v0.8.9 User`s manual (a work in progress) Introduction EQUINOX
Contents
1. xX TI F Textures Wireframe EA Schematics Layout vertical EA lt ji eH rai ES light CC SS I tt a Figure 1 the main window of EQUINOX 3D 1 1 3D windows Each 3D window has a header with some controls and a main part with the 3D display Perspective EL fT Textures Wireframe ZS Figure 1 1 a 3D window with Perspective view and Wireframe display mode The active window where the mouse pointer is has a filled in blue header like the one on Figure 1 1 All keyboard input will apply in the active window 1 1 1 View mode and rendering mode The top left button of each 3D window activates a pull down menu of choices for the view mode Any of the 3D windows may be set to one of these view modes Perspective standard 3D view with a perspective or custom projections Top Front Right orthographic projection Schematics shows the relationships between objects as a graph Animation animation curves Texture texture mapping view Textures Wireframe EI Figure 1 1 2 view modes in a 3D window The second button on the top right activates a menu for selecting rendering mode Each display mode is a different renderer Figure 1 1 2 different rendering modes in a 3D window EQUINOX 3D has a unique and extremely powerful renderer infrastructure Plugins can implement new renderers and any 3D window can then use those renderers while still2. ribs Create a set of Splines and make sure they are selected Click on the Skin icon on the Tool Panel left button no dialog box right button dialog box or Select Menu gt Surface gt Skin either the main button or the little dialog box icon besides it Dialog box options Triangles the resulting surface will be made of triangles or rectangles Smooth average the normal vectors at the vertices to create a smooth surface appearance Weld closed cross section ends merge the two Vertices on the surface that correspond to the beginning and the end of a closed Spline cross section Sides the number of steps along the cross section Splines The tool maintains a construction history so you can edit the cross section Splines change the Skin parameters etc and the surface will change interactively You can also go back and change the options of the tool by selecting the surface Geometry and activating Menu gt Info gt Edit on selection 33 Geometry Tesselate This tool converts all complex Polygons in the selected Meshes into triangles A complex Polygon is one that is either concave or has holes in it Triangulate Convert all Polygons in the selected Meshes into triangles This might be necessary when using a 3D object in a real time renderer such as in a 3D video game as most of those renderers only support triangles In EQUINOX 3D Polygons can have any number of sides they can b
3. flat surface defined by closed Splines Each Spline defines a contour of the Face The first contour defines the exterior of the Face while the rest define the holes Creating a Face is very easy Just make a Spline close it and activate Menu gt Spline gt Convert to face See Figure 2 1 2 Then you can add further Splines to cut holes in the Face using Menu gt Spline gt Attach hole to Face Note that the Spline and Face related functions are all in the Spline menu and there is a separator before the Face functions Appendix A describes all the above mentioned tools with examples Figure 2 1 2 Converting a Spline to a Face Faces with holes are essential for shapes like letters such as A B D etc because these letters have enclosed holes in them Figure 2 1 2 1 A Face with holes 18 4 Selecting EQUINOX 3D has context sensitive selection and three main selecting modes 4 1 Model selecting Hold down SPACE bar Information is displayed in the Status panel about the Model under the mouse pointer and the functions of the 3 mouse buttons are shown Left button select Node single Model Middle button select Branch Right button select whole tree hierarchy To select multiple Models hold down the Shift key simultateously with the SPACE bar Clicking on nothing while in single selection mode no Shift key will unselect everything in the scene 4 2 Geometry selecting Hold down
4. the G key Information in displayed in Status Panel about the Geometry under the mouse pointer The Geometry type is identified and proper options displayed E g if the object under the pointer is a Mesh you can select the Mesh itself Geometry the PolyGroup or the Polygon under the pointer In this mode holding down the right button while moving the pointer will paint select or unselect if started on a selected Polygon the Polygons under the pointer Figure 2 2 2 Polygons selected with Polygon paint select Note that selected Polygons are highlighted with red but the original surface wiil show through including textures and reflections 19 If the Geometry under the pointer is a Spline you can select the Spline itself Geometry or the Spline Segment under the pointer Figure 2 2 3 Splines with one segment selected Multiple Geometries or sub geometries PolyGroups or Spline Segments can be selected by holding down the Shift and G keys simultaneously Clicking on nothing while in single Geometry selection mode no Shift key will unselect every Geometry or PolyGroup in the scene In Solid display modes as opposed to wireframe when selecting a ray is cast through the scene and the intersection between this ray and the closest surface closest hit is selected In the preferences dialog box an option can be set to limit ray intersect testing to the selected objects
