Features

Introduction

ColladaXna aims at making animated 3D models stored in COLLADA ".dae" files usable in XNA. While COLLADA files can contain entire 3D scenes with lighting, cameras etc. the focus of this library right now is importing single models and mainly data relevant to this purpose are therefore imported. In future an extension to this library is planned which allows to correctly import complete scenes.

Models are imported through a custom content importer that is compatible to the XNA Content Model. Consequently COLLADA Models imported with the "COLLADA Standard Importer" are compatible to the default XNA Model processor. As a result of this COLLADA Models can be handled just like FBX- and X-Models that are supported by XNA per default.

Standard Features

Standard features (compatible to the XNA default classes) of models loaded with ColladaXna include the following:

• Triangulated Mesh Geometry

• Multiple meshes and mesh parts with different materials and vertex channels

• Standard vertex channels for positions, texture coordinates, normals, binormals, tangents, blend weights and blend indices

• Basic Materials compatible to XNA's BasicEffect and BasicMaterialContent

• Bones and Skinned Mesh Animation

Normal Maps and other Texture Maps

Even though XNA's BasicEffect and BasicMaterialContent only support a single diffuse texture in a standard way, the XNA content model can be used to store further features, such as Normal Maps and Specular Maps, too.

For implementation details and how to access these maps in your own content processor, refer to the Documentation. The Quickstart page offers a quick overview on how to get ColladaXna running.