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Version 6.4 User Manual © Copyright Inivis Limited 2008

1. 15 Creating other obiectis acond a rincer Ri ada 15 Selecting resizing moving and rotatiNg cocccccnnnicnnanccancnoncnnenancnnnnnnnnancnnnarrnnanrnnanrrnannna 16 Selecting 16 HOSIZIO pe 16 MOV reet C 17 A Mew Dc 17 Exteriding Negating the selection eere noce ee DUoe tn er oen eon e Ree sad 17 Clearing the Selec met 18 A I 18 LOCKING OD Cs tada 18 Model manipulation soii daa 19 Operations ON objects acia ani nonoui 19 TOUS A e e eo 19 O O 19 MIO rta RE ET T UE MENO 20 BOGAN s ace ceste da SIUE CLAN eL DM Mese dui d a e p Mesa INN PAA deir us atin eM EM IU SQUAD 21 Optimize Vertio S LRU fauci a in pde RU DLE 21 ODIITUZe SUTACOS ossis utate AA audiatis erdt eat quid A cata dovute dci 21 HOOUCO SSSR cU TETUER RN NNUS 21 OHDOIVIOO 7 SUD OV see ncs ttv dr m REP det vet ne aM EDO T dr PE MM 22 Commit SUbalVis NR te ED De de D ghey 23 O nr pe T o T tM PS 23 Minim mM CeM E eoe 23 EM ds 23 METE dt ii 24 A O A O 24 Extrude Along Patay senor de aet icti vi Ta ee eer Ropa Lor Rd eT errs or 24 Operations 0N SUTTACOS fe I Aaa 25 A NC EN C Eee 25 FADUDHHOl Stasi dnte td emitti tna d E Mu T 28 Change Veltex order sonus AAA tube alae AA A on bea doa dd 28 O A 29 LIO a PP 29 A eT or TT
2. After selection of this menu item you may switch to another program e g an image editor or word processor program and then Edit gt Paste within that in order to insert the image The same function is also available on the Edit menu for the main 3D view Note that the Copy item on the Edit menu is used for the internal AC3D clipboard the item that copies the image to the system must be used to retrieve the image To increase the quality of the image anti aliasing can be switched on from the view s 3D menu This smooths the image Anti aliasing slows down rendering of the 3D image so it s recommended that it only be used when preparing images for a snapshot Inspect mode switches off the display of vertices surface outlines etc so that a clean image is displayed It also changes the way that you can navigate the view When inspect mode is on simply dragging the mouse navigates normally the alt key would be used Inspect mode is useful if you are performing a lot of work in the other views and using one view for previewing the changes It s also useful with additional monitors where one monitor has a single AC3D view Views gt New View that is set to inspect Work can be performed on the main monitor and inspected quickly spin or walk on the other monitor 11 Creating AC3D objects AC3D Surfaces Crease angles Each AC3D object has a crease angle property Objects in AC3D consist
3. Custom greebles are merely AC3D objects To make an object a custom greeble edit the object s Data property F9 in Object mode and type CUSTOM GREEBLE without the quotes at the beginning of any line in the text box Make sure you type in all caps as shown and do not enter any spaces NOTE A future release may make this a friendlier process You may define as many custom greebles as you like If you have a set that you like to use you could save them to their own file and load that file into whichever document you d like to use them Also greebles should point up along the Y axis Basically the view of your greeble in the top view is the way the greeble will be applied to the target surfaces Once you have your custom greebles created make sure the Use custom greebles checkbox is checked Below is an example using custom greebles The cylinder and half sphere have been defined as custom greebles have created a greebled cube with a mixture of custom and standard greebles Notice that the size of the custom greebles does not matter It is copied and resized to a square area and then proportionally placed on the target object so it doesn t keep any proportions you initially apply Texture coordinates are preserved on custom greebles but the material used will be the same as the underlying surface onto which it is applied Textures themselves are not applied to greebles by default you must do that yourself For mor
4. Version 6 4 User Manual O Copyright Inivis Limited 2008 INTFOQUCUO Na eee 5 Welcome to ACID ln la 5 GSD TOKIO Van aria 5 A mmm cH 5 SUN ipic NEM M Cr PN EE 5 SUNCE ROMA SR E 5 Dic REM UMENRREPUN 5 COPA ete ena da once ee PC RUE 5 O 6 O A O 6 VOTE td lo do 6 TEXTO CODINA S cs A E 6 NS A OR c ec ENRICO 6 Getting Mi o PC r 6 WINdOwWS VIEWS P 7 oils Mee M 7 D He Le reper cda 7 M Allison Att 7 OrhOographiIC 2D VICWS C 9 NIVITINAD AD BD VIOWS AE E A Re Se Ne nn A 9 TICO AAA 9 USING Background Images sasise E 9 SIBA S PP O EA 10 Navigating An SD rrene O eE A E Aa A aaa aa i e 10 aKING a Snapshot image rcp Ee 11 A a edd dete ec apatedd un aceteu as tmecethveudethcespendastedseducdectincttoecsente 11 Creating AC3D OD ec Sii ib au da saci eas uo euo nm eee 12 ACSD SUMACES erm 12 Crease INS rss aay Ni en te ete gO dS ne m ec 12 One sided and Two sided surfaces strain o nes ess nel dant Donna o da 13 IO A ed ep ed c EN 13 Creating new ODJeCtS anse ee ER oan eee ed nt ds 13 ROIS POIVINICS EMNOS oder Stier T 14 Spheres O A A A O A tele tied dongs moe 14 IN QING ODIO Sarita E 14 A A rr n Ev 15 Oblectmode 106K X
5. Here the number of sections to produce is specified The end of the new object can be capped with a copy of the original selection New surfaces can have their normals reversed Removal of the original surfaces is also an option After setting these parameters the bounding box is dragged in the desired direction If the control key is held down movements of the mouse are constrained to either horizontal or vertical The extrude function is best demonstrated with some examples This star was made by creating a 10 sided disk selecting alternate vertices and shrinking the selection using the 1096 toolbar button a few times 25 The magenta lines shown here represent the normals Normals can be displayed by switching on Normals from the Orth and 3D menus Displaying the normals is used here to help determine the direction in which to extrude the object In the extrusion if the selection is dragged in the same direction as the normals the resulting shape will hide the front of the original surfaces This is useful if one side of a box is being extended but in this case the original surfaces need to be facing outside of the final shape This means that the surfaces need to be dragged in the opposite direction to the normals Here flip new surfaces is used so that all the new surfaces face outwards This is what happens when the selection is dragged up in the plan window If remove original was ticked then the star that that is
6. Object gt Optimize Vertices A second example uses a number of simple objects which are shrink wrapped by this function In this case we are creating the fuselage of an aircraft The objects are ellipses and a single red box Any AC3D objects can be used this way either lines or polygons 34 To get a more accurate outline these shapes could have been made by placing background images of a real aircraft onto the views and building the shapes on top of those images Fi CE Wem F Boy E Das tei D len After Surface Create Convex Surface Object menu function has been selected This picture shows the fuselage object created from the simple shapes It has been dragged to the side of the original objects which still remain in the scene Its important to note that the hull created is convex This means that if there had been any vertices that were totally inside the encompassing hull the new hull object would not have any vertices created at those points 1 aix Fis LE Ves o Ge a ref segment afuef Dd nef core ld re aller ZO den This function will also create 2 dimensional convex hulls provided all of the selected vertices lie on the same plane If they are not a 3d object will be created Create Ordered Surface This function creates a surface using the individual vertices that are selected The vertices should be selected in the correct order and in an ant
7. Subdiv EUIS selected objects will have the subdivision level altered W 0 94 H 088050391 subject to the maximum and minimum subdivision level The subdivision level can also be altered by editing the object property from the Object Property Editor tool in the Tools menu Changing the subdivision level is not a permanent change to the geometry AC3D still maintains the original object and any changes to this original object affect the subdivision All of the functions that work on normal surfaces are still functional Adjusting the original surfaces directly affects the subdivided object Objects retain the subdivision property when AC3D files are saved To export the model into another file format keeping the smoothed subdivided shape the objects can be transformed into full polygon objects by using Object Commit Subdivision A setting in File gt Settings defines a maximum number of surfaces for a subdivided object Advanced gt Subdivision maxsurfaces If this maximum is exceeded when the subdivision level is changed a message is shown and the subdivision will not proceed The default value is chosen for average computers For faster machines the value can be increased Switching display of subdivisions The display of subdivisions is easily changed by pressing the d key It is possible to have different settings for orth and 3d views e g orth views display the base non subdivided model and the 3D view shows the full subdi
8. adjacent surfaces and creates a single surface The selected surface must share edges for this function to complete Select the menu item or press the c key to execute the function two surfaces selected after combine one surface It is possible to combine surfaces that do not lie on the same plane It is recommended that the vertices be flattened in order to make them lie on the same plane If after combining surfaces the new surface appears black from every angle this means that the first three vertices of the surface form an angle of more than 180 degrees To prevent this the vertex order must be changed Surface Change Vertex Order so that the first three vertices of the surface form an angle less than 180 degrees 29 Flatten This acts on multiple surfaces and aligns the vertices so that they all lie on the same plane After Surface gt Flatten Spike This creates a spike in place of each surface selected The distance that the apex of the spike will be away from the original surface is specified If used with a spike distance of zero this function is useful for breaking a surface into triangles around a central vertex Indent This function creates new surfaces around the edge of existing surfaces If the select mode is Surface or Vertex the new centre surface or vertices of it is selected after the operation completes Bevel Beveling a surface does the same as Indent but the new centre s
9. best with quads four point sided surfaces since they divide symmetrically A cube is a good starting point for many models since each face can be extruded and the vertices moved to form other shapes whilst retaining a single closed object with no holes The block object is also a good base for building subdivided objects Using Extrude to add detail Extrude is the best way to add extra detail to a subdivided object These settings are recommended for Extrude parameters extruding 3D subdivided shapes Cap end Ww Flip new surfaces Remove original v 46 A simple way to add stronger defined edges to a model is to extrude with zero movement This can be done by switching into extrude mode and simply clicking on the bounding box The extrusion will be performed but no movement takes place In the example here the left object is a cube with the top surface extruded The right object is a copy of this object but with no subdivision level set note that although it looks the same as a normal cube there are actually extra surfaces around the edge of the top surface Display or hide subdivisions This image shows a cube with the top surface selected Notice how the bounding box is not located directly over the selected surface as it would be with a non subdivided object This is normal since the bounding box surrounds the original non subdivided geometry Switching off the display of subdivisions press d show
10. cursor E The 3d cursor specifies a position in 3D space It is useful when creating ata objects since it specifies the missing axis For example when a sphere is being drawn in the front window the mouse movements specify the X and Cursor D l 0 Y position of the sphere the Z position comes from the location of the 3D Get cursor Set Set to origin The default position of the 3D cursor is at the origin 0 0 O Close Many users find that they never need to adjust this but it can be useful to change its position when working on large models away from the origin 96 Materials The palette The scrolling window of buttons near the bottom of the control panel represents the palette of colors materials available The default color for an object is palette entry 1 usually white The colored buttons are pressed to change the material on the currently selected objects surfaces Setting the material of surfaces works in all selection modes but for a surface to change color in Vertex mode it must have all vertices selected Note that the color on the palette button represents the diffuse color for that material New palette buttons are appended to the list when a file containing extra materials is loaded When surfaces have a texture as well as a material that material can affect the way the texture appears To make a texture appear as the original colored image the surface color should be white To find the mat
11. if the camera is being controlled commonly called camera mode navigation AC3D can be configured for both user preferences for zooming Zooming can be performed either when the 3D mouse is pulled up down or when it is pushed forwards backwards The following image shows a configuration dialog from a SpaceNavigator In ACSD this is shown when the right button on the SpaceNavigator device is clicked E Hemmes Come Pare Or are Apr 4e Dessin e Sonda np Condfigarnacon Buthen Configuration danced Settings In this image zooming is set for up down on the SpaceNavigator There are two 3D mouse related settings in AC3D which can be altered See menu File 2Settings Advanced 3D mouse flip axis for walk mode Iv 3D mouse flip axis for spin made M These settings affect the way the SpaceNavigator controls rotation For up down zoom direction the rotating is done when the 3D mouse is twisted left right For forward backward zooming the rotation is controlled by tilting the 3D mouse left and right If zooming is set to up down as in the SpaceNavigator dialog image above green arrows these two settings should be left un ticked If the 3D mouse zoom is set for forward backward blue arrows tick these settings The left device button on the space mouse is set to Fit This moves the display focus to the center of the current selection An example if you are navigating in spin mode and wish to work on another object or
12. in the file Object mode lock Clicking twice on an object mode button causes the mode to lock This is indicated by the button changing to green When a mode is locked the mode does not revert to Move size after an object is created Pressing Move Size Rotate or extrude releases the lock Creating other objects It is very easy to create other objects from these shapes For example to make a torus shape donut create an ellipse and select Object gt Revolve A cone can be made in a number of ways Create a cylinder select one end in vertex mode and select Vertex gt Snap Together A cone made this way will have the texture coordinates set correctly For a simpler cone fewer vertices optimize the vertices with Object gt Optimize Vertices This means that the centre point of the cone will be a single vertex which is shared with all the sides Some other ways of making cones include making a disk and pulling the centre point up or using Object gt Revolve to revolve a line around an axis Extrude is used to add extra parts to objects or to give 2d shapes depth Objects can be cut into pieces and specific surfaces deleted 15 Selecting resizing moving and rotating In AC3D the manipulation of 3D objects works in a very similar way to a 2D drawing program i e the selection is shown highlighted and handles can be moved to reshape the section Selected components surface vertices are shown in
13. is a texture it will be shown in the window Selecting and manipulating When surfaces are selected in AC3D and the TCE is visible the texture coordinates of those surfaces are all visualized The TCE allows editing of all or a subset of the texture coordinates The TCE has two modes of selection Surface and Vertex In Surface select mode the texture coordinates are selected moved and size by manipulating individual surfaces Vertex select mode allows individual texture coordinates to be manipulated Der M2 maths el int tard a Surface select mode Vertex select mode Manipulation in the TCE is similar to the main AC3D 2D views After a selection is made the green bounding box can be moved the handles can be dragged to resize the selection and the selection can be extended and negated shift left mouse shift right mouse The selection can also be rotated using the mouse When the mouse pointer is over the edge of the bounding box the pointer changes to indicate that if the left mouse button is dragged the selection will be rotated jum amp m Movin Rotating Resizing The Flip buttons mirror the selection either vertically or horizontally Flipped vertically Flipped horizontally 53 Remapping the selection The Front Side Top buttons project the texture onto the surfaces in the specified axis The bounding size of the selected surfaces determines the boundaries of the mapping T
14. object shapes that can be created New objects are created by selecting one of these buttons and clicking dragging in one of the view windows 13 Polys Polylines Lines To create a Poly Polyline Line click to position each point and either double m T lt click or press the middle or right mouse button to end The surface type can be altered later from the control panel if you need a different type These objects consist of a list of vertices and a single surface The surfaces from more than one of these objects can be collected together into a single object by using the Object gt Merge function Polygons should be 3 or more points Concave polygons are handled by AC3D They can be converted to triangles by using the Surface gt Triangulate function It is possible to draw a line or poly in different windows creating a non planar surface This makes sense with lines but is not correct for a polygon which should have all of the points on the same plane Invalid polygons i e polygons that have less than three vertices are displayed in a cyan color Surfaces that have crossing edges are displayed ina red color This shows part of a sphere where This shows a four point polygon where the some vertices have been deleted vertices are positioned so that the edges Polygon surfaces with only 2 vertices overlap This is fixed by moving the vertices have been left These can be removed by using Object gt Optimize Surfaces To d
15. of a collection of vertices and a number of surfaces that reference those vertices A surface may be one of three types Polygon Polyline or Line A polygon is a filled area a Polyline is a wire frame outline of the polygon a loop that joins the start vertex to the end and a Line has a specific start and end Surface type is changed by pressing a button on the control panel The Surface type buttons are located at the bottom of the control panel Poly Polyline Line This panel also contains controls to set surfaces to be smooth or flat This determines the way that a polygon is drawn it has no effect on Lines or Polylines If a surface is flat shaded the color across the surface will be constant If it is shaded then the color will be graded depending on lighting conditions Vertices can be shared between surfaces i e one or more surfaces use the same vertex If these surface types are set to smooth the effect is of one continuous smooth surface The vertices MUST be shared for two surfaces to be smoothed together This method of shading allows smooth looking objects to be created from relatively simple shapes This is adjusted via the Tools gt Object Property Editor The crease angle is specified in degrees and is used to determine if adjacent surfaces in the object should be smoothed together by averaging the surface normals The angle between adjacent surfaces is measured and if this is larger than the crease angl
16. part of an object 62 change the selection and press the fit button The right device button is set to bring up the settings dialog Pressing this button again dismisses the dialog For more information on 3Dconnexion s devices see www 3dconnexion com Plugins Plugins add extra functionality and additional file format support to AC3D Plugins files are usually named lt something gt p and reside in the Plugins folder within the AC3D installation Additional tcl files in the same folder may also provide user interfaces and scripting for use with some plugins Plugins are automatically loaded when AC3D starts The console displays the progress of loading plugins and will show any errors that occur It is important that plugins are designed to run with the correct version of AC3D or they may fail to load To find out more about the plugins that are currently installed use Help gt About Plugins MID tpe Selecting each plugin line brings up a description and any associated Ei m php rd A n a o rr dern nn instructions for the plugin corna phage 1 lo bey T inicie nol ena Logan Tia dl gro cep dl rd bam cs e ets Rs cabe n ur IP WEIL ET LIT a a dp mi a Css Performance tips Rendering more polygons takes more time As larger and more detailed objects are edited the rendering will take longer Here are some tips to help edit larger models more effectively e Switch to wireframe viewing This is faster to r
17. the vertices along the join and Vertex gt Snap Together by Distance The Object gt Optimize Vertices will remove the duplicate vertices and allow the surface to appear smooth This moves each selected vertex to the nearest grid position This may or may not be the visible grid The snap grid is defined by snap grid in settings and may be different to the draw grid which is the visible grid Snap Objects by Vertices One vertex in each of two separate objects should be selected before executing this function The objects will be moved together so that the two selected vertices are in the same location Smooth Shape This function repositions the selected vertices in order to smooth the shape of the surfaces Align to Axis This function moves all selected vertices so that they lie on the specified axis 32 Weld Weld removes duplicate vertices where more than one vertices lie in the same position Unweld This creates new vertices so that each surface will access a unique vertex in the same object New vertices will be created in the same location as the originals Insert Vertex This function inserts a new vertex between each selected pair of vertices Insert Vertex is useful for adding extra points into a line If the two vertices selected are on an edge which is shared by two or more surfaces only one vertex will be created but it will be shared across the surfaces Divide Triangle Edge This function takes two
18. the views Individual views are maximized by clicking on the view buttons at the top right of the main window alternatively the F1 F5 keys can be pressed to switch between the different view configurations The main window size position and other settings are saved when AC3D exits The configuration of the views that AC3D starts up with can A Configure views easily be changed from the menu Views gt Configure views Apply Each view window has an individual menu at the mera View 3D dui M top This contains the menu for the view angle Camera changing the viewpoint e g focusing on the currently selected area and some misc controls that are dependent on whether the window is set to 2D or 3D The Camera angle can be changed at any time This is useful if for example you need to view or work on a model from the underside bottom view The icons on the right of each view menu allow you to use the mouse to navigate around the 3D space show a clean image and maximize the view window Spin 3D views only press and drag Move Pan view press and drag Zoom in out view press and drag Inspect Switch to show clean image display without all surface outlines grid controls etc and change to simple navigation mode Maximize minimize view button The spin move pan and zoom button are special controls that are held down left mouse button whilst the mouse is dragged The views adjust their vi
