Working with the view options

Applies to 2022.0 Update and later

Commands in the View category of the main menu

With the view options you control which objects appear in the display and how those objects are visualized.

Some modes such as the support editor have a varying set of commands.

Jump to:

To adjust the level of detail

A reduced level of detail may be necessary for projects containing many parts or complex parts. Netfabb operations run faster when parts are displayed with lower levels of detail.

  1. Select a part.
  2. Click View > Level of detail and choose the appropriate level of detail.
    Note: If no parts are selected, the level of detail is applied to all parts. Also, when parts are created as duplicates, they share the same level of detail. This connection can only be resolved by overwriting the duplicate, such as by applying repair to it.

Left: Part with low level of detail. Right: Part with high level of detail.

Despite the coarse appearance of low-detail parts, the part attributes remain unchanged. The project tree reports the current level of detail for each part.

Part levels of detail in the project tree

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To highlight backfaces

  1. Click View > Highlight backfaces.

When enabled, the interior side (negative normal) of triangles is always colored red, even when the part is selected. It helps to detect inverted triangles, holes, and cuts.

Backfaces are marked as red triangles

Backfaces showing to the outside not always, but usually, require repair.

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To highlight mesh edges

  1. Click View > Highlight edges.

When enabled, sharp edges (<135° between normals of adjacent triangles) on objects are highlighted with black lines.

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To show the buildroom boundaries

  1. Click View > Show platform.
  2. Tip: Hold the P key to display a local platform with the selected parts at the origin.
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To toggle the machine-specific platform model

  1. Click View > Show machine platform.
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To toggle the gizmo

  1. Click View > Show gizmo, or use the default shortcut Shift+Ctrl+G.

The gizmo is not always available. It is disabled where it would interfere with other operations. When this is the case, a message notifies you about this.

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To show part names

If you have loaded several parts, Netfabb can show part name labels in the display.

  1. Click View > Show part names.
  2. Tip: You can also press Ctrl + L on your keyboard.

In addition, a selected part also shows its dimensions along X, Y, and Z on its outbox.

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To show the triangle mesh

  1. Click View > Highlight triangles.
  2. Tip: You can also right-click a part and choose Highlight triangles to show the triangles for just the selected part.
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To toggle between display color and actual part color and texture

  1. Click View > Show texture and color, or use the default shortcut Ctrl+M.
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To toggle the part outbox shadow

  1. Click View > Show part outbox shadow.
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To toggle visibility of no-build zones

  1. Click View > Toggle no-build zone visibility.

Alternatively, click the lightbulb icon for the No-build zones group, or even for individual no-build zones, in the project tree.

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To hide and show parts

When you need a clear view of certain parts, it can be useful to hide other parts from view.

There are multiple ways to hide a part:

To make hidden parts visible:

To flip the visibility of all parts:

Tip: When activated in the settings, clicking a part's lightbulb icon in the project tree provides a third option between visible and invisible: transparent. You can set the strength of transparency in the Settings.
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Parent topic: About the display

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