Scene (vuo.scene)

These nodes are for working with 3D graphics scenes.

Scene basics

A scene (scenegraph) contains a set of 3D objects. Each object has a set of vertices (mesh) that defines its shape. You can control how the object looks when rendered (such as color and texture) by changing its shader. You can control the position, angle, and size of the object by changing its transform. You can control the point of view on the scene by adding a camera.

Many of the nodes in this node set are object filters — they take an input object and apply an effect on it to produce an output object. To see a list of the object filter nodes, search the Node Library for “object filter”.

Loading a 3D model

To load a 3D model from a file, you can use the Fetch Scene node. It supports files with extension .3dgs, .3ds, .ac3d, .b3d, .blend, .cob, .dae, .dxf, .fbx, .hmp, .irr, .irrmesh, .lwo, .lxo, .m3, .md2, .md3, .md5, .mdc, .mdl, .ms3d, .ndo, .nff, .obj, .off, .pk3, .ply, .q3d, .q3s, .raw, .scn, .smd, .stl, .ter, and .xml.

Showing the back/interior

To make graphics rendering more efficient, by default Vuo only renders the front/exterior side of a 3D object. For example, with Make Sphere, Vuo shows the sphere when viewed from the outside — but if you move the camera inside the sphere, it disappears. You can make the back/interior of the object visible with the Show Back of 3D Object node.

GPU acceleration

If the GPU supports it, the object filter nodes do their work on the GPU (rather than CPU) for faster performance.

Coordinates

In Vuo Coordinates, (0,0,0) is the center of the scene. The default camera is at (0,0,1). When viewed through this camera, the scene has a width of 2, with X-coordinate -1 on the left edge and 1 on the right edge. The scene’s height is determined by its aspect ratio, with the Y-coordinate increasing from bottom to top. The Z-coordinate increases from back to front. Objects are visible if their distance from the camera along the Z-axis is between 0.1 and 10.

Vuo Coordinate System



Example compositions:



Nodes: