How to fix shading on arbitrary JavaFX TriangleMeshes? - javafx

So I love JavaFX for its 2d functionality, and was excited to try the 2d features. Unfortunately, in trying to load arbitrary triangle meshes, I keep getting results like this:
Is this just the reality of the JavaFX shading algorithm? Or is my model import function just incorrectly written? I have tried tinkering with smoothing groups, vertex normals, and face culling to no avail, and am about ready to give up on JavaFX and Java altogether for this project.

Related

How does JavaFX deal with normal checking on projected Shape3Ds?

I looked for a way to create shadows in 3D javaFX programs, and since I found none, I decided to make my own. It accomplishes this by taking the shape of the 3D model, and using a projection matrix to flatten it onto a surface (I'm using the Affine class to make this matrix. There are a couple issues with it, but the most pressing is the fact that Affine doesn't seem to update the normal vectors once the projection is complete, leaving a weird lighting issue. Similarly, it doesn't seem to update the information used by PerspectiveCamera when calculating distortions.

How to create 2D slices of 3D object model in Qt?

I'm currently rendering a 3D model (Wavefront .obj format) in my Qt program. Right now, I'm rendering the model using Scene3D in QML, and I'm able to get it to display in the viewing area. What I would like to do is have a user click on the model and generate a 2D cross section of the slice that I would like to plot on a different window. I'm quite new to 3D rendering, and a lot of Qt documentation isn't very descriptive. I've been reading Qt documentation, experimenting, and searching online with no luck. How can I create 2D slices of a 3D object Model in Qt 3D, preferably in QML? What Qt libraries or classes can I use to achieve this?
Unfortunately, the fact that models are stored as a set of surfaces makes this hard. QT probably doesn't have a built in method for this.
Consider, for example, that a model made of faces might be missing a face. What now? can you interpolate across that gap consistently from different angles? What about the fact that a cross-section probably won't contain any vertices?
But, of course, it can be solved. First, just don't allow un-closed surfaces (meshes with holes). Second, for finding the vertices of your cross-section, perform an intersection between every edge in your model and the plane you're using, and if there's an intersection, there's a point there. Third, to find the edges, look at the list of vertices, and any two that are from an edge on the same polygon in the mesh should be connected by an edge in the cross section. To find which direction the edge should go, project the normal of the polygon onto the plane your using. For filling, I don't really know what to do. I guess that's whatever you want it to be.

How to visualize a graph/network in 3D

I am working with networks which vertices are nodes of brain areas with specific coordinates.
I need to visualize these networks in a 3D enviroments in order to improve the understanding of my results.
Up to now I have tried to plot them using rglplot of igraph library in R, but the result is not so good in truth.
Currently I am plotting them using projection on each pair of axis (XY, XZ, YZ).
Futhermore I also have tried several tools like gephi, but it seems that 3D is not really supported.
There is some tool or software for visualizing a network in a 3D space?
It turns out that in fact Gephi supports 3d display of graphs, only to see the effect you have to pan the graph in the Overview Pane by keeping you mouse's scroll wheel pressed! Also the rotation options are limited to rotating on the x-axis
See the example below for the Les Miserables graph laid out with the Force Atlas 3d algorithm
You can also set the coordinates from within the Data Laboratory with the aid of the Data laboratory helper plugin. See a screenshot below

JavaFX 2D shapes in 3D space

I know that if I rotate an object, which extends javafx.scene.shape.Shape, I can transform it into 3D space, even though it was primarily designed to be in 2D (at least as far as I know).
Let's say I have a 3D scene (perspective camera and depth buffer are used), where various MeshViews occur. Some are used for areas, others for lines. In both cases those shapes must be triangulated in order to draw them with a TriangleMesh, which is often nontrivial.
Now when I change the drawing of these lines to use the Polyline class, the performance collapse is horrible and there a strange artefacts. I thought I could benefit from the fact, that a polyline has less vertices and the developer doesn't have to triangulate programmatically.
Is it discouraged to use shapes extending javafx.scene.shape.Shape within 3D space? How're they drawn internally?
If the question is "should I use 2D Shape objects in 3D space?" in JavaFX then the answer is No because you will get all terrible performance that you are seeing. However it sounds like you are trying to make up for JavaFX's lack of a 3D PolyLine object using 2D objects and rotating them in 3D space. If that is true, instead use the free open-source F(X)yz library:
http://birdasaur.github.io/FXyz/
For example the PolyLine3D class which allows you to simply specify a list of Point3Ds and it will connect them for you:
/src/org/fxyz/shapes/composites/PolyLine3D.java
and you can see example code on how to use it in the test directory:
/src/org/fxyz/tests/PolyLine3DTest.java

