3D Viewer Drawing

This command loads the selected 3D faces, blocks, polylines, lines and points into a separate 3D Viewer window. Some of the features of this viewer include the ability to zoom in and out, pan, rotate around the X-Y-Z axes, and shade entities with user-positioned lighting.

Mouse/Keyboard Controls

The 3D Viewer Window has several mouse and keyboard controls that can assist with navigating the scene. These are listed below:

Hold left-mouse button: Rotates/pans/zooms the scene based on the current mode. You can change the mode by clicking one of the control icons.
Hold right-mouse button: Zooms in/out.
Hold middle-mouse button: Pans around the scene.
W key: Zooms in.
S key: Zooms out.
A key: Pans left.
D key: Pans right.
Q key: Pans up.
Z key: Pans down.

View Control Tab

Ignore Zero Elevations: When enabled, the 3D viewer will not display entities at zero elevation.

Color By Elevation: This will color the entities by elevation.
    The None option will not modify the color of entities in the viewer.
    The All option will color all entities by elevation. The elevation color legend will be displayed on the left of the window and can be adjusted via the Color By Elevation Scale controls.
    The Surface Only option will only color surface files by elevation. Other entities such as polylines and 3D faces will not be colored by elevation.

Sky: This option controls the background image for the 3D viewer. By default, no background image will be displayed. When a background image is displayed, you can toggle the Background Color Below Horizon checkbox to hide the bottom half of the background image.

Vertical Scale: This option sets the vertical scale factor for the 3D viewer.

Lighting by Location/Time: This button will display the below dialog, which allows you to set the lighting as it would appear at a specific location at a specific time.

Date/Time: These values set the date and time for the lighting. The Select button will allow you to pick the date from a calendar. The horizontal slider below the time will allow you to set the time of day.

Latitude/Longitude: These values set the location of the viewpoint

Time Zone: This value adjusts for the various time zones. Values should be integers representing GMT adjustments. For example, the Eastern Standard Time (EST) in the USA will use a value of -5.

Additional Visualization Controls
Control	Action
	This control represents the position of the sun in plan view. If the yellow square is in the center of the blue circle, the sun is in a zenith. If the yellow square is near the edge of the circle, the sun is near the horizon. To move the yellow square, simply drag it to a new location, or click on the new location. The slider bars on the sides control the intensity and brightness of the display.
	Switch to Pan mode. Click and drag to pan.
	Switch to Rotation mode. When the cursor is placed near the outer edge of the view, a "Z" cursor is presented that permits rotation around the Z-axis. When the cursor is placed further into the interior of the view, an "X,Y" cursor is presented that permits the tilt angle of the view to be adjusted.
	Switch to Dynamic Zoom mode. Click and drag to zoom in and out.
	Zoom Previous.
	Toggle shading of 3D Faces and Surfaces. The shading of these entities is controlled by the Shading Mode control.
	Switch to Pick mode. In this mode, hovering over an entity will display data such as the layer, entity type, elevation, and length. Double-clicking an entity permits additional actions to be performed on the entity including the ability to change the layer of the entity and/or setting the entity to an elevation of zero (0). When hovering over a surface, the coordinates and slope of the surface at the cursor location will be displayed.
	Resets the 3D view to plan.

Rotation Axis: Permits the use of "slider" controls to orient the view in the X, Y and/or Z axis direction(s). Axes may be locked to prevent rotation about that axis.

Fixed Views: Permits the view to be displayed from one of six different directions:

Custom - This option will be displayed after manually rotating the view. Selecting this option will not return to a predefined view.
Plan View - Sets the view directly over the site, looking straight down. This is the same as the Reset to Plan button.
NE - Sets the view as shown from the Northeast looking to the Southwest in a downward direction.
SE - Sets the view as shown from the Southeast looking to the Norththwest in a downward direction.
SW - Sets the view as shown from the Southwest looking to the Norththeast in a downward direction.
NW - Sets the view as shown from the Northwest looking to the Southeast in a downward direction.

Settings Tab

Display Axis Icon: This option toggles the display of the X-Y-Z axes icon in the lower left corner of the window.

Display Bounding Box: This option toggles the display of a 3D box around the limits of the data.

Display Orbit: This option toggles the display of a graphic guide for controlling the view angle and position using the mouse movements similar to the AutoCAD Orbit routine.

Apply Surface Smoothing: This option shades 3D faces in a way that appears to remove sharp transitions from one entity to another. This option affects both surfaces and solids.

Display Triangle Edges: This option toggles the edge lines of triangles that make up surfaces. The triangle edge color can be set with the Set Colors button.

Display Surface Names: This option toggles the display of the file names for the surfaces currently being viewed.

Display Vertical Scale: This options toggles the display of the vertical scale.