5. to quickly build a couch just from a few Splines 31 Revolve This tool revolves a Spline the profile around an arbitrary axis to create a P surface e g a Polygon Mesh Typical use Create a Spline and make sure it s selected Click on the Revolve icon on the Tool Panel left button no dialog box right button dialog box or Select Menu gt Surface gt Revolve either the main button or the little dialog box icon besides it Dialog box options Triangles the resulting surface will be made of triangles or rectangles Smooth average the normal vectors at the Polygon Vertices to create a smooth surface appearance Start and End angle it allows for a non complete less than 360 revolution Sides the number of sides on the surface The tool maintains a construction history so you can change the shape or the parameters of the profile Spline at any time and the surface will change interactively You can also go back and change the options of the tool by selecting the surface Geometry and activating Menu gt Info gt Edit on selection Note make sure that the contour Spline is drawn counter clockwise and to the right of the Y axis as seen on the Front view otherwise the revolved surface will be inside out Figure A 6 1 Revolving a Spline 32 Skin S This tool stretches a surface on a set of a Splines the cross sections 1 much like the skin of an airplane wing covers the
6. CVs A Spline is a usually curved line that is described by a mathematical formula using a parameter hence the other name parametric curves Splines are usually composed of multiple segments The shape of the segments is determined by points called Control Vertices or CVs Depending on the type the Spline might not necessarily go through its CVs EQUINOX 3D supports the following Spline types Linear Continous segments of straight lines going from one CV to the next Bezier A very versatile Spline that goes through all of its CVs and the type of the segments can be changed individually There are 4 CVs for each segment These are usually represented by 2 lines called handles These lines are parallel with the tangent of the curve The CVs can have diferent editing constraints Cl continuity mirrored handles blue When you move one end of such a handle the other side will have the same direction tangent continuity and length Gl continuity direction mirrored handles purple The other side will keep the same direction but not the lenght C0 discontinuity independent handles cyan 16 B spline Cardinal This Spline might not go through its CVs instead the CVs pull on the curve like magnets oN ES A simpler type of Spline that goes through its CVs and has only two CVs per segment no handles 17 3 3 Parametric Faces A Parametric Face or just Face is a
7. a perspective window you can move the camera along the line of sight with the mouse see the Status panel indications for the mouse button functions Track Zoom While holding down the Z key on a perspective window you can move the camera and the interest point parallel to the view plane tracking or you can change the field of view zoom On an orhogonal window TOP FRONT Schematics etc holding down the Z key will activate Scroll Zoom mode Zoom into region While holding down the Z key on a non perspective window you can select a rectangular region with the right mouse button When you release the mouse button the camera will fly into that region If you accidentally activate this just release the Z key before releasing the mouse button to cancel the action 1 4 2 Single key camera control Orbit Dolly Track while holding down the Ctrl key you can Orbit Dolly or Track the camera by moving the mouse while holding down one of its 3 buttons Orbit Track Dolly hold down the Alt key and see the Status panel Note that the above modes are transient modes meaning that for example releasing the Ctrl key will deactivate Orbit Dolly Track mode and put EQUINOX 3D back in the state it was before e g rotating an object This is much more efficient than having to switch back and forth between modes by clicking on buttons or icons 10 1 4 3 Fly to Framing things When working on
8. an object we usually need to move the camera so the object is in the middle of a window and zoom in on it 1 e frame the object EQUINOX 3D has a sophisticated automatic framing feature In a perspective window it can frame an object or objects by not just putting it in the center of the window and getting close enough to it but it also places the camera s interest point at a reasonable center point around which you can orbit the camera and keep the object s in the center This allows you to easily examine the object from different angles EQUINOX 3D takes this feature a step further instead of immediately placing the cameras to their new positions and orientations it smoothly flies them there The framing fly to function works in any view 3D schematics animation curcves etc This helps you maintain a sense of relative location of objects and it provides a more pleasant user experience Similar techniques are common in video games but EQUINOX 3D is the only modeler to support it since the last edition of this manual some modelers partially copied this feature but only for 3D views You can adjust the duration of the fly to under Menu gt Camera gt Settings Hitting the F key will frame the camera to the selected object s in the active window A will frame the camera to all objects in the Scene F or A with Shift will perform the fly to in all 3D windows simultaneously Frame selection works for Models transf
