Art Of Illusion is an
open source 3D modeling, animation and rendering program. It is
written completely in Java, so it can run on as many different types
of computer as possible. Using Art Of Illusion, you can ‘render’
(create) images in formats such as JPEG, PNG and TIFF, as well as
videos in QuickTime format. Using further tools other video formats
such as MPEG and DivX can also be produced. Modeling in AOI (Art Of
Illusion) is performed using meshes. While the basic support within
AOI is generic, the built in tools all work with triangle meshes.
Quad and ‘ngon’ meshes are more recently supported with a plugin,
the PolyMesh editor. Textures and materials
are well supported, with linear and procedural, 2D and 3D textures,
and linear and procedural materials. There are visual editors for all
texture and material types, and you can create a procedure or texture
by simply dragging connections between logic modules. (Of course, to
begin with, you may want some guidance on what to drag where...) All renderers in AOI
are plugins, with the standard distribution containing a polygon
(raster) renderer, and a raytracer renderer. Further renderer plugins
are also available. All renderers can be used to create both single
images and animation videos. The AOI raytracer is both powerful and
fast, proving that compute-intensive code written in Java does not
necessarily suffer a performance penalty when compared to C or C++
code. The AOI raytracer is multi-threaded to take advantage of
multiple CPUs, and supports adaptive antialiasing, multiple Global
Illumination options including photon-mapping, ambient occlusion, and
Monte-Carlo, and various processing options such as transparency,
depth of field, caustics, etc. The AOI plugin
architecture allows users and 3rd parties to create new
functionality without needing to modify the base code. AOI comes with
a version-aware plugin manager (SPManager) which enables you to
download and install plugins and scripts from central repositories,
just by clicking a few buttons. The AOI scripting interface allows
users to automate tasks, create new tools and even new object types
without having to compile or package code. Scripts are written in a
Java syntax, and are executed using the open source ‘Beanshell’
engine. A sample of the
publicly available plugins includes: A PolyMesh plugin
which supports quad meshes and subdivision, in a similar fashion to
Wings3D. A Tree and Plant
designer, which uses the visual procedural editor concepts of AOI to
create repetitive and branching structures for trees and plants; A Vector renderer
which supports output into vector formats such as SVG; Various
translators, which support the import and export of external file
formats including VRML, STL, XML, and OBJ; A sample of the
publicly available scripts includes: Grunge, which
applies effects such as dirt and dents to selected surfaces; Text, which allows
3D objects to be made of characters and words; Tinsel, which
creates tinsel objects There is an excellent
and up-to-date manual available online; a range of tutorials covering
the basic my-first-model (an hourglass), to complex modeling,
animation, lighting techniques, and even script and plugin writing.
The AOI community uses a number of forums to provide help to new
users and discuss techniques, features, problems, and future
directions. In addition, an active Wiki documents news and new
features on an ongoing basis.
Overview