Folks:

  There's a fairly full featured physics library called "ODE" that I've been
looking at; it would offer anything we'd need for a particle system, but as
it's C/C++ type of a thing it would require processing before POV-Ray
parsing (sort of like how Morray does it).

  I have also gotten the SDK for a system called "HyperMatter"
(http://www.hypermatter.com) that does more than rigid bodies - you can also
do 'flexible' objects.  Some of their demo's look pretty cool.  They seem
open to the idea of a shareware plugin type of a thing.
 (I think they are redoing their homepage, this is the new one).  See
(DivX):
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/hypermatter/avi/dice_divx.avi
or
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/hypermatter/avi/mstrap_divx.avi


  If I built something like this, it would have to be a preprocessing type
of a thing.  My feeling is that due to CSG complexities, you'd have to
designate some objects as BBox's or somehow declare to my preprocessor what
physical attributes an object has, i.e.

box { <-0.8, -1.2, -1.2> <0.8, 1.2, 1.2> }
 /*Physics: weight 1.3 rigid velocity(1,0,.4) */ }

(best, as you can just do a regular POV-Ray run on the file and it'll pass)

or
#include "physics.inc" //defines physics macro's)
box { <-0.8, -1.2, -1.2> <0.8, 1.2, 1.2> }
 mass(1.0) elasticity(0.4) }

or something.

There's quite a lot of complex keywords / properties that would have to be
programmed in, constraints, physical properties, and you'd have to define
what actual objects compose seperate physical objects.  I'm tring to get a
general feeling for how people would like to use such a package before I
think about what the actual syntax would look like.

Thoughts?

                  == John ==

p.s.  Don't look at the "Naturally" clip, you'll be mesmerized.

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