Version 6.0 Release

Gravity Sketch Version 6.0 is launching on 12th June 2023. This major new release focuses on big UI and Experience changes aimed at putting our tools right at our user's fingertips and making the experience of creating in Gravity Sketch more intuitive. As with all our releases, we have introduced a number of bug fixes as well. You can find the full outline of all the updates and changes in our release notes below.

VR

🚀 Features & Tweaks

• Reworked tool menus.
  • Holding the black button either in or out of edit mode opens the Tools Box. Release to select one of a variety of tools with their own functionality and menus. In the main Toolbox these tools are:
    • Measure: relocated the measure tool from the Primitive Objects menu.
    • Selection: use the trigger to add and remove objects from the selection. This causes the selected objects to behave as if in a group and allows you to manipulate them with the gumball (detailed below). Is also accessible in edit mode and works with points, edges and faces.
      • Direct selection: flick the drawing-hand thumbstick to the side to switch to direct selection (white arrow cursor). This allows you to select specific items from a group without selecting the whole group
      • Gumball: press the purple button while a selection is active to rotate, reposition and resize the selection at the same time. Hold the index trigger on the non-drawing hand to make incremental adjustments.
    • Sketch: the default tool which allows you to create strokes, surfaces and other objects. Pressing the purple button with this tool selected opens the brush menu detailed below.
    • Color & Materials: used to adjust the color, materials and textures of objects in the sketch.
      
