Both the Current Tile (the tile that follows the mouse) and tiles within the design area can be rotated.

Rotating a group of tiles treats the tiles as a single block, where they all move relative to each other, as if the design were imprinted on a rotating disc.

Rotate tiles with the tile rotation keys:

Tile rotation in TileDreams is accomplished through the use of trigonometric algorithms interacting with the planar geometry of horizontal and vertical coordinate points. 

Rotation Multiplier

This process can result in some skewing, due to the need to round decimal values to whole integers when recreating a geometric construction on a computer screen.  Every vertex of every tile is projected however many angle-units (based on the rotation key pressed), clockwise or counter-clockwise, as though it were on a record-turntable.  After a tile is subjected to this trigonometric wringing numerous times, it starts to look like a calculus student studying for mid-terms.   This skewing can be offset by using the Shift and Ctrl rotation modifiers.

• Holding [Shift]  will double the effect of the rotation key
• Holding [Ctrl] will triple the effect of the rotation key

An illustration of the effects of multiple rotations

• The red image is the original design. 
• The green image was generated by rotating the original design using the Ctrl - F8 key combination multiple times until a full 360^o was obtained.
• The blue image was rotated using the F8 key multiple times until a full 360^o was obtained.  This required 3x the amount of rotation algorithms, causing the skewing.

Upon consideration, it becomes clear that there is no need to rotate any group of placed tiles more than 180^o.  Once reaching this point, the designer would be better off rotating in the opposite direction if their design made such rotation necessary.

So how many times do you have to click the button to rotate ¹/₂ way around the circle?  As many times as the base-factor.  The skewing effect at base 5 is not as pronounced by a full 360^o rotation as a tile at base 9.

Group rotation, used sparingly, can allow you to make some impressive and beautiful designs quickly and easily.  Used excessively, it can be an amusing illustration of the need for floating-point precision.

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Last modified: 05/21/04