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We strongly recommend enabling graphics acceleration in Chrome when working with PCD Scenes.

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In-Editor Tutorials

Scene-type Projects include interactive in-editor tutorials that guide you through key annotation workflows step by step. Each tutorial auto-advances as you complete actions in the editor, so you get immediate feedback as you practice on a live scene.
In-editor tutorials are only available in Scene-type (3D LiDAR/point-cloud) Projects.

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Cuboids across time

The Cuboids across time tutorial teaches you the full multi-frame cuboid tracking workflow. It takes approximately 5 minutes and covers 10 steps:
  1. Select an existing cuboid in the 3D view
  2. Copy the cuboid to the clipboard
  3. Navigate forward several frames and place the copied cuboid using Shift + Click
  4. Interpolate between keyframes to fill in-between frames
  5. View the cuboid’s trajectory in the 3D view and on the timeline
  6. Enable Auto interpolate in the editor settings so adjustments re-interpolate automatically
  7. Edit the trajectory in grid view by dragging the cuboid in any frame column
  8. Toggle a keyframe using Alt + K
  9. Lock the cuboid size to keep it uniform across all frames
  10. Mark the object as static using Alt + S
The tutorial auto-advances when the editor detects you have completed each step. Step 5 (view the trajectory) requires you to click OK to advance manually. After you finish a step, you can click its title to re-expand and re-read the instructions at any time. To start the tutorial:
1

Open the Help panel

Click the Help button in the top toolbar.
2

Navigate to Tutorials

Click Tutorials in the Help panel.
3

Start the tutorial

Find the Cuboids across time card and click Start.

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Label and Review Scenes

We strongly recommend that Taskers use a mouse when annotating or reviewing Scenes. Using a mouse makes annotating or reviewing Scenes significantly easier.
  1. Click Start task or Initiate to annotate a PCD data unit. The Label Editor opens with a PCD data unit ready for annotation.
  2. Use the Editor controls and Toolbar buttons to navigate the PCD workspace.
  3. Select an object label from the left-hand menu and begin annotating the PCD data unit.
  4. Use your input device (mouse or trackpad) to create a label in the PCD workspace.

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Navigating in the Scene

Context-sensitive keyboard hints display in the top-right corner of the 3D view.
Move: Use the WASD keys to move along the X axis in the workspace.
Elevate: Use the QE keys to move along the Y axis in the workspace.
Rotate: Hold down the scroll wheel and move your mouse to rotate.
Pan: Hold down the right mouse button and move your mouse to pan around.
Go Faster: Hold Shift while using the WASD, QE, or camera movement keys to move faster.

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Annotations

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Cuboids

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Cuboid trajectory in grid view

When you work in grid view with a cuboid selected, the top-down (bird’s-eye) tile now displays the selected cuboid’s full trajectory path as a semi-transparent gray line. This gives you a spatial reference for the object’s direction of travel across all frames, making it easier to verify and correct cuboid orientation without switching back to the main 3D view.
The trajectory path only appears in the top-down tile of grid view. It does not appear in side-view tiles (front, back, left, right) or camera-view tiles. You must enable Show Cuboid Trajectories in the render settings for the trajectory to display.

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Copy and pasting Cuboids

Copy labels from within the same frame using Command + C and Command + Shift + V on Mac, or Ctrl + C and Ctrl + Shift + V on Windows. You can select multiple cuboids, copy them as a group, and paste them all at once onto any frame. The copied group moves together as a preview that follows your cursor, preserving each cuboid’s relative position and orientation.
Only cuboid objects are included in a bulk copy/paste. If your multi-selection includes non-cuboid objects (such as polygons or polylines), those objects are not copied.
Copy/paste keyboard shortcuts:

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Stereo Cuboid Tool

The stereo cuboid tool provides an assisted workflow for creating and editing 3D cuboid annotations using camera image data. The stereo tool button, Edit in stereo mode context-menu option, and associated keyboard shortcuts are available in any Scene that contains at least one image or video channel.
The stereo cuboid tool is available for Scene-type datasets only. It requires edit permissions on the label and is not available on approved labels.
The stereo tool checks calibration data for each image at fit time. If your single camera image lacks calibration data, the tool may be available but the stereo fit could fail. Ensure your image has valid calibration data for best results.
If you work with wide-angle or fisheye camera lenses and camera tiles appear cropped, enable Render full camera image in the Editor settings panel to display the full captured area.

