Immersive Virtual Environments CAVE

[matthewjj]

Our office wants to put together a CAVE system or CAVE-like system. Has anybody had experience assembling spaces like this and using archicad to navigate through models? It seems like a software problem but I am having a hard time finding good resources on the web. Preferably this would be a DIY kind of setup.

General characteristics of the CAVE (from wikipedia)
The CAVE is a 10’ X 10’ X 9’ theatre that sits in a larger room measured to be around 35’ X 25’ X 13’. The outside room must be free of light at all times while using the CAVE. The walls of the CAVE are made up of rear-projection screens, and the floor is made of a down-projection screen. High-resolution projectors (the University of Illinois uses an Electrohome Marquee 8000) display images on each of the screens by projecting the images onto mirrors which reflect the images onto the projection screens. The user will go inside of the CAVE wearing special glasses to allow for the 3-D graphics that are generated by the CAVE to be seen. With these glasses, people using the CAVE can actually see objects floating in the air, and can walk around them, getting a proper view of what the object would look like when they walk around it. This is made possible with electromagnetic sensors. The frame of the CAVE is made out of non-magnetic stainless steel in order to interfere as little as possible with the electromagnetic sensors. When a person walks around in the CAVE, their movements are tracked with these sensors and the video adjusts accordingly. Computers control this aspect of the CAVE as well as the audio aspects. There are multiple speakers placed from multiple angles in the CAVE, giving one not only 3-D video, but 3-D audio as well.

[Anonymous]

you might want to look at these guys.
EON Reality
My clients have "walked thru" a project we are working on using this. Eventually I will to. From my end I had to export out a 3DS model.
The system is serious money.

Cary

ArchiCAD 11 build 1200 usa full
windows XPsp2

[Djordje]

There used to be an export plugin for EON, once upon a time? Or is my memory finally gone? 😉

[Anonymous]

Djordje...I believe you are correct. I recall seeing in the past that they had a program that imported the archicad model such that non-archicad folks coud do walk thrus. Fuzzy memory says this was around 8.0.

EON is in the process of setting up a ftp site where my model can be viewed with 3D glasses thru any monitor. As the project is complex we want a way for subs to move in and out of the building wihout having to travel to their facilities in Irving CA. I will report how this goes...soon.

Cary

ArchiCAD 11 build 1200 usa full
windows XPsp2

[Anonymous]

How about combining the CAVE system with an 'endless treadmill'.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7346325.stm

That - I would love to see!

[Anonymous]

I use QUEST3D to navigate through models

[Rex Maximilian]

The guys at i3D in Poland are the ones that EON contracts the work out to. You may try an dcontact Artur there. Nice bunch of guys!

http://i3d.pl/

(**make sur eto hit the "English" option on the upper right after the Flash intro)

[Anonymous]

eon 3d model of my archiCAD model

When you go here the first time you are asked to download a viewer...then you are sent to the model.

you can toggle textures on and off and 3D on and off. It's a hoot with the glasses www.colorcode3d.com 3D GLASSES

Ctrl F gets you full screen
Ctrl A toggles 3D when in full screen

cfd

ArchiCAD 11 build 1210 usa full
windows XPsp3

[stefan]

Cary wrote:
eon 3d model of my archiCAD model

When you go here the first time you are asked to download a viewer...then you are sent to the model.

you can toggle textures on and off and 3D on and off. It's a hoot with the glasses www.colorcode3d.com 3D GLASSES

Ctrl F gets you full screen
Ctrl A toggles 3D when in full screen

cfd

ArchiCAD 11 build 1210 usa full
windows XPsp3

Was this created in ArchiCAD 11 with the EON exporter? Has it been updated to work in AC11?

The result is nice. There seems to be no gravity nor collision detection, however, which is available in most VRML browsers.

On my PC, it all looked very dark and without much contrast. Is this adjustable?

Oh, I had Firefox crash when installing the plugin. But after a restart, everything worked correct.

Alas, not available for OