3D surface warping

Pull the surface model itself until it sits on the real object. Every projector lighting it follows at once.

Use this for object mapping: a built set, a car, a sculpture, a stage element that doesn't quite match the drawing. You work in the 3D viewport on the Scene tab, in two stages: first choose the points you want to move, then move them.

The three viewport modes

The mode switch is in the toolbar at the top of the viewport, beside the display modes (Mesh, UV, Lux and Beams).

Mode	Key	What it's for	Vertices shown
Object	V	Moving whole objects, such as surfaces and projectors, with the transform gizmo	None
Point Select	E	Choosing which points of the surface you'll pull, and how far each pull reaches	All
Warp	W	Moving those points	Only the selected ones

The camera works the same way in all three: left-drag orbits, right-drag pans and scroll zooms. With the pointer over the viewport, F frames the selection (a projector or a surface), or the whole model when nothing is selected. P switches to the selected projector's point of view and back.

When Point Select or Warp is on, a line under the toolbar says what you're working on and what to do next, for example Warp · Projector 1 on Screen — click a picked point, then drag its arrows to move it. Both modes are grayed out until the scene has a surface and a projector. While either one is on, Rotate, Scale, the pivot tool and World / Local are grayed out, because they move whole objects. Switch to Object mode to use them.

Pick a projector first

Selection sets belong to one projector and one surface. Until you select a projector, the Point Select and Warp panels read Select a projector first. See Projectors.

Stage 1: build a selection with Point Select

Press E. Every vertex of the surface appears as a point. Hover a point to preview the brush: every point it would affect lights up, green in Add mode and red in Subtract mode.

Click a point to add it to the active selection set. It becomes a large white center, and the points around it shade from indigo toward amber. The more amber a point is, the more of the move it will take.

If no set is active, clicking creates a new set called Selection 1, even when other sets exist. To add to an existing set, choose it under Active Set first.

Radius and softness

Two sliders in the sidebar set how far a pull reaches.

Control	Range	What it does
Radius	0 – 1000	How far the influence reaches, in hundredths of a unit of the model's own geometry. If you scale the surface, the reach scales with it. The default, 50, is half a unit. At 0, only the clicked point is selected.
Softness	0 – 100	How much of the radius is a gradual falloff. At 0, everything inside the radius moves by the same amount, leaving a hard step at the edge. At 100, the default, the movement eases from full strength at the center to nothing at the edge.

Moonshine remembers both settings on this device between sessions.

You can change them from the keyboard without leaving the viewport:

Key	Action
[ / ]	Radius down / up
Alt+[ / Alt+]	Radius, in steps a fifth the size (Option on a Mac)
Shift+[ / Shift+]	Softness down / up, 5 at a time. Add Alt to change it 1 at a time
X	Switch between Add and Subtract

Radius and softness are set when you click

Each point keeps the radius and softness that were set when you added it. Changing the sliders afterward affects the next point you add, not the points already in the set. To change a point's reach, subtract it and click it again with the new settings.

This lets one set hold a broad point for a gentle pull across a large area and a tight point for a sharp local correction, each with its own reach.

Add and subtract

The Mode switch (green Add, red Subtract) sets what a click does. X switches between them.

• Add puts the clicked point into the set with the current radius and softness.
• Subtract works like an eraser: it removes every center within the current radius of your click, so you can clear a cluster in one click. Set the radius to 0 to remove a single point.

Selection sets

A set is a named group of points, each with its own reach, saved with the project. Keep separate sets for the parts of the object you correct separately (the roofline, the door, the base) so you can come back to any of them later without rebuilding it.

Control	What it does
Active Set	Chooses the set you're editing. Each entry shows its name and point count.
New	Creates an empty set with its own color, so overlapping sets are easy to tell apart. To start a set that already holds every point the projector lights on the surface, use Add Selection Set in the scene graph, the + Add grid or the command palette. That set is named after the projector: Projector 1, then Projector 1 2 for a second set on the same surface.
Rename	Edits the name in place. Enter saves and Esc cancels. You can also rename a set from its node in the scene graph.
Delete	Removes the set.
Clear Selection	Empties the active set but keeps it. Moonshine asks first, naming the set and how many points it will remove.

Rename and Delete appear once a set is active, and Clear Selection once the set has points in it. Below the buttons, a color dot and a point count show the state of the active set.

A set named after its projector follows the projector's name: rename the projector and Projector 1 2 becomes Stage Left 2. If you've given the set a name of your own, it keeps it. The new name shows everywhere the set appears, including a Material's Limit to.

Show soft selection shows or hides the amber halo. Turn it off when the halos in a dense set overlap so much that you can't see the centers. The centers stay visible either way.

Stage 2: move the points in Warp mode

Press W. The unselected vertices disappear, leaving your selection centers.

1. In the sidebar's Warp Settings, check that Target Selection shows the set you want. If the projector has no sets yet, the panel tells you to pick points with Point Select first.
2. Click one of the points. A three-axis gizmo appears on it: red for X, green for Y, blue for Z.
3. Drag an arrow to move the point along that axis. The surface deforms as you drag, and anyone else viewing the same surface sees it move.
4. Click another point to move the gizmo there. Click empty space or press Esc to hide the gizmo.

Key	Action
Left Right	Nudge the active point along X
Up Down	Nudge the active point along Y
Shift + any arrow	Nudge in steps a fifth the size
Esc	Hide the gizmo
Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Shift+Z	Undo / redo your warp edits

The arrow keys move along X and Y only. For depth, drag the blue arrow.

To finish a correction, drag close to the target, then step back to where you can see the object properly and make the last adjustment from the keyboard.

What "soft" does

When you move a point, its neighbors move with it in the same direction, scaled by how strongly each one is influenced.

• Inside the point's inner core, neighbors move the full distance, like the center.
• Between the core and the edge of the radius, the movement eases off to nothing.
• Softness sets the size of the core. At 0, the core fills the whole radius, so everything moves together with a hard edge. At 100, there's no core, and the result is a smooth dome centered on the point.
• Points outside the radius don't move.

Only the active point's radius and softness apply to a drag. The other centers in the set are handles you can grab next; they add no influence to this one.

One soft pull with a generous radius usually works better than several hard pulls. It keeps the surface smooth, so content moving across the correction doesn't visibly kink.

Working with other operators

Several operators can build selections and pull on the same surface at the same time. You see their cursors and their edits live, and nothing is locked. Ctrl+Z takes back your own edits: it returns the points your pull reached to where they were, which also undoes a colleague's later move in that area. See Editing a surface together.

Bake Warp and Revert to Source work differently: only one operator can use them at a time. They're disabled while another operator holds the warp lock for the surface, which anyone with the Warp tab open on it does. See Locks.

When you are happy with it

Your sculpting reaches the projectors as you work. Baking sets the shape the show machine restores the next time the project opens. Bake Warp, Revert to Source and Reset Warp are in the same Warp Settings panel, which also shows whether the surface has a bake. The dot in the top bar shows whether you've edited since. Read Baking and reverting next.