Chapter 28.3.   Playing Movies in a Java 3D World (Part 1)

[ This chapter does not appear in the book. ]

The ability to play a movie clip inside a Java 3D scene opens up opportunities for richer, more interesting 3D content. A movie can display more believable backgrounds, such as moving clouds, a busy city street, or the view out of a window. Movies can be employed in help screens, or as transitions between game levels.

This article, which is split into two parts, describes how I implemented a Java 3D movie screen. In this part, I'll explain how I utilized the Java Media Framework (JMF), more specifically the JMF Performance Pack for Windows v.2.1.1e The other tools in my arsenal were J2SE 5.0 and Java 3D 1.3.2. In part two, I'll discuss another version of the movie screen, using Quicktime for Java.

Two screenshots of the JMF Movie3D application are shown at the top of this page, taken at different times: the one on the right is a view of the screen from the back.

The important elements of this application are:

• An integration of JMF and Java 3D. There can be multiple screens in an application, of any size. Since a screen is a subclass of Java 3D's Shape3D class, it can be easily integrated into different Java 3D scenes.
   
• The implementation uses the Model-View-Controller design pattern. The screen is the view element, represented by the JMFMovieScreen class. The movie is the model part, and is managed by the JMFSnapper class. A Java 3D Behavior class, TimeBehavior, is the controller, triggering periodic updates of the movie. All the JMF code is localized in the JMFSnapper class, making it easier to test and changes. Part two of this article essentially replaces JMFSnapper by a Quicktime for Java version called QTSnapper.
   
• The use of Java 3D performance tricks to speed up rendering. The result is a movie which runs at 25 frames/second without any difficulty.
   
• A discussion of the problems I had with JMF, problems which meant that my preferred solution wouldn't work. JMF has the potential to be a great API, but beneath its gleaming surface there are some poorly implemented features lying in wait.

Downloads

• This chapter as an article at O'Reilly's OnJava Website. Last updated 1st June 2005.
  
• The PDF file for the draft chapter (234 Kb). Last updated: 20th May 2005.
  
• Zipped Source code (1.4 MB). Sorry, MPEG examples can get big.
  Last updated: 20th May 2005.
  
• Readers Comments. Last updated: 13th January 2005.

• Up to the Killer Game Programming in Java Index Page
• Back to Chapter 28. Trees that Grow
• On to Chapter 28.5. Playing Movies in a Java 3D World (Part 2)