| Author | Message | ||
     SamualT Rating: N/A |
I have been looking around for some programs to do simple Stereo 3D Demos and Games (3D Pong type stuff). I could just drop to the C++ or Visual Basic ( http://is6.pacific.net.hk/~edx/contents.htm ) level and do some OpenGL ( http://www.opengl.org/ ) programming or even DirectX. However, not only do you have to learn your API of choice, like OpenGL, but create a 3d graphics engine and physics engine also. That is really a little lower level than I want. There are engines for those things I could use but your still at a very low level. Blah. Incidentally, I did find an Open Source program for rendering things in Stereo 3D with OpenGL. But it looked like it died on the vine over a year ago. Interested parties can see StereoGL ( http://sourceforge.net/projects/stereogl ). At least they had some alpha code which may be informative. I really think they took the wrong direction with it though. They had some good ideas on their Homepage. Then I came across things like 3D Game Studio. ( http://www.conitec.net/a4info.htm ). It is an interesting program, very professional. But it only works in DirectX and has no stereo support built-in. And I think it is really too much for what I had in mind. It is a complete game builder, like for first person shooters and stuff. That goes a little beyond the demos and pong games I wish to write. LOL. See Renderware also ( http://www.renderware.com/ ) I also found DarkBasic ( http://www.darkbasic.co.uk/ ) but it is also DirectX only. I was hoping for something that also supported OpenGL. This program also looked interesting but costs allot of money with all the confusing expansion packs. It also has no built-in stereo support. There seem to be lots of these kind of Game-Kits around. I don't think they're for me. BTW, you can find a CRAP LOAD of good 3D programming links (not necessarily stereo 3d) at Ultimate 3D Links ( http://www.3dlinks.com/ ). Look under Programming in the left column. Perhaps low-level programming and Game-Kits are not the way to go. I remember the really old DOS programs like Rend386/VR386 and Avril (all versions of the same engine http://www.ece.uwaterloo.ca/~broehl/avril.html ). It was a kind of open source Virtual Reality platform that supported just about everything. I had the shutter glasses and Cyberglove working with it. It was too cool! (Pre Doom/Quake days. It wasn't too hard to impress us ;-) So now I'm thinking maybe a true Virtual Reality engine may be the way to go. The advantages are that they support many types of input devices, usually support stereo 3D, and are easy to program/script. The disadvantages are the graphics aren't quite as advanced as Doom/Quake/Unreal engines and they really arn't set up to make games, although it's possible with most to do so. Does anyone here use software to create Virtual Worlds? Do you know of any good VR Editors? Do you use any kind of Game builder? Or, am I the only one interested in this stuff? Thanks for any info............SamualT | ||
| tj Rating: N/A |
Good topic. This may seem like a lame, typical suggestion, but Direct3D has a "retained mode" that lets you control high-level 3D objects within larger 3D scenes. This, as opposed to D3D's lower-level, but faster and more flexible "immediate mode." Google on either of those quoted terms along with Direct3D to find lots of tutorials. Whatever you develop in D3D will generally support stereo 3D with NVIDIA's drivers. As for an even higher-level resource that's open source, the only thing that comes to my mind is VR Juggler (http://www.vrjuggler.org/). One if its strong points is platform independence, but I've never actually used it. I remember some other things like Sense8's WorldToolKit, but I don't think that was open, and I think some of those world builder tools could've been expensive. Beyond that, there'd be another learning curve and these days my brain hasn't been very well ported beyond C/C++. I wonder if there's a void that just such a "rapid 3D application development" tool could fill. You briefly mentioned physics engines... quite the hot topic in 3D gaming today. I saw the Half-Life 2 demo at E3 - blew me away! Its use of the Havoc/Havoc 2.0 physics engine is very impressive. Everything in the game world has physics and can move... even enemy bodies when you kill them. Check out the video of these ragdolls at Havoc's website! http://www.havok.com/havok2/Fallguy.avi Painkiller (http://www.painkillergame.com) is another awesome looking game that uses Havoc2. I would love to mess around with one of those physics engines. I think they're expensive though. :-( If only there could be an open source physics engine! | ||
| Anonymous Rating: N/A |
Hi, i'm looking around for info on this exact subject, that's how i ended up here. I think stereo 3d has more potential than is being used, so i wanted to do some experimenting. But, i have no idea how i'd access the lcd shutter glasses from within visual basic. It would be helpful to have a "simple" 3d drawing program that lets you draw shapes and place them in 3d space. That's the type of thing i'd like to create if i knew how to talk to the shutterglasses with visual basic... Any ideas? Robt | ||
| Anonymous Rating: N/A |
Richard Scullion's program 3dcombine at www.3dcombine.com is made with Visual Basic and can control shutterglasses but uses opengl display methods. You could email him where he got the routines from. | ||
| Anonymous Rating: N/A |
There's an open source physics engine called ODE. |
