Working with occluded textured geometric elements

Selecting textured geometric elements in a dense scene via the Viewer window can be challenging and time consuming especially if the elements are occluded by other elements. You can change the camera view or use the Navigator window to access and select elements behind other elements but this workflow may be quite inefficient particularly with large scenes.

This release optimized the selection of occluded textured geometric elements by providing the following capabilities:

• Selecting an occluded textured geometric element through alpha channels

• Selecting an occluded textured geometric element through alpha channels and selection override color via the API

  See What is the MotionBuilder SDK?

• Selecting an occluded textured geometric element through partially transparent textures

• Selecting an occluded textured geometric element by using a selection override color

Keyboard shortcuts for selecting and displaying occluded textured geometric elements in the Viewer window

The following table lists the keyboard shortcuts and User Interface (UI) elements associated with the selection and display of occluded textured geometric elements in the Viewer window. The keyboard shortcuts are supported in all default and custom cameras.

Note: All keyboard shortcuts associated with actions within the Viewer window require the Viewer window to be in an active state.

Action	Keyboard Shortcut	UI Element	State / Alternative to Keyboard Shortcut
To toggle the EZ Selection button on.	Alt + Shift + A		Enable the IDBufferPicking property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To toggle the EZ Selection button off.	Alt + Shift + A		Disable the IDBufferPicking property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To display the transparency threshold of textures.	Shift + A	IDBufferDisplay	Enable the IDBufferDisplay property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To define the transparency threshold of textures.	Shift + A + scroll mouse wheel	IDBufferPickingAlpha	Adjust the value of the IDBufferPickingAlpha property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To enable the selection override color for selecting occluded geometric elements.	Alt + Shift + Q	SelectionOverride	Enable the SelectionOverride property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To disable the selection override color for selecting occluded geometric elements.	Alt + Shift + Q	SelectionOverride	Disable the SelectionOverride property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To define the selection override color for selecting occluded geometric elements.	None	SelectionOverrideColor	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To define the selection override color transparency for selecting occluded geometric elements.	None	SelectionOverideTransparency	Adjust the value of the SelectionOverrideTransparency property in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To select and cycle through textured geometric elements with a selection override color.	Click a geometric element and press Shift + 1 + scroll mouse wheel	None	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To cycle through textured geometric elements with a selection override color and hide the geometric elements in front of the selected geometric element.	Click a geometric element and press Shift + 2 + scroll mouse wheel	None	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To hide textured geometric elements with a selection override color in front of the selected textured geometric element.	Click a geometric element and press Shift + 2	None	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To show only the selected textured geometric element.	Click a geometric element and press Shift + 3	None	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.
To isolate the selected textured geometric element with a selection override color and then scroll through all the geometric element with a selection override color (one by one).	Click a geometric element and press Shift + 3 + scroll mouse wheel	None	Define the selection override color in the SelectionOverrideColor property fields or button in the Renderer Properties Resources.

Selecting an occluded textured geometric element by using a selection override color

Similarly to selecting occluded geometric elements through alpha channels, you can select a geometric element in the background through partially transparent textured geometric elements in the foreground by using the Easy Selection button () in the Viewer toolbar or its keyboard shortcut (Alt + Shift + A), and by specifying the texture's selection override color. Setting a selection override color uses the textures' diffuse channel for the color override.