A Scene is the highest-level element in the Vortex® hierarchy and allows you to position and connect the elements of the scene (mechanisms, terrain, etc.) together.In addition, you can add extensions in the scene (for example, custom lights and input controllers).

What You Can Do With Scenes

Vortex scenes allow you to test out the dynamics objects you built in the Vortex Studio Editor.

You start by importing mechanisms into the scene and adding any extensions you might need. For example, you could add a joystick extension which will enable you to control an object when testing the scene.

If you use an external controller like a joystick, you will need to connect it to Vortex by establishing the mappings in the Connection Editor. The Connection Editor allows you to connect extensions to Vortex object parameters or VHL Interfaces.

You can also set up a terrain for the scene. Once you have your mechanisms and terrain set up, you will position them in the scene.

To optimize the simulation, you can limit the number of collision calculations by establishing a set of rules for which objects should be considered for collision detection if they come in contact with each other.

You can debug by playing the scene in the Vortex Studio Editor or by using a custom application.

Adding Mechanisms

Mechanisms are a critical part of your test scene, as they contain the dynamics objects that will interact with other mechanisms.

Note Since terrains are a type of mechanism in Vortex® 2020a, you can use this procedure to load a terrain mechanism.

1. If you are not already in the Scene editor, either open an existing scene or create a new one.

2. Do one of the following:

   • Load an empty Mechanism (.vxmechanism) file and then you can open and modify it (see Mechanisms for information).
   • Load one or more existing Mechanism (.vxmechanism) file(s).

3. Once you have imported your mechanisms and terrain, you can lay them out in the scene by transforming the mechanisms using the selection and transform tools.