8

1082 Glossary
Ov ers hoot
Above: No overshoot
Below: O vershoot turned on
The Overshoot option causes a spotlight to
floodbeyonditsfalloffarea,andcastlightin
all direc t ions. With Overshoot turned on, the
spotlightcastslightinalldirectionsbutcasts
shadows only within its falloff cone.
The Overshoot control effectively turns the
spotlightintoahybridbetweenanOmnilightand
a spotlight. With O vershoot set, the spotlight casts
light in all direc tions as an Omni light does but still
casts shadows or projections as other spotlights
do. The shadows and projections are limited to
thefalloffregion:outsidetheconeofthespotlight,
Overshootcastslightbutdoesnotcastshadows
or projections.
Overshoot is useful when you want to light a large
area but need to cast shadows in only a small
part of that area. Set the falloff to include the
area where shadows must appear, and then turn
on Overshoot to light the rest of the scene. This
techniquecanreducethesizeofshadowmapsand
thereby improve rendering speed.
PAL
PAL (Phase Alternate Line) is the video standard
used in most European countries. The frame rate
is 25 frames per second (fps) or 50
fields (page
3–1032)
per second, with each field accounting
for half the interleaved scan lines on a television
screen.
Pa r a met er S pa ce
In addition to their existence in 3D space, NURBS
objects have a parameter space that includes the
arr ay of knot values. NURBS curves have a single
U dimension in parameter space. NURBS surfaces
have two dimensions, UV, in parameter space.
Parameters Panel
The parameters panel, found to the r ight of the
event display (page 3–1029) in Particle View (page
2–121)
, displays the parameters of any action
whosenameyouclickinthedepot. Thepanel
uses the same format and editing methods as
the command panel in 3 ds Max. Display of the
parameters panel can be toggled with the Particle
View menu command Display > Parameters.