[ros-users] Robot model meshes in RViz

Hi!

I have a few meshes which I converted from VRML to STL to be rendered as
robot body parts (specified in the robot's URDF). Is it possible to make
the RViz rendering more "smooth"? A different Ogre-based rendering tool
displays the curvatures very smooth, while RViz seems to display each
triangle as a flat surface (no interpolation of the surface normals). If
I look at the meshes in Meshlab, the RViz view corresponds to "flat",
while what I want to achieve corresponds to "smooth". Maybe there is a
setting that I need to activate in the Mesh file or the URDF?

Secondly, is it possible to have multiple mesh parts / files per robot
link? It seems like additional "visual" or "mesh" tags after the first
one are ignored. Or do I have to create virtual (fixed) robot links for
them? Alternatively, is it possible to have one multi-colored mesh? What
I would like to achieve is to have a robot link that has
differently-colored parts.

Best regards,
Armin

-- 
Armin Hornung                              Albert-Ludwigs-Universität
www.informatik.uni-freiburg.de/~hornunga   Dept. of Computer Science
HornungA@informatik.uni-freiburg.de        Humanoid Robots Lab
Tel.: +49 (0)761-203-8010                  Georges-Köhler-Allee 79
Fax : +49 (0)761-203-8007                  D-79110 Freiburg, Germany