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Stereo cuboid keyboard shortcuts

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Edit in stereo mode

To edit an existing cuboid in stereo mode, right-click the cuboid annotation and select Edit in stereo mode from the context menu. This option is available in any Scene with at least one image or video channel.

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Toolbar

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Setting cuboid orientation

You can show or hide the orientation of cuboids using the “cuboid orientation” setting:
You can change the front face of a cuboid by holding Alt (on Windows) or Option (on Mac) and clicking any face of the cuboid. This works whether the cuboid is currently selected or unselected. When you hold Alt / Option, the drag-handle controls hide automatically so your click targets the cuboid face rather than a resize handle. The operation updates only keyframes — interpolated frames rotate to match but retain their interpolated status and are not promoted to keyframes.
This changes the front face of the cuboid across all the frames where it exists.

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Height Filter

The height filter lets you restrict which points the editor displays and which points segmentation tools can select, based on each point’s height above a reference surface. Click the Height filter button in the toolbar to open the height filter popover.

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Height filter modes

The height filter offers two reference modes. The mode selector label updates dynamically depending on which ground reference is currently active:
The Ground mesh option appears in the mode selector only after you fit a ground mesh using Adjust ground → Detect and fit. If no ground mesh is active, the selector shows Ground plane instead.

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Min/Max snap buttons

Each Min and Max input in the height filter popover includes a snap button that links that bound to the active ground reference. The button label updates to reference either “ground mesh” or “ground plane” depending on which is active:
  • When unlinked: Snap min/max to the ground [plane/mesh] and track it
  • When linked: Min/Max tracks the ground [plane/mesh] (click to detach)

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Using the height filter with a ground mesh

1

Fit a ground mesh

Click Adjust ground in the toolbar, select the Mesh tab, click Detect and fit, then click Fit ground mesh once the detection completes.
2

Open the height filter

Click the Height filter button in the toolbar.
3

Select Ground mesh mode

In the mode selector, click Ground mesh. The histogram and min/max range update to reflect heights above the mesh surface.
4

Set your height bounds

Drag the slider or type values into the Min and Max inputs to define the height range you want to keep visible. Use the snap buttons to link a bound to the ground mesh surface.
Lasso (freehand) and brush segmentation tools respect the ground-mesh-relative height filter when Ground mesh mode is active. Only points above the mesh surface within your defined range are selectable.
The height filter range initializes to the 0.5th–99.5th percentile of point heights in the scene, giving you a wider default range that includes more of the point cloud.

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Branch Overlay Labels

When you enable the branch overlay in the editor header, Encord displays annotations from other branches as read-only colored shapes overlaid on the active branch. Each overlay label shows the branch name on its own line below the object class name, making it easy to identify which branch each overlaid shape belongs to without toggling branches on and off or relying solely on color. To enable the branch overlay, click the branch overlay button (branch icon with a magenta New tag) in the editor header and select the branches you want to compare. The branch selector only appears when alternate branches exist for the current data unit.
  • In the 2D canvas, all shape types (boxes, polygons, ellipses, keypoints, and so on) display the branch name tag on their label.
  • In the 3D scene viewer, cuboid overlay labels display the object name and branch name. Polylines and keypoints in 3D do not yet show branch name text.
  • If an object’s class is not present in the current Ontology, the branch name appears alone.
  • The raw branch name always appears on overlay labels. The main branch does not display as “Ground Truth” in overlay labels.
  • Branch overlay colors match the branch legend colors shown in Encord Active.
  • Overlay labels respect the same display settings as regular labels, including object names, confidence scores, hashes, and classifications.
  • When you navigate to a different data unit, Project, or branch, Encord automatically clears your overlay branch selections so stale overlays do not appear on unrelated items.
Branch label comparison is available in Review and Complete editor views — no feature flag or admin configuration required. Overlay labels are read-only — you cannot edit annotations from other branches directly in the overlay view.
Audio and text-document modalities do not yet display branch names on overlay labels. The vertical fan-out uses fixed pixel offsets and is not collision-aware; in very dense scenes with many overlapping annotations, labels from multiple branches may still be difficult to read.

