macOS Initial Feedback

Shapr3D for macOS - Beta group
#1

Hi guys,

Delighted to be able to try out Shapr3D on my Mac, I think this has the potential to be a gamechanger for designers everywhere! Here are my first impressions of the macOS Beta without having gotten into the details of actual designing just yet:

  • The onboarding experience is great, super simple and intuitive- gets you right into the experience.
  • It’s a nice touch to have the availability of tutorials and inspiration in the app itself- what would make it even better would be to have the option to watch the YouTube links picture-in-picture while modelling. The biggest pain of using YouTube videos is having to switch from window to window- this is the same in the iPad app and perhaps less of an issue on macOS as you could use multiple monitors but it would be great to replicate the experience of the in-built onboarding tutorials with the other materials.
  • Having the keyboard shortcuts easily available in the top left is excellent. Maybe a keyboard shortcut could be added that will allow you to bring up the shortcuts list- would be even better!
  • Zoom is not working with the scroll wheel on my mouse. It worked during the onboarding, but in general use is not.
  • My designs didn’t sync between my account on my iPad and macOS- assuming this is something that isn’t yet functional but will be in the future?
  • It would be great to make better use of the mouse functionality for navigation- for example, using the left click or middle click to navigate in space instead of having to use shift+right click. This would free up the left hand for completing other commands. Even if the current commands are the defaults, having the option to change these in settings would be great.
  • It would be great to implement support for the use of a 3D mouse- I use 3DConnexion SpaceMouse Pro and its compatibility makes a big impact on my decision to use a tool or not. I appreciate it’s early days and this is probably a much lower priority but coming from a lean startup background I know this is the type of thing you want to hear!
#2

Hi, I love modeling with Shapr3D on the iPad. With the new version for Mac this will now also work on a large display. I tried the first beta. It is already really good. Here are a few things I noticed:

  • high processor load of the process WindowServer (fans turn up)
  • too low resolution of the model (no sharp edges especially on large display)
  • movement of objects not fluid
  • video tutorial: 2 finger taps = select area on body → does not work. 2 finger click works
  • symbols too small (especially value input for movements/rotation)
  • zoom works cumbersomely, especially with complex objects
#3

:pray:

Every feedback on navigation is welcome. It’s still very new for us and we are still learning a lot. We did not plan to support space mouse, but actually we are receiving a ton of requests for it. So I guess we will have to prioritize it, but I can’t promise anything.

Yes, that’s not implemented yet. We would like to implement it very soon. Definitely a priority. We would like to provide a seamless experience for switching between devices.

1 Like
#4

Hi Sven,

Can you share the specs of your mac? The experience on Apple Silicon macs is amazing, but we have to work a lot to optimize further for Intel macs.

On Intel macs due to performance issues anti aliasing is not as high quality as on Apple Silicon macs or on iPad.

Are you using a trackpad or a mouse? What does “cumbersomely” mean?

#5

Just tried the onboarding and had a few comments:

  • The zoom-into-face says to double click with 2 fingers (on the trackpad) - is this supposed to be the system secondary click setting? I was finding it impossible to do this and realised the reason is I set my secondary click to the bottom right corner (double clicking there worked fine). I’m not sure if there’s any easy way to check the user preference but it might save some confusion for other people like me
  • Again might just be me, but the default font size seems a little bit small

And a few small things that might be nice further down the track:

  • Alignment haptic feedback would be a neat little addition (e.g. the circle centre alignment)
  • The tool circles on the left would be perfect in the Touch Bar

Otherwise it’s working very smoothly on an M1 MBP so far, thanks for letting us try out the beta!

2 Likes
#6

Hi @bhc, great points, thank you.

Great catch.

This is an awesome idea. We are working on hover implementation, I think there will be a lot of options to use haptic feedback there.

2 Likes
#7

Hi Sven,

For 2 finger tap to work, you need to have both Secondary click and Tap to click enabled in System Preferences > Trackpad.

#8

Hi David, this option is enabled on my system. But only 2-finger click works (not tapping).

#9

Unfortunately, I’m not privileged to have one of the new Apple Silicon Mac - that’s my wish for Christmas :wink: I’m working with a MacBook Pro 13" 2019 2.4 GHz Core i5 (Intel :frowning: ) and 8 GB RAM.

1 Like
#10

My comparison was Rhino3D. Here the edges are absolutely sharp.

