[x3d-public] Non-Hand Coding of X3D

[John Richardson]

Hello,

In XML format

<DO NOT MESS WITH THIS DEFINITION
the definition of non-hand coded is....:-)   [in this space time continuum. I make no attempt to define non-hand coded in parallel universes]

Use tool N(1) of M major modeling and animation tools [Maya, Lightwave, Houdini, Cinema 4d, Poser, Daz Studio, GIS type tools, Blender, COMSOL, ANSYS, Solidworks, BIM tools, Simulink, Mathematica System Modeler, Maple's tools, Form-Z, Nemetchek's stuff, AutoCAD, ProEngineer, plus any I left out that have reasonable market shares or throw in open source stuff].
Make unbelievably complex models with really sophisticated simulations [behaviors in the common tongue]
Select VRML or X3D for export format [see fbx below]
Push the export Button
Go get a cup of coffee or tea [no comment on whether you will survive this step]
Return to your Ergometric furniture [or stand to give your back a rest]
View the massively complex interactive simulation [business or training or...] in the Instant Reality / Bitmanagement / FreWRL viewer / X3D Edit / Simulink 3D animation / <insert view name here>
Subnote: format conversion is not allowed unless you want to pull out your hair (see following comment). This just makes the M number of tool designers lazy and X3D authoring tool designers pull out their hair...:-)
If the viewer squeals or pukes or upchucks or throws up trying to view the massively complex VR scene, execute X3D Edit or Bitmanagement or Simulinks 3D animation tool or Mathematica or Maple or COMSOL or....
Press the import button
Tweak to your hearts content
Push the export button on the VRML/X3D/VR authoring tool
View the massively complex interactive simulation [business or training or...] in the Instant Reality / Bitmanagement / FreWRL / X3D Edit / Simulink 3D animation / <insert view name here>
Repeat tweaking until your viewer of choice or preferably every viewer in existence is error free with regard to your VR scene

Repeat the above process for modeling and animation tool N(2) through N(M)....:-)

Keep on repeating until a suite of massively complex simulations generate error free viewing....:-)

Publish the proclamation that VRML and X3D is not suitable for non-hand coding development....:-)

Note: M = 20 plus V where V is the number of tools the community thinks are major or makes community participants smile while they consume coffee or tea.

Note: Export to fbx translates into "when facebook finishes spending money on 3D VR" then fbx/facebook authoring tools will be the tweak tools for facebook VR. Just to add an American obsolete silver 3 cent opinion to an earlier thread...:-).

Final Note: Process should be turnkey on Windows PC, Macintosh, Linux, mobile .... with community agreed upon minimum RAM, processor, disk specs.
/DO NOT MESS WITH THIS DEFINITION>

Feel free to engage in vigorous architectural design of the X3D spec to facilitate this definition. The X3D community will prevail...!

John

-----Original Message-----
From: x3d-public [mailto:x3d-public-bounces at web3d.org] On Behalf Of Leonard Daly
Sent: Wednesday, February 24, 2016 6:02 PM
To: John Carlson
Cc: X3D Graphics public mailing list
Subject: Re: [x3d-public] Non-Hand Coding of X3D

John,

Just to address a few of your points.

I don't see the functionality currently available with PROTOs and Scripts going away. I see it increasing because HTML Scripts can easily add nodes to the DOM. There have been several discussions on the topic of PROTOs. I see a proto-expander or MACRO as being a great addition to V4. It is also possible to easily provide that sort of service via an HTML Script or new custom-implemented node. If the new node is a collection of existing nodes (say Yves pyramid node), then the supporting code to create and parse that node is very easy to write in X3DOM.

I can see a shared library of useful nodes that sites on top of X3D and is available to the user as either nodes or HTML scripts.

I would like to see X3D accept a wide variety of data formats, even if some translation/conversion needs to occur. Using InstantReality it is possible to go from X3D, OBJ, FBX and perhaps others to SRC. SRC is a good format for injestion because it moves quickly to WebGL. X3D is to remain ISO standardized. No other 3D format and run-time can state that.

Animation is a current problem. The SRC does not hold animations. The only widely used format that does combined with model data is FBX. That is something that needs to be developed, but there are several things that need to come first.


Leonard Daly





> You make good points Leonard.  How would you differentiate V4 from 
> Collada in that case?    My understanding is that X3D provides for 
> declarative app development. This is one reason we are moving towards 
> the web, to open X3D up to more app developers.  What is important for 
> declarative app development?  Protos, Templates, Web Components and 
> associated scripts, essentially *shared behavior*.  If you have a 
> virtual world, you might certainly have exactly one of everything.
>  However, it’s easier to instantiate Protos or Templates, I think.   
> The trick is to only mention the creation a few times (once) with 
> templates or web components, and let the environment expand it into 
> multiple instances through templated transforms and parameterization.
>  I don’t want to see 400 ProtoInstances of cylinders in code, unless 
> it’s generated (HTML).  X3D *should* be associated with a data format 
> for pure data, like D3.js has several, and transforming pure data into 
> 3D.  I know I have different requirements, but I think X3D V4 should 
> be designed for scaling things up—not only shapes and transforms, but 
> coordinates and polygons as well (SRC). Is any other format in 
> position to provide for such scaling without killing memory or 
> diskspace?  Models are certainly moving towards SRC. If you are 
> concerned about animation, what’s the best way to provide for
> animation coming from these tools?   We have your proposed nodes.  Are 
> these sufficient?   Should we start looking more at creating exporters 
> for animation beyond just models?  What animation exporters to X3D are 
> already out there?
>
> John
>
>> On Feb 24, 2016, at 7:55 PM, Leonard Daly <Leonard.Daly at realism.com 
>> <mailto:Leonard.Daly at realism.com>> wrote:
>>
>> There seems to be some confusion about my statements about not 
>> hand-coding certain things.
>>
>> I have stated that models and animations are not hand-coded anymore. 
>> That statement does not mean it can't be done, but there are many 
>> tools that do it, including open-source ones. There is no way someone 
>> is going to hand-code models such as you can see at 
>> http://www.blendswap.com/blends/index. Hand coding models to be 
>> printed is also not a good idea because things will probably not line 
>> up correctly.
>>
>> Animation is the same thing. Yes you can animate by hand-coding all 
>> of the motions and deformations, but that is not how it is done. If 
>> X3D is to get any acceptance into the professional marketplace it 
>> MUST work with application generated models and animations. There 
>> will still be some important animations that are hand coded (e.g., 
>> camera motions, automated systems, etc.).
>>
>> Nothing I have done in working out the V4 proposal precludes 
>> hand-coding of animation or modeling. It does not provide a lot of 
>> convenience features/nodes to make complex work simple. In the 
>> marketplace, it is much simpler to get someone to do the model or 
>> animation in a tool.
>>
>>
>> --
>> *Leonard Daly*
>> 3D Systems & Cloud Consultant
>> X3D Co-Chair on Sabbatical
>> LA ACM SIGGRAPH Chair
>> President, Daly Realism - /Creating the Future/ 
>> _______________________________________________
>> x3d-public mailing list
>> x3d-public at web3d.org <mailto:x3d-public at web3d.org> 
>> http://web3d.org/mailman/listinfo/x3d-public_web3d.org
>


--
*Leonard Daly*
3D Systems & Cloud Consultant
X3D Co-Chair on Sabbatical
LA ACM SIGGRAPH Chair
President, Daly Realism - /Creating the Future/