Zapfab: JOGL-powered online 3D print shop

[zapfabgeek]

Not strictly a game, but we'd welcome any feedback:

http://www.zapfab.com

The home page has a catalog of customizable 3D designs (bowls, boxes, bangles, etc). Select any of the designs to view or customize, and you should see it in a JOGL-powered 3D Viewing/Customizing applet. You can customize size and shape, color and pattern (depending on the design).

You can save the customized design back into the database; comment on, tag and rate the designs, and order them to be 'printed' on our 3D printers. Using the 3D printers, we can make you a real, physical object based on your chosen design (it's like watching magic!)

We'd welcome any feedback on the JOGL, the Java applet, or the site itself (but particularly on the JOGL)

[MasterOfDisaster]

awesome stuff!

when starting the applet it showed the certificate info and i noticed you use a WrapperApplet from sun microsystems. i googled a bit but didn't find info about it. i wonder what that is and if it could be beneficial for my work, too.

[gouessej]

We'd welcome any feedback on the JOGL, the Java applet, or the site itself (but particularly on the JOGL)

Yeah!!!!!!!!!! JOGL! Excellent choice! Thank you very much!

Games published by our own members! Check 'em out!

[zapfabgeek]

Thanks for the positive comments!

MasterOfDisaster, you can get the WrapperApplet (or Applet Launcher) from https://applet-launcher.dev.java.net/. It lets you use native libraries from an applet without you having to sign the applet code.

HTH

[CommanderKeith]

That's cool, I'd love to see how this 3d printer works!

Maybe you should make it more clear on the website that you will actually make the object - it's not obvious what the point of the whole website and its designs are. If you spelt out that you can own the physical object, that might be better. Also, it might be worth magnifying objects that are small, so they aren't little pixels in the preview.

Nice job

[nva225]

Very interesting concept, I tested out loading/editing objects and found I was very pleased with the simplicity of doing it and the general speed of the page loading and rendering (the latter of course being fantastically fast). Only two minor gripes: one, I'm running a fairly high resolution (1680 by 1050) and the little edit window is a bit small. Would prefer an option to bump that up to 50% or maybe 100% of the current length/width. Also, if possible, can you stop the screen from flashing every time you update the dimensions in a customize? It's a little annoying, would look much smoother if it didn't do this.

Also, it would be cool if you posted some examples of a 3D image previews alongside the produced output. Some people may be a bit doubtful or curious as to how well it really works (esp for some of the weirder shapes).

But overall really cool. Hope the site does well!

[Hansdampf]

Torus knots rule!
Like nva225, I think that the size of the preview window is too small, in that size you could easily do it in software rendering (especially because the shading is sooo simple).
It does not work with Aero enabled, not a problem for me, maybe for some of your potential customers.

[zapfabgeek]

Thanks again for the comments!

CommanderKeith: You can see how the printer works on this video from YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yyZtBYG0QOg. We'll have another go at the words on the website to make it clearer that we will make the objects, and look at magnifying some of the small thumbnails.

nva225: Yes, we need to make the screen layout more flexible. We've just gone with the fixed layout at the moment for simplicity, but we'll be making it flexible as soon as we can.  Thanks for mentioning the flashing: I need to give the recalculate/redraw code some more TLC (and understand JOGL/OpenGL better...). We're aiming to have some photos of real models on the site in the next week or so.

Hansdampf: I'm sure that we can get better (more realistic?) rendering from JOGL, as soon as I can figure it out. Thanks for the tip about Aero: We'll go and test it.

Thanks again for looking and commenting: I really appreciate you taking the time.