Android 3D object with physics

Question

I've been an Android programmer for a while, but I've never touched 3D Graphics (OpenGL 2 ES).

To keep this question simple, this is along the lines of what I need to do...

A piece of material with texture, waving in the wind which I want to draw in a GLSurfaceView I want to be able to control the speed of the wind, but what would be really nice is to be able to move the material with touch. So a physics engine of some sorts will be involved.

This question is for experienced 3D graphics developers for android. How would you go about doing this, and what tools do I need?

Answer 1

Sounds like 3d cloth simulation. From Blender Wiki:

Cloth simulation is one of the hardest aspects of CG, because it is a deceptively simple real-world item that is taken for granted, yet actually has very complex internal and environmental interactions. After years of development, Blender has a very robust cloth simulator that is used to make clothing, flags, banners, and so on. Cloth interacts with and is affected by other moving objects, the wind and other forces, as well as a general aerodynamic model, all of which is under your control.

See: http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Doc:2.4/Manual/Physics/Cloth

There is an Android project on Google Code that implements a flag waving in the wind:

http://code.google.com/p/waving-flag-android/

I hope this helps you.