#translators
20 messages in this thread
A big question for you, but first a little background. We either
directly use or use through one of our affiliated companies, the
following software tools.
a.)Wavefront
b.)Alias
c.)Softimage
d.)3D Studio
Now, we have a continuous nightmare trying to move geometry back and
forth between 3D Studio and the other three programs. What I would
like to know is if your company currently has any tools or plans to
release any tools inthe extremely near future that will make my life
easier?
Additionally if you have a utility to move the geometry back and
forth, does it properly translate multi-mesh scenes without turning
everything into a single block? Does it work in batch mode? What O.S.
does it run in? and does it utilize actually binary formats as
opposed to ascii formats?
I don't want a dxf translator, because it's pretty useless to try to
read large dxf files into anything.
If the tool doesn't exist then I'm going to hire a couple of
programmers to write it. It's rediculous for us to have such a
powerful tool as 3DS and not be able to easily utilize it with the
rest of our tools.
Through Wavefront, I can pull dta from virtually any government or
scientific source and convert it to a mesh, but when I need to
effectively triangulate the mesh and bring it into 3DS with it's
original integrity, it just doesn't work.
Anyway, What do you have to offer? Paul
If you do write such a beast, I think you should have no trouble
finding people willing to buy it. It seems to be common need that I
don't think anyone has adequately addressed.
We already have Wavefront and 3D Studio support. Alias hasn't
documented their high-end format in years, but I'm trying to get more
info about their current format. Softimage has a developer's kit,
and we're in the midst of adapting it. We've got a "read-only"
converter working to some extent.
At this time, we're only shipping an Amiga version. The Windows
version will be released later this year. We do handle DXF, but as
you recognize, it's a terrible format for 3D exchange.
We do support sub-objects (with their own name, rotational center,
etc.) as well as parent-child hierarchies, named material attributes,
and other info.
Our translators are in use at places like Viewpoint and Noumenon Labs.
These places found it effective to add an Amiga to their networks for
purposes of translation as well as testing their support for Amiga
file formats.
John,
I actually may be to the point of buying an Amiga just for the conversions.
If you don't mind I have a couple of more questions.
A.) Does your converter go from wavefront binary to 3ds binary?
I've already written an .obj to .dxf and an .obj to .asc converter
but I have to get around the act of waiting days for 3DStudio to
convert the dxf or asc into a .3ds file.
B.) Is there any file size limit on your program?
Some of my .obj files can run 10 megs or more. in dxf terms this is
close to 50 megs.
C.) What type of memory structure do you use?
Does your converter access all available memory or do I have to listen
to a hard disk page for extended periods of time.
In the end, I can already take virtually any SGI platform file and turn it into
a dxf but that *!$# dxf to 3ds conversion is a total nightmare on large
projects. So, I'm willing to do alot to go straight to .3ds.
Paul
.
I don't believe the Wavefront binary model format is documented, so we don't
support it. Only ".obj". 2) Our conversion is memory-based, so you'll need
plenty of memory. A 10 meg .obj doesn't mean you need 10 megs of RAM, of
course. We use floats and longs for many things, so if you're a programmer,
you might estimate how much memory it might take: 12 bytes for each point, plus
4 bytes for each point in a face.
Feel free to give me a call at (414) 674-5200 if you'd like to talk about it.
Used Amiga systems are selling for great prices in the Amiga forums.
If I use your translator, and throw an .obj file into it, will I get a
.3DS file out of it?
Our Wavefront translator handles the polygon-based geometry from an obj file.
If you're using the nifty spline-and-patch-based stuff in Wavefront Advanced
Visualizer 3.0, we skip them. We translate the faces and lines, except 3DS
doesn't have lines or points, so we don't make them. We translate 'g' grouping
info as sub-objects in 3D Studio. We translate the material library if it's
present, meaning you'll get 3DS materials for each with the same name.
Similarly, when we translate a 3D Studio file to Wavefront, we optionally write
a material library of the materials from 3DS.
There's no easy way to support sub-object hierarchies in Wavefront files, so
you'll get all root-level sub-objects in the Keyframer.
John,
It sounds like your translator will work fine for what I need it for. It sounds
like your group had the same translation problems that I did. At least you're
going out to .3ds files instead of DXF and the material libraries translation
sounds great.
How much is it? This would at least save me the time of trying to implement the
.3ds format.
Paul
The retail is $199.95, but we've got an intro price for a while at $129.95.
All'
Just picked up this thread, any ideas on getting a Pro-E IGES (or otherwise)
model in 3ds with its surfaces?
Regards, Peter Kroko
Actually, for Pro Engineer, our Stereolithography conversion will work
quite well. We don't have an IGES converter shipping yet.
John,
Please tell me more. I don't have the "Pro-interface" module with the SLA
capabilities(desided to buy a car instead <g>.)
Regards Peter Kroko
I've just picked up a bit of this thread about translators. I'm
looking for a translator for SDRC "universal" format to 3D Studio.
Does anyone know if such a thing exists?
PMJI, are you trying to pull stuff from SDRC's IDEAS packages into 3D
Studio? If so, there are a number of ways to do it. We've used SDRC
data to generate a number of 3DS based animations.
Paul,
We're trying to go from IDEAS to an animation. IDEAS can export an IGES file
which is a decent start.
But IGES just represents the surface. IDeally we'd like to get the entire 3D
model from SDRC into an animation package.
Wavefront is supposed to be able to import SDRC "Universal file format".
(We havn't been able to demonstrate this yet, because SDRC's latest release
changed their file format and Wavefront hasn't caught up yet. That should be
fixed in a couple of months.)
But what about 3D Studio? Is there a way to import the SDRC model? I guess
the real question would be "Does anyone have a translator which would convert
SDRC universal format into dxf file format?
An SDRC to dxf file converter would enable me to bring the full 3 dimensional
model into 3D Studio.
You say you've used SDRC data to generate animations. What was your method of
file export/import? What were the results like?
Thanks, Bill
Can you tell me more about SDRC format, like who uses it, what you're
running it on, what you build with it…
John,
> "What is SDRC File Format?"
SDRC is an engineering modelling package on Unix workstations.
Bill
Paul:
Would you have any interest in a program which could take meshes, turn them
into NURBS, then adaptively tessilate them based on local curvature?
Evan
i would what is it Evan How mucho?
also what kind of Nurbs? File types?read by what?
hope all's well in Phoenixw/you.