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Index › Discussion › Exhibition › Layering Demos
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Layering Demos (Read 1577 times)
Michael Krumpus
Layering Demos
Dec 9th, 2009, 8:12pm  
I built a library for Processing that allows the developer to write sketches with multiple layers that are drawn independently of one another.  All the info about the library is here: http://nootropicdesign.com/processing-layers/

Some demos that show the capability:
Paintball: http://nootropicdesign.com/processing-layers/Paintball/applet/index.html

LaserBurn: http://nootropicdesign.com/processing-layers/LaserBurn/applet/index.html
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jeffg
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #1 - Dec 10th, 2009, 6:19pm  
Very Interesting...  Smiley
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WWW  
onar3d
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #2 - Dec 11th, 2009, 4:37am  
Michael,

I've made a program very similar to yours that you may be curious to see the source code of, to give you ideas: http://www.onar3d.com/mother/

It is like yours, but OpenGL only, and has been in development in quite a while now, so it's feature set is pretty stable.

Knowing how OpenGL works, I believe you will find it is very difficult to get your idea working with sketches that run different renderers, ie layering three sketches, where one runs P2D, the other P3D and a third running in OPENGL. At least to get it running efficiently.

Because it will necessarily involve copying screen-sized images back and forth between the graphics cards memory and the computers memory once for each sketch, per frame, making for a great deal of unnecessary overhead.

Anyway, cool to see more people interested in the idea!
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andrewowaun
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #3 - Dec 11th, 2009, 5:12am  
Totally awesome stuff.

I will apply this to a tennis game I wanted to do.
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blindfish
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #4 - Dec 11th, 2009, 5:15am  
I like the idea; but I'd be happy enough with something that allowed me to switch the ordering of layers on-the-fly without necessarily treating each individual layer as a separate sketch - though I do see the benefit of not having to re-calculate an unchanged 'layer' each frame.

I've got into the habit of using registerDraw on classes and it would be handy to be able to change the rendering order as and when required.  Apparently Processing stores registered classes in an array...  No idea if this is exposed or what would happen if you changed the order whilst the sketch is running... Alternatively I guess you could unregister and re-register in the required order, but again no idea what effect this might have...
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Where is the what if the what is in why?
 
bredend
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #5 - Dec 11th, 2009, 7:07am  
Are the layers some kind of ArrayList with PGraphics?
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Michael Krumpus
Re: Layering Demos
Reply #6 - Dec 11th, 2009, 1:47pm  
bredend:
yes, each layer has its own PGraphics object, and the PAppletLayers object manages an ArrayList of PLayer objects.

Take a look at the source code here:
http://layers.svn.sourceforge.net/viewvc/layers/trunk/src/com/nootropic/processi...


This library only has two classes.  It's a shockingly small amount of code needed to accomplish layering. (not that it wasn't challenging...)
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