General: OPTION to get the Y-axis up
I'm touching a sensible topic with this request. But it should definitely be an option.
At school, we learn graphics with Y-axis pointing up, Z-axis pointing depth. Most of the creation softwares use this standardized way of computing the 3D space.
The Z-axis up leads to confusion when communicating with other softwares. The Blender creators may have had a reason to build it this way, but it does NOT make sense for most users.
Current status: the z-axis is pointing up.
Solution: in the Blender preferences, add an option to use the standardized axis system (Y pointing up). It's a simple checkbox.
AN OPTION, NOT AN OBLIGATION!
This idea was marked as a duplicate of Y - axis, finally UP?.
5 Comments
I feel this image explains it best:
That ship already sailed :
blender.community/c/rightclickselect/qQpD
blender.community/c/rightclickselect/HGbbbc
blender.community/c/rightclickselect/0Pbbbc
blender.community/c/rightclickselect/qZdbbc
Short answer : it is not "the" standard as so many people think, nor a simple option to implement - even as a simple fake display.
Every 3D software use one of the four common coordinates system, no matter what you're used to. You better get over it.
Think about it:
Maya does have an option so switch between Yup and Zup Coodrinates Systems, but:
That's why I said "option"; I don't get why this would be so hard to implement.
I don't get what's the problem with a "fake display" built well, and why it would be more harmful concerning the default settings.
I'm personally totally used to the Zup CS. I'm just making this proposal to go towards a greater user accessibility for Blender. My belief is that open-source software should remain user-centered, unlike the paid software that take a great pleasure being conservative and a pain in the ass with stupid, old principles that never change.
Look at ******** after effects....
Coordinates Systems being an option isn't the issue. The issue is that it's not trivial to do, and the gain is questionable at best.
Development side:
You basically have to rewrite everything to support a new CS, then maintaining the software is heavier because you have to make everything for two CSs, and people will still be confused at some point no matter the CS they chose.
Gain side:
Look at Maya, they have an option too, it's still confusing at some point, and every one uses the default CS on tutorials and documentation so everyone keeps using it just for consistency. It's like customizing keymaps on a software to make it feel like another: you can do it, but most people end up keeping everything mostly vanilla because it's a bigger pain otherwise.
Again, that discussion already happened.
Adding an option like this would take months of effort and be a big pain to implement. And maintaining it would be just as hard. You can't just tell the code "Y is up now". Hundreds if not thousands of tools and calculations have to changed that were designed assuming Z-up. And I'm pretty sure this would have a notable performance impact, since it creates many code branches where the CPU needs to first query if it should execute the "Z-up" or "Y-up" code. Some low-level optimizations might be possible, but it's not gonna be at no cost.
From what I heard other applications that have such an option are struggling quite a bit with it, and they are error prone. Any "fake display" would run into problems & limitations very quickly, since the rest of Blender design doesn't match.
Time is better spent on other things, like improving axis converting options in importers/exporters.