Build View#

The Build View is a omnidirectional node-based editor on which you create your build assembly. It is the central widget of the build assembly workflow on which you can add, remove, connect and layout nodes.

Clarisse BUiLDER Build View

Navigation#

To pan press Alt or Space and click in the view using either left or middle-mouse button.

Drag in any direction to pan the view.

To zoom press Alt or Space and Right Button in the view.

Drag left or up to zoom out and right or down to zoom in. It is also possible to use the mouse-wheel to zoom in and zoom out.

To fit the view to display all nodes press A.

To fit the view to the selection press F. When there is no selection, pressing F fits to view all nodes.

Minimap#

When the current viewing area doesn’t fit the entire graph, a minimap displaying a simplified view of the entire graph is automatically displayed as overlay on the bottom right. This minimap can be freely resized by clicking and dragging its top right corner.

Minimap overlay displaying in the orange rectangle the viewing area of the build

The orange rectangle displays the current viewing area. Drag the orange rectangle in the minimap to pan in the view.

Bookmarks#

It is possible to set bookmarks and store custom viewpoints to simplify navigation especially on large builds. To create a new bookmark press Ctrl+B or Right Button and select Bookmark Viewpoint.

When you create a new bookmark you will be prompt to set a name and a color. Available bookmarks are displayed on the top right of the Build View as color pots.

To go select a bookmark, go to the bookmark area to reveal the bookmark names. Just click on the bookmark to set the new viewpoint.

To manage bookmarks, Right Button in the bookmark area to popup the bookmark menu.

Managing Nodes#

The nodes displayed and managed by the Build View are managed the same way as standard items in Clarisse. For more information on how to manage items in Clarisse please refer to Managing Items.

Adding Nodes#

There are quite a few different ways to add a new nodes to you build. To add a new node you can use:

• The Node Creation popup invoked by pressing Tab.
• Right Button to invoke the Build View contextual menu.
• The Create menu located in the application menu bar. Note that this only works when you didn’t set a vizroot. When you set a vizroot, Clarisse automatically tries to create the node in it.

Using Tab to create nodes#

Press Tab to summon the Node Creation popup.

Either type the name of the node or click on its name to create it. When you type the popup will automatically filter out non matching items.

Press Tab or Enter to validate and press Esc or click outside to cancel.

Note that the next time you’ll press Tab the previously created node will be highlighted in the popup that way you can double Tab to create the same kind of node.

Node Creation popup of the Build View

Using the contextual menu#

Right-click on an empty area of the Build View to display the contextual menu and select the node via the New submenu.

Alternatively you can type type the name of the node you are looking to create, the menu will automatically filter out non matching item.

Selecting Nodes#

To select a node simply click on the node. Selected nodes are displayed in orange. To select multiple nodes hold Shift and click on each node you want to select.

Clicking on a node while holding Ctrl toggles the node to the selection.

It is also possible to select nodes using a rectangle selection. To initiate a selection marquee, simply click and drag to select nodes entirely enclosed in the marquee.

By default, only nodes entirely enclosed in the marquee are selected:

It is possible to control this behavior in the Application Preferences using Ctrl+K. In the Nodal View section change Selection Mode to either:

• Inside (default) so that only nodes entirely inside the rectangle selection are selected
• Overlap so that nodes overlapping the rectangle selection gets selected.

To select all upstream dependencies of a node, you can either double-click on the node, press Select Upstream Nodes in the toolbar or Right Button and choose Select Inputs in the contextual menu.

To select all downstream nodes press Select Downstream Nodes in the toolbar or Right Button and choose Select Outputs in the contextual menu.

To select all upstream and downstream dependencies of node, double-click on the node while holding Shift, press Select Connected Nodes in the toolbar or Right Button and choose Select Connected Nodes in the contextual menu.

To deselect, click on an empty area of the Build View or go to Edit > Deselect All in the application menu bar.

Editing the attribute values of selected node is achieved using the Attribute Editor.

Selection and Link Highlights#

Selected nodes are always highlighted in orange, upstream nodes and links are highlighted in yellow while downstream ones are highlighted in green.

Orange is for the selection, yellow for upstream nodes and green for downstream ones

To disable Links Highlights display, Right Button and uncheck Links Highlights or click on Links Highlights in the toolbar.

By default, the Build View highlights both upstream and downstream links. However, you can change this behavior to highlight instead only upstream or downstream links. To do so Shift+Left Button on Links Highlights on the toolbar and choose the highlight mode you wish to use.

