Question about the 3DS format as native format

[bornemix]

Hi,

I just saw mentioned that this has been discussed previously -- what was the consensus?

I mean, does the 3DS lack some kind of feature that PIE has, or the planned WZM?

If this file format is beneficial to the engine, then it shouldn't be gone to waste, I think.

I think that, even though 3ds wont be used natively, how about including the possibility to make models in 3ds and then insert them in the models folder, and wz will convert it and save a PIE automatically?

Also, it would detect changes in the original file and reconvert them as necessary...

(Or maybe I'm too used to EAR/WAR deployment on J2ee application containers... )

[Per]

does the 3DS lack some kind of feature that PIE has, or the planned WZM?

Yes. Connectors, for one example. Different way of doing animation, for another.

[bornemix]

Thanks.

Couldn't this be solved by using special objects though, for example 2x2x2 objects with a certain color will match ... etc? or something specified in the "description" field of the 3ds specifying what parts should be connected, and where?

[i-NoD]

Is 3DS format GPL-compatible? Overall, it too much work for smth that can be done in a few clicks through current exporter.

[bornemix]

Hi i-NoD,

The implementation issues aside, would it be *useful*?

I don't know about the licensing, but the format is openly used by open source software like Blender. Am I right?

I think that the modellers and mod-makers should be asked for comments?

[i-NoD]

Hey, I'm not resisting
If you feel that you could invest your time into this (since it's not the modelers who'll do this), then who am I do tell you otherwise?

That would require lib3ds or smth equal as a dependency, plus the format is binary, which is bad for tracking diffs.
IMO as long as format is easy to modify/export/track changes it doens't really matter which one we'll use.

[stiv]

The implementation issues aside, would it be *useful*?

I don't know about the licensing, but the format is openly used by open source software like Blender. Am I right?

The format is open in the sense of being reverse engineered. And we have importers/converters in the tools dir as well as Blender. But I believe the format is owned by Autodesk and not officially published. (corrections welcome)

Given the fact that it doesn't support what we need for the game, it doesn't seem useful as a native WZ format.

[bornemix]

The 3DS format has shortcomings, yes, but so does the PIE format (one example: the ordering of vertices, but let's not to mention the hassle of implementation and further development of it!)

So would the shortcomings of the 3DS overweigh the shortcomings of the PIE or WZM?

Also, I found an *open* format which is called OBJ, and it's in clear text like PIE: Wavefront OBJ format

---

My point with all this is that we should not reinvent the wheel when not ***absolutely*** necessary.

And please, let's go beyond the "it would take too much time to change", because it doesn't get us anywhere. Maybe a motivated coder will step up out of nowhere!

Also, about the 3ds format being hard to diff: Only dates should be enough I think...

[Per]

I spent a lot of time investigating other 3D modelling formats, exactly for the reasons you describe. I found none that we could use. It may be possible to use 3DS if we re-use some fields for things they were not originally meant for, but then you use 3DS in non-standard ways and lose the advantages of using a standard format, and probably need a converter program. Besides, it is really neat to be able to run diffs on a text format rather than messing around with binaries.

OBJ is way too simplistic to be really useful. The closest thing I could find were the Quake model formats, but their animation formats are very different than ours (which is a home-brewed system which is not identical to anything else - why of course it is), so it would take an enormous amount of work to adapt.

[i-NoD]

My point with all this is that we should not reinvent the wheel when not ***absolutely*** necessary.

And please, let's go beyond the "it would take too much time to change", because it doesn't get us anywhere. Maybe a motivated coder will step up out of nowhere!

Also, about the 3ds format being hard to diff: Only dates should be enough I think...

I do like your wording: 'maybe' xD
I strongly recommend to sit there and .

Another reason for not using some 3ds or obj is a speed consideration. pie format is a proxy between 3d modeling app and game engine, which will remove all redundant data through one time conversion, rather then every time you start your game. As the game is bundled, what is point in expecting changed models? It a modeler's pain not an end-user's one.

[Olrox]

I do like your wording: 'maybe' xD
I strongly recommend to sit there and .

I second that an triple that if necessary, it would take years for anyone to make this if someone ever would.
PIE format is only a bit irritating because no CAD software exports to it natively (if you know what I mean by "no CAD software"). Once you get the handle of the exporter, it's just boring, but not hard or troublesome to export. A "preview PIE" function on the 3ds2pie would be really useful but I step aside and watch because I don't have the slightest idea of how making this interface.

Another issue with PIE is the native editors for it, which aren't good, rather primitive. But as well, once that the artist gets the handle of it, it's again just boring to work with, but not too difficult. Of course it doesn't do most things that blender would do, but serves it purpose of scaling/adjusting vertexes/rotating in specific increments/comparing with original files.

~Olrox

[stiv]

PIE has the virtue of being a simple text format, easy to parse, easy to write and since it is text, easy to diff. Per has been working on a WZM format that is an evolution of PIE and will eventually be our format going forward.

Blender imports and exports PIE format nicely - at least the version of the scripts in the patch tracker do. The catch for the exporter is that it needs a Blender model that was imported as PIE. But it does handle existing WZ models. Real Soon Now(tm), we will have some tools to export any Blender model as PIE.

[bornemix]

Code: Select all

I strongly recommend to sit there and [img]http://www.threadbombing.com/data/media/2/th_popcorncat.gif[/img].

site there and... wait? But I hate waiting

[Kamaze]

In the front, I'm not into modelling nor graphics programming, yet. But I like the approach Horde3D uses. It has its own binary format, but for modelling it works with COLLADA as source file and converts them using a own small COLLADA -> Bin compiler.

Well, it doesn't really resolve the problem of connectors, but maybe they could be emulated with bones or a own custom COLLADA extension (as it's a XML format)? And about speed considerations, maybe we could cache the processed COLLADA files just as they are represented within the game source? Or compile COLLADA to PIE, WZM...

[i-NoD]

Real Soon Now(tm), we will have some tools to export any Blender model as PIE.

As long as they will not hang Blender during export