Virtools User Guide
www.virtools.com
UG.book Page 1 Tuesday, July 11, 2006 2:19 PM
Virtools User Guide
Copyright © 2006 Dassault Systemes, 1999-2006
Virtools is a registered trademark of Dassault Systemes or its subsidiaries.
All Rights Reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in
any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without prior written permission from Virtools.
VIRTOOLS SA (Virtools) PROVIDES THIS MATERIAL "AS IS", WITHOUT WAR-
RANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED. INCLUDING, BUT
NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
Virtools may make improvements and changes to the product described in this document at
any time without notice. Virtools assumes no responsibility for the use of the product or this
document except as expressly set forth in the applicable Virtools license agreement or license
agreements and subject to the terms and conditions set forth therein and applicable Virtools
policies and procedures. This document may contain technical inaccuracies or typographical
errors. Periodic changes are made to the information contained herein: these changes will be
incorporated in new editions of the manual.
Virtools is a registered trademark.Windows and Internet Explorer are registered trademarks of
Microsoft, Navigator and Communicator are registered trademarks of Netscape Communica
-
tions. All other brand or product names are the trademarks or registered trademarks of their
respective holders.
Written and edited by Christopher Mc Carthy and David Callele. Updated by Frédérique
Krupa. Cover art by Etienne Mineur
Thanks to Ouali Chabi, Nicolas Philippon, and Idenao (G. Lancrey and R. Enjalbert) for help
with tutorials, to Erwann Surcouf and Boris Duong for line art, and to Severine Deneau for
original document design.
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Table of Contents
1
PART 1 - INTRODUCING VIRTOOLS ....... 11
1 What is Virtools?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.1 An Authoring Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.2 A Behavioral Engine (CK2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
1.3 A Render Engine. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1.4 A Web Player . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1.5 A Software Development Kit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
2 About this User Guide . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.1 Introducing Virtools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.2 Looking at Virtools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2.3 3D Space in Virtools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2.4 Understanding Virtools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2.5 Authoring in Virtools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2.6 Appendix. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
3 Installing Virtools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
3.1 Hardware. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
3.2 Software . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
3.3 Installing Virtools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
4 Getting More Information . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.1 Virtools Authoring Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.1.1 Screentips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.1.2 Online Reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
4.2 SDK Documentation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.3 Virtools MiniSite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
4.4 Internet Based Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
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Table of Contents
5 Document Conventions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
5.1 Organization . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
5.2 Emphasis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
5.3 Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.4 Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.5 Acronyms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
5.6 Building Blocks (BBs) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
5.7 Parameter Operations (paramOps) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
5.8 Parameter Names (pNames) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
5.9 Parameter Types (pTypes). . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
5.10 Parameter Values (pValues) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
5.11 File, Resource and Object Names . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
5.12 Graphical User Interface (GUI) Elements. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
5.13 Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
PART 2 - LOOKING AT VIRTOOLS ......... 33
6 Virtools at Start-Up . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
7 Menu Bar. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
8 3D Layout . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
8.1 Top Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
8.2 Left Toolbar. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8.2.1 Selection Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8.2.2 Transformation Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
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Table of Contents
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8.2.3 Reference and Screen Guides . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
8.2.4 Creation Tools. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
8.2.5 Camera Navigation Tools . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
9 Building Blocks and Data Resources. . . . 45
10 Level Manager. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
10.0.1 Top Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
10.0.2 Left Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
11 Schematic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
11.0.1 Top Toolbar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
12 Status Bar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
PART 3 - 3D SPACE IN VIRTOOLS ........ 55
13 Virtools and 3D Graphics . . . . . . . . . . . 57
14 Coordinate Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
14.1 The 2D Coordinate System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
14.2 The 3D Coordinate System. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
14.2.1 Units of Measurement. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
14.2.2 3D Coordinates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
14.2.3 Vectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
14.2.4 Local Coordinate System, Relative Coordinate System . . . . . . . . . 63
14.2.5 World Coordinate System, Absolute Coordinate System. . . . . . . . 64
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