9. ation gt Simple path animation The message on the Status Panel will ask you to pick a path click on the Spline Hit PLAY on the Time Panel If you close the spline and turn on looping in the Time Panel the cube will keep flying around the closed path Since there is no function curve editing yet this tool simply assigns the start and end frame set in the Time Panel for the starting and ending point of the path For a closed path you can try the example file Examples Animation Path FunkyPath hrc For the technically inclined this tool uses correct arc length parameterization on the Spline so objects will move at an even speed regardless of the shape of the Spline Appendix B Glossary Construction history CV Geometry Material Mesh Model 39 A high level description of a Geometry It describes how that Geometry was created This lets the user edit a Geometry at a higher level than its physical representation e g a Polygon Mesh For example simply changing the radius of a sphere e g by moving a slider the user can have the Sphere tool re build a different polygonal approximation of a sphere Control Vertex also known as Spline Key A point of a Spline that affects the shape of that Spline A type of point list line surface or volume that represents a shape EQUINOX 3D supporst the following Geometry types Point set Spline Linear B Spline Bezier and Cardinal Face flat surface
10. defined by Splines Polygon Mesh The description of a surface and internal properties of an Object that along with the shape makes it possible to render an image of that Object or for other Objects to interact with this Object physics simulation Material descriptions may range from a single color or the traditional Ambient Diffuse Specular colors plus transparency refractive index etc to complex physically based models that describe how light interacts with a certain Object Materials may contain textures and shaders Also called Polygon Mesh A type of Geometry that has an array of points Vertices and Groups of Polygons PolyGroups The Polygons index the Vertices from the array on the Mesh Also called transformation node or transform node the element that brings instantiates Objects into the scene and defines their size orientation and location in world space 40 Object space PolyGroup Plugin Shader Status Panel Transformation World space Also called local space the coordinate system in which the shape of an Object is defined The relationship between the local space of that Object and world space is specified by the Model s that instantiate that Object via coordinate system transformations scale rotate translate A group of Polygons in a Mesh that share a Material and its Textures A piece of software program and data that can be inserted and removed from an applicatio
11. displaying selections 3D controls etc and allowing editing in that window In other words plugins can add fully integrated renderers to EQUINOX 3D For example Cg and Ray tracer renders are implemented by plugins while Wire frame Hidden line etc are built in Also EQUINOX 3D has an extremely fast interactive ray tracer so you can edit your 3D models directly in a ray traced window with physically correct shading reflections refractions etc changing as you change a shape Clicking the the Middle Mouse Button MMB on either the view mode or the rendering mode buttons will toggle between the two most recent modes The button on the top right of the window header is for changing the size of the window stretch out horizontally vertically or both ways see the tool tip on this button for more details 1 2 Panels On the bottom of the main window there are 3 panels bars These panels can be turned on and off from the Panels menu or via the hot keys 1 2 1 Toolbar This panel has folders that open and close The folders can have buttons with icons Light Create gt a 4 y iJ J iy Q 9 LA Surface P Clone b Transform Hierarchy gt g of Geometry b 54 The Toolbar is organized into folders Light Create Surface etc The folders can be opened and closed by clicking on the little green arrow after the folder s name Clicking on an icon with the LMB Left Mouse Bu
12. e You need to select a Spline before activating this tool 2 Edges to Splines Takes a Mesh as an input and for every edge of that Mesh it creates a linear Spline It can be useful for extruding a shape Spline along those edges to create a manifold shape Convert to Face Convert the selected Spline or Splines into Face s The Splines must be closed The resulting Face will have its own copy of the Spline but the original Spline will be kept as well See Figure A 4 1 Figure A 4 1 Converting a Spline to a Face Attach hole to Face Attaches the selected Spline s to the selected Face s as hole s The Splines must be closed The resulting Face will have its own copy of the Spline s and the original Spline s will be kept as well See Figure A 4 2 for an example Figure A 4 2 Adding holes to a Face Convert Face to Polygon Converts the selected Face into a Polygon This tool creates a new Model Mesh and Polygroup for this Polygon 28 1a Polygon Edit Polygons This is an interactive tool Before activating it select a PolyGroup to be edited This tool lets you perform different operations incuding Adding new Polygons to a PolyGroup Mesh Adding Edges splitting Polygons Deleting Edges merging Polygons Deleting Vertices This tool is context sensitive so the type of applicable operations will depend on what is under the mouse pointer Read the StatusPanel for further
