Subject: Description of Turbo Silver Object format
From: [email-masked] (Helge Egelund Rasmussen)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.tech

Here is the description of the Turbo Silver TDDD chunk.
If you order the 'File formats diskette' (value $5) from Impulse Inc.
you also get the source for a program to read/write an object file. 
As I'm not sure that the program is Public Domain, I'll not post the program.

======================================================================

                          FORM TDDD
                          ---------

    FORM TDDD is used by Impulse's Turbo Silver 3.0 for 3D rendering
    data.  TDDD stands for "3D data description".  The files contain
    object and (optionally) observer data.

    Currently, in "standard IFF" terms, a FORM TDDD has only two chunk
    types:  an INFO chunk describing observer data;  and an OBJ chunk
    describing an object heirarchy.  The INFO chunk appears in "cell"
    files, and the OBJ chunk appears in "cell" files and "object" files.
    The FORM has an (optional) INFO chunk followed by some number of
    OBJ chunks.  (Note:  OBJ is followed by a space -- ckID = "OBJ ")

    The INFO and OBJ chunks, in turn, are made up of smaller chunks with
    the standard IFF structure:  <ID> <data-size> <data>.

    The INFO "sub-chunks" are relatively straightforward to interpret.

    The OBJ "sub-chunks" support object heirarchies, and are slightly
    more difficult to interpret.  Currently, there are 3 types of OBJ
    sub-chunks:  an EXTR chunk, describing an "external" object in a
    seperate file; a DESC chunk, describing one node of a heirarchy;
    and a TOBJ chunk marking the end of a heirarchy chain.  For each
    DESC chunk, there must be a corresponding TOBJ chunk.  And an
    EXTR chunk is equivalent to a DESC/TOBJ pair.

    In Turbo Silver, the structure of the object heirarchy is as
    follows.  There is a head object, and its (sexist) brothers.
    Each brother may have child objects.  The children may have
    grandchildren, and so on. The brother nodes are kept in a
    doubly linked list, and each node has a (possibly NULL)
    pointer to a doubly linked "child" list. The children point
    to the "grandchildren" lists, and so on.  (In addition, each
    node has a "back" pointer to its parent).

    Each of the "head" brothers is written in a seperate OBJ chunk,
    along with all its descendants.  The descendant heirarchy is
    supported as follows:

        for each node of a doubly linked list,

        1)  A DESC chunk is written, describing its object.
        2)  If it has children, steps 1) to 3) are performed
            for each child.
        3)  A TOBJ chunk is written, marking the end of the children.

    For "external" objects, steps 1) to 3) are not performed, but
    an EXTR chunk is written instead.  (This means that an external
    object cannot have children unless they are stored in the same
    "external" file).

    The TOBJ sub-chunks have zero size -- and no data.  The DESC
    and EXTR sub-chunks are made up of "sub-sub-chunks", again,
    with the standard IFF structure:  <ID> <data-size> <data>.

    Reader software WILL FOLLOW the standard IFF procedure of
    skipping over any un-recognized chunks -- and "sub-chunks"
    or "sub-sub-chunks". The <data-size> field indicates how many
    bytes to skip.  In addition it WILL OBSERVE the IFF rule that
    an odd <data-size> may appear, in which case the corredponding
    <data> field will be padded at the end with one extra byte to
    give it an even size.

    Now, on with the details.

    First, there are several numerical fields appearing in the data,
    describing object positions, rotation angles, scaling factors, etc.
    They are stored as "32-bit fractional" numbers, such that the true
    number is the 32-bit number divided by 65536.  So as an example,
    the number 3.14159 is stored as (hexadecimal) $0003243F.  This
    allows the data to be independant of any particular floating point
    format. And it (actually) is the internal format used in the
    "integer" version of Turbo Silver.  Numbers stored in this format
    are called as "FRACT"s below.

    Second, there are several color (or RGB) fields in the data.
    They are always stored as three UBYTEs representing the red,
    green and blue components of the color.  Red is always first,
    followed by green, and then blue.  For some of the data chunks,
    Turbo Silver reads the color field into the 24 LSB's of a
    LONGword.  In such cases, the 3 RGB bytes are preceded by a
    zero byte in the file.

