(Wasn’t sure what the best place to post this would be so hopefully this is ok.)
I’m looking into alternative 3d libs for a small 3d mesh (map) editing application intended for use with a commercial game. I’m also considering J3D (for which I have a working prototype) or just plain LWJGL.
What I need to do is get as close to the actual in-game appearance as possible, while allowing the user to edit the map geometry and terrain. (Textures and map vertices need to be fully editable/shapeable, and I’ll need to add/remove vertices to create new faces, etc.) Basically the map is a bunch of triangle polygons (approx 40,000 or so) textured, shaded and blended (about 7 primary textures). I’m including a screenshot showing the original (which I need to imitate) and what my J3D prototype does so far (missing blending and shading).
So, will jMonkey be of any assistance (and provide me with the features I need) getting this done? I have some experience with various 3D libs (J3D, Panda3D, Papervision3D) so I think I’m okay on the basics, but where should I get started assuming jMonkey is a good candidate for this? Any ideas for design strategies?
(For background - I’ve some worries regarding the lack of support for J3D and possible lack of some of the blending capabilities that I need, this is why I’m considering porting to another lib like jMonkey.)
tebriel said:
What I need to do is get as close to the actual in-game appearance as possible, while allowing the user to edit the map geometry and terrain. (Textures and map vertices need to be fully editable/shapeable, and I'll need to add/remove vertices to create new faces, etc.)
From what I've in JME, it's possible ... Take a look at
https://wiki.jmonkeyengine.org/legacy/doku.php/jme3:advanced:terrain
And the "user can also edit" part of your map editor ...
Look deeper in the Terrain Plugin of the SDK and learn how they do the scrulpting and texture painting...
It's not easy I think but it's possible !
I saw that, but I think the way that’s working is quite different. JME seems to prefer heightmap terrain, while I need to work with a less flexible format, just a simple 3d mesh. Example to illustrate the difference is posted below. I guess I was assuming it’s possible in JME, but my real question is-- is JME going to give me the access and tools I need to make it easy, or am I better off going a different route?
http://s1.postimage.org/srg5cqyc1/mb3.jpg
Yeah you can do that with jME
I think I’m going to look into porting over to jME in a bit, I was concerned that jME was more of a “platform/tool” like some high level 3d engines out there, and built on Netbeans. But it seems Eclipse is not a problem and as far as I can tell I think I can do what I need to do even though I’m not strictly working on a “game”. Thanks,
I just thought it’d only be right if I updated this with a jME implementation screencap (so far, still a WIP of course). In a short period of time I’ve ported everything done previously in Java3D to jME, and added to the number of total number of completed planned features.
Now rendering looks a little better in jME…
(Same general area of the map with the jME version.)
http://s1.postimage.org/67nlcc6hv/jme.jpg
Needless to say I’m impressed with jME, especially given the current Alpha status.