Having a longer label option could be a nice solution. Decipher icons aren't an issue when you use Maya every day. Eventually you'll get used to them.
The problem is when you don't use it every day. I can be months or even years without using Maya at full (I think that may change a little from now on) and every time I forget what half of my shelf means. And custom scripts without icons and only 4 chars labels are also another problem. Martin Sent from my iPhone > On 2014/03/26, at 5:06, Luc-Eric Rousseau <[email protected]> wrote: > > You can turn on the labels for the Maya shelf in the shelf editor (in > its Option menu) but the point is, the shelf, or toolbar in general, > are quick shortcuts to things that are the menu, so having to decipher > them is not an issue. The shelf is fun and made to play around. You > can tear off a menu to get a quick toolbar for one-click access to > menu commands. The only maya thing doesn't do correctly in that area > is it's not showing you the shelf icon next to the menu item to help > users learn that these two things are the same, which might be leading > some of you to believe that these are different. Now about the > wonderfulness of text labels, I have no clue what a QuadChamfer is and > if there is an ointment for that. :P > > >> On Tue, Mar 25, 2014 at 3:28 PM, Octavian Ureche <[email protected]> wrote: >> Icons are great for people comfortable with the application, not that much >> for everyone else. A perfect example of an elegant solution would be what >> the sidefx dev team did when doing their own version of "the shelf". They >> added 3 modes for displaying it: icons, text and icons with text underneath. >> The shelf in maya, has always been icons only. Yes you can hover the mouse >> over the icons and it will show you what that icon represents, but it's >> pretty annoying to have to do that all the time, or learn the shapes of the >> icons. Yes, you can also hack it, by building your own custom color square, >> and use that for every single shelf button, and then add a custom label for >> each, taking into account that you can't use more than 6 or 7 letters for >> each square, thus reducing things like "rigid link" to "rgdlnk"...and this >> is exactly the point - this is the maya way...hacking your way through with >> a mental machete, instead of just having things layed out elegantly in front >> of you. >> The truly great thing about text is that it is usually consistent throughout >> all 3d applications. >> A sphere, an extrude, a cut, a material, a vertex etc, are all usually the >> same in all apps, or similar concepts very easy to translate mentally. While >> a square cut in 4 sides with one side greenish and arrow pointing at it >> (component selection icon), or a set of bowling pins with a large circle >> around them (rigid body from selection) is only in maya. If i am a max, >> lightwave, c4d, houdini, xsi etc user, and i see a set of bowling pins, how >> does that make me think of rigid bodies from selection? i could think of >> nurbs or game engine tools or shading or who knows what. Each of us >> understands an image differently, but a "rigid body from selection" is the >> same to everyone working in 3d. >> >> Does this make sense? >> >> Cheers, >> Octav >> >> >> On Tue, Mar 25, 2014 at 8:56 PM, Andy Goehler <[email protected]> >> wrote: >>> >>> Would you want to ged rid of that massive arrow in the MCP too? :-) >>> >>> Icons have their place, they need to communicate well and be used with >>> care. The Nuke toolbar icons work great IMHO. >>> >>> Cheers, >>> >>> Andy >>> >>>> On 25.03.2014, at 17:40, Paul Griswold >>>> <[email protected]> wrote: >>>> >>>> 1. Text based everything - I hate the shelf in Softimage as well as the >>>> UV editor. Get rid of icons entirely. >> >> >> >> -- >> Octavian Ureche >> +40 732 774 313 (GMT+2) >> CG & VFX >> www.okto.ro
