3D View of a Greek Temple

XYZ Axes, Groundplane Grid, Numbers, Handles and Context Menu

Plan View of Selected Faces from the Soccer-Head Object

Help Screen on How To Make a Soccer Ball

Wooden Bowl

Psychedelic Dodeca-Star and the Star-Maker Dialog

Mirrored Stone Soccer Balls

Data View of an Outback House

The Scale Dialog with CarPort

The Verandah House Rendered in Wireframe Mode

This is Ligno3D Designer's 3D View, which by default uses perspective projection, realtime solid rendering and blue-on-blue decor. The left mouse button pans the scene and selects faces. The right mouse button rotates the scene and displays context menus. The mouse scroll wheel zooms the scene in and out. The Standard and Select toolbars lie across the top of the screen, the 3D-Edit and Boxatrix toolbars are on the left and right, and the Status Bar is at the bottom. The yellow roof face is currently selected. The Status Bar displays the coordinates of the center of the selected face and the internal solid angle (141.33 degrees) between this face (4095) and the other, previously selected, roof face (4096).

3D View of the 'CubbyHouse.lig' project file, with the XYZ axes, goundplane grid, face numbers, vertex numbers, vertex handles and edge handles all turned on. Any vertex, edge or face (or group thereof) can be selected with the mouse - they turn yellow when selected - and moved intuitively in XYZ space with the arrow and plus/minus keys. One keystroke equals one user-defined 3D unit. Selections can be also be moved radially or parallel and perpendicular to a face. The Edge Context Menu has been displayed by by right-clicking with a stationary mouse on the handle of Edge 1-10. The Status Bar shows data from this edge, the rightmost pane giving the 'radius' of the edge's center point - i.e. its distance from the origin.

Ligno3D Designer's 2D Plan View, showing a group of faces that were selected from the 3D view of the 'SoccerHead.lig' project file. Note the face and vertex numbers, adjacent face numbers, edge and diagonal lengths, and inter-edge and half-interfacial angles. The diagonals are used in triangulation with a beam-compass when transferring face plans to panel material. If any part of the plan is obscured or illegible the scale of the plan can be increased until all lettering is visible. The Status Bar shows the median XYZ coordinates and radius of all the vertices in the selected group of faces.

Ligno3D Designer's comprehensive help facility functions both as a help system and a user manual. It is extensively illustrated, includes tutorials, and has detailed instructions on physically building objects from panel materail. A 'What's-This' cursor is also available for obtaining detailed explanations of all menu items and toobar buttons.

The three mutually perpendicular mirror planes appear as transparent blue planes. Other symmetry elements include a center of symmetry and a Y rotation axis that can also generate spirals and helixes. Active symmety elements act dynamically to replicate all newly created vertices and faces. They can also be applied retrospectively to whole objects, or to selected faces and vertices.

The Data View consists of three lists. The Component List shows all named components. The Face List has the face number, bearing, incline, vertex numbers (in counterclockwise sequence) and component pointer belonging to each face. Bearing is the horizontal angle measured clockwise from the positive end of the Z axis to the projected face normal. Incline is the angle the the face normal makes with the vertical Y axis. This is zero for a horizontal face that is shiny side up, 90 degrees for vertical faces, and 180 degrees for a face that is horizontal and shiny side down. The Vertex List contains the vertex numbers and XYZ coordinates of all vertices.

The Scale Dialog sets, or resets, the overall scale of the project, along with related parameters such as the groundplane-grid spacing, keystroke increment, vertex tolerance and snap-grid spacing. The carport as it currently stands is obviously far too small, but it is easily enlarged to an appropriate size via L3DD's 'Resize' command. The Scale Dialog is then used to re-dimension the project so that the enlarged carport fits within the displayed groundplane and XYZ axes.

Wireframe Mode can be confusing, and is not used much in Ligno3D Designer. The face numbers are not easy to relate to the corresponding faces, and the scene has to be rotated often to resolve all lines. Specific lines can be hidden with Ctrl-left mouse button. The responsiveness of the real-time solid rendering in Ligno3D Designer means wireframe rendering is not often required. However, there are some circumstances where it can be used to advantage - such as the interior detail in complicated objects like large houses.