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Point Cloud Segmentation

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Scene Slicer

The Scene slicer is a planar point cloud data selection guard. Place a Scene slicer to confine point cloud data selection. Point cloud data on the outside of the Scene slicer area cannot be selected for annotation. Use the left-click button on your mouse to select an area in the PCD workspace. Use the Alt/Option key to hide all point data outside the selected area.

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Editor actions

Hot key: Shift + CBrings the POV to origin. When you have an object selected (cuboid, keypoint, or polyline), this command centers the camera on that object instead of the origin.
Hot key: ALT/OPTION + TBrings the POV to the “tiles” listed in the drop-down that appears.
Sets the position and rotation of the ground plane in the workspace. The ground plane is used for navigation (see “pan along ground” setting) as well as determining the initial position of cuboids.Click the ground plane icon in the toolbar to open the ground height controls:Auto-detection: Click Detect and fit to automatically detect the ground plane in the point cloud and fit a flat ground plane to it. This is useful when the ground is flat or nearly flat.
Automatic ground segmentation is a preview capability. Advanced controls for ground mesh fitting parameters and the segmentation grid overlay are available in the debug panel for internal and developer users. Known limitations include reduced accuracy on steep slopes and uneven terrain in some configurations.
Set Manually:
  • Slider: Drag to adjust the ground height. The range spans from the lowest to the highest point in the point cloud along the up axis.
  • Visibility toggle: Show or hide the ground grid overlay in the 3D view.
  • Fit from 3 points: Select 3 points on any point cloud to automatically fit the ground plane. This is useful when the ground is not flat or is at an angle.
    You can also enter “Fit from 3 points” mode directly using the keyboard shortcut Option + G (Mac) or Alt + G (Windows), without opening the popover first.
    When fitting mode is active, the toolbar button changes to show how many points remain to be picked:
Click 3 points on the point cloud surface to define the ground plane. The counter updates as each point is picked. Click the x on the button or press Escape to cancel.When the ground plane is rotated (tilted), rotation information is displayed in the controls. Use the Reset rotation button to return the ground plane to flat.When the ground grid is visible, it is displayed as a grid in the scene:
For ground mesh fitting (an improved, terrain-conforming alternative to the flat ground plane), see the Ground mesh fitting settings below.
Hot key: Option + RRadius indicators are useful guides when annotating in 3D space. For example, you might only want to annotate anything that comes within 3 meters of your object (vehicle, robot, drone). You would then use a radius of three and only annotate anything within that radius.
  • ON: Displays one or more radii centered on the object (vehicle, robot, drone) that captured PCD. You can select the color used for all radii.
  • OFF: Hides all the radii.
Specify custom or use “tile” coordinates as the Scene origin.
Hot key: ALT/OPTION + MDisplays point cloud data from multiple frames simultaneously in the workspace. When enabled, you can use the frame range controls to specify which frames to merge.
  • ON: Displays PCD from multiple frames at once. Click the dropdown arrow next to the button to access the controls.
  • OFF: Displays the PCD for the current frame only.
By default, all frames in the scene are included when merged view is enabled.
Hot key: ALT/OPTION + IDisplays point cloud data in 2D images.
Hot key: CONTROL + ALT/OPTION+ CSpecify the camera target on a single point in the PCD data.
Use this feature with Center camera on orign.
Display or hide various elements in the PCD space.
  • Show top view: Displays view from the top in the right hand work area.
  • Show left view: Displays view from the left in the right hand work area.
  • Show right view: Displays view from the right in the right hand work area.
  • Show control hints: Displays context-sensitive keyboard shortcut hints in the top-right corner.
  • Show camera switcher: Displays video views for the Scene.
  • Show zoom indicator: Displays zoom level information.
  • Show size rulers: Displays a scale ruler in the orthographic side views showing world unit measurements.

