Rigs and targets

A rig is a set of views you place and shape yourself: a sphere, dome, cylinder, grid or ring of views, or one view at every vertex of a mesh. Rigs are for when you want control over where the views go, for example for a subject that automatic views do not suit, or to reuse a setup across files. To use them, set Source to Rigs in the Views panel.

Two rigs in the rig list. The active rig and its segment target show yellow handles in the viewport.

Make a rig

1. Select the object you want to capture (optional).

2. In the Views panel, set Source to Rigs and click + beside the rig list.

3. SplatPilot adds a rig around the selected object: its anchor sits at the object’s origin and follows it, the object becomes the rig’s target, and the radius is set to two and a half times the radius of the object’s bounding box. With nothing selected, the rig appears at the 3D cursor.

4. Shape it with the settings below the list or by dragging its handles in the viewport.

Each rig is a collection inside the SplatPilot collection. It holds the rig’s anchor, an Empty that places it, and, if you add them, its target and baked cameras.

The rig list

The Views panel lists the rigs of this scene. Each row has:

• Use, the checkbox: whether Create Splat renders this rig’s views. A rig that is not used is drawn faint in the viewport.
• The rig’s name: double-click to rename it.
• How many views the rig has.
• An eye: shows or hides the rig’s collection in the view layer. A hidden rig draws nothing and shows no handles.

The highlighted row is the active rig: its settings show below the list, and its handles show in the viewport. They come in groups: Shape and Direction; the shape’s own settings; Anchor, Target and how the views aim at it; Focal Length, Sensor and Colour; then View, Look Through and Bake Cameras. Selecting a rig’s anchor (or a mesh rig’s mesh) in the viewport makes that rig the active one. + adds a rig, − removes the active rig together with its anchor, its baked cameras and a target that SplatPilot added for it; the next rig in the list becomes the active one.

In an environment, Geometry Views shows below the list (with Advanced Settings): the rigs’ views then come with geometry views too, five per view.

Check Coverage, in the Coverage panel, measures all used rigs together, whichever rig is active: how well their views see the subject. The panel then gives the verdict, such as “Few directions”, the Surfaces and Directions bars and the coverage map. See Check Coverage.

Shapes

Shape	Views	Settings
Sphere (default)	Evenly spread over a sphere	Count, Radius
Dome	Evenly spread over the upper half of a sphere	Count, Radius
Cylinder	Stacked rings of views	Segments (views per ring), Rings, Radius, Height
Ring	One ring of views	Segments, Radius, Level (how high the ring sits above its anchor)
Grid	A flat grid of views above the anchor	Columns, Rows, Size, Level (how high the grid sits above its anchor)
Mesh	One view at every vertex of a mesh, along its normal	Mesh

Every shape but Mesh stands where its anchor is: move, rotate and scale the anchor Empty like any object to place the rig. A Mesh rig follows its mesh object instead; edit the mesh to change the views.

Direction sets which way the views look:

Direction	Views
Inward (default)	Look at the target, or at the rig’s centre without one
Outward	Look away from the target, or away from the rig’s centre
Both	Two views per point: one inward, one outward

Focal Length is the lens of the rig’s views (50 mm by default), Sensor their sensor width (36 mm by default), and Colour the colour its views are drawn in.

Targets

The target is the object that inward views aim at. Pick any object in Target, or click + beside it and choose a kind to add a new target: SplatPilot adds an Empty fitted around what the rig aimed at so far (a box of its bounds, a segment from its bottom to its top, or a point at its centre), parented to it so it follows. A target that SplatPilot added this way is removed again when you clear or replace the rig’s Target.

Aim At sets which point of the target each inward view aims at:

Aim At	Views aim at	Settings
Point (default)	The target object’s origin
Segment	The closest point of a line between two points	Segment Start, Segment End, in the object’s local space
Box	The closest point of a box around the origin	Half Size: half the box’s size along the object’s local axes

A segment suits long subjects such as a car or a row of shelves; a box suits bulky ones such as a building. Because segment ends and box sizes are in the target’s local space, they move, turn and scale with the target object. Targets are drawn in cyan in the viewport.

Handles

The active rig and its target show handles in the viewport, in Blender’s gizmo colour (yellow by default, the same as on lights and cameras). Drag them to shape the rig where you see it:

Handle	Changes
An arrow along the anchor’s X axis	Radius (Sphere, Dome, Cylinder, Ring) or Size (Grid)
An arrow along the anchor’s Z axis	Height of a cylinder, or Level of a ring or a grid
Two rings at the segment’s ends	Segment Start and Segment End. Hold Ctrl to snap an end onto geometry.
Three box arrows on the box’s faces	The box’s Half Size along each axis

Each drag is one undo step. Handles work with scaled, rotated and parented anchors and targets. They show while Source is set to Rigs and the active rig is visible; hide them with the rig’s eye or Blender’s gizmo toggle in the viewport header. A Mesh rig has no shape handles.

Preview and bake

• View picks one of the active rig’s views, counted from 1: “View 12 of 48”. It is drawn in green.
• Look Through shows this viewport through that view (the scene’s camera stays). Click again to go back.
• Bake Cameras creates a camera object for every view of the active rig, in a collection inside the rig. Baking again replaces the earlier cameras. You can render baked cameras with Source: Cameras.