Realtime 3D on the web - a toy or a useful tool?

Realtime 3D on the web a toy or a useful tool? twitter.com/jenschr Jens Christian Brynildsen ﬂashgamer.com jensa@ﬂashgamer.com Friday, May 22, 2009

What are we talking about? Realtime vs Pre Rendered Friday, May 22, 2009

3D on the web A little history Friday, May 22, 2009

1994 VRML Friday, May 22, 2009

1999 Java3D Web Start (1, 2) Friday, May 22, 2009

2001 Shockwave 3D Friday, May 22, 2009

2005 Unity 3D Friday, May 22, 2009

2005 3D in Flash Friday, May 22, 2009

Last week Google O3D Friday, May 22, 2009

No success on the web Why? Friday, May 22, 2009

The problems Friday, May 22, 2009

The problems 1. Poor distribution Friday, May 22, 2009

The problems 1. Poor distribution 2. Difﬁcult installation Friday, May 22, 2009

The problems 1. Poor distribution 2. Difﬁcult installation 3. Difﬁcult authoring Friday, May 22, 2009

The problems 1. Poor distribution 2. Difﬁcult installation 3. Difﬁcult authoring 4. Poor use Friday, May 22, 2009

Flash can solve this! But it can’t make it a success by itself Friday, May 22, 2009

Flash solves 3 out of 4 1. 98% distribution 2. Simple, standardized installation procedure 3. AS3 is a mature, but relatively simple language 4. We still need to solve the “good use” issue! Friday, May 22, 2009

What is “Good Use”? Good Use is subjective Friday, May 22, 2009

Rule #1 Never use 3D “because it’s 3D” Friday, May 22, 2009

3D because it’s 3D Komodomedia - http://www.komodomedia.co.uk/2008/ Friday, May 22, 2009

3D because it’s 3D EcodaZoo - http://ecodazoo.com Friday, May 22, 2009

Rule #2 Build better experiences with 3D, not worse Friday, May 22, 2009

Build better experiences ExitReality - http://www.exitreality.com Friday, May 22, 2009

Build better experiences Cooliris - http://www.cooliris.com Friday, May 22, 2009

Rule #3 Don’t mimic 2D, use the third dimension Friday, May 22, 2009

Easier to explain in 3D Education Friday, May 22, 2009

Make 2D more exciting Information graphics Friday, May 22, 2009

Better illustration Sales tool Friday, May 22, 2009

Exploring the real world Panorama viewer Friday, May 22, 2009

Realtime modeling Ramp Generator Friday, May 22, 2009

What 3D offers over 2D • A way to freely explore • A way to hide and reveal something • New ways to tell a story • The experience of a room, not just a ﬂat stage Friday, May 22, 2009

Three rules for 3D on the web #1 Never use 3D “because it’s 3D”! #2 Build better experiences, not worse #3 Don’t mimic 2D, use the third dimension Friday, May 22, 2009

3D in the Flash Player Friday, May 22, 2009

Flash can only do 2D We must extend it to go to the third dimension Friday, May 22, 2009

What is a 3D engine? • A set of Actionscript classes that extend the Flash Players capabilities • Can be used for more than one thing • Reusable • Extendable • Rich on features Friday, May 22, 2009

Sandy 3D Sandy3D - http://www.ﬂashsandy.org Friday, May 22, 2009

Papervision3D Papervision3D - http://blog.papervision3d.org Friday, May 22, 2009

Away3D Away3D - http://www.away3d.com Friday, May 22, 2009

Alternativa Platform Alternativa3D - http://alternativaplatform.com/en/ Friday, May 22, 2009

Other engines • WireEngine3D • Wick3D • ND3D • FreeSpin 3D • Five 3D (vector-based) • Project3D • Sophie 3D • Silverback3D • DirectFlex • Ambiera CopperCube • Sharikura 3D • Electric 3D • Haxe3D Friday, May 22, 2009

Personal projects • Mr. Doob (Voxel engine) • NewX3D • Minority • Flash3D • Yağız Gürgül • ... and many more Friday, May 22, 2009

Flash 3D is past the “Toy” stage But there are some snags... Friday, May 22, 2009

Disadvantages of Flash 3D • No hardware support • No shadows • Simple models with few polygons • No dedicated IDE / Software for authoring ... but this is only the second generation of Flash 3D! Friday, May 22, 2009

Is Flash lighting the way for future media? \"Right now Flash is rendering in high-end 2D, equivalent to games like Diablo (from 1997),\" says Mr Koster. \"There are a few 3D engines out there - Papervision, Alternativa and Away3D - and they are developing rapidly. They are surprisingly good and are all built on top of Flash.\" Raph Koster, creator of Ultima Online From http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2009/02/ﬂash.html Friday, May 22, 2009

It’s not about the technology It’s what you do with it Friday, May 22, 2009

Looking ahead • 3D in Flash is already usable for many purposes • We’ve come a long way in a very short time. From Toy to Tool in just 3 years is good! • The Flash Player will get hardware accelerated 3D and we will have the tools to use it • Flash will validate 3D on the web, just as it has done for Video and Rich Internet Applications • People are not fascinated by technology, but rather the possibilities it offers Friday, May 22, 2009

Pushing the limits Away3D Feature demos Friday, May 22, 2009

Getting started with Flash 3D Friday, May 22, 2009

Away3D resources Away3D documentation http://away3d.com/livedocs/ Developers group http://groups.google.com/group/away3d-dev Away3D http://away3d.com/ Flashmagazine tutorials http://www.flashmagazine.com/Tutorials/category/away3d/ Tartiflop tutorials http://blog.tartiflop.com/first-steps-in-away3d/ Advanced modeling tutorials http://blog.closier.nl/ Advanced text http://www.lidev.com.ar/?cat=3 Friday, May 22, 2009

Questions twitter.com/jenschr Jens Christian Brynildsen ﬂashgamer.com jensa@ﬂashgamer.com Friday, May 22, 2009

Realtime 3D on the web - a toy or a useful tool?

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