As a rule, the files when exporting
should contain some data, that is not represented in the elements of
Modeler (neither in vertices, edges, faces nor in objects). And this
data is saved while importing in the miscelaneous areas and readed
from there on exporting. To operate this data there is an Attributes dialog
box.
This dialog contains some other information that might be used when
working in Modeler: the name of objects or texture of the faces.
To show this diloag you can select Edit/Attributes in the
main menu or press Ctrl-A. Also note, that this dilog box works
with selected elements only and will not display if nothing is selected.
Here it is:
The left one is on Objects level: Objects' name and flags can be
changed, the central one is on faces level: Material and flags can
be changed and the right one is on vertices level: nothing but flags
can be changed.
It's clear that objects, faces or vertices can be hidden or disabled
by means of this dialog: simply mark the Hidden or Disabled
checkboxes.
Another thing you shold notice is that there are four Miscelaneous
Flags that can be assigned or removed. Note, that these flags are
not used internally by Modeler: these flags are used while exporting: to
point that according face (or vertex) has something. (For example flag1 might
identify, that face is semitransparent). All the meaning of miscelaneous
flags can be found in readme file for according filter that you use.
When you import the file it can contain some specific information
for faces or vertices and four miscelaneous flags might be not enough to
store that information. For example miscelaneous value might show whether the
polygon (face) will disappear after user damages the object in the game, or it
can indicate whether the vertex of the object should spin in some cases like
drivers' moving arms.
But there might be values that specifies custom
value that can't be stored in that four flags. For example it myght be the degree
of damage (in percents) that vertex accepts or degree of trasparencity of polygons
in an object and so on. Thus there are another four storages for each face, vertex
and object. They are Miscelaneous values. These values can store any information,
but as a rule, it is the smoothing bits or groups of animation.
ZModeler also has some internal miscelaneous values
for faces and vertices. They are so-called Render flags that indicates how the
specified polygon will be rendered. To change any of these values you should
first: activate the Attributes diloag box and second:
hit the Flags>> button in it to activate the following dialog box:
Here you can select one of four values to change and change it
in bits treat. (Each value can be treated as 32bits sequence). When marking
the checkboxes the marked means that this bit will be assigned in misc value
in all selected elements; grayed checkmark means that this bit will not be
changed in all selected elements; unchecked box means that this bit will
be unmarked in all elements. When this dialog apperas the marked sheckbox
means that ALL selected elements has this bit marked; unchecked - no one of
elements hasn't this bit marked; grayed - at least one of selected elements
has the markage on this bit but not all of the elements has this bit marked.
As for Rendering flags it can be applyied
to faces only and there are only some of them available now:
Cull mode: means how the face will be culled: it indicates what side of face
is visible when rendering. The dropdown has four vaules: Current - leave
unchanged culling mode when closing dilaog box; Default - changes all faces to
defalut CCW (counter-clock-wise) culling; CW - changes to backward culling;
None - no culling that means both sides are visible.
Semitransparencity checkmark means that the face will be displayed 50% transparent.
NOTE that all the combinations and
meanings should be read in according readme file for the file format you are going to
produce. And I RECOMMEND NOT TO USE CUSTOM RENDER FLAGS if they are unneccesary while
exporting
Also NOTE: To enable custom rendering
flags you should chackmark Use Custom Flags in Custom Settings
in main menu.
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