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Editor Settings

Input DeviceSpecify using a mouse or trackpad to rotate or pan in the workspace.
We STRONGLY recommend using a mouse to rotate or pan in the workspace.
Pre-load dataPre-load data in the background for smoother navigation. Enabling this setting can improve performance when annotating or reviewing point cloud data.
FaceShows/Hides the “face” of cuboids in the PCD workspace.OrientationShows/Hides the orientation of cuboids in the PCD workspace.Set front face from motionWhen enabled, Encord automatically orients the front face of a cuboid annotation based on the object’s direction of motion whenever you add or paste a keyframe. Encord re-orients all existing keyframes for that cuboid in the same operation, so undoing the action also reverts the orientation change.
This setting is disabled by default. When disabled, the front face follows how the cuboid was originally created. You can always set the front face manually at any time using Alt+Click.
Use Set front face from motion when annotating moving objects (such as vehicles or pedestrians) to keep cuboid orientations consistent with the direction of travel across all keyframes.
Setting the front face manually with Alt+ClickHold Alt and click any face of a cuboid to designate that face as the front face. This shortcut works whether the cuboid is currently selected or unselected — you no longer need to deselect a cuboid before using Alt+Click.While you hold Alt, Encord hides the cuboid’s drag-handle controls and makes the cuboid body the click target, so you can accurately pick the intended face without accidentally resizing the cuboid.When you set the front face, Encord rotates every frame of the cuboid to match the new orientation. Keyframes update their stored rotation, and interpolated frames rotate to match but retain their interpolated status — the operation does not promote interpolated frames to keyframes.Show Cuboid TrajectoriesWhen enabled, Encord renders the selected cuboid’s full trajectory path across frames. The trajectory path appears in the main 3D view and in the top-down (bird’s-eye) tile of grid view, giving you a visual reference line for the object’s direction of travel. The trajectory does not appear in side-view tiles (front, back, left, right) or camera-view tiles — only the top-down tile.
Use the trajectory path in the top-down grid view tile to verify and correct cuboid orientation against the object’s actual direction of travel, especially when a vehicle or object has an incorrect heading across keyframes.
GroundShows/Hides the “ground” plane as a grid in the PCD workspace.AxisShows/Hides the axis of the point of origin in the PCD workspace.CamerasShows/Hides camera helper lines to aid in annotating PCD.BackgroundShows/Hides the background in the PCD workspace.
The Color filter button appears in the 3D scene editor toolbar only when the loaded point cloud contains color or intensity data.
The color filter applies globally to all loaded point clouds in the scene. When you enable the filter, points outside the selected range are hidden in the viewport and cannot be selected by any segmentation tool.
Enabling the filterClick the Color filter button in the toolbar to toggle the filter on or off.Filter modesOpen the Color filter popover (click the chevron next to the button) to configure the filter. Select a mode using the mode selector at the top of the popover:
  • RGB — Filter points by red, green, and blue channel ranges (0–255 per channel). Available when the point cloud contains file color data.
  • HSV — Filter points by hue, saturation, and value ranges. Available when the point cloud contains file color data.
  • Intensity — Filter points by intensity range (0–100%). Available when the point cloud contains intensity data.
Use the range sliders to set the minimum and maximum values for each channel. Only points whose color or intensity falls within all specified ranges remain visible.Eyedropper (Pick color from scene)Click Pick color from scene in the popover to activate the eyedropper. Then click any point in the 3D viewport to seed the filter with that point’s color or intensity. The sliders update automatically to a range centered on the sampled value.Composition with other filtersThe color filter works together with the height filter and slicer planes. A point must pass all active filters to remain visible and selectable.Segmentation tool integrationWhen the color filter is active, the lasso, brush, and cuboid segmentation tools automatically exclude filtered-out points from selection. Only visible points can be selected.
If the cuboid tool cannot resolve a point cloud in the rendered scene, it falls back to unfiltered selection for that cloud.
Color settingsYou can change the color of point cloud data in the PCD workspace. Here are the options:
  • Solid: Displays points with a single uniform color.