      • Paintbrush: Moved from the Tool Belt and selected by default when you enter the Color & Materials tool. Hold the trigger with the Paintbrush and brush it against objects in the sketch to change their color and material to your currently selected color and material.
      • Color picker: Moved from the color wheel. Selected by flicking the drawing-hand thumbstick to the side when in Color & Materials. Press the trigger to pick a color and texture from an existing object or image. Hold the trigger on the non-drawing hand at the same time to only pick the color.
      • Press the purple button to access six customizable material slots. These will persist across sketch and app sessions. Click on one of these to expand the menu, showing the Wheel, Pie and History tabs. Wheel and Pie allow you to change the color and transparency of the selected material slot, while History lets you pick from textures and colors that have previously been used in the sketch. Material options (Basic, Reflective, Toon, Flat, Clay) are unchanged.
      • The Transparency slider now shows a percentage tooltip when changing transparency.
      • Nameless materials are named ‘Custom #’ (Custom 1, 2, 3 etc.).
      • Added a quick color puck selection menu on the side of your non-drawing controller that displays when you hover your main hand pointer over the puck to bring up the quick color panel. This can be used to choose the color and transparency level of newly created objects. 
    • Viewpoints: moved from the purple button brush menus.
  • Removed the Tool Belt from Beta menu options.
• Reworked brush menus.
  • When the Sketch tool is selected the purple button now opens the brush menu, which contains four categories, each of which contains six customisable and nameable brush pre-sets which persist across sketch and app sessions. All geometry types have the same customization options as in previous versions.
    • Draw: ink, strokes ribbons and volumes.
    • Surface: revolves, NURBS and SubD surfaces.
    • Shapes: primitive and subdivision shapes.
    • Text: 3D text in various fonts.
  • Input smoothing is now set per brush pre-set rather than globally in Preferences.
  • Added a “Reset Brushes” option to the Preferences menu to restore default brush settings.
• Updated the appearance of various menus and user interface.
• Added an ‘Unmerge Edge’ tool to edit mode on subdivision objects. This allows you to cut your SubD surfaces along edges and is useful for creating geometry which requires unmerging vertices, as well as improving the appearance of textures on subdivision objects.
• Added the ability to log in without a password from the lobby.
• Added the ability to log in or sign up from within the Save menu in a sketch session.
• Added a button to the Online Users menu in Collab to invite other users to follow you.
• Moved Review Mode from being part of the Viewpoints tool to being its own tool in the Beta menu.
  • Added a new hint to exit Reviewer mode.
• Added a ‘Display Frequency’ setting to Preferences on standalone headsets with four options if your headset supports them: 72hz, 80hz, 90hz and 120hz.
• Made edges on ink and strokes grabbable and transformable, and added selection modes (flick the drawing-hand thumbstick to the side while in edit mode) so the grabber can affect only points or edges
• Made edges and faces on NURBS surfaces grabbable and transformable, and added selection modes (flick the drawing-hand thumbstick to the side while in edit mode) so the grabber can affect only points, edges or faces.
• Added an icon next to a user’s name in Collab to display when they are in passthrough.
• Added a ‘Render Mode’ toggle to screenshots with two options: Screenshot and Render. Screenshot captures the scene exactly as you see it, while Render will hide menu and interface elements from the screenshot and apply ambient occlusion if it’s not already enabled.
• All sketching tools now display mirrored cursors when the mirror is active.
• All tools now have a cursor, apart from the primitive and text sketch tools.
• A full set of mirrored polar symmetry cursors will appear when using mirror and polar symmetry simultaneously, rather than just the main mirrored cursor.
• The teleporter will now collide with the floor level even in environments with no visible floor.
• Combined the subdivision Merge and Separate tools into one tool. Flick the drawing-hand thumbstick to switch between them.
• Added Selection tool (detailed above) to edit mode on all geometry types.
• Moved the Recenter Mirror button to the gumball (detailed above) when only one mirrored object that has been moved off the mirror is in the current selection.
• Layers added to Toggle Solo Layer will now always be visible even if visibility is set to minimum.
• Added different colored backplates to different file types in File Manager to make them more easily distinguishable.
• Added a ‘Stretched’ toggle to the Round Stroke menu which when disabled preserves the corner radius of the stroke when it’s non-spherical. When enabled behavior is the same as in previous versions.
• Images will now only snap to axes if you are holding the non-drawing hand index finger trigger while moving them.
• Switched the green mannequin control points to directional arrows.
• Grab bars on the menus have been removed and changed to grabbable panels. 
• Allow toggling between different edit modes (faces/points/edges) while using the selection tool.
• The pointer now becomes a pipette when interacting with color menus.
• Added a screenshot button to the web browser.
• New UI on imported sketch videos allowing for play/pause and scrubbing.
• When first entering a sketch your material will be set to the first saved material profile you were using previously. When opening the materials panel the full panel is shown by default.
• You can now use edge sliding on NURBS surfaces and on single vertices on strokes.
• The brush stroke menu has been updated. Now instead of the ribbon stroke option you can adjust sliders to change strokes to be vertical ribbon or horizontal ribbons. Instead of thin line stroke being a separate option it is now located at the bottom left of the stroke shape slider.
• Re-enabled scaling during smart move.
• Added a toggle to the environment menu when custom HDRs are enabled that allows you to specify the source of an HDR.
• Changed the default Comfort Level to Blink.
• Added a new tutorial and walkthrough sketch to guide users through the new features of 6.0.0.
• Moved the on hand-clock and time reminders to the back of the hand and changed its appearance.

