Adobe ATMOSPHERE User Manual

Adobe

Atmosphere

™

User Guide

Adobe

Atmosphere

™

User Guide

Adobe® Atmosphere™ User Guide for Windows®

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Part Number: 90047303 (11/03)

Contents

Chapter 1: The Atmosphere Platform

Platform Features. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

The Atmosphere Architecture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1

Why 3-D?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Chapter 2: Exploring Atmosphere Environments

Using the Atmosphere Player . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

Tutorial: Visiting Atmosphere Environments at Adobe.com . . . . . . . . . . . . . .8

Tutorial: Viewing Atmosphere Environments in Photoshop Album. . . . . . .9

Tutorial: Viewing Atmosphere Environments in PDF Documents. . . . . . . 10

Navigating Atmosphere Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Tutorial: Practicing Navigation. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Using the Toolbar. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Tutorial: Moving to an Overhead View of the Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Working with Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Tutorial: Bookmarking New Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Understanding and Using Avatars. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Tutorial: Swapping Your Avatar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Setting Player Preferences . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE i

User Guide

Chapter 3: Interacting with Atmosphere Environments

Moving Through Portals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Tutorial: Jumping Between Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Understanding Entry Points . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Communicating and Collaborating with Other Visitors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Tutorial: Communicating with Other Users. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Interacting with the Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Using Custom Controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Chapter 4: Atmosphere Overview

Scene Object Types. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Chapter 5: Exploring the Interface

Using the Menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

ii CONTENTS

Learning the Toolbars. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Working with Palettes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Tutorial: Maximizing Screen Space by Docking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Tutorial: Positioning and Combining Palettes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Using context menus . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

Using Undo and Redo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Customizing Atmosphere. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Chapter 6: Working with Files

Understanding the Atmosphere Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Opening Environment Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Tutorial: Viewing Sample Environments. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Saving Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Closing Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Importing Files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Tutorial: Importing a Viewpoint Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Importing to Preset Palettes. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Tutorial: Importing Wood Textures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Managing Object Sets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Exporting Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

Saving World Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Publishing. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Chapter 7: Views

Introduction to Views. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Working with the View Windows . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Working with the Actor Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Using the Reference Point Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

Working with Views. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

Controlling the View. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Zooming to ﬁ t Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Tutorial: Viewing a Character’s Good Side. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

Chapter 8: Using Scene Objects

Positioning Models as Scene Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Positioning Solid Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Adding Scripts to the Scene. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Using Viewpoint Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Tutorial: Adding a Viewpoint Object to a Scene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Tutorial: Adding a Viewpoint Object from the Object Presets palette. . . 88

Tutorial: Scaling a Viewpoint Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Converting 3-D Files for Import into Atmosphere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Converting Viewpoint Objects to Surface Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91

Creating Avatars. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Creating a Portal. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

Positioning an Entry Point. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

Using Anchors. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Naming Scene Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Locking Scene Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Setting Visibility . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Chapter 9: Assembling Solid Objects

Understanding Solid Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Understanding Boolean Operations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Connectors, Welding, Constraints and Layouts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Naming Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

Tutorial: Creating a Table . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

Learning the Primitive Types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Triangular Slab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Deleting Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Duplicating Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Grouping Objects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Ungrouping Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Locking Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Hiding Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

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Chapter 10: Selecting and Editing Objects

Selecting Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

Moving Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 124

Editing using Connectors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126

Snapping to a Grid. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

Tutorial: Building a Chess Board . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 132

Rotating Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133

Tutorial: Tilting a Top. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134

Clearing Transformations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

Subtracting Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135

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Tutorial: Making Alphabet Letters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Chapter 11: Applying Colors and Textures

The Appearance Editor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Adding Color . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139

Tutorial: Coloring Chess Pieces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142

Adding Preset Colors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143

Texture Formats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Applying Textures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145

Tutorial: Adding Textures to an Object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 146

Working with Movies and Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147

Tutorial: Making a Television Come Alive. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148

Removing Textures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Sampling and Editing Colors and Textures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Chapter 12: Manipulating Textures

