Blog For Google Warehouse (April 2008)

At the beginning of every month 3Dwalkthroughs.com selects our favorite 3D model from Greg Rose's blog which highlights new 3D building models as they are added to Google's 3D Warehouse.

Our monthly selection is based on impressive: architecture, level of detail, level of realism etc. For the month of April 2008 we have chosen the Landmark Hotel & Kabul City Centre. This model was selected as we really liked the clean lines that were used as well as the reflective surface of the facade.

Description
This is one of the largest and tallest buildings in Kabul, housing a 4-star hotel complex and parts of the famous and popular Kabul City Centre. The centre itself is a giant shopping mall offering all sorts of goods and articles. Though prices are very high compared to average income, this mall is generally judged upon as an enrichment for the capital city. This building is open to the Afghan and international public.

ThinkWare's 3D Navigation System - Making It Impossible To Get Lost?

Based on the direction that navigation systems are heading, soon we might not need to look out of the windshield to see where we are going...well, not exactly, but close.

A new 3D navigation system has hit the market in Korea by a company called ThinkWare. The navigation system features highly detailed 3D maps that show every imaginable aspect of the travelled route.

Thinkware's iNAVI K2 boasts a 7-inch 800 x 600 resolution touchscreen, DMB TV tuner, 500MHz processor, picture-in-picture support, integrated media player and AV input. You'll also find a headphone jack, USB port, built-in antenna, SD expansion slot, stereo speakers and some form of karaoke game -- which is likely worth the price of admission alone.

Source: Engadget.com

Unfortunately it does not appear like Thinkware's device will be available any time soon in the United States. With that being said, 3Dwalkthroughs.com is pretty confident that it is just a matter of time before a similar 3D technology is developed and made available here in America.

3D Virtual Worlds Trade Show in NYC

Members of 3Dwalkthroughs.com have just returned home from our European excursion and we are fighting our jet lag as we prepare for the week to come.

This week will be an interesting week as New York City will play host to the Virtual Worlds 2008 convention taking place at the Jacob Javitz Center. The show will be open from April 3rd until April 4th and will feature presentations by current and upcoming players in the 3D Virtual World industry.

As we near the launch of 3D Virtual Venues it will be interesting to visit the show and meet some of our competitors and future collaborators. The show is scheduled to cover topics ranging from legal issues involving 3D Virtual Worlds to completely new applications of 3D Virtual World technology that we have not even seen yet.

About Virtual Worlds 2008
Virtual Worlds 2008 is where leading media, consumer entertainment, youth brands and agencies come to understand how to monetize their intellectual property using virtual worlds.

Entertainment brands and youth-oriented companies are increasingly integrating virtual worlds into their product mix. Forward thinking brand advertisers and agencies are aligning themselves with high-quality virtual worlds franchises in order to further engage consumers.

Source: Virtual Worlds 2008 Website

3Dwalkthroughs.com in Germany

3Dwalkthroughs.com arrived in Munich, Germany about 4pm and we headed straight to the main shopping area immediately after checking into our hotel. Munich was much more modern than the other cities we visited and actually reminded us of certain areas of London. The makeup of the stores as well as the diversity of the people walking around was what you might expect in Picadilly Circus in London.

After a good night’s sleep we took a bus tour around Munich and visited certain notable landmarks such as BMW’s world headquarters and museum (pictured above), as well as the Olympic Stadium which the movie Munich was based on.

The second part of the day included a very powerful visit to Dachaus. Dachaus was the first concentration camp built by the Nazi’s and served as a model for all of the other concentration camps. Needless to say it was overwhelming and very emotional.

This concludes the diversion from our normal 3D posts as we head back to New York tomorrow morning. We hoped our play by play of our trip through Vienna, Budapest, Prague and Munich was somewhat enjoyable and informative.

3Dwalkthroughs.com in Prague Day 2

3Dwalkthroughs.com’s second day in Prague involved a lot of walking and very strange weather. It went from sunny and 45 degrees, to heavy snow and a windy 30 degrees about 5 times during the day.

