INDEX

NVIZ - Movement

nviz starts up with one graphics window and one control panel window. The top third of the control panel window contains the Movement panel. Other panels may be selected from the Panel menu at the top of the window. When a panel is selected it appears in the control panel window. If the window is full, and there is no room for the new panel, one or more panels that are open on the control panel window will be closed to make room for the new panel. Panels can also be closed using the Close button that appears on each panel. The Movement panel, however is always visible. Each panel from the Panel menu will be described in more detail below.

Movement Panel

Use the Movement panel to position the viewer over the data and to indicate viewing direction and perspective. As options in this panel are changed, a wire grid of the surface is redrawn (fast display mode) to immediately show the results of the changes. This panel also controls the actual drawing.

Auto Clear
This is a toggle button. If it is enabled the screen is automatically cleared before surfaces are drawn.

Clear
Clears the screen with the background color.

Surface
Draws loaded surfaces with current drawing and lighting options.

Vectors
Draws loaded vector files on selected surfaces.

Sites
Draws loaded site files on selected surfaces.

Cancel
Cancels drawing in progress.

XY position
The XY position box contains a star-shaped puck which represents the viewer. Click on the puck and drag to move the viewer around. The data may be thought of as always lying in the center of the box, with north at the top.

Height
Adjusts the viewer's height.

look here
Allows the user to click on a spot on the data surface which will remain centered as the viewer position changes. After clicking on the surface, the new center is automatically set and the surface is redrawn.

look center
Automatically fixes new center of view at the center of the graphics window (not the center of the data).

look cancel
Clicking on cancel allows the user to move over the surface with no fixed center of view (default).

zexag
Exaggerates the vertical dimension of the surface. An exaggeration of 1.0 represents the surface with x, y, and z units all being equal. For example, if the easting and northing units are in meters and the elevation in feet, a Z exaggeration of .305 would be the true exaggeration for the surface. For most geographical applications, greater than true exaggeration produces more visually pleasing images.

Perspective
Adjusts the viewer's angle of view.

Reset
Sets all settings to their startup values.

Occasionally, the bounds of the height slider are too narrow to position the camera as desired. In this case, the type-in entry next to the height slider may be used to set camera height directly. Typing in a value will also automatically adjust the slider bounds to account for the new maximum and minimum height. In general, most sliders with corresponding type-ins provide this functionality where it makes sense. Color sliders, for example, cannot be adjusted since color components must always be between 0.0 and 1.0.