Verteks ver 1.0 Beta

Introduction:
	First, Verteks is not a ray-tracing program. It is assumed that you have a thorough understanding of using programs like Pov-Ray. This program is a 3-d modeler that is used to build objects that can be exported to ray-tracing programs like povray and moray. Objects are built using lines and vertices in a 3-d environment. The lines are then put together into triangles for use in ray tracing programs.

Version 1.0 Beta 
	Please be aware that this is a new program, and as such, may have some bugs. Please E-mail questions and comment to 

	Sparksd@lightspeed.net





Getting Started:
	All objects in Vertex are made up of triangles. A triangle consists of three point, or vertices, linked by lines or edges. To make a triangle, hold the right mouse button down and click on the left button. This will leave a small red x on the screen. Make three of these x's on the screen and then click on the line button. Lines will then join the three (or two) vertices together. If three vertices are joined, a triangle will be formed. If more than three triangles are selected, nothing will happen. These triangles make up the basis of all objects. They can be stretched, joined, rotated, extruded, to make up more complex objects.

Ready made objects:
	Verteks comes with six ready-made primitive objects. They include a cylinder, circle, cube, box, cone, and pyramid. When clicked on, these buttons will produce a primitive of the same size every time. The user must then size and move to where they are needed. Keep in mind that the circle and square can not be exported until the sections are joined to form triangles. Some of these objects can be drawn at different resolutions depending on the needs of the user. A cylinder drawn in 40 points will look very different, and smoother than a cylinder drawn at 5 points. But there is a trade-off for the added smoothness. More memory is required for the higher resolutions and the time it takes to export and render these shapes may become excessive. Keep this in mind and only use higher resolution when absolutely necessary. Resolution applies to any shapes with rounded appearance, like cylinders and cones.









Getting Around:
	There are several tools for getting around on the screen. They are the pan, zoom, and view buttons. These are used to look at different views of the same object, or zoom in on a certain detail. You may notice that as you zoom in on an object, certain lines may start to disappear. This is because they have gone off the screen on other views. This is actually desirable to have, because it lets you view parts of an object without unneeded lines getting in the way. Experiment with this to see how it works.






Rotating, and enlarging objects and moving objects:
	There are four buttons to rotate and shrink or enlarge objects. These button work differently depending on where the cursor is. Rotations will take place using the cursor as the pivot. Sizing works the same way. Objects will shrink toward or enlarge away from the cursor. Moving object only works if their vertices are selected. Select vertices by click on them individually or using the select functions in the do menu. Objects can be moved using the grabber tool. Once the grabber is active, selected vertices will go where ever the cursor goes.

Extruding:
	One of the most powerful functions is the extrude function. When combined with rotate and size, very complex shapes can be made. The coffee cup above was made using only the circle object, the extrude function, and rotate function. Extrude must be used with single triangles, or outlined object. Do not use extrude with a filled in object or a mess will result. Here is an example of how to make an extruded object. Clear the screen using new and then click on the circle. 





Then, click on the 'Y' view
Then click on do/extrude, click on the grabber tool, and drag the extruded form away from the circle. You can repeat the process, each time clicking on the extrude, to add another section. Try rotting the sections to form a torus.

Exporting:
	Object can be saved using the normal save command on the file menu. Once you object is complete click on the file/export menu to export the object to a POV file.
Caution!
Large objects made with more than 500 or more triangles may take several minutes to export. This is in part because of the large number of calculations that must be made to find all of the triangles. We are working on a way to speed this up in future versions. For now, limit object to 500 triangles or less. Verteks can, however handle up to 10,000 triangle but the time it takes to export these would be several hours. 500 triangle takes about 1 minute, and the time goes up exponentially with added triangles. The program may appear to lock up during these exports. Be patient..... Objects will be exported as a pov "union' made up of triangles. Our next version of this software will include smooth triangles, which will really make this package useful. Don't worry, it will still be free.









