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DarkBASIC Professional Discussion / Is DarkBasic Pro appropriate for this,? If so...looking for collaborator

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huertaaj
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Posted: 17th Aug 2010 22:21
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Hi all: I am a professor of plant biology at a university. My goal is to develop "interactive" educational materials for teaching undergraduate courses in botany and also in general biology. I also model and make my own animations for teaching using 3DS MAX (every since 3DS version 1). For a few years now I have toyed with DBPro for creating interactive animations for my classes but I'm not that good of a programmer. Based on my tests I can see that there is plenty of potential for using DBPro to develop teaching materials. My goal is to develop interactive animations, using DBPro if possible, with funding from a National Science Foundation grant. The end result would be to create a nationally-recognized educational website for teaching plant and general biology primarily based on animations and short instructional videos (I also create my own videos for teaching). In order to get the grant from NSF I need to develop a few prototype interactive animations, hopefully using DBPro. For this purpose I tried to link up with a computer science professor on campus but that didn't work out since he was too busy and also didn't seem to like DarkBasic Pro very much. He was even saying that he thought we should develop our educational materials aimed at the XBOX360. I've played with things like VRML, and other types of interactive visualization but nothing seems to be good enough for what I would like to accomplish. At this point I'm also not sure if DBPro is good enough for what I want to do. If you consider youself an "expert" DBpro programmer, especially programming physics-based animations, have the time and interest, and would like to discuss the possibility of a collaboration with me, please let me know. I would probably eventually hire you as a consultant/programmer/animator through the NSF grant once I got the grant. However, before I can obtain the NSF grant, you would have to help me to develop a few "example" animations showing off the possibilities for what could be done in the future using DBPro. To clarify, I'm not interested in creating games, but I am interested in scientific visualization for teaching. Any comments or interest?
Sincerely,
huertaaj
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Fatal Berserker
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Posted: 17th Aug 2010 23:06
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In future can you implement paragraphs into your messages please.

If all else fails, blame your Government.
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Clonkex
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 04:46 Edited at: 18th Aug 2010 04:56
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Hey huertaaj (<<?),

Well, I would say DarkBASIC is plenty good enough. What you need to look for is a programmer willing to help you. I am, but I am only.....wait mod said not to say my age if I'm under 18.....well, I'm under 18. I homeschool, so school isn't too much of a problem. I don't consider myself an expert DBPro programmer, but I think what you are asking is quite possible, and I think I could manage it, if you explained a bit what needed doing. I'm not interested in money or anything (well...credit for the code would be nice), so I'm basically a free programmer. I have major problems with modelling stuff, but since you can model things I believe I can do this.

Anyway, if my age is no problem, and you can explain what needs doing, then I will start programming for you.

Clonkex

Making games is easy.....finishing them is a different matter.

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz, Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT 512mb, 1gb ram.
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tiresius
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 05:07
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It sounds like you would use DBPro to create scenes with animation (easy), realistic physics (a little harder) and interactivity (easy).

But to get on the web you would really have to capture video from the DBPro window and make MPG files or stick it on Youtube. Because as far as I know DBPro is not made for the "web". Unless this website would just provide a download for the DBPro interactive video programs.


A 3D marble platformer using Newton physics.
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Clonkex
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 05:25
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Oh, yeah. As far as I know you can't embed a DBPro program into a webpage. It would be fine to have them download it, though. Plus, DBPro is completely royalty-free.

Clonkex

Making games is easy.....finishing them is a different matter.

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz, Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT 512mb, 1gb ram.
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MMM
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 05:34
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Last Life?


If anything, that shows you can do what you're thinking of. Pretty old now as well.

Powerboard Productions
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Igglepud
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 06:24
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Huertaaj--

I am a Spanish teacher looking to create games for my curriculum. How do you apply for the grant? Is there a link somewhere?

Also, the 360 would work at home, but I am looking for things in the classroom. Aimed more at teachers. If the teachers are your market, I think you are on the right track.

www.dustinmcmurry.com
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Igglepud
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 06:24
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Huertaaj--

I am a Spanish teacher looking to create games for my curriculum. How do you apply for the grant? Is there a link somewhere?

Also, the 360 would work at home, but I am looking for things in the classroom. Aimed more at teachers. If the teachers are your market, I think you are on the right track.

www.dustinmcmurry.com
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huertaaj
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Posted: 18th Aug 2010 16:21
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I'll respond to your responses in the order received. I don't know how else to respond since I'm kind of new to this forum.

Clonkex: It doesn't matter if you are 2 or 200 years old. If you can do the job, that's all that matters. I'll put together a couple of simple scenes in 3DS Max and tell you what I need to do. Give me a couple of days.


Tiresius: I want to create the primitives, surfaces, basic animation, etc. in 3DSMax, then use DBPro capabilities (if it has them) to animate whatever animation does not translate from 3DSMax,throw in an interactive camera, and a few user controls. Doesn't sound that difficult. Capturing videos and posting them to Youtube is not the goal here. I can already do that from 3DSMax and rendering to video. What I want is to create "interactive" animations that the user can control, moving the camera around a scene, watching something happen from any angle, etc. I understand that the DBPro EXE files have to be downloaded and executed. That's the way it is and I don't see any problem with that. If the downloaded file shows the scientific visualization as I intend, then "job done".


