Dave Donley

BTW, the fit to objects button can either zoom in on the selected object(s), or it will zoom to fit all objects on the layer if no objects are currently selected!

Hello Mia: To the left of the bottom scroll bar, there are several "View Bar" buttons. One of these is the Fit To Page button, it looks like the page with a blue grid. The Fit To Objects button is also there. The arrow buttons to the left of the others let you move to the previous and next views you were in, and you can save views for reuse with the far right button in the View Bar. Enjoy!

Hello Yovav: I am not getting an image for the model you're describing, and when I click the link I get document not found. I'm using Safari...

Hello Dave M: There are VectorScript calls you could use to rotate an object while outputting frames to a Quicktime movie. That is how the Solar Animator feature in ARCHITECT works. Or, Julian Carr's Animation Works can do this: http://www.ozcad.com.au/product_AddOn.html HTH,

Hello Dave M: Yes, one of the things included as part of the QD3D technology was the 3D metafile format (3DMF) which we supported for export. Apple dropped QD3D though in favor of OpenGL for use for interactive rendering. OpenGL doesn't include a file format, so that was lost when QD3D was retired. There isn't a dominant, open, standard 3D file format like 3DMF tried to be.

Hi Mike46: An example of where revolve with rail is useful would be to make a pumpkin shape. You could do this by creating each segment and adding the segments together, but if you draw one half of the side view of the pumpkin, a vertical segment, and a curved path that looks like the top view of the pumpkin, the revolve with rail command can create the shape in one shot.

Hello rosebud: If you can, please send me a copy of this file. I will try to see what is going on here. Thanks!

Hello Anthony: If you could, please send me a compressed version of the file. We may have to upload it using ftp if it is still too large for email.

Hello Propstuff: What image format are you trying to create props from? PNG or TIFF will maintain the alpha channel. Are you saving the files and importing them at 32 bits color? If they are brought in at thousands of colors the alpha channel will stripped off.

Hello John: Please send me a copy at dave@nemetschek.net Thanks! p.s. Are the texture sizes set to something reasonable for the objects being textured?

Hello Ilan: I would use a constant reflectivity shader, with an image color shader. If you want the screen to actually project its image onto other objects, the image transparency shader can do this if you place a light on the other side of the polygon. Combining these two would do both, but I think the projecting part would be unrealistic. You may try using the constant reflectivity shader with image color, then place a point light with the average image color slightly in front of the screen, that would give you an indistinct glow that matches the image. The screen will be unaffected by the point light because of the constant reflectivity. HTH!

Hello Chuck D: quote: Current file sizes: ? Floor 1: 47.2 mb !!! This floor is not complete, and has fewer parts. It has standard glass, but no image textures - so it should be smaller, right? ? Floor 2: 16.6 mb This is largely complete and has some image-based textures... Are there any images as resources, on the drawing, or as unused textures in this file? Images are the easiest way to make the file large. Its harder to do this with just geometry. quote: Are any of the following assumptions, taken from above, valid?: 1. Image textures don't always make files bigger. 2. Smaller (in megabytes) files seem to render as slowly as larger... 3. A Symbol of an object doesn't redraw (& render) faster than a group of the same thing. 1. No, images always make the file bigger, because they are saved as uncompressed raw bitmaps. 2. Yes. It would be easy to make a tiny file that takes a long time to render and a large file that renders speedily. 3. Maybe. In RW modes symbols are more efficient than groups because only one copy (the symbol definition) is kept and then instanced which saves a lot of memory, and should save time. It may not save time directly but using less memory for the geometry should help stave off virtual memory thrashing longer. I would love to see this file and tweak it for more efficiency and speed if possible. If you can please send it to me at dave@nemetschek.net

Hello Chuck D: QTVR object movies allow you to move in two dimensions (up down left right), regular QT movies only have 1D in the timeline control. QTVR panoramas as well allow you to tilt up and down as well as look around horizontally. I am not sure if saving views that just rotate around a fixed point and using that as a path would work for generating a panorama. It may be worth a try though!

