This mode hides all parts of the character rig and leaves visible only meshes - 3d objects used to represent a character in the scene. Every character is made of one or several meshes that can be deformed by adjusting the rig attached to them.

Meshes can be selected by clicking them with the , like any other scene object. Selected meshed are colored yellow in the Viewport.

Rendering Modes

Meshes can be rendered in two different ways: the Shaded Meshes mode and the Wireframe Meshes mode.

The Shaded Meshes mode (left), the Wireframe Meshes mode (middle) and a combination of the two (right)

Mesh rendering modes are enabled and disabled from the Visible menu. Both modes can be enabled (or disabled) at the same time.

The color of the meshes can be set in the Settings window (available through the Settings menu).

Materials

Aside from the regular textures, there are also Materials - a more complex way of rendering mesh objects, with much more lifelike results.

Materials are created automatically when importing 3D meshes into the scene. If you want to use Materials with outdated scenes, use the Fix Scene option in the File menu.

Settings for Materails are available on the Material tab of the Object Properties panel:

Base Color
Sets the default color for the surface.

An example of a material with Base Color set to different values.

Base Color Factor
Sets how much the Base Color gets mixed with the default mesh color.
At the value of 0 the Base Color is omitted completely, at 1 it fully replaces the default color.

The default color is defined by the Mesh Default Color parameter in the Settings Window → Visualizers.

Emissive Color
Sets the color for the light that the surface emits.
If the value is set to the color black (0, 0, 0), no light is emitted (this is the default value).

An example of a material with different emission settings.

Emissive Color Factor
Sets the strength of the emissive color.
When this value is set to 0, no light is emitted; at 1, emission reaches its maximum strength (defined by the Emissive Color parameter).

Roughness
Sets the roughness of the surface, i.e. the sharpness of the reflection.
This value can change from 0 (perfectly sharp reflection) to 1 (very soft).

Metallic
Sets the metallicity of the surface, i.e. how well it reflects light.
This value can also change from 0 (no light is reflected) to 1 (all light is reflected).

Reflectance
Sets the strength for specular reflections.
The value can change from 0 to 1; the default value is 0.

This example uses a darker Base Color so the specular highlights would stand out more.

Ambient Occlusion
Sets the strength of the ambient occlusion (self-shadowing) effect.
The value can change from 0 (the effect is fully visible) to 1 (the effect is completely invisible).
The default value is 0.5.

Ambient occlusion value from 0 to 1.

Sheen Color
Sets the color for the sheen: an effect that simulates very small fibers on the surface. This is mostly used for imitating cloth or dusty surfaces.

An example of the Sheen Color with different values; the Sheen Roughness (see below) is set to 1.0.
This example also uses a darker Base Color to make the effect more visible.

Sheen Roughness
Sets the roughness value for the sheen effect.

Sheen Roughness from 0.0 to 1.0.

Clear Coat
Sets the strength for the ‘clear coat’ effect that simulates an additional layer of material on top of the surface. Used for portraying things like lacquer surfaces or car paint.

Clear Coat from 0.0 to 1.0.

Clear Coat Roughness
Sets the roughness for the clear coat effect.

Clear Coat Roughness from 0.0 to 1.0.

Material Textures

Aside from the numerical settings described above, Materials in Cascadeur include several texture channels:

They can be used to apply textures (2D images) to the model, customizing its appearance.
Textures work in conjunction with the parameters described above: for example, if you set a texture for the base color, you can use the Base Color value to adjust its hue.

The available texture channels are:

Normal map
Sets the texture for the normals.

Base Color Map
Sets the texture for the base color of the surface.

Emissive Color Map
Sets the texture for the light emitted by the surface.

Roughness Map
Sets the texture for controlling the roughness of the surface.

Roughness channel
Designates one of the image channels as a map for roughness. Used when you have several maps packed into one image.
There are four options: R (the red channel is used), G (the green channel), B (blue) and A (alpha i.e. transparency).

Metallic Map
Set the texture for controlling the metallicity of the surface.

Metallic map
Designates one of the image channels as a map for metallicity.

Reflectance Map
Sets the texture for controlling the reluctance value of the surface.

Reflectance map
Designates one of the image channels as a map for reflectance.

Ambient Occlusion Map
Sets the texture for the ambient occlusion effect.

