[neone]

i noticed that when i want to get very close to an object with my camera the view goes blank. But when i render it it's there all right. Is there any sollution for this? It's kinda a pain to try to get a good camera aim when u can't see anything in the camera view.

btw is lightwave good at creating detailed views in general?


thnx all

[Johnny9ball]

Yes it is you just need to change a setting.

Hit D and bring up the Display settings. Change the Fixed near clip distance to something really small. Now get your cam as close as you want.

[neone]

ooh my...i couldn't find that one myself

thnx alot for the help Johnny

btw...why does the option exist? is it to create a special effect or something?
i'm just eager to know every little thing

[Johnny9ball]

Humm you know I dont know exactly for sure why this option is included. Mabye a more enlightened individual can fill us both in.

In LW8 its not turned on till you check a box. Annoyingly in LW7.5 its always on till you reduce the fixed clip distance.

[Mark]

The reason for the clipping that occurs is (I believe) because of the fixed precision maths used in OpenGL. As you start to get into smaller and smaller detail, the numbers used by Lightwave to render the geometry get progressively smaller and smaller until you get to the point where it physically can't represent the points on screen.

You don't, of course, get the problem in the final renders, since the display is using the full precision of the rendering engine rather than the lower mathematical resolution of the OpenGL engine.

[Johnny9ball]

Yes but his question was why have the option to set clipping distance. Like why would you want to have a high/low clip distance?

[Mark]

I think it's there to get around the limitations of OpenGL. You should find that if you change the clipping distance, then you'll slowly lose the ability to make really fine point adjustments since the precision of the application is then changed... (or something like that).