13. e concave or even have holes on them Separate Geometries Collect all the selected Geometries Meshes Splines etc and move them into a newly created Model Separate PolyGroups Collect all the selected PolyGroups within a Mesh and move them into a newly created Mesh Separate Polygons Collect all the selected Polygons within a PolyGroup and move them into a newly created PolyGroup This allows for assigning and changing a common Material on these Polygons 34 dbp MF Transform Reset Set the transformation values of the selected Model s to Scaling 1 0 1 0 1 0 Rotation 0 0 0 0 0 0 Translation 0 0 0 0 0 0 Freeze to world Perform the local to world transformation of every Geometry in the selected hierarchies and reset the transformation values of the Models in those hierarchies This effectively puts the origins of the local coordinate systems of every affected Model into the world origin The position of the objects will remain the same Freeze branch to its parent Perform the local to branch parent transformation of every Geometry in the Models of the selected branches This puts the origins of the local coordinate systems of every affected Model into the origin of the parent of the branch root and resets their local transformations If the branch root has no parent it is the root of the hierarchy this operation is equivalent to Freeze to world Freeze branch to its root Perform the local to branch tra
14. e g povrender for the POVRay renderer plugin These files are saved in the same directory where the main prefs file was found when EQUINOX 3D was started Plugins can define a list of resources variables with type information and these are all automatically saved into the appropriate files when the user selects Save preferences 25 Appendix A Summary of menus 2 ij Information Edit selection hot key E When this menu item is activated the program parses the scene and finds the first selected Item by analyzing the selection modes It can be a Model node a Geometry Mesh Spline etc a PolyGroup or many other things Depending on what is selected a dialog box will appear with the appropriate parameters e g The Edit PolyGroup dialog box If the selected Geometry has construction history e g a torus Edit selection will bring up the dialog box of the appropriate plugin such as the Edit torus dialog box Remove attributes hot key Alt Del Remove extra information such as construction history from the selected Geometries and Models 26 at Spline Face Draw Linear Create a Linear Spline by adding CVs When a new CV is created it can be moved right away without releasing the mouse button A new CV can be added after the last one before the first one or between two existing ones the tool finds the closest point on the Spline For a description of the different Spline types
15. esentations of a hierarchy on the Schematics view with vertical and horizontal layout and different connector types left and the actual 3D shapes right 14 3 Geometries A Geometry is a type of Object that describes a line a surface or a volume of a solid liquid etc object EQUINOX 3D allows for multiple Geometries Mesh Spline etc per transform node Model so unlike in many other 3D programs there is usually no need for empty Models to group Geometries This simplifies hierarchies and avoids performing the extra transformations leading to faster rendering At the same time it still allows you to easily select and edit Geometries 3 1 Meshes PolyGroups and Polygons A Polygon Mesh is a type of Geometry It is a surface described by Polygons A Mesh has groups of Polygons that share a Material a k a Shader These shading groups are called PolyGroups PolyGroups within a Mesh can share Vertices If a Model or a Mesh is selected its Vertices are shown with little blue rectangles see Figure 3 1 1 If only a Geometry of a Model is selected not the whole Model the edges will be highlighted with cyan instead of white If only a PolyGroup is selected in a Mesh the Vertices of the Mesh will not be shown Figure 3 1 1 A Polygon Mesh with 2 PolyGroups Grey and Red Polygons The Model selected left the Mesh selected midle the red PolyGroup selected right 15 3 2 Splines Spline Segments and
