Transform Object: move, rotate and scale objects with a widget

Transform Object puts a widget with three rings and three arrows on the selected objects, so you can rotate, move and scale them with the mouse. Use it to place a part or a scan by eye, for example to stand a model upright before printing or to put two parts next to each other.

You find it in Transform › Transform Object and on the toolbar above the viewport.

Task	Tool
Rotate, move or scale an object by eye, one axis at a time	Transform Object
Drag an object in the viewport without a widget	Move Object
Change the size by a factor, for example after a unit mix-up	Scale
Put one object onto another by pairs of matching points	Align Manually

How to move, rotate or scale an object

1. Select one or more objects in the Scene tree.
2. Click Transform › Transform Object. The widget appears around the selected objects, and the Transform Object panel opens on the right.
3. Drag the widget:
   • Drag a ring to rotate around its axis: red is X, green is Y, blue is Z.
   • Drag an arrow to move along its axis.
   • Hold Ctrl (Cmd on macOS) and drag an arrow to scale along that axis.
   • Hold Ctrl+Shift (Cmd+Shift on macOS) and drag an arrow to scale the object uniformly, with the same factor along all axes.
4. Close the panel when the object is in place. To undo a drag, press Ctrl+Z (Cmd+Z on macOS).

The first lines of the panel remind you of the scaling keys.

While you drag, a label next to the cursor shows the angle, the distance or the scale factor. The same values appear in the Transform block at the bottom of the left panel: Rotation XYZ in degrees, Translation along X, Y and Z, and the scale. With Uni-scale on, one field holds the scale for all axes; turn it off to see and enter a factor for each axis. You can also type a value in any of these fields or drag inside it.

Panel options

Option	What it does	Default
Fixed Size in Pixel	Keeps the widget the same size on screen when you zoom. Radius and Controls Width are then set in pixels.	Off
Radius	The radius of the rings	Set from the size of the objects
Controls Width	The thickness of the rings and arrows	Set from the size of the objects
Detach controls	Dragging moves and rotates only the widget, not the objects. Use it to move the center of rotation, then turn it off and rotate the objects around the new center. Scaling is not available while it is on.	Off
Reset controls	Puts the widget back to the center of the selected objects	–
Fit on mouse up	Fits the view to the objects each time you release the mouse button	Off
Mode: Rot X, Rot Y, Rot Z, Move X, Move Y, Move Z	Shows or hides each ring and arrow. Leave only the ones you need, for example only Rot Z to turn a part on the build plate.	All on
Dot threshold	Hides controls that are hard to grab from the current view: a ring you see almost edge-on, and an arrow that points almost straight at you. The higher the value, the more controls are hidden.	0 % (all shown)

Apply Transform

An object in MeshInspector has two parts: the coordinates of its points, and a transform, which says where the object is placed, how it is turned and how large it is in the scene. Transform Object, Move Object and the fields of the Transform block change only the transform. Apply Transform writes the transform into the coordinates of the points and resets the transform to zero rotation, zero translation and scale 1. The object stays where it is on the screen.

When to apply the transform:

• Before a tool that works in the coordinates of the object itself. For example, Z-Compensate moves vertices along the Z axis of the mesh, and Terrain to Mesh triangulates points by their own X and Y. If you turned the object, apply the transform first, so that these tools use the axes you see in the scene.
• When you want the Local values of the Information panel, such as Local Box Size, to match the object as it is placed now.

You do not need it before export: when you save a mesh, a point cloud or lines to a file, MeshInspector writes the coordinates as you see them in the scene. Voxel objects and distance maps are an exception: they are saved without the transform of the scene.

To apply the transform:

1. Select the objects in the Scene tree.
2. Click Transform › Apply Transform. Or click the check mark in the header of the Transform block, or open the ⋮ menu there and click Apply.

The check mark appears only when a selected object has a transform to apply. After Apply Transform, Rotation XYZ and Translation show 0 and the scale shows 1. Objects nested in the selected one keep their place in the scene. For a voxel object, MeshInspector warns that it also shifts the voxels so that no data has negative coordinates. To go back, use Undo.

Reset, copy and save a transform

The buttons in the header of the Transform block:

• ✓ (check mark) applies the transform, as described above.
• × resets the transform: the object goes back to the position, rotation and size stored in its points.
• ⋮ opens the Transform Data menu.

Command	What it does
Copy	Copies the transform to the clipboard
Paste	Gives the copied transform to the selected objects. It appears when the clipboard holds a copied transform.
Save to file	Saves the transform to a JSON file
Load from file	Gives the transform from a JSON file to the selected objects
Apply	Same as Apply Transform
Reset	Same as the × button

Copy and Save to file are unavailable when the selected objects have different transforms. Apply and Reset appear only when a selected object has a transform to apply or reset. Use Copy and Paste, or a saved file, to give several scans or parts exactly the same placement.