Gradient in 3D view
Right now if you customize 3D viewport to have a gradient in themes/preferences, all the gradient does is add a gradient to your view window (not the actual world). So if you rotate your view to look up and then rotate your view to look down, you end up seeing the same color. A gradient should be in 3D space so that when you look up you're seeing lighter color and rotate down you're seeing a darker color to distinguish between negative z and positive Z. All the gradient does now is to shade the viewport window.
4 Comments
you can do this pretty easily with a world shader. that's what i do anyway. the trick is using a light path node to split what's visible in the background (your gradient) and what's actually contributing light to the scene (your HDRI, a solid color, or nothing at all). Though I agree it would be useful to have something built in.
Not sure this matters, but that behavior will be familiar to Maya users, since that's what Maya's viewport looks like. It's easy enough to create a panoramic gradient texture to do what you're asking.
I think it's important to keep both options. Maybe what you're suggesting could be implemented as a check-box in the theme settings?
I really wouldn't want this as a shader or texture. I was hoping to see this as a customization in themes ideally.
* @steve1 * well, i mean behind the scenes it's a shader, even in maya/modo/max/whatever. tossing it in themes just removes the ability to customize it (other than color)