19. tracer see www povray org This example shows a very simple model consisting of a mesh a sphere and a cube that has been divided a couple of times with Surface gt Divide then had a Surface Make Hole operation There is also an extra light present in the model Fs dw M um P ume S F K A ES I _ The sphere has had a pov texture specified using the Tools gt Object Property Editor the appearance of the object in AC3D will be unaffected by this 24 texture F_Glass10 The settings in File gt Settings were POV header Hinclude glass inc M Use object data for POW files Pressing the Render button in the Render Tool gives 60 The Povray exporter supports bitmap textured objects Ensure that the formats of the texture picture files used are compatible with POV Ray 61 Appendix 3D Mouse support AC3D supports 3Dconnexion s 3D navigation hardware There are a number of different motion controllers available from 3Dconnexion all are compatible with AC3D A 3D mouse can be used in the AC3D s orthographic 2D views and in 3D views in both spin and walk modes In AC3D s Orth 2D views a 3D mouse will pan move left right up down and zoom In a 3D view in spin mode the 3D mouse will act as if the selection is being handled this is commonly called object navigation in many CAD applications In a 3D view in walk mode the 3D mouse is used to walk fly around the scene as
20. C MR 58 SN rnm TR 58 VAIL FAT qo o Me EN TRE RS 58 DD rM PP P P ed Car ne ame 59 MASSIVE ati PR Y 59 RENDE RMAN ECCE 59 POVRAY aiun a Aaa EE AAEE iia 59 a A E E E EE 59 ODOC LIBRARY oon Est 59 FREI ODI ING ira aa nA ae tee ete mures encens 60 A FOV a OX GING reaa a AEE E A a Na E 60 1 1 0 6 GING A 62 3D MOUSeO SUBDO Ei ASS seat NS dana EN idu su lec Lecco desi dud Eo Ioue EEEE 62 PILIQINS Bpee 63 Pertormance LIDS EC ds Hm 63 Key Presses gern 63 PrelerenCes SelLiNOS sseni E aE 64 Additional Information en a a a a 65 Ullum bim 65 tlIIQIM 65 Introduction Welcome to AC3D AC3D is designed to make the construction of 3D objects fast and easy lt is used to create 3D models for simulations games rendering ray traced images and for scientific and general data visualization Fe die mm br F pa pa rue o ues uan AC3D runs on a wide range of standard hardware and is available across a number of popular platforms AC3D terminology Vertex A vertex is a single point in 3d space It s specified by three coordinates x y and z More than one vertex can occupy the same position in 3d space A vertex is always owned by a single object they cannot be shared b
21. E RIP TIEN qr e 29 Fattoh An RUND ABI UD Ru ME 30 MD a A a e EE 30 Bovel O 30 E O TO TN 31 ANNA ll lod EE 31 joo KR E 31 UAW AV OD COT SX C TR CN No a EI US 31 Remove SUM ACE ON cm 32 EA AAA O IO 32 Operations on V Cruces a es hui rea reste as 32 is ES PETERE 32 Shap TOYS NED DISTANCE m RE 32 IS Mtr EET 32 onapcbieoted3 y Veri beso quce Du CA Td Fr niea dada 32 LS A STR 32 PAN OVD TO AS sl tl dt E M M sg 32 TT EIS UIE ROE aeo de dette 33 Nis ARM M 33 HAS OTE 10 qum ER EE 33 A EU satius A a D e DE EE 33 zio Wroo RC rt ii laica lirica 33 OO NO 33 Create Convex SUM aC ODO vida ati der veta t ENE REAL a ASA tie Ke RR d sa REN AAA n a PU Ra re dnos 34 Create Ndr eT SU acetato a 35 Croate QUIO PERMET EE 35 CrAl D eS nem ANO 36 Boolean OPE OA Sa ne 37 E ues ON 37 IIO EET MET 37 Woo RN CE 38 DD AWAY RM MM M NO 38 lesse eom t IE du dM Ut d M M 39 Knifteand 913 EAU EN CE NR 39 zfeljcnEDCnjgglre I M 40 Cutting a round ended channel in a cylindrical object 40 CUMING aaler OP TOT QU WIFIO antaras ale ltd 40 Cutting multiple windows from a fuselage a doo rosea kot a nta reae A ea te haac cgo ea ed es enr do aad 41 CUMING d sold Oe aba ales ita a aida 41 Aints and TIPS A A dao 43 SUPAIVISION SUFfaces ii ind 44 Changing the subdivision l
22. a different color and are surrounded by a bounding box usually green Selection is possible in move size rotate and extrude modes The default mode is move size Selecting select 099 I The Select mode defines the granularity of selection i e it determines if selections will affect objects groups or vertices To select in AC3D either click the left mouse button or use the left mouse button to drag a box over an area When something is selected the bounding box that appears can be dragged or resized directly affecting the points surfaces objects Vertex mode vertices can be selected by a single click on a single vertex or by dragging a box over a number of vertices box over an area Object mode selecting any part of an object causes the whole object to be selected O Surface mode a single surface is selected by a click Multiple surfaces are selected by dragging a Group mode a group of objects can be selected by highlighting any part of a single object that belongs to a group There is an important difference between a click select and a drag select Click selects are used for selecting single entities e g one object one surface one vertex A click select will select the nearest entity underneath the pointer A drag select will select everything within the drawn box that lies underneath the region Click select is useful for example when selecting a single s
23. ance a more simple shape is adequate and can save drawing time 21 Reduce E Reduce number af vertices to an keep original object s Heduce Close A target percentage specifies the proportion of vertices that are to remain For example if an object has 100 vertices and 80 is entered the final object will contain 80 vertices The original object can remain in the model or it can be replaced with the new object If the original object is kept the new object will be created in the same position and will be selected An example 732 surfaces 376 vertices Reduced to 40 gives 276 surfaces 150 vertices a saving of 456 polygons The reduce window remains visible so that different reductions can be tried use Edit 2 Undo to revert to the previous state Subdivide Subdivide These functions change the subdivision level A surface subdivision is where each surface is divided and then the shape of the overall object is smoothed Original object 22 Single subdivision Two subdivisions Three subdivisions without surfaces displayed Commit subdivision This function affects objects that have the subdivision preview level set to a value larger than zero The subdivision preview level is set from Tools gt Object Property Editor or by adjusting the subdivision level from Object gt Subdivide also from the toolbar controls It converts the subdivision preview into r
24. angle files is each line contains 9 floating point numbers and one hex value e g 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 Oxffffff represents 3 vertices of a triangle Hex value is OXRRGGBB col in this case white duplicate vertices are aggregated when loaded Vector files This is another simple format for importing 2D vector data Each line should consist of a number of vertices followed by the same number X y coordinate pairs e g 3 0 5 0 5 2 5 2 5 10 5 This represents a line with 3 vertices 0 5 0 5 2 5 2 5 10 5 Exporting files AC3D can generate output files for many different formats Support for extra file formats can be added by installing additional AC3D plugins See File Export for a list of the output files supported Several are mentioned here 3D Studio 3ds 3D studio files are used in 3D Studio Max 3D software This is a long established binary format which is supported by alot of third party software Note that objects with gt 1 material will be split into separate meshes within the 3DS file VRML 1 VRML is an ASCII geometry file specification used for web graphics VRML files may be viewed from within any web browser that has an appropriate plugin installed e g Cortona http www parallelgraphics com products cortona AC3D Object URLs set from the object data dialog are used so that objects will be selectable in the appropriate browser The output of normals and textures can be switched on off in the File
25. anner then the second object can be selected by holding the shift key and clicking or dragging over another object In the following image a sphere has been positioned to overlap with a box The subsequent sections illustrate the operations that can be performed from the intersection of these shapes Subtract Using Object gt Boolean gt Subtract the second object is subtracted from the first as if they were solid shapes This image illustrates the result of the subtraction Intersect After Object gt Boolean gt Intersect a new object is created from the overlapping solid volume between the two objects 37 Union Selecting Object gt Boolean gt Union creates a single object from the two objects The overlapping portion is removed Order of selection is unimportant As the function s result does not appear to be very different to the original objects the result is best illustrated here in wireframe Before Union operation After Union any internal surfaces have been removed Cut away The Object gt Boolean gt Cut Away function uses the second object to cut a solid portion from the first This function is similar to performing a Subtract and an Intersect at the same time After the cut The cut section is moved aside 38 Knife Unlike the previous Boolean functions which require that both objects are 3D and closed e g no open edges as in for example a tube AC3D s two knife operatio
26. being dragged will be deleted 26 Here the original surfaces have been removed to leave a star shaped box without a lid If cap end had been unticked then it would have been possible to see right through the star shape This picture shows what happens when sections is set to 4 To extend an existing set of surfaces it may not be desirable to keep the existing surfaces inside the new object Here is a cube that has had a single Surface gt Divide Two of the surfaces are selected 27 These surfaces can be extended without keeping the original surfaces since they will not be visible as they are inside the shape These settings are used Estrude parameters Sections i M Cap end Flip new surfaces M Remove original To perform the extrusion the bounding box is dragged to the left in either the front or plan window Holding down the Control key whilst dragging ensures that the new surfaces are square to the original This gives From 1 When extruding lines ensure that Remove original is ticked and Cap end is un ticked This ensures that no lines remain in the new surfaces It is useful to switch on the display of normals when extruding to check that the resultant surfaces are facing in the correct direction If they are not select the surfaces and use Surface gt Flip Normal Flip normal This effectively reverses the list of the vertices in each selected surface This reverse
27. ber of greebles that will be applied to each surface The raised height of each greeble Greeble heights default to the surface area of the underlying surface This number may exceed 100 The size of each greeble as it is spread on the surface 100 means the greeble will completely cover the surface Greebles are randomly rotated when placed this value dictates the increment in degrees which a greeble may be rotated from 0 to 90 A seed for the randomizer used to determine greeble placement Use a number here for consistent results between greeble runs on the same objects or specify one 1 for a number based on the current date time If checked custom greebles will be located and used if present See the Custom greebles section below If custom greebles are found and this box is checked the custom greebles will be combined with standard greebles If this box is not checked standard greebles will not be used unless there were no custom greebles found If checked custom greebles will not be distorted to conform to the underlying surface Use this for greebles where you wish to maintain their current width depth height aspect ratios Note that this works best when placing greebles on relatively square rectangular objects When placing un distorted greebles on triangles or skewed polygons they may tend to gravitate toward the weighted center of the polygon rather than If checked each greeble bevel will be created in its ow