Editing Textures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 151

Tutorial: Applying a texture to a single face . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Tutorial: Scaling a Texture to Fit. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 156

Tutorial: Creating Seamless Textures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Positioning Projective Textures. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160

Creating Billboards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Tutorial: Making a Billboard object . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 161

Chapter 13: Lighting a Scene

Understanding Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 166

Working with Emissive Surfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

Pre-Computed Lighting. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 168

Tutorial: Making a Light Bulb . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169

Setting Light Parameters. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

Tutorial: Changing Scene Brightness. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 173

Using Sunlight. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 174

Tutorial: Coloring the Sun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

Using the Background as a Light Source . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 176

Tutorial: Creating a Sky Cone . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177

Using Object Light Maps . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178

Using Dynamic Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 178

Effective Lighting Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179

Tutorial: Preparing Textures for Lighting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 180

Chapter 14: Adding Interactivity

Drag and Drop Scripting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 181

Tutorial: Adding Fog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183

Deﬁ ning Properties and Setting Values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 185

Tutorial: Adding Background Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 186

Adding New Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 187

Associating a Script with an Object. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 188

Tutorial: Making a Showroom Car Rotate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 190

Tutorial: Creating a Free Moving Soccer Ball. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191

Linking a Script to a Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Tutorial: Starting Rotation with the onClick Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

Chapter 15: Publishing

Testing and Debugging Environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Testing the Final Environment. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

Using World Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196

Publishing an Atmosphere Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197

Publishing a Single Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Publishing Preferences. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198

Embedding within a Web Page . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 199

Tutorial: Adding an Atmosphere Scene to an Existing Web Page . . . . . . 199

Publishing in a PDF Document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200

Tutorial: Adding an Atmosphere environment to a PDF Document . . . 200

Optimization Techniques . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 201

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE v

User Guide

Appendix A: Installing and Conﬁ guring

Installing the Atmosphere Player . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

Installing Atmosphere . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

Using Hardware Acceleration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 203

Tutorial: Helping Atmosphere Recognize Your Card . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 206

Supported Video Cards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

Appendix B: Keyboard Shortcuts

Appendix C: Resource Libraries

Textures – Set 1. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 214

vi CONTENTS

Textures – Set 2. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

Objects – Set 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 227

Objects – Set 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

Objects – Set 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231

Scripts - Set 1 - Basic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232

Scripts - Set 2 - Intermediate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 233

Scripts - Set 3 - Advanced . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 234

Appendix D: JavaScript API Overview

Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235

SceneGraph Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 235

Physical Simulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 238

JavaScript Interpreter Information. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240

Script Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241

Appendix E: JavaScript API

JavaScript API Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243

Utility Functions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 243

Application. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248

Application . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 248

View . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 250

Button . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 251

Slider . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 253

PrintDevice & Object Synchronization. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 254

