I’m loving the new Dynamite V3. Only produced one new visualisation so far, but already some great benefits to me:
1. Parameter Instancing is excellent - very easy to use. Making me lazy not saving styles
2. Combing Global Vertical Shift and Individual Shift for various Road Markings excellent (can’t remember if we could do that before) I use a combination of these all the time.
3. Placing instant Geometry is very cool - using that lots already
4. Being able to modify swept objects is awesome
5. Swept objects dialog and methodology is quite different. I used to use ‘spanning between shapes’ alot. Takes a while to get used to multi spline parent shapes. (I used to import a left and right edge for bridges, span the bridge between the shapes, and then apply a Left and right bridge barrier - rail objects to each shape. - bit different now) I’m still importing a left / right shape for the rail barrier, and now a new mx string with a gap for the bridge deck….......seems to work well. - Maybe I can split the multi-spline parent somehow ?? i.e. left rail barrier for 1st half of string, and then right rail barrier for 2nd half of string ???
6. Bitmap draping is much easier for me now. Especially with my DVSP in Sth Africa negative coords, I can easily move aerial photography manually by adjusting the BL and TR co-ords.
7. New Import Object Manager is great. I’ve have already re-associated quite a few GENIO files to Model.fils, which saves space and importing time. I’ve still got lots to learn in this manager !!
8. Imported objects and vehicles using existing VIZ mapping will be awesome. I’ve had lots of headaches in the past with this, so I’m sure I’ll use this.
9. DVSP Lights and Exposure Rollouts seem to share the same information as the VIZ Command rollout now. In V2 I would update say shadow casting on the DVSP rollout, but it wouldn’t update on the VIZ Command Rollout. Same with Forest information.
10. Capping of swept objects is very cool. Ends of bridges much tidier now.
11. Object Placement Style Edition is much tidier now. Creating objects, moving objects etc etc seems much faster than before. Up and Down arrows seem to work much better now. Smoother or something…..
12. Adding extra materials to the DVSP rollouts seems way easier.
13. Creating a surface from closed strings is very handy. Already used that for creating lakes and ponds. Works very well when the MX string has changed, the lake just updates. Could have used this lots in the past !!
Anyway – that’s my feedback on V3 to date. Well done to the guys at 3am-soultions for this great release.

Cheers Mark

Mark, thanks for your feedback. Feedback like this is vital in helping us to understand whether we are taking the product in the right direction. So far, the comments we have received relating to Version 3.0 are 100% favourable, which is great news.

If there are any other important features that you would have liked to see in this release, please be sure to use our wishlist forum to tell us about your needs. Wishlist comments will help us to guide development for the next release.

My comments as follows:

Mark Parkinson - 20 December 2006 10:38 AM

2. Combing Global Vertical Shift and Individual Shift for various Road Markings excellent (can’t remember if we could do that before)

Confirmed - that was in V2, but glad to hear that you found it.

Mark Parkinson - 20 December 2006 10:38 AM

5. Swept objects dialog and methodology is quite different. I used to use ‘spanning between shapes’ alot. Takes a while to get used to multi spline parent shapes. (I used to import a left and right edge for bridges, span the bridge between the shapes, and then apply a Left and right bridge barrier - rail objects to each shape. - bit different now) I’m still importing a left / right shape for the rail barrier, and now a new mx string with a gap for the bridge deck….......seems to work well. - Maybe I can split the multi-spline parent somehow ?? i.e. left rail barrier for 1st half of string, and then right rail barrier for 2nd half of string ???

Can you post a sample, or a screenshot? I’m having trouble “visualising” your problem. Pun intended…

Mark Parkinson - 20 December 2006 10:38 AM

10. Capping of swept objects is very cool. Ends of bridges much tidier now.

The next service pack will add a new skew parameter to the swept object style editor panel. This should help with the modelling of asymmetrical bridge decks.

Mark Parkinson - 20 December 2006 10:38 AM

11. Object Placement Style Edition is much tidier now. Creating objects, moving objects etc etc seems much faster than before. Up and Down arrows seem to work much better now. Smoother or something…..

Yes it’s definitely quicker in V3. We did a lot of work on this to optimise the performance of placed objects. Still not perfect, but far better than V2, especially on long splines.

Mark Parkinson - 20 December 2006 10:38 AM

5. Swept objects dialog and methodology is quite different. I used to use ‘spanning between shapes’ alot. Takes a while to get used to multi spline parent shapes. (I used to import a left and right edge for bridges, span the bridge between the shapes, and then apply a Left and right bridge barrier - rail objects to each shape. - bit different now) I’m still importing a left / right shape for the rail barrier, and now a new mx string with a gap for the bridge deck….......seems to work well. - Maybe I can split the multi-spline parent somehow ?? i.e. left rail barrier for 1st half of string, and then right rail barrier for 2nd half of string ???

Bruce Harfield - 20 December 2006 12:51 PM

Can you post a sample, or a screenshot? I’m having trouble “visualising” your problem. Pun intended…

I’ve attached a few screen shots to try get across what I mean. Now in V3 I import an MX string (with a gap) to sweep my bridge along. No problems there. Then I want to apply a left Rail Object along the left half of the MX string, and a separate right Rail Object along the right half of the MX string.

The process I’m using now in V3 is to import the above mentioned MX string, along with 2 additional MX strings, one for the left Rail, and one for the right Rail. Maybe there’s a more efficient way of doing this ?? There’s more work required at V3 to do this, compared to V2. Any ideas ???

A few comments…

Firstly, the old V2 swept object methodology is still available if you would prefer to use it the old way. It has been moved though from the main Swept Object Style Editor panel to a sub-panel which can be accessed from the “Create Multispline Parent Shape” button. This sub panel allows you to define a parent shape for the swept object by building it from portions of one or more “donor” strings. So if you revert to the V2 method you could just use your independent strings for each side of the road as the source for your swept object, which will mean that you can apply the rail styles independently.

The problem with this (and the reason for changing the basic methodology in V3) is that any swept object parent shapes that are “built” in the SOS Editor do not retain a relationship with the imported design data. If the imported design strings are ever updated by using the update functionality in DVSP, the swept object will not change since it is based on a “constructed” parent shape rather than a single imported design string.

For this reason, I would still recommend that you create the swept object from a single “dual spline” pre-trimmed parent string because it allows you to retain a better one-to-one relationship with your design strings. In your case, I would simply suggest generating separate strings to use as the parent shape for the rail object (because you require a different rail style to be applied to each side of the road). So you would have one design string for the swept object, and two seperate strings for the two rail objects.

I hope this makes sense, and answers your question adequately?

Yes this does make sense. Thanks for the detailed response, and I know I’m the right track now !! I definitely want to keep with the V3 swept object methodology.