3D Toolbar

The toolbar is located at the top of the 3D View window and gathers everything you need to build a three-dimensional scene: moving fixtures between the mapping and 3D, importing models, navigation, creating objects, splines, cameras, and projections. The window itself is toggled on and off from the Window → 3D View menu.

The buttons are separated into groups by vertical dotted lines. Some of the buttons are toggles: exactly one tool is always active, and it determines what mouse clicks and drags do in the scene (for details, see 3D Навигация). The rest of the buttons are one-off actions: create an object, import a model, frame a camera.

All the labels below are the buttons' tooltips: hover the cursor over a button and the program will show its name.

Moving Fixtures and Importing Models

The first group links the 3D scene to the rest of the project: fixtures on the mapping and external models.

Magic 2D Button

Transfers objects from 3D to the Mapping plane. Opens the Magic Settings window, where you set:

Select Camera — which view to look at the scene from. Fixtures will be placed on the mapping the way they are seen from this camera, so choose a camera that shows the needed side of the object fully and without heavy overlaps. Selecting a camera from the list immediately switches the window's view to it, so you can see exactly what will be transferred.
Transfer Objects — All Objects, Visible Objects, or Selected Objects.
Size — the Width and Height of the area on the mapping that the transfer will fit into. The values are linked proportionally: change one and the other recalculates.

The OK button creates fixtures on the mapping and immediately links them to the source 3D objects. Fixtures already transferred to the mapping earlier are not transferred again — you can open the window as many times as you like as new objects appear in the scene.

Magic 3D Button: The reverse action: transfers fixtures from the mapping to 3D. The Magic Settings window sets the Width and Height — the dimensions of the rectangle in which the fixtures will be laid out in 3D as a flat "wall" that repeats their arrangement on the mapping. Only fixtures that don't yet have a 3D counterpart are created, and each new 3D object is immediately linked to its fixture on the mapping.

Import Object: Opens a file selection window and adds a model in *.obj or *.fbx format to the scene. From an *.fbx file, not only the objects themselves are pulled in but also splines and light sources prepared in the 3D editor — meaning the model arrives with fixtures already placed. The program remembers the folder you imported from last time. For details, see Импорт моделей OBJ and Подготовка модели в 3ds max.

Navigation and Selection

Select and Move: The main tool, also the one active when the window opens. A click selects an object, a selection box selects several objects, and Shift and Ctrl add to the selection. A selected object gets a three-axis gizmo, whose axes are used to move, rotate, or scale the object.

Hand: Pans the scene by dragging. The same effect is available in any tool by holding down the mouse wheel (middle button), so switching to the "Hand" tool is usually unnecessary.

Orbit: Rotates the camera around the center of the window by dragging. The same result is achieved in any tool with Alt + middle mouse button, while Shift + middle button rotates the camera in first-person mode.

Move, Rotate, and Scale

To the right of the navigation tools are coordinate fields and three toggle buttons. They determine exactly what the gizmo does to the selected object.

Button	Key	What the X, Y, Z fields show
Move	Q	the object's position in the scene
Rotate	E	rotation angles in degrees
Scale	R	scale in percent, 100 is the original size

The X, Y, Z fields to the left of the buttons show the selected object's values and can be edited: you can type in exact numbers instead of dragging with the mouse. Values are rounded to the hundredths.

Snapping

Snap to Vertices: A toggle. While it's on, the object being dragged and the points of the spline being drawn stick to the vertices of geometry already present in the scene; the snap point is highlighted with a light-green cross. This is the main way to place fixtures precisely along the edges and corners of an imported model rather than "by eye". Snapping is off by default.; Right-clicking this same button opens the Snap Settings window with two parameters: Snap to Grid (with the grid step next to it) and Snap Angle.

Rotation Snap and Angle: A toggle and a field with a number of degrees next to it. When snapping is on, rotating with the gizmo happens in steps of the specified angle; when off, rotation is free. Snapping is on by default, with a 5° step. This is the same value as the Snap Angle in the Snap Settings window.; A step of 0 degrees doesn't limit rotation — it completely blocks it, so you shouldn't set a zero value.

