Organizational Tools
In this book we use the term “organizational tools” for tools or fea-
tures that allow the user to improve the organization of a complex
scene or model in order to avoid losing time looking for specific
objects and to optimize speed.
Hide and Freeze
Hide is used to hide objects in your scene. The objects are still
there, but you can’t see or select them in your viewport; you will
need to unhide them from the appropriate editor.
The name for the Freeze feature may vary from application to
application. Its main function is to lock the selected object for any
viewport selection or transformation, such as translation, rotation,
or scaling.
Layers
Layers have became an industry standard for computer graphics
and multimedia. However, layers behave a little differently in 3D. In
2D applications like Photoshop or Flash, layers are used to deter-
mine the depth of the elements inside the layers. In other words,
layers determine what is under what. In 3D applications, layers are
used like groups; if you add all the spheres to layer1, all the cubes to
layer2, all the tori to layer3, then hide layer2, all the cubes (and any
other objects) assigned to layer2 will be hidden (or reflect whatever
properties that layer may have). It’s a quick way to set properties
globally for all objects of a single group without having to select
them individually. For character setup, for example, a technical
director usually puts the bones of the character and the skin mesh
in separate layers to make it easier to lock one and unhide the other.
Conclusion
In this chapter we got a quick overview of the basics of the polygo-
nal world. We covered the importance of customization, aspects of
3D surfacing, Cartesian space, and polygonal structure aspects and
properties, along with some of the most common general deforma-
tion tools and organizational features inside 3D packages.
22
Chapter 1 – Polygonal System Basics
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