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perspective (keep vertical lines straight)


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"first formz has an option when in perspective mode to "keep vertical lines straight." all vertical lines are made perfectly vertical + straight, so that the perspective does not appear distorted. this is fantastic and a must. how can i do this with vw9?"

You have to set your perspective to a large number(Under "view", "perspective", "set perspective". I usually set my perspective marque to 42 x 36 and set my perspective to 42. I get good results. A higher # will get the image to appear flatter.

"the ability to change the camera angle? do i really only have the three preset options of wide, normal + tele?"

Its a little limiting if your used to programs that let you set a camera as an object, but its how it works. Using the "set perspective" helps get values in between the preset ones.

"save different views? so that i don't have to recreate each particular view every time."

Hit the button on the left side of the bottom scroll bar. This lets you save sheets. It will record your class and layer visibility, as well as your current perspective view. You can name them to make it easy to identify what they represent.

Good Luck

Also, Can anyone clarify what the "set perspective" number represents. I've seen a worksheet that can calculate F-stop values based on this number, but I still don't know what it means.

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In View>Perspective>Set Perspective, the Perspective value you enter determines how narror or wide the perspective will be. The higher the number, the more narrow the view will be - similar to a telephoto lens. The lower the number, the wider the view will be - similar to a wide angle or fisheye lens. The Narrow Perspective value is 24.41, Normal Perspective is 9.76, and Wide Perspective has a perspective value of 4.88. Generally, if you want to produce a perspective similar to what you will view at eye height, you may want to chose something between wide and normal.

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i am a formz user making the leap to vw9. but there seem to be some basic 3d features that are missing or i just haven't figured out how to do. i hope someone can help.

first formz has an option when in perspective mode to "keep vertical lines straight." all vertical lines are made perfectly vertical + straight, so that the perspective does not appear distorted. this is fantastic and a must. how can i do this with vw9?

the ability to change the camera angle? do i really only have the three preset options of wide, normal + tele?

save different views? so that i don't have to recreate each particular view every time.

if these above features are not available, is it possible to create everything in vw9 and then open the drawing in formz and select my final views and perspectives in formz?

thank you in advance for your help.

-marc

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Thank you both for your kind reply. i am slowly figuring the program out. I am having trouble having success with you suggestion though, I think partly because i don't understand everything that you are suggesting. i understand how to set the perspective to a different number, but what do you mean when you say:

" I usually set my perspective marque to 42 x 36"?

what is the perspective marque and how do i set it?

thank you again.

best,

marc

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I'll try to explain how I do this.

I don't know how you work but I usually build different parts of my model in different layers and then layer link them all together into a single layer called the "Model" layer or something origional like that ;^). The "model" layer will usually have a scale of something like 1/4" = 1'. Then I will create another visible layer at 1" = 1" and draw a rectangle in that layer the real world size I want my perspective marque. I use this for reference later when I resize the marque

I switch back to my "Model" layer and use the "Set 3D View" command under the "View" menu. This is a great tool. The first click is where the viewer is, the second click is the direction the viewer is looking. and then a dialogue box opens that asks for a view height and the height of what you are looking toward. So I set the viewer height to 5'8" and then the looking toward to whatever (5'8" if I want to be on the ground) It is important to keep your ground plane at 0 in the Z axis for this tool to operate correctly. I usually set the perspective to normal and then when I hit OK VW sets the view. I can then change the perspective marque and the perspective setting to get the view how I want it. Sometime I have to use the "Translate View" on the 3D palette to get everthing to fit in the marque correctly. One everything looks good I save the view as a "saved sheet"

From here I render the image and then I usually export it as an image file to further manipulate in Photoshop.

I hope this makes sense

Good Luck.

[This message has been edited by MikeB (edited 09-28-2001).]

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quote:

Originally posted by Stereo:

The lines become straight when the actual viewpoint and eye are on the same height. If you want to look at an object that is high up like a roof if you stand in front of a house - you just stretch the marquee until you see that object - and do not change the viewpoint.

To gather these threads together, the question becomes: How can you reset a perspective so that the viewer height and the "Look Toward Height" are the same, thus making all vertical lines vertical? You can use the Walkthrough Tool to change your view "angle" (i.e., look up or down at the scene, and move viewpoint up or down, using <ctrl + mouse> ), but I know of no process that allows us to reset the viewer height and "Look Toward" parameters. This would be very useful.

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I'd like to see the perspective view be determined by a physical camera that can be edited in the info palette like a light source. This way you could set the focal length, and angle numerically. As is stands you either have to completely reset the view to change the parameters or use the translate view and rotate view tools, which are far from accurate. I'll post this on the wish list too.

One trick I use is to set a 3D polygon in my model at my viewer height. This way when I rotate my view I can find the horizon easily and get my viewer height the same as my look toward height again. (This happens when the 3D polygon looks like a line and not a trapezoid). Once I get the view reset I delete the polygon.

[This message has been edited by MikeB (edited 09-28-2001).]

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ok so i have been able to get everything to work. perspectives with straight vertical lines. thank you everybody.

but i couldn't agree with mikeb more.

quote:

Originally posted by MikeB:

I'd like to see the perspective view be determined by a physical camera that can be edited in the info palette like a light source. This way you could set the focal length, and angle numerically. As is stands you either have to completely reset the view to change the parameters or use the translate view and rotate view tools, which are far from accurate.

i think that it is important to have this ability not just to be more accurate with the camera and ones views around the model, but maybe more importantly (at least for me) to allow me to 'play'. i mean that quite seriously. sometimes i find viewpoints and perspectives that i never thought of because i had the ability to just grab the camera and play with it and move it around the model and i discover beautiful perspectives that i hadn't thought of. the current tools are just to clumbsy to effectively move the viewpoint around.

thank you all again. i am sure i will have more questions as i keep getting aquainted with vw9.

best, marc

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