Display Non-Surface Entities: This option toggles the display of entities that have been tagged as "non-surface" by the Tag Non-Surface Entities/Points commands.

Use Dynamic Text: This option automatically resizes and rotates text entities so that they are always readable. When the option is first enabled, you will need to restart the viewer for the changes to take effect.

Hide Backs of Triangles: This option toggles the display of the backs of 3D Faces. When enabled, even the edges of the triangles will be hidden.

Linework Pixel Thickness: This value sets the thickness for polylines.

Set Colors: This button opens the dialog shown below.

Color By Elevation Scale: These three colors are used for the Color By Elevation option. The program will interpolate between these colors for the color scale.

Contour/Edge color: These colors control the coloring for contours and triangle edges. Note that this does not affect the coloring of contour polylines that are loaded into the viewer, but only contours that are generated within the viewer.

Use CAD Background Color: When enabled, the background color of the 3D viewer will match the CAD background color. If this option is disabled, you can set a different background color.

Settings Controls
Control	Action
	Sets the drawing view to match the view shown in the 3D viewer window.
	Sets the view position and target position by coordinates according to the below dialog.

The positions can be entered in the edit boxes or you can use the respective Pick > button to pick a point in the drawing. The program will pick up the elevation of the surface for picked points and then the Height above the position can be entered. For example, to check sight distance the view position could be a point on a road at the driver's eye height and the target position could be the distance to check.

Saved Views: This option allows for naming and saving a 3D view for easy recall later. Named views can be selected from the pull-down and the active view can be deleted from the list.

Block Model Objects: This option has three choices when loading block model entities:

Leave as Points - this option will display blocks as points. In this mode, vertical stacks of blocks will be composited by color. For example, if 5 blocks of the same color are on top of one another, only one point will be displayed for those 5 blocks. This greatly reduces the number of points to be displayed in the viewer, but this viewing mode can be difficult to interpret for relatively homogenous block models.
Render - this option will display each block as a solid.
Prompt Each Time - this option will prompt you to select the viewing mode each time a block model is loaded into the viewer.

Shading Mode: When the Shading control is enabled, the rendering of the shaded 3DFACE entities (usually used to represent a surface model) will vary based on:

Shade Front - Shades only the "positive" normal direction.
Shade Back - Shades only the "negative" normal direction.
Shade Both - Shades both the "positive" and "negative" normal directions.

Model Tab

Model Controls
Control	Action
	Adds a single surface file to the 3D Viewer. You may also add one or multiple surfaces to the viewer by right clicking on "Surfaces" in the tree view.
	Allows you to edit properties of the currently selected entity.
	Loads a 3DX file into the viewer. This files contains all entities within a saved 3D View.
	Save the entities in the 3D Viewer to a 3DX file.

Within the "model" tab is a "tree-view" of the various entities that comprise the view along with the listing of layers upon which the entities are found. Each "branch" in the tree view may be expanded by clicking the "+" symbol to the left of the branch. Entities may be displayed (thawed), hidden (frozen), or edited by right clicking the entity name and selecting the appropriate option. The below dialog shows the properties of a surface that may be edited.

Visibility: This option toggles the visibility of the entity.

Color By Normal (Surfaces/Solids): When enabled, this option will color the surface/solid by the direction perpendicular to each face. This view can be useful for identifying particularly steep areas of the surface. The Color By Elevation option must be disabled to show the designated color.

Override color from file: When enabled, this option will override any color assignments and display the entity as a single color. The Set Color button below this option sets the color for the entity. The Color By Elevation option must be disabled to show the designated color.

Opacity (Surfaces/Solids): This option controls the opacity of the entity. A lower opacity results in increased surface transparency and is helpful for viewing sub-surface utilities such as Storm Sewer pipes and manholes.

Texture (Surfaces/Solids): When enabled, the option colors the surface with a texture such as grass or asphalt. The Scale of the texture may be modified to enlarge or shrink the image resolution.

Shading Mode (Solids): This option controls which side of the 3D faces of the solid should be shaded.

Common Controls

These controls are always displayed at the bottom of the window.

Common Controls
Control	Action
	The Clip Plane slider bar hides a portion of the view. Sliding the bar to the right will clip more of the view. This is helpful for producing quick "section" views of the data.
	This button takes a screenshot of the 3D Viewer. Several different image file formats are supported including bmp, png, jpg, xpm and gif. The image resolution and color depth may be set with this option.
	This button exports the 3D Viewer to a PDF report with project information. The default project information is set under Carlson Configure → General Settings. The dialog that appears for this command is shown below.
	This button exports the 3D Viewer to a 3D PDF. This function is further described in the to the 3D Viewer to 3D PDF help article. Note that you must have access to the CADNET module in order to use this command.
	This button opens the help documentation you are currently reading.
	Exit the 3D viewer window.