3D Software Renderer with VB6

I am IT student and I have to make a project in VB6, I was thinking to make a 3D Software Renderer but I don't really know where to start, I found a few tutorials but I want something that goes in depth with the maths and algorithms, I will like something that shows how to make 3D transformations, Camera, lights, shading ...
It does not matter the programing language used, I just need some resources that shows me exactly how to make this.
So I just want to know where to find some resources, or you can show me some source code and tell me where to start from.
Or if any of you have a better idea for a VB6 project.
Thanks.
I disagree with the previous posts, a 3D renderer is actually pretty simple. A high-quality 3D renderer is hard however.
Get a bunch of 3D data, triangles are simplest.
Learn about homogenous coordinates and the great 4x4 matrix for transforms.
Define a camera by a position and a rotation (expressed in the 4x4 matrix).
Transform your 3D geometry by this camera.
Perform the perspective divide and scale to your window. This converts your 3D data to 2D.
Render the data as 2D.
Now you're going to lose out on a depth buffer, so stick to wireframes in the beginning. :-)
Don't listen to these nay-sayers, go out and have some fun!
Many years ago I made a shaded triangle renderer that used library calls to draw the triangles. It's a rather naive approach but you would be able to achieve the same result using VB6. I got all the maths & techniques from "Computer Graphics principles and practice" by Foley et al. Some parts are out of date now but I think you'd find it very helpful for this project and it can be bought 2nd hand at reasonable prices from Amazon for example.
One simple approach could be:
Read model file as triangles
Transform each triangle using matrices to account for camera position
Project triangle points onto 2D
Draw 2D triangle (probably using GDI)
This covers wireframe viewing. To extend this to hidden surface removal you need to work out which triangles are in front. Two possible ways:
Z-order sorting the triangles and drawing the ones furthest from the camera first. This is simple but inefficient if there are a lot of triangles and can give overlapping triangle effects when the order is not quite correct. You also have to decide how to sort the triangles - e..g by centroid, by extents...
Using a software depth buffer. This will give better results but is more work to implement. You will have to write your own triangle drawing code so cannot rely on GDI. See bresenham's line algorithm and related algorithms for doing filled triangles for how to do this.
After this you'd also need some kind of shading based on lighting. The calculations are covered in Computer Graphics principles and practice. For simple shading you can stick with drawing triangles using gdi , but if you want to do gouraud or phong shading the colour values vary across a triangle. One way around this is to sub-divide the triangle into smaller triangles, but this is inefficient and won't give very nice looking results. Better would be to draw the triangles yourself as required above for the software depth buffer.
A good extension would be to support primitives other than triangles. Basic approach would be to split primitives into triangles as you read them.
Good luck - could be an interesting project.
VB6 is not the best suited language to do maths and 3D graphics, and given that you have no previous knowledge about the subject either, I would recommend you to choose something different (and easier).
As it's Visual Basic, you could try something more form-oriented, that is the original intent of the language.
There is the 3D engine list which lists three engine in pure basic (an oxymoron) + Source code and of them one is in Visual Basic (Dex3D)
DeX3D is an open source 3D engine
coded entirely in Visual Basic from
Jerry Chen ( -onlyuser#hotmail.com ).
Gouraud shading
Transparency
Fogging
Omni and spot lights
Hierarchical meshes
Support for 3D Studio files
Particle systems
Bezier curve segments
2.5 D text
Visual Basic source
More information, screenshots and the
source can be found on the Dex3D
Homepage. (<= Dead Link)
EGL25 by Erkan Sanli is a fast open source VB 6 renderer that can render, rotate, animate, etc. complex solid shapes made of thousands of polygons. Just Windows API calls – no DirectX, no OpenGL.
VBMigration.com chose EGL25 as a high-quality open-source VB6 project to demonstrate their VB6 to VB.Net upgrade tool.
A 3D software renderer as a whole project is fairly complex if you've never done it before. I would suggest something smaller - like just doing the 3D portion and using lines to do the rendering OR just write a shaded triangle renderer (which is the underpinnings of 3D renderers anyway).
Something a little simpler rather than trying to write a full-blown 3D software renderer on the first go - especially in VB.
A software renderer is a very difficult project and the language VB6 is not indicated at all ( for a task like this c++ is the way.. ), anyway I can suggest you some great books I used:
Shaders: http://wiki.gamedev.net/index.php/D3DBook:Introduction_%28Volume%29
Math: 3D Math Primer for Graphics and Game Development
There are other 2 books. Even if they are for VB.NET you can find some useful code:
.NET Game Programming with DirectX 9.0
Beginning .NET Game Programming in VB .NET
I think you can take two ways either go the Direct X way and use DirectX 8 that has VB 5-6 support. I found a page http://www.gamedev.net/reference/articles/article1308.asp
You can always write a engine group up but by doing so you will need some basic linear algebra like Frank Krueger suggests.

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