16. heir Geometries If only Geometries are selected on a Model this tool creates a new Model and adds a duplicate of each selected Geometry to this new Model If only PolyGroups are selected new Meshes and Models will be created accordingly Options Duplicate shares Materials If this option is selected default the new Geometries will share Materials with the originals so the Materials can be edited simultaneously Otherwise each new Geometry will have its own copy of the Materials it is using Clone construction history If this option is selected default the new Geometries will have a copy of the construction history of the originals Instance Create copies of the selected Models but instead of making copies of their Geometries those will be shared between the original Model and the new one When a shared Geometry changes e g when you move a Vertex of a Mesh all of its instances will change simultaneously This allows for creating copies of objects placing and orienting them and later editing their shape all at once without having to copy and position them again Instancing can also save a significant amount of memory as only one copy of the instanced Geometry will need be stored 38 Animation Simple path animation Animate an object along a path defined by a Spline Example Create a Spline for this tool only Bezier or Linear are supported at the moment Create say a cube Select the cube Activate Anim
17. information 29 Surface Extrude GT This tool takes a profile Geometry that is either a Spline or a Face and extrudes it along a straight line creating a surface e g a Polygon Mesh The extrude tool maintains a construction history on the resulting surface and is fully interactive You can for example change the shape of the profile Face and the extruded surface will change interactively The direction of the extrude can be specified and the front and back faces can be beveled Figure A 5 2 Extruding a Face with holes Without bevel and with bevel 30 Extrude along Spline v This tool takes a profile Geometry that is either a Spline or a Face and S extrudes it along a path Spline creating a surface e g a Polygon Mesh This tool maintains a construction history on the resulting surface and is fully interactive You can for example change the shape of the profile Face or the path Spline and the extruded surface will change interactively You can also go back and change the options of the tool by selecting the surface Geometry and hitting the E key Menu gt Info gt Edit on selection Figure A 5 1 and A 5 2 show examples of extruding a Spline and a Face along a path Spline Figure A 5 1 Extruding a Spline along another Spline Figure A 5 3 Extruding a Face with holes along a Spline Figure A 5 4 Extrude along spline with bevel is a powerful modeling tool For example it allows you
18. n while the application is running Plugins allow anyone with programming knowledge and familiarity with the API Application Programming Interface of a particular application to add custom functions without needing to re build the whole application EQUINOX 3D has a relatively small core and a large number of plugins providing flexibility and scalability A mathematical model that simulates a light surface or light volume interaction and its program implementation Shaders are associated with Materials On top of the built in shaders such as Lambert Phong Ward s anisotropic EQUINOX 3D also has a programmable shader interface People familiar with basic computer rendering can implement their own shaders in a plugin and use them in the ray tracer you don t need to understand how the whole ray tracer works For example a physically correct skin or hair shader A horizontal bar that displays information about the current state of EQUINOX 3D These include the function of the mouse buttons undo stack indicator and the time code for the current frame An operation to convert an Object from one coordinate system to another Usually consistr of scaling rotating or translating moving See Model Also called global space the common coordinate system that defines a 3D scene See local space Appendix C Abbreviations LMB Left Mouse Button MMB Middle Mouse Button RMB Right Mouse Button 41
19. n you edit one of them only that one will change Instancing it on the other hand will create links to the same Object from multiple Models so if you change one all instances will change simultaneously This will allow you to see your hallway with all 20 columns while you are refining your column model but save you the repetitive work of applying every change to all copies Instancing is also more efficient because EQUINOX 3D will only have to keep one copy of the Object in memory Figure 2 2 Schematics view of a duplicated left versus instanced right Object 13 2 2 Hierarchies Models may be connected together to form hierarchies Hierarchies allow for relative transformations which means that each Model is scaled rotated and moved relative to its parent This makes it easy to have a person s upper arm rotate relative to the torso at the shoulder joint the lower arm rotate relative to the upper arm at the elbow joint etc A hierarchy is sometimes referred to as a tree because its representation on the Schematics view resembles an upside down tree Sub trees are also called branches Figure 2 1 shows an example for a hierarchy Note that the branch containing the Models named Tube Sphere and Capsule is selected the edges of the Models are highlighted with white lines Tube is the root of that branch while Box is the root of the whole hierarchy tree Figure 2 1 repr
