trueSpace7, Introduction

trueSpace7.6,
A First Look

trueSpace7.6 is a fully-featured 3D authoring package that will let you model, texture, light, animate and render 3D content. As well as traditional images and movies, you can also make 3D content for online shared spaces, and for Virtual Earth.

Export to Virtual Earth and X format

Click to watch video of fly through in Virtual Earth

A house by Marcel Barthel in trueSpace (left) and in Virtual Earth (right). Click either image to view a fly-through in Virtual Earth, or click here to visit the house yourself.

An entirely re-written X format exporter lets you save your trueSpace creations to load into game engines such as XNA to develop games for Windows or the Xbox 360.

Also included is an export to Virtual Earth which will let you place your 3D creations straight into Virtual Earth from trueSpace. Now you can place whatever you make into real world locations in Virtual Earth and share them with others!

trueSpace also supports import from a wide variety of formats, letting you take existing objects and use them in Virtual Earth.

A tour bus from trueSpace in downtown Denver.

A ranch modeled in trueSpace, shown in Virtual Earth (by Heidi Simonsen)

New Modeling Tools

The already powerful range of modeling tools in trueSpace is expanded with this release, making it easy for you to create your 3D objects and scenes.

by Griff Wason.

The improvements include the ability to sweep edges as well as faces; the option to hide geometry while point editing to make it easier to work on areas of your model; a heal vertices tool to tidy up geometry after booleans or imports; tools to optimise triangulation or quadrifying polygons to ensure a workable mesh; new point edit selection tools to grow, shrink, invert, and convert a selection; and more.

This means it is quicker and easier to work with your model in any way you need, to get precisely the result you are after with the minimum of fuss.

You can model anything from the futuristic (by Marcel Delord) to the historical (by Monte Wolford)

Booleans

As can be seen in Emmanuel Asset's sample image above, trueSpace7.6 sets a new standard for Booleans, able to handle complex set-ups and still provide you with full control to adjust the boolean after it is applied to get exactly the result you are after.

trueSpace7.6 features interactive booleans. These work like a history stack, allowing you to move the objects around even after the boolean is performed, or even change the boolean from a subtraction to an intersection!

Edit a boolean in real-time to get the effect you want, or even keyframe it (click any image to view animation)

Work in real-time

by Marcel Barthel

A real-time scene with several lighting set-ups (by Marcel Barthel).

trueSpace7.6 re-writes the book on real-time rendering in a 3D authoring package. This gives you the best possible modeling environment, and the ability to render an image in seconds rather than hours, or an animation in minutes rather than days.

$Click to watch real-time refraction video$

Real-time animation of refraction and reflection. Click any image to view animation (by David Bokon)

A real-time image by David Bokon.

The same real-time engine drives our shared spaces, letting you create immersive online environments with a realism unrivalled in other solutions.

trueSpace7.6 adds more shaders for you to use, including real-time refraction, smoke, water and fire, plus a new light library to instantly change the lighting in your scene.

With this new content at your disposal, it makes it easier than ever to exploit what the real-time rendering has to offer!

Real-time trees by Marcel Barthel.

Improved UV Editor

When the time comes to add color and detail to your model, trueSpace gives you what you need through a re-written UV Editor.

This lets you lay out the different areas on your model that need different textures, and then export that map to a 2D editor so that you can draw and create the textures needed.

The scene on the right shows the rendered character (left), and the UV mapping for his head and face in the UV Editor (right).

by Heidi Simonsen.

Behavioral animations

Objects in trueSpace can be given behaviors and animations using the in-built scripting capabilities. The behaviors are encapsulated with the object itself rather than stored externally, making the objects self-contained - if you copy it, you copy the behaviors too.

These 'intelligent objects' have many uses, for example you can have a shark chase after the nearest avatar, or even set it to pursue someone with a specific name!

This shark can chase avatars, while the egg breaks procedurally if the impact is hard enough.

Characters

trueSpace7.6 features easy-to-use skeletons that will let you bring your characters to life. Apply pre-recorded BVH animations from motion capture for the ultimate in realism, use pre-made skeletons to animate your characters, or build your own skeletons thanks to tools that are easy for anyone to learn. With IK Handles, the ability to add or change limbs, and the ability to create and blend clips, trueSpace7.6 makes it possible for anyone from beginner to master to animate their characters.

$Click to watch real-time refraction video$

With clips for a shrug, a wave and a walk cycle, you can combine these to give a range of movements
(by 3D Frog). Click any image to watch the video.

Morphs

Morphs let you point edit your mesh and store the results as a named morph, then allow you to blend between all those stored morphs with an easy to use slider panel. This can be used to create facial expressions, for example, storing a smile, frown, laugh, eyebrow movements and more, which you can then mix and match to get the required expression for your character.

Not only are these ideal for static poses, but recording the changes in morph blends makes it easy to bring your characters (or other creations) to life in animations.

Click to watch video of expressions using morphs

Morphs bring this real-time character to life (by David Bokon; click any image to view animation)

Real-time cloth

For your real-time scenes, you can now add cloth, which will deform with the real-time physics. The cloth will react to user input via the Physics Move tool, or with other objects in the scene, both being pushed by them, and pushing them.

Click to watch screen captured video of real-time cloth

Throwing a ball at a net with real-time cloth & physics (by Augusto Michelis; any image to view animation)

Collaboration

trueSpace7.6 is the only 3D application that lets you meet other people in online shared spaces, whether you want to meet other 3D artists to work or learn together, or just to meet friends for fun.

The community already holds regular meetings of its own, but there is plenty of room for you to start meetings of your own, or use the 3D spaces for your own needs.

Meeting the Renderosity artist of the year to view their work and ask questions in a 3D gallery.