Overview

You probably have a number of other programs that you use on a daily basis. Most people have a word processor and a spreadsheet program, along with utilities for virus protection and Internet security. Business users typically have a personal information manager and database. Frequently, computer users use one program to create data that ends up in a different program. For example, you might create a spreadsheet, then move the spreadsheet data to a word processing document, or you might insert text from a word processing document into an AutoCAD drawing.

As a VIZ user, you'll have the same needs as others to create data in one program and move it to another. As in most of this book's examples, your designs will most likely begin in a CAD program before they are brought to VIZ. At the other end of the process, VIZ images may also be destined for a page on the Internet, which may require the use of a web page design program.

On the other hand, your rendered image from VIZ may be part of a printed presentation that is being produced in Adobe Photoshop or in another image-editing program.

There are also VIZ features and operations that involve working with an image-editing program like Photoshop. For example, you will want to create and edit custom material maps, which requires an image editor. In this chapter, you'll explore ways that you might use an image-editing program...