    The following "typedef"s are used below:

    typedef LONG    FRACT;          /* 4 bytes */
    typedef UBYTE   COLOR[3];       /* 3 bytes */

    typedef struct  vectors {
        FRACT   X;                  /* 4 bytes */
        FRACT   Y;                  /* 4 bytes */
        FRACT   Z;                  /* 4 bytes */
    } VECTOR;                   /* 12 bytes total */

    typedef struct  matrices {
        VECTOR  I;                  /* 12 bytes */
        VECTOR  J;                  /* 12 bytes */
        VECTOR  K;                  /* 12 bytes */
    } MATRIX;                   /* 36 bytes total */

    The following structure is used in generating animated cells
    from a single cell.  It can be attached to an object or to the
    camera.  It is also used for Turbo Silver's "extrude along a
    path" feature.

    typedef struct  story   {
        UBYTE   Path[18];           /*  18 bytes        */
        VECTOR  Translate;          /*  12 bytes        */
        VECTOR  Rotate;             /*  12 bytes        */
        VECTOR  Scale;              /*  12 bytes        */
        UWORD   info;               /*   2 bytes        */
    } STORY;                    /*  56 bytes total  */

    The Path[] name refers to a named object in the cell data.
    The path object should be a sequence of points connected
    with edges.  The object moves from the first point of the
    first edge, to the last point of the last edge.  The edge
    ordering is important.  The path is interpolated so that
    the object always moves an equal distance in each frame of
    the animation.  If there is no path the Path[] field should
    be set to zeros.
    The Translate vector is not currently used.
    The Rotate "vector" specifies rotation angles about the
    X, Y, and Z axes.
    The Scale vector specfies X,Y, and Z scale factors.
    The "info" word is a bunch of bit flags:

        ABS_TRA     0x0001      - translate in world coorinates (not used)
        ABS_ROT     0x0002      - rotation in world coorinates
        ABS_SCL     0x0004      - scaling in world coorinates
        LOC_TRA     0x0010      - translate in local coorinates (not used)
        LOC_ROT     0x0020      - rotation in local coorinates
        LOC_SCL     0x0040      - scaling in local coorinates
        X_ALIGN     0x0100      - (not used)
        Y_ALIGN     0x0200      - align Y axis to path's direction
        Z_ALIGN     0x0400      - (not used)
        FOLLOW_ME   0x1000      - children follow parent on path

    INFO sub-chunks
    ---------------

    BRSH - size 82

        WORD    Number;                 ; Brush number (between 0 and 7)
        CHAR    Filename[80];           ; IFF ILBM filename

        There may be more than one of these.

    STNC - size 82

        Same format as BRSH chunk.

    TXTR - size 82

        Same format as BRSH chunk.  The Filename field is the name of
        a code module that can be loaded with LoadSeg().

    OBSV - size 28

        VECTOR  Camera;                 ; Camera position
        VECTOR  Rotate;                 ; Camera rotation angles
        FRACT   Focal;                  ; Camera focal length

        This tells where the camera is, how it is aimed, and its
        focal length.  The rotation angles are in degrees, and specify
        rotations around the X, Y, and Z axes.  The camera looks down
        its own Y axis, with the top of the picture in the direction of
        the Z axis.  If the rotation angles are all zero, its axes
        are aligned with the world coordinate axes.  The rotations are
        performed in the order ZXY about the camera axes.  A positive
        angle rotates Y toward Z, Z toward X, and X toward Y for
        rotations about the X, Y, and Z axes respectively.  To
        understand the focal length, imagine a 320 x 200 pixel
        rectangle perpendicular to, and centered on the camera's
        Y axis.  Any objects in the infinite rectangular cone defined
        by the camera position and the 4 corners of the rectangle will
        appear in the picture.

    OTRK - size 18

        BYTE    Trackname[18];

        This chunk specifies the name of an object that the camera
        is "tracked" to.  If the name is NULL, the camera doesn't
        track.  Otherwise, if the object is moved inside Turbo Silver,
        the camera will follow it.

    OSTR - size 56

        STORY   CStory;         ; a STORY structure for the camera

        The story structure is defined above.