28. cting Grid from the Orth menu or pressing the g key when focused in an orth window The Snap grid is shown by thin visual guide lines the draw grid uses thicker lines If Gridsnap is switched on moving resizing creating mouse movements will be aligned to the nearest snap grid points The grids can be configured to display units of any size e g for eighths of an inch the major draw grid would be set to 1 0 and the snap grid set to 0 125 1 8th Using Background Images Any orthographic 2D window can display a background image This can be useful for tracing shapes or laying out objects in relation to a scanned image e g a plan or map Background images are set and unset from the Orth menu at the top of an orthographic window All image formats that are supported by AC3D s texture loaders can be used as background images Background images will scale and move with the views By default the image will be centered on the origin The scale and position of the background image is adjusted by using alt and the cursor keys Alt and the cursor keys reposition the image whilst Alt Shift plus cursor up down scale the image Details of background images are currently not saved with models or when AC3D exits A 3D view window displays the current model in a three dimensional perspective and changes instantly when any modifications are made to the current model The main 3D menu at the top of the main AC3D window contains con
29. d points of the cup profile above then these points should lie exactly on the axis Drawing the line with Gridsnap can ensure this Alternatively snapping the points to the grid Vertex gt Snap to Grid or by using the control panel Move to function to ensure that two of the values are zero If these points are not exactly on the axis a small hole or possibly overlapping surfaces will be created If this happens the Vertex gt Snap Together function and Object gt Optimize Vertices can be used to remove duplicate points Setting the revolve offset allows the profile to be moved along an axis for each revolution This is useful for making spiral pipes springs and screw threads Example creating a spring Example creating a thread Mirror The mirror function duplicates all object surfaces and vertices and flips the new surfaces and vertices around the specified axis Examples A hemisphere 20 Object gt Mirror gt X Front por Object gt Mirror gt X Front Y Object gt Mirror gt X axis Front Pr Where possible Mirror will remove duplicate vertices If mirroring half of a shape use Vertex gt Align to Axis to align the inner edge vertices to an axis Alternatively select the inner vertices and resize one dimension to zero this flattens the selection aligning the vertices Mirror is useful after use of the AC3D real time Mirror function View menu where half of a symmetrical object has been work
30. e Ungroup function to separate the objects Select mode The select mode allows control over the level of editing in AC3D In Vertex individual vertices can be selected and adjusted In Surface operations are performed on one or more selected surface In Object whole objects are selectable This allows manipulation of objects even if they are part of groups In Group selecting all or part of an object automatically selects the top level object Material A material defines the color of a surface and also the attributes that define the way it will react to light e g shininess Texture Graphical images can be mapped onto the surfaces of an object The images are usually from graphics files such as gif jpg bmp etc Texture coordinates When the vertex of a surface is drawn a texture coordinate specifies the position of a texture image to map to that point A texture coordinate is a two dimensional u v value which defines the point on the 2D image Bounding box When you make a selection of objects surfaces or vertices a green box outlines it You can drag resize or rotate this box to adjust the contents Getting help User interface components in AC3D have balloon help Small tooltip windows will popup when the mouse pointer rests over a button or field label This feature can be switched off from File gt Settings When browsing through the menu items the function on each item i
31. e these coordinates to become disturbed in these cases it is necessary to remap the texture coordinates Changing the texture repeat and offsets The texture repeat and texture offset for an object can be modified in Object gt Texture gt Set texture repeat offset The texture repeat indicates the number of times the texture is to be fitted into that dimension Example a cube with texture repeats set to 1 1 the default 48 Object gt Texture gt set texture repeats offsets and repeats set to 2 2 The texture offset determines how far across the texture the mapping should start Texture repeat set to 1 1 and Texture offsets set to 0 5 0 5 Texas repest X TT zl gt Teie egs TD 4 E Teie olit Lj fos Testo oliver Ly fs Fe Beime update If more than one texture is required on a single object e g a different image on each side of a cube the object should be split up into parts e g use Surface gt Cut Away Object and a different texture mapped on to each of the sub objects Alternatively it is more efficient to create a single texture image i e a single picture file containing all the required images and use AC3D s Texture Coordinate Editor tool to map parts of the object 49 Tools This section describes AC3D s integrated tools Tools are accessed from the Tools menu Other tools can be added to this menu via software plugins Model Information This displays information about the cur
32. e current view 63 f toggle textures o set select mode to OBJECT set select mode to VERTEX s set select mode to SURFACE im set drag mode to MOVE f Set drag mode to ROTATE e set drag mode to EXTRUDE contro fit selection to all views 9 toggle grid h hide selected objects z zoom in Space Imaximize minimize view Some of the keys for the 3D window have an equivalent menu item in the 3D menu In 3D views Key Function wo wirefram e filled toggle f toggle textures lg toggle 3d grid 1 fit to window centre spin view around the selection Space m aximize minimize view In the 3D window the cursor keys spin the model in spin mode In Walk mode they control the viewpoint in a similar way to Quake and other games e g left right forward back alt up down move up down control up down tilt Preferences settings The settings in File gt settings are saved automatically when you exit AC3D This automatic saving can be switched off from the settings window Settings must be saved with this set to off for the change to be remembered Under Mac Unix the settings are saved to HOME ac3dprefs Under Windows they are saved to the user s home directory as ac3dprefs txt 64 Additional Information Third party plugins There are a number of additional plugins that add extra functionality to AC3D Some are supplied with AC3D and are described here others are available via the AC3D forum pages see the
33. e information on the Greeble and other excellent AC3D plugins see www supercoldmilk com 67 O 2008 Inivis Limited All rights reserved No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical including photocopying recording or storing in a retrieval system or translated into any language in any form without the prior written permission of Inivis Ltd Software license The software described in this document is furnished under a License Agreement which is included with the product This agreement specifies the permitted and prohibited uses of the product Licenses and trademarks Inivis ltd the Inivis logo AC3D and the AC3D logo are trademarks of Inivis ltd All other product names and any registered and unregistered trademarks mentioned in this manual are used for identification purposes only and remain the exclusive property of their respective owners Inivis www inivis com Last updated 4 July 2008 68
34. e the surfaces will be smoothed A crease angle of zero degrees forces all surfaces to be flat A crease angle of 180 degrees forces all surfaces to be drawn smooth Setting a surface type to flat forces the surfaces to remain flat shaded Setting a surface type to smooth allows it to be under control of the crease angle Example a cylinder with all surfaces set to Smooth crease angle 0 All surfaces appear flat crease angle 45 Crease angle 91 The cylinder edges are The cylinder sides are now smoothed together but the shaded along with the edges end is flat because the angle between it and the edges is 45 12 One sided and Two sided surfaces The 1S and 2S buttons select how many sides a surface has one sided or two sided If a surface is single sided it will only be visible from one side The following pictures demonstrate this In this model there are three objects a green rectangle a red rectangle and a blue ellipse made by creating an ellipse object and setting the surface type to be Poly The red rectangle has been set to be single sided 1S This means that it is visible from the front but not from the back the second image shows the whole model rotated Objects such as spheres and cubes which do not have any interior surfaces visible benefit from a speed optimization when being drawn with the surfaces single sided Surface normals The direction a su
35. eal polygons for the selected objects See the section on Subdivision surfaces for more information Re centre Object centres define the local origin of AC3D objects Object centres can be seen by switching on the button on the main Orth menu This function sets this origin at the centre of gravity This can be useful for specifying where the pivot points or local origin of an object are Minimum centre This function sets the object centre object s origin to the minimum xyz of the object Fragment Fragment creates one object per surface of the original object so that each object contains only one surface and the necessary vertices The surfaces are no longer smoothed together this is because each surface is now a separate 23 object and vertices cannot be shared across objects If you need to extract a number of surfaces from an object using Surface Cut Away Object is recommended Merge This function places all of the surfaces from the selected objects into one single object This does not optimize the vertices so that they can be shared across the surfaces Use menu Object gt Optimize Vertices after merging to create a more efficient object and or get smooth shading across adjacent surfaces Explode This is similar to fragment but each new object is moved forward in the direction the surface is facing by a specified amount Extrude Along Path This function sweeps a profile along a specified path to crea
36. ed on Boolean Boolean operations allow objects to be cut and intersected with one another See the chapter dedicated to Booleans Optimize Vertices This function removes duplicate vertices from each selected object For vertices to be removed an object must own the vertices and they much match the same position exactly The function will share one vertex between each connected point This can make the object less complex and means that vertex normals can be calculated if smooth shading is required This function also removes duplicate vertex references from the surface something that might cause a bad polygon If vertices do not match the same position Vertex gt Snap Together or Vertex gt Snap Together by Distance can be used to move them to the same point Optimize Surfaces This function removes any duplicate surfaces and any polygons that consist of 1 or 2 vertices these may exist if vertices have been deleted from an object AC3D highlights invalid polygons by displaying them as cyan lines Reduce This function reduces the number of vertices and polygons whilst trying to retain as much of an object s original shape as possible This is useful for saving on storage space and for speeding up the rendering of complicated objects This function can be used to create different objects that will be shown at different distances LOD level of detail For example a car object should be viewed close up with all polygons but from a dist
37. ements 47 Texturing as jue ee rom Pa STI A ns UE ai fo Dem Feu Fes Les mn um Ex dl B A m mas nn maa a Fem m PU ne WO ssa D on bou x imi fai Een Am mp ua i uli Fu S Fabien ire bts _ nF Aa fee Se e CE E Aira El matar ee M aL S PLE E Each AC3D object can have one texture A texture is set from the Object gt Texture menu Setting a texture Teue bes b Haa ppm pg bmp gb T L i pit Each AC3D object can have one texture applied to its surfaces After selecting an object or objects use the menu Object gt Texture gt Load Texture to set a texture AC3D loads a number of different picture file formats as textures These include gif jpeg etc To view which formats AC3D can load see the load texture dialog Note that some export formats or rather the programs that load the files do not support all the texture file types that AC3D supports You should ensure that you are using the correct format texture for the correct export file type e g jpg or gif for VRML Changing the mapping Texture coordinates determine how a texture is mapped onto the surfaces of an object All AC3D objects have default texture coordinates applied to them when they are created A cube for example has mapping set so that one instance of the texture will appear on each face Some external files have formats that do not contain texture coordinates and some AC3D operations may caus
