3.4. Adding Viewers to ImageLoad

3.4. Adding Viewers to ImageLoad
	Chapter 3. Loading and Viewing Images

Instead of using the Output Inspector (whose display might change with every clicked connector), it is sensible to add a viewer to the network. There are two standard macro modules available in MeVisLab which provide standard viewer configurations for 2D and 3D rendering, namely View2D and View3D. Especially the 2D Viewer is frequently used to examine image processing results within a module pipeline, for example. Once you begin to implement your own applications, you are free to create your own viewer implementations adapted to your special tasks.

3.4.1. Adding the View2D Module

Add a View2D module to your network. In the Modules menu it is located at Modules → Visualization → 2D Viewers → View2D.
The View2D module has one input connector for the image to be rendered, as well as three Inventor inputs.

Feed in the image by connecting the image output of the ImageLoad module with the image input of the View2D module. This is done as follows:

Click the output connector of ImageLoad.
Keep the left mouse button pressed while dragging the connection to the input connector of View2D (white line).
Check that the connection is well-defined (green line).
At the input connector of View2D, release the mouse button and establish the connection (blue line).

Figure 3.15. Setting up the Connection

	Tip
	There are many more ways to connect and to disconnect modules, see Section 3.4, “Connecting, Disconnecting, Moving, and Replacing Connections”.

Although the connection is established, no image rendering has started yet. To initialize rendering, open the View2D panel by double-clicking the View2D module in your network. As you can see, the default panel is the viewer itself.

Figure 3.16. Panel of View2D

The View2D panel provides a standard viewer with many features, like slicing, zooming, windowing, annotations, slab view, cine mode, and many more. A full description of all supported features and how to use them can be found on the View2D help page which you can open from the module's context menu.

The View2D module offers various settings. As the default panel is the viewer, the Settings panel needs to be opened explicitly from the context menu via Show Window → Settings.

Figure 3.17. Opening the Settings Panel of View2D

Figure 3.18. Settings Panel of View2D

Note

	Note
A module always has one automatic panel and may have an arbitrary number of additional panel windows, as defined in an MDL file (in the `.script` file by default). The automatic panel lists all variables, fields and inputs/outputs of the module; the scripted panels may only include a fraction of these fields (see also Section 2.7, “User Interfaces Controls”) or more controls than fields. Figure 3.19. Automatic and Settings Panel of View2D

A module always has one automatic panel and may have an arbitrary number of additional panel windows, as defined in an MDL file (in the .script file by default). The automatic panel lists all variables, fields and inputs/outputs of the module; the scripted panels may only include a fraction of these fields (see also Section 2.7, “User Interfaces Controls”) or more controls than fields.

Figure 3.19. Automatic and Settings Panel of View2D

Now is a good time to save your network as MyFirstNetwork.mlab. You can do this in several ways:

Select File → Save or press the respective keyboard shortcut (for how to get a list of all shortcuts, see the MeVisLab Reference Manual, chapter “Shortcuts”).
Click the disk symbol in the toolbar.

The network modules and all module parameters are stored. Next time you open the network, you will get access to the loaded image at the output of the ImageLoad module immediately.

	Tip
	You can quickly re-open the last twenty networks via the menu bar, File → Recent Files.

	Tip
	The most recent network file can be opened via File → Open Most Recent File which has an own keyboard shortcut.

	Tip
	If the option Auto save MeVisLab documents in the Preferences is selected, MeVisLab networks are auto-saved as `<NetworkName>.mlab.auto` upon major changes. This allows for restoring the networks in case of system crashes. Auto-saved copies are deleted when the according networks are saved.

3.4.2. Adding the View3D Module

The View3D macro module is an easy-to-use application of the SoGVRVolumeRenderer module, which is a high-end, hardware-based image rendering module using 3D textures. Adding the View3D module to the network, we get access to a 3D scene of our example image.

Figure 3.20. Connecting the View3D Module

Figure 3.21. The View3D Panel

In addition to the 3D display offered by the Output Inspector, the View3D viewer comes with several panels on which you can set display details or even record a movie.


3.3. Using the ImageLoad Module		3.5. Alternative Ways to Load Images