Math . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257

Rotation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 257

Transform. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259

Vector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261

Effects. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263

Fog . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 263

Glare. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 264

Sound . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 265

Event Handlers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

CollisionEventHandler. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

KeyEventHandler. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 268

KeyEvent. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 270

MouseEventHandler. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 272

MouseEvent. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 274

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE vii

User Guide

OverlapEventHandler . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 275

Scene Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

Actor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 277

Anchor. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

Camera . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 286

EntryPoint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 290

PhysicalModel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 291

ReferencePoint. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302

SceneGroup. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 303

Script . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 312

SolidObject . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 315

SurfaceObject. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321

ViewpointObject . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 325

Solid Object Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330

Face . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 330

Primitive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 332

Materials . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336

SurfaceTexture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 336

Texture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

Viewpoint Object Structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339

MTSBaseObject . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 339

MTSImageStream . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 340

MTSScene. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341

MTSGeometry. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343

MTSInstance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 343

MTSTexture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 346

MTSInstance2d. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 347

MTSMaterial . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 350

MTSTimeElem. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 351

MTSTimeElemSWFView . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 353

Physics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355

FastConstraintSolver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355

AngularDashpot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 359

Actions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360

DragAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360

FluidAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 361

MagneticAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 362

MotorAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 364

viii CONTENTS

SingleDragAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 365

SimpleRigidWindAction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 366

Constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367

BreakableConstraint. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 367

HingeConstraint. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 368

PointToPointConstraint. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 369

PrismaticConstraint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 370

StiffSpringConstraint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 371

WheelConstraint . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 373

Colophon

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 1

User Guide

Chapter 1: The Atmosphere Platform

Welcome to the Adobe® Atmosphere™ platform – revolutionary software for creating immersive 3-D multimedia rich stage sets for delivery on the web and within PDF documents.

What is Atmosphere?

The Adobe® Atmosphere™ platform is a completely integrated end-to-end solution for creating 3-D interactive environments, delivering them over the web or within PDF documents, and allowing users to collaborate within them. The Atmosphere embedded multimedia type gives the web or document designer the ability to present a rich variety of interactive content, including three-dimensional objects, directional sound, streaming audio and video, SWF animations, and physical behaviors, all within the context of a live theater performance. Viewers of Atmosphere environments can move and interact freely within these spaces, and collaborate with each other.

Atmosphere is different from other multimedia authoring tools in that it provides all of the tools and capabilities needed to author and play back realistic, immersive experiences within a 3-D stage set.

Platform Features

The Atmosphere platform integrates many features into a single application:

Immersion Create environments with dramatic lighting, animated 3-D objects, real-time behavior, video and audio in

small ﬁ les embedded in a PDF or HTML doucment.

Interactivity Atmosphere users can easily create realisitc enivronments and behavior thanks to the built-in JavaScript

API and integrated physics engine. Users can interact realistically with environments, objects and avatars that can behave independently or under user control.

Multimedia Atmosphere supports directional sounds, streaming video and audio, SWF animations and high

deﬁ nition 3-D objects including animations.

Collaboration Add multi-user interaction with text chat, avatar motion and gestures, shared object synchronization

and message passing, without additional server software or hardware. An HTTP server is all that’s required.

The Atmosphere Architecture

The Atmosphere platform consists of 3 parts:

Atmosphere An easy to use, powerful authoring application that can be used to create, import and manipulate

3-D objects, light, sound, images, textures, video and other multimedia; attach scripted behaviors to objects and environments; and securely publish these environments to the Web or PDF.

2 CHAPTER 1

Atmosphere Player A web browser plug-in that allows users to interactively view and navigate Atmosphere

environments embedded in web pages. Atmosphere Player for Adobe Reader™ enables users to access Atmosphere environments embedded in PDF documents.

Atmosphere Collaboration Server A publicly available server, which allows messaging, object synchronization and

interactivity between users of Atmosphere environments.

Atmosphere Player

The Adobe® Atmosphere™ Player® is a free application that allows users to view, interact, and collaborate with others in environments created with Atmosphere and published online or within PDF documents.

Atmosphere environments can be viewed within a web page using the Player plug-in.

Web Page Integration Atmosphere Player supports communication between web page HTML, Java and JavaScript

allowing web designers full control of user experience using the Player’s JavaScript API.

A Multimedia Experience The Atmosphere Player offers the user a rich and interactive multimedia experience without

requiring a high-bandwidth connection (56K normally sufﬁ ces). Atmosphere environments can also be viewed in PDF documents using Atmosphere Player for Adobe Reader™.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 3

User Guide

Atmosphere Player System Requirements:

• Intel Pentium II or faster processor

• Microsoft® Windows® 98SE, Windows ME, Windows 2000, Windows XP Home or Pro

• 64 MB of available RAM (128 MB recommended)

• 14 MB of available hard-disk space

• 16-bit color (32-Bit Color recommended)

• 56K modem or faster Internet connection

• Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.00.2614.3500 and above.

