3D Editing

This mode is used for segmenting the surface into two categories either for deleting unwanted bits of surface or for performing certain operations on only part of the surface such as area measurement and surface registration. The painted marks are remembered so that repeated painting from different viewpoints can be used to paint all round an object surface before using the segmentation. The editing pattern can be saved to disk file (from the file menu) for later re-use .Please note that this segmentation operates by tagging individual surface triangles. There are two modes of painting, defined by the state of the Visible surface only check box. The default mode (checked) is set every time edit mode is selected. In this mode only the visible surface is marked. If a triangle is too small to be marked it cannot be tagged - enlarging the object (by zooming in) generally solves this marking problem. If Visible surface only is unchecked, then marking is applied to ALL triangles at any distance into the screen within the marked area. This mode is useful for removing large regions of data. Painting is unreliable if the main image window has been made smaller than the standard size (see StdSize in file menu).

Press the right mouse button in the main window and drag to unselect a region of the image in the aux colour (this colour can be modified in the colour selection menu). Click and drag with the left mouse button to restore the normal colour. Once the regions are painted satisfactorily, two buttons in the edit menu (Show This Region) allow the choice of showing either coloured region. Apply Edits will irreversibly remove any unshown parts of the object.. If the edit pattern is saved after using Apply Edits then the pattern canot be loaded onto the original data - the edited data should also be saved to disk (as an obj or stl file) if subsequent re-use is intended.The Undo Last Show button reverses the effect of the last Show This Region click. The Restore Current Obj. button reverses the effect of all Show This Region clicks unless Apply Edits has been used which cannot be reversed. The Select All Surf button causes the whole object surface to be marked in the normal colour. The Select None button causes the whole object surface to be marked in the aux colour. The Swap selection button reverses the marking pattern.

Different objects can be moved independently within the view control menu to allow comparison of surfaces or to determine the relative positions of two objects prior to them being combined into a new object. It displays an edit control window and selects a brush for painting on the image.

A total of eight objects (numbered 0 to 7) may be loaded from files or created by combining two existing objects (using the current+aux button). Multiple copies of the same file can be loaded. At any one time, two of these objects may be tagged as having special status (Current Obj & Aux Obj.).The Current object is the one, from the available set of objects, which is being examined or operated upon. The Aux object is the one used in operations involving a second object (registration, combination, surface difference mapping).

The buttons Current obj. and Aux. obj. display a list of objects to allow reselection. The highlighted image indicates the existing state of the system. Clicking on any image exits the list, selecting the chosen object. If an object selected to be the new "current obj" is already in the "Aux obj" state, the current and aux tags are automatically swapped.

The menu also contains a selection of different brush styles for painting regions. The first four brushes are the same size and shape as the white part of the cursor, the last two paint a stripe the full height or the full width of the screen respectively. The fifth brush is an adjustable sized spot which can be varied in size from 1 to 50 pixels. If a region is outlined with a brush, the patch in the middle can be painted in by clicking on the flood fill button and then clicking, with either the left or right button as appropriate, inside the region to be filled. Only a region with a closed boundary will be filled. Clicking outside the main window aborts the flood fill mode.

Marker Based Editing

5 markers on a sphere	Holes cut at markers A,C,E
Discard to right of contour	Discard to left of contour

There are some extra editing functions, based on the use of landmarks, which can be found in the measurement menu. The object can be trimmed along a closed loop boundary in the polyline option. Holes can be cut with the paint round markers option. These editing functions will alter the triangles on the boundary of the cut to produce a clean edge.

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