2013

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www.xara.com
Lights
LIGHTS ON/OFF
You can adjust the lighting of your shape in 3D space by turning on the lights. There
are 3 lights, each of which can be given their own color and position in 3D space
around the 3D shape.
In this example the face color of
the shape is set to white. But you
can see that it appears green
because there is a green light
shining almost directly onto the
front face of the shape.
By adjusting the colors of the face
and extrude and the positions
and colors of the three lights, you
can enhance the realism of the
3D objects in your design.
Behind the object is a beige / orange colored light and another that is a purple color.
Both lights cause reflections down the side, and changing the color, or direction of the
lights behind will change the reflected highlights.
To move a light around the 3D object, simply drag on the light arrow. If you happen to
drop a light so that it is behind the 3D object and therefore isn't selectable, you can
retrieve it by using the left slider on the Extrude InfoBar. Select one of the light angles
from the dropdown list to the left of the slider (e.g. "Light 2 Angle 1") and then adjust
the slider. The light moves around the 3D object in your design. The various "light
angle" options in this dropdown list allow you to move any of the lights in any
direction in 3D space to achieve the positions you want. However for most purposes
you can achieve good results most easily by dragging the light arrows directly on the
page.
To change the colors of the lights, you can simply drag colors from the color bar and
drop them directly onto the light arrows. To edit a light color with the color editor,
double click on the light arrow you want to change and the color editor opens with
that light color selected. You can now edit the light's color. With the color editor open,
as you click on the different light arrows, extrude face and extrude sides, the color
selected in the color editor dropdown list changes to match your selection, so you can
quickly select the different colors on your extrude to modify them.