GCrafter
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3d View

Overview

The 3D View is where you’ll spend most of your time. It’s the main workspace for assembling and inspecting your project in 3D. From here you can:

  • Move, rotate, and size parts
  • Inspect joinery and fitment
  • Measure distances
  • Create 3D dimensions
  • Switch render modes (wireframe, ghosted, bounding boxes, etc.)
  • Left Mouse Button (drag): rotate the camera (Perspective mode)
  • Right Mouse Button (drag): pan the camera
  • Mouse Wheel: zoom in / out

Tip: If you ever “lose” the model, switch to a known view (Top/Front/Perspective) from the View menu and zoom back in.

Explode

Explode moves parts outward from the assembly so you can inspect them individually.

Use Explode to:

  • Check intersections and joinery clearly
  • Verify part orientation
  • Debug overlapping parts
  • Understand build order

Settings

The Settings button gives you quick access to view and interaction controls, including:

  • Grid snapping options
  • FOV (Field of View) slider to change the “lens” feel of the camera
  • Lower FOV feels more “telephoto” (flatter perspective)
  • Higher FOV feels wider and more dramatic

View Menu

Set View

Quickly jump the camera to a standard view:

  • Perspective
  • Top / Bottom
  • Left / Right
  • Front / Back

Render Modes

Choose how the model is displayed:

  • Wireframe: outlines only (fast and very clear for edges)
  • Rendered: solid shaded parts
  • Rendered + Wireframe: great for seeing edges while keeping surfaces
  • Ghosted: like Rendered + Wireframe, but semi-transparent
  • Bounding Boxes: shows simplified part volumes (helpful for debugging positioning and intersection behavior)

Gizmos & Toggles

These let you control what you see and how you interact:

  • Grid: show/hide the grid
  • Axis indicator: shows X/Y/Z orientation
  • Shadow: toggle shadows for depth cues (can be disabled for performance)
  • Auto-rotate: slowly spins the model for inspection
  • Dimensions: show/hide dimensions in the scene
  • Pockets: show/hide pockets
    Pockets can be expensive to display—if the scene feels slow, disable pockets.

Selecting Parts

To quickly preview what you’re about to select:

  • Shift + mouse over a part: the target part highlights (blue / semi-transparent)

This is useful when parts overlap or when you’re working inside assemblies.

Moving a Part

There are two main ways to move parts:

1) Movement Gizmo

Use the move gizmo to drag parts along axes in a direct, visual way.

2) Point-to-Point (Alt Key)

Use Alt for point-to-point positioning (the same workflow as part positioning elsewhere):

  • Pick a point on the moving part
  • Pick a target point in the scene
  • The part snaps so those points align

This is the fastest way to align edges, corners, or key reference points precisely.

Measure (Quick Measure)

To measure without creating a saved dimension:

  • Make sure no part is selected
  • Hold Alt
  • Pick a start point, then pick an end point (same feel as point-to-point)
  • You’ll get an on-screen measurement readout

Use this for fast “how far is that?” checks while assembling.

Dimensions (Create a 3D Dimension)

Dimensions are persistent annotations you can place in the scene.

Workflow:

  1. Hold Ctrl and find your first point
  2. Release Ctrl
  3. Move to the second point, then Ctrl + click to set it
  4. Drag the dimension to the desired display plane (where you want it to “sit” visually)

Use dimensions to document:

  • overall width/height/depth
  • hole spacing
  • offsets to edges
  • assembly clearances