6.20. Menu: Signs/Text

6.20. Menu: Signs/Text

Fig.80 signs menu
Fig.80: Figure Editor: Menu Signs/Text

6.20.1. New Text or Sign

Simple words and signs, not animated
To use this kind of design, the text option “Morphing Text” should be selected.

Fig.81 text options dialog
Fig.81: Figure Editor: Dialog for text options

After having made the appropriate adjustments, click “Close Window”. When activating the text tool with left mouse click, the new settings have effect: In the drawing area, click at the starting point of the first letter: The dialog box for entering the desired text shows up. Please confirm with OK after having typed the text.

This procedure is good if only single words shall be projected. Longer texts will be cut at their end. If longer texts should be displayed and text wrap is necessary, please repeat the above procedure per text line or use the following text creation method.

Long texts, animated -> Morphing Text
Long texts and animated texts need to be created directly in the text dialog. The checkbox “Morphing Text” needs to be checked.

Right click on the A symbol to open the Text Editor. The text can then be entered into the text box in the left column:

Fig.82 write longer texts
Fig.82: Text Editor: Write longer texts here

When having entered the text, Showeditor automatically shapes the text correctly when “Create” is clicked. The continuous text is automatically wrapped in a way that not too many characters must be displayed at one – this avoids flickering of the text projection, as it doesn’t stress the scanner motors too much. When clicking “Create”, a dialog box opens asking, if the characters should morph. This effect makes the transition from one text line to the next one much smoother, as the characters seem to re-shape from the old character to the new one. So if this is a desired effect, click yes.

The Drawing Area shows the first frame of the text animation sequence. To see all frames of the figure, drag the horizontal scroll bar in the left column of the Figure Editor, just under the “Frames per Second” button. This allows for checking each frame of the figure individually.

IMPORTANT: If a text is created within the Text Editor, a New Figure is generated automatically when “Create” is clicked. This means that any changes to the previous figure, that haven’t been saved, will be erased!

Long texts, animated -> Scrolling Text
Scrolling, animated text can be created in two different ways:

A: Using the text box in the Text Editor window (Right click on the A symbol to opens the Text Editor), just enter the text and change the radio button from “Morphing Text” to “Scrolling Text”.
An additional setting is important to be made for Scrolling Text: The coordinates of the area in which the text shall scroll must be specified. The X and Y values can be directly entered in the area above the “Create” button. As it’s not easy to guess the X and Y values for the desired position, there is another option for proper positioning – see B.

IMPORTANT: If a text is created within the Text Editor, a New Figure is generated automatically when “Create” is clicked. This means that any changes to the previous figure, that haven’t been saved, will be erased!

B: To create a running text without the need to enter X and Y coordinates for the scroll-area definition, first settings in the Text tool options should be checked for being set to “Scrolling Text” (Right click on the A symbol to opens the Text Editor). Then do not click on “Create”, but just close the window. Again select the text tool (“A”) with a left click and then draw the scrolling area by click and drag in the drawing are. The text-entry dialog opens and the scrolling text can be entered.
This method is the most convenient one, and used in most cases.

IMPORTANT: As this method does not use the Text-Editor for the creation of a multi-frame figure, but uses the direct text feature of the Figure Editor, existing frames are not erased and no new figure is created on using the tool. Due to this it is possible to display several running texts in one figure - even different scroll speeds per scrolling text line are possible!

Special Characters handling
Special characters may not be displayable with the desired font. As there are many different characters possible, the Text-Editor comes with an additional drawing area for special characters. The Character can be entered (or copy-pasted) into the input box and then the visible points as well as blank points for this very character can be drawn – and saved. If they have been saved, it is possible to use this special character within the text as if it was possible to display it with the very font – the Text Editor will substitute the special character (which didn’t display properly before) with the hand drawn one.

Fig.83 apply special characters
Fig.83: Text Editor: Special Characters can be copy-pasted to the input box and then be redrawn manually in the drawing grid

 

6.20.2. Enable SMS

Laserworld Showeditor supports the handling of Text Messages (SMS) for laser projection interactivity. The mobile SIEMENS TC35I GSM module is supported. Other mobile receivers haven’t been tested yet, but may work.

Fig.84 enable sms
Fig.84: Figure Editor: Menu Signs/Text Enable SMS

A control window for the SMS display shows. Choose the COM port the mobile receiver is connected to. A baud-rate of 19200 should be sufficient. If distortions happen, a slower baud-rate is recommended.

A click on “OK” establishes the connection to the mobile receiver and (if not done yet) to the mobile provider (requires PIN code of the mobile card). It is recommended to switching on the mobile in advance and entering the PIN-code.
If this has already been done, the request of the software asking for the PIN can be skipped by entering “xxxx”. It should work to enter the PIN in the software as well, but in case of a transmission error the mobile receiver might become locked unintendedly.

The upper left area of the dialog (GSM Status) shows the actual status information.

The lower left area shows the received messages. The currently displayed message with the laser is marked in the message table. Clicking on the very message allows for editing it.

The way of displaying the messages can be set in the upper right area of the dialog (Laser output): morphed or scrolling text are options for output, “None” suppresses any output.

A “bad word filter” can be set in the text area on the lower right. Words of this list show as XXX in the output. Bad word lists can also be saved and loaded again.

The “Read all SMS from mobile” area provides several logging and reply features.

SMS from File or SMS from TC53i
In general the SMS should be handled by the TC35i. In addition to that there are several programs available that convert SMS to *.txt-files (e.g. http://www.t2slive.co.uk). These *.txt-files then can be imported into the program and handled like original TC35i messages.

 

Read more: 6.20. Menu: Signs/Text

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