New or improved in XenoDream v2.4
New options for Point Cloud export
The camera orientation can be used. PRT files now include the ID channel. The PLY format is also supported.
30 new metamorphs
Ten new constructors for making fixed shapes. Portions of a cylinder or sphere; two rectangular blocks with various rounding options; single or double wing/horn/arrowhead shapes; two grilles with various patterns; lineart with eight patterns; 3D Lissajous shapes; a conic section.
Six tiles for replicating holons. One for making copies in an arc; two ladder shapes with optional helical twisting; an arch with eight shapes; random oval or rectangular arrangements with variable random orientation.
Two new patterns of axial radial displacement.
New Maskit style Kleinian fractal patterns.
Metamorphs to extrude in various ways. Extrusion in Z, straight or sloped; helical and rotational extrusions; spiral extrusions to make spiral shells.
Other additions flatten or modulate towards a cylinder, and modulate around a horizontal valley.
Animation improvements
Increased maximum number of keyframes to 40.
The spline interpolation has been rewritten to allow separate settings for the camera and the object morphing, with variable amounts of smoothing, from extra smooth to linear, and negative values for magnetic bounce effects. There is also an acceleration control to vary the rate of change, with an S-bend option. All can be set per keyframe, or synchronized. An Autobias option allows object morphing to avoid overshoots within constant segments, by biasing smoothing into neighbouring segments. The smoothing now correctly accounts for varying keyframe intervals.
A Subframe control shows progress during animation preview, and allows scrubbing between keyframes at other times.
Improved quality and timing of preview, and frame controls are updated at each keyframe. Various bugs fixed.
Gradient Editor improvements
Options to reverse the gradient, and trim nodes at either end or anywhere. Capture randomised gradient from any rectangle on screen. Increased number of gradient memory spots to 14.
Other improvements
Camera memory spots are included in parameter files.
The Depth of Field effect is scaled to the picture size, and is faster to preview and apply.
In Mesh Export, while adjusting simplified mesh size, the manifold status of the mesh is shown.
Hundreds of new gradient presets are included.
New or improved in XenoDream v2.3
Use more than 2GB of memory
You can use a bit more than 3GB of RAM in 64bit Windows or 64bit Linux; or just under 3GB in 32bit Windows configured with the /3GB switch.
Preview improvements
In Grey Preview mode the holon under the mouse pointer is drawn in pink and identified in a tooltip. Right-clicking selects it.
The Grey Preview updates selection colors without restarting.
Solo Holon button improvements
The Solo Holon button shows all selected holons when Ctrl-clicked, and works for all configurations.
Export point clouds
Export any object as a point cloud in either Krakatoa PRT format or CSV format. Anywhere from 10 points to 100 million points can be generated with full color, from either the current object or a batch of files.
79 new metamorphs
Ten new constructors for making fixed shapes. A dumbell with useful variations; an oloid (the convex hull of two perpendicular circles); a pipe with variable ends; a prism box with variable hole size and open or closed top; a screw head; four shapes of shaft and a torus that can be plain or have patterns with grooves, rings and threads.
There are four tile metamorphs to make copies in an inward spiral, an outward spiral, a cone of rings or a tower of rings.
There are metamorphs for making patterns for coloring or displacement: cylindrical brickwork; alternating or random dumbells; planar or radial Poisson spaced Voronoi cells; planar or radial Gabor convolution noise.
Nine metamorphs provide a huge variety of patterns based on concentric circles or combinations of shapes. They can be used for coloring, displacement or stencils in a planar, cylindrical or spherical grid.
There are metamorphs for making shapes more or less square; more or less round; folding into a box; and for mapping to a Riemann sphere.
Fractal metamorphs produce Juliabulb fractals in spherical coordinates, with several different formulations and powers, for use alone or with other holons.
Enhanced metamorphs produce highly detailed 2D Julia sets, with five variable power formulas and nine cubic rational formulas. They can be used alone or with other holons.
There are two metamorphs giving additional rotation options around an iteration path.
Metamorph masks to cut holes in the shape
Use the metamorph pattern as a mask to cut holes in the shape. The mask follows the coloring, but is independent of the color gradients.
Pic Texture filter improvements
Three new turbulence types and 10 new noise types.
A noise variation control expands the possibilities.
Up to 15 octaves, with options to rotate and shift per octave.
Controls to randomize and reset noise parameters.
Better shadow setup
Improved shadow map calibration gives better quality shadows. Shadow resolution can be adjusted to use more or less memory.
Setting up shadows is easier with a new dialog showing the light directions for each lighting preset.
Soft shadows
Adjust the softness of each shadow, with a choice of circular or square light source.
Mesh Export improvements
More accurate and faster triangulation.
A Two Step filter produces a cleaner mesh, with adjustable sharpness (shown at right with 0 and 90).
A Mesh Info dialog gives information about the number and size of pieces in the mesh, and sets a threshold to remove small pieces when simplifying.
Simplify options to optimize for best shape, low polygon count or 3D printing.
Save to STL files for 3D printing.
Batch export of meshes.
Other improvements
Numeric controls respond to Ctrl and Shift keys to increment by 10, 100 or 1000 units, and to modify drag sensitivity. The mousewheel can also be used.
The Holon Info List shows holon scale, rotation and position when it has no metamorphs. You can drag and drop rows in the list to change the holon numbering.
Antialiasing of color data in rendering.
Opening picture files allows for resizing, and can also open 16 bit and greyscale PSD files.
Depth maps can be saved and opened in 16 bit greyscale PSD format, to support editing and reloading into a scene.
Gradient sampler controls are embedded in the Gradient Editor for more convenient access, and sampling can be started from the Picture window menu. Capture gradients from anywhere on the screen.
In the Lighting window, the polishing filter works better and faster.