• Graphic Card Support: Radeon 7500 or higher, GeForce 2 or higher

Atmosphere

Adobe® Atmosphere™ is a professional authoring tool for assembling and creating 3-D interactive environments. This new embedded multimedia type offers a unique way to present a rich variety of interactive content, including three-dimensional objects, sound, streaming audio and video, SWF animations, and physical behaviors. Atmosphere enables the designer to easily and quickly create content using intuitive tools. Users can import objects created with other 3-D authoring applications, add texture, media, interactivity and lighting and then publish the environment for use on the web or in PDF documents.

4 CHAPTER 1

Atmosphere offers powerful, intuitive creation tools.

Import Standard Formats Atmosphere supports importing 3-D assets from applications, libraries and other sources

via the Viewpoint media format (MTX, MTZ). Atmosphere also supports wide range of standard graphics and multimedia formats.

Scene Modeling Create objects and combine them with imported assets to build a seamless environment. Apply

global appearance properties such as lighting. Texture and fog using intuitive tools.

Interactivity Add interactive elements to the environment using JavaScript and a real-world physics simulation

engine.

Publishing Output the resulting environment in a form that can be embedded in either a web page or a PDF

document. Published worlds cannot be re-opened in Atmosphere, thus securing the author’s intellectual property.

Atmosphere System Requirements Atmosphere, like the Atmosphere Player, can run well on a minimal system

conﬁ guration, but more powerful systems will improve the authoring experience. System requirements for Atmosphere are:

• Intel® Pentium® III or faster processor

• Microsoft® Windows XP Home or Pro

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 5

User Guide

• 128 MB of available RAM (256 MB recommended)

• 50 MB of available hard-disk space

• 1,024x768 screen resolution

• 16-bit color (32-Bit Color recommended)

• Graphic Card Support: Radeon 7500 or higher, GeForce 2 or higher

Atmosphere is only available for the Windows XP platform.

Atmosphere Collaboration Server

The Atmosphere Collaboration Server is a publicly available server that offers messaging and collaboration within any Atmosphere environment. The source code for the Atmosphere Collaboration Server is available at no cost under a simple license from Adobe System.

Why 3-D?

The Atmosphere platform is designed to make the power of immersive media rich environments available to a much wider audience than has been previously possible. The web is a very popular way for individuals and organizations to present information, but until now, it has largely been limited to the same kinds of 2-D information that can be presented on a printed page.

People are accustomed to a world that has height, width and depth. Technologies like the telephone, television and the web offer only a limited lower number of dimensions. Consider the difference in trying to learn to navigate an unfamiliar place like an airport: directions given over a telephone (1-D), via a map (2-D) or by means of a video ﬂ ythrough (3-D) represent successively easier ways to learn an unfamiliar space.

By making it possible to easily create 3-D environments that can be navigated online, Atmosphere extends a powerful medium to a much wider audience and range of applications.

6 CHAPTER 1

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 7

User Guide

Chapter 2: Exploring Atmosphere Environments

Before we turn our attention to learning how to create interactive environments in Atmosphere, let’s learn how to use the Atmosphere Player. The Player is a free plug-in that allows people to view and interact with Atmosphere environments embedded in web pages and PDF documents.

Using the Atmosphere Player

When you installed Atmosphere, the Player was installed automatically. If you need help with Atmosphere installation, please see Appendix A, “Installing and Conﬁ guring Atmosphere.” Once installed, Atmosphere environments will be loaded in the Player automatically when you navigate to a web page or open a PDF document that contains an Atmosphere .aer ﬁ le. If the Player isn’t installed, a dialog box will appear asking if you wish to install it.

The Atmosphere Player features support for hardware acceleration. If the Player detects a supported video card, it will

enable hardware acceleration automatically.

This animated spinning globe icon and a progress bar will appear as the Atmosphere environment is loading.

When the spinning globe icon disappears, the geometry for the environment has completed loading and will be

displayed. Textures and multimedia ﬁ les will continue to download.

