15.5 Camera Control¶
In FEBio Studio, the camera determines the position and orientation from which the model is viewed. The user can position and orient the camera in several ways. Camera positions can also be saved to make it easier to recover certain preferred positions.
Basic Camera control¶
The easiest way to position the camera (and thus change the view) is by using the mouse. Moving the mouse while holding down one of its buttons will modify the view. The action depends on which mouse button is held down. The following lists the possible actions.
| Action | Mouse/Keyboard |
|---|---|
| To rotate the view | Left MB |
| To pan the view | Middle MB or ALT\(+\)Right MB |
| To zoom | Right MB |
| To rotate in the plane of view | ALT\(+\)Left MB |
| To rotate view left/right by small increment | Left/Right arrow key |
| To rotate view up/down by small increment | Up/Down arrow key |
Table 1. Mouse and keyboard shortcuts to control view.
The camera position and orientation is displayed under the View item in the Model Viewer. By selecting this item in the Model Viewer, the current camera position and orientation is shown in the properties panel under the Model Viewer. All these fields can be edited manually for precision control over the camera.
Element tracking¶
The element tracking feature in FEBio Studio allows you to track the position and orientation of an element. The camera will then move with this element as it deforms through time.
In order to use element tracking, first select the element that you wish to track. Then, select the View → Track Selection menu item. To stop element tracking, clear the selection and then select the same menu item (or use the Ctrl\(+\)T shortcut).
Camera key-framing¶
The current position of a camera can be stored in what is called a viewpoint. Simply select the View → Save viewpoint menu item and a new key item will be created in the Model Viewer. As with the View item, selecting a Key item allows you to edit the position and orientation of that stored camera position. In addition, by selecting the View → Prev/Next viewpoint, you can smoothly interpolate between camera key positions. This feature comes in handy when recording an animation and different camera positions need to be visited in a repeatable manner. Camera keys are stored in the FEBio Studio session file so they can be retrieved later.