Deleting Nodes#

To delete a selection, press Del, Right Button and choose Edit > Delete or go to Edit > Delete in the application menu bar.

Duplicating Nodes#

To duplicate a set of selected nodes, press Ctrl+C , Right Button or go to the application menu bar and choose Edit > Copy.

To paste the current clipboard, press Ctrl+V, Right Button or go to the application menu bar and choose Edit > Paste.

When you copy something in Clarisse it is serialized as text in the clipboard. It’s then possible to paste the clipboard to a text file for example to paste it later on in Clarisse. Here is what the pasted clipboard would look like:

#Isotropix_Clarisse_Clipboard_Serialization 0.94
Locator {
   name "locator"
   #version 0.9
   copy_from "build://locator"
}

Instancing Nodes#

To make an node an instance of a source one, initiate a link from the source node and connect it to the Source attribute of the instance.

Making locator1 an instance of locator

Just disconnect the Source link to break the instancing relationship.

Renaming Nodes#

To rename a node, select the node and press F2, Right Button and choose Edit > Rename... or go to Edit > Rename... in the application menu bar.

Disabling/Enabling Nodes#

When a node is disabled, the evaluation engine ignores the node as if it wasn’t part of the build. To disable selected nodes press Ctrl+D, Right Button or go to the application menu bar and choose Edit > Disable.

To enable a selected disabled nodes, press Shift+D, Right Button or go to the application menu bar and choose Edit > Enable.

Bypassing Nodes#

Some class of nodes have the ability to be bypassed. When a node can be bypassed it will always define a Pass Through attribute.

To bypass a node press D or Right Button and choose Pass Through. To remove the bypass press D again or Right Button and uncheck Pass Through.

When a node is bypassed, the node is skipped by the evaluation as if its input node was connected to the output node instead.

As edit node is bypassed, isolate is virtually connected to merge

Some nodes also provide a Master Input attribute to define which input node should be returned by the bypassed node.

Master Input of fractal_noise is set to color2. When fractal_noise is bypassed the node connected to color2 is returned

Connecting/Disconnecting Nodes#

Connecting nodes is a large part of the daily work of an artist working in the Build View so we devised quite a few different ways to initiate links by:

• Using the node connectors.
• Pressing X to initiate a link from the node located the mouse cursor.
• Inserting a node between two connected nodes.
• Rerouting an existing link.

When you hover over a node, 4 identical connectors will appear on each side of the node.

Just click-drag the closest connector or press X to initiate a link. Move the mouse over the destination node to reveal its attributes. If you notice closely, incompatible attributes are greyed out.

Move over the attribute you wish the create the link to and release the mouse button. In the event you only have one compatible attribute you can just release the mouse button over the node without the need to move the mouse over the attribute.

Once the link is created, the node is collapsed and the created link displayed the name of the attribute it is connected to.

If the link isn’t long enough to entirely display the name the attribute it is connected to, the name will be truncated with an ellipsis.

To display the full name of truncated attribute names hold Z. Holding Z also expands the node located under the mouse cursor.

Node Auto Insertion#

When Node Auto-Insert is enabled, it is possible to insert a node between two nodes. Drag the node you want to insert over a link.

When the insertion is possible the link turns to orange. Just drop it to insert it in place.

To enable/disable Node Auto-Insert, click on Node Auto-Insert in the toolbar or Right Button and check/uncheck Node Auto-Insert

Rerouting Links#

It is possible to reroute existing links to change the upstream connection or change the attribute the a node is connected to.

Hover over the extremity of a link so that an orange handle appears. Just click and drag the handle to reroute the link.

Drag this handle to change the node that will be connected to the attribute color1 of fractal_noise

Drag this handle to connect map1 to another attribute of fractal_noise or to another node

Dropping the link on an empty area disconnect the connection.

Multiple Connections#

When a node is connected multiple times to another one, a single link is still displayed. However, this type of links representing multiple connections from a node to another is displayed with multiple arrows.

If you hover over one of the arrows or handles the link displays the attribute name the node is connected to. Just use the corresponding handle to reroute the link to a specific attribute.

Disconnecting Nodes#

You can disconnect nodes by rerouting links or Right Button and select Disconnect. You can also disconnect multiple connections at the same time by right-clicking and dragging to draw a cutting path.