Opening Local Atmosphere Files

In addition to Atmosphere environments that are posted online, you can also open environments that are saved locally. To open a local environment, right-click in the Player window and select File > Open from the pop-up menu. This will open a ﬁ le dialog box where you can select an Atmosphere environment to open.

The Player can only open and view AER ﬁ les, not ATMO ﬁ les.

8 CHAPTER 2

Tutorial: Visiting Atmosphere Environments at Adobe.com

You can begin to explore Atmosphere environments on the Atmosphere product pages at Adobe.com. You can ﬁ nd these pages at www.adobe.com/products/atmosphere.

To browse the Atmosphere environments at Adobe.com, follow these steps:

1 Open a web browser and enter the URL http://www.adobe.com/products/atmosphere/.

2 The Adobe Atmosphere web pages will open. Click on one of the links under the Atmosphere Showcase heading

3 The Atmosphere environment will load within the web page if the Player is installed. If not, you will be asked if

in the left column.

you wish install the Player. Click Yes to install the Player if necessary. Once downloaded and installed, you will be able to view the Atmosphere environment.

Atmosphere environments can be viewed from within a web page. Above is an environment built using Atmosphere and showcased on the Adobe site.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 9

User Guide

Tutorial: Viewing Atmosphere Environments in Photoshop Album

Even if you’ve never surfed the web, you may have seen Atmosphere if you use Adobe Photoshop Album. All the 3-D galleries in Photoshop Album are Atmosphere environments. Photoshop Album is available from the Adobe Store online as well as from authorized Adobe resellers.

To explore the Atmosphere environments in Photoshop Album, follow these steps:

1 Open Photoshop Album and select several images you would like to place in a 3D gallery.

2 Select “Adobe Atmosphere 3D Gallery...” under the Creations menu.

3 Select the gallery you want from the Gallery Style list.

4 Click OK and the 3D Gallery will load within a web browser.

10 CHAPTER 2

An Atmosphere environment created using Photoshop Album’s 3D gallery plug-in.

Tutorial: Viewing Atmosphere Environments in PDF Documents

Atmosphere environments can be embedded in PDF documents, providing readers a much richer experience than static images.

To explore the Atmosphere environments in a PDF document, follow these steps:

1 Open a PDF document that includes an Atmosphere environment.

The Atmosphere web pages at http://www.adobe.com/products/atmosphere/ include an example PDF of Lewis

Carroll’s classic Alice in Wonderland that includes Atmosphere environments.

2 Scroll the document until you locate a Atmosphere environment and click on it

3 The Atmosphere environment will load within the document.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 11

User Guide

The Mad Hater’s Tea Party Atmosphere environments within a PDF document.

Navigating Atmosphere Environments

There are several ways to navigate in Atmosphere Player, using the mouse or keyboard.

Before you can navigate an Atmosphere environment, the environment must be the focus of the web page. You can

give the environment focus by clicking on it.

Using the Mouse

Moving about an Atmosphere environment is straightforward. Dragging (moving the mouse with the left button held down) the mouse forward will move you forward in the environment and dragging backwards will move in reverse. Dragging the mouse to either side will rotate the view to that side. Holding down the Shift key while dragging forward will move you upward in the environment. If gravity is enabled, you’ll descend back to the ground when you release the mouse button. Otherwise, you can move back down by holding down the Shift key and dragging the mouse backwards.

12 CHAPTER 2

Holding down the Ctrl key while dragging the mouse forward will tilt the view perspective up towards the ceiling or sky, while dragging backwards will tilt down.

There is one other movement associated with the Shift key. Holding down the Shift key and moving the mouse to the side will shufﬂ e your view horizontally. This movement is called a strafe and it allows you to move linearly to either side.

These are all the movements possible within the Player. With a little practice, you will ﬁ nd that you can combine movements to navigate wherever you wish to go within an environment.