1 Like
#11

I’m using a trackpad. With “cumbersomely”, I mean, that the zoom function sometimes work and sometimes not. Sometimes I need 3 or more tries to get a reaction.

2 Likes
#12

I’m working on an Apple Silicon Mac. I am really encouraged by the performance.

I usually use rhino 3d for 3d modeling. I brought a heavy rhino model over as a step file and I am impressed by the performance. However, some of the functionality is lacking.

I would like to orbit with the trackpad without using shift. If, you let us choose that would be a lot better. The combined use of the keyboard, mouse, and trackpad would be a great consideration. In rhino I select, point, zoom and pan with the mouse, and orbit with my trackpad. It is very intuitive, ad fluid. This is of course, when I don’t have a 3d Mouse at my disposal.

Also, the use of a 3d mouse for those of us who have one would be fantastic.

Touch Bar functionality is a must. I have customized my Mac to have the commands I use the most for both AutoCAD and rhino on the touch bar, and is a game-changer. Another great implementation of it would be to contextualize the commands you typically get at the right on it.

The loading of the model I previously exported is quite slow. Even after saving and opening back up.

Thank you so much for putting Shapr 3d on mac it looks really promising.

2 Likes
#13

You are right Sven, this seems to be a bug on our side, working on it.
2 finger click works, tap isn’t at the moment, but should.

#14

Hi Shapr3d Team,

First off I’m very happy you guys decided to bring out Shapr3D for macOs. I like the iPad & Pencil version, but working on it anything longer than a few hours, I find it very uncomfortable because I’m constantly looking down and my neck starts to hurt. So thank you very much for the macOs version. I’m using a 27” 5k iMac Intel (& Apple Magic Mouse 2), to have the extra screen real estate is fantastic! It took me very little time to getting used to mouse & keyboard. Although I find the “control”-key should be used for moving the camera around instead of the shift key and the zoom in & out should be the “option”-key, but I guess that is someones preference. Which gets me to the customization of the app (ie. keyboard shortcut & a dark mode), it would be great to have more options to tweak the app to a users mindset.

Also, a nice option would be, to be able to move the folder panel separately from the rest of the interface and even have the option to have it float outside of the main window.
What I would like to have is that the macOS version is more integrated into the system. For example that the menu bar is actually being used for options and functions to be more accessible through the menu; the dialog windows should be more macOs style and less iPad (Open & export for example) – it would make it more professional looking and use macOs full UI potential. I used and tried many other 3D CAD apps from the competition and it always seems to me that the macOS version are converted apps from other operating systems with a missing macOS design guideline, which sometimes hurts my eyes and to me also is an indication that the apps are prone to crashing in the wrong moments or in other words just not really made for Mac (there are few exceptions). The looks may not be related to the code necessarily of course, but I believe the attention to detail is. Shapr3D is on the right track, I find, and the latter mentioned observation is only meant to underline that.

Although not specific to the macOS version, I very much appreciate the export option to DWG & DXF. A important feature for using Shapr3D in production environments. Together with the macOs version so comfortable to confirm the files and to send off to a CNC machine, GOOD WORK!

So far I haven’t run into any major problems with the beta version, other than it sometimes gets a little slower displaying camera movements. Looking forward to Apple Silicon.

Thank you again for a great product – it makes making things easier and more intuitive.

1 Like
#15

Awesome feedback, thank you.

This is absolutely true, and this is our no1 priority. The items panel, the color tool, and other UI elements will be completely redesigned for mac (and for iPad too btw), and many many improvements related to hover are coming. Our ambition is to provide a first class, stellar mac experience. Our goal with this early beta was really just to “make it work” and collect early feedback.

Coming in 2021/Q1 :slight_smile:

#16

I agree. It wold be really nice to be able to tweak the navigation buttons. It would make it so much easier when using more than one 3D app.

Philip

#17

Just did an initial beta install on MacOS. Pinch to zoom doesn’t work at all and can’t progress past intro screens.

#18

Can you share your config? Are you using it with a built in trackpad or magic trackpad? A screenshot of your mac’s “About this mac” (under the Apple menu in the top left corner) would be super helpful.

#19

Magic Trackpad, but Trackpad on Laptop doesn’t work either.

Screen Shot 2020-12-10 at 11.30.19 AM

P.S. I write software for a living so if there’s anything technical you want me to do in turn, don’t hesitate to ask.

1 Like
#20

Thank you, we are looking into this.

Ps.: we are hiring https://www.shapr3d.com/jobs

:slight_smile: