These tools create a displayable image from a renderable object or modify the visual characteristics of the object(s) being displayed. For example, Normals and FaceNormals could be used to add shading to a geometrical structure created with RubberSheet (Realization category), while Light and AmbientLight could be used to change its default lighting.

AmbientLight	Produces an ambient light. You can specify the color of the light. Ambient lights illuminate a surface equally, regardless of direction, so an object illuminated only with ambient light is not shaded. Note that it is not necessary to specify an ambient light, because a small amount of ambient light is built into the object model. However, explicitly specified lighting overrides the default lighting.
Arrange	Creates a single image from a collection of images. You can specify how many images to put in a row.
AutoCamera	This module produces an appropriate camera as input to the Render or Display module. Specifying a "look-from" direction changes this default camera. The width of the image in model units (orthographic projection) or the field of view (perspective projection), or the image size and aspect ratio can also be changed.
Camera	Produces a camera for input to the Render or Display module. You can specify the "look-to" point, the "look-from" point, the width of the image in units corresponding to those in the data, the image size, and the aspect ratio. Camera differs from AutoCamera in that it specifies a "look from" a point instead of a direction.
ClipBox	Clips an object using a box. You can specify the box explicitly, as the two corners defining a box, or it can be the bounding box of an object. The module renders only that part of the object inside the box. The Render, Display, or Image tool actually performs the clipping.
ClipPlane	Clips an object by a plane. The user specifies the plane with a point and a normal. The side of the plane the normal projects into is the side that will be clipped (i.e., not displayed). The Render, Display, or Image tool performs the clipping.
Display	Renders and/or displays an image to the screen. If a camera is not provided, the Display module expects the first input to be an image (e.g., the output of Render or Arrange).
FaceNormals	Computes normals on a surface. When you use the FaceNormals module, each face of the surface is flat-shaded.
Image	This tool renders and displays an image to the screen. It performs like the AutoCamera and Display modules combined. Using the Image tool to render an image enables many direct interactors that are not available when using AutoCamera and Display. These options are available in the View Control option of the Options pull-down menu in the Image window. For example, see "Controlling the Image: View Control..." in IBM Visualization Data Explorer User's Guide. The Image tool is available only in the graphical user interface.
Light	Produces a distant point light. You can specify the direction and color of the light. Note that it is not necessary to specify a light, because there is a default light built into the object model; however, explicitly specified lighting overrides the default lighting.
Normals	Computes point or face normals for shading a surface. For example, you can use this module to produce shading on rubbersheets and boundaries. However, shading on an isosurface is smoother if you use the gradient shading options built into the Isosurface module.
Overlay	Overlays two images. The result is a new image that can be displayed using the Display module. The new image is a pixel-by-pixel sum of the two images, where 1 - blend attenuates the base-image pixels, and blend attenuates the overlay-image pixels, (blend is a value between 0 and 1). You can also perform chromakeying by specifying blend as an RGB color or as a string specifying a color.
Render	Renders an object and creates an image. The object can be any combination of volumes, surfaces, lines, and points, and you can clip the object. You need to provide a camera to the Render module to specify the viewing direction.
Reorient	Rotates or inverts an image or a group of images.
Rotate	Rotates an object around specified axes. The Render, Display, or Image tool actually performs the rotation.
Scale	Changes an object's dimensions along the x, y, and z axes. The scaling is actually performed in the Render, Display, or Image tool.
ScaleScreen	Scales all screen objects (typically captions and color bars) by a specified amount.
Shade	Allows you to specify object-shading parameters such as specularity.
Transform	Moves, rotates, and resizes an object. The Render, Display, or Image tool actually performs the translation.
Translate	Moves an object along the x, y, and z axes. The Render, Display, or Image tool actually performs the translation.
UpdateCamera	Makes specified alterations to the input camera.

Special

Tools in this category can be used in visual programs for a variety of purposes.

Note: For details, see the sections of the IBM Visualization Data Explorer User's Guide referred to in the following list.

Colormap	Presents an interactor tool for creating color maps.
Input	Defines an input to a macro. See 7.2 , "Creating and Using Macros" for information.
Output	Defines an output of a macro. See 7.2 , "Creating and Using Macros" for information.
Pick	Allows the user to pick objects in a scene using the mouse. See "Using Pick" for information.
Probe	Allows the user to pick an xyz point in a scene using the mouse. See "Using Probes (Cursors)" for information.
ProbeList	Allows the user to pick multiple xyz points in a scene using the mouse. See "Using Probes (Cursors)" for information.
Receiver	Receives the output of a transmitter for "wireless" connections. See "Using Transmitters and Receivers" for information.
Sequencer	Allows animation of a visual program. See "Using the Sequencer" in IBM Visualization Data Explorer User's Guide for information.
Transmitter	Outputs an Object for "wireless" connections. See "Using Transmitters and Receivers" for information.

Structuring

These tools manipulate Data Explorer data structures. Their functions include the creation of hierarchies, selection of elements in a hierarchy, allowing operations on components other than "data," manipulation of Field or Group components, and determining which branches of a visual program are to be executed.

Append	Adds Objects as members to an existing Group.
Attribute	Extracts an attribute from an Object.
ChangeGroupMember	Inserts, renames, or deletes a member of an existing Group.
ChangeGroupType	Changes the type of a Group.
Collect	Collects Objects into a Group. For example, you can use Collect to collect a streamline, an isosurface, and a light. You can then pass the collection to the Image tool.
CollectMultiGrid	Collects Objects into a Multigrid (a Group that will be treated as a single data Object).
CollectNamed	Collects Objects into a Group (like Collect) but allows each Object in the Group to be given a name.
CollectSeries	Collects Objects into a Series. You give each element of the series a series position (e.g., a time tag).
CopyContainer	Copies the top container Object.
Extract	Extracts a component from a Field (e.g., the "colors" component).
Inquire	Returns information about the input Object (e.g., data type, number of elements, etc.).
List	Concatenates several items into a single list.
Mark	Marks a specified component in a Field as the data component. Many modules operate only on the "data" component. Thus the Mark module allows modules to operate on components other than data (e.g., "positions" or "colors"). If a "data" component already exists, it is preserved in a "saved data" component. You can restore it by using the Unmark module.
Options	Associates attributes with an Object. For example, plotting options such as marker type can be specified by adding attributes to the line.
Remove	Removes a specified component from a Field.
Rename	Renames a component in a Field. For example, you could rename the "colors" component to "front colors" to get only front-facing colors. You should be aware that component names have special meanings to modules using them. See Chapter 3. "Understanding the Data Model" in IBM Visualization Data Explorer User's Guide.
Replace	Replaces a component in one Field with a component from another, or with an input Array.
Select	Selects members out of a Group or elements from a list. two isosurfaces, a streamline, and a mapped plane. You could then use the selector input to the module to choose which of these is the output of the module.
Unmark	Undoes the action of the Mark module. It moves the "data" component back to the component you specify, and the "saved data" component is restored to the "data" component.

Transformation

These tools generally modify or add to components of the input Field without changing its underlying positions and connections. For example, AutoColor creates a "colors" component based on the data values of a Field and Compute performs a mathematical operation on the "data" component of a Field.

AutoColor	Automatically colors a data Field. By default, the minimum data value is blue, the maximum data value is red, and data values between are blue to red through cyan, green, and yellow. You can control what subset of the data range to color and what portion of the color wheel to use. You can also control the opacity of the object and the intensity of the colors. AutoColor also chooses appropriate colors and opacities for volume rendering.
AutoGrayScale	Automatically colors a data field using a gray scale.
Categorize	Categorizes data, creating an integer data component along with a lookup table into which the integers reference.
CategoryStatistics	Performs various statistics such as minimum, maximum, number of items, etc., on categorical data.
Color	Allows you more control over the coloring of an object than is possible with AutoColor. You can specify a string representing a color (e.g., "spring green"), an RGB color, or a color map (from the Colormap Editor, for example) to be applied to a data Field. You can also use the Color module to make objects (e.g., isosurfaces) translucent.
Compute	Performs point-by-point arithmetic on a Field or Fields. For example, it can add the "data" component of one Field to the tangent of the "data" component of another Field. You can also use the Compute module to select components from a vector data Field; construct a vector "data" component from a set of scalar input data Fields; or perform conditional operations.
Compute2	Differs from Compute in allowing the expression to be passed in by means of an input tab (e.g., from a Selector interactor).
Convert	Converts between hue, saturation, and value color space and red, green, and blue color space. You can convert either a single vector, a list of vectors, or a color map.
DFT	Performs a discrete Fourier transformation on a 2- or 3-dimensional field.
Direction	Converts azimuth, elevation, and distance to Cartesian coordinates (x, y, and z), which are useful for specifying camera viewing directions and for specifying ClipPlane or MapToPlane normal directions.
DivCurl	Computes the divergence and the curl of a vector field.
Equalize	Applies histogram equalization to a field.
FFT	Performs a fast Fourier transformation on a 2- or 3-dimensional field.
Filter	Filters a Field. You can specify a name describing a filter (e.g., "laplacian") or a filter matrix explicitly.
Gradient	Computes the gradient of a scalar Field.
Histogram	Computes a histogram and the median of an input data Field. You can then use Plot to visualize the result as a 2-dimensional graph.
Lookup	Uses one object to look up the value of another object in a field.
Map	Maps Fields onto one another. For example, you can map a data Field onto an isosurface or onto a tube that has been formed from a streamline.
Measure	Performs measurements (e.g., surface area or volume) on a data Object.
Morph	Applies a binary morphological operator, such as erode or dilate.
Post	Changes the dependency of data (and other components) between positions and connections.
QuantizeImage	Converts an image from a format containing (potentially) as many colors as pixels to a quantized image with a color map with a user-specified number of colors between 8 and 256.
Sort	Sorts a list or Field based on values in the data component.
Statistics	Computes the statistics of a Field: the mean, standard deviation, variance, minimum, and maximum. You can use these statistics as input for other modules, or print them using the Echo or Print modules.

Windows

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