MMM: I don't know what Last Life is but I'll check it out. I tried Second Life but that was pretty useless for my purpose (too much overhead, too limiting, and it wouldn't behave as required).

Igglepud: Yes, what I want to create is mostly directed at teachers (professors, etc). These interactive animations are intended to be used in class for teaching and then at home at the convenience of the student for reviewing and understanding difficult concepts in biology such as membrane function and transport, protein catalysis, gas exchange, etc. I imagine that you could develop DBPro applications for teaching Spanish or anything else. I don't think that the National Science Foundation would fund projects for teaching language since they focus only on science. It's probable that the Department of Education has funding opportunities that would meet your requirements.
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Clonkex
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Posted: 19th Aug 2010 10:51
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Right, then I will do it. I will give you a couple of days and check back.

Clonkex

Making games is easy.....finishing them is a different matter.

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz, Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT 512mb, 1gb ram.
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jrowe
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Posted: 19th Aug 2010 12:42 Edited at: 19th Aug 2010 18:47
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Huertaaj,

I'm a recent UK biology graduate, whose main academic interests are plant biology and the application of computer modelling. My Literature review was on modelling phyllotaxis and my research project involved testing a systems biology model of root hormone interactions.

As a teenager, I also did a lot of programming in DBpro and, with another member of the forum, I even contributed a 3D game to a TGC competition. Although it has been a good couple of years since I picked DBpro up properly.

I think it sounds like a great idea, and although I'm not sure that in my circumstances I can commit completely, I am interested in contributing.


James Rowe

For Fathers and Sons who enjoy wholy spirits.
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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 20th Aug 2010 12:43
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I think flash or java applets would be a much better idea - they're usually more cross-platform and accessible than executables you have to download and leave the comfort of your web browser to play. The only problem with that is that 3d animations are a much less standard thing. (also these executables cannot be run on macs)

I'm trying to get into website programming and flash programming right now, so I'm nowhere near apt enough to help you much, but I could try


Is't life, I ask, is't even prudence, to bore thyself and bore thy students?
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huertaaj
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Posted: 20th Aug 2010 18:19
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Neuro Fuzzy: It would be great to be able to do something like what I'm proposing with Java or flash but I have never seen interactive 3D animations using those platforms. Do you know of any that are online and if so can you point me to any links?
huertaaj
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Neuro Fuzzy
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Posted: 21st Aug 2010 06:11
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this guy, ken perlin (whose idea "perlin noise" was) has a bunch of 3d java applets on his site, namely these:
http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/experiments/ice/
http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/homepage2006/glop/index.html
http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/homepage2006/raytrace/index.html
http://mrl.nyu.edu/~perlin/experiments/ghost/
and a bunch of other ones.

I know this flash game is in 3d
http://www.gameshot.org/?id=5132
and a couple other ones.
I think java would have the best support for this kind of thing. All examples could be accessible in-browser. I think that java 3d (the standard library for 3d things) only supports .obj formats or something. Not too sure though.


Is't life, I ask, is't even prudence, to bore thyself and bore thy students?
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Clonkex
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Posted: 7th Oct 2010 11:59
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It seems either this post has disappeared so deep down into the stack that no-one can find it any more, or huertaaj has died. Well, maybe not the latter Just to make everyone sure, I am still available to make a program huertaaj. I am even making my own gui system, so that will make it a lot easier.

Clonkex

Making games is easy.....finishing them is a different matter.

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz, Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT 512mb, 1gb ram.
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huertaaj
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Posted: 7th Oct 2010 20:47
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Hi Clonkex; Luckily I'm not deat yet. Sorry I had not gotten back to you. The fall semester started and ate up all my time. I checked out the Java applications suggested by Neuro Fuzzy above but they are all way too primitive. I need to develop interactive visualizations that are much more complex containing animated objects in addition to allowing the viewer to move around in the 3D space. I'll get back on this and send you something by next week. By the way, I am planning on traveling to Melbourne Australia next summer to present my research at the International Botanical Congress. I'm wondering if you don't live too far from there.
huertaaj
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Clonkex
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Posted: 8th Oct 2010 01:06
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Hi huertaaj,

Unfortunately I live a LONG way from Melbourne. I have just bought Nuclear Glory Collision Plugin so it should be very easy to make a First Person walk-around style viewer, or even easier a fly-around viewer. I will also be buying EZ-Rotate and Enhanced Animations sometime soon. EA should make it really easy to animate stuff (plants, insides of plants etc) a lot easier and they will be smoother animations too.

I have never been to Melbourne, but I believe it's a nice place to visit. Tell me what you think of Australia!

Clonkex

P.S. If you've been to Oz before you can tell me now !

Making games is easy.....finishing them is a different matter.

Intel Core 2 Duo 2.8Ghz, Nvidia GeForce 9400 GT 512mb, 1gb ram.
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