Mahaha! You have fallen directly into the devious trap know as 3D Data Interchange! Mahahahahahahah! Mahaha! *cough* *sputter* ha?
Ok, so this is actually a fairly common problem. You have data created in application XZY (no offense to XYZ, if they exist) but you want to integrate it with application ABC (once again, no offence) but realize something is lost in the translation. Your missing data.
If OBJ is the vehicle that connects your two products, you need to make sure the source application XYZ and the host application ABC actually correctly export, and translate the data property. It's not as easy as it may sound, giving rise to "middleware" products like PolyTrans (
http://www.okino.com/conv/conv.htm) that do the job much better then anything else on the market. As it turns out, all OBJ files are not created equal, and 75% of them on the market just support the absolute barebones. Even if you use Polytrans and write out an OBJ file full of information, the importer may not be able to read it, so keep that in mind.
To address this problem Autodesk has released FBX (
http://usa.autodesk.com/fbx/) a platform independent 3D Data interchange with a SDK so people can write importers for custom products. In addition there is COLLADA, the open source choice, and Alemic who is produced by Lucas Arts and Sony Pictures. Among the three, go with the one backed by Autodesk. Your importers and exports are in nearly everything Autodesk makes, they have a good forum here, and it's well documented and feature-rich.
Now, for a contest, the link above should work for a quick turn around. The bulk of this information might be useful down the road, or to someone else, so I wanted to add it.
So there you go, more information then you really care about. I hope it was helpful.
Avotas