Drawing a cutting path from top to bottom

Each time the cutting path intersects a link it is disconnected.

All links are disconnected

Links Culling#

Sometimes on complex builds there can be so many links that they degrade visibility when you are navigating the graph. You may want to cull links for which both input and output nodes are not visible in the current view.

This is possible by enabling the auto link culling feature. To enable it press K, click on Links Culling in the toolbar or Right Button and select Links Culling.

Dots#

A Dot is a very useful layout node used to visually reroute connections between nodes. For more information about dots please refer to Dot.

While you can create dot nodes the same way as any other ones, in the Build View you can directly double-click on a connection to insert a new dot.

You can also use Alt+D to create a new dot. If a node was already selected when pressing Alt+D, the new dot will be connected to the selected node. This behavior is also very useful to successive dots together.

Initiating a connection from the right area to the node creates a attribute connection to node

When your mouse cursor is over a dot node, it displays a visual helper to help issue new connections.

The left area of the dot allows you to initiate connections to an input node while the right area is used to initiate connections to attributes.

Initiating a connection from the left area to the node sets the node as input of the dot

Initiating a connection from the right area to the node creates a attribute connection to node

Dots also displays comments when the dot is commented which is very useful to document what using dots as node proxies. Of course, using the attribute editor you can choose the orientation of the comment or hide it entirely.

Backdrop and Notes#

Backdrop and Note nodes are layout nodes that improve the readability of your build graph. The Backdrop is a color backdrop surround a group of nodes. It also acts as a selection proxy handle for nodes it surrounds. Notes are text box areas to document part of your build.

No backdrop on the left, with on the right. Notice how backdrops improve readability.

Backdrops also display comments when they have a comment. This is very useful to document a group of nodes. Also, using the attribute editor you can choose the orientation of the comment or hide it entirely.

Comment displayed on the right of the backdrop

Alternatively, you can use a Note node instead of displaying backdrop comments.

For more information about backdrops and notes please refer respectively to Backdrop and Build Layout Nodes > Note.

Nodes Display#

The Build View provides some useful feature that may improve readability of the node graph.

Nodes Labels#

The name of nodes is displayed inside the node. However, depending of the zoom level, the node eventually becomes too small to display its name. When that happens, the Build View displays the name at the top of the node in screen space (size not affected by the zoom level). However, depending on the number of nodes in your build, zooming out the view may result to a text mess where node’s names are overlapping with each other.

Node Label set to On

To solve this problem it’s possible to hide the display of node’s names Right Button and choose Node Label > Off.

Node Label set to Off

The view also provide an alternative display mode that tries to display the name of the nodes by avoiding overlaps. To enable this mode, Right Button and choose Node Label > Smart.

Node Label set to Smart

It is possible to cycle through all display modes by pressing N.

Status Bar#

Some nodes may display a status bar at the bottom of the node to display useful information such as error, warning etc… Please refer to the documentation of each node for more information.

Nodes displaying status bar codes

Node Auto Zoom#

Press Z over a node so that it displays its full content. It is possible to enable automatic node zooming when the mouse cursor is over a node. To enable this feature click on Auto Zoom in the toolbar.

Simplified View#

The Build View can display itself in special simplified display mode that increases readability at the cost of losing information. To switch the normal mode and the simplified mode, Right Button and choose Display Mode > Simplified or Display Mode > Normal.

Display Mode set to Full (left) to Simplified (right)

Nodes Layout#

A simple yet efficient node auto layout feature is available in the Build View. To auto layout a selection of nodes, press L or Right Button and choose Layout. When no node is selected, the entire build is auto layouted.

Since the Build View is an omnidirectional graph, it is possible to hint the auto layout by setting the favored graph orientation. Right Button and choose either Layout Orientation > Top -> Down or Layout Orientation > Left -> Right.

Snapping and Magnets#

The Build View supports magnet snapping to align nodes to neighbors. Activate the magnet by pressing M or right-clicking and choosing Magnet.

When the magnet feature is activated, nodes are automatically snapped to neighbor nodes when you are moving them to make sure they stay aligned.

It is also possible to activate grid snapping to constraint nodes on an user defined grid. To enable/disable grid snapping press G. You can also activate the Grid Snapping using the toolbar or using the Right Button contextual menu.

When grid snapping is enabled a dotted grid is displayed in the background of the Build View. It is possible to edit the grid size and options by pressing Shift+G or using the Right Button contextual menu.