seanc@pro-party.cts.com (Sean Cunningham) (05/18/91)
PEAK makes the splines between selected CONTROL POINTS rigid,
like they were vectors in a polygon editor, while SMOOTH will give
you a "continuous junction" between CONTROL POINTS. But JMan doesn't
stop here. You have three-dimensional control over splines via the
ALPHA, GAMMA, and MAGNITUDE gadgets.
Let's say you have curve made up of three CONTROL POINTS
connected together by a single spline. ALPHA lets you interactively
control the tension of the curve along the same plane as the curve
while GAMMA controls the tension along the plane perpendicular to the
curve. These allow you to twist and shape your curve from each
CONTROL POINT. The MAGNITUDE controls how tight the curve is between
control points. In other words, the higher the number, the more
broad your curve will be. Lower values cause your curve to become
PEAKed. And since the cubic patches are laid down over the curvature
of the splines, these three tools give you total power over the the
surface characteristics of your SEGMENT. Even minor adjustments can
dramatically change your surfaces.
After you've modified your SEGMENT to your liking, or while you
make your modifications, you click the Front-to-Back gadget in the
upper right corner to take you back to the PAINTER screen. Once
here, click on the QUICK RENDER gadget. After some thinking, you'll
see b&w shaded representation of your object. (Note: the viewing
angle of the FIRST viewing window is used for QUICK RENDER's view)
This brings us to another of JMan's features that sets it apart from
the rest: DECALing.
There's only one problem with me reviewing this feature, it
doesn't work. According to Ken Baer of Hash Enterprises, this
feature is supposed to work beautifully, but I have yet to see it
happen.
DECALing lets you bring in IFF brushes (by clicking on one of
fifteen DECAL BUFFER gadgets), and stamp them over your QUICK SHADEed
SEGMENT. After stamped, you click the GLUE gadget to render the
SEGMENT again, but this time you'll see the image wrapped onto the
surface of the SEGMENT. In addition, you can use the drawing tools
to paint *directly* onto the surface of the SEGMENT!
The current version only supports what are called STANDARD MAPs,
which are the equivalent to COLOR MAPs in IMAGINE. Future versions
will support TRANSPARENCY, and BUMP mapping. Plans also point to
ANIMBrush mapping.
After you've DECALed your SEGMENT to your taste, you choose SAVE
SURFACEMAP from the PROJECT menu. The SURFACEMAP must later be
called from the CHARACTER module.
Next up: CHARACTER
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> .SIG v2.5 <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
UUCP: ...!crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc RealWorld: Sean Cunningham
ARPA: !crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc@nosc.mil Voice: (512) 992-2810
INET: seanc@pro-party.cts.com ____________________________________
// | * All opinions expressed herein |
HELP KEEP THE COMPETITION UNDER \X/ | Copyright 1991 VISION GRAPHICS |
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<seanc@pro-party.cts.com (Sean Cunningham) (05/18/91)
Modeling is what separates the men from the boys when it comes
to 3D packages. JMan's SCULPTURE module has one of *the* most
powerful interfaces you'll find. What's interesting is that the
SCULPTURE module is actually two programs in one: PAINTER and
MODELER.
JMan's PAINTER module allows you to quickly create 3D volumes of
rotation through a process called AUTOSCULPTING. Although just about
any modeler available lets you spin or sweep a cross-section to
create such volumes, JMan lets you create symmetrical or
*asymmetrical* volumes through an intuitive paintbox interface.
The PAINTER screen gives you a lores (320x200) workarea, with a
toolbox over on the right-hand side of the screen. Here you find
a group of common drawing tools (freehand, line, curve, etc.) and
gadgets for toggling back and fourth between PAINTER's two
workscreens, AUTOSCULPTING, quick rendering, and fifteen banks for
IFF brushes used to DECAL your object, or in JMan terms, your
SEGMENT. There is also a coordinate window for precise placement of
AUTOSCULPTING LINES, decals, etc., and a user-definable palette of
twenty-four colors.
To create your SEGMENT, you need to draw a SILHOUETTE of its
VISAGE (front) and/or its PROFILE (side). This is accomplished
through the use of color-coded lines that JMan will follow in the
AUTOSCULPTING process.
