Best 3D engine / software for four view editor application

Question

I am going to write an 3D path editor. This editor should support four view set up (rront, left,right,3D). There is also necessary to use third party libraries for path calculations. Also there should be possible to import 3D scene in common free format (X3D,COLLADA,..) Free means that there is free editor available to create this scene.

Question is what engine/tool should I use for this program?

I am now comparing

• Java based:
  • JMonkeyEngine
  • Java3D
• Web based:
  • CopperLicht
  • X3DOM
• Other:
  • Unity
• Or:
  • DirectX
  • OpenGL
  • WebGL

According to me it is better to use some tool/engine where scene loaders are already written. But there is also request to supply additional GUI for the editor.

What would you recommend for me?

Answer 1

Don't use Java3D (it's largely abandoned). JMonkeyEngine is GREAT - I'd definitely recommend this library. Very active community, active development, and even though it's called an "Alpha" currently, it's VERY stable and relatively bug free.

One possible complication with XNA (from what I've heard) is that adding UI can be problematic - which would make your job tougher.

Web based, personally I'd reject just out of pure yuckyness (and performance reasons? uncertain concerns there)

Unity I wouldn't recommend, not because I have experience, but because it's very much a higher level "game engine". I know for a fact that JMonkeyEngine, on the other hand, gives you access to the low level functions you'll need to create such a tool.

Lower level (DirectX, OpenGL), I don't think you need to go that low, and the amount of time you'd be wasting doing basic stuff (which jME provides for you) just makes that prohibitive.

Answer 2

If you feel like using XNA (since you included the c# tag), see

Here's an older (VS2005) example

and a post from one of the XNA creators, Shawn Hargreaves,

And a corresponding entry on his blog

There are actually quite a few examples out there.

Answer 3

As stated above (+1) the XNA framework is a very good one for the .NET environment (it would work on any .NET managed programming language, the guides should be suitable to help you).

Essentially it works over the DirectX API (so avoid using it if your target platform is not windows/xbox)

Answer 4

I'd question whether you really need to write a full 3D editor yourself?

It might well be possible to do what you need by using an existing 3D editor such as Blender and adding the extra path information using the available tools and/or the built-in scripting language.