  • Origin: Displays points in colors based on the distance from the world origin point.
  • Camera: Displays points in colors based on the distance from the camera position.
  • Height: Displays points in colors based on the distance from the “ground” plane.
    You can adjust the “ground” plane using the ground height feature on the Editor toolbar.
  • Provided: Displays points in colors based on how they were originally captured and recorded.
  • Image: Displays points in colors by projecting camera image data onto the points.
  • Sensor: Displays points colored by the sensor that captured them, making it easy to visually identify which sensor contributed which points in a multi-sensor setup.
  • When you enable Color by sensor mode, points from different sensors are automatically assigned distinct colors from a fixed palette of 20 maximally distinct colors.
  • Sensor colors are assigned consistently based on the sensor’s stream ID, so the same sensor is always use the same color across different frames and sessions.
PCD display settingsYou can change the display settings of point cloud data in the PCD workspace. Here are the options:
  • Show: Displays point cloud data in the PCD workspace.
  • Merge: Displays all point cloud data across time in the PCD workspace.
  • Uniform size: Displays all point cloud data in a uniform size in the PCD workspace.
  • Hide segmented: Hides all point cloud data that is behind segmented objects in the PCD workspace.
    Only segmented objects that are set to be hidden hide all point cloud data behind them.
  • Hide Unsegmented: Hides all points not covered by any segmentation label. This toggle is off by default. You can also toggle this setting using Shift+U.
    When you enable Hide Unsegmented before creating any segmentations, no points are hidden because no segmentation coverage exists yet.
    You can combine Hide Unsegmented with Hide segmented to show only points that belong to visible segmentation labels.
    Use Hide Unsegmented when trimming or refining segmentations on large point cloud scenes — hiding background points reduces visual clutter and prevents the brush and lasso tools from accidentally selecting unlabeled points.
Specify the size of cloud data points in the PCD workspace.
Specifies the opacity of PCD in 2D views.
The default value is 0. PCD does not display in 2D views with a value of 0.
Renders the full image captured by the camera beyond the source image’s nominal bounds. Enable this setting when working with wide-angle or fisheye lenses in 3D scenes to display the complete captured area in the rectified camera view.
This setting is off by default. When disabled, the rectified camera view clips to the source image’s nominal bounds. This setting is only visible when you are working in a 3D scene context.
Enable Render full camera image when your camera tiles appear cropped. You can also search for this setting in the settings panel using keywords such as “fisheye”, “wide-angle”, “distortion”, “rectified”, or “clip”.
The ground mesh fitting tool improves ground detection in LiDAR/point cloud scenes, including curved roads and uneven terrain. When enabled, it automatically fits a mesh to the detected ground plane as the scene loads, rendering it as an overlay in the 3D viewer. This gives you a visual reference for scene geometry, making it easier to focus on objects of interest.Ground segmentationEncord automatically segments the point cloud into ground and non-ground points. To trigger this, click Adjust ground in the toolbar, then Detect and fit, and once detection completes, click Fit ground mesh. The segmentation algorithm handles curved and uneven terrain more accurately than a flat ground plane.Height filter integrationWhen you fit a ground mesh, the height filter gains a Ground mesh mode. In this mode, the height filter measures each point’s height above the local mesh surface rather than a flat plane, enabling accurate filtering over curved or uneven terrain such as cambered roads or hilly ground.To use the height filter with a fitted ground mesh:
  1. Click Adjust ground in the toolbar, click Detect and fit, then click Fit ground mesh once the detection completes.
  2. Close the Adjust ground pane.
  3. Click Height filter in the toolbar.
  4. Select Ground mesh from the mode selector. The selector shows Ground mesh when a fitted mesh is active, or Ground plane when only a flat ground plane is available.
  5. Adjust the Min and Max bounds. The histogram and range reflect heights above the mesh surface.
The Ground mesh option appears in the height filter mode selector only when a fitted ground mesh is active. If no ground mesh has been fitted, the selector shows Ground plane instead.
Use the ground snap buttons next to the Min and Max inputs to snap a bound to the ground mesh surface and keep it tracking as you navigate frames. The button labels update dynamically to reference “ground mesh” or “ground plane” depending on which reference is active.
