EnigmA Amiga Run 1997 July/EnigmA AMIGA RUN 20 (1997)(G.R. Edizioni)(IT)[!][issue 1997-07 & 08][EAR-CD IV].iso/lightwave/lwmlist/95.lightwave-07/[e-mail]_Sun Jul 23 13:57:45 1995.msg

Internet Message Format | 1995-08-06 | 4KB

Received: by webcom.com
    (1.37.109.15/16.2) id AA179503065; Sun, 23 Jul 1995 13:57:45 -0700
Return-Path: <[e-mail]>
Received: from mail.globalone.net by webcom.com with ESMTP
    (1.37.109.15/16.2) id AA179323053; Sun, 23 Jul 1995 13:57:33 -0700
Received: from shell.globalone.net ([e-mail] [198.69.121.31]) by mail.globalone.net (8.6.12/8.6.9) with SMTP id RAA22479 for <[e-mail]>; Sun, 23 Jul 1995 17:02:38 -0400
Date: Sun, 23 Jul 1995 17:02:36 -0400 (EDT)
From: [e-mail]
X-Sender: [e-mail]
To: LightWave Mailing List <[e-mail]>
Subject: Re: Physics of Impact
In-Reply-To: <[e-mail]>
Message-Id: <[e-mail]>
Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Sender: [e-mail]
Precedence: bulk


On Mon, 17 Jul 1995, Dennis R. Harp wrote:

>     I just noticed a post about Impact & its recent ad in VTU.
> I have heard a variety of dismal, 2nd hand reports about poor
> collision detection in some programs attempting to incorporate such
> attributes to LW objects, and was wondering if anyone could give a
> first-hand report on Impact's capabilities.  Thanks.

Well, I just received a new version 4 days ago and haven't had a chance
to put it through it's paces yet, but I can tell you that the collision
detection of the previous version was very accurate, even though it only
supported Sphere or Box collision detection shapes...you could simulate
complex colision shapes by using many spheres or boxes, but it was a
somewhat awkward way of doing things.  The new version (Beta 0.92) now
supports Arbitrary Shape collision detection, which SHOULD give you the
ability to make objects of any shape collide accurately.

The only other LightWave-related program that attempted to simulate
physics was called Dynamic Motion Module and it totally sucked....objects
would routinely pass through each other regardless of what sort of accuracy
settings you turned on, and it was as slow as frozen molasses caught in a
black hole!

I'm sure that Impact will suffer a speed decrease when using Arbitrary
Shape collision detection, but when using Sphere and/or Box, it is
wickedly fast!  And more importantly, it is accurate...I've generated
many different scenes with Impact and never had an object pass through
another.  I'm not saying that previous versions of Impact were perfect,
but they did work.

Other things I like about Impact:  The ability to assign materials to
objects, like a light, bouncy rubber ball, or a heavy, solid bowling
ball....the ability to apply "engines" to objects, like Thruster, Torque
Motor, Spring, Force Field, and others in addition to the standard
Gravitational forces.  I also like the fact that Envelopes can be
assigned to just about everything.

The few things I don't like about Impact! are it's somewhat temperamental
interface (which uses the pain-in-the-ass MUI preferences system on Amiga)
and the fact the the name of the program has an exclamation mark in it,
so that when you tell people about Impact!, it looks like you don't know
how to speak good.  =)

Feel free to ask any questions you may have about Impact!....I'm not a
physics professor, but I did read and understand Stephen Hawking's "Brief
History of Time", so I must not be a complete idjut.

Hopefully I'll have time to play around with the new version over the
next few days and will let everyone know how it works....

                                      -David Warner
                                       Event Horizon Graphics


--
[e-mail] sent this message.
To Post a Message           : [e-mail]
Un/Subscription Requests To : [e-mail]
(DIGEST)                 or : [e-mail]
Administrative Items To     : [e-mail]