Using winding rules

These fill rules are complicated, but in some situations they are necessary. For example, consider drawing a star shape. With the standard even-odd rule, the shape would require ten different lines. With the non-zero winding rule, those ten lines are reduced to five. Here is the ActionScript for a star with five lines and a non-zero winding rule:

graphics.beginFill(0x60A0FF); 
graphics.drawPath( Vector.<int>([1,2,2,2,2]),  Vector.<Number>([66,10, 23,127, 122,50, 10,49, 109,127]),   GraphicsPathWinding.NON_ZERO);

And here is the star shape:

A star shape using different winding rules

A.

Even-odd 10 lines

B.

Even-odd 5 lines

C.

Non-zero 5 lines

And, as images are animated or used as textures on three-dimensional objects and overlap, the winding rules become more important.