CGTalk - What has to do bones with rendering?

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nikopol_gfx

06-28-2005, 11:43 AM

I heard sometimes about different rendering plugins for Lightwave that supports various features and... bones. For what? As much I know from 3d theory, a rendering engine gets only shading and geometry information, usually, and nothing like bones, deformations(except animation data, for motion blur).

Is it LW's fault, because it's architecture, a plugin rendering has to do itself deformation, subpatch subdivision and others? What are other current LW API constraints?

Anyway, the biggest enhancement I expect from LW9 is a much better, complete API for 3rd party developers. We'll see plugins more powerfull and integrated, at least.

Have a nice day !

zuzzabuzz

06-28-2005, 02:05 PM

The bones apply deformations to geometry, which are then fed to the renderer. So while the bones are invisible, their effects are not.

There can be troubles in getting the geometry to plugins at the right time. If care is not taken, plugins get the geometry before the bones have had a chance to work. But, this can be changed by the user. Unfortunately, I do not think plugins have control of whether they get pre-displaced or post-displaced geometry.

Looking forward to the future. I'm still thinking about LW8.5 instead of 9. We shall see. :)

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