Which formats should my engine support?
Author
Hi,
I'm currrently building up a new game engine. I already made the directX render, and before doiing the openGL one, I would like to be able to load 3D scenes and animations from 3DS max, Maya, Blender etc, to my engine.
My question is, which format do you guys think I should support in my game engine?
If you could also provide me with a link to the format explanations, I would be very happy.
This game engine will be open source, and I will create a website for it, once I'll have some loaders created.
Thanks all for your help,
Stev
For DirectX I would definately recommend x files. they are DirectX's only supported 3D file format. Google up "directx x files tutorial" or something like that and there are tons of good stuff online. Also there are lots of people who made exporters from the main 3D editing software, just google up that stuff and you should be able to find information.
As far as OpenGL, I'm not sure. they might have an integrated XFile importer. I'm not exactly sure.
Hope that helps
As far as OpenGL, I'm not sure. they might have an integrated XFile importer. I'm not exactly sure.
Hope that helps
Author
Quote:Original post by Bliz23
For DirectX I would definately recommend x files. they are DirectX's only supported 3D file format. Google up "directx x files tutorial" or something like that and there are tons of good stuff online. Also there are lots of people who made exporters from the main 3D editing software, just google up that stuff and you should be able to find information.
As far as OpenGL, I'm not sure. they might have an integrated XFile importer. I'm not exactly sure.
Hope that helps
My loaders are API independant. So if I want to load x files, I'll load them for all the renders...
I plan to load obj and collada files. If you guys think other formats should be added to my list, please post the format here.
Thanks all,
Stev
Just make your design so that you can add any loader without problem. Separate the engine and the loader. The model data looks the same in vid memory regardless the format you load it from.
Quote:Original post by Stev Studio
Hi,
I'm currrently building up a new game engine. I already made the directX render, and before doiing the openGL one, I would like to be able to load 3D scenes and animations from 3DS max, Maya, Blender etc, to my engine.
My question is, which format do you guys think I should support in my game engine?
If you could also provide me with a link to the format explanations, I would be very happy.
This game engine will be open source, and I will create a website for it, once I'll have some loaders created.
Thanks all for your help,
Stev
Write your own script for blender to expert to your own format, this is what I am doing and it gives you more power
darkelf2k5 makes a good point. On top of that, I'd investigate what formats would actually be usefull to support. You surely want at least one model format that supports animations, and there may be more aspects of importance. Find out what you need, then look into the available options.
Perhaps even developing an own model format and writing conversion tools is the best approach, or using a popular game format to benefit from the already written convertors/compilers.
Perhaps even developing an own model format and writing conversion tools is the best approach, or using a popular game format to benefit from the already written convertors/compilers.
Quote:Original post by darkelf2k5
Just make your design so that you can add any loader without problem. Separate the engine and the loader. The model data looks the same in vid memory regardless the format you load it from.
Some formats will just represent your program memory model closer and so be easier to load (easier to program the parser).
Consider one format which faces point to vertices and another in which faces own pointers (as a clasS)
just keep the engine to one format only - chances are it'll be your own custom format. Write a seperate tool to convert from any format to your format. I'm not a fan of X files, collada or obj files for game engine usage, they are either overkill for the purposes of a game - else they simply take too long to load....
3DMAX files loader class is pain in the ###. If you look at 3dexploration (3D file viewer), program needs 3dmax installation to show files.
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