In this very brief basic tutorial, we’ll talk about a specific rotation called Tilting and the Tilt operator that allows us to perform it.
Video Transcript
Hello, everyone! In this very brief basic tutorial, we’ll talk about a specific rotation called Tilting and the Tilt operator that allows us to perform it.
The definition of Tilting may sound intimidating, as it involves rotating the Normal of a curve's control point around the tangent direction of the curve at that control point.
Simply put, although not formally precise, it allows you to rotate the control point along the curve.
Tilting should be done in Edit Mode with one or more control points selected. There are various ways to perform Tilting. One of these is to set a rotation value in the Item Transform section of the Sidebar in a 3D Viewport.
If we’ve extruded a profile along the curve using Geometry Bevel, this operation will rotate the profile near that control point.
The result of this operation is similar to the Twisting achievable with the Simple Deform modifier, but with the advantage of being able to apply it along the path defined by the curve.
Just as with Simple Deform on meshes, to achieve good results, it's necessary to set the curve’s resolution in the Shape section of the Object tab, especially with high rotation values.
If the curve doesn’t yet have a profile and its Normals are not visible, it may be helpful to enable the visualization of the Normals. This can be done in the Curve Edit Mode Overlays menu of the 3D Viewport, then setting an appropriate value for the size of the arrows representing the curve’s Normals.
Tilting can also be done interactively by selecting the Tilt operator in the Control Points menu of the 3D Viewport and moving the mouse to set the desired rotation freely, then pressing Enter to confirm the operation.
The shortcut for tilting is CTRL T, while we can reset the Tilt of the selected control points with the shortcut ALT T.
Of course, these operators can also be accessed through the Search window.
After confirming the operation, we can modify the rotation value in the operator panel that will appear in the 3D Viewport.
In the operator panel, we particularly notice the Proportional Editing checkbox, which suggests that Tilting can be applied gradually to multiple control points if they are at a certain distance from the control point where we’re applying the Tilt. Let’s look at a practical example.
The geometry you’re seeing on screen was created from a curve serving as a path and a mesh object that was repeated several times using an Array modifier and positioned along the Bezier curve path with a Curve modifier.
The starting geometry is simple but has a good number of internal cuts, so it doesn’t show unwanted distortions when curved along the path.
To influence multiple control points proportionally to the selected one, we activate Proportional Editing, and when performing an initial interactive Tilting with the mouse, we scroll the mouse wheel to enlarge or shrink the influence area of Proportional Editing.
Once you’ve found a suitable size for the influence area of Proportional Editing, press Enter to confirm the operation. Then, open the Tilt operator panel and adjust the Angle field value to set a more precise rotation.
In this panel, you can also modify the influence area size of Proportional Editing, as well as the shape of the falloff curve, which determines how strongly the effect will apply to other control points based on their distance from the selected point.
If you notice that there are control points within the influence area of Proportional Editing that should not be affected by the operation, you can exclude them by selecting and temporarily hiding them with the H key.
Later, you can bring all control points back with the shortcut ALT H.
The Tilting operator might not be an immediately visible tool, but it’s very useful in various circumstances. I hope this brief basic tutorial has been helpful! See you soon!