Manipulating Smart Objects

Finding the perfect visuals for a step is a combination of finding a great Camera Angle and manipulating the objects on screen. Sometimes exaggerating the size of the objects or vice versa, is useful to be able to relate relevant information for the user.

Adding and Deleting Smart Objects in a Step

To add an object to the step, you need to drag it from the Smart Object Library to the scene. Adding an Object into a Content Step creates a clone of the original Object shown in the Library. This means that modifying an individual Object in the Content Step Editor does not affect the other Objects that are created from the same original. So changing the color of an object in the inspector, for example, only affects that single object.

There is no limit of how many Objects you can have in one Content Step. But it's good to make sure that there’s very little or none extra elements outside the camera view in content steps. This helps the overall performance and reduces the size of the tutorial.

Add Objects by dragging them from the library to the content area.

Delete an Object or Objects by first selecting and then clicking delete on the keyboard.

Basic Controls

Move (Shortcut key: W) Move the object(s) around the stage

Rotate (E) Rotate the selected object(s)

Resize (R) Adjust the size/scale of the selected object(s)
Undo (CTRL + Z) Undo the last action. Note, undo does always work correctly with animations and timeline manipulation!

Redo (CTRL + Y)

Reset Rotation and Scale to the applied to the selected object(s)

Duplicate Object creates an exact copy of the object (animation included) to the same exact position as the old one was

Snap to Ground drops the selected object(s) to ground level

Box Snap Toggle When moving an object it will snap to the bounds of other objects

Guides brings the visual aids to help aling camera angles

Quick Reference brings up the shortcut-key list

Select Object: Hover Object + Left Mouse Button (When selected, an Object has a Bounding Box (indicated by green highlighted corners) and an Anchor Point (point where the arrows meet). Object rotates around its Anchor Point.

Select Multiple Objects draw a bounding box around the objects. If you have a prior object selected, press shift while drawing the bounding box.

Deselect Object(s) Left Mouse Button in an empty space on the stage

Aligning and Snapping

Content editor does not use a pre-existing snap-to grid, and all objects can be moved freely. The grid goes to all three dimensions but is visible on only 2 dimensions at the “table level”, the level where the Object shadows are also visible.

Snap to grid (Left Shift + S)

● Snap Selected Object’s Anchor Point to closest grid point in the pre-existing grid.

Snap to grid (Hold Left Shift)

● While Moving: Moves Object in with 2cm steps. To move Object in the pre-existing grid first snap to grid (Shift+S), and then move by holding down Left Shift.

● While Resizing: Snap to increments when Resizing.

● While Rotating: Rotation is done by 15° increments.

Snap to Bounding Box (Hold V) Best done with a simple object, such as a card or a cube

1) Select an Object.

2) Hold down V and hover over one corner of the object’s bounding box (indicated by green corners). Corners should be indicated by a grey box.

3) Click and hold left mouse button on the selected corner and move Object next to another Object. Selected Object will now try to snap to the bounding box of the nearby Object(s).