Bl
Bl
Bl
Bl
Bl
You are here:   Home »  Products »  PolyTrans|CAD+DCC  
Bl

Home > Supported File Formats > DirectX to VRML


How to convert DirectX (.x) to VRML (VRML2, VRML97, X3D)?


PolyTrans|CAD+DCC performs mathematically precise CAD, DCC/Animation, GIS and BIM 3D file conversions into all key downstream 3D packages and file formats. Okino software is used and trusted throughout the world by many tens of thousands of 3D professionals in mission & production critical environments, backed by respectable personal support directly from our core development team.

     

DirectX

.x files are the native 3D file format of the legacy Microsoft DirectX v2/v3 API and 3D toolkit. They were generally associated with 3D gaming whereby low polygon meshes with skinning (deformation) and "animation sets/clips" were the required norm. At the time of its introduction in 1995 there really wasn't any other similar 3D file formats which supported these capabilities in one, well defined and easily accessible format. Direct3D shipped for the first time in the DirectX 2.0 SDK in June 1996

Historically, the DirectX technology was developed a company called Rendermorphics of the UK which Microsoft purchased in February 1995. As little known history, 3 companies in the UK developed advanced realtime rendering toolkits prior to 1995: Argonaut Software (BRender), Criterion Software (RenderWare) and Rendermorphics (Reality Lab). Microsoft was to license the Argonaut 3D toolkit but opted to purchase the entire Rendermorphics company instead, at the last moment. As these various toolkits often sold for $50k at that time, the other two competitors eventually went out of business once Microsoft started giving DirectX away for free.

Okino knows of the .x file format well as it was the first company to properly and fully implement a DirectX importer and exporter, including full support for skinning and animation at a time when no other software provided such conversion support.

The DirectX file format had a long life until some people inside and outside of Microsoft started to push the FBX file format instead.

     

VRML

VRML2 ("Virtual Reality Markup Language") is one of the very best of non-MCAD file formats, little appreciated and lost (mainly) to the annals of time. Many people (wrongly) believe that FBX is the primary "translation file format" but VRML2 pre-dated it by at least 10+ years and has equally good or better functionality (and in an open, non-proprietary specification). It was supplemented or augmented by the X3D (XML-based) file format in the mid 2000s. The Web3D Consortium supports the evolution of VRML2/X3D and of its acceptance as ISO and IEC standards.

Without getting into specifics, VRML2 can be considered a "rich file format" in terms of its functionality and capabilities, yet few software programs fully utilize all of that functionality. It could have, and should have, become the defacto "universal 3D file format" for data translation and long term storage but it did not have the clout nor marketing dollars that other newer formats had such as from Autodesk (FBX, DWF), Sony (COLLADA), Adobe+Intel (U3D), Dassault Systemes (3DXML) and others.

VRML1 and VRML2 are 3D file formats with a long and complex history. They were originally developed in the mid 1990s to define 'interactive 3D worlds' on the then-new World Wide WEB. However, statistically speaking, VRML2 became more well known as a high quality "data translaton and storage" file format, partly due to Okino pushing it as such a standard in the industry. It was implemented by a good number of 3D software packages and hence became a "reliable back door" to convert 3D assets out of those packages before FBX, DWF, COLLADA, U3D and other similar file formats came along in the mid to late 2000s, or glTF in the late 2010's.

It is also known as VRML2, X3D, Classic VRML, VRML97, VRML1 and Inventor2.