Hello Stephanie: If you want to, please send me the file you are rendering, and I'll try to get a good aluminum appearance out of RW. RW's cruel master,

Hello propstuff: It is possible to save them for reuse, because the Textures library has props in it. Image props however don't render when they are in symbols, so you have to create them as plug-in-symbols (or whatever we call them). Create your image prop Organize->Create Symbol... Click the Options... button Check the Convert to Plug-in Object checkbox The symbol name will appear in red in the Resource Browser, rather than black for regular symbols. Good luck!

Hello Peter: No, VW/RW cannot export Quicktime VR movies. It may be possible to stitch an object movie together from many frames using some utility app, but it would be tedious.

Hello ApocHalyptic: Azimuth should fit the bill nicely: http://www.azimuthmapper.com

Hello Anthony: If the symbol has any 2D objects in it then it will automatically become a hybrid symbol. Only the 2D parts will show in plan, and the 3D parts in other projections. The quickest way to balloon VW file size is through image-based textures, image objects, or image fills. It is otherwise very difficult to make a very large VW file through modeling alone, unless the model is converted to a large mass of polygons. You may try using the Purge Unused Objects menu item to flush out any textures that aren't being used in the drawing. Try setting a non-zero value in the Document Preferences->Line Render->Smoothing Angle field. That should reduce the number of lines in Hidden Line render mode.

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Hello Isid: The texture resources are managed through the Resource Browser palette (was the Resource palette in 8.5), and assigned to objects through the Object Info palette, like in 8.5. Now you can assign textures to objects by selecting the object and double-clicking on the resource, rather than having to open the textures pane on the OI palette and using the texture menu.

Hello Runtime Error, Old Friend (= : You may check that this layer has been linked twice into your model layer. I have seen similar results when layers have been linked into a model multiple times; the surfaces are exactly on top of each other, and render with a speckly or comb-like effect. HTH,

Hello Anthony: quote: I have been creating moulded surfaces by extruding a 2D polyline profile along a 2d polyline path (sometimes a 2D polygon path as well). This usually works out well, but when I assemble all the members of the building the resultant file is 250MB and growing - which is difficult for my computer (G3 iBook 700mhz 256RAM) to handle. Are you making repetitive items into symbols? That can greatly reduce the file size for repetitive geometry. quote: Also, when I extrude a 2d Polyline I have not been able to get it to render correctly - when I render in unshaded polygons no lines - I get a mass of confusing geometry shown. Are 2D polylines good for this sort of thing or should I first convert to NURBS curves - what is the advantage of converting to NURBS? As you can tell, I'm a little inexperienced and any advice would be much appreciated. Ideally I'd like to export a model of a church to VRML (which, I know, will greatly reduce realism and accuracy - but hopefully improve 'explorability'). If you don't have RenderWorks, OpenGL should provide a better rendering than the polygon modes, unless you want to see the edges. If you think the polygon rendering is incorrect, please call tech support and find out if this is a bug we should be fixing. Extruded or swept 2D polylines should be perfectly fine for rendering. The OpenGL and RW modes can generate NURBS surfaces from them for rendering purposes, so you are not losing anything by not modeling directly with NURBS. I would recommend modeling with the simplest techniques that provide the geometry you need, from solid primitives like spheres, extruded 2D cross sections, circular sweeps, and on up to more sophisticated modeling tools like extrude along path, revolve with rail, and freeform NURBS modeling only if needed. The OpenGL rendering mode will render your model interactively while uding the Flyover or Walkthrough tools, which can be great for exploring the model. Also, you can define multiple views with the Saved Sheets control at the bottom of the window (next to the Fit to Object and Fit to Page buttons) then create a Quicktime animation from the saved views (Model->Create Animation, choose to create a Path instead of Orbit). Does this help?

Hello Ilan: Look for the Light Tool in the 3D tool palette. It should be at the top next to the 3D cursor tool.

Hello Dux: Note that any shader-based texture in VW 10 will be missing in VW 8. Only image color shaders will be reverse-translated to 8.

Hello: The loci will not be visible with printing, image export, or rendered bitmaps. They are only visible onscreen. We will be removing them in a future release. They are there so that you have a snap point available; otherwise the smart cursor wouldn't snap to the bottom center of the prop. We can remove the loci by adding an extra vertex at the bottom center of the prop polygon which will give you the snap point.