Actor Read Mode
In the advanced settings, every Actor has a "ReadMode" item which specifies how this particular Actor will read in the monitor data.
Snapshot Read Mode
- USING_DATA_STORED_IN_PARENTS_QUANTITY_MODEL: Every Actor belongs to a quantity (it is rendering the data of this quantity) and each quantity has a model which stores the data. In this mode, the Actor reads in the data stored in the quantity model.
- SLICE_PLANE_SNAPSHOT_FOR_SPECIFIED_QUANTITY: The Actor reads in the data at a particular slice plane of a particular snapshot for the specified quantity. (refer to the Snapshot section.)
- DOMAIN_SNAPSHOT_FOR_SPECIFIED_QUANTITY: The Actor reads in the data of entire Domain at a particular snapshots for the specified quantity. This option is usually used for isosurface related Actors because constructing an isosurface needs, in general, the data of the whole Domain and it is not possible to read in only a particular slice of data.
The Snapshot Read Mode is efficient because instead of loading data of all the snapshots, it only read in the data of a particular snapshot.
Animation Read Mode
- SLICE_PLANE_ANIMATION_FOR_SPECIFIED_QUANTITY: The actor reads in the data of all the snapshots at a particular slice plane for the specified quantity (so it can be used for an animation).
The Animation Read Mode is useful when you create an animator, because animator needs the data of all the snapshots in order to play the animation smoothly.