JPCT or not JPCT?

[BaCaRoZzo]

Hi all.

My deepest apologies if my post could sound a little bit odd. I just need a fast feedback and I thought that, using the forum was the best choice. 

I'm currently involved in a small research project for the creation of prototype of a 3d simulator. Such simulator exploits discrete collision detection (with v-clip package) to simulate moving 3d shapes which can attach by colliding and split at a certain time in the future. Shapes are polyhedrons represented as a set of features (points, edges and faces) and can move and spin. A log traces the trajectories and velocities of shapes, along the simulation.

The first version of the prototype is in development and I think that a post-simulation visualization module would be a nice addition. I've just played around with other engines, some months ago, but all of them seem too "complex" for what I need. I'm searching for something "raw": just plain visualization of polygonal elements (polyhedron as said) moving along the trajectories logged from the simulator.

Thus, my question is: is it feasible (and possibly not that hard) to set up such visualization that shows my logged shapes? That is, set up predefined routes for my polyhedrons in JPCT? Is there some code, I can start working from? Moreover, how many polyhedron can I show? I'm going to simulate 1 million shapes (or more), can JPCT handle such scenario?

Any clue is really appreciated. Even advices for other engines/fremeworks/APIs/whatever.
Thanks in advance.

[EgonOlsen]

In theory, you can do this. In practice, 1,000,000 shapes and more seem to be very much for any generic 3d engine like jPCT. You can give it a try by simply creating a world that consists of so many dummy objects and see what happens. IMHO, you would be better of with your own, customized engine for this. No general purpose engine has been written with this special scenario in mind.

[BaCaRoZzo]

Hi Egon,
thanks a lot for the FAST reply and the help!
I'm going to give a try and add a lot of dummy objects, as you suggested. Surely a tailored solution for the purpose could be the key choice solution.

Even if the performances will be poor with tons of object, I'm still into the engine. Indeed, it would be also interesting to do some visual tests for the current prototype with a few shapes. This implies moving/rotating along routes, as explained in my first post. I've just played around with the engine, added some mouse/keyboard controls for the camera and tested basic objects. To create a simple visualizer for shapes moving on predefined routes, which classes should I pay attention to? Is there some code available (I'm just thinking about games with enemies following specific routes)?

Thanks again for your patience (especially with my English!) and the help.
Bests.