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quickly understands how to use them. Second, the shadows may give the application more visual
interest.
You may also want to include bitmap effects and opacity masks to create glows and lighting effects
in your application design. Glows around objects highlight them, and make them more visible
without increasing their size. And you might want to use partial transparency to make tools less
visible when they’re not being used or not needed.
See Chapter 7 for more information about transparency, opacity maps, and glows.
Metawindows, drawers, and scrapbooks
A metawindow is a window into the entire world of your application where you can see the entire
functionality of your application at a glance, somewhat like the example shown in Figure 1.20. The
user may choose the tools he wants to use or what room he wants to enter, or how he wants to
proceed in the application from the metawindow.
FIGURE 1.20
A metawindow may show you the entire functionality of an application at a glance. In this Poser
metawindow, many tools are accessible at once.
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Exploring New User Interface Techniques
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