The majority of the day was spent walking around the downtown area which was completely filled with little shops, cafes and bigger chain stores. A couple of us commented that walking through the narrow cobblestone streets of Prague with the heavy snow falling felt very surreal, almost like out of a movie.

Most of the narrow side streets all connect with a main square which features a huge tower with a very interesting clock. According to a guide, the clock has many details which are all symbolic of ancient beliefs.

The image above shows a small waterway which runs behind many of the old shops and apartments. It looks similar to something you would expect in Italy, but without the Gondolas. If you look very closely you can see the snow as it began to fall for the third time of the day. About 15 minutes after the picture was taken it was bright sunshine again.

Our next post will be from Munich Germany which is our last stop before returning home…stay tuned.

3Dwalkthroughs.com Heads To Prague

After leaving Budapest, 3Dwalkthroughs.com headed off to our next stop in Europe which is Prague. I must say it is one of the most amazing places I have ever been. The castles, churches and other buildings dotting the landscape are beyond belief.

One of the most noteworthy castles which we actually were able to go in, was the Prague Castle. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, Prague Castle is one of the largest continuous castle complexes in the world. It comprises an extensive group of palaces and church buildings in various architectural styles, from 10th Century Romanesque buildings to the newest modifications of the late 20th Century.

The picture above shows a view from one of the entrances, taken from the ground up. The interior of the castle was breathtaking although we were not allowed to take photos. Our next and last stop on our European tour is Germany.

3Dwalkthroughs.com in Budapest

3Dwalkthroughs.com finally arrived in Budapest after our brief stop in Bratislava. We spent 2 days in Budapest and took in a lot of the sites. In Budapest we did something we do not typically do, which is take a city tour.

It was a good move as our tour guide was extremely informative and passionate about his country and it s heritage. The architecture in Budapest was primarily old but very impressive There were many huge, intricately detailed castles and government building with very intriguing stories.

One of the more interesting but very sad stories from our tour guide took place in front of the Parliament building. The story described a massacre that took place in 1956 as a result of a peaceful but heated demonstration that was being held by the Hungarians. The heated demonstration took the lives of a couple hundred Hungarians by the Soviet Army.

The image above was taken from a high vantage point overlooking the Danube River which separates the Buda and the Pest sides. The Danube River has been following us throughout our journey but will leave us as we head to our next stop, which is Prague.

3Dwalkthroughs.com - A Stop in Bratislava On Our Way to Budapest

The traveling team from 3Dwalkthroughs.com left Vienna early this morning heading to Budapest. On our way we made a stop in Bratislava. The city is interesting as the architecture is extremely old. Apparently the less bombing an area experienced during the war, the more likely the original architecture was still intact. This seemed to be the case in Bratislava.

The above picture shows a sidestreet off one of the main tourist areas in Bratislava. The area is filled with quaint tourist shops, cafes and pubs. Below is a short history of Bratislava taken from Slovkia.org.


About Bratislava
Not only is Bratislava the largest city in Slovakia, it also serves as the state capital. Furthermore, Bratislava is the seat of the National Council of the Slovak Republic, the Government of the Slovak Republic, national ministries and the other central bodies of the state administration of the Slovak Republic. It is situated in the centre of Europe in the southwestern part of Slovakia.

It borders with Hungary in the south and with Austria in the west. The town spreads like a fan on both banks of the Danube River, and at the foot of the Low Carpatians. Due to its position on the border between the mild and warm climatic zones, it ranks among the warmest spots in Slovakia with an average temperature of 9.9 C. It has 1 976.4 hours of sunshine a year and annual total rainfall is 527.4 mm. Bratislava is the most populous city in the Slovak Republic and its population is some 450,000.

3Dwalkthroughs.com in Vienna (Day 2)

As we mentioned yesterday, over the next week or so a few members of 3Dwalkthroughs.com will be traveling throughout Eastern Europe. During our trip we will be documenting interesting architecture we encounter along the way.

Today we hopped on a tour bus which gave us a much better overview of the whole downtown area of Vienna than yesterday. During our tour we stopped to check out a very odd but original apartment building called the Hundertwasser House.

Here is a description of the famous building from Wikipedia.