20. nsformation of every Geometry in the descendant Models in the selected branches This puts the origins of the local coordinate systems of every affected Model into the origin of the branch root and resetting the local transformations Freeze scaling on branch Perform the local to branch scaling of every Geometry in the descendant Models descendant Models in the selected branches This operation is similar to Freeze branch to its root but it only affects the scaling values All the affected Models will have a scaling of 1 0 1 0 1 0 but will retain their original shape Snap tagged points to grid Move all tagged points to the closest grid cell The grid settings used are of the main 3D window usually top right 39 A Hierarchy Connect node or branch Connect a Model or a branch to a parent Model to make a hierarchy You need Pa to select a Model or a hierarchy branch before activating this tool You can pick a parent or a child for the selected Model You can connect multiple selected Models to a parent at once Of course 1f you pick a child for a parent to be Model you should have only one Model selected Disconnect node or branch f Disconnect the selected Model s or branch es from their a parents Collapse branch Collects all the Objects from the Models in a branch hierarchy sub tree then performs the appropriate transformations on them adds the Objects to the root Model of the branch then rem
21. orm Nodes Geometries Meshes Splines etc PolyGroups or even a group of selected Polygons 11 2 Objects and Models EQUINOX 3D has two fundamental 3D elements Object and Model Objects represent Lights Cameras Geometries Special elements defined by plugins For example force fields Models bring Objects into the 3D scene The 3D industry calls this instantiating or instancing Objects Models also define the transformation scaling orientation rotation and position of Objects therefore they are also called transformation nodes or transform nodes On the schemaitics view Models are shown as blue boxes with a coordinate system icon Objects are shown as a torqoise box with angled sides and a little icon When you create an Object EQX will automatically create a Model for it and place it at the origin It will also name them the Model will have the name of the tool that created it starting with a capital letter and the Object will have the same name starting with a lower case letter Figure 2 1 Schematics view and 3D view of a Model with an Object 12 2 1 Multiple instancing An Object might be added to multiple Models and those models may be placed oriented and scaled differently in the scene This is a powerful and commonly used technique called instancing Imagine that you want to build a long hallway with 20 identical columns If you create 20 duplicates of your column whe
22. ove a single point activate the Move point tool by holding down the M key This is also a transient mode tool As soon as you release the M key it deactivates so you can very quickly select an object move a few points on it select another one etc The point being moved becomes active which is indicated by a green highlight When you create a Bezier spline its Previous and Next sub keys will be at the same position as the CV itself so all segments of the Spline will appear linear However when you start moving a point with the Move point tool it first pulls apart the Previous sub key so the segments around the key will become curved 22 5 1 Editing the attributes of a Spline Select a Spline Geometry or one of its Segments by holding down the G key The Spline or Segment should turn turquoise as seen on Figure 2 3 3 Now go to Menu gt Info gt Edit on selection or just hit the E key This should bring up the dialog box shown below Spline attributes Name bezSpl ine Follow selection b Geometry Y Spline Uniform drawing steps Drawing steps E LUE B Mi Closed Type BEZIER CVs a Segments 2 Length 25 544537 Shift CVs CV segment E m hb Segment shape ft Tangent constraint PA PA AY Drawing steps IIE 4a SSS Figure 2 3 1 Spline attributes dialog box If a Spline Segment was selected the current CV Control Vertex will be
23. oves all descendant Models from the branch root Example The Model called Tube will contain the tube sphere and capsule Objects The 3 Objects will now all use the same transforms defined by Tube However their shape was modified by the collapse tool to compensate for the different transforms the Vertices of the Meshes were transformed the opposite way so the 3D view will look the same after the operation 36 Material Add edit on selection Edit the Material of the selected objects Models Geometries etc When activated this tool first looks for an object that has a Material If it finds one it assigns that Material to all selected objects then pops up the dialog box for editing If none of the selected objects has a Material the tool creates a new Material and assigns that to all selected objects then pops up the dialog box If an object has no Material of its own but is in a hierarchy it will inherit a Material from its parent or its parent s parent etc This inheriting is automatically updated when a Model is connected or disconnected from a hierarchy Assign from another object Assign share the Material of another object to all selected PolyGroups You can also pick the Material to be shared from the Material lister Copy from another object Copy the Material of another object to all selected PolyGroups 3 7 ed Clone Immediate Create a clone copy of the selected Models including t
