The Curve Educator was designed to help student's understand the magic behind B-Spline, Hermite and Bezier curves. Be sure to check out the Help Index if you want to get help on a particular topic.
Things you need to know in order to get started quickly:
1) The left
mouse button does all the work. On the Curve Editor panel, clicking
the left mouse button will add/delete a point. Holding down the left
mouse button and moving the mouse will translate/rotate/scale the curve.
(These actions depend on the mode selected on the Curve Editor panel.)
The left mouse button in the "B-Spline Basis Functions" window will
do one of two things. If you "click and drag" over a knot (one of
the red dots at the bottom of the basis functions), you can change the
location of that knot. If you click and drag anywhere other than a knot,
you will update the "time line". (Notice that the corresponding point
in time on the "Curve Editor" panel will be updated.)
2) By selecting a curve from the "Select Curve Type" panel, the type
of curve and/or the knot vector for the curve will be updated. However,
if you modify the knot vector or add more points, the "selected" curve
will no longer be valid. For example, if you choose
"Bezier Curve (Cubic)", then add another point to the Curve Editor
panel or change the knot vector, you will no longer have a Bezier curve
(even though it will still be selected on the Select Curve Type panel.)
3) Because of a bug in java, the "Hermite Basis Functions" Window
does not come up correctly until you "Select [a] Curve Type".
4) By selecting the "Toggle Help Mode", the cursor will change shape,
and the help information will be updated corresponding to mouse
selections.
5) BTW, all help messages displayed on the Curve Educator are
taken from corresponding HTML pages. For this reason, they will
all have "Help Index", and "Back to the Curve Educator" at the
bottom.
6) If you are confused about any of the help information, or anything
else in the Curve Educator, please
send me a note at dav@cs.utah.edu. Thanks.
The Curve Educator is divided into three sections. The Select Curve Type panel. The Curve Editor panel. And the basis function panel which displays either the B-Spline Basis Functions panel or the hermite functions canvas.