Use FBX file with 3D model in iOS native app - ios

I have a requirement to display an interactive 3D model (the client supplies few FBX files) in one of the screens in a native Objective-C/Swift app.
I know that there's a possibility to work with Unity/Cocos3D but then the entire app will have to be Unity/Cocos3D based. In my case the app has to be native and only one screen (one of the tabs in the tab bar controller) should integrate the 3D model that the user can move/rotate etc.
Thanks.

The FBX SDK is available on iOS and I wrote a little tutorial to demo how to use it here. However, the FBX SDK does contain a viewport/canvas for displaying FBX file on any OS. For displaying FBX you would need to create your own view. There is couple of solutions you can use here:
without programming, you can use the 'FBX Review'. This tools is free and designed to display FBX, DAE, OBJ, ... files
you can implement your own viewport/view such as an obj view like I did here, but it would probably need to be rewritten. I wrote it overnight for a hack, so it needs to be optimized.
you use the iOS SceneKit library which would be a better approach than implementing your own view.

If you go with option 3 above, you can use Unity to export a Collada (.dae) file for importing into SceneKit thru the collada exporter. You can buy the exporter on the Unity Asset Store directly; there's one for Unity 5.x and one for Unity 2017.

Related

Load glTF model into RealityKit scene?

I'd like to load a glTF file generated by another program into RealityKit. I get the impression that the only way to load models into RealityKit is via USD or Reality files.
Anyone know a way to get some other model into RealityKit? Not necessarily as a file -- I'd be happy to be able to generate a MeshResource and array of Materials myself and load them in that way.
Reality Converter
Apple discussed this in the WWDC20 video "The artist’s AR toolkit".(link)
They show how to convert FBX, OBJ, USD and GLTF files to USDZs for use in Reality Composer.
Reality Converter is still in beta and needs to be downloaded from the Apple Developer website. I used it and it is quite nice.
There is also other tools you can use on the command line if this is more your thing. At WWDC 2019, Apple announced the USDZ Tools or also called USD Python Tools.
USDZ Tools is a pre-compiled Python library containing binaries of Pixar’s USD library for macOS. This is the link. You will need to download and install the library.
I would give a try to the Reality Converter first. I think it is here to stay since probably Apple has no intention to add support for glTF files in Reality Composer in the future, since they love USBZ!
I ended up using GLTFKit, an open source library by Warren Moore. It does exactly what I want -- lets me load a glTF file into SceneKit/RealityKit.
https://github.com/warrenm/GLTFKit
Alas, as you said, at the moment the only way to load your .gltf model in RealityKit scene – is firstly to convert it into .usdz model via Xcode command line tools. Also in RealityKit you can use .reality format (use it for a much faster uploading time) and .rcproject format that can be exported from Reality Composer app. These two file formats allow you store not only PBR shaders and animation but also a dynamics.
Please, read this post for further details.

Dynamic 3DObject use in ARKit-SceneKit

I want to download the 3D Object-dae(collada) file from server and want to display on surface dynamically so can please share how can I achieve this in ARKit via SceneKit or else?
You can check this link: https://the-nerd.be/2014/11/07/dynamically-load-collada-files-in-scenekit-at-runtime/ it is old post but I don't think something is changed since that
According to this (see the Discussion section): https://developer.apple.com/documentation/modelio/mdlasset/1391813-canimportfileextension?language=objc
dae is not supported at runtime (ModelIO).
Additionally I'm working on a library called AssetKit (In Progress) and it will full support COLLADA and glTF, it is too early to say that but after initial release, you will be able to load dae files dynamically. It is written with C99 but I'll optimize it for Swift (by writing wrappers or integration with SceneKit...). Since it is still in progress I suggest that follow the first link

How to animate object 360 in ARToolKit in iOS

Currently I am working on the Augmented Reality and it works perfectly for me but I wanted to know how to animate the object in ARToolkit my issue is animation is not working for me
What i did i have created a fbx file from blender then i have converted into the .osgt format then i have converted to .osg format
Can any one help me out how we can animation the object in ARToolkit for iOS ?
You need to generate an .OSG file from whatever 3D Modelling/Animation tool you are using. You can use that .OSG file together with ARToolKit5.
For export from Blender have a look here: https://github.com/cedricpinson/osgexport
Then you need to read through this C-Interface that ARToolKit5 uses to interact with OpenSceneGraph(OSG) http://artoolkit.github.io/artoolkit5/doc/apiref/arosg_h/index.html
There are several arOSGSetModelAnimation* functions that you can use to manipulate the animation.
Have a look at the Android example: https://github.com/artoolkit/artoolkit5/tree/master/AndroidStudioProjects/ARNativeOSGProj
The C-Classes show you how you can load and use .OSG files with ARToolKit.
However, you need to use C on iOS and you cannot use Swift.
==Edit==
This question here gives some background regarding .FBX usage.
Import FBX to ARToolKit
In short .FBX is not supported and one should use the OSG commandline tool to convert .FBX to .OSG
--- Personal note ---
From my experience is easier to use the Unity3D plugin of ARToolKit5 or ARToolKit6 do you animations with Unity3D and export an iOS app.

ios : Displaying a simple 3D model with GLEssentials sample code

My goal is to display a simple 3D model and apply a texture on it.
I've downloaded the GLEssentials ios sample project to learn how to develop this (i'm new in ios OpenGL-ES API)
But the example model is a .model file, which I never heard about and which never appear in model bank websites.
What is this kind of file?
is the sample code compatible with other common model types (.obj, .c2d, .3ds)?
is it a good idea to start from this project?
Have a look at this question:
How to convert Blender blend (or obj) file to Qualcom Vuforia .h file
In my answer, I describe a script and accompanying Xcode project that converts .obj/.mtl files to header files suitable for OpenGL ES on iOS [link].
In response to your questions:
I believe the .model file is only appropriate for the sample project and is a proprietary Apple extension. It most likely contains simple data such as vertex positions.
I think you'd struggle to fit other model types into the sample code, which is very complex for OpenGL ES beginners. You might want to have a look at .pod files on Cocos2D here. I've seen and heard great things about it.
I wouldn't recommend it :)

Loading 3D model in iOS

I'm creating a game application from scratch with xcode for iOS, and I've use the OpenGL Game projet template to create mine.
I've searched a lot in the past few days, but I can't find any tutorials or example as to how I would load 3D model (via .obj files) in my application. I've found some documentation on loading them onto an app with a console script, but I need to do it programmatically.
Any help would be very appreciated
Also, my 3D models are created using blender
The future will be here momentarily — SceneKit, available in OS X since v10.8, will be in iOS 8. It can build and render a scene with COLLADA (.DAE) models directly. No need for third-party tools or code, nothing complicated to learn.
Apple's documentation is pretty good but if you prefer then other tutorials are available.
OpensceneGraph has support for iOS and a lot of prebuilt code which can help you develop the game. It supports loading OBJ models.
I recommend to use an Engine (like isgl3d, nineveh, Cocos3D, ...) for creating a 3D game, it will be hard if you use Opengl for a start.
Note: you can search for a list of game engine to choose the suitable one for you game, cause there is a lot of game engine, open-source or paid engine.
You can download the zip file from here and then run ./obj2opengl.pl 3DModel.obj in terminal .It will give you 3DModel.h file as output.
You need to use glDrawArrays instead of glDrawElements as the .h file contains array.
Obj files are simple to parse and are well described on wikipedia. You should be able to load them in one or 2 hours. But if you want to load the materials you need to invest some more time in your engine and into loading the obj file.

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