3DF Masquerade is the standalone external tool (included in all 3DF Zephyr versions) to create masks to pair with the images to be processed in 3DF Zephyr. A mask is defined as a specific selection of one (or more) images that allows to force zephyr to ignore the corresponding part in a picture. The first time you run Masquerade useful tooltips will appear on the screen that will teach you the interface basics.


You can find a complete tutorial (and video tutorial) about 3DF Masquerade at the URL http://www.3dflow.net/en/technology/documents/3df-zephyr-tutorials/tutorial-use-masking-tool/


You can load images by simply dragging and dropping them in the main window or from the File menu.


The 3DF Masquerade interface is organized in five main areas:


       1. Folder Navigator - browse the loaded images and shows their status - "(M)" near the filename means that a mask has also been detected in the same directory.

       2. Mask editor - shows the current image and the drawn mask

3. Toolbar - allows access to the masking tools

4. Top toolbar - allows quick access to save/load functions, undo/redo, rotate image and show black and white mask functions

5. Command history - used to undo / redo commands in 3DF Masquerade.




The Rectangle, Polygon and Lasso tools are very similar and most users should be already familiar with them: to mask a certain area (the area you want to process) you can:


- drag a rectangle and click the "mask" button to mask the selected area


- use the left click button to add nodes to the polygon path (double-click to automatically close the polygon) and click the "mask" button to mask the selected area


- drag the lasso and click the "mask" button to mask the selected area.


When the selection has been made, you should see a blue overlay, while when the mask is being applied, you should see a red overlay.


You may also remove a mask subsection using the "remove mask" button.


Using these tools you can add and subtract different ares by keeping the left control/left shift keyboard button pressed when doing an action. You may also undo actions using the CTRL+Z shortcut or by using the command history.


You may also change the zoom value by using the scroll up/down mouse wheel; you may also translate the current view by moving the mouse while the mouse wheel is kept pressed down.


The silhouette tools (red stroke and blue stroke) can be also used to automatically compute the silhouette of the subject by tracing the foreground element (red, which will be masked) and the background element (blue, which won't be masked). You may also quickly swap the foreground/background by using left shift + left click.


You can also delete strokes by dragging the cursor over it and right clicking while dragging.


This tools is very useful especially when the background has a very high contrast with respect to the subject that you want to reconstruct.


A gear shaped function allows you to automatically compute the next silhouette, very useful especially when dealing with turntables. In this case you should consider accessing also the "mask by color" function, useful especially when the background is uniform and in high contrast with the subject.

You may also start the "autocompute" function using ENTER or the "autocompute all" function using CTRL+ENTER.


The "turntable mode" will also compare the current image to the next one when using the autocompute function to better draw the silhouette.


Finally, a tool that automatically removes the background, especially useful with controlled scenarios (i.e., close range/turntable photogrammetry).


All masks are saved as .bim files and are loaded automatically by 3DF Zephyr if saved in the same directory as the images (as long as you have also checked the "mask images" button in the project wizard). You may import masks that have been generated outside 3DF Masquerade into 3DF Zephyr using the _masked suffix.