The SILHOUETTE color is used to draw out the basic shape you
want, using the second color in the palette, usually black. On top
of this SILHOUETTE you draw an AUTOSCULPTING LINE, using the fourth
color in the palette, usually red. The AUTOSCULPTING LINE is what
controls the symmetry of your SEGMENT. A straight line down the
middle will result in a symmetrical shape, while a line with a curve
to it ON THE SAME SILHOUETTE will result in a shape completely
different. I won't even try to explain how this works, as it takes
allot of experimentation. From the manual:"...a set of symmetrical
forearm SILHOUETTES could show musculature if the AUTOSCULPTING LINE
was curved to one side."
To control the vertical complexity of your object, you also need
to draw SLICES, or horizontal lines, across your SILHOUETTE using the
third color in the palette, usually brown. The SLICES will become
horizontal "loops" around the SEGMENT once it's AUTOSCULPTED.
After you've drawn your SILHOUETTES, it's time AUTOSCULPT. A
click on the AUTOSCULPT gadget gives you a requester asking how
complex you wish to make your SEGMENT. This governs how many CONTROL
POINTS to use per SLICE. Your choices are FOUR, EIGHT, SIXTEEN,
THIRTY-TWO, or SIXTY-FOUR. Under most circumstances, eight CONTROL
POINTS will do the job.
To see the results, you go up to the menus and choose MODELER
SCREEN from the PROJECT menu, or press the [J] key, ala DPaint.
MODELER is where you modify AUTOSCULPTED SEGMENTS created with
PAINTER, or you can choose to model more intricate surfaces
point-by-point.
The SCULPTURE screen is hires-interlace (640x400), but due to a
careful choice of palette the flicker is next to nonexistent. It
presents you with a panel of gadgets across the top, and two windows
for SEGMENT views. You can choose from front, right, top, back,
left, bottom and perspective views. You're also given gadgets for
ZOOM, MOVE, and TURN to control your view, and ROLL, TILT, and SWIVEL
to control the orientation of your SEGMENT. You're also give gadgets
for scaling your segment along the X, Y and Z planes, and each can be
accessed independently of the others.
JMan differs from most other modelers (particularly IMAGINE's
DETAIL editor) in that it lets you push, pull, mold and modify your
object from *any* view, even PERSPECTIVE. And since all
modifications take place with the wave of the mouse, there is a
definite "tacticity," if you will, to the interface, not unlike
CALIGARI. You get near immediate feedback so you know if your move
was right or if you've made a mistake...but don't worry, there's a
very useful gadget for these instances right up at the top of the
screen...the UNDO :) And if you need to make very precise
modifications, each of the gadgets has an accompanying text-entry
window for coordinates.
Creating SEGMENTS from scratch is a fairly straight-forward
process similar to polygon modelers. You simply click the ADD
gadget, or press [A] and begin placing CONTROL POINTS onscreen.
Now you have two points connected by a spline. If you have several
points linked by splines that you wish to join together you click on
the LOOP gadget and the ends are closed. To aid in the placement of
control points, you can turn GRID SPACING on by selecting GRID from
the PREFERENCES menu and enter a value for the spacing (default is
20). But instead of a screen full of intersecting lines, which can
be confusing at times, you only see their intersection represented by
a single dot. This also helps to combat the flicker that thin
horizontal lines can cause.
From the panel of gadgets along the top of the screen you can
select tools to aid in the modeling process. The GROUP tool lets you
draw a bounding box around several CONTROL POINTS so that JMan knows
that the next tool or function is to affect only these points. Once
selected, points may be PEAKed, SMOOTHed, EXTRUDEed, or CLONEed. You
can also HIDE selected points if they're in the way.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> .SIG v2.5 <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
UUCP: ...!crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc RealWorld: Sean Cunningham
ARPA: !crash!pnet01!pro-party!seanc@nosc.mil Voice: (512) 992-2810
INET: seanc@pro-party.cts.com ____________________________________
// | * All opinions expressed herein |
HELP KEEP THE COMPETITION UNDER \X/ | Copyright 1991 VISION GRAPHICS |
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<