[Opensim-users] Collada

[Paul Fishwick]

Toni Alatalo wrote:
>  
> Someone asked for my strategy for dealing with 3d data. Well for us at 
> Playsign it's pretty simple, we have models made for games and some 
> other things, and the plan has been to keep everything in Blender 
> trusting that we can import anything and export to everywhere from 
> there. I've participated in Blender development myself so it's easy to 
> trust it. So far have used mostly Soya3d and Ogre, for which there are 
> direct exporters, and looked at e.g. Papervision3d (that would use via 
> the Collada export). There is also an Ogre importer. We don't use SL, 
> but are looking at Rex and working on it 'cause might be able to use it.
>
>   

 From the standpoint of yet another user of OpenSim, I echo this desire 
to use Blender (which
we use on other projects) for forming and manipulating geometry and then 
being able
to import into SL. The actual format (Collada, X3D,...) to us is less 
important than the sheer
ability to enrich the variety of geometry types that SL can display 
(perhaps through he evolving
Rex viewer). In-world SL-style prim construction is nice, but it just 
doesn't cut it for richer
environments. Meshes are a good start. Also, how about the parametric 
nature of spline
surfaces (this would be efficient from a communications standpoint since 
the client does the
leg-work on rendering the surfaces)?

-p

-- 
Paul Fishwick, PhD
Professor and Director, Digital Arts and Sciences Programs
University of Florida
Computer & Information Science and Eng. Dept.
Bldg. CSE, Room 301
P.O. Box 116120
Gainesville, FL 32611
Email: fishwick at cise.ufl.edu
Phone: (352) 392-1414
Fax: (352) 392-1220
Web: http://www.cise.ufl.edu/~fishwick