Steps and Step Rotation

Organizing your model into steps allows you build sequential instructions like Lego’s.

Activating Step Display
Click the Steps button at the top of the viewing window. Then you can click though each step of your model and watch it build up.

Rotating Steps

Sometimes, you may find that you need to show the underside of your model, such as when putting wheels on the bottom of a car chassis. Or perhaps you need to rotate it to see the other side. You can do this with the Step Rotation settings.

You will only see step rotations applied when Step Display is active.

There are several different ways to enter a step rotation. Ultimately they all do the same thing: rotate your model. But some types of rotations are easier to accomplish in one mode than in another.

Step Rotation Modes
Rotation Type Best Used For Description
None specified Steps that don’t need to begin a special rotation Steps with no specified rotation are drawn with the rotation of the previous step, or with the default viewing angle if there was no previous rotation. Most of your model’s steps will use this setting.
Relative to default view Most rotation situations The step’s viewing angle is computed by starting with the default 3D perspective angle, then adding the value you specify. This setting is ideal for most normal step-rotation operations, such as flipping upside-down or looking at the left or right side of the model.
Absolute Head-on views like Front or Top Whatever you type in, that’s what the camera angle is. This is perfect for setting a view like Top, but otherwise it should be avoided in favor of Relative rotation. While it may be tempting to use Absolute rotation for everything, your instructions will look better (and more consistent) if you always base your rotation on the default viewing angle like relative mode does.
Additive When you liked the last step’s view and want to tweak it without doing math Additive rotations accumulate from step to step. Four y=90° additive step rotations would show all four sides of the model in order. In contrast, each Relative rotation starts over with the default view as its base, so they cannot accumulate.
End rotations Restoring the view to its default angle Cancels the effect of all step rotations and restores the viewing angle to the default 3D Perspective angle.