POD Format help understanding

PowerVR Insider
1

I am trying to better understand the POD file format in relation to the 3DMax elements. I am new to this so please bear with me.


Using the IntroductionPOD example from the SDK.


If I load the POD scene I can see that I will have:


9 total Nodes.


4 meshes


2 lights


1 camera.


(This adds to 7 so I am not sure what the missing 2 nodes from the total are but let me continue…)


Lets say that I want to load another “arm” looking object with in the same scene. If I duplicate that object on the same scene I will have a pod with


8 meshes


2 lights


1 camera


(Correct so far?)





Lets say that in my application I want to take one of these “arm” objects and move it around the scene.


Does the POD format allow me in any way to “group” the 4 meshes that make up the “arm” object?


Or would I have to come up with my own way of doing this in code.


For example. I guess one way would be for me to name each node something like arm1_part1


arm1_part2 arm1_part3. And then group based on the “arm1_” part of the name. Not very pretty though.


Is there a better way of doing this? Can I use 3DMax to group the 4 meshes that form an “arm” objects? Does POD recognize 3DMax groups?





Thanks for any information you can provide.


2

Hi,


Quote:

(This adds to 7 so I am not sure what the missing 2 nodes from the total are but let me continue...)

The missing two nodes are what the Camera and Light nodes look at. In Max they're called FDirect01.Target and Camera01.Target. They're basically dummy nodes.


Quote:

8 meshes
2 lights
1 camera
(Correct so far?)

Yep, this is correct.


Quote:

Lets say that in my application I want to take one of these "arm" objects and move it around the scene.
Does the POD format allow me in any way to "group" the 4 meshes that make up the "arm" object?
Or would I have to come up with my own way of doing this in code.
For example. I guess one way would be for me to name each node something like arm1_part1
arm1_part2 arm1_part3. And then group based on the "arm1_" part of the name. Not very pretty though.
Is there a better way of doing this? Can I use 3DMax to group the 4 meshes that form an "arm" objects? Does POD recognize 3DMax groups?

It does indeed recognise groups. When exported, the group becomes a dummy node which all the grouped objects share as a parent. Unless that object already had a parent in which case it may be a grandparent, great grandparent etc..


e.g. If you were to group the "arm" in IntroducingPOD you would get in your POD file


Code:

Group01
      - Cylinder01
            - BottomArm
                  - TopArm
      - GeoSphere01

So in this situation if you wanted to see if TopArm belonged to Group01 it would still not be very pretty.


I think a better solution for you would be to have a couple of CPVRTModelPOD scenes with each one containing one "arm".  That way when you go to draw a scene you'd know that every mesh inside belongs to a particular arm and would be able to move it appropriately.


Thanks,


Scott

Scott2010-06-11 10:26:27