The Hundertwasser House Vienna (German Hundertwasserhaus Wien) is an apartment house in Vienna, Austria, designed by Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser.

The house was built between 1983 and 1986 by architects Univ.-Prof. Joseph Krawina and Peter Pelikan. It features undulating floors ("an uneven floor is a melody to the feet"[citation needed]), a roof covered with earth and grass, and large trees growing from inside the rooms, with limbs extending from windows. Hundertwasser took no payment for the design of the house, declaring that it was worth it, to prevent something ugly from going up in its place.

Within the house there are 52 apartments, four offices, 16 private terraces and three communal terraces, and a total of 250 trees and bushes. The Hundertwasser House is one of Austria's most visited buildings[citation needed] and has become part of Austria's cultural heritage.

It reminded us of something that Howard Roark would have built.

3Dwalkthroughs.com in Vienna (Day 1)

3Dwalkthroughs.com has taken the show on the road and is visiting a number of cities in Eastern Europe. Our trip is taking us to Vienna, Prague, Budapest and Munich. We thought it would be a good idea to take this opportunity to post about interesting architecture we come across during our trip.

Our first stop takes us to Vienna, Austria. We just landed yesterday and we are trying to stay awake to avoid the jetlag. It has been raining/snowing non stop since we landed and is expected to stay that way for our 2 days here.

Regardless, we have had the opportunity to explore a little of downtown Vienna. The downtown area reminds us quite a bit of Picadilly Circus in London. The architecture is quite old, however the retail which resides below each structure is quite modern with a lot of the familiar franchise stores.

Above is a shot we snapped while trying to avoid the driving wind and rain. We will be heading back to the same spot today and I will gather more information about the specifics of the buildings...stay tuned.

Liverpool Hope University To Hold a 3D Open House

A university in England has built a virtual campus in Second Life in order to host a 3D open house. Liverpool Hope University aims to attract students from across the world as it opens the doors of its virtual campus. The virtual open house, taking place on Wednesday, has been planned as part of a six month project by third year BA Media students.

The open house will provide potential students with an opportunity to view existing and fictional buildings as well as interact with current students acting as tour guides. The participating students will create 3D avatars to welcome students and answer questions.

Following the open house, Hope's virtual campus will return to an invite-only basis.

Source: The Press Association

While we are way beyond the days of touring colleges to determine where we might apply, we think this is a great concept and very effective use of a 3D virtual platform such as Second Life.

3Dwalkthroughs.com will soon be launching 3D Virtual Venues which will be focused on creating imagninative and useful venues such as Liverpools 3D open house.

A 3D Platfrom For The Adult Scene (25-40 Year Olds)

Not too long ago, 3Dwalkthroughs.com posted a story about an up and coming 3D social networking platform being developed by our friends at the Wyndstorm Corporation. Well, their 3D platform called Riplounge.com has just been released for beta testing.

The RipLounge 3D platform is targeting a much older population than alot of the current 3D virtual platforms on the market. Riplounge will feature "swanky nightclubs, beaches and yachts, where users can meet, dance, flirt, kiss, hold-hands and audio-visual chat.”

Users get personalized 3D animated avatars and can invite friends to join them. The service promises to showcase independent music artists and offers advertisers “in-scene” advertising.

Source: techcrunch.com

We are exciting about testing Riplounge and seeing all that it has to offer. As we have mentioned many times before, we sincerely believe that all social networking platforms will move to a 3D environment over the next few years. At the very least they will have some 3D components integrated into their current 2D platforms. We will post an update after we had a chance to test the platform.

3D Characters To Be Integrated into AOL Instant Messaging

Here's a piece of 3D news on the lighter side. Gizmoz, a social expression and user-generated media service, today announced an agreement with AOL to allow users of the AIM service, the largest instant messaging community in the U.S., to create 3D, talking Gizmoz characters to personalize their messages.

Simply upload a personal photograph or select characters and accessories from an extensive library of costumes, hair, makeup and more. Gizmoz has already animated nearly 50 trigger words, such as "blabla," "ttyl," "rbay" and "brb." Gizmoz characters react and behave according to the expressions typed within the message window.

