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3Space export for Amapi 3D 5.15A
This document describes the new 3Space export for Amapi 3D 5.15A
Installation:
You must first install Amapi 3D 5.15A .
Then you may check that the 3Space plug-in is correctly installed, open
Amapi 3D, create a simple geometry, then click on file->export. The
sub-menu should include a 3Space entry. Select this entry and give a name
to the exported file. This name must have a .z3d suffix. For instance:
sample.z3d. The exporter will then create two files: sample.z3d containing
the geometry written in ZAP format and sample.html containing the XML
tag and the 3Space player object. To view the result in Internet Explorer
you need to:
- Install the 3SpacePlayer extension into Internet explorer. See the
3SpacePlayer help file in the 3SpacePlayer directory.
- Copy the Schemas.xml file provided with the 3Space player into the
directory where you created the sample.xxx files.
- Once this is done, just open the sample.html file and you will see
your object inside the 3Space player.
Description of the 3Space export:
The Amapi 3Space export saves the current visible polygonal geometries
with some of their rendering attributes. It also keeps lights and cameras
and computes the limit of the scene. Although the camera is located exactly
at the same position, the default field of view is different in the 3Space
Player than in Amapi 3D, resulting in object appearing farther from the
viewer than in Amapi 3D. The limits of the scene are set to the bounding
box of the whole scene scaled up by 10%.
Hidden objects are not saved. Curves and lines are ignored.
Objects are saved with their current names. It is important to notice
that names should include only alphabetic characters. The XML parser may
reject other characters. This limitation is due to XML and not to Amapi3D
nor to the 3Space Player. Using consistent names for objects make editing
the XML document much easier.
Groups are saved as a single entity. This is a convenient way to build
complex assemblies.
The geometry is stored in a single ZAP file and each group or shape is
identified in this file by its name.
The XML tag containing the scene description of the exported geometry
contains only fixed solids, camera and lights. It does not produce any
3Space animation. They must be done by editing this file by hand. For
instance, by replacing the fixed attribute by 0 (not fixed) and adding
a GravityForce element, the solids will fall down and bounce on the limits
of the world.
See the 3Space Description Language document to learn more about the possible
features of this language.
How to create very small 3D contents
In order to export compact geometry (which will be encoded into the ZAP
file), we strongly suggest to :
- Use NURBS surfaces as much as possible
- Create polyhedral geometry with the minimal number of polygons and
then use the smoothing tool to increase the density of the meshes and
enhance their resolution.
- The current version of the ZAP export only supports dynamic recording
of the Bezier smoothing method (the first one in the smooting tool).
It means that if you create a polyhedral model smoothed with the Bezier
method, the output file will contain only the initial polyhedral geometry.
- Next versions of the ZAP format will encode much more efficiently
the other smoothing methods as well as all models created using the
Dynamic Geometry
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Be aware that the unit of the 3Space world is the meter. So we suggest
you to work using the meter (or centimeter) unit in Amapi (use the Preferences
>> Units settings menu).
Furthermore, the following rendering attributes are not exported:
- falloff
- filter
- reflection
- refraction
- 3D textures
- multi layer textures
- texture operations except mix and replace
- texture operand except color
- texture mapping type except sphere, plan cylinder
- texture balance
Some attributes may produce slightly different visual effects in Amapi
and in 3Space Player. This is due to the limitations of the OpenGL rendering
engine included into 3Space.
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