Using the Center to control the perspective of effects

The Center is the + point that appears when you select a face. It can be used as the origin point in many Group effects and helps you add perspective to your mapping.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

• What's the Point?
• Using the center instead of the default origin
• Placing the Center of a Face
• Animating the Position of a Center
• Using Controls to Animate Coordinates Remotely

What's the Point?

The Center is a geometric property of a face. It's a point that, while it doesn't serve the same purpose as other regular vertices, behaves similarly in the canvas.

It is used to change the vanishing point of compatible Group effects, allowing you to adjust the perspective illusion.

Each face has a unique Center, which remains the same across all sequences where the face is used (like other geometric features, it is saved in Maps).

Note: The Center of a face cannot be deleted.

Using the center instead of the default origin

To see the impact of the Center, you first need to toggle a compatible effect and set "Center" as the Origin point in the Path category.

Now, when you move the Center point, you'll see the origin adapt to it. Since the Center of a face coincides with its center of gravity by default, you need to move it first to see any change.

The compatible effects are: all Outline effects, Rotation, Inside, Outside, Hypnotic, Mosaic, Radial Glow, Round Trip, and Elastic.

Note: If you don't want your effects to be rendered outside of the Group outline, check "Clip the overflow of Group effects" in Edit → Preferences... → Output → Overflow.

This will give you the following appearance:

Placing the Center of a Face

By default, Centers appear when you select their faces. You can also make them visible all the time by enabling "Show All Centers" from the View menu.

Adjusting Its Position from the Canvas

Like any other regular vertex, you can move the Center by selecting it and dragging it with your mouse pointer or using the arrow keys.

If you enable the Magnet Snap , you can even snap Centers together. This way, they'll coincide and be considered as the same point when you edit their properties. To unsnap, simply drag one away.

Adjusting Coordinates from the Properties

You can also edit the position of a Center from the Properties panel on the left. When a Center is selected (or its associated face), its X and Y coordinates are displayed.

Note: The (0,0) origin of the coordinates is the top-left corner of the Canvas.

Resetting Its Position

If you wish to reset the position of a Center so that it coincides with the center of gravity again, you can do so with the button in the Properties panel or with the option in the "Transform" category in the right-click menu.

Note: When a Center is in its default position, it is not affected by shape transformations until you edit it manually, i.e., it stays stuck to the center of gravity.

Animating the Position of a Center

Using LFOs to Automate the Variation of a Coordinate

The coordinates of a Center can be animated with automatic variators! As you can see in the Properties, each coordinate has an LFO selector, similar to those found on some Group effect parameters.

Simply select a type of variation and adjust the min and max limits of the range in which the Center will vary

Learn about the different variations available in the LFO article.

Using Controls to Animate Coordinates Remotely

The coordinate spinboxes and variation type selector are learnable elements, meaning you can assign them a Keyboard, MIDI, or OSC control.

Note: At the moment, the controls you assign will only affect the selected Center (or Centers if they are snapped together) regardless of the sequence or map you're in: you can't target a specific Center.