Good sculpting is half looking. You'll orbit around the model hundreds of times an hour, so these moves should become reflexes before anything else.
The three camera moves
- Orbit — hold the right mouse button and drag. The camera circles the model.
- Pan — hold the middle mouse button (the wheel) and drag. The camera slides sideways.
- Zoom — roll the mouse wheel.
Hold Ctrl while orbiting and the camera snaps to fixed angles — useful when you want a clean three-quarter or profile view without hunting for it.
Lost the model? Press F — Fit view centres the model and fits the zoom to it. It's also a button in the Gizmo section of the right panel.
Snap to the classic views
The number keys jump straight to the six axis views:
| Key | View |
|---|---|
| 1 | Front |
| 3 | Right |
| 7 | Top |
| Shift+1 / 3 / 7 | Back / Left / Bottom |
| 5 | Toggle Perspective / Ortho |
The same views live in the View menu, and the navigation gizmo in the top-right corner always names the view you're closest to.
Perspective and Ortho
Perspective is the natural sculpting view — closer things look bigger, and a floor plane sits under the model for orientation.
Ortho (orthographic) removes perspective entirely: parallel lines stay parallel, so proportions read true. It's the projection for checking silhouettes, comparing sizes, and working against reference images. In Ortho, two extra panel sections appear — Reference and Grid — and a world-unit measurement grid can sit behind the model like graph paper.
The grid's Size slider sets the spacing in world units, and Unit mm maps world units to real millimetres — which also scales exports, so a slicer reads true sizes. The Floor toggle controls the perspective ground plane, and the X / Y / Z chips toggle the axis guide lines.
Where you're pointing matters
Sculpt strokes land where the cursor ray hits the surface, so orbit until the area you're working on faces you comfortably. Sculpting at a steep grazing angle stretches strokes; a quarter-turn of orbit fixes it. When a stroke feels wrong, check the camera before blaming the brush.
Next: your first strokes.