Tag: wayfinding

People move, think and experience the world in three dimensions. The majority of media channels are using 3D technologies to attract people’s attention more and more. Nowadays, 3D has become an icon that is written on many products, even on toothpaste. There it serves a marketing purpose, but in IT sector we can make use of it. One Estonian company, called 3D Technologies R&D has developed the first wayfinding software using WebGL. The company calls themselves a WebGL pioneers, because this technology is in its baby shoes. Most solutions that you can find at this point are usually object demos or games. They may be cool, but not practical. However, 3D wayfinder is a very practical solution. It is a web-based service for creating building directories for large public buildings.

What is WebGL?

WebGL (Web Graphics Library) in its most basic level is a graphics library that allows us to create real-time rendered interactive 3D graphics inside browser, so it is browser-based. With it, you can experience rich 3D content within any compatible web browser, without installing additional plugin. Most modern browsers support WebGL technology to deliver hardware-accelerated 3D graphics. The HTML5 and WebGL platform allow direct access to the graphics card. That means much faster load times and smoother operation on PC and on mobile devices. According to the WebGL stats, we can show you some statistics about supported desktops and mobile browsers. Data is assembled from over 15 million visits on more than 615 participating sites over the last 60 days.

Source: http://webglstats.com/

As we can see from the diagrams, almost ¾ of the personal computer users, who have visited WebGL participating sites, use browsers that support that graphics library. Mobile devices percentage is low, but it is increasing on daily basis as more power is put under the hood.

WebGL Advantages

WebGL is the best solution enabling to display 3D content on every browser and platform. It is plug-in free, memory management is handled automatically and, it is royalty free web standard for low-level 3D graphics. WebGL is supported in most of the operating systems (Windows Vista or later, Mac OS 10.6 or later, Linux and Chrome OS) and browsers. Unlike other 3D graphics technologies, such as Unity 3D, Flash.

WebGL elements can be mixed with other HTML elements and composites. This enables to design and integrate according to personal needs in combination with other technologies and content. It all together offers endless possibilities for designers and developers.

3D indoor wayfinding software

3D Technologies R&D created FRAK engine to ease up the 3D content development process. FRAK is a JavaScript 3D engine for creating interactive 3D applications. With this engine, you will have the power to build the next generation application. WebGL and the power of HTML5 gives cool designing and functionality opportunities for the future projects.

Today we are presenting 3D Wayfinder at Hospitality Technology Day in Meriton Grand Conference & Spa Hotel.

It’s a first time event specialized on introducing the possibilities of Digital Signage in hospitality sector.

Where is people there’s always a question of orientating – 3DWayfinder for hotels and spa’s

3D Technologies R&D presented it’s 3D Wayfinder software at Rock IT Con 2013 fair from 24-25 of August. It was a first time event specialized on bringing together IT companies from Russia and Estonia. Our software got a lot of attraction by many companies and also by visitors from the street. We had a good opportunity to present some of our projects on our partners ML Novator’s kiosk.

It’s so fresh that its even warm yet. All you Android users can download the Lõunakeskus wayfinding application from Google Play.

Excuse us iPhone users but Apple makes his own rules and you have to wait at least 24 h.

We have created a Google+ page for 3D Wayfinder to get You a better way to get up to date  information about 3D Wayfinder, indoor navigation, building directories and digital architecture related news. Please go and follow us or +1 our posts.

After finishing WebGL version of 3DWayfinder software we are planning to create one very useful tool for administrating the content. This is Map Generator, which enables users to create and change 3D maps by themselves. Hopefully this tool will be ready to use from third quarter of 2013.

More and more shopping centers are using 3D maps to provide indoor navigation to their visitors in Norway.

Bergen Shopping Centre, Strømgt. 8, 5015 Bergen, Norway

City Nord, Stormyra, 8008 Bodø, Norway

Our reseller in Norway, Easy Touch AS has delivered our wayfinding solution for Jekta Storsenter.

Our very first project in Norway, Farmandstredet shopping center is now launched.  The map is very beautiful and intuitive. This is the first portrait layout for 3D Wayfinder with a custom alphabetical shop directory.

Estonian shopping centre Viru Keskus recently renewed its building directory, moving from print to digital. The printed version had 2D building plans with a list of shops on the side. Navigating and finding the right destination was time consuming and required an architect-like approach to understand the building plan. Tenants changing, grow and downsize all the time. As the shopping centre has 6 floors with 7 exits, this made it necessary to print around 10 A0 directories, to reflect each change at considerable cost.

Finding the Solution
The objective was to save on printing costs with a modern innovative solution. The shopping centre chose 3DWayfinder, a solution developed by 3D Technologies R&D that features an administration panel for managing content. Updates can be applied through the web instantly. It also has the ability to offer tenants different kinds of advertisements. The 3D maps are based on precise CAD drawings, giving an accurate overview of the property. All of these features affected the final choice.

3D Wayfinding
In total, the Estonian shopping centre occupies 85,000m² of space and attracts approximately 11 million visitors annually. Nine kiosks were delivered by ML Novator, making it the company’s largest project to date.
There were obstacles during and after the installation. 3D Tech had problems with screensaver activation. Viru Keskus had its own screensaver coded, while ML Novator monitors with SiteKiosk, which has its own screensaver. The presence of two simultaneous screensavers made the application reload every 45 seconds, forcing users to either wait 30 seconds or walk away. Eventually 3D Tech had to forbid the screensaver function in SiteKiosk.
The second problem came as a result of the application running on a web browser. As we know, every browser has a zooming option. Well, every time the user tried to zoom in it just enlarged the whole window and confused the user. In this case, 3D Tech had to forbid the browser’s zooming option. No one saw these problems in advance and thanks to quick and professional response from both parties the problems are solved. After fixing these issues, 3D Tech noticed an increase in the usage of its application. During last Christmas, the usage rose to 4 percent of visitors.

Version 2.0
3D Tech recently released a new version with many improvements and new features. In the original version, it was only possible to advertise with banners. With the new version, it’s now possible to do it in three ways. Banners are still the very first eye catchers, but when the user gets closer they notice 3D pop-ups in the 3D plan. They are dynamic – if the plan is turned, they turn also, never being lost from sight. The pop-up can be clicked for additional information on the right side, inside the menu. The third option is to advertise inside the contextual menu.
The system is very simple, if I start searching for a shop or product, the relevant destinations are returned with the ones with ads will being highlighted and placed highest. It’s now possible to get statistics about usage and count destination clicks, which ad was most popular and what visitor were unable to find. This is all really valuable information. With all of these improvements, 3D Tech intends to increase customer usage up to 10 percent.

Vision
We believe that 3D way-finding solutions have a bright future. Eyecatching 3D maps and innovative ads will encourage visitors to interact. Tenants will have more possibilities to get customers into their shop. Advertising sales have the potential to make a return on investment within one year, depending on the size of the mall and the booking rate. To further reduce costs and continue to enhance the shopping experience, we plan to launch a 3D Wayfinder mobile application in June 2012.