38. ender than filled graphics Use object hiding and locking This reduces the graphics load e Edit in only one maximized view This prevents all views from being updated every time a change is made e If surfaces can only be viewed from one side e g they are outer surfaces of a closed object such as a box set them to single sided This is slightly faster to draw e Switch on interactive wireframe in both the Orth and 3d menus This temporarily sets the view to wireframe when being panned or zoomed using the mouse Wireframe usually renders faster than filled polygons e The Interactive Wireframe switches located on the main Orth and 3D menus will switch the views into wireframe for manipulations e When using surface subdivision keep the subdivision preview level set to 1 or 2 when working on the object Switching off the display of subdivisions will also speed up interaction e Use Object gt Reduce to reduce the number of vertices polygons in an object Key presses Key shortcuts for menu items are shown on the menus Other keys can be used In orthographic 2D windows Key Function Cursor keys move view Shift Cursor move view faster Control up zoom in Control down zoom out Shift Control up zoom in with larger step Shift Control down zoom out with larger step Alt Cursor move background image Alt shift cursor up down scale background image Backspace Delete delete current selection Space maximize or minimize th
39. erial index of an existing polygon select that surface and the message at the bottom of the AC3D window will display the material number Editing Palette entries ar aunq ram I MOTTE Pressing the right mouse button on a palette button pops up a menu The options are to edit a color select all surfaces with that material or add a new material copy of the selected material will be added to the end of the list Pressing the colored button brings up a system color selection Pressing the button next to an item expands the item so that the numeric values of the Red Green and Blue components can be altered with sliders The material window allows various attributes of the material to be altered Diffuse Ambient Emissive Specular Shininess Transparency This is essentially the main color of the material The exact shade shown on a model depends on the amount of light available to the surface Ambient color works with the diffuse to affect the overall color of a surface but is not sensitive to the amount of light on that surface Setting this can make a surface appear to be giving off light This may be used for example to give a light blue glow to a spaceship s engine No actual light is emitted from surfaces with an emissive color set The specular quality defines the color and brightness of highlights This works in conjunction with Shininess A high value means that highlights will be smaller and le
40. etween objects A vertex is usually part of one or more Surfaces but need not be Surface A surface in AC3D is a sequence of vertices Surfaces are one of three types polygons lines or polygon outlines The type of a surface defines how the surface is drawn and this can be easily changed If a surface is set to be single sided it will only be visible from the front Two sided surfaces will be visible from both sides lt is more efficient to draw single sided surfaces and makes more sense when used as part of an object such as a sphere where you can t see the other side of the surfaces Surfaces have a material attribute which defines the color and quality for lighting purposes Each vertex referenced in a surface has an associated Texture Coordinate Vertices can be shared between surfaces in the same object Surface normal A surface normal specifies the direction a surface is facing Normals are used in lighting calculations Surface normals are automatically calculated by AC3D A surface is defined as facing the viewer if the vertices can be seen in an anti clockwise direction Object An AC3D object is a list of vertices and surfaces that use these vertices It also has other attributes such as a name and texture Group A group is a special object that has no surfaces or vertices but has other objects as children Groups are created by selecting two or more objects and selecting Group from the edit menu or toolbar Use th
41. evel da Oia 44 Switching display of SUDAIVISION Sii ads 44 Committing SUDOIVISIONS cnm 45 I crie ct 45 FINES La Lo IDS mec M 46 Using ExXtr ae to dad detall oro A P tip Mares AA titans hada sa Sa 46 Display or hide SUDOMISIONS 7 voa eroe oe ci rebate de ttt iM e M AU 47 Choosing the right subdivision level ei e nt adi a weeded Savas ates 47 AVANCE USES A cT 47 MOU FIN A o oM 48 o A M 48 Changing The mapping coo it aaa 48 Changing the texture repeat and Of Sui co asas 48 TOS m RS RE RSR te nt SC ee te 50 Model ANTONIN AMOR 22sec cence rct 50 sinl 50 Object Hierro anna 50 Object Property EG Ole ss 51 Texture Coordinate EGILOI rs en an a E ac 52 Secc tique and manipulating NENNT 53 PEMA DING fie selecto isisa a keniaecs quddddu bel ouva diga du band phis den d atat obe bu diua de AN Rent 54 PREDIC AU ON darme 54 Create gp quer Em 56 YD ODJ ECIS cosie c 56 Position SD SCUES Ol eet Ea 56 MaternalS enm E 57 Inn iaa 57 Editing Palette entes eee S te tn ete nent 57 Loading and saving files iiie dio iia 58 Importing Other formats ers ER 58 TRATO MOS a RE A A AA E A AA AAA As 58 VECES as Ds pu ne 58 EXPOFUNO files tcs 58 A E NUM I
42. ewpoint as the mouse is dragged Additional views can be created from the menu Views gt New View Unlike 2D CAD programs the space presented in the AC3D view windows is not like a finite piece of paper which has a limit and edges You can move viewpoints just like a person moves around in real 3D space There are no real edges to the available space apart from reaching computational limits Orthographic 2D views When a view camera is set to Front Back Top Bottom Left or Right the view is non perspective orthographic 2D An orthographic view shows a view parallel to a single axis The items on the main Orth menu control how views set to these camera modes are drawn and what components are visible For these settings all Orth windows work together e g switching from filled to wireframe appearance in one Orth window causes all other Orth windows to also be set to wireframe Although it s useful sometimes to work in a single view seeing all the windows at once can be very helpful when positioning objects and laying out scenes Navigating in 2D views Use the mouse to pan or zoom an orth view The keyboard arrow keys pan and control up down zooms in and out Holding down a shift key increases the movement zoom distance The grids In the orthographic windows there are two grids the draw grid major lines and the snap grid minor lines Both can be set from File gt Settings and their display can be toggled on off by sele
43. gin of the object 51 Texture Coordinate Editor m 3D Texture Coor dinate Editor Eding 472 surfaces ol obesct idjenp Sudaces selected 80 AC3D s integrated Texture Coordinate Editor TCE allows full control over the texture coordinates that are applied to all surfaces in AC3D objects To start the TCE select Tools Texture Coordinate Editor To edit the texture coordinates of an object select a single object or surfaces from a single object in the main AC3D windows The TCE runs in conjunction with the main AC3D program so it is possible to switch between the windows selecting the surfaces and objects you wish to edit Note that if a group object is selected which has textured children then nothing will appear in the TCE In this case switch to Object select mode and select a single object The surfaces selected in AC3D will appear in the TCE according to their texture coordinates All AC3D primitive objects those created from the control panel have default texture coordinates For example bin e oam do Lem eee T VIP dig A anum does ades mes dmi Cylinder Sphere Lim AL LLL ee pme m F It s important to realize that the pictures here represent the coordinates that are attached to each vertex reference in each surface and have no relation to the layout of the actual object vertices 52 Note that the pictures above show the texture mapping for objects that have no textures applied lf there
44. gt Settings window VRML 2 VRML 2 is a geometry description web file format which also allows animation and some other powerful constructs See VRML 1 for a suitable browser plugin Output of normals and textures is switchable via Settings VRML2 Proto This form of VRML2 output exports objects into a VRML prototype This can be used when compositing larger models where each object may be stored in an individual file and a single file controls the locations of individual instances 58 DIVE Dive is a Virtual Reality system The Dive generation will include the object data if you have input any this is usually TCL code If an object has a URL then the object will be a dive gateway See http www sics se dive for more info about the Dive VR system MASSIVE Massive is a distributed VR tele conferencing system written by Chris Greenhalgh at Nottingham University in the UK It runs on SGl and Sun platforms For more details see http www crg cs nott ac uk csm massive html RENDERMAN These files are used in a raytracer This allows detailed images with accurate lighting shadows and reflections to be created from a 3D model There are a number of Renderman compatible renderers available The eye viewpoint is defined by your view position in the primary 3D window approx Note that lines will not be output Any polygons that need triangulating breaking up into triangles will be triangulated POV Ray POV Ray is a very po
45. he spherical button causes the texture coordinates to be wrapped around selected surfaces Remap frant ALSO Texture Coordnate Editor l 4 It is possible that after starting the TCE and Wm DE r selecting an object the window appears blank It is been likely that the object has zero value texture 8 Salim coordinates e g each surface vertex reference has IM 0 0 0 0 as a coordinate In a case like this a Select all in the TCE would reveal that all of the Select coordinates are set to 0 0 aa ones Fi In this case you will need to make sensible coordinates for your model probably in groups Do this by selecting a number of surfaces from within AC3D and using the remap buttons to assign a mapping to the texture coordinates You can then reposition and size the surfaces in the TCE and map them onto a texture E ding M miee of object car Surfaces relecied 125 Replicator The Replicator allows multiple copies of the selection to be created Each copy can be moved rotated and scaled The Replicator also allows objects to be Copes I extruded Mode Translation m Rotation degrees Rotate about ngn C See fo fio io Go Ob FS ACID Replicator The replicator works by first duplicating or extruding the current selection It then moves the new copy using the distances specified by Translation X Y Z coordinates If there is a rotation specified it rotates the object around the
46. i clockwise direction This function works by creating a new surface and adding vertices in the order they were selected If vertices are not selected in exactly the correct order a bad surface crossing edges or non planar may be created Create Quad This function is used to create a four point four sided surface from three selected vertices 35 a Before Vertex gt Create Quad After new surface created New vertex is positioned as and new vertex selected desired Create 2D Mesh This function uses a technique called Delaunay Triangulation to calculate triangles between a set of points When this function is selected a plane is specified This treats the points as 2D so that a mesh can be laid out over the points Example here are a number of vertices in the front window After Vertex gt Create 2D Mesh gt Front is applied To make vertices specifically for this function create a line placing each point at the desired location and select the line and Surface gt Remove Surface Only This removes the surface and leaves the vertices Note that this function works convexly 36 Boolean operations AC3D s powerful Boolean functions take two objects and perform a volume based operation between them The functions reside in the Object gt Boolean main menu Each function requires two objects to be selected To select two objects first switch to Object or Group selection mode one object is selected in the normal m
