I''m just looking for opinions here if this is the right thing to do: I got caligari gamespace for designing some models for 3d stuff (just as a hobby for playing about with some graphics stuff) and want to load the models into a 3d program in c++. I''ve looked at the various model formats and think that rather than write a complicated loader in c++ my best bet it to take something like the .X format that gamespace outputs and preprocess it into a more suitable format using a python program and load that. All I need is a vertex list with X, Y, Z coordinates, normal, texture U,V coordinates and which texture to use for each vertex and then a triangle list containing sets of 3 vertexes for each triangle. It seems a lot easier to take the text of a .X file and process it in python to be a simple binary format containing the data above which I can load in C++ almost directly into memory. I''m not interested in animation for this project. I''m looking for comments and experience. Is this a good idea? Or would I do better to bite the bullet and write a full general purpose model loader?

It''s always easier to write importing and/or exporting code of your own filetype, if you know exactly what variables you need that would be the easiest solution. I used my own filetype to test a program of mine and i like it because it didn''t cost much time to write and it was exactly what i needed at that moment.