A new external adaptor to vrml viewer based on Java platform

VRML is a very powerful language for displaying 3D objects and supporting interactivity, sophisticated lighting and cinematography. For reasons of processing speed and availability of 3D libraries, formats of VRML viewers are generally implemented in native C/C++ code. However, these languages may not be the most elegant languages to use for artificially intelligent control of 3D for dramatic narrative, believable speaking characters, dynamic cinematography and stage management. A good alternative is the Java language which provides very productive syntax and a body of developed application code for control and management of 3D scenes. The paper first presents an analysis of the problems of interfacing Java to 3D rendering systems, and some possible solutions in the context of interfacing Java to VRML. Finally we implement a Java interface which is defined independent to the underlying 3D representation and format. This solution makes it possible to abstract out the particular field types used in the 3D rendering platform. Therefore a Java control system using the interface presented here should be simple to port and integrate with any 3D rendering system using any 3D format.