Ok, so I've really been struggling with this project. I'm fluent in solidworks, but clearly that is a program designed for accuracy and detail, not necessarily for simulation. And I knew that going in, but figured this would be a reasonable first step. I mean I "could" probably model galaxy world purely by photos and estimated sizes (ask adam savage how he recreates props by taking hundreds of photos with a dollar bill next to it for scale). But.. "THERE HAS TO BE A BETTER WAY"... right?
Ok, so I've known for a while that there are programs that will take photos from multiple angles, and create psuedo 3d models based on that using point cloud information (not unlike how the 2 cameras on an xbox camera does). So far all of these software packages seem very locked down without a way to export that into something usable.
I can't seem to get autodesk's 123d software to ever work on my phone. However, googling around, it still seems like microsoft's photosynth still does a pretty darn good job of creating 3d objects. If you don't believe me, look at this example (you need silverlight installed):
https://photosynth.net/preview/view/b729a003-9692-4fa7-9ad5-304d880cdd59
So what do you do once you have a "photosynth"? Well, there's a few kluged options, like this supposed autocad 2011 plugin:
http://through-the-interface.typepad.com/through_the_interface/2010/04/importing-photosynth-point-clouds-into-autocad-2011-part-4.html
And this program that can supposedly convert it to something useful, like an OBJ file:
http://synthexport.codeplex.com
But still, point clouds aren't exactly efficient. They are hogs because they are made of points, not faces (and they are typically fuzzy so it would need cleaning up anyway).
So another thing holding me up right now, I finally upgraded from xp to windows 7 (64 bit) so that I could actually load that retro arcade simulator:
http://digitalcybercherries.com
It recommends a quad cpu and 8gb of ram (I have a dual core 2.33ghz and 4gb of ram, should be fine). Nope, it ran MAYBE 9fps at 800x600 full detail, full screen. Objects loaded really slow and there was lots of ghosting. low detail, 640x480, windowed, ran fairly good without ghosting but it looked like crap. So what the heck is going on? Well I did some research on my video card (geforce 8400), and turns out it's dog slow. Sure, probably better than the crappy on-board video card, but not by much. In fact, if you do a comparison, my card ranks 115 while modern cards rank in the thousands:
http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+8400+GS
Now I'm not going to spend hundreds no a video card, I'm just not. The used desktop I bought as an upgrade was a used box I bought off ebay for $45. I AM however going to buy a pretty good bang for buck card that should get me by plenty:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KYCTCZ8/ref=wl_it_dp_o_pC_nS_ttl?_encoding=UTF8&colid=88UWXQ9B7XVR&coliid=I2UMGBVH3TPFA7
Not only will it be good for 3d, supposedly it's also good when it comes to video editing and photo editing. Oh, one other thing, since I upgraded to windows 7 64bit, my solidworks 2012 no longer works. So I'm also hunting for a solution to install "some sort of solidworks" on this "new to me" desktop.
Anyway, getting back to point clouds and that retro arcade simulator. So that simulator is based on the unreal 4 engine. I googled it and wouldn't you know, theUE4 engine is completely free. That means I can download it right now and start playing around with it (FREE). Just check out how powerful it is in the embedded video (they just released a ton of objects from some 3d animation called a boy and his kite):
http://www.pcgamer.com/epic-gives-away-fantastic-unreal-engine-4-assets-for-free
Have I ever messed with 3d engines? Well, sorta. I mean I was pretty dam good with duke nukem 3d (the first one, not the one that took 11 years to release). I got really good with it. Then around, oh 1997 I started messing around with the first unreal tournament engine. It was somewhat impressive, I mean back then it sure was. You could literally walk around the engine in realtime (with lighting and shadows) and move objects and walls around. The thing that turned me off was dealing with all the scripting needed for objects and players (I'm not a coder).
With that said, I'm going to assume that in 15 years the engine has become more user friendly so I'm going to give it a shot. I figure even if I can't somehow import my map into the nicely done retro arcade package, at the very least everyone can load the free engine and go explore.
