Real-3D
<<Would you give more details on use of Pro Draw clips in Real 3D>> OK,
Doug, I'll try. Pro Draw is a structured drawing program, so called
"vector" based. This is quite different than a normal bitmapped paint
program like DPaint. In Pro Draw you create outlines that are individual
elements. They can be resized, rotated, distorted, magnified, etc with no
loss of detail and no pixelization as seen in bitmapped drawing programs.
It has really neat drawing and editing tools for creating nice curved
outlines. IFF bitmapped drawings can be imported and automatically traced
to form a PDraw "object".
Now, in Real 3D, very smooth curved surfaces ("meshes") can made by joining
together "curves". Curves can be absolutely anything from a rectangle to a
circle to whatever. Primitives can be used to create curves or you can
draw them freehand. The problem is how do you easily create a smooth curve
that cannot be made with the primitives. If you import a PDraw clip, it can
be defined as a curve thus giving you a very smooth outline with which you
can create your mesh. The beauty of these meshes is not only the
smoothness but they are very light on points used so you do not get bogged
down with complex objects. Other programs can be used to import bitmaps
but none of them will give you such a smooth result. See the section in the
manual on curves and meshes. Good Luck.
John