realbasic-plugins
[Top] [All Lists]

Re: [OT] GL Plugin Worthyness (Was: Maybe a way to register global const

To: REALbasic Plugins <realbasic-plugins at lists dot realsoftware dot com>
Subject: Re: [OT] GL Plugin Worthyness (Was: Maybe a way to register global constants?)
From: Frank Condello <developer at chaoticbox dot com>
Date: Fri, 16 Dec 2005 18:13:29 -0500
Delivered-to: realbasic-plugins at lists dot realsoftware dot com
References: <3A710B42-C352-4D33-9B91-F04FC553B604 at sqlabs dot net> <CAC84461-C87A-4EEB-8388-73CEF234F8C8 at realsoftware dot com> <71CCFA99-4B1E-49C8-A846-03BB2AB99015 at sqlabs dot net> <95344E36-E288-4106-9D3B-AA1098E00369 at elfdata dot com> <F1DAF93C-DE25-4B09-BA4E-E5AE38BD36C8 at chaoticbox dot com> <8F577F49-EEB4-4605-A99E-DAB716BBB751 at elfdata dot com> <16EB6F6B-6926-491F-818E-3289820F9914 at chaoticbox dot com> <143BFBCF-834A-470E-8C68-85ECB482BD50 at elfdata dot com> <2BAEA61F-107A-4156-929A-200BBFA9EE17 at elfdata dot com>
On 16-Dec-05, at 7:24 AM, Theodore H. Smith wrote:

I'd like to see a nice OpenGL plugin that allowed for good games or other 3D apps (visualisation of biological data perhaps), could keep it's speed up compared with modern games, had a simple structure and was extensible so that you could play around with it's internals even if you eventually found that the default settings were usually the best to use. Having collision detection, kinesematics (or whatever it's called it's when one object is moved relative to another), animated textures, bollards (for the animated textures), etc etc.

I think you're asking for too much :) This is exactly the problem with most of the generic scene graphs that already exist - they handle just about any data you throw at them, but aren't optimized for any of it - Or, they have optimized paths for a bunch of specific things, but are bloated beyond practical use.

There's generally two approaches that work best: Create the engine for the specific application, only adding what you actually need for that application. Implement everything in a modular fashion, and use only the modules you actually need for a particular app. You can leave out the reverse kinematics and rigid body collision modules for tic-tac-toe ;)

Something like that would really be nice.

Oh yeah now I remember, in addition to all of that some kind of depth sorting is necessary.

Yup, transparency depth sorting is one of the toughest problems to solve for realtime graphics. There's a few ways to do it, and games rarely if ever do it the "proper" way - they basically all "cheat", and it's up to the artists to work within the limitations.

Really it quickly became so much work to do all this 3d stuff, even a very simple game like "3d tic tac toe", that I knew it wasn't worth it unless you have a proper thorough understanding of OpenGL and game/demo making by an OpenGL master or were willing to become one. Then write fast and powerful framework that makes coding nice and simple for the developer. Someone has to make it easy for the rest of us :)

Well that's what Rb3D/Quesa are for :)

Frank.
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Open Source RB Goodies and Shareware
<http://developer.chaoticbox.com/>
<http://www.chaoticbox.com/>
–––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

_______________________________________________
Unsubscribe or switch delivery mode:
<http://www.realsoftware.com/support/listmanager/>

Search the archives of this list here:
<http://support.realsoftware.com/listarchives/lists.html>


<Prev in Thread] Current Thread [Next in Thread>