Pretty cool...been waiting on this ever since I heard Intel and Macromedia signed a
pact some time back. The quality is similar to Blender and WildTangent. I think you
are looking at different markets, though.
I would imagine Java3D will lose out to tools such as Director, WT, Blender in the
commercial web3D "Applet" space. Here it's all about ease of development (by
non-programmers), speed of deployment, tool support etc and basically there are a lack
of tools for Java3D in this area. Flash 3 onwards had the option to export movies to
Java if I'm not mistaken.
Java3D, however, has the power and features (6dof, head trackers etc) needed for heavy
duty visualisation (AR/VR) that these platforms don't have. Development of these apps
are more suited to programmer centric develoment methods via beans and libraries. Plus
the cost for cash strapped educational institutions is a good plus!
I think Java3D also possibly has some serious competition in this area from companies
like ndl http://www.ndl.com/ who are licensing game engine technology. Expect to see
the game engine licensing models change over the next 6 months-1 year as the market
hots up and they look to apply the technology outside their traditional industry due
to convergence/competition. Next generation (say 2 years away) gaming will make heavy
use of headsets and controllers as the price comes down. Nvidia G3 (read XBOX) already
is breaking real time rendering barriers.
Basically it all comes down to tools (IDE, beans, libraries, frameworks) for RAD, I
think.
Personally I think Java3D has huge potential, if the right tools can be developed.
In the end it just comes down to the right tool for the right job at the right time
(given the right budget:-), if you are working under commercial pressures.
Just my thoughts...What are other people thinking of using Java3D for?
---- original message ----
Sent: Thu, 12 Apr 2001 21:12:07 PDT
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Cc:
Subject: [JAVA3D] Macromedia 3D
--------------------------
Macromedia has just released a 3D package that is exported via Shockwave. It seems to
have full hardware support and some really interesting rendering methods (including
"cartoon').
Has anybody tried this? How does it stack up against Java3D?
http://www.macromedia.com/software/director/
It seems to be backed by Intel as well.
Rich Gold
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