Away3D 3.6 Essentials

Table of Contents

• Preface

• Chapter 1: Building Your First Away3D Application
• Choosing between Away3D for Flash Player 9 or Flash Player 10
• Downloading Away3D
• Downloading the source ZIP file
• Downloading the source using SVN
• Using TortoiseSVN
• Creating an empty project for Away3D
• Adobe Flex Builder or Flash Builder
• FlashDevelop
• Adobe Flash CS4
• Targeting the Flash Player 10 runtime
• Adobe Flex Builder and Adobe Flash Builder
• FlashDevelop
• Adobe Flash CS4
• Creating the initial application
• Running Away3DTemplate
• Adobe Flex Builder and Adobe Flash Builder
• FlashDevelop
• Adobe Flash CS4
• The end result
• Positioning objects in a 3D scene
• Extending Away3DTemplate to populate the scene
• Running SphereDemo
• Adobe Flex and Adobe Flash Builder
• FlashDevelop
• Adobe Flash CS4
• The end result
• Summary

• Chapter 2: Creating and Displaying Primitives
• The basic elements of a 3D object
• Vertices
• Triangle faces
• Sprite3D
• Segments
• UV coordinates
• Creating primitive 3D objects
• Common init object properties
• Cone
• Cube
• Cylinder
• Geodesic sphere
• Grid plane
• LineSegment
• Plane
• RegularPolygon
• RoundedCube
• SeaTurtle
• Skybox
• Skybox6
• Sphere
• Torus
• Triangle
• Trident
• Summary

• Chapter 3: Moving Objects
• Global, parent, and local coordinate systems
• World space
• Parent space
• Local space
• Transformation functions / properties and their coordinate systems
• Modifying position
• The x, y, and z properties
• The position property
• The move functions
• The moveTo() function
• Modifying rotation
• The rotation init object parameters
• The rotation properties
• The rotateTo() function
• The eulers property
• The rotate() function
• The lookAt() function
• The pivotPoint property
• The movePivot() function
• The scenePivotPoint property
• The pitch(), roll(), and yaw() functions
• Modifying scale
• The scale init object parameter
• The scale() function
• The scaleX, scaleY, and scaleZ properties
• Modifying the transform
• Tweening
• Nesting
• Summary

• Chapter 4: Z-Sorting
• The painter's algorithm
• Sorting the scene
• Adjusting the sorting order
• The pushfront and pushback properties
• The screenZOffset property
• The ownCanvas property
• A note about Z-Sorting
• Additional renderers
• Summary

• Chapter 5: Materials
• The difference between textures and materials
• Resource management
• Defining colors in Away3D
• By integer
• By string
• Pixel Bender
• Lights and materials
• Shading techniques
• Texture mapping
• Normal mapping
• Environment mapping
• Flat shading
• Phong shading
• Applying materials
• Basic materials
• WireColorMaterial
• WireframeMaterial
• ColorMaterial
• Bitmap materials
• BitmapMaterial
• TransformBitmapMaterial
• Animated materials
• MovieMaterial
• AnimatedBitmapMaterial
• Interactive MovieMaterial
• Composite materials
• DepthBitmapMaterial
• EnviroBitmapMaterial
• EnviroColorMaterial
• Light materials
• WhiteShadingBitmapMaterial
• ShadingColorMaterial
• PhongBitmapMaterial
• PhongColorMaterial
• PhongMovieMaterial
• Dot3BitmapMaterial
• Pixel Bender materials
• Dot3BitmapMaterialF10
• PhongPBMaterial
• PhongMultiPassMaterial
• FresnelPBMaterial
• CubicEnvMapPBMaterial
• Loading textures from external files
• BitmapFileMaterial
• Using the TextureLoadQueue
• Summary

• Chapter 6: Models and Animations
• 3D formats supported by Away3D
• Exporting 3D models
• Exporting from 3ds Max
• Exporting from MilkShape
• Exporting from Sketch-Up
• Exporting from Blender
• A note about the Collada exporters
• Loading a 3D model
• Animated models
• MD2—Loading an embedded file
• Static models
• The problem with init and Init objects
• Converting a loaded model to an ActionScript class
• Summary

• Chapter 7: Cameras
• The properties of a camera
• Camera lenses
• ZoomFocusLens and PerspectiveLens classes
• SphericalLens class
• OrthogonalLens class
• Camera classes
• Target camera
• Hover camera
• Spring camera
• Summary

• Chapter 8: Mouse Interactivity
• Away3D mouse events
• The difference between ROLL_OVER / ROLL_OUT and MOUSE_OVER / MOUSE_OUT
• Projecting the mouse position into the scene
• Summary

• Chapter 9: Special Effects with Sprites
• Using the Sprite3D class
• Using the DirectionalSprite class
• Using the DepthOfFieldSprite class
• Using a particle system
• Creating the Away3D Stardust initializer
• Creating the Away3D Stardust particle renderer
• Creating the Stardust emitter
• Putting it all together
• Summary

• Chapter 10: Creating 3D Text
• Embedding fonts
• Displaying text in the scene
• 3D Text materials
• Extruding 3D text
• Warping 3D text
• Summary

• Chapter 11: Extrusions and Modifiers
• Creating a flag with the PathExtrusion class
• Creating walls with the LinearExtrusion class
• Creating a vase with the LatheExtrusion class
• Creating terrain with the SkinExtrusion class
• Reading the height of a terrain surface with the ElevationReader class
• HeightMapModifier
• Summary

• Chapter 12: Filters and Postprocessing Effects
• Flash and Away3D filters
• The Flash filters
• Applying filters
• Applying the BlurFilter
• Applying the DisplacementMapFilter
• Applying the GlowFilter
• Applying Pixel Bender shaders
• Applying filters to the view
• Away3D filters
• Render Sessions
• Postprocessing with the BitmapRenderSession
• Summary

• Chapter 13: Performance Tips
• Determining the current frame rate
• Setting the maximum frame rate
• Setting Flash quality to low
• Reducing the size of the viewport
• Scaling the viewport output
• Triangle caching
• Level of detail models
• Away3D filters
• ZDepthFilter
• MaxPolyFilter
• Offscreen rendering
• Model formats
• Summary

• Index