TextureEditor

Texture Frame

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Section contents

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Texture Frame control bar

A texture to be edited is represented by a Texture Frame containing the following elements:
  • connect socket,
  • connect plug,
  • menu,
  • label,
  • switcher,
  • expand,
  • collapse, and
  • Parameters.

    connect socket

    This button is highlighted in red when the texture is active. The texture is visible in the Texture Preview window. The button is active after selecting the connect plug button of another texture (in order to be able to connect two textures), or when a texture name in the texture listbox is selected.

    connect plug

    This button is selected before the connect socket button is selected, to connect one texture to another.

    menu

    This button displays a menu list with the following actions that may be performed on the texture:
    save
    Restores the texture to its source. This can be either a file or a solid object. In other cases this button has no effect.

    save as
    Saves the texture with the given file name and given texture name. A box is displayed and a new name for the file and texture can be given. Also a description of the texture can be entered. This text will be displayed every time the texture is previewed.

    save as attribute
    Saves the texture as an attribute that can be retrieved in GIG with the add parameter
    Adds a new parameter to the texture. A box is displayed for entering the name of the new parameter. The new parameter name may not contain any spaces. If spaces do appear in the parameter name, they will be replaced by underscores ("_") automatically.

    cleanup
    Parameters that have no connection to any property will be removed from the texture. In the editing process, some parameters may become redundant, but they cannot be removed individually due to internal texture structures.

    expand
    Collapsed parameters of the texture can be made visible in a hierarchical order of complexity. It has the same effect as the expand button.

    collapse
    When creating or editing textures, the amount of parameters might grow quite large, or they may become irrelevant to the user. To organize this, less important parameters can be tagged "collapsable" with the collapse switch. If they are marked collapsable, after selecting the collapse option they will be hidden, thus leaving the unmarked parameters to work with. Selecting this menu item will have the same result as pressing the collapse button.

    remove
    The texture will be removed from the working area.

    label

    The label represents the name of the texture. When the label area is selected, the Texture Frame may be moved up and down by dragging the mouse up and down. When selecting the label area of the Texture Frame, the texture becomes active.

    switcher

    The texture is switched from one area to the other, denoted by the arrow.

    expand

    Collapsed parameters of the texture can be made visible in a hierarchical order of complexity.

    collapse

    When creating or editing textures, the amount of parameters might grow quite large, or they may become irrelevant to the user. To organize this, less important parameters can be tagged "collapsable" with the collapse switch. If they are marked collapsable, after pressing the collapse button they will be hidden, thus leaving the unmarked parameters to work with.

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