The metric cursor

Abstract

This paper proposes a new interaction technique for positioning or moving 3D points, which is a basic task in geometric modeling and several other applications. These systems usually make use of a 2D interface with a 2D cursor. However positioning 3D points with a 2D cursor is often done by using several windows, each window displaying a different orthographic projection of the 3D space. This paper introduces the Metric Cursor, a multi-purpose 3D cursor which moves freely in the 3D space, requires only one window and provides the user with different helpful functionalities such as grids and some measurement capabilities.