User Guide
Modes and Actions
The basic paradigm in Cardinal3D is that there are six different modes, each
of which lets you perform certain class of actions. For instance, in Model mode, you
can perform actions associated with modeling, such as moving mesh elements and performing global mesh operations. (In assignment 2, you will spend most of your time in Model mode.) In Render mode you’ll be able to render the current model with a ray tracer (once you implement one in Assignment 3).
When in Animate mode, you can perform actions associated with animation. Etc.
Within a given mode, you can
switch between actions by hitting the appropriate buttons or keys; keyboard commands are
listed below for each mode. Note that the input scheme may change depending on
the mode. For instance, key commands in Model mode may result in
different actions in Render mode.
The current mode is displayed as the “pressed” button in the menu bar, and available actions are are detailed in the left sidebar. Note that some actions are only available when a model/element/etc. is selected.
Global Navigation
In all modes, you can move the camera around and select scene elements. Information about your selection will be shown in the left sidebar.
The camera can be manipulated in three ways:
- Rotate: holding shift, left-clicking, and dragging will orbit the camera about the scene. Holding middle click and dragging has the same effect.
- Zoom: using the scroll wheel or scrolling on your trackpad will move the camera towards or away from its center.
- Translate: right-clicking (or using multi-touch on a trackpad, e.g., two-finger click-and-drag) and dragging will move the camera around the scene.
Global Preferences
You can open the preferences window from the edit option in the menu bar.
- Multisampling: this controls how many samples are used for MSAA when rendering scene objects in the Cardinal3D interface. If your computer struggles to render complex scenes, try changing this to
1.
Global Undo
As is typical, all operations on scene objects, meshes, etc. are un and re-doable using Control/Command-Z to undo and Control/Command-Y to redo. These actions are also available from the Edit option in the menu bar.
CS248A-Specific Modes (for CS248A assignments)
Other Modes
These additional modes are in the codebase for non-CS248A reasons, and you might want to explore, or even implement, on your own.