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Surface Explorer 4D offers different projection methods to map geometry onto your screen. You can cycle through these modes using the dedicated button in the bottom status bar:
- Perspective: Standard 3D perspective projection with depth perception.
- Stereographic: A conformal projection that maps the geometry onto a sphere before projecting it onto the screen, producing a characteristic wide, curved distortion.
- Orthogonal: Flat, parallel projection without depth distortion. Ideal for technical visualization and exact proportional sizing.
Field of View (Fov slider): in the Renderer dock, from 20° to 110° (default 45°), for whatever drives the camera. A wider angle helps when flying inside a surface along a camera path, where nearby walls loom much less at 60–70°; in Orthogonal mode the slider acts as a zoom.
Important: When using Perspective or Stereographic modes, if the surface moves too close to the camera (near-clipping plane), visual artifacts or "holes" may appear. If this happens, try switching the projection mode to
Orthogonal.
In
Stereographic mode there is a second, different case: a surface passing close to the projection pole gets a rippled rim, and 4D rotations can move it onto the pole. See
4D Rotations in
The 4th Dimension for which rotations to prefer.
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