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Certainly a cool demo — but has anyone already seen a use of 3D in CSS/WebGL for a productive purpose? I'd be really interested in that; showing the atoms/molec

by ewolf 14y ago

Certainly a cool demo — but has anyone already seen a use of 3D in CSS/WebGL for a productive purpose? I'd be really interested in that; showing the atoms/molecules in 3D, as it is the suggested in one of the comments in the link @mmahemoff posted, for example, seems like a great idea.

marcospri 14y ago
The people at www.foldable.me use css animations for their cool editor 3D editor. That's certainly in production but I don't know if counts as a "productive purpose".
- ewolf 14y ago
  It is a productive purpose, but a very obvious one — designing a 3D object requires 3D display. We keep seeing impressive 3D interfaces for regular everyday tasks in sci-fi movies, so I was just wondering whether this way of displaying information actually is useful.
malandrew 14y ago
IMHO, the biggest use case for 3D right now is to add affordances to current flat interfaces. Many interfaces already incorporate 3D affordances, usually demonstrating depth to help the user understand what is happening, but these affordances are almost always faked, the same way that 3D is often faked by photoshop wizards. At famo.us, we hope to make it much easier for interface designers use real 3D effects to add affordances to their interface and explore how else 3D can be used. Previously, if you wanted to design a 3D interface you had to completely invest in 3D, which is expensive time-wise to do for the sake of experimentation. What we'd like to do at famo.us is bridge 2D and 3D in a way that you can build your interfaces using familiar 2D paradigms, but also give you the tooling to explore 3D using real content you already have in 2D. As more designers explore 3D and more customers become familiar with 3D little by little, I think we'll see more and more examples of its utility. Here's a video where 3D is used with a constrained z-depth and orthogonal camera position (i.e. elevation view). http://famo.us/ http://famo.us/ (the video on the left) Also take a look at Clear App to see small examples of how 3D has been used to add affordances to a mostly 2D interface. http://www.realmacsoftware.com/clear/ http://www.realmacsoftware.com/clear/
- crucialfelix 14y ago
  I'm starting development shortly on an app for which I really want this type of interface (as seen in the video on famo.us) Do you have any idea when developers will get access ? Is there any other place to get information about it ?
  - malandrew 14y ago
    We're keeping everyone updated of our progress via our mailing list. You can sign up for notifications at http://famo.us/ http://famo.us/

by ewolf 14y ago

marcospri 14y ago

The people at www.foldable.me use css animations for their cool editor 3D editor. That's certainly in production but I don't know if counts as a "productive purpose".

ewolf 14y ago
It is a productive purpose, but a very obvious one — designing a 3D object requires 3D display. We keep seeing impressive 3D interfaces for regular everyday tasks in sci-fi movies, so I was just wondering whether this way of displaying information actually is useful.

malandrew 14y ago

IMHO, the biggest use case for 3D right now is to add affordances to current flat interfaces. Many interfaces already incorporate 3D affordances, usually demonstrating depth to help the user understand what is happening, but these affordances are almost always faked, the same way that 3D is often faked by photoshop wizards. At famo.us, we hope to make it much easier for interface designers use real 3D effects to add affordances to their interface and explore how else 3D can be used. Previously, if you wanted to design a 3D interface you had to completely invest in 3D, which is expensive time-wise to do for the sake of experimentation. What we'd like to do at famo.us is bridge 2D and 3D in a way that you can build your interfaces using familiar 2D paradigms, but also give you the tooling to explore 3D using real content you already have in 2D. As more designers explore 3D and more customers become familiar with 3D little by little, I think we'll see more and more examples of its utility. Here's a video where 3D is used with a constrained z-depth and orthogonal camera position (i.e. elevation view). http://famo.us/ http://famo.us/ (the video on the left) Also take a look at Clear App to see small examples of how 3D has been used to add affordances to a mostly 2D interface. http://www.realmacsoftware.com/clear/ http://www.realmacsoftware.com/clear/

crucialfelix 14y ago
I'm starting development shortly on an app for which I really want this type of interface (as seen in the video on famo.us) Do you have any idea when developers will get access ? Is there any other place to get information about it ?
- malandrew 14y ago
  We're keeping everyone updated of our progress via our mailing list. You can sign up for notifications at http://famo.us/ http://famo.us/