General

During the development of the "Undisclosed Project" (see relevant portfolio entry), apart from Graphics Programmer I took up Artist duties as well. Since the development time given for this project was very short (2 months) I decided I would use Maya for the most rapid production of 3d assets, since that is the 3d packet I am most familiar with. However I couldn't find a single .obj loader that would work as I wanted. So what does a programmer who can't find the software he needs do? Right! He writes it himself :)

However apart from just writing an .obj loader that conformed with the latest .obj file format (Maya 7.0) I decided (since I was going to need lots of metallic surfaces for this type of game) to customize the format a bit so I could define reflective surfaces from within the .obj file and have OpenGL display them with techniques like environment mapping. That, along with the added bonus of display list usage gave me an efficient and functional model loading module which I since use for any small or larger demos I create.

Skills Practiced / Knowledge Acquired

Efficient File Parsing - OpenGL - Optimization - Environment Mapping Techniques