class Technique;
/**
-Combines a Mesh with a Technique to give it an appearance. The Technique will
-define which render passes the Object supports.
+Combines a Mesh with a Technique for a complete model.
-In many cases, it's desirable to include multiple copies of an Object in a
-Scene, with different model matrices. ObjectInstances can be used to alter the
-rendering of an object on a per-instance basis.
+An object does not have a model matrix and will be rendered at origin if used
+by itself. The ObjectInstance class provides a way to position objects in a
+scene and customize them in other ways.
-Objects can have multiple levels of detail. The most detailed level has index
-0, with increasing indices having less detail. When rendering an instance, the
-instance's get_level_of_detail method is called to determine which LoD to use.
+Objects can have multiple levels of detail, with different resources. The most
+detailed level has index 0, with increasing indices having less detail. When
+rendering an instance, the instance's get_level_of_detail method is called to
+determine which LoD to use.
+
+An Object can be rendered with any tag its Technique supports. Unknown tags
+are silently ignored.
*/
class Object: public Renderable, private ResourceObserver
{
/** Sets the mesh for the highest level of detail (index 0). */
void set_mesh(const Mesh *m) { set_mesh(0, m); }
- /** Sets the mesh for a given level of detail. Previous LoDs must have been
- defined. */
+ /** Sets the mesh for a specific level of detail. LoDs must be defined in
+ order, without gaps. If this call creates a new LoD, technique is copied
+ from the previous one. */
void set_mesh(unsigned, const Mesh *);
private:
/** Sets the technique for the highest level of detail (index 0). */
void set_technique(const Technique *t) { set_technique(0, t); }
- /** Sets the technique for a given level of detail. Previous LoDs must have
- been defined. */
+ /** Sets the technique for a specific level of detail. LoDs must be defined
+ in order, without gaps. If this call creates a new LoD, mesh is copied from
+ the previous one. */
void set_technique(unsigned, const Technique *);
const Technique *get_technique(unsigned = 0) const;