltip explains when and why to use it. |
Right zone (permanent strip) — always visible; never covered by transient messages.
| Cell | When visible | What it shows |
|---|---|---|
| Render progress bar | While a final render is running | Completion percentage (0–100). Hidden when idle. |
| Save progress bar | While a background save is writing | Indeterminate while the stage exports; fills while streaming to disk. Tooltip: "Saving the document in the background". Hidden when idle. |
| Interactive preview progress | While the live renderer is refining | Sample count or tile progress for the current kick. Hidden at idle. |
| Units: + picker | Always | The document unit (mm / cm / m / inch / ft). This is the per-document unit: it controls real-world material sizes, dimension readouts and STEP import scale. Changing it rescales material sizes and re-renders at the new scale; geometry does not move. It is one undo step. Materials edited as nodes keep their old scale, and a warning names them (use Rebuild from Spec to rescale). Distinct from the Settings ▸ Units ▸ Default import unit preference, which sets the fallback only for files that carry no unit metadata. |
| ● Renderer: state | Always | ● Renderer: idle, ● Renderer: rendering (a final or queued render is running) or ⚠ Renderer: stalled (N strikes — breaker open). Green while rendering, amber when stalled and muted when idle. |
| VRAM | Always | GPU 4.2 GB as reported by the renderer, or GPU — before it reports. |
| FPS | Always | 12 fps, or — when no frames are arriving. |
| Job | While a batch renders or jobs are queued | ‹job name› · job 2/12 · ~41 min left while a batch renders (the time appears once measured); Queue: 3/12 when jobs are queued but none is rendering; empty otherwise. |
| Retry (flat button) | Only when the breaker has tripped | Same action as the left-zone Retry button; visible from anywhere in the app. |
| Project: | Always | The active client / brand project name, or "Project: —" when none is set. Click to open the Client Projects dialog (requires the asset backend; see Edit ▸ Projects…). |
Related topics
- Selecting objects — selecting and transforming
- Placing objects — the Drag tool and nudge keys
- Keyboard shortcuts — viewport and tool keys