Source: earthtimes.org

3Dwalkthroughs.com is interested in this news as we believe customizable avatars will be a big part of the virtual venue experience in the near future. With 3D technology constantly improving and 3D environments becoming more realistic, it only seems logical that the demand for avatars representing users to be more realistic as well. I suppose customizable avatars are a mixed blessing..all we need is another place to feel self-conscious.

About Gizmoz
Founded in 2003, Gizmoz offers consumers a new generation of character-based visual expression for use across their digital lives. The Gizmoz service makes it easy to create, customize, animate and share photorealistic 3D talking characters and videos that allow consumers to communicate and express themselves in more realistic and imaginative ways. Gizmoz is funded by Benchmark Capital, Columbia Capital, DoCoMo Capital, ngi capital, inc., and Jagen, with offices in Menlo Park, CA and Israel.

3D Assets and Property Marketing Websites

It is very common for 3Dwalkthroughs.com and our interactive services partner, Launchsight Solutions to work together on projects. Almost all 3D assets that we create for our clients need to be integrated in one form or another into a website.

We are constantly amazed when we come across great looking 3D assets integrated into old school and/or hard to navigatge websites. In most cases when the property marketing websites are highlighting development projects that are still not completed, the 3D assets are the most impactful tools available to pre-sell the project.

Tucking them away in hard to find pages or putting them on websites where the image or video is too large or too small could potentially do more harm than good.

With the advances that have been made in 3rd party video hosting sites, there is no reason that anything short of a good size/resolution version of a 3D Walkthrough be integrated into the property marketing website.

In addition to making sure that the 3D assets are presented in the best format possible, it is also important that the quality of the website itself is up to the highest standard. As the saying goes, you only get one chance to make a great first impression. In today's web 2.0 world, people will judge you and your company based on the first few seconds they spend on your website...might as well make a great first impression.

3D Sidewalk Art Part 2

Almost a year ago 3Dwalkthroughs.com posted a story about an artist who uses the sidewalk as his canvas. With nothing more than colored chalk and his creativity, Julian Beever creates 3D sidewalk art that makes you feel like you are "seeing things".

Julian's 3D artwork is amazing because it looks unbelievably realistic when seen from the right perspective. If you look at the same piece of artwork from the wrong perspective it actually loses it's 3D effect.

The piece shown above creates the illusion that the sidewalk is broken apart to reveal the piping that feeds a fountain. We strongly suggest checking out Julian's website for some other unbelievable 3D pavement drawings.

3D Walkthroughs Set To Music

Almost every well made movie utilizes music to help tell the story. Whether it is a soft violin tugging at your heart strings or a heavy orchestra run to help sell an exciting chase scene, music can certainly make or break a scene.

When creating a 3D Walkthrough the choice of music is just as important to help sell the story. If the 3D Walkthrough is being used to sell a new hotel project with dramatic views it is probably not a good idea to use a slow moving, soft jazz tune. Conversely, if the 3D Walkthrough is being used to showcase a new upscale restaurant, a slow moving jazz tune might be very effective.

3Dwalkthroughs.com is often asked how we differ from the competition. In addition to a number of post-production effects that we only see a few companies starting to implement, our answer is often music. Our team spends a lot of time choosing the best music to create the right synergy between the 3D Walkthrough and the music.

In the future when reviewing 3D Walkthroughs of different companies, we recommend you take notice of the music and see if it helps/hinders the effectiveness of the presentation.

3D Movie Industry is Set To Explode

In the last year the movie industry has re-embraced 3D as THE format to produce major motion pictures. Movie's such as U23D and Hannah Montana 3D have taken the world by storm.

One of the company's which has been a big proponent of 3D technology is Pixar films which is soon to release Toy Story 3 in 3D. Not to be outdone, Dreamworks has just announced that it will be investing $30m dollars a year into 3D technology as it hopes to get the edge over rival Pixar.

"Clearly I'm putting my money where my mouth is and the company's bet on it", said CEO Katzenberg in an interview with Reuters.

Katzenberg said that he plans to make all of Dreamworks' future films in 3D. The company's latest animated movie, Monsters vs. Aliens, will open in the US in March 2009 and be shown in 3D where available.