47. level groups To select individual objects switch to Object select mode using the main AC3D control panel The eye icon shows controls visibility similar to Hide Unhide on the main AC3D control panel The padlock icon controls shows if an object is locked A right click on an object item will reveal a popup menu 50 Oibiecte pelected 4 PT e ie TT santa ct de group cer A toi El pap yor Les Om o Veto head Fieve ba tad j Echt object daha Select al Select no ou Cista Fistrech This allows control over hiding a more detailed properties viewer editing object data and the option of moving an object to the head start or tail end of the children list Object Property Editor Objects have properties that can be adjusted using the Object Property Editor The crease angle and subdivision level can be adjusted by moving a slider and pressing a set button Every AC3D object can have a URL web link address and text data attached to it This is a string of text This data is saved in the AC3D file along with the object geometry information a ACIDO Cfo pect Properties Loc Fla T3 Loc 0 2 Objects exported in VRML files will have a link generated around them if a URL is present and Povray objects can include object data text at the end of each object description allowing custom Povray commands to be added The Loc point defines the position of the centre of the object This is the local ori
48. n separate object All greebles are then grouped into a single AC3D group Note that this can cause significant slowdowns if you end up with thousands of greebles bevels in separate objects This feature provides you with an interactive preview directly on your selected surfaces of what your generated greeble will look like The greebles will be updated as you tweak change variables While realtime preview is active you will not be able to interact with your model You may go in and out of realtime preview to rotate scroll your model view to get a different perspective on the greeble in progress Note that if you manually type values in fields the realtime preview does not update only when you use the numeric scrolls or the checkboxes does the preview update Once you click the Create greebles button the actual greebles are generated and realtime preview is disabled Enable this feature to write a summary of greeble settings to the newly created greeble object Handy for seeing how you initially generated a greeble object Use the AC3D object property window to see the contents of the Data field Each textual setting is prefixed by which should make this POV Ray safe 66 Standard greebles By default there are 4 types of greebles shown here These greebles are stretched rotated and scaled in accordance with the underlying surface Custom greebles Use custom greebles where the standard set does not meet your needs
49. names to be set 14 Object names can only be edited set in Group or Object select mode Object names need not be unique and can be the same across multiple objects This can be useful for selecting or finding particular objects with the Edit gt Select by name function e g to select all objects named chair Object names are used in some of the file formats exported by AC3D If AC3D is being used to generate VRML or Dive files URLs and other text can be associated with objects This text is used in a number of the export file formats that AC3D generates The names text and URLs are saved in the ac AC3D files Text attached to each object is entered into the field on the Tools gt Object Property Editor window Object names can also be set in the property editor Lights Lights have no associated geometry and represent a point light In the AC3D views lights are represented by this symbol Lights are fixed brightness white lights Lights are selected and repositioned in Group or Object select mode Lights are generated in exported files such as POV and RIB files The generated files can be edited to alter the lighting attributes This image shows a green sphere with two lights indicated by white spheres the main headlight is off The headlight in the 3D window is toggled on and off with the l key or from the main 3D menu If the headlight is on when POV or RIB files are generated a light will be added to information
50. ns can use a 2D or open 3D object as the primary operand In both functions the second object which is used as the knife must be a closed 3D object After the Knife The appearance is the same as Cut Viewing this In wireframe shows that the box surfaces Away but the result is a single object have been sliced and no internal surfaces are created Knife and Cut Away This function is similar to Knife except the original object is split into two objects along the cut edges The result appears to be the same as Knife but is Here the cut away part has been move aside There actually two objects are no internal surfaces 39 Boolean examples Cutting a round ended channel in a cylindrical object After Object gt Boolean gt Subtract A cylindrical object and an oval The channel cutting piece is moved the channel has been cut object to overlap the cylinder The cylinder is selected by clicking and then the oval is selected by shift and clicking Cutting an aileron from a wing In this case we want to cut a solid shape from a wing and retain the cut piece A box is positioned over the area of the wing that is to be cut out The Object gt Boolean gt Cut Away function is used Th gm AE I faa pm IN ZI LF i rte J Before Object gt Boolean gt Cut Away 40 This image shows the aileron moved away Cutting multiple windows from a fuselage This image shows a hollow cylinder The ovals a
51. nto a new object This can be useful for extracting parts of objects e g splitting a sphere into two 31 Remove surface only This deletes any whole surfaces selected The vertices will remain Calculate surface area This function calculates the total surface area of the selected surfaces Note that the total area accounts for one side of each surface Operations on Vertices The majority of functions on the Vertex menu are available when the Surface or Vertex select mode is active and one or more vertices are selected Snap Together This sets all selected vertices to the same location The vertices can be in separate objects or the same object The point that they are snapped to is the average of all selected points Snap Together by Distance This function moves vertices together that lie within the specified distance This is useful for example to join two halves of an object together Snap to Grid This picture shows a close up of an object where two halves have been positioned together Notice that there is a visible seam along the top This is because the two halves are separate objects Once the two halves have been merged together into a single object Object gt Merge the vertices need to be shared in order for this seam to disappear If Object gt Optimize Vertices does not remove duplicate vertices then it means that the vertices are in very slightly different positions The solution is to select
52. on Extend and negate selection work in all select modes 17 Clearing the selection Clicking outside the area of the bounding box will cause everything to become unselected The selection can also be cleared by pressing the None button in the toolbar or from the menu Edit gt Select Nothing Hiding objects Hide Locking objects Lock Linzel Ungel Hiding allows objects to be temporarily removed from the views The current selection or objects that are not selected can be hidden from view The Unhide button ensures that all objects are visible The Show Hidden toggle in the main 3D menu determines if the hidden objects are visible in 3d views Hiding is useful when access is needed to work on obscured objects Locking is useful for temporarily disabling objects that are obscuring others When objects are locked it s not possible to select them Locking also helps with the speed performance when editing large models It works in a similar way to hiding except that locked objects are drawn in grey wireframe This picture shows the top and bottom of a sphere selected This is done by first selecting the top vertices with a drag then holding down the shift key and dragging across the bottom of the sphere Note that if objects are hidden or locked and the model is saved exported hidden and locked objects are included in the file 18 Model manipulation Operations on objects These o
53. perations are on the Object menu and act upon one or more selected objects Texture Each object can have one texture A texture is a 2D bitmap image such as a gif or jpg file which is drawn onto the surfaces of an object To set a texture on an object use Object gt texture gt Load texture AC3D s default palette of objects predefine the way that the textures are mapped onto the object surface To adjust this or to define a custom mapping use AC3D s Texture Coordinate Editor Tools menu See the section on Texturing Revolve Revolving makes copies of the selected objects rotating each copy and then creating surfaces between the copies It s recommended that this function be used to revolve 2D outlines of shapes rather than filled polygon objects Any revolved line objects are automatically removed after the revolution The axis around which the revolution is performed can be altered To create a torus make a circle in the Front window Select Object gt Revolve JA revolve degrees 26 avis Y segments i 2 offset 0 0 Revolve Lancel Set the axis to Y and click Revolve You should see something like this Select the smooth surface type near the bottom of the control panel to make it appear rounded 19 The degrees of revolution can also be altered e g 270 degrees If there are points that need to be in the centre of the final revolved object e g the start and en
54. pular raytracer see www povray org for more information The eye viewpoint is defined by the view position in the 3D window In Spin mode the viewpoint will be approximate for a more accurate viewpoint position switch to walk mode in the 3D window The color palette is output at the top of the file each entry has the same number as the AC3D material The properties can be altered easily to provide different surface types and textures some includes can be added at the top of the file to get external definitions The light is output at the end of the file The light s position is the same as the viewers The POV Ray output is based on triangles lines will be ignored and polygons with more than three vertices will be triangulated automatically The Object data text specified in Tools gt Object Property Editor can be used to attach information to objects which is then inserted into the POV Ray file Use object data in POV files in the main AC3D File gt Settings must be ticked so that this text is inserted into the file A POV Ray include command may be inserted in to the setting POV header e g include glass inc See the Rendering section for an example of using POV Ray Triangle files See loading triangle files for a description of this format This format is very simple and is easy to parse Object Library A Object Ebrary The object library is accessed from the File menu and can help organize and maintain a structured se
55. raw shapes that have vertices in the same position as an existing shape use the Nearsnap function the control for which appears under the draw mode section when Poly Polyline Line mode is selected When Nearsnap is on the next point drawn will snap to the nearest existing vertex when there is a vertex within a certain range Spheres boxes etc Creating a 3D object by dragging the mouse in a window specifies two of the dimensions for the new object the third dimension is an average of the original two The location of the object in the third dimension is specified by the 3D cursor These objects can also be created with a single click in a view window This will create a regular object that fits into a 1 x 1 x 1 square The 3D cursor is shown in the orthographic views by a cross This is repositioned by using the tool Tools gt Position 3D Cursor Most people rarely use this because it is very easy to create an object and position it afterwards Some object types allow parameters to be set before creating the object For example spheres and meshes can be made from triangles or quads Cylinder Draw a cylinder Controls for any available parameters appear in the x pon panel underneath the Mode box on the control panel Segments Td E Triangles cA I a a a Naming objects When created AC3D Objects are automatically named The object name box is at the bottom of the control panel and allows these
