Third Guild

ARCH ESSENTIALS: User Guide

Picture Frame

Use for

  • Pictures, paintings or mirrors to enchance interior visuals.
  • A glass-fronted box to hold plants or curios.
  • A starting point for creating more complex picture frame designs.

Overview

Generates 3D picture frames, with or without glass, of various shapes and sizes. Includes 20+ canvas size presets and provides controls for canvas height, width and inset, as well as, orientation, frame thickness and depth.

UVs are automatically generated with the UV for the canvas maximized within the 0-to-1 UV space. Separate polygon-part names are created for the canvas, frame and glass to enable fast selection and material assignment; e.g. using the Part Names To Masks command.

Workflow

To use this tool,

  1. Left-click on the ‘Picture Frame’ button in the Arch-E user interface.
  2. Left-click in the 3D viewport.
  3. Select options as required (see below).
Picture Frame 3D View

User Interface

Picture Frame UI

Canvas Section

Shape

The shape of the canvas/picture. Choose between,

  • Rectangle
  • Diamond
  • Hexagon
  • Circle
  • Oval

Detail Level

Amount of smoothing/sub-divsions. To activate, select the Circle or Oval shape.

Preset Size (inch)

Select from a range of common canvas and poster sizes. To activate, select the Rectangle shape. Note, some additonal information about these preset sizes is given in the 'tooltips' for this field.

Swap Width-Height

Switches the model between portrait and landscape orientations.

Width

Sets the width of the canvas. Note, this is not the overall picture frame width.

Height

Sets the height of the canvas. Note, this is not the overall picture frame height.

Inset

Sets the inset of the canvas or glass from the front of the picture frame. The minimum inset is 1mm, whereas, the maximum is limited by the Frame Depth (see below).

Frame Section

Thickness

The thickness of the frame that surrounds the canvas. The minimum value is 1mm.

Depth

Depth of the picture frame. Minimum is 4mm.

UV Method

The method used to UV the frame geometry will be auto-selected, but can be overriden using this drop-down. Choose either,

  • Segment: Creates individual UV islands for each section along the sweep path; Ideal for frames with long, straight sections and mitre-type joints; or
  • Peel: Creates a strip of UVs that follow the sweep path (similar to modo's built-in peeler). Ideal for curved frames.

Add Glass

Adds a 1mm deep, glass box that sits 1mm from the surface of the canvas. Use to add addtional realism and reflections.