Source: Sky News

3Dwalkthroughs.com believes the 3D revolution in the movie industry will carry over to many other industries due to the cross pollination between the media industry and the rest of the business world.

3D Deco - Transforming The Office Space into a Lasting First Impression

As big fans of interior design and architecture, 3Dwalkthroughs.com is constantly researching new technologies and services that are truly innovative.

South Africa based, 3D Deco has launched an innovative new service that is focused on creating unique and impressive office interiors. 3D Deco was founded in 2000 to create distinctive interior designs for launches, exhibitions, functions, large events as well as interior spaces.

According to a press release, their newest service involves the complete spatial enhancement of the office environment by incorporating 3D brand-focused solutions for an immersive branding experience, making that first contact with your clients a lasting one.

Their team is highly trained and will do a complete analysis of your working space, and provide a range of visual enhancements to suit your needs. From simple light fixtures and wall units, to a complete seamless transformation and wall to ceiling coverage, they promise to make your experience a memorable one.

Their décor is a permanent installation in your office space with a one year warrantee on the product. It meets fire and safety regulations with certification provided. Warrantee is void if damage of product is found to be the cause of negligence. All other cases will warrant full replacement or part specific.

Source: bizcommunity.com

Any company that is based in the very expensive NYC understands it is hard enough to make the rent, let alone being able to design an impressive office space. Assuming 3D Deco's price is right, and the installations do not involve heavy construction, 3D Deco would probably do very well in NYC...especially in today's market.

Sched.org - Could This Application Organize Increasingly Complex 3D Virtual Trade Shows?

3Dwalkthroughs.com came across an article on the Wired.com blog about an application that is getting a lot of recognition at this year's South by Sothwest Music and Media Conference.

The application is called Sched.org and is be used by attendees of the festival to keep abreast of all that is going on at the conferenece.

The Sched.org website displays the entire conference calendar, covering the interactive, film and music events plus parties and unofficial galleries, on a dynamic, easily customizable web page.

The login is simple -- just pick a user name and password and Sched.org sets up your account. Each day's festival events are laid out in their own tab. Click on a tab to browse the events and pick which panel, film or music show you want to attend. One click adds the item to a personalized page with a unique URL, which can be bookmarked on a mobile device (it looks great on an iPhone) or printed out. You can also see who is attending which event, and sort the events by popularity.

Source: Wired.com Blog

Sched.org was created by Chirag Mehta, a 27-year-old IT consultant, who built the site with 24-year-old web designer Taylor McKnight.

With a growing number of 3D virtual world platforms, specifically 3D Trade Shows, it dawned on me that Sched.org might prove to be just as effective in the virtual world as in the real world. We have already seen some samples of 3D conferences that could benefit from this type of intuitive scheduling application.

PicLens - Very Cool 3D Internet Search Tool

3Dwalkthroughs.com found a pretty cool technology that was developed by a company called Cooliris based in Menlo Park, California. The technology called PicLens instantly transforms your browser into a full-screen, 3D experience for viewing images on the web. We believe PicLens offers a snapshot of where the 3D internet is heading.

The PicLens technology features an interactive "3D Wall" which lets you effortlessly drag, click, and zoom your way around a wall of pictures for an extraordinary, full-screen viewing experience. The technology currently works with a number of Photo Sharing Sites, Social Networking Platforms, Image Searches, Webhosts and Galleries.

Source: PicLens.com

About Cooliris
Cooliris, Inc. was founded in January 2006 with a simple mantra: "Think beyond the browser". We focus on creating products that make discovering and enjoying the Web more exciting, efficient, and personal.

You can download the 3D browser here>>

3D Walkthroughs Created From 2D Photos?

3Dwalkthroughs.com came across a blurb on wired.com's blog about a technology created at Stanford University that can convert 2D Photos into 3D models.

The technology takes a two-dimensional image and creates a three-dimensional "fly around" model, giving the viewers access to the scene's depth and a range of points of view. After uploading your image, you can "fly" in the 3D scene or watch a rendered 3D movie.

It uses powerful machine learning techniques to learn the relation between small image patches and their depth and orientation. This allows it to model 3D structures such as slopes of mountains or branches of trees.

