Applying physics to games....
Author
Hello,
This coming school year I will be taking AP Physics B concurrently with AP Calculus BC. I also am interested in learning how to apply the physics to my game projects (i think i can figure out the calculus part)...Does anyone suggest any books that talks about applications of Physics? Like a book that I could read as I progress through my school year?
IMHO the applications are obvious:
Q: how do i make this thing move?
A: <turns to kinetics of motion chapter in school textbook>
Q: how do i make the camera act like a spring?
A: <turns to sub-chapter on springs>
Dunno. For me anyway my high school and college textbooks on physics were what I wanted in my hands when I was programming game physics.
-me
Q: how do i make this thing move?
A: <turns to kinetics of motion chapter in school textbook>
Q: how do i make the camera act like a spring?
A: <turns to sub-chapter on springs>
Dunno. For me anyway my high school and college textbooks on physics were what I wanted in my hands when I was programming game physics.
-me
First off, if you don't feel like re-inventing physics for your programs, there are plenty of free SDK's.
ODE and PhysX just to name two.
Secondly, the formulas in the books can be translated as noted above. The hard part is realizing that you can't just
"integrate" on a computer. You need to look into numerical integration methods like RK2, RK4(integrates any formula, including momentum into velocity), verlet(kenetics only, position/velocity), or velocity-verlet(kenetics only).
ODE and PhysX just to name two.
Secondly, the formulas in the books can be translated as noted above. The hard part is realizing that you can't just
"integrate" on a computer. You need to look into numerical integration methods like RK2, RK4(integrates any formula, including momentum into velocity), verlet(kenetics only, position/velocity), or velocity-verlet(kenetics only).
Actually integration is the easiest part. Developing robust collision detection and response for multiple collisions between multiple bodies (ie > 2) in the same frame is much harder and requires implementing a big matrix solver (I think). But go ahead try it anyway, it's a good learning experience :)
This topic is closed to new replies.
Advertisement
Popular Topics
Advertisement