24. re CIUINO 30 v0 8 9 User s manual a work in progress 1992 2006 by Gabor Nagy http www equinox3d com This version of this manual can be freely printed and redistributed as long as the above information is left intact Introduction EQUINOX 3D is intended to be a complete 3D modeling animation and rendering software package The version number approximately represents how far it is from having the minimum functionality to achieve that v1 0 will be the first such version Font conventions When referring to a menu item or a button on the tool panel the following conventions are used Menu gt Transform gt Reset means the vertical menubar s Transform menu Reset menu item Tool gt Surface gt Skin means the tool panel Surface folder Skin button Key words such as Spline or Model are capitalized 1 User inteface basics EQUINOX 3D has the traditional 4 view look There is a vertical menu bar and a Transformation Panel on the right see Figure 1 Most buttons have tool tips bubble help These little help messages pop up if you rest the mouse pointer on the button for 2 seconds or longer Reading the tool tips is a quick and easy way to get started with EQUINOX 3D EQUINOX 3D v0 8 93 Linux glibc2 3 lt 2 gt ES Textures Wireframe EH Perspective E Textures Wireframe ES a da to A NS TI w lt x cs el m ci I si m es QUE
25. resented as a Polygon Mesh EQUINOX 3D remembers that it was created by the Torus plugin This plugin can re build the torus with different parameters If you want to say change the main radius of the torus just select the torus Geometry G key Left Mouse button hit E to edit the parameters again radius number of subdivisions etc 5 3 Deleting Delete selection Delete key will delete selected Polygons in a Mesh PolyGroup if they are selected as a Geometry or a PolyGroup if there are no selected Polygons in a selected PolyGroup it will remove the Polygroup from its Mesh deleting a single Model node or a Branch of a hierarchy also works 24 6 User preferences settings The preferences files are located either in usr local equinox equinox or in equinox from the user s home directory The main preferences file is called EQUINOX 3D It stores the following information Size of displayed points Line width used for drawing Camera orbiting speed Display control settings Show camera Show vertices Show control points Show lines etc Font settings for the user interface Path names Which panels were visible Which ToolPanel folders were open Menu bar mode Icons only Text only or Icons and Text Point size for displaying vertices and spline keys Selecting preferences File selection dialog settings Plugin preferences are saved in separate files specified by the plugins
26. see section 2 1 2 Draw Bezier Create a Bezier Spline by adding CVs When a new CV is created the handles can be pulled apart right away without releasing the mouse button A new CV can be added after the last one before the first one or between two existing ones the tool finds the closest point on the Spline If you add a new CV before the first one this will pull out the Previous side of the handle For after and between CVs it pulls out the Next side This also works in the Add point tool Draw BSpline Create a B Spline by adding CVs When a new CV is created it can be moved right away without releasing the mouse button A new CV can be added after the last one before the first one or between two existing ones the tool finds the closest point between the CVs Draw Cardinal Create a Cardinal Spline by adding CVs When a new CV is created it can be moved right away without releasing the mouse button A new CV can be added after the last one before the first one or between two existing ones the tool finds the closest point on the Spline Add point tool Add new CVs to an existing Spline You need to select a Spline before activating this tool When a new CV is created it can be moved right away without releasing the mouse button A new CV can be added after the last one before the first one or between two existing ones the tool finds the closest point on the Spline Delete point tool Delete CVs from a Splin
27. the one at the beginning of that selected Segment Selecting a different Spline segment while the dialog box is up will automatically update the CV and segment information This dialog box shows allows you to change attributes of the spline such as tesselation piecewise linear approximation settings and segment types EQUINOX 3D lets you change the tesselation per segment This is very useful when you use a Spline to create a surface e g with the Revolve tool because it lets you finely control the number of polygons in the resulting surface There is also a very useful function called Shift CVs Often when you create a Spline you might not start with the CV you will want to be the first one Sometimes this does not matter For example when a closed spline is used for modeling However when you want to use a Spline to move the camera along a path the start and end points matter even if the Spline is closed The Shift CVs tool allows you to move the CVs around forward or backward Each CV will preserve its attributes so the Shape of the Spline will not change unless the Spline is open in which case the gap between the last and the first CV will move around 23 5 2 Construction history Geometries in EQUINOX 3D can remember how they were created This information is called construction history For example create a torus and close the Torus dialog box Even though this torus is now rep