    FADE - size 12

        FRACT   FadeAt;         ; distance to start fade
        FRACT   FadeBy;         ; distance of total fade
        BYTE    pad;            ; pad byte - must be zero
        COLOR   FadeTo;         ; RGB color to fade to

    SKYC - size 8

        BYTE    pad;            ; pad byte - must be zero
        COLOR   Horizon;        ; horizon color
        BYTE    pad;            ; pad byte - must be zero
        COLOR   Zenith;         ; zenith color

    AMBI - size 4

        BYTE    pad;            ; pad byte - must be zero
        COLOR   Ambient;        ; abmient light color

    GLB0 - size 8

        BYTE    Props[8];       ; an array of 8 "global properties" used
                                ; by Turbo Silver.

        Props[0] - GLB_EDGING       ; edge level (globals requester)
        Props[1] - GLB_PERTURB      ; perturbance (globals requester)
        Props[2] - GLB_SKY_BLEND    ; sky blending factor (0-255)
        Props[3] - GLB_LENS         ; lens type (see below)
        Props[4] - GLB_FADE         ; flag - Sharp/Fuzzy focus (globals)
        Props[5] - GLB_SIZE         ; "apparant size" (see below)
        Props[6] - GLB_RESOLVE      ; resolve depth (globals requester)
        Props[7] - GLB_EXTRA        ; flag - genlock sky on/off

        The edging and perturbance values control the heuristics in
        ray tracing.  The sky blending factor is zero for no blending,
        and 255 for full blending.  The lens type is a number from 0
        4, corresponding to the boxes in the "camera" requester, and
        correspond to 0) Manual, 1) Wide angle, 2) Normal, 3) Telephoto,
        and 4) Custom.  It is used in setting the camera's focal length
        if the camera is tracked to an object.  The Sharp/Fuzzy flag
        turns the "fade" feature on and off - non-zero means on.
        The "apparant size" parameter is 100 times the "custom size"
        parameter in the camera requester.  And is used to set the
        focal length for a custom lens.  The "resolve depth" controls
        the number of rays the ray tracer will shoot for a single pixel.
        Each reflective/refractive ray increments the depth counter, and
        the count is never allowed to reach the "resolve depth".  If both
        a reflective and a refractive ray are traced, each ray gets its
        own version of the count - so theoretically, a resolve depth of
        4 could allow much more than 4 rays to be traced.  The "genlock
        sky" flag controls whether the sky will be colored, or set to
        the genlock color (color 0 - black) in the final picture.

    All of the INFO sub-chunks are optional, as is the INFO chunk.
    Default values are supplied if the chunks are not present.  The
    defaults are:  no brushes, stencils, or textures defined; no story
    for the camera; horizon and zenith and ambient light colors set
    to black; fade color set to (80,80,80);  un-rotated, un-tracked
    camera at (-100, -100, 100); and global properties array set to
    [30, 0, 0, 0, 0, 100, 8, 0].

    DESC sub-sub-chunks
    -------------------

    NAME - size 18

        BYTE    Name[18];       ; a name for the object.

        Used for camera tracking, specifying story paths, etc.

    SHAP - size 4

        WORD    Shape;          ; number indicating object type
        WORD    Lamp;           ; number indicating lamp type

        Lamp numbers are:

            0 - not a lamp
            1 - like sunlight
            2 - like a lamp - intensity falls off with distance.

        Shape numbers are:

            0 - Sphere
            1 - Stencil
            2 - Axis            ; custom objects with points/triangles
            3 - Facets          ; illegal - for internal use only
            4 - Surface
            5 - Ground

        Spheres have thier radius set by the X size parameter.
        Stencils and surfaces are plane-parallelograms, with one
        point at the object's position vector; one side lying along
        the object's X axis with a length set by the X size; and
        another side starting from the position vector and going
        "Y size" units in the Y direction and "Z size" units in
        the X direction.  A ground object is an infinte plane
        perpendicular to the world Z axis.  Its Z coordinate sets
        its height, and the X and Y coordinates are only relevant
        to the position of the "hot point" used in selecting the
        object in the editor.  Custom objects have points, edges
        and triangles associated with them.  The size fields are
        relevant only for drawing the object axes in the editor.
        Shape number 3 is used internally for triangles of custom
        objects, and should never appear in a data file.

