Thierry’s Technical Tutorials

I have now moved the blog from the old free blogger host, to a new self hosted wordpress account.

Address has therfore now changed:

www.thierryzoghbi.co.uk/blog 

spread the word!!!

This tutorial will show you a quick and easy way of allowing your objects to spin/rotate automaticaly.

Firstly you need to either import or create your shape.

creating a plane:

private var object:Plane;...object = new Plane(...)

If you need a more detailed explanation of creating standard shapes, please visit this tutorial for more information.

Importing a .DAE:

public class Example extends BasicView
{
var dae:DAE;
var daeFile:String;
var daeMaterialName:String;

public function Mainscale()
{
daeFile = "yourDAEfile.dae";
daeMaterialName = "YourTextureName";
dae = new DAE();
dae.load(daeFile);
dae.scale = 120;
scene.addChild(dae);
}
}

after you have imported and added your Object to the scene, you need to add a loop in the code (i.e an event listener) then call the function.
so stragiht after we have added the object to the scene i.e using scene.addChild(yourobjectName);

add an event listener:

addEventListener(Event.ENTER_FRAME, loop3D);

Then create a new function, that listens for the event:

private function loop3D(e:Event):void{
//either use
yourobjectName.yaw(2); //changing the number will increase or decrease the speed
//OR use
yourobjectName.rotationY++}

And that should do it!
need any extra help? leave a comment, and i will get back to you!

Here is an example code, of how to enable mouse and keyboard interaction within your papervision actionscript file.

May promise a better full tutorial later on….


package
{
import flash.events.Event;
import flash.display.Sprite;
import flash.geom.Point;
//Import Camera, Scene, etc..
import org.papervision3d.view.BasicView;
//Mouse Movements
import flash.events.MouseEvent;
import flash.events.KeyboardEvent;
//rotation calculations
import org.papervision3d.core.math.Matrix3D;
import org.papervision3d.core.math.Number3D;

/*
*@Author: Thierry Zoghbi
*@Date: 2009.
*/

[SWF(width="800", height="600", backgroundColor="#0066F", frameRate="25")]

public class Mainsack extends BasicView
{

private var container : DisplayObject3D;
private var previousMousePoint : Point = new Point();
private var targetScale : Number = 1;
private static const FORWARD:Number3D = new Number3D(0, 0, 1);

public function Mainsack()
{
var yourobject = new Collada("yourDAEfile.dae");

this.stage.doubleClickEnabled = true;
this.stage.addEventListener( MouseEvent.DOUBLE_CLICK, onDoubleClick );
this.stage.addEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_DOWN, whenMouseDown );
this.stage.addEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_WHEEL, whenMouseWheel );
this.stage.addEventListener( KeyboardEvent.KEY_DOWN, whenKeyDown );

addChild(yourobject);
resetView();
}

private function whenKeyDown( event : KeyboardEvent ) : void
{
trace( event.keyCode );
switch ( event.keyCode )
{
case 187: //
case 107: //
zoom( 3 );
break;
case 189: // –
case 109: // –
zoom( -3 );
break;
case 82: // r (reset)
resetView();
break;
}
}

private function whenMouseWheel( event : MouseEvent ) : void
{
zoom( event.delta );
}

private function onDoubleClick( event : MouseEvent ) : void
{
zoom( 10 );
}

private function whenMouseDown( event : Event ) : void
{
this.startRendering();
previousMousePoint = new Point(viewport.containerSprite.mouseX, viewport.containerSprite.mouseY);
this.stage.addEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_MOVE, whenMouseMove );
this.stage.addEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, whenMouseUp );
}

private function whenMouseUp( event : Event ) : void
{
this.stopRendering();
this.stage.removeEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_MOVE, whenMouseMove );
this.stage.removeEventListener( MouseEvent.MOUSE_UP, whenMouseUp );
}

private function whenMouseMove( event : Event ) : void
{
var currentMousePoint:Point = new Point(viewport.containerSprite.mouseX, viewport.containerSprite.mouseY);

var difference:Point = currentMousePoint.subtract(previousMousePoint);
var vector:Number3D = new Number3D(difference.x, difference.y, 0);

var rotationAxis:Number3D = Number3D.cross(vector, FORWARD);
rotationAxis.normalize();

var distance:Number = Point.distance(currentMousePoint, previousMousePoint);
var rotationMatrix:Matrix3D = Matrix3D.rotationMatrix(rotationAxis.x, -rotationAxis.y, rotationAxis.z, distance/(600*Math.pow(container.scale, 5)));
container.transform.calculateMultiply3x3(rotationMatrix, container.transform);

//this line used to apply transform to actual rotation values, so that if you change scale, the changes are persisted
container.copyTransform(container);

previousMousePoint = currentMousePoint

trace( container.rotationX, container.rotationY, container.rotationZ, container.scale );
}

private function zoom( delta : Number ) : void
{
targetScale = targetScale (delta * .01);
targetScale = Math.max( targetScale, .5 );
targetScale = Math.min( targetScale, 1.6 );
Tweener.addTween( this, {sceneScale:targetScale, time:1, transition:"easeOutQuart"} )
}

public function resetView() : void
{
Tweener.addTween( container, {time:3, rotationX:0, rotationY:0, rotationZ:0, transition:"easeOutQuart"} )
//Tweener.addTween( container, {time:3, rotationX:-45, rotationY:0, rotationZ:0, transition:"easeOutQuart"} )
Tweener.addTween( this, {sceneScale:1, time:3, transition:"easeOutQuart"} )
}

public function set sceneScale( value : Number ) : void
{
container.scale = value;
singleRender();
}

public function get sceneScale() : Number
{
return container.scale;
}

}
}

This tutorial will explain how to enable keyboard commands in Flash Actionscript 3 CS3.

Firstly we need to import the Keyboard class in flash this can be done by:

import flash.events.KeyboardEvent;

After we have imported the keyboardEvent package, it is necessary to add an event listener to the stage, otherwise Flash will not know that we are pressing a key, and will not know what to do with it.

stage.addEventListener(KeyboardEvent.KEY_DOWN, KeyPressed);

We need to create a function for our KeyPressed event listener but inside our function we create a switch statement to determine what the function should do when a certain key is pressed. Inside our parameters we have the argument evt.KeyCode this gets the key code for the key that was pressed to trigger the event.

function KeyPressed(evt:KeyboardEvent):void {switch (evt.keyCode){
case Keyboard.UP :break;case Keyboard.DOWN :break;case 
Keyboard.LEFT :break;case Keyboard.RIGHT :break;
}
}

After you have specified what keys you would like to use, you can link them for example to move something. For example, if you want a square to move in the x direction when the “up” arrow is pressed on the keyboard you would add square.y += 5;

so the code above would be modified to look like this:

case Keyboard.UP :square.y += 5;break;

Just a small message to all subscribers/readers..

I have upgraded & moved server, and now have the ability for automatic redirects within subdomains.

so, new blog address:

thierryzoghbi.co.uk/blog

Thanks!