Blog - Interactive 3D VR Virtual Reality Models

My online 3D work began in 1999 when I discovered VRML at the back of a web programming book someone lent me. I was excited to be able to create 3D content and see it easily on the web. At first, Netscape showed VRML content natively; it was already built into the browser. But soon there were plug-ins that could be installed in other browsers. These plugins were Cosmoplayer, Blaxxun Contact and Cortona by ParallelGraphics. There may have been some others but I can't recall them all.

The first 3D object I wanted to build that came to mind was the Space Station 5 from the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. I'm a big fan of that movie, by the way. So I started building it bit by bit as I learned how to code in VRML. At first it was just a static ring. Then I added spokes and a central hub. Eventually I figured out how to make it rotate.

I continued to add to the space station world, eventually including the Orion spacecraft flying to and into the space station. But the more I added, the more the world frame rate started to slow down. I finally settled on a certain amount of detail to keep the 3D from slowing down too much and ruining the user experience. There was enough detail to give the world a nice feel, but not as much as I'd like.

Eventually, plugins were discontinued I think in the mid 2000's so unfortunately my site no longer worked so I took it down.

Over the years, I occasionally looked around to see if there was an alternative to the old plugins, but never found anything. That was until recently, when I discovered X_ITE. They created JavaScript code that is an interface to the now native WebGL found in most modern web browsers.

I was very excited to discover X_ITE. So, I made a simple test web page and put in the link to the code, put in my VRML code and it worked right away! I began to test the other worlds I had and much to my happy surprise it all worked. I just needed to tweak a couple of things. And now my 3D worlds work much faster and better than before with the plugins!

So, basically the worlds you see here in my site are about 20+ years old. I'm hoping I have time to continue building my 3D VRML sites as I had originally envisioned.

Hope you like my work here.