28. tton will activate a tool while the RMB Right Mouse Button will bring up the tool s dialog box if that particular tool has one and possibly activate the tool For example LMB on the Tube icon will simply create a default Tube while RMB will also pop up the Create Tube dialog box and let you interactively change the parameters of the Tube inner radius outer radius height etc 1 2 2 Status panel The Status panel has a message label undo stack indicator bar and a time code display for animaton The message label indicates the status of EQUINOX 3D the function of the mouse buttons it can display messages and or a progress indicator bar a iT Tie oe RRR The Status panel is the main source of feedback to the user 1 2 3 Time panel The Time panel includes the main time slider with the current start and end frame fields and the usual VCR buttons This panel is used for controlling and displaying playing animations 1 2 Menus There are two menu bars in EQUINOX 3D The horizontal one on the top has the standard File menu user interface options preferences etc The vertical menu bar on the left has the 3D modelling rendering and animation menus This menubar is configurable in the Preferences settings The buttons can be displayed either with Icons only Text only or both Icons and Text Menu buttons in the menu panes can have an Option dialog box activating sub button This can pop
29. u can select what will be transformed with the mouse transform target Obj whole object s Models or Tag tagged points of objects Under the How label you can select how the interactive translating will work transform mode View drag objects or components along the view Lol move along X Y or Z axis of an object There is also an interactive finder tool on this panel If you type in a name or a partial name using the wildcard character it will select objects that match that name If the transform target is Tag but there are no tagged points on the selected objects it will temporarily switch to Obj while the transforming is taking place holding down a mouse button This allows for quick switching between transforming objects or points just by tagging and un tagging points Please note that interactive transforming is still a work in progress 1 4 Camera control To ease the transition from other 3D packages EQUINOX 3D implements the camera control of some popular 3D programs as well as its own In this manual and in EQUINOX 3D in general e g on the Status panel LMB means Left Mouse Button MMB means Middle Mouse Button RMB means Right Mouse Button Orbit While holding down the O key on a perspective window you can orbit the camera around the interest point with the mouse LMB longitude latitude MMB longitude RMB latitude Dolly While holding down the P key on
30. up the a dialog box for a particular tool similarly to right clicking on a ToolPanel icon The Clone gt Immediate button is an example in Figure 1 2 1 Figure 1 2 1 Menu button with dialog box sub button Clicking on a menubar button e g Display with the Middle Mouse Button will activate the last function again Note plugins can add and remove buttons from both the menus and the tool panel 1 3 Transform Panel This vertical panel is used for interactive transforming scaling rotating moving etc objects or components of objects It controls the way objects are manipulated with the mouse Mransiation Mi VAE zis Wii pyeit J Obi Tag i K stealing 1 10000 Yi 10000 Z 1 0000 3 Rotation 1 0 0000 W0 0000 Z 0 0000 LAGrensieton 1 0 0000 Y 0 0000 Z 0 0000 Wi pyeit obi I Tag Tor Torus This panel is inactive left image when there are no objects selected If an object is selected the panel becomes active right image and shows the current transformation values as well as the name of the selected object s You can enable disable interactive transformations per coordinate axis X Y Z with the little buttons right to the number fields You can also turn them on off simultaneously by clicking on the Scaling Rotation or Translation buttons or hitting the X C or V keys Under the label What yo
31. when performing this kind of selecting This can be useful for example to select Polygons on an object behind an unselected object It could also mean a significant speedup when selecting Polygons in Polygon paint select mode Selected Polygons are highlighted in solid display modes this is optional though see the display controls The highlight is blended with the surface so shading and textures show through as fig 2 2 2 illustrates 20 4 3 Selecting Points Hold down the T key and drag the mouse with one of its 3 buttons pressed This will draw a rectangular area in which points are tagged selected un tagged or the tags are inverted when you release the mouse button The Status Panel will explain the function of each mouse button Figure 2 2 2 Tagging points of a Mesh and a Bezier Spline Another way to select points select Polygons on a Mesh PolyGroup as described before goto Menu gt Select gt Tag Vertices of selected Polygons To un tag all points of the selected objects go to Menu gt Select gt Un tag all vertices Once points are tagged you can transform them by selecting Tag in the Transform panel and activating Scaling Rotation or Translation See figure 2 2 3 Rotation Figure 2 2 3 Rotating Vertices of a Mesh 21 5 Basic Geometry editing The easiest way to edit Geometries is to move their points the control vertex of a Spline or a Vertex of a Polygon Mesh To m
Download Pdf Manuals
Related Search