Surface Tool Overview

Image Processing Toolkit User Guide > Surface Tool > Surface Tool Overview

Surface Tool is used to display one 2D variable containing surface data.

note	Avoid using the PV-WAVE DEVICE command at the WAVE> command line when VDA Tools are running.

Surface Tool Features

The Surface Tool offers options for enhancing the appearance of the surface plot.

These options include:

annotating, shading, and rotating the view.

adding a skirt to the surface view.

modifying the colors used to display the surface.

The default is to display this type of data as a regularly gridded fishnet (mesh) surface, looking down (from an angle) at the top of the surface, and using no skirt.

Using Online Help

The online Help system for this VDA Tool contains:

Reference material on the menus, button bar, and controls area of the Surface Tool. To access this information, click on the links in the Surface Tool Contents topic.

Task-oriented information. To access this information, click on the How To link in the Surface Tool Contents topic.

A glossary of terms. To access the glossary, click on the Glossary link in the Surface Tool Contents topic.

Context-sensitive reference material on dialog boxes. To access this information, click the Help button in any dialog box.

note	Don’t forget to check the message area at the bottom of the Surface Tool window. The message area displays helpful information about whatever task you are performing.

Surface Tool Controls Area

X and Z Rotation—These controls allow you to interactively rotate the surface (counter-clockwise around either the x- or z-axis) a specified number of degrees. The current rotation is shown in the text field to the right of the slider.

Zoom Factor—Scales the original surface by multiplying (zooming out) or dividing (zooming in).

Layer to Plot—This feature lets you choose which color plane (e.g., red, green, or blue) of a 24-bit image to represent as a surface plot.