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Dear all,
I’d like to develop a Sailing Simulator during the summer and I already have some background knowledge on how the physics work on a boat while sailing (both up and down wind). The problem is: I don’t know whether writing a custom physics engine or using an existing one. The first case would be much more interesting but time consuming; in the second one I wouldn’t really know how to model the interaction between the wind, the sail and the boat using the existing API (in my case I’m familiar with ODE).Any suggestions?
As always, thanks to all!
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Depends how accurate you want to be, if its not for testing hull and sail designs and is for a game I would simplify. First thought would be just use layers of dynamic steering fields for water current and wind with a turbulence influence and just account for the momentum of the boat and the rudder position and the properties of the sail (Boom angle, % full sail that sort of thing) rather than trying to have the physics determine the force the wind imparts due to its shape (But I am sure that is a solved problem). Then you can have the wind fields affect in a purely visual way with the sail with it modelled as simply a mass point grid.
(I did a simple steering field at the end of this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3dR6SPMrrc).
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Good artists borrow, great artists steal
I’d pay close attention to Virtua Skipper for how it should feel. I think you risk choosing such a specific application of physics (wind and water) that by the time you’ve fully figured out how to bend one of those physics engines to your will you could have written a moderately bug free physics system that really suits your use case. Enjoy yourself!
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Hi all, thanks for the replies. What I’d like to do is a game, so it has to feel good (as Greenbean was saying) and some simplification can be used (thanks David). I will start working on it (hopefully) soon, I’ll come back if I have more specific questions :)!
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> (in my case I’m familiar with ODE).
As an alternate physics engine, Bullet Physics seems to be a lot more active than ODE ( http://bulletphysics.org )
Havok Physics is also free to use on Windows etc.
Even if you are adding your own "wind physics’, having the ability to let a third party physics engine handle the dynamics, and especially collisions, will be a big win as you add more and more features to your app.
Mal
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