Plan for David "Fulcrum" Wyand

Welcome to the first in a series of frequently infrequent talks about Torque Constructor. Woohoo!

What is Torque Constructor
Torque Constructor is a .map (as in the .map file format) editing and .dif (the Torque interior file format) producing program being developed primarily by Matt Fairfax and myself under the direction of GarageGames. You may have seen the Development Snapshot of the Day posted back in March where the project was first announced. If you're familiar with programs like Valve's Hammer, with a smattering of traditional 3D apps such as NewTek's LightWave or Luxology's Modo, then you'll understand Constructor.

What I will NOT talk about
OK, let's get this out of the way up front. In this Deconstructing Constructor series I'll not be discussing release dates or pricing in these little talks. Some of you may jump up and down and wave your arms demanding this information, but all you'll get are funny looks. I'm the developer and not the publisher, so I cannot provide this information. I hope we'll not have to speak of this again. Please, don't make me get Pat's knife wielding monkey. :o)

Discussion: Constructor's GUI Layout
Constructor's primary window GUI has been designed to allow the user to modify its arrangement to suit their particular needs. Constructor will ship with a number of pre-built layouts to get you started. Here's a couple of examples, although unlikely to be the final versions:

Default Constructor Layout showing Tim Aste's church from his Content Pack 1
Larger Version

Mini Constructor Layout showing Tim Aste's church from his Content Pack 1
Larger Version

Both of these arrangements were built from scratch from within Constructor, and saved to be accessible under the Layout menu. The process of building your own layout is straightforward: you add horizontal and vertical splitters, drag them about, and fill the resultant panes with Forms. For example, the upper left pane in the Default layout above is filled with the Tools Form, which includes all of the buttons and tabs to access the various plug-in tools.

If you're one of those fortunate people that have a wide-screen monitor, there's nothing stopping you from having more than four 3D views. Below is an example of Constructor running across my two monitors giving an effective workspace of 2048x768. By strategically placing the 3D view's splitters along the center of my two monitors, none of the 3D views need cross from one monitor to the other. In fact, with this much real estate, I could have a Tools Form on both the left and right of the window to cut down on my mousing around.

Wow, that's big!
Larger Version

Finally, I've put together a 9MB Quicktime movie showing the process of building Constructor's default layout from scratch:

Take me there, baby!

Until next time, enjoy!

- LightWave Dave

NOTE: This .plan is now continued here.