December 1991 Tree 4D v1.5 ------------ Copyright 1991 Bruce Thomson DISCLAIMER No guarantee is made, expressed or implied as to Tree_4D's suitability for any application. No responsibility will be taken by the author for any results of its use or misuse. This is Shareware. If you use this program or any of my other sculpt tools then please send some cash. I recommend $US10 but any amount whatsoever is acceptable. No, I draw the line at coinage. LIMITATION This version will create trees with branches, sub-branches and leaves. If you would like a version which allows for more detailed and intricate trees send $US10. Tree 4D creates 3D branching trees with leaves, as objects for Sculpt 4D. The trees are made of branches splitting off from a trunk, with branches having sub-branches etc. Branches on the final level may have leaves. Many details of the tree can be altered to give a wide variation of final results. The following can be set by the user: - Branch length and variation - Branch angle and variation - Branch radii - Number of sub-branches per branch - Colour of branches - Detail of branches The same applies to the leaves. Tree_4D can run from Workbench or CLI and needs around 150K of memory free. A copy of 'req.library' should be present in your LIBS: directory. Trees are formed by arranging the branches or leaves spread equally around a circle at each branching point, and then angled according to the settings. Controls -------- Use the gadgets to select which type of tree you would like created. The settings will be stored between creation of several trees so you can alter single settings to fine-tune a tree. With string gadgets if a decimal place is shown as part of the default value then you can use fractional values. If only an integer is shown then only integers will be acceptable. - Seed value. This is an integer from 0 to 9999. This sets the random number generator. If you want to recreate a particular tree then you must record this number along with the other settings. To get trees that look different alter this value. - Tree with branches/sub-branches gadget. This will toggle between creating trees with branches only or branches and sub-branches. - Modify the branch settings Takes you to another window to set branch values. - Change Tree Colours The branches and trunk are all of one colour and the leaves are all of another colour. You are able to alter which each of these colours are. Although the screen colours return to what they were originally after you have altered the brown and green default colours for the branches and leaves, respectively, your colours will be stored internally and used in future trees until you change the colours again. - Generate scene. This gadget will prompt you to enter a filename for the scene to be named as (with a '.scene' automatically appended) - Quit. There are some defaults for the design of the branches. They will generate a standard tree. Any of the settings can be changed but there are many settings and you may be satisfied with the ones used to generate a previous tree, or with the defaults if this is the first tree to be made. If you modify the branches you can alter: - Trunk height factor. If you would like the trunk to be taller or shorter than normal then alter this setting. This allows the turnk to be a significantly different length to the branches without needing to set the branch length multiplier below. Use 1.0 to leave trunk at default height. - Trunk shape. This is used to set the ratio of height to width of the trunk. If you would like a skinny looking tree then make this value greater. - Minimum and maximum branches at each branching point. These will determine the number of branches and sub-branches to create at each branching point. A number between minimum and maximum will be selected at random. Lower bound can be zero, but you may have to create a few trees until you find one with an acceptable number of branches. Upper bound of 10. -Branch angle & Branch angle Multiplier. These two will set the general look of the tree, from flat and bushy to tall and narrow. Branch angle is the angle that the first set of branches will take, measured from the vertical. Thus a value of zero will make all branches point straight up, and 90 will point all branches straight out. The multiplier alters how any future levels of sub-branching will be angled. A value of one means all branches and sub-branches are at the same angle, a value less than one means the sub-branches become less spread out, the tree becomes denser, and a value greater than one increases the spread. - Branch angle variation. This is used to give the tree a more natural look. The branching angles can vary for each branch. The final angle is: Standard Angle For This Level * (1+/- random*angle variation) - Branch length multiplier. Each level of branches has a length that should generally shorten as trunk goes to branch to twig etc. This value alters the length of the current level of branches to be multiplier*previous length. - Branch length variation operates in a similar fashion to angle variation above. - Branch detail. The branches are made of tubes, with branches on the final level created having the ends filled as in cylinders. This value is the equivalent of Sculpt's subdivision level when creating tubes, circles, cylinders etc. The higher it is the more faces will be created, and the smoother the branches will look. - Branch radius multiplier. The radius of the branches can be modified independently of the lengths of the branches. The trunk radius relative to length is set in the 'Trunk shape' value above. The radius of the trunk will be multiplied by the value for the radius multiplier to give the radius of the first set of branches. This will be multiplied again to get the radius of the second set etc. - Reset settings to default Will return the branch settings back to a set of reasonable defaults if you think you have mucked it up. - Done. Return back to the main window. Modify the leaf settings These settings generally mirror those for the branches. - Minimum and Maximum number of leaves The number of leaves to appear on each branch at the final branching level. A random number between the two will be selected. These will be evenly spaced around the end of the branch. - Leaf detail. Leaves are filled ovals. This value is the equivalent of Sculpt's subdivision level when creating circles. - Leaf angle and variation are the same as for branches. - Leaf size factor and Variation. These modify how large the leaves are in comparision to the branches. A value for size factor greater than one will make leaves that are larger than normal. Variation will make some leaves smaller or larger than normal. This is the same as other variations above. - Leaf shape This is a ratio of the length of the leaves to the width. A value of 1 will give circular leaves, a value of 2 will give long leaves. Use this with the leaf size setting. After you click on 'Generate Scene' from the main window, you will be shown the number of branches and leaves, the number of vertices, edges and faces in the object and total scene size. Now you enter a filename to save the tree under. If you are unhappy with the final size of the object Cancel the file requester and try again with a tree with fewer branches, fewer leaves, less detail or just a different random seed. Problems, questions,suggestions, money (cash preferred to avoid bank fees to us all, but preferably register it) can be sent to: Bruce Thomson PO Box 33116 Takapuna Auckland New Zealand.