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Points on strokes and ink can no longer connect at the mirror while planar mode is enabled.
• Fixed an issue where closing the web browser without dismissing the keyboard would cause most controller functions to not work when you opened the keyboard elsewhere.
• Fixed some zipped .obj files failing to import and preventing you from sketching.
• The opening animation for the lobby clipboard is now left to right in left-handed mode.
• Fixed various text overlaps with long email addresses, file and Collab room names.
• Fixed incorrect menu spacing in Online Users menu when closing and reopening the menu with the audio input device dropdown open.
• You can no longer attempt to create Collab rooms in organizations you don’t belong to if you have a Collab room from that organization shared with you.
• Fixed an error that could occur when deleting the a face of a mirrored subdivision object very close to the mirror plane.
• Fixed an error that occurred when dragging a subdivision object face beyond the mirror and deleting it.
• Attempting to quit a Collab room via the quick access Quit button on the controller will now bring up the Save menu if there are asset downloads or uploads in progress.
• The microphone input device dropdown no longer changes color when muting and unmuting.
• Fixed losing connection to a Collab room while the 3D text prompt is open causing the prompt to remain open in the lobby.
• Collab rooms no longer appear in File Manager.
• Fixed saving an existing file with a different name causing the original file to update its thumbnail.
• Fixed renaming a file to use an existing file’s name causing it to adopt the thumbnail of the existing file.
• Can no longer attempt to make a Collab room that you do not own public.
• Fixed saving a cloud file located in a subfolder to save in the top level file directory if loaded via Recents.
• Fixed an out of memory crash on standalone headsets when flicking between full pages of screenshots in File Manager.
• The inactivity warning no longer triggers in solo mode.
• Downloading a folder from cloud to local files in File Manager now actually also downloads the files inside rather than just the folder.
• Fixed the tooltip on the Settings button in the lobby sometimes reading “Switch organization”
• The password protection screen now correctly appears when setting a new password while tethered to desktop.
• Fixed text overlap in Prefabs menu when a folder’s name goes on to three rows.
• Color picker and paint brush now correctly interact with thickened subdivision surfaces.
• Repositioned “Your Collab session is disconnected” pop-up window to prevent accidentally interacting with lobby option instead of the pop-up.
• The “LandingPad” section of the desktop lobby now correctly displays its options immediately after logging in.
• Fixed picking a audio input device in the LandingPad Collab menu not applying once you entered a room.
• Fixed an error and soft lock when loading some rigged .dae files.
• Fixed viewer and reviewer users being able to take screenshots if that user had previously had Instant Screenshot enabled.
• Users will no longer see each other’s screenshot menus in the wrong place in Collab if one user is left handed and one is right handed.
• Fixed some parts of the screenshot menu not being visible to other users in Collab.
• Fixed missing icon on controller thumb stick to indicate how to change point weight on volumes.
• Orthographic viewpoints on standalone are no longer removed from the sketch if you close and reopen the Orthographic Viewpoints menu or if you toggle Viewports Visibility.
• It is no longer possible for all points on a subdivision object to be deleted by toggling on the mirror if all points are close to the mirror.
• Fixed the File Manager disappearing if the user first navigates to the New Feature Tutorials section of the Learn menu.
• Fixed .mp4s uploaded via File Manager being treated as sketches.
• Can no longer name layers with just spaces/underscores.
• When logging out of LandingPad via the desktop lobby the delete autosaves pop-up window will now dismiss properly.
• Fixed odd normals when placing a point on the mirrored side of a stroke that has both ends locked at the mirror.
• Exiting a sketch by starting the First Sketch experience and opting to not save changes will no longer update the sketch’s thumbnail.
• Launching the First Sketch experience from a sketch and choosing to save changes no longer causes the updated thumbnail to include a window from the user interface.
• Fixed the aspect ratio of the screenshot preview that slides out the top of the screenshot menu being too wide.
• The Reset Weights action is now in object edit history and can be undone and redone.
• Fixed a typo in the title of the “Navigation Lock” feature walkthrough.
• Corrected inaccurate “Mirrored over world axis” tooltip when something is not mirrored over the world axis.
• Updated sketch thumbnails are now correctly reflected in File Manager.
• Corrected string and fixed text overlap when attempting to exit a Collab room while uploading an asset.