Scene Objects

The Add Plane, Add Cube, Add Cylinder, and Add Sphere buttons create simple primitives: a wall, a box, a column, a ball. The object appears at the center of the scene, is immediately selected, and the "Select and Move" tool is activated — so you can set its size and location right away.

These objects don't glow themselves: they serve as scenery and as a base against which it's convenient to place fixtures with vertex snapping enabled. Size and material are configured in the Properties window (see 3D Объекты).

Splines and Fixtures

Add Line, Add Circle, Add Rectangle, Add Polygon: Ready-made spline shapes along which fixtures are arranged. Each is created at the center of the scene with a single click of the button, and its shape is then set with numbers in the Properties window: for a circle — radius and opening angle, for a rectangle — width and height, for a polygon — number of sides and radius. Individual points of these shapes cannot be edited: to change the shape, you change the parameters.

Draw Spline: Draws a polyline directly in the scene: the first click is the start, each next click is a new vertex, Enter finishes the spline, and Esc also ends the drawing. After finishing, the program automatically switches to "Select and Move", and the new spline remains selected.; Points are placed on the horizontal plane of the scene (floor level) — unless Snap to Vertices is enabled. With snapping on, each point lands on a vertex of existing geometry, which is how a spline is drawn along the edges of an imported model. For details, see Добавление 3D сплайнов.

Add from Fixtures: Adds a single 3D fixture to the scene. On its own it isn't linked to anything: which fixture from the mapping it represents is assigned in the Properties window (see Связь 2D и 3D).

Cameras

Add Camera: Creates a new Target Camera in the scene, aimed at the entire scene. Such cameras are saved in the project: they're used to view the object from a desired point, and they're also the source for the view used for the GIF preview on export and for transferring fixtures with the "Magic 2D Button".

Camera List: The dropdown list to the right of the button switches the view in the window. It always contains seven built-in views — Perspective, Top, Bottom, Left, Right, Front, Back — followed by the cameras added to the project. The six flat views are convenient for precise placement: objects aren't distorted by perspective in them. For details, see Переключение видов и камер.

Camera Target (Z): Frames the selected objects in the window and makes their center the point around which the camera orbits. If nothing is selected, the whole scene is framed; cameras themselves aren't taken into account, so the view doesn't "fly off" because of a camera positioned far away. Pressing the Z key while the cursor is over the window does the same thing.

Editing, Copies, and Projection

Edit Spline: A mode for editing the vertices of the selected spline: points can be dragged, added, and deleted. The button is available for manually drawn and imported splines; for ready-made shapes, the form is set by parameters rather than points. The mode's panel has a Snap Movement checkbox and six buttons — +X, -X, +Y, -Y, +Z, -Z — which align the selected points along the corresponding axis.

Duplicate: Makes a row of copies of the selected object with a fixed step. You set the Count of copies and the Offset along X, Y, and Z between them; the copies are shown in the scene immediately as you adjust the values. The Auto Trace checkbox links each subsequent copy to the next fixture in the list — a row of copies immediately gets different fixtures instead of repeating the same one. Enter creates the copies, Esc cancels.

Spline Cloner: Unlike "Duplicate", this doesn't create a set of independent copies but a single Cloner object that multiplies the source spline or fixture. The button is available when exactly one spline or single fixture is selected; right after creation, the cloner produces 10 repeats. The count, offset, and rotation of each subsequent repeat are configured in the Properties window and can be changed at any time — the source object itself remains a single one. This makes it convenient to build rows of identical strips, staircases, and rings.

Add Projection: Adds a projector object to the scene that shines a composition's image onto the objects in the scene. The projection is created at the center of the scene and immediately selected; its position and parameters are configured in the Properties window. For details, see Создание проекции and Настройки проекции.; When deleting a projection, the program asks for separate confirmation — a configured projector can't be erased by accident.

Other things worth knowing

The View → 3D View menu controls what's drawn in the window: Model Grid, Auxiliary 3D Objects (cameras, projections, and splines), Show 3D GIF Bounds. The G key toggles the floor grid on and off.
Keyboard navigation: WASD moves the camera, and + and − on the main keyboard control the speed of that movement.
Undo and redo in 3D work the same way as everywhere else: Ctrl+Z and Ctrl+Shift+Z. The full list of shortcuts is in the Help → Hotkeys window.