Frozen Fish 1: Amiga/FrozenFish-Apr94.iso/bbs/alib/d5xx/d586/contour4d.lha/Contour4D/contour_4d_docs

Text File | 1992-01-04 | 9KB | 206 lines

December 1991                   CONTOUR_4D v1.5
                                ---------------

                  Copyright © 1991 by Bruce Thomson

                           DISCLAIMER
 No guarantee is made, expressed or implied as to Contour_4D's
suitability for any application.  No responsibility will be taken by the
author for any results of its use or misuse.

        SIZE LIMITATION
 This is Shareware.  This version will create objects of up to 2000
faces.  If you want more then I recommend you register with $US10 to get
latest major updates etc.

      What Does It Do?

    Contour_4D makes objects for Sculpt 4D out of IFF brushes.  It uses
a 'colour' brush and a 'contour' brush.  The 'colour' brush is converted
into a flat plane with various  controls over texture etc.  It doesn't
stay flat for long.  The 'contour' brush alters the altitude of the
pixels in the flat brush depending on the colour of the matching pixel
in the 'contour' brush.  Bright colours make for high points, dark
colours for low points.  You end up with a 3D surface.  The program
allows you to use  standard, Extra Halfbrite and HAM brushes for both
the 'colour' and 'contour' brushes.  It works in full colour.

You can also:
- Optimise the brush so that areas of the same colour become
  one large square as opposed to many small ones.
- Make any colours transparent.
- Alter the texture of colours independently.

      How Do I Use It?

Contour_4D runs from CLI or Workbench and is easy to use.  It needs
about 160K of free memory as well as the screen memory for your brushes.

When running respond to the requesters, set up transparency and textures
and then the object file will be created, ready to load into Sculpt 4D
as an object or scene.

You will need a copy of 'req.library' in your LIBS: directory.

      How Does It Work?

Contour_4D loads in the brushes and displays them.   You enter some
information and then Contour_4D will then proceed to analyse the
pictures and convert the pixels into pairs of sculpt faces making up
squares with that block's colour.
  The height of the pixels depends on the colours in the 'contour'
brush.  The four pixels around the corners of the faces in the object
are averaged to get the height of that corner. Black (red=0, green=0,
blue=0) has an altitude of zero.  White (red=15, green=15, blue=15) has
an altitude of 45.  Shades inbetween these boundaries will give
intermediary altitudes.  Pure red for example gives an altitude of 15.
The red, green and blue values are added to give the final altitude.
The best palette to work with when designing the contour palette is
one with 16 grey scales.  Colours you think might give the same height
may not, such as white and bright yellow.  Yellow is missing any blue
component and will have 33% less height.  If you wanted to use a
colourful IFF you had handy generally convert it to B&W first.
The program links up all the squares to give a smooth surface.
  You can have some optimisation of the object, rather than every pixel
being made into a pair of faces.  This allows areas of one colour to
become a large block rather than lots of small blocks.
  Depending on the brush, optimisation of up to around 90% can be
achieved, giving a great saving in memory and object faces.

  When the conversion is finished you will be told of the number of
vertices, edges, faces and file size of the object, along with the
percentage of points made transparent and the percentage of compression
performed.  Conversion time varies greatly depending on brush size and
complexity, but should be around a couple of minutes.  The current
location being converted is shown on the main screen along with the
current number of faces.  If you wish to abort the conversion for any
reason click on the 'Abort' gadget.

When one conversion has been done you will be given the choice to
perform another or to quit.

      The Inputs.

A series of requesters and gadgets will pop up which you will use to
control the conversion.

First you must select the filenames for the IFF brushes.  A file
requester will appear and you will enter the 'Colour' brush first and
then the 'Contour' brush.  If you want to quit then click on 'Forget it'

Next the contour control panel window will appear and from this you
can change the
  - Height and Width to be converted
The area to be converted is from the top left and these values
give the size of the area to convert.
They default to the largest area possible constrained by the size
of both input brushes.

  - Optimisation
Click on the gadget to toggle between optimisation or not.  If
you don't optimise every pixel will be converted into a pair of
faces.
You should normally have optimising on.  You will get a smoother
contour under some circumstances without it but depending on
brush complexity could have a lot more faces.

  - Transparent colours
If you have a HAM screen as the colour brush you will only be
able to make the background colour transparent.
If you have a non-HAM brush for the colour brush then each colour
can be made transparent or not.  A set of gadgets will appear on
another window, each with a number 0 - #colours in brush.  The
numbers correspond to the palette number in the brush.  Click on
the gadgets to toggle transparency for that colour.
The bright and dull versions of extra-halfbrite colours can be
changed separately.

  - Textures
If you have the colour brush as a non-HAM screen then each colour
can be given a different texture so that the final object will be
constructed of faces of differing textures.  When you click on
'change colour textures' another window will appear with gadgets
for each colour you can change.  The current setting of each
colour is displayed to the gadget's right.  The two characters
shown are the abbreviations of the possible textures.  The
numbers in the gadgets are the palette numbers.  To change
textures click on the first colour to change, then the last and
finally the texture that you want them to become.
  All colours start off being dull.
With a HAM screen as the colour brush you can only alter the
overall texture for the object.
With EHB the half-brite colours should be textured separately
from their corresponding bright colours.

When the conversion is finished you will be asked for a filename to
save the scene under.  A ".scene" will be appended to the name so do
not enter one yourself.

      Tips.

Make sure the 'contour' brush is large enough to cover the 'colour'
brush or the program will automatically convert a smaller brush.

If you have a simple but large brush you should reduce it in size to
greatly decrease conversion time.

Fewer colours will result in higher compression levels but you should
balance the memory saving against the look of the object.

If you want smaller objects then reduce the brush before conversion or
reduce the number of colours on a program like Deluxe Photolab.

Name your objects when they are loaded in as when you have transparent
colours the various parts may not be connected so you will want an easy
way of selecting the whole object.

Key frame animation can be performed.  Use either no optimisation and
any brushes of the same size or you can use optimisation as long as you
change only the colouring of the contour or colour brush within blocks
of one colour which have surrounding edges of an unchanging colour.

      Errors.

You will be told throughout if anything goes wrong like not being able
to open the screen or files etc.

You might get the "Exceeded maximum vertices" or "Exceeded maximum
faces" message.  If this happens you should send off the cash for the
version without limits.  Alternatively reduce your image (but lose
detail).

If you run the program but it returns immediately then you  may not have
the "req.library" in your  LIBS: directory, or be low on memory.

7.      The Address

I am a poor student, and need your donations. Future upgrades depend on
your generosity.  These will be sent free of charge when any important
changes are made, to all registered users.

Send your money to:

                    Bruce Thomson
                    PO Box 33116
                    Takapuna
                    Auckland
                    NEW ZEALAND

Make that $US cash or international cheques or money orders.

8.     Other Important Stuff.

This program is to be distributed with these docs intact and unaltered.
Distribution of restricted (in object size) version. (ie this package)
- This restricted version is freely uploadable to BBS's etc.
- Fred Fish can include it in his library.
- Other PD/Shareware libraries can distribute it if they are
not greedy, ie they charge no more than 150% of Fred
Fish's charges.
- Free User Group disk magazines, etc. may distribute it.
- Ask me if you want to distribute it packaged in any form
that is not covered above, that you will be charging any
money for - e.g. a disk that accompanies a magazine
-The unlimited size version is for your private use only if you
decide to register.  It is not to be copied.