Visualization is an important medium to communicate the design intention to external stakeholders.
Visualization helps people to better understand the project by simplifying complexity. Furthermore, it helps you win more work, enables decision-making processes and raises the profile of your company.
MAGNET Explorer provides a variety of Visualization tools. Tools are located under the Analyze tab of the MAGNET Explorer ribbon.
You can specify:
- Sun and Sky
- Weather
Calculate Sun Position
Calculation of the sun's position can be activated from Analyze > Sun and Sky. This dialog changes the global rendering settings for Sun and Sky within the MAGNET Explorer Model screen.
The following dialog opens:
In this dialog the user can set the date, time and location. These values are used to calculate sunlight's direction accurately.
In the Date and Time section of the dialog, the user must also set the correct time zone for the model location and also activate Daylight Saving Time if used at that time.
In the Location section of the dialog the user can choose predefined locations from the drop-down list or enter the latitude and longitude values of the model location.
Enable shadows activates the real time shadow feature, which will automatically calculate shadows in the model resulting from sunlight.
The Update Shadows While Moving option activates an automatic update of shadows. If this is set the shadows are periodically updated during movement. This option also needs to be active if the user wants to change the time and see the shadow change instantly. With this option it is easy to make sunlight analysis at different times of day in real time by just changing the time in the dialog.
Simulate Sky activates the physically simulated sky. The new sky model includes the correct sky gradient colour, visible sun, moving clouds and, at night, even stars and the moon.
The Apply button will apply the settings to the model and updates shadows if shadows are active.
In the Date and Time section of the dialog, the user must also set the correct time zone for the model location and also activate Daylight Saving Time if used at that time.
In the Location section of the dialog the user can choose predefined locations from the drop-down list or enter the latitude and longitude values of the model location.
Enable shadows activates the real time shadow feature, which will automatically calculate shadows in the model resulting from sunlight.
The Update Shadows While Moving option activates an automatic update of shadows. If this is set the shadows are periodically updated during movement. This option also needs to be active if the user wants to change the time and see the shadow change instantly. With this option it is easy to make sunlight analysis at different times of day in real time by just changing the time in the dialog.
Simulate Sky activates the physically simulated sky. The new sky model includes the correct sky gradient colour, visible sun, moving clouds and, at night, even stars and the moon.
The Apply button will apply the settings to the model and updates shadows if shadows are active.
OK will close the dialog and keep the settings.
NOTE! Not all graphics cards support shadows and some graphics cards can produce higher quality (more accurate) shadows than others. If you do not get realistic looking shadows then your graphics card probably doesn’t support MAGNET Explorer shadows implementation or has a bug in the graphics driver.
NOTE! If the model is very big the shadow calculation may take some time. Generally shadows should activate/update in couple of seconds at most.
NOTE! Not all graphics cards support shadows and some graphics cards can produce higher quality (more accurate) shadows than others. If you do not get realistic looking shadows then your graphics card probably doesn’t support MAGNET Explorer shadows implementation or has a bug in the graphics driver.
NOTE! If the model is very big the shadow calculation may take some time. Generally shadows should activate/update in couple of seconds at most.
Weather
The Explorer has some basic weather effects: Rain, Snow and Fog. The effects can be activated and deactivated from Analyze > Weather.
Rain and Snow are standalone effects and both of them can be combined with Fog.