1. The Cage Efficient Construction in 3D using a Cubic Adaptive Grid
Patrick Baudisch
GMD-IPSI

2. Contents Motivation Existing alignment tools The Cage
Appearance
Functionality
Aligning Objects using The Cage
Video: 5 min
Conclusions

3. Motivation Context: Direct manipulative 3D modelers
Problem: How to get precise results?
Tasks to solve
Align many objects to a reference object
Keep an object aligned while manipulating it

4. Existing alignment tools
1. Traditional grids are fast but not flexible
2. Explicit alignment is flexible but slow
Solution: A grid with the same flexibility as explicit alignment

5. Appearance/Enclosing planes
Turn planes on/off

6. Appearance/Components
line grid
translucent planes
axes
labels

7. User interface
Surround
SetSystem
Appearance
Fine positions functions

8. Surround Position the Cage 1. Surround selected objects
2. Selection empty -> Surround whole scene
3. Empty Scene -> Default size

9. Manual positioning
Thumbwheels adjust Cage size

10. SetSystem
Adapt the Cage to the local coordinate system of a selected object

11. Aligning Objects
Align blue cubes to red reference cube

12. An example snapping method
Restrict snapping

13. Restricted alignment
Place teapot on the table
Move teapot around

14. (Show Video here)

15. Conclusions Extends the applicability of snap-to-grid
Align many objects to a reference object
> The Cage is faster than explicit alignment
More flexible than normal grids
Does not clutter the screen
Additional functions
help the user to orient himself
reference for any alignment