Source: Make3D website

Click here>> to see a gallery of 3D samples from the the Make3D website.

As this technology continues to improve, we envision virtual tour photographers integrating this into their product mix. Imagine the ability to create a 3D Walkthrough of an existing property with just a digital camera...pretty cool.

3D Cyber Convention Big Hit in Real Estate Industry

It is no secret that 3Dwalkthroughs.com is getting close to launching 3Dvirtualvenues.com. A company focused on creating custom designed, 3D virtual venues for real world business to business applications.

Today an article on the RISMEDIA website validates our forray into 3D virtual world technology.

According to the article, 38,000 real estate professionals immersed themselves in the latest ideas, training and products at the RISMedia sponsored Seventh Annual National Real Estate Cyber Convention and Exposition held from February 11 to February 18th. Virtual attendees from 23 countries enjoyed the festivities during the seven-day event. The completely online event is produced annually by the Real Estate Cyberspace Society, a professional real estate organization with over 10,000 members and 120 Chapters worldwide.

According to John M. Peckham III, the Society’s executive director, attendees participated in 33 educational sessions, plus convention keynote talks by Dave Liniger, Stu Siegel, and showcase talks by leaders such as Stefan Swanepoel, Michael Russer and Microsoft’s Bill Gates. They made 112, 405 visits to the 190 booths at the Convention Expo and while at the booths talked directly to vendors, purchased products/services and made 23,694 requests for additional information.

Source: RISMEDIA.com

In addition to the large attendance, the other encouraging statistic is the sheer number of booth visits and requests for additional information. It is one thing for people to just drop in to see what a 3D exhibition hall looks like, it is quite another for people to interact with such frequency. As the graphics and functionality of 3D platforms continues to improve we expect the attendance of 3D virtual trade shows to blow past real life trade shows.

Liberty University Modeled in 3D

3Dwalkthroughs.com usually waits until the begninning of the month to post about impressive 3D models added to Google Warehouse. This month we made an exception as we came across a cool project that was undertaken by a team from Liberty University located in Virginia.

The project involved a team of staff and students recreating the Liberty University campus in 3D using SketchUp and Google Earth. Well over a thousand reference photographs, as well as building blueprints, were used to accurately recreate Liberty’s campus. The project began in April 2007 and has been updated several times since then.

The 3D campus can be launched here>>

Basically the way it works is you start out with an interactive Google view of the entire campus. Using your mouse you can navigate the campus in all directions unveiling all of the existing structures. Clicking on any one of the structures launches a new page with 3D walkthroughs, videos and documents about that specific building.

The project is impressive as it truly gives a good sense of the campus without having to travel to Virginia...we recommend checking it out.

Google New Cities in 3D Tool Encourages Content Sharing

Google just announced the launch of their new Cities in 3D tool. The Cities in 3D tool is designed to encourage the sharing of 3D content and it's integration of into Google Earth.

"We're inviting local government to produce 3D data that they can make available to Google users so we can integrate it into Google Earth and provide a rich, 3D representation of their locality on Earth," said J.L. Needham, Google's manager of public-sector content partnerships. "We see this as a content partnership -- in this case a public-private content partnership in the sense this is the government making its data available to its citizens by way of Google Earth."

Source: Govtech.com

Cities in 3D is specifically geared towards smaller towns and communities. Currently only cities with large downtowns and business districts have been integrated into Google Earth. For the first time, smaller suburban cities and even rural towns can contribute datasets, which will help to create a much broader virtual world than exists today.

One of Google's motivations for offering this tool is to improve the experience for users of Google Earth. As more of the world is modeled in 3D, Google Earth will become exponentially more valuable for a variety of applications. According to the article on Govtech.com some of the industries that might benefit from Google's new tool include: Public Safety, Urban planning, Tourism and public input on new developments.

3Dwalkthroughs.com is excited about this new tool even though some might view it as competition to our current suite of products. As far as we are concerned, the more Google focuses on 3D products, the more the world will understand the value this type of media offers to almost all industries.