    POSI - size 12

        VECTOR  Position;       ; the object's position.

        Legal coordinates are in the range -32768 to 32767 and 65535/65536.
        Currently, the ray-tracer only sees objects in the -1024 to 1024
        range.  Light sources, and the camera may be placed outside that
        range, however.

    AXIS - size 36

        VECTOR  XAxis;
        VECTOR  YAxis;
        VECTOR  ZAxis;

        These are direction vectors for the object coordinate system.
        They must be "orthogonal unit vectors" - i.e. the sum of the
        squares of the vevtor components must equal one (or close to it),
        and the vectors must be perpendicular.

    SIZE - size 12

        VECTOR  Size;

        See SHAP chunk above.  The sizes are used in a variety of ways
        depending on the object shape.  For custom objects, they are
        the lengths of the coordinate axes drawn in the editor.  If the
        object has its "Quickdraw" flag set, the axes lengths are also
        used to set the size of a rectangular solid that is drawn rather
        than drawing all the points and edges.

    PNTS - size 2 + 12 * point count

        UWORD   PCount;         ; point count
        VECTOR  Points[];       ; points

        This chunk has all the points for custom objects.  The are
        refered to by thier position in the array.

    EDGE - size 4 + 4 * edge cout

        UWORD   ECount;         ; edge count
        UWORD   Edges[][2];     ; edges

        This chunk contins the edge list for custom objects.
        The Edges[][2] array is pairs of point numbers that
        are connected by the edges.  Edges are refered to by thier
        position in the Edges[] array.

    FACE - size 2 + 6 * face count

        UWORD   TCount;         ; face count
        UWORD   Connects[][3];  ; faces

        This chunk contains the triangle (face) list for custom objects.
        The Connects[][3] array is triples of edge numbers that are
        connected by triangles.

    COLR - size 4
    REFL - size 4
    TRAN - size 4

        BYTE    pad;        ; pad byte - must be zero
        COLOR   col;        ; RGB color

        These are the main object RGB color, and reflection and
        transmission coefficients.

    CLST - size 2 + 3 * count
    RLST - size 2 + 3 * count
    TLST - size 2 + 3 * count

        UWORD   count;      ; count of colors
        COLOR   colors[];   ; colors

        These are the main object color, and reflection and
        transmission coefficients for each face in custom objects.
        The count should match the face count in the FACE chunk.
        The ordering corresponds to the face order.

    TPAR - size 64

        FRACT   Params[16];     ; texture parameters

        This is the list of parameters for texture modules when
        texture mapping is used.

    SURF - size 5

        BYTE    SProps[5];      ; object properties

        This chunk contains object (surface) properties used
        by Turbo Silver.

        SProps[0] - PRP_SURFACE     ; surface type
                                    ;   0 - normal
                                    ;   4 - genlock
                                    ;   5 - IFF brush
        SProps[1] - PRP_BRUSH       ; brush number (if IFF mapped)
        SProps[2] - PRP_WRAP            ; IFF brush wrapping type
                                    ;   0 - no wrapping
                                    ;   1 - wrap X
                                    ;   2 - wrap Z
                                    ;   3 - wrap X and Z
        SProps[3] - PRP_STENCIL     ; stencil number for stencil objects
        SProps[4] - PRP_TEXTURE     ; texture number if texture mapped

    MTTR - size 2

        UBYTE   Type;               ; refraction type (0-4)
        UBYTE   Index;              ; custom index of refraction

        This chunk contains refraction data for transparent or
        glossy objects.  If the refraction type is 4, the object
        has a "custom" refractive index stored in the Index field.
        The Index field is 100 * (true index of refraction - 1.00)
        -- so it must be in the range of 1.00 to 3.55.  The
        refraction types is 0-3 specify 0) Air - 1.00, 1) Water - 1.33,
        2) Glass - 1.67 or 3) Crystal 2.00.

