Add Blender-inspired transform tools in the 2D editor

Lamoot commented 1 year ago

Describe the project you are working on

2D graphics, turn-based rpg.

Describe the problem or limitation you are having in your project

Godot 4.0 received a great usability improvement to 3D transformation tools, inspired by Blender's UI and shortcuts. It's the well-known G - translate / R - rotate / S - scale approach. The feature request is found in https://github.com/godotengine/godot-proposals/issues/1215 and was implemented by https://github.com/godotengine/godot/pull/56543

The limitation I'm facing is that these same transform tools don't work in the 2D editors. One of Blender's usability strengths is consistency across the program. The same way to transform objects in one editor can be used in any of the other editors. Godot would equally benefit users by having this consistency.

Describe the feature / enhancement and how it helps to overcome the problem or limitation

The feature would work the same as described in https://github.com/godotengine/godot-proposals/issues/1215 but limited to 2 dimensions. By using these same transform tools and shortcuts across Godot's editors, users could use the common G - translate / R - rotate / S - scale approach any time they wanted to transform an object.

This core of this proposal is to have these tool available in the 2D editor. However, it could be further expanded to also work in:

Node editor to move nodes around
Animation editor to move selected keys
Any other relevant editor where objects can be moved around the space

Describe how your proposal will work, with code, pseudo-code, mock-ups, and/or diagrams

Pressing keyboard shortcuts G - translate / R - rotate / S - scale immediately activates the corresponding transform tool for the selected 2D objects.
Transformation is performed until the user confirms or cancels it, no mouse button needs to be held. Mouse click confirms the transform, ESC cancels it and restores the initial object transforms.
While the transformation is active, the user can (once) press x or y to limit the transform to one of the axis in global space.
While the transformation is active, the user can (twice) press xx or yy to limit the transform to each object's local space x or y axis.
While the transformation is active, hold ctrl to use snap, shift for precise transform, or ctrl+shift for precise snap transform.

If this enhancement will not be used often, can it be worked around with a few lines of script?

This is a core usability and is expected to be used very often by the people that already use this approach https://github.com/godotengine/godot-proposals/issues/1215 in the 3D editor.

Is there a reason why this should be core and not an add-on in the asset library?

This deals with the very fundamental way users use the Godot editor to move, scale, and rotate 2D objects. Since the same Blender-inspired approach works built-in in Godot's 3D editor, it wouldn't make sense to have this work in the 2D editor via a separate add-on.

ywmaa commented 1 year ago

I love this feature (even though I don't work in 2D other than UI), I will try to work on it soon(TM).

Calinou commented 1 week ago

@ywmaa Were you able to make progress on this? If not, no worries – let us know and someone else can continue looking into this :slightly_smiling_face:

If you have an unfinished branch, I suggest pushing it to your fork and linking it here.

ywmaa commented 1 week ago

@ywmaa Were you able to make progress on this? If not, no worries – let us know and someone else can continue looking into this :slightly_smiling_face:

If you have an unfinished branch, I suggest pushing it to your fork and linking it here.

unfortunately I didn't work on it, if someone doesn't do it and I have some time I might look into it.

godotengine / godot-proposals