3D Floor Plans - A Great Tool For Furniture Companies

One of 3Dwalkthrough.com's core products, the Custom 3D Floor Plan, is evolving into one of our best selling products. A couple of the reasons for this phenomenon is the versatility and value a 3D Floor Plan offers to many different industries.

In addition to the obvious sales and marketing value a 3D Floor Plan brings to residential, commercial, retail and hospitality real estate, we are finding that it is also being used for many other purposes.

Recently, we have been contacted by various furniture and interior design companies that are interested in using our 3D Floor Plans as a dynamic way of demonstrating their concepts. The fact that we can integrate realistic 3D models of their specific furniture lines into the virtually any type of room layouts, allows them create a very effective web-based show room.

We have read various reports and articles recently which suggest the home improvement industry will see an increased volume as the sales of new homes continues to slow. If this theory holds true, home improvement companies would be wise to consider adding innovative marketing materials, such as 3D Floor Plans, 3D Walkthroughs and 3D Renderings to their websites.

Crime 360- New Show on A&E Will Use 3D Graphics

I guess I had a lot of free time this weekend as this is my second post in two days that is based on something on I watched on TV. Today's post is about a new show called CRIME 360 that is launching March 6th on the A&E channel. The cool part about the show is that it will use high end 3D technology to allow viewers to look at evidence in a similar way to a forensics expert at a high end crime lab.

The staff at 3Dwalkthroughs.com will certainly be watching CRIME 360 to see if there are any new effects and post production techniques we might be able to add to our current 3D Walkthroughs.

Below is a description of the show taken directly from A&E's website, however, I would suggest checking out the site directly to view some of the cool 3D animations and learn how they were made. You can check out the website here>>.

About CRIME 360
Following in the footsteps of A&E's innovative real-life investigative hit series THE FIRST 48, CRIME 360 re-invents the genre yet again with a brand new ground-breaking format. Never before on television have cutting-edge technology and high-end CGI (computer generated imagery) been combined with present-tense investigations - it's a completely new way to experience real-life investigations as they unfold. CRIME 360 is the perfect blend of technology and immersive real-time edge-of-your seat suspense, as viewers see forensics and evidence in a way they've never been able to before.

Mobile Media and 3D Property Marketing

Apples new batch of TV commercials does a great job of illustrating how effective the Iphone, and mobile media devices in general, are for tapping into the internet on the go.

In one of the commericals, a narrator describes a situation, for example, a person is out car shopping, the scene then transitions to a full screen view of the Iphone, and shows how easy it is to pull down the information available on the internet. Another commerical shows how easy it is to interact with facebook, which has been recently optimized for mobile media devices.

As the experience of accessing multiple media formats on mobile devices continues to improve, it will become increasingly important for companies to optimize their websites accordingly.

3Dwalkthroughs.com believes that the real estate industry will be one of the largest benefactors of improved mobile media capabilities. Real estate agents on the go will be able to pull up all possible information about a property including: Property Details, Photos, 3D Floor Plans, 3D Renderings, 3D Walkthroughs, Virtual Tours, etc.
While these capabilities are available now, our experience shows that only a small number of forward thingking agents have fully embraced this technology.

It will be interesting to look back in a few years and remember the primitive times when desktop computers were the method of accessing the internet.

YouTube To Offer Live Video Feeds

3Dwalkthroughs.com came across a post on Wired.com's blog that could have a significant impact on the future of blogging as well as 3D Virtual Worlds. According to YouTube's founder, Steve Chen, YouTube will be offering Live Video Feeds by the end of the year.

While YouTube may not be the first video sharing site on the block to add live content, the sheer size of YouTube's audience, and ability to integrate into various Google Applications will allow it to hit the ground running.

It’s not hard to imagine something similar being used as a video conferencing app within Google Apps, or perhaps even adding online video-chat to gTalk.

Source: Wired.com

3Dwalkthroughs.com believes that will be an opportunity for YouTube's live video feeds to deliver a new and improved method of communication to new and existing 3D Virtual Worlds. In other words, you would be able to launch live video conferences within 3D virtual world platforms as a complement to the VOIP and text chat capabilities that are currently available.

We will keep our ears to the ground for any new rumors.