56. re moved into the large After Object gt Boolean gt Knife and and three oval shapes The three tube so that the objects overlap Cut Away the pieces cut are in oval oval shapes have been merged holes together to form a single object Object 2 Merge so that they can be used in a single Boolean operation This image shows the model after the ovals have been moved away from the main tube object If Object gt Boolean gt Knife had been used the window shapes would still be part of the main object Note that for the knife functions the main object first selected does not need to be 3D and closed Cutting a solid object at an angle 41 This image shows a cylinder and a box The box has been positioned at an angle over the end of the cylinder This shows the result of selecting Object gt Boolean gt Cut Away If Boolean gt Object gt Knife Cut Away is used the object has been cut but is no longer solid A wireframe view shows the end of the cylinder fully enclosed inside the box Anything inside the box will be cut away from the cylinder The cut piece has been moved 42 Hints and Tips To perform successful Boolean operations e All objects should be three dimensional and have no open edges the object should appear solid The exception for this is the main object being used for one of the knife functions this may be open or 2D The knife objects the second selected object which is u
57. rent model J Model information E Group WORLD v 0 0 kids 1 Object box v 8 s b kids 0 Total objects 2 surfaces 6 veitices B This shows the information for a single cube Note that the total number of objects shown is actually two This is because the World object is included in this count The internal world object is the top level container object This window can remain visible whilst other work continues but if any changes occur to the current ACSD model the refresh button must be pressed in order to update the displayed information Render Dupuis Poe ugs Manari Ae dents pere Rance pogar C Programs Fla PD Fans or freier v1 Ebr preargnea ans Farde parlar ell iL af 2 aF TSS Xr Felt Sheed Fender batir alba This tool is used to start up an external renderer such as a Raytracer like Povray or other linked program See the rendering section for more information on how this is configured Object Hierarchy This window shows the structure of the current model but also allows control over the structure of the hierarchy beets 12aehus 4 gt E g ele pd Ed ow ow aba Doky Urcup rug GEC pl ste idad abaci wheal pbl wheal Select Sabot nara Pis Pedes Clicking on one of the items in the list can select or unselect objects This selection is sensitive to the current select mode being used In Group select mode for example it is only possible to select top
58. rface is facing is determined by its Normal indicated by arrows in the above diagram This is a 3D graphics term for a line at right angles to the surface that indicates a direction Normals are used to calculate surface colors and shading when the objects in AC3D are drawn For smooth shading vertex normals are automatically calculated by averaging normals of all connected surfaces Normals can be visualized in both the orthographic and 3d views Normals on the orth and 3d menus This preview is useful for solving problems where for example some surfaces in an object are the wrong way around This can cause surfaces to appear missing if they are one sided or the smoothing can appear uneven Viewing the normals is also handy for use with the extrude function and can help determine the extrude settings that ensure that new surfaces face in the correct direction This picture shows two spheres The sphere on the left shows correct normals i e all facing outwards The sphere on the right shows some surfaces facing in the wrong direction Notice how the shading is not consistent AC3D automatically calculates the normals both surface and vertex To flip the direction of a surface use Surface gt Flip Normal This actually reverses the order of the vertices in the surface so that the automatically generated normal faces the opposite way Creating new objects The AC3D control panel contains a number of 2D and 3D
59. s described in the message text at the bottom of the AC3D window Windows Views AC3D has a control panel on the left plus 4 view windows There s also the menu and toolbar at the top and an information bar along the bottom Control panel 1 This is where the main controls over the selection and draw modes are located lt also oD dg contains the surface type controls the palette of materials and the object name field LE ra The top of the control panel shows information about the current selection When the mouse is being used to interact with models this area will also display current positions distances moved and other related information Toolbar This contains buttons for some of the most commonly used functions AI None Dup Cut Copy Pastel Gp Unorouo Fig s 2 60 200 10 10 Subdw Subd a EE out selected objects into a group remove the group object flip the section about this axis 200 50 10 10 scale the selection uniforml Maximize a single view or view ALL together View windows By default AC3D starts with three two dimensional 2D orthographic view windows and a single three dimensional SD window The default view windows show Front Left Top and 3D camera angles onto the model space TE st Pes ome net vo ern Salil f Sade Se MY ROS mM F Sein bE e m el The dividers between the 4 view windows can be dragged to resize
60. s the way that a poly faces A polygon is defined as facing if the vertices appear anti clockwise to the viewer If a polygon is set to be one sided by pressing the 1S button on the control panel then it will only be viewable from one direction the direction it is facing The display of normals can be switched on in the orth and 3D windows this can help determine if any surfaces are facing in undesired directions Change vertex order This changes the order in which the vertices of a surface are drawn by moving the first vertex to the end of the vertex list This can be used to change the position of a break in a line It can also be used to fix a bad polygon which has the first three vertices in a non anti clockwise order causing the normal used for lighting to be 28 incorrectly calculated If a polygon appears all black this function may need executing possibly repeatedly until it appears correctly Flip Triangle Edge Given two adjacent triangles the joining edge is flipped Divide Divide creates new surfaces by splitting each surface to make quads four point four sided surfaces Note that because this function splits surface edges it affects any surfaces that are adjacent to those being divided This image shows a box that has had the top surface divided The red surfaces that are adjacent now have five points each because the division inserted an extra vertex Combine Combine takes two or more
61. s why the actual surface selected in the original object is in a slightly different location because the subdivision causes the shape to change A similar effect can be seen in Vertex select mode Here two vertices are selected note how the selection shows around the area of the original vertices This is because it is the original vertices that are affected the subdivision is based on their positions Choosing the right subdivision level Subdividing an object by one level increases the number of surfaces in that object by a minimum of four times and each subsequent subdivision increases this number by a factor of four Each level of subdivision increases memory requirements and will have an effect on speed since there are many more polygons to be drawn and processed The number of vertices and surfaces in a subdivided object can be view from the ooa UDIN Model Info tool on the Tools menu Djeni hara 11 a 108 bae Qiiod v TEE 0 1720 Pala obra 2 malec n DD aces 1 Une less For general use level 2 gives a smooth appearance to objects whilst keeping polygon counts lower Obviously machines with large amounts of memory fast processors and fast graphics accelerators can work with larger models more easily Advanced users The default maximum subdivision level in AC3D is 3 This can be increased in the advanced settings You should be aware that any increase in subdivision levels increases the computational requir
62. sed to cut must be 3D and closed e All surface normals should be facing outwards This can be checked by displaying normals 3D and Orth menus or pressing n to toggle When showing normals the magenta lines should be facing away from the surface If a surface normal line is not visible or appears as a magenta dot the surface should be flipped with Surface gt Flip Normals Many triangles may be created if holes are created in a single polygon It is often better to divide a single surface Surface Divide before performing this type of Boolean operation To check overlapping objects before performing a Boolean function it sometimes helps to view the model in wireframe press the w key or use the controls on the main Orth and 3D menus 43 Subdivision Surfaces Modeling with subdivision surfaces makes it easy to create smooth objects using simple polygon objects In ACSD any polygon or line object can be subdivided This includes objects containing ordinary poly surfaces and also lines and polylines When an object is subdivided the original geometry is used as a base model Any changes to this base model are instantly reflected in the smoothed subdivision Changing the subdivision level The subdivision level can be quickly changed by using the Subdivide items on the Object menu or by using Subdiv Subdiv a the toolbar buttons Subdiv Any whole or partly Oe Subdiv
63. selected vertices and divides the edge between two triangles This splits each triangle into two further triangles two vertices selected after the edge division Extrude Edges This function provides a quick way of performing a simple extrude on one or more surface edges i e between vertices The selection is moved Vertices selected After Vertex gt Extrude Edges the new surfaces and vertices UPwards showing the new have been created but are not Surfaces fully visible until moved Slice Surface This function is used to cut one or more surfaces across selected vertices Single surface with two After Vertex gt Slice vertices selected Surface now two surfaces 33 A row of vertices around a After Vertex gt Slice cylinder is selected Surface each surface is cut into two Create Convex Surface Object This function uses a technique called convex hull to create a new object that surrounds the vertices that are selected This is very useful for joining complex objects together or for simplifying the creation of some complex shapes These two pictures show the function being used to join a cylinder to a cube Note that because this function makes a new object the vertices are not shared with the old objects If the whole shape i e the original objects plus the new part is required to be smooth then the objects must be merged together Object Merge and then have the duplicate vertices removed
64. specified location Finally if the scale fields are set to anything other than 1 1 1 the copy is scaled Examples Creating an array of 5 objects 1 unit apart in the X dimension ax 5 Dup amp cae O arado p m n E iign C Sack CC JD Cano 54 Creating four copies scaling each time e Duplicate P Er Translation be i lo o Fictation Hegel le n la Faute about Ce Om O Sokcton 30 Cuneo Go Coe Extruding a horn shape from a single ellipse Mode C Dupkcam Eia Teds d 0 0 Foie shui C Din Selection C 3D Cano Go Ce Creating a single step for a spiral staircase by extruding a rectangle EA pai EE so es han Lam iks k a im eds de AA e od r Car Use the replicator to duplicate the steps in a spiral pattern Create Text The Create Text tool which is to be found in the Tools menu generates 2D and 3D objects from TrueType fonts This image shows the same text in Outline Solid Extruded and Beveled type The font size specifies the maximum unit height of the text The font detail 1 to 10 controls the number of vertices per letter The greater the detail the more surfaces and vertices will be in the resultant AC3D objects Align Objects This allows objects to be repositioned relative to one object Select a single object and then shift select others On pressing Align the first object is used as the reference object Position 3D cursor Position
