4.1.1. Base Colour

The Base Colour or Diffuse controls the basic colour of a model, much like painting with matte paint.

4.1.2. Highlight Colour

The Highlight Colour or Specular controls the shiny highlights on a model. Paint with shades of dark grey to "dirty up" the model and remove highlights, or paint with brighter colours to emulate shiny and metalic surfaces.

4.1.3. Curvy Map

The Curvy Map or Displacement Map distorts the surface of your model.

This is particularly useful in combination with loading existing images from your texture library to quickly add surface detail to a model.

Curvy Displacement Slider

The slider next to the Curvy Map sets the amount of displacement. When in the middle the displacement is zero, to the right of centre displacement is positive, and to the left displacement is negative. You can also right click the slider and enter a numeric value.

4.1.4. Bump Map

The Bump Map is similar to the Curvy Map in that it appears to distort the surface - but in the case of the bump map the distortion does not actually move the mesh, it just creates an illusion of bumps and dents on the surface.

It is useful to add fine details to a model's surface.

Bump Intensity Slider

The slider next to the Bump Map sets the strength of the effect. You can also right click the slider and enter a numeric value.

4.3.1. Symmetry

This is a Primitive modifier that takes effect on Lathe/Blob/Slab objects.
On Lathes it effectively mirrors the 3rd curve to the other side of curves 1 and 2 to make a symmetrical model. See Lathe Tutorial.

On Blob and Slab it mirrors the curve drawn from left to right, and creates a symmetrical object.
N.B. Symmetry takes place in the front view over the grid centre line. To move a symmetrical object away from the centre convert to a mesh first (Press K).

4.3.2. Soft Alpha Blending

Turn on to enable smooth blending with material and texture Alpha channels.

You can load tga files with alpha as "Base Colour" and "Base Light". By default Fog is turned off and the surface will be drawn with a sharp edge wherever alpha is less than 50%
But with Fog turned on the result is a smooth effect.

4.3.3. Glow

When Glow is turned on the model is rendered like an additive layer.

4.3.4. Double Sided

Objects in Curvy are rendered as a thin surface layer. For solid objects Curvy only needs to draw the outer side of this layer.
However for sheet-like objects (eg: A Loft without depth) Curvy needs to draw both sides of the surface.

This check box lets you toggle drawing of the "inside" side of the surface.

This can also be helpful when using Fog and Glow as you will often want to see through the surface to the inside.


N.B. To swap the inside/outside surfaces over you can use "Mesh/Reverse Surface".

4.3.5. Cap Ends

For Lathes - if the curves do not meet at either end of a Lathe you can let Curvy fill in with an End Cap, or leave the object open.

4.3.6. Rounded

For Lathes and Lines - where a Lathe's curves do not meet at a point, and for all Line objects this check box determines the style of the ends of the object.
This has a slightly different effect on Line objects where the end becomes fully rounded into a hemi-sphere, whereas the Lathe gets a smooth looking, flat cap.

4.3.7. Closed Loop

Joins the two ends of a Line object, or the top and bottom of a Lathe object. Useful for making rings, loops and donut shapes.

4.3.8. Quad Cap

A different style for Sphere and Cylinder objects that uses a quad square on top instead of the normal triangle poles.

4.3.9. Skinned

The object will deform with it's controlling Bones skeleton.

4.3.10. Flat Shaded

Gives the object a facetted look and sharpens every edge.