Not too long ago, this statement would have been false. With today’s emerging technologies, the gap between graphics intensive 3D sites, and bandwidth limitations have closed. In the past if you wanted interactive 3D on the Web, it more often than not was delivered to your customers via Macromedia Flash (now owned by Adobe). The 3D “scenes” were often pre-rendered using expensive 3D software, and the results were typically less-than-desirable file sizes that choked on dial-up connections. Furthermore, updating these kinds of sites typically incurred a hefty service fee. In today’s Web, the fear of gigantor-sized, bandwidth clogging Flash sites or Flash elements is yesterday’s news. Enter the Flash 3D rendering engines of today. Through the use of ActionScript 3.0 (Flash’s native programming language) and popular 3D rendering engines such as Papervision3D or Away3D, you can finally have your 3D cake and eat it too.

Onto a brief overview for the “geeks” out there, that may be scratching their heads right now. Previous to the advent of the Flash 3D rendering engines of today, designers would architect 3D scenes that were comprised of 3D models, animations, and textures in industry standard 3D animation and modeling software such as Alias|Wavefront’s Maya or Autodesk’s 3D Studio Max. They would then import into Flash these complex rendered scenes as a series of videos that would receive programming to achieve the interactivity of the Web site. If there was a mistake or revision, they would have to go back and re-render scenes, thus incurring additional production time. The end-result was often a large clunky Flash element, which took most users (especially those on dial-up) a considerable amount of time to download.

Most recently (within the past 12-18 months), only the 3D models have to be designed, but all the animation and 3D texturing is done in Flash. The 3D model is referenced by the Flash and all the texturing and animation and interactivity are handled on the fly. What does this mean exactly? Well, it means you no longer have to wait to download some behemoth of a Flash file. It means you download a few lightweight 3D files, some code, and voila! Now the real magic begins. Everything is rendered on your customer’s machine, in real-time. If you need something changed, it can all be done programmatically, and the turnaround time is severely decreased.

This is the point where you say, “This is all well and good, but I am still not sure I know what you’re talking about.” If the saying holds true that a picture is worth a thousand words, than the following sites are worth a million. The Eco Zoo is a wonderful example of an effective use of interactive 3D and Flash. Kindly pay attention to load times, and the fluid animation along with the overall interactive experience. Another popular site (and winner of many Web awards) is Red Bull’s Flight Lab. This site combines information (about Flugtag) and a truly unique interactive experience that brings the competition to you. This is just a preview of what is being done with this exciting technology right now, and how it succeeds in laying the groundwork for future web-based interactive experiences.