Ambient occlusion map
Designates one of the image channels as a map for ambient occlusion.

To add a texture to a channel, click the folder icon at the right side of it. This will open a standard ‘open file’ dialog where you can select an image to be used as a texture.
To remove a texture from a channel, simply erase the path to it in the corresponding field.

Textures (Deprecated)

For cases when you don't need complex materials, there's also an option to use Textures: simple 2D images that are applied to a Mesh to simulate the color scheme of the surface and the details on it.
Unlike Materials, this feature does not support separate images for normals, roughness and such.

Textures can be controlled with two items in the View menu:

Bind Images
Applies a texture image to the currently selected Mesh.
Using this option will open a standard ‘open file’ dialog, where you can select an image to apply.
If you select several images, they will be treated as an animation sequence (one image per frame)

Supported file fomats are: .png, .tga, .bmp and .jpg.

Unbind Images
Removes texture image(s) from the currently selected Mesh.

Texture Parameters

If you select an object that has a texture, you’ll see theTexture container set of options on the Object Properties panel:

Start frame
Defines the start frame for the texture, if it has more than one.

Texture path
The path to the texture file.
If the texture consists of multiple frames, all of them are listed here.

Camera Textures

There is also an option to add a texture to a camera object:

1. Select a Camera

2. Select Bind images from the View menu.

3. Select a texture file.

Now, when you view the scene through this camera, it will show the texture you’ve selected as a background:

This feature can be useful when you need to use a video sequence as a backdrop to your animation (for example, to make the animation in sync with the motion on that video).

Mesh Settings

A specific set of settings is available for Meshes in the Outliner window.

Fbx Export

This set of options controls how Joints and Meshes are exported to the FBX format.

Rotation order

This parameter sets the rotation order used for the selected object.

When you export your animation, custom rotation order might be necessary to bypass the gimbal lock problem. This problem does not occur in Cascadeur itself because instead of Euler angles it uses quaternions for calculating rotations.

Is exported
If this is enabled, the object is exported to the FBX format. Otherwise, the object is ignored during export.

Export translate animation
If this is enabled, the object's transations (changes in its coordinates) are exported to the FBX format. Otherwise, they are ignored.

Export rotate animation
If this is enabled, the object's rotations (changes in its spatial orientation) are exported to the FBX format. Otherwise, they are ignored

Export scale animation
If this is enabled, the object's scale is exported to the FBX format. Otherwise, the scale reamains constant.

Use namespaces
If this is enabled, the name of the exported object would include its namespace. This can be used when a scene has two or more identical objects (such as two characters with the same mesh), so the namespace is necessary to distinguish them.
Otherwise, the namespace is ignored.
Disabled by default

Mesh object

This set of options defines how Meshes are show in the Viewport.

Render layer
This defines how the mesh object is rendered in the scene:
Ghosted means the object’s Ghosts (are drawn on top of the object itself (so they won’t be obscured by it).
Mesh means the object’s Ghosts are not drawn at all.
Reference means the mesh is rendered as a reference object: semi-transparent and behind all other objects.
By default, the Ghosted option is used.

Is transparent
If this is enabled, the mesh object is rendered as transparent.
Disabled by default.

Is both side
If this is enabled, the mesh object is rendered as two-sided (normally, a mesh has only one visible side).
Also disabled by default.

Always show textures
If this is enabled, textures applied to the mesh are always visible, even under Edit Modes (such as Point Controller Mode) where they normally aren't.

Use color
If this is enabled, you can set a custom color for the mesh (using the Color parameter).
Disabled by default.

Color
Sets a custom color for the mesh. Only works when Use color is enabled.

Linked objects
The list of the Joints linked to the mesh and used to deform it.

Creating Meshes

Cascadeur also includes options for creating basic meshes such as cubes, spheres, cylinders etc.

These options are available in the Commands menu:

These additional meshes are generally used to outline the scene environment, but they can be parented to Joints and rigged just as well.

Snapping Meshes to the Center of Mass

When you import meshes into Cascadeur, you need to attach them to a Center of Mass for them to work correctly.

To do this:

1. Select the mesh.

2. Select the Center of Mass.

3. Select Center of Mass → Snap mesh to the center of mass from the Scripts menu:

 

See Also

Selecting Objects