Eclectic3D

Programs tend to have design goals; for J3DWorkbench, it aims to be:

• A 'swiss army knife' of desktop interactive 3D.
• A 'glue' of real-time 3D

Here are great some things you can do (and being done) with J3DWorkbench:

Geography, Geolocalization, Architecture

Do a virtual fly through of your geographical area, using real arial or satellite data

How?

Follow some links on the Virtual Terrain Project, and read about acquiring Digital Elevation Models (DEM)s or SDTS from links on here. SDTS files will need conversion into DEM before import into J3DWorkbench--see this site for details and links to more DEM elevations files. I downloaded an historical example of Mnt. St. Helens before the eruption in 1980 from here, and imported into J3DWorkbench (figure 1).

Now I can fly over, or orbit around the topography, measure it, illuminate it, scale it, texture it, or compare it to the model of AFTER the eruption. Going further, I could propose to animate the eruption, adding effects such as fire, lava and smoke. Or, more simply, download a flatter area, and add buildings, and other artifacts.

Recreate an existing landscape, or design a realistic-looking custom place

How?

This is standard procedure for people who make games; not only does it have other applications, but it is also fun! Use Terragen to create a custom terrain, complete with land, water, mountains with realistic textures, sky with clouds in and import these into J3DWorkbench. Terragen uses mathematical functions such as Perlin noise and Fractals to produce eye-catching, realistic-looking landscapes and effects. J3DWorkbench uses some of these devices for cloud texture generation, and water animation. The next figure shows some imported terrain with water, but without the skybox applied.

Stay posted for more examples of what you can do with J3DWorkbench. In the meantime, download it, visit the demo scenes, and see for yourself!