ConvertGigaCadPlus

About Giga Cad Plus

Giga Cad Plus is a simple modelling application for the Commodore 64, written by Stefan Vilsmeier. It was distributed as a Book with Diskette by "Markt und Technik Verlag".

It allows 3D modelling, and rendering of objects into "high-res" images or short animations.

Unfortunately the only way to get a copy these days is from various second hand markets like eBay.

Model files

Models are stored in files that begin with "ob." They can be extracted from .d64 disk images, or saved into plain directories with an emulator or a SD2IEC interface.

Converting a model file

$ python3 gigaCadToObj.py <model>

This will open a model file and write out an equivalent Wavefront .OBJ file.

For example

$ python3 gigaCadToObj.py ob.schiff.seq

will convert ob.schiff.seq to schiff.obj.

How to import converted files into Blender

During import I found best results by setting -Z as "up" vector:

The model will most likely be too big for the current "far" plane. Open the "View Properties" menu:

and change the far clip to a larger value:

You can then explore the model in the main view:

CPC Giga CAD

There is a similar application called Giga CAD for Amstrad CPC that was published in Happy Computer magazine. It is written in assembler with Turbo Pascal subroutines, and runs in CP/M.

You can convert models with cpcGigaCadToObj

$ python3 cpcGigaCadToObj.py <model>

For example

$ python3 cpcGigaCadToObj.py BRUECKE.OBJ

will convert BRUECKE.OBJ to BRUECKE_wf.obj.

Other tools

There is another tool for Giga CAD written in C giga-cad-obj