Using the Keyboard

If you prefer, you can use the keyboard to navigate instead of the mouse, the arrow keys work just like mouse dragging. The up arrow will move you forward in the environment and the back arrow will move you backwards. The side arrows will rotate the view to the side and the Shift and Ctrl keys along with the arrows allow you to move upwards, strafe to the side and tilt your view.

Using the Ctrl key to tilt the view will not change your horizontal or vertical movements. For example, if you ﬁ rst

hold down Ctrl and drag the mouse backwards so that you are looking at the ground and then, releasing the Ctrl key, drag the mouse forward, you will still move in a forward direction even though you’re looking at the ground. You will not move closer to the ground.

The strafe movements is very useful if you want to look at pictures, like those in a gallery, that are lined up on a wall

side by side.

Atmosphere Player Navigation

Movement Mouse motion Keyboard

Move forward Drag mouse forward Up arrow

Move backwards Drag mouse backwards Down arrow

Turn to left Drag mouse to left Left arrow

Turn to right Drag mouse to right Right arrow

Ascend upward Shift+drag mouse upward Shift+up arrow

Descend downward Shift+drag mouse downward Shift+down arrow

Tilt view up Ctrl+drag mouse upward Ctrl+up arrow

Tilt view down Ctrl+drag mouse downward Ctrl+down arrow

Strafe left Shift+Drag mouse to left Shift+Left arrow

Strafe right Shift+Drag mouse to right Shift+Right arrow

Tutorial: Practicing Navigation

The best way to learn how to navigate Atmosphere environments is to practice.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 13

User Guide

To practice navigating within Atmosphere Player, follow these steps.

1 Load an Atmosphere environment, one can be found in the Help\Tutorials\Gallery folder under the directory

where Atmosphere was installed. It should be a path similar to c:\Program Files\Adobe\Atmosphere\Help\Tutorials\ Gallery. After navigating to your folder in the open dialog, select the ﬁ le Gallery.html and press Open.

2 Click on the Atmosphere environment to active it, then hold down the up arrow to move forward into the

environment.

A simple environment in a web browser as it appears when ﬁ rst loaded.

The scene changes after moving forward into the environment.

3 Return to your starting point by holding down the down arrow to move backwards through the environment.

4 Next hold down the left arrow key and you’ll spin around in the environment to the left. The right arrow key will

do the opposite.

5 If you’d like some elevation, hold down the Shift key while pressing the up arrow and you’ll ascend in the

environment. When you release the up arrow, you’ll descend again if gravity is enabled.

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6 Holding down the Ctrl key while pressing the up arrow will tip your view up towards the ceiling. Holding the Ctrl

7 The last move to practice is a strafe. Hold down the Shift key and press the left arrow key. This will move you

The view after moving further into the scene.

key while pressing the down arrow will tip your view down towards the ground.

sideways to the left. Try it with the right arrow key to return to the original location.

Using the Toolbar

If you look in the lower left corner of an Atmosphere environment, you may see a toolbar of icons. The Atmosphere Player toolbar includes several icon buttons that toggle properties and open palettes. You can control several settings using these icon buttons. If you forget which button does what, hold the mouse cursor over the top of the button and a tooltip will appear with the button name.

You can turn this toolbar on and off using the Contextual menu – right-click to bring up the pop-up menu and choose Toolbar to make the icons appear or disappear You can also access all the toolbar commands from the Contextual menu, which is convenient if the toolbar is hidden.

The Player toolbar.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 15

User Guide

Atmosphere Player Toolbar Buttons

Icon Name Description

Collide toggle Enables collision detection in the environment

Gravity toggle Enables gravity in the world

Show My Avatar toggle Shows your avatar in the environment

Chat Enables chat mode and opens the Chat palette

Controls Opens the Controls palette which may include custom controls

Preferences Opens the Preferences palette for setting Player preferences

Users Opens the Users palette which lists the other users in the current environment

Avatars Opens the Avatar palette where you can change the current avatar

Bookmarks Opens the Bookmarks palette which stores bookmarks of favorite sites

Toggle buttons are enabled when they are indented–highlighted in white.