• Fixed a text overlap on error message when trying to connect to Collab room when domains aren’t whitelisted in the firewall.
• Fixed incorrect texture mapping on some .glb imports.
• Detaching the Online Users menu in a Collab room and then starting a solo sketch no longer causes an empty outline of a menu to appear.
• Improved computation of UVs when deleting faces on subdivision objects.
• Added a background to the microphone settings button in the LandingPad Collab menu to make it easier to see against light colored backgrounds.
• Fixed opening the screenshot tool with 16:9 aspect ratio enabled causing thumbnails to also be taken in 16:9.
• Thumbnails in File Manager and now cropped vertically if they are taller than 1:1 aspect ratio.
• Files uploaded from local to cloud in file manager now have thumbnails without needing to reload the folder.
• Exiting edit mode on a subdivision object while hovering over one of the edit tools no longer causes tooltips to become stuck and prevent sketching.
• Improved how exports of double-sided FBX geometry to Substance Painter.
• Measurements on import previews no longer show in front of all UI regardless of their distance to the camera.
• Removed “Deleting another user’s layer” warning when watching another user delete their own layer in Collab.
• Removed redundant extra notification when cloud exporting FBX on standalone.
• Fixed textures sometimes not applying correctly on unbaked thickened subdivision objects.
• Hid the microphone mute/unmute icon while using the web browser keyboard.
• The screenshot menu now automatically closes when using the keyboard to report an issue.
• Fixed connecting edges to the mirror making you unable to slide the edges neighboring the mirror.
• Prevented imported meshes with lower Level of Detail settings displaying as cuboids.
• Fixed a subdivision error that could occur when deleting edges.
• Fixed an issue that caused you to exit a Collab room if you previously tried to exit mid-asset upload and then later opened the save menu.
• You can now grab the thickening arrows on a subdivision object even if you are not in a selection mode that includes vertices (for example face or edge selection).
• Removed the ability to add, remove and duplicate points on imported IGES splines and surfaces as it would usually lead to crashes.
• Fixed a normals rendering issue after deleting faces on a stroke without end caps that had been converted to subdivision.
• The text entry field in the 3D Text tool now correctly adjusts in size depending on the text.
• Moving locked points off the mirror using non-proportional scaling no longer results in asymmetrical geometry.
• Fixed a NaN error when attempting to thicken a subdivision object after sliding two of its vertices into the same location.
• In File Manager moving a local file out of and back into its original folder, or deleting and then replacing a file in the same folder will no longer append “(1)” to the end of the file name as if it’s a duplicate.
• Fixed the VR screenshot tool constantly flickering.
• Fixed an issue where imported videos would not play
• Baking a mirrored NURBS surface with a loop now does not cause the surface to disappear
• Fixed a bug which rendered the delete autosaves, keep autosaves go back and change password options in the logout page unusable.
• Fixed a left-handed highlighting issue with the draw menus.
• Fixed an issue where importing a .dae file into GS and converting it to SubD created holes in the mesh
• Fixed a bug that caused “link to device” option to disappear and not show up in login panel.
• When the main-hand controller is in pointer mode (like while accessing menus) you can no longer create viewpoint.

Screen Collab

🚀 Features & Tweaks

• Moved user joining and leaving notifications to the bottom-right of the screen.
• Added follow me button.
• The Page Up and Page Down keys now move between viewpoints.
• Can now choose the location of screenshots and name them in a window pop-up.
• When saving a screenshot, the maximum number of characters is now 60 (to tackle a bug).
• Added the ability to import the following file types via dragging and dropping from the Windows/macOS file systems:
  • JPG
  • JPEG
  • PNG
  • MP4
  • GRS (including zipped GRS files)
  • OBJ
  • STL
  • FBX
  • GLTF
  • GLB
  • IGS
  • IGES

🐛 Bug Fixes

• Increased size of notification of screenshot save location so you can actually see the save location.
• Corrected string on room password text entry box.
• Can now leave view points by moving the camera with the keyboard.
• Fixed bounding box on image imports.
• The laser can no longer intersect pen and marker annotations left by screen users.
• Can now double click to centre camera on rigged chassis geometry.
• Fixed a bug affecting annotation timestamps.
• Fixed a bug where screenshots failed to save if their names were too long.
• Fixed a misleading error message when trying to save screenshots.
• Rooms with a full stop (period) in their name now show the whole name instead of the name up to the full stop.