[ODE] Shockwave of an explosion

[Roel van Dijk]

On Tuesday 23 December 2003 11:36, bernd129 at web.de wrote:
> Hello.
> How can I simulate the shockwave of an explosion?
Hmm. You first have to define the shockwave of the explosion. Let's say it's a 
perfect sphere. The shockwave has a position and a radius. Everything within 
the radius of the shockwave is propelled outwards. Away from the center of 
the shockwave. The amount of force applied to objects depends on the distance 
from the center. At the time of detonation the radius is 0. The radius of the 
explosion should grow rapidly after detonation.

How much and for how long depends on the type of explosion. A handgrenade 
could make an explosion of 2 meters for 0.5 seconds (just estimating) and a 
huge napalm bomb could have an explosion of 100 meters for 5 seconds.

An explosion 'object' could look something like this:
class Explosion
{
	public:
	vector3D position; // position of the explosion
	float maxSize; // maximum size of the explosion
	float curSize; // current size, initially 0, increases over time
	float duration; // duration in seconds
	float elapsedTime; // how much time has elapsed since detonation
	float force; // force of the explosion

	void update(float time); // progress the explosion 'time' seconds
};

When there is an explosion you create an Explosion object with the appropriate 
parameters. You call the update function every simulation loop. Then you do 
collision detection. If an object is within the radius of the explosion you 
apply a force on that object. The force vector  runs from the center of the 
explosion the the object. The size of the vector depends on the distance 
between the object and the explosion and the force of the explosion.

I haven't really tried any of this. It's just what I came up with :-)