StudioPro 2.5.3

[Norm Lindenberg]

If anyone is interested, the current issue of Digit magazine includes a CD containing among other things, version 2.5.3 of Strata StudioPro. The magazine costs about $12.

The information came originally from JKMANI2 on the PFO forum.

[karen jacobs]

What are the program features? What does it do? ;o) --kj

[Norm Lindenberg]

Hi Karen,

It's a 3D modeling tool. After playing with it for a few hours, I'm not too impressed but I may change my mind after learning a bit more about it. One of the interesting things about it is you can load Poser object files into it and manipulate individual parts. Don't ask me why you would want to do that; I tried it just to see what would happen. It accepts as inputs and outputs a wide variety of file formats. It was something to do over the weekend.

Norm

[karen jacobs]

;o) hummm, interesting; manipulating individual poser parts and i/o file formats might be useful . . . Thanks for the info.

Have you tried Anim8or? I found it in the free modeling programs links http://www.challagarsweb.com/tutorial/links.html <http://www.challagarsweb.com/tutorial/links.html> I played with it briefly and it seems to be an excellent modeling tool; the documentation is very thorough. I was able to export to Poser 3 with that and from Poser, you can get an object for Viewpoint. Didn't get any further than a weekend's play myself. ;o) --kj

[Norm Lindenberg]

Thanks for the suggestions Karen.

I have looked at animator in the past but until you mentioned it, did not realize Poser files could be loaded into it. I just now took another look and was able to import a frame I had exported from Poser as an object file. I was able to see it in anim8or but was unable to ungroup its parts. A quick scan of the documentation file did not help any. Have you been able to load anything other than an object file from Poser and after loading have you been able to ungroup the subobjects?

I will look at it in more detail.

It would be nice to have fewer file formats or a single program for converting between them.

Thanks again,

Norm

[karen jacobs]

Actually, Norm, I only exported from Anim8or to Poser and found I could alter the 3ds file; that's the extent of my few hours experience: 1 hr 50 min frustration and last 10 min looking at documentation and swearing "why didn't I read this first!!!!" ;o< --kj

[Atmospherics]

You might also like to try Amapi, you can use this version free indefinitley.

http://amapi.idevgames.com/html/download.html <http://amapi.idevgames.com/html/download.html>

Eddie

[Norm Lindenberg]

I am more convinced than ever not to buy a product that does not directly import and export in most if not all industry-wide standard formats.

I am beginning to think that Adobe is painting themselves into a corner with their dependence on Viewpoint and Curious Labs.

[Atmospherics]

It certainly would be refreshing to have an alternative to Viewpoint alone for imported content but your thread is about modelling software though, yeah? Most 3D file formats would be too large for the web and realtime display and Atmo would have to be a (presumably automatic?) 3D model format converter and optimiser as well as what it is.

Some way to convert externally created stuff to *.aer maybe, or some other way to involve imported objects in Atmosphere lighting, that would be soooo cool.. Atmosphere v.2.0 maybe??

Eddie

[Norm Lindenberg]

Eddie,

Thanks for the link.

I was able to download, install, and try out Amapi. I loaded a 3ds file I had exported from Poser and was able to ungroup it and manipulate the individual pieces.

The funny thing about it was the import showed up in every color of the rainbow. It was the wierdest looking dog I ever saw.

I'll have a busy time of it next weekend, familiarizing myself with three different modelers.

Thank you too Karen,

Norm

[Norm Lindenberg]

Your idea about converting externally created stuff directly to aer might be a solution. If Adobe underwrote the addition of this feature to Accutrans, or Crossroads, or one of the other inexpensive converter programs, it would provide additional alternatives for Atmo users and broaden Adobe's potential market.

[Atmospherics]

:-) Glad you got it, I do enjoy Amapi. It's 'natural design' option for the interface is the weirdest looking thing, but makes it easy to learn. Get used to using two hands most of the time and you do start to feel sometimes like you've actually got hold of the object! Here's a good page with quite a few links to tutorials, various versions up to the current one to get you started if you want to try them out.

http://www.staigerland.com/amapi/index.mv <http://www.staigerland.com/amapi/index.mv>

Eddie

[Atmospherics]

Crossroads can sometimes make a model look like its been run over on one but sure, better intergration of imported models, web compression and whatever else it takes to deliver worlds people want to come back to, I'd imagine the development team are doing their damnedest to make it happen. I think Atmo will probably get a lot more interest soon when less sluggish (build after next I think) when hardware acceleration support comes.

Eddie

[A B Carter]

I think it would make a huge difference to the acceptability of Atmosphere if you could import some of the standard formats. A few disjointed comments on this.

1 - In the past couple of years I've been looking for various interactive 3D packages. Atmosphere is one of the best I've seen, but a mistake it makes that is made by the vast majority of the other packages I've looked at is thinking it needs to supply its own modeling. There is already a large number of extraordinarily good modeling applications out there that Atmopshere can't hope to equal. There are even a number of freeware packages that have far greater functionality that anything supplied by Atmosphere. So why compete here. Atmosphere should stay focus as an interactive scene builder.

2 - I think it is a given that this shouldn't be a question of importing other formats into Atmosphere, but converting them into .aer format. This is the only way I can get the web compression and the ability to create light maps. This is exactly the mistake that was made with Viewpoint. I find it absolutely infuriating that I get to import these great Viewpoint models into an Atmosphere scene only to have them stick out like a sore thumb because it can't use any light maps. Honestly, this is the only real complaint I have about Atmosphere.

3 - The conversion could be fairly basic. It only has to include the ability to create a polygon structure and perhaps a single texture file.