Detecting Collisions

You may notice as you move through Atmosphere environments, that you cannot move through solid objects such as walls and pillars. This is because the Collide option is enabled. The Collide button allows you to toggle this feature, enabling movement through solid objects when turned off.

If you have trouble navigating a particular environment, you can disable the Collide button to m ake it easier to move

around.

Setting Gravity

Another physical constraint in Atmosphere environments is gravity. If the Gravity toggle button is enabled while you are higher than the ﬂ oor of the environment, then you, and avatar - if turned on, will descend until you come to rest on a solid object.

You won’t descend unless both the Gravity and Collide button are enabled.

If there is no solid object underneath you, then you will continue to descend until the entire environment is out of site. If the Gravity toggle button is disabled, then you will hang in the air after releasing the mouse.

If you ever ﬁ nd yourself falling off the edge of environment, you can right click on the environment and select

Navigation > Reenter World from the pop-up menu to restore yourself to the Entry Point location.

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Tutorial: Moving to an Overhead View of the Environment

Using the Shift and Ctrl keys, you can quickly get a bird’s-eye view of the environment. This overhead view will give you a good perspective of the entire environment.

To move to an overhead view of an environment, follow these steps.

1 In the Player toolbar, click on the Gravity and Collision buttons to disable them.

2 From a point near the center of the environment, hold down the Shift key and press the Up arrow (or drag the

3 When you ascend sufﬁ ciently, hold down the Ctrl key and press the Down arrow (or drag the mouse backward)

mouse forward) to ascend upwards.

until the environment tilts into view.

Disabling Gravity and Collisions lets you easily ascend high above an environment.

ADOBE ATMOSPHERE 17

User Guide

Working with Bookmarks

You can bookmark scenes that you would like to revisit. Bookmarks aren’t enabled by default. To enable bookmarks, open the Preferences panel, click the Chat tab and check the Enable Bookmarks box. Once enabled, a Bookmarks icon button appears in the Player toolbar. Clicking this button will open the Bookmarks palette.

The Bookmarks palette holds snapshots of your favorite Atmosphere environments.

The Bookmarks palette

The Bookmarks palette shows a snapshot of the current environment in the box labeled Current World. If you drag the environment displayed in the Current World box to the My Bookmarks section, a bookmark to the scene will be created. You can revisit the bookmarked environment by dragging it from the My Bookmarks section to the Current World box at the top of the palette.

If you move the mouse over the top of a bookmarked environment, a tooltip will appear that lists the URL to the bookmarked ﬁ le. You can delete bookmarks by selecting them in the My Bookmarks section and pressing the Delete key. If you right click in the My Bookmarks section, a pop-up menu will let you change the thumbnail size to Small, Medium or Large.

You can also share Bookmarked environments with others during a Chat session. Sharing bookmarks is covered in

Chapter 3, “Interacting with an Atmosphere Environment.”

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Tutorial: Bookmarking New Environments

If you ﬁ nd an environment that you would like to return to, you can bookmark it. Bookmarks appear in the Bookmarks palette.

To bookmark an environment, follow these steps.

1 Visit an Atmosphere scene that you wish to bookmark. Right-click in the environment and select Window >

2 Drag the thumbnail of the current environment and drop it in the My Bookmarks section of the palette. This will

3 You can revisit the bookmarked environment at any time by double clicking on it in the Bookmarks palette.

Understanding and Using Avatars

As you move around in public Atmosphere environments on web sites, you may see other characters moving about. These characters are called avatars and they provide a visual representation of visitors to the environment. Each visitor has her own avatar. To see your avatar, click on the Show My Avatar button in the Player toolbar.

Bookmarks from the pop-up menu to open the Bookmarks palette. The current environment will be displayed in the Current World box of the Bookmarks palette.

add the environment to your list of bookmarks.

An environment with the default avatar visible. Click the Show My Avatar button on the toolbar to see the avatar.

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