"dune", what's that ?
dune is a graphical VRML97 Editor. It can be used to make simple
animations and interactionen in VRML97.
It is normally not suited to work as 3D modelling tool. It makes sense,
to use it together with a static 3D modelling tool with VRML97 export.
Exercises with the VRML-editor "dune"
In VRML97 the scenegraph and the Routes exhaustive describe a VRML-World.
You can see this Information in "dune"'s graphical Userinterface.
Therefore it is sufficient to show screenshots for both exercises.
Animation
Interaction
Working with "dune"
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Dune is not suited as modelling tool.
Only primitive shapes like box, sphere, cone, cylinder and text
(text will not be displayed yet (not implemented))
have easy input features.
Other shapenodes like for example IndexFaceSet (a shape made of multiple
facets), IndexLineSet, PointSet and ElevationGrid require the input of
a big amount of numbers.
The remaining shapenode "nurbsPlane" is not part of the VRML97 standard.
It will be part of the next VRML200x Standard.
When you want to work with a "IndexedFaceSet"
VRML-modell instead of primitive shapes,
you work better with the result of a modeller (like e.g. ac3d, maja,
ppe, ppmoder, catia, i3d etc.) or search for a free 3D modell in
the world wide web.
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Switch on the "View -> Route View" Window to display the routes.
This window is not diplayed per default at the first start of dune.
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Dune shows very few frames per second in animations. Therefore
it makes sense to use values greater than 1 at CycleInterval
in the TimeSensor while testing.
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With the tools
you can record and
playback animations.
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To record animations, you need to set the field loop of the matching
TimeSensor to TRUE.
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To test interactions, you need "File -> Preview" (or you have to save
the file and use it in a VRML Browser). Dune has no testmode for
interactions yet.
-
Using the tools
while interactive work
selects, if a mouse input on a transformnode is
- a translation
- a rotation
- a scale
Note, that you can not use this tools, if the matching
branch of the scenegraph do not have a transformnode
.
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To navigate in the 3D Window, you have
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Shift-Mouse 1: Zoom View
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ctrl-Mouse 1: Rotate View
Additional you have from version 0.16 a SGI like navigation.
Please note, that a misconfigured windowmanager can eat up this input....
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Alt-Mouse1: Rotate View
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Alt-Mouse2: Move View
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Alt-Mouse1-Mouse2: Zoom View
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Some of the interpolators are hard to input manually, to much data.
-
Easy usable (cause of the Channel View) are:
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ColorInterpolator:
Interpolate between Colors.
Route targets for colors you will find at Shape->Appearance->Material
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PositionInterpolator:
Interpolate between Positions.
Route target can be Transform.set_translation for example.
-
OrientationInterpolator:
Interpolate between rotations.
Route target can be Transform.set_rotation for example.
-
ScalarInterpolator:
Interpolate between single (floating point) numbers.
Single numbers are possible EventIn's of multiple VRML Nodes.
There are multiple possibilities of usage.
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The following interpolators are usually hard to input:
-
CoordinateInterpolator:
Interpolate between points in a IndexFaceSet.
Animations, which use the CoordinateInterpolator are called
"morphing".
-
NormalInterpolator:
Interpolate between the Normales of a IndexFaceSet.
You can find some typical VRML examples (you can load into dune)
here.