Global scene building tools

The global scene gathers all the objects according to their relative position, in a referential based on the cardinal points. In Construction mode, the shading obstacles are represented in black and the sensitive area of the PV fields in blue.

Creation

Create objects with the "Create" menu, PVsyst handles many types of objects including :

PV fields: several kinds: tables and arrays of tables, arrays of domes, arrays of trackers, rectangular, polygonal, sun-shields.
Elementary objects: a variety of 2D an 3D predefined shapes,
Building / Composed object: an assembly of elementary shapes. “Buildings” can be saved as models to reuse in other shading scenes. They can’t include PV fields, which should be added independently in the global scene.
Ground objects

History

Executing actions like creating, selecting or editing objects will save changes in a history that you can undo or redo.

Undo - Ctrl+Z

Redo - Ctrl+Y

Selection

Default object selection - Esc

Click on any object to select it, in Technical view you must click on the edges to be able to select an object.

Rectangle selection - Shift+Ctrl+R

Click and drag to draw a selection rectangle.
You can specify if you want to select all objects touching the rectangle or only the ones inside it.

Lasso selection - Ctrl+Ctrl+L

Click and drag to draw a selection zone.
You can specify if you want to select all objects touching the zone or only the ones inside it.

Hold Shift to add objects to the current selection.

Hold Ctrl to remove an object from the current selection.

Press Ctrl+A to select all objects of the scene.

Point of view

Pan

Click and drag to move the point of view along its plane.
When another tool is selected, hold Shift and Middle Button to pan.

Rotate view

Click and drag to rotate the point of view around its current target.
When another tool is selected, hold Middle Button to rotate.

Perspective view - F2

Click to revert the point of view to the basic perspective position.
If down, the current view is a perspective one.

Top view - F3

Front view - F4

Side view - F5

Sun view - F6

Set the point of view at the current sun position.

Zoom in - F7

Zoom out - F8

Zoom rectangle

Click and drag to draw a rectangle and set it as the new viewport.

Zoom to fit - Ctrl+F

This zooms the view in order to see all selected objects in the current viewport.

Render options

Technical / Realistic view

Technical view: Objects are drawn in wireframe, they can only be selected when clicking on their edges.
Colors are defined by the type of object and its selection status.
Lighting and real-time shadows are disabled.

Realistic view: Objects are drawn in a more realistic way, and can be selected by a click on any visible part.
Colors can be customized for each object.
Lighting is enabled, real-time shadows can be enabled.

Perspective / Orthogonal projection

Orthogonal projection is the default one, it is advised to use it when building the scene.

Perspective projection can be used to get a more realistic view of the scene, when generating the shadows video or in the report

Module strings

Show module strings defined in Module Layout.

Other render options

From the menu "View / Render options", you can enable/disable the following :

Anti-aliasing: Enable it to smooth the objects edges rendering.
- This may not be available depending on your hardware setup, and it may also reduce performance.
Real-time shadows: Enable it to render shadows at real-time.
- Shadows on PV fields are always rendered when moving the sun, but this allows to see all shadows always.
- Enabling it may reduce performance.
Camera animation: When moving to another view, the transition can be animated or not.
- Enabling it may slightly reduce performance.
Backfaces: You can show or hide objects backfaces, i.e, faces that are not facing the point of view.
- Hiding backfaces will increase performance.