    SPEC - size 2

        UBYTE   Specularity;            ; range of 0-255
        UBYTE   Hardness;               ; specular exponent (0-31)

        This chunk contains specular information.  The Specularity
        field is the amount of specular reflection -- 0 is none,
        255 is fully specular.  The "specular exponent" controls
        the "tightness" of the specular spots.  A value of zero
        gives broad specular spots and a value of 31 gives smaller
        spots.

    PRP0 - size 6

        UBYTE   Props[6];           ; more object properties

        This chunk contains object properties that programs other
        than Turbo Silver might support.

        Props[0] - PRP_BLEND        ; blending factor (0-255)
        Props[1] - PRP_SMOOTH       ; roughness factor
        Props[2] - PRP_SHADE        ; shading on/off flag
        Props[3] - PRP_PHONG        ; phong shading on/off flag
        Props[4] - PRP_GLOSSY       ; glossy on/off flag
        Props[5] - PRP_QUICK        ; Quickdraw on/off flag

        The blending factor controls the amount of dithering used
        on the object - 255 is fully dithered.  
        The roughness factor controls how rough the object should
        appear - 0 is smooth, 255 is max roughness.
        The shading flag is interpreted differently depending on
        whether the object is a light source or not.  For light
        sources, it sets the light to cast shadows or not.  For
        normal objects, if the flag is set, the object is always
        considered as fully lit - i.e. it's color is read directly
        from the object (or IFF brush), and is not affected by light
        sources.
        The phong shading is on by default - a non-zero value turns
        it off.
        The glossy flag sets the object to be glossy or not.  If
        the object is glossy, the "transmit" colors and the index
        of refraction control the amount of "sheen".  The glossy
        feature is meant to simulate something like a wax coating
        on the object with the specified index of refraction. The
        trasmission coefficients control how much light from the
        object makes it through the wax coating.
        The Quickdraw flag, if set, tells the editor not to draw
        all the points and edges for the object, but to draw a
        rectanglular solid centered at the object position, and
        with sizes detemined by the axis lengths.

    INTS - size 4

        FRACT   Intensity;          ; light intensity

        This is the intensity field for light source objects.
        an intensity of 255 for a sun-like light fully lights
        object surfaces which are perpendicular to the direction
        to the light source.  For lamp-like light sources, the
        necessary intensity will depend on the distance to the light.

    STRY - size 56

        STORY   story;          ; a story structure for the object.

        The story structure is described above.

    Again, most of these fields are optional, and defaults are supplied.
    However, if there is a FACE chunk, there must also be a CLST chunk,
    an RLST chunk and a TLST chunk -- all with matching "count" fields.
    The SHAP chunk is not optional. 

    Defaults are:  Colors set to (240,240,240); reflection and
    transmission coefficients set to zero; illegal shape; no story or
    special surface types; position at (0,0,0); axes aligned to the
    world axes; size fields all 32.0; intensity at 300; no name;
    no points/edges or faces; texture parameters set to zero; refraction
    type 0 with index 1.00; specular, hardness and roughness set to zero;
    blending at 255; glossy off; phong shading on; not a light source;
    not brightly lit;

    EXTR sub-sub-chunks
    -------------------

    MTRX - size 60

        VECTOR  Translate;          ; translation vector
        VECTOR  Scale;              ; X,Y and Z scaling factors
        MATRIX  Rotate;             ; rotation matrix

        The translation vector is i world coordinates.
        The scaling factors are with respect to local axes.
        The rotation matrix is with respect to the world axes,
        and it should be a "unit matrix".
        The rotation is such that a rotated axis's X,Y, and Z
        components are the dot products of the MATRIX's I,J,
        and K vectors with the un-rotated axis vector.

    LOAD - size 80

        BYTE    Filename[80];       ; the name of the external file

        This chunk contains the name of an external object file.
        The external file should be a FORM TDDD file.  It may contain
        an any number of objects possibly grouped into heirarchy(ies).

    Both of these chunks are required.

-----
Helge E. Rasmussen  .  PHONE + 45 31 37 11 00  .  E-mail:  [email-masked]
Compel A/S          .  FAX   + 45 31 37 06 44  .  
Copenhagen, Denmark