Hi All,

3D Canvas 6.6.5.0 Release Candidate 1 is now available for download: Download 3D Canvas 6.6.5.0 Release Candidate 1

All functions have now been tested. The only thing left to do is complete the help file updates.

Finally, after more than a man-year of work it is done. Hooray!

Richard

After the change from 7.0 to 6.7 and then to 6.6.5.0… I was wondering what your next plans are.
I certainly missed something as I cannot tell if 6.6.5.0 is DirectX 9 compliant or DirectX 8 compliant.

I've read you are going to make a version suitable for Vista (certainly the first priority when 6.6.5.0 is released).
7.0 was about a switch to .NET (2.0?)
After all the code rewriting done in version 6.6.5.0, I believe (hope) you are going to be able to keep this work for a .NET version.

If I remember well, the switch towards .NET must be done because of DirectX 10.
When DirectX 10 is implemented in 3DC, will 3DC still be able to generate DirectX 9 compliant models? I'm thinking of KRS which is a DirectX 9 game and the main raison (at least for some time) why I'm going to use 3DC.

It really is confusing isn't it? No, there isn’t a version 6.6.4.0 on the way. :-)

I chose 6.6.5.0 as the version number for this release because I felt it was important to not “skip” a release number. Version 6.6 was never really released officially and going to version 6.7 would have been even more confusing for the typical 3D Canvas user. In reality 6.6.5.0 is what I envisioned for 6.7. In many ways it is what I envisioned for 7.0 (except for the .NET transformation.). I have made the key, and very involved changes, that will allow 3D Canvas to move forward.

Unfortunately the move to .NET did not go as planned. There was so much that should have been re-written before I started on .NET that wasn't. I've been able to save some of what I wrote, but not all. I actually took some of what I wrote for .NET and converted it BACK to VB6. I can take all the experience gained to make the next attempt at converting to .NET much easier.

The next step for me is to write a TrainSim Modeller importer, if such a thing is possible, and prepare for the release of Kuju's Rail Simulator.

I also have a few more items that I want to re-write within 3D Canvas. There are a few other areas that are slower than I would like. In particular the recording of videos is much slower in 6.6 than in 6.5. The cure seems relatively easy now because of the work I did between 6.6.1.0 and 6.6.5.0.

I'll work on these items over the next few weeks since they are my first priority.

Probably in December I will start the project to make 3D Canvas ready for Windows Vista. This is important for the project to move to .NET.

As for your specific question, 3D Canvas is now a DirectX 8 application. Version 6.5 was a DirectX 5 application. But, 3D Canvas still uses DirectX 5 for some functions that are not directly available in DirectX 8. For example DirectX 8 does not support the importing of Quads (4 sided faces) and higher from the DirectX file format. DirectX 5 did support it. I’ll have to write this myself in order to remove DirectX 5 entirely. This is what I need to do to make 3D Canvas ready for Windows Vista.

3D Canvas could be a DirectX 1 application and produce models suitable for Kuju’s Rail Simulator. The problem is that 3D Canvas would not run if it were a DirectX 1 application. It isn’t necessary that 3D Canvas and Kuju’s Rail Simulator use the same version of DirectX.

I hope this answers your questions.

DOM107,I received your texture and see the problem now. The textures I was testing with were a color where the translucency wasn't obvious. I think the solution is to make 2% and lower tranlsucency behave as no-translucency.

I still don't know the solution to the odd distortion of the texture on your model. If you send me the entire model (the 6.5.1.0 version) and all textures (support@amabilis.com), I can have a look and maybe find the cause.

I've made two small changes for the final release.

The first is that materials with translucency of less than 3% are considered to be non-translucent. This is necessary because train models exported to Microsoft Train Simulator use translucency as a flag rather than actual translucency. I expect that this will result in no practical reduction in functionality since 3% translucency is still effective for times when a very low level of translucency is required.

I've also made a change to the "hover" information added in this release. It now displays not only position in world coordinates but in model relative coordinates also.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Amabilis Support,

This all sounds great...nice work.
I'm half way through a quit large project, does 6.6.5.0 run alongside 6.5.1.0.

I noticed in the readme file on an earlier beta the instruction for windowsXP was to uninstall previous version first.

Bazza

quote:

Originally posted by Bazza:
does 6.6.5.0 run alongside 6.5.1.0.

Yes it does (and I hope future 7.0 version will work alongside 6.6.5.0... otherwise Betatesting is painful and its better to keep the 2 versions for some time in case big problems arise with the more recent version).

quote:

Originally posted by Bazza:
I noticed in the readme file on an earlier beta the instruction for windowsXP was to uninstall previous version first.
Bazza

What must be uninstalled is the previous 6.6.5.0 beta version.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: DOM107,

quote:

Originally posted by Amabilis Support:
I still don't know the solution to the odd distortion of the texture on your model. If you send me the entire model (the 6.5.1.0 version) and all textures (support@amabilis.com), I can have a look and maybe find the cause.

I'll do it tonight.

Most of my plugins for 6.6.5 RC 1 are now at:

http://www31.brinkster.com/decapod

Thanks Paul...I needed those.

DOM107,

I've responded to your "white lines" bug report. White Lines Post

Hi,

Just a note on how Canvas is fairing out with the new release... I've played around with it for awhile today and have come across something..

The thing is.. if you have 2 viewing panes open.. in my case the one on the left is in perspective view and the one on the right in front view.. but when you change to animation camera in the left "perspective view" and middle click on or off of an object to zoom or pan or rotate, the right "front view" pane is the one being changed.. i.e.. still in orthographic view.. wich can be a very handy option to have.. but I know this is not supose to happen as the left "perspective view" does not change, when it is that pane that I'm trying to change the view.. this seems only to happen in "Animation Camera mode".

Hope I made sence.. let me know if some one else is having the same problem..

Thanks

James

This message has been edited. Last edited by: polybuilder,

CanvasScreenGrab1.jpg (77 Kb, 25 downloads)

Thank for the report. I think I have this fixed for the final version.