Blender Tutorial
 Navigating in 3D Space Beginner Move inside Blender 2000 07 20 
>> back to www.psycho3d.de << Bart Veldhuizen 
The 3D window is where you will spend most of your time in Blender. In this window, you can rearrange the objects in your scene, edit their individual vertices (vertices are the points that make up an object), define animation, add lights and cameras, ...
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If you own a mouse with two buttons instead of three , skip ahead and read about the Info Window in 'The Blender Windows: a summary'
Rotating the 3D view.
Rotating the 3D view. The first thing to know about the 3D view is how you can navigate through it. I am not talking about moving objects, but about moving your viewpoint - how can you examine objects? How does an object look from another side? Do the different parts have the correct color? Did I add a little detail correctly?

Blender uses a very simple yet intuitive method for changing the view in 3D. To get started, press and hold the middle mouse button and drag your mouse around. Do you see what happens? Without any modifiers, middle mouse rotates your 3D view.
Translating the 3D view.
Translating the 3D view. Now try the same but hold down the shift key before you click the mouse button. The view is now translated instead of rotated.
Zooming in the 3D view.
Zooming in the 3D view. Finally, the ctrl key allows you to zoom in and out.
Perspective/orthogonal view.
Perspective/orthogonal view. To toggle between perspective and orthogonal view, press numpad5.
Wireframe/solid/shaded.
Wireframe/solid/shaded. In the 3D window, you can display your scene in a number of modes. Especially if you don't have 3D hardware this can make a huge performance difference. To toggle between wireframe and solid view, press z. Solid view can display a scene with some shading even though you have not yet defined a lamp.

Switch to (real) shaded view with shiftz. If you have not defined a lamp yet, the scene will be completely black.
Different views.
Different views. Aside from navigating around 3D space to look at your objects, you can also use a few hotkeys to quickly switch to standard views. Use numpad 7, 1, 3 and to switch to top view, front view, side view or camera view.
Show the entire scene.
Show the entire scene. Sometimes you may get lost inside 3D space a bit. To restore the view, either click on the home icon at the bottom of the 3D window, or press Pos 1. Blender will resize the view to include every object in your scene.
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The Blender User Interface components work in the same way as the 3D Window - you can translate and scale any component. The Pos 1 key works, too.
Zoom in on the selected object.
Zoom in on the selected object. If you want to get a specific object into view and not the entire scene, first select the object by right clicking on it (the object will turn pink to indicate it is selected). Next, press numpad dot.
Showing only the selected object.
Showing only the selected object. A similar function like the previous one, you can also zoom in to the selected object and hide all other objects at the same time by pressing numpad/. To unhide your objects, press / again.