Lasso (freehand) and brush segmentation tools respect the ground-mesh-relative height filter when Ground mesh mode is active, so only points above the mesh surface at the specified height range are included in your selection.To disable the height filter at any time, press Alt+Shift+H.
Cuboid fitting on the ground plane currently uses the flat ground plane, not the terrain mesh. Full integration with the terrain mesh is planned for a future release.
Ground mesh fitting runs in the browser. On large or merged point clouds, the fitting process may temporarily affect UI responsiveness while it completes.
Specifies the opacity of data points that fade into the background. For example, all data points outside of a Scene slice.
Controls whether points that fall inside cuboids are highlighted with special coloring to make them more visible. This setting overrides the normal point coloring mode for points contained within cuboid annotations.
Use “Selected only” mode when working with many overlapping cuboids to focus on the cuboid you’re currently editing.
Controls how 3D labels are colored during workflow review and consensus review tasks. This setting applies to all 3D label types: cuboids, spheres, polylines, and keypoints/points.
This setting only takes effect when you are in a workflow review stage or consensus review stage. It has no effect outside of review tasks.
By review statusWhen you set Label color mode (review) to By review status, all 3D labels in the point cloud viewport are recolored according to their current review state:Labels you action (approve or reject) during the current review session fade to the opacity configured in Reviewed label opacity, reducing visual clutter as you work through the scene.
The opacity fade applies only to filled shapes — cuboids and spheres. Polylines and keypoints/points are recolored by review status but do not fade.
Selected 3D labels retain their review-status fill color when selected. Only the selection outline switches to the selection highlight color, matching the behavior in 2D review tasks.
Specifies the opacity applied to 3D labels that you have actioned (approved or rejected) during the current review session. Reducing this value fades reviewed labels into the background, making it easier to focus on labels that still require review.
The opacity fade applies only to filled shapes — cuboids and spheres. Polylines and keypoints/points are recolored by review status but are not affected by this opacity setting.
This setting only takes effect when Label color mode (review) is set to By review status and you are in a workflow review stage or consensus review stage.
Scene-type (3D LiDAR/point-cloud) projects include interactive in-editor tutorials you can access directly from the label editor. Each tutorial guides you through a specific workflow step by step, and the editor automatically detects when you complete each action so the tutorial advances in real time.Accessing tutorialsClick the Help button in the top toolbar, then select Tutorials. The tutorials panel lists all available tutorials for your project type. Click Start on any tutorial card to begin.Cuboids across timeThe Cuboids across time tutorial teaches you the full multi-frame cuboid tracking workflow. It takes approximately 5 minutes and covers 10 steps:
  1. Select a cuboid — select an existing cuboid in the 3D view.
  2. Copy the cuboid — copy the selected cuboid to the clipboard.
  3. Place it on a later frame — navigate forward several frames, then hold Shift to preview the copied cuboid and click to place it.
  4. Interpolate between keyframes — fill every frame between your two keyframes using the interpolate shortcut or the right-click menu.
  5. View the trajectory — review the trajectory the editor draws between keyframes, then confirm with OK.
  6. Turn on auto re-interpolation — enable Auto interpolate under Drawing in the editor settings so the editor automatically re-runs interpolation when you adjust a keyframe.
  7. Edit the trajectory in grid view — open grid view, drag the cuboid in any frame column to refine its position, and close grid view when done.
  8. Toggle a keyframe — use Alt+K to unmark or re-mark the current frame as a keyframe.
  9. Lock the size — click Lock size in the cuboid pane to enforce a uniform size across all frames.
  10. Make it static — use Alt+S or the pushpin in the cuboid pane to mark the object as static, copying its current pose to every frame.
After you complete a step, the tutorial advances automatically. Step 5 (View the trajectory) requires you to click OK to advance manually. Once you finish a step, you can click its title to re-expand it and re-read the instructions at any time.
The Cuboids across time tutorial is only available in Scene-type (3D LiDAR/point-cloud) projects. It does not appear for other project types.