4 - Since the conversion is so simple I don't think you have to be able to convert a vast array of formats. For example, just the ability to convert a .obj file could be sufficient. All the major, and most minor packages, allow their files to be converted into .obj format. You could then create anything you want using Lightwave, 3D Max, Cinema 3D, Rhino, Truespace, Amapi, Carrara, whatever and then import it into Atmosphere. Understand, anything would be possible.

5 - You do open yourself up for potential problems here. You could create models that are far to large for Atmosphere to handle effectively. But this is fine so long as you make some effort to educate the user, and emphasize that although in principle you can convert anything into Atmosphere you nonetheless always have to be careful about the number of polygons the model has.

6 - With 5 in mind there area number of things you could do. For example when you convert a model it could tell you how many polygons the model will have and some idea of the load this will create in Atmosphere. YOu could also have a utility that could reduce the number of polygons. This doesn't always work, in many cases it could be a godsent.

7 - The chief issue for me is the ability to create and use light maps. The realism you get with them for a real-time interactive application is really quite incredible. Better than anything I've scene other than actual PC and console games like Playstation2. But so long as you're using polygons I don't see that there should be an issue here. Granted it may take you a lot longer to create a light map, but I don't see that as an issue. Even if it takes me 50 hours to create a lightmap, so what, it is a one time affair and it just means I keep my computer on over the weekend, which I do in any case.

I've said a lot here for someone who has only used Atmosphere for a couple of months. But like I've said I've looked at dozens of applications in the past couple of years and Atmosphere is just about the best I've seen. But some kind of functionality like what is being talked about here is the differene between it being a good application to hands down best out there.

Regards, A B Carter

[Aero]

heres my ten cents AB...

1. Atmosphere will stay as just a scene builder and useing there importing Viewpoint into it.
They most likely will not have much Polygon Super building like 3D Max, Truespace,Lightwave ect.

2. Fingerstyle has already converted Obj to aer. Grantit it was really cool but it gave him 500 trislabs to 5k in trislabs. Which is not good. Plus alot of lag so this is already a bad idea....

-==Knight

[jbezorg]

This may be of interest to everyone:

Web3D Pushes Development of 3D Web Standard <http://siliconvalley.internet.com/news/article.php/1431291>

[A B Carter]

Could you give me a bit more information about what Fingerstyle did, like a polycount of the object he was converting from. Also I'm a little confused when you say "500 trislabs to 5k in trislabs"?

I certainly agree that Atmosphere will probably keep their model building to a bare minimum. My previous post implied otherwise and that's a mistake.

My real problem is what I've mentioned a couple times now, which is that given the present limited integration between Viewpoint objects and Atmosphere scenes, the result is deeply unsatisfactory.

[jbezorg]

The way I read it is that polygons were converted into tri-slabs. Av Lab avatars already have about 1000 polygons so a conversion from a OBJ file with that many would consist of about 1000 Builder tri-slabs or about 5000 faces.

I built a world with 10000 faces once and couldn't light it. Also as I tried to view the world in it's whole by moving away from it. Faces started to disappear. There's probably a sanity limit built into the Browser an Builder that, at some point, limits the number of faces shown.

[Benjamin Jordan]

Good comments A B Carter. I think Adobe is already working on importing other meshes as a native part of Atmosphere, visible in wireframe, participating in lighting, etc. I agree that it will be very welcome, but not until hardware rendering is a reality - although a polygon reduction option would be awesome.

Web3D Pushes Development of 3D Web Standard

"Standards are good - let's have lots of them" - Anon :-)

Could you give me a bit more information about what Fingerstyle did, like a polycount of the object he was converting from.

The original object was around 500 faces or so, resulting in 2,500 faces after the trislab conversion. You can see the results at http://www.atmostyle.com/dl/obj2aer.zip <http://www.atmostyle.com/dl/obj2aer.zip>

Faces started to disappear. There's probably a sanity limit built into the Browser

I experienced the same thing, and discussed it with mrk. It's a bug.

~ Ben (fingerstyle)

[A B Carter]

Ah. Well first that's a very clever solution on your part, Fingerstyle, more power to you. But yeah, it's going to be of limited usefulness since is dramatically increases the poly count. This is more than an annoyance because one of the main reasons for conversion functionality is the desire for adding more complex objects into Atmosphere, so size is going to be an issue from the beginning. In the end, to be done right this probably should be done by Adobe.

(However I am curious. How much of the format for .aer files do you know? Is there a public specification?)

The point I want to emhasize with this kind of enhancement is that you are not providing a totally perfect solution, but you are giving more options to the user/builder. If the builder hangs himself with a million poly object, well that's his problem. The feature has to be used judiciously. But I think there are lots of scenes where adding a little complexity in specific places could dramatically increase the realism of the scene.

[Benjamin Jordan]

more power to you. But yeah, it's going to be of limited usefulness since is dramatically increases the poly count.

Exactly. That's why I never completed and distributed the tool - It's just not worth it. If we had a single-sided triangle primitive it would be feasible.

However I am curious. How much of the format for .aer files do you know? Is there a public specification

I know of no specification, and I can guarantee that if Adobe provides one it won't be until Atmosphere is out of beta. What I know of it is from looking at the ASCII aer files. Much of it is fairly obvious.

[Norm Lindenberg]

Ben,

How does one create an ASCII aer file?

[Benjamin Jordan]

How does one create an ASCII aer file?

With the Builder. Open the Builder Settings palette and uncheck "Save in Binary Format" and "Save in Compressed Format"

[Norm Lindenberg]

Thanks Ben