65. ss scattered across the surfaces Transparency can be useful to for making a surface look like glass Transparency is supported in the palette but for purposes of speed the surfaces are not sorted when they are rendered into the views If the real time update option is selected any 3D view windows are redrawn every time a change is made to the material 57 Loading and saving files An AC8D file usually named lt something gt ac is a text file describing the geometry of a model AC3D files retain all available information about a model built with AC3D e g textures surface settings materials object data etc Other file formats exported by AC3D may not retain all of this information Models should always be saved in this format to ensure that no detail is lost Developers can view a description of the file format on the AC3D website AC3D files are loaded by selecting File gt Open This will replace the current model To load models in addition to the current model use File gt Merge A list of the most recently opened files appears on the File menu Selecting one of these causes it to be loaded Importing other formats See the File gt Import menu for a list of file types that AC3D can import Extra Import Export plugins allow AC3D to handle more file formats Check the AC3D website for details of additional plugins The following formats may be useful for importing your own model data Triangle files The format of tri
66. t of model component objects Objects may be added and removed from the library For example these components may be electronic parts kitchen units molecule models etc Loading a single object from the library can be repeated to make multiple copies of the same object Note that the 3D position at which the object is saved will be its location when it is loaded again from the library To add an object to a library select it and press Store Take care when replacing objects as the object that is currently selected in AC3D will overwrite the file stored on the library 59 Rendering The Render tool in the tools menu can be configured to automatically launch an external renderer This allows generation of high resolution images with shadows reflections transparency and other effects The output file type is set from the Output file type pull down menu The file types listed here are all of the file types that AC3D can export extra file types may have been added using plugins The Output filename specifies the name of a file that the model will be generated into The Render program specifies the program that will start after the file is written The Render Parameters are appended to the command line that it executed to start the render program Ifa s is specified in the render command it will be replaced by the render filename A POV Ray example POV Ray is a very popular ray
67. te a 3D shape The operation works on two objects the profile and the path The order in which these objects are selected is important The profile should be selected first and the path second usually with shift select An example Front xy Ensuring that the select mode is Object first select the circle then hold down the shift key and select the line Next select Object gt Extrude Along Path Front xy The shapes created by this function can easily be smoothed by using AC3D s subdivision In the following image the line has been subdivided twice smoothing the appearance It is possible to reposition the vertices in this line to fine tune the desired shape After using Extrude Along Path the new object initially appears the same as before but once subdivided has the same smooth profile as the original line path 24 Front xy Operations on surfaces Extruding Pressing the extrude button on the control panel or pressing the e key when there are one or more surfaces selected enables the function The actual extrude is done after the selection is dragged Extruding is a powerful function that can be used for a number of tasks It works by making new surfaces at the edges of the current selection The original selection can be removed and or copied to the end of the new surfaces A Selecting one or more surfaces and then selecting the extrude button on the control panel brings up the extrude parameters
68. trols to switch visibility of many attributes within the 3D window Changing these controls affects all 3D windows within the program A 3d grid is available toggle with g The grid lies on the XZ plane floor w toggles between wireframe and filled drawing t toggles textures toggles the fixed light See the 3D menu for more viewing options Navigating in 3D Two navigation modes are available in this window spin and walk These can be switched from the view s own 3D menu or by pressing the 1 or 2 keys whilst the pointer is in the 3D window Spin mode Button controls at top of view for spin pan and zoom From keyboard Spin up down left right keys or Alt left mouse button Zoom Control up down Walk mode Button controls at top of view for walk fly pan and tilt From keyboard Move forward up key Move backward down key Turn left right keys Move up down alt up down Holding down the shift key with the above combinations increases the distance of travel 10 Taking a snapshot image Camera View 30 Front Back Left Right Top Bottom w 3D Copy Image to Windows Clipboard Inspect mode gt Pressing down the eye icon which is available on each view sets the view into Inspect mode Windows and Mac users can quickly copy the image shown in a view to the system clipboard by selecting the item on the Camera menu which is on each View window
69. urface Greeble minimum height 96 Greeble maximum height 96 Greeble minimum size 96 Greeble maximum size 96 Greeble rotation degrees Random seed Use custom greebles Use standard greebles with custom Maintain custom greeble aspect Greebles in separate objects Realtime updates Save settings to greeble Data Usage If checked bevels will be placed on selected surfaces prior to adding greebles This is often used to get a discontinuous raised floor effect The frequency with which bevels are applied to surfaces For instance a value of 75 means roughly 3 4 of the selected surfaces will be beveled The minimum maximum height that a bevel will be raised on a given surface the actual value per surface is random Beveling uses a formula that takes the area of the underlying surface into account This number may exceed 100 The distance from the edge of a surface that a bevel will start Specify zero to have bevels at the very edge of a surface The frequency with which bevels will be split into 2 3 or 4 separate bevels If a bevel is split the split between 2 3 or 4 bevels is random This feature only works on quads not triangles If checked greebles will be placed either on the tops of bevels or directly on the tops of surfaces where no bevels exist The frequency with which greebles are applied to surfaces For instance a value of 75 means roughly 3 4 of the selected surfaces will be greebled The num
70. urface is raised Two parameters are required one for the distance in from the edge the other is the distance to move the new inner surface forward 30 If the select mode is Surface or Vertex the new centre surface is selected after the operation is complete Make hole This function creates a hole in each selected surface This image shows 4 objects that have had holes made in them An ellipse set to poly surface type a sphere a cube and a disk Notice how the insides of the sphere and cube are not visible through the holes this is because the default surfaces for these objects are single sided and face outwards To see the insides though the holes these surfaces need to be made two sided by pressing 2S on the control panel Some concave polygons may have overlapping surfaces after making holes Vertices may need adjustment to prevent overlapping The size of the hole is specified as a percentage and can be adjusted in File gt Settings Triangulate This splits non triangles i e polygons with more than 3 sides into more surfaces each new surface being a triangle This operation can fail if it is given a bad polygon i e one that has overlapping edges or duplicate vertices Spline This is useful for smoothing out a line object and for rounding off polygons New points are interpolated between existing points This function takes all of the selected surfaces and vertices and puts them i
71. urface of a sphere where a drag select will always select more than one surface Selections are preserved between changes of select modes Changing from vertex to surface select mode means that any surfaces that have all vertices selected will remain selected in surface mode Resizing Dragging the handles at the corners of the bounding box using the left mouse button resizes the selection Holding down the control key whilst dragging an edge handle resizes opposite edges On the corner handles holding down the control key scales the selection uniformly 16 Resize selections of vertices and surfaces Itis possible to resize a selection down to zero width height This is useful for lining up vertices The green bounding box is dragged with the left mouse button to reposition the selection Holding the control key down whilst dragging constrains movement to up down or left right only In a 3D view AC3D displays green arrows on each side of the bounding box These can be dragged to move the selection Rotating When the rotate button is selected clicking on the bounding box and dragging left right will rotate the selection about the point of Extending Negating the selection Holding down the shift key whilst selecting with the left mouse button extends the selection adds new entities Pressing shift whilst selecting with the 2nd or 3rd mouse button negates subtracts items from the current selecti
72. vided model 44 Switching off the display of subdivisions in all views can be useful when working on large detailed models since AC3D will only calculate the subdivision when it is needed for display Working without displaying subdivisions can therefore speed up interaction with the 3D model The main 3D menu has an option to simultaneously display the original base object as well as the subdivisions This can sometimes be useful to see how the original object directly affects the subdivision Committing subdivisions To apply the subdivision permanently e to create a new non subdivided object with the same polygons as the subdivision use Object gt Commit Subdivision Examples Subdivision works by dividing each surface and then smoothing the overall shape An example a simple box O subdivision level 1 subdivision level 2 subdivision level 45 3 subdivision level Note that the default surface type for a box is flat Setting this to Smooth and setting the object property for Crease angle to 180 ensures that the object is fully smoothed Display of the surfaces has been switched off for this picture These images show a simple cup shape that was formed by using Object gt Revolve on a line The number of segments was set to 6 The image on the right shows this same object with subdivision level applied Hints and tips Although any polygon in AC3D can be subdivided subdivision works
73. website for more information Greeble From SuperColdMilk this excellent AC3D plugin makes it easy to add detail to your models Greeble is an AC3D plugin that adds greebles to existing geometry Wikipedia defines a greeble thus a small piece of detailing added to break up the surface of an object to add visual interest to a surface or object particularly in movie special effects Greebles are placed in a separate object from the base object Your base geometry is not modified The Greeble user interface is accessible from the AC3D Tools menu mum SEL b Ecru sss liscisrcu z Exc isl ty Da nas mam Pl x E svr minam i cna N mcm msc dd rreri x E omari rr A IH gui EE liebre i314 puis JB rii m gestes per dsc Hea Diels Lei 24 4H ci riim bea Greebl 001 m l3 Hed ri vno rrhh 70871m 526 X Grass 5 5 cr cacad Foran cee Beer eee 5 liie b de emo b Ilay serrr circ lez ai ann D Hrita cm per e Il IHS Grebis miss sis cti Mes rie aped epe sus celle 2 A E Lie cle 1 Lie Pire circles nd 773 There are many options the parameters are described here 65 Parameter Beveling Bevel frequency Bevel minimum height Bevel maximum height Bevel minimum indent Bevel maximum indent 96 Bevel division frequency 96 Greebling Greeble frequency 96 Minimum greebles per surface Maximum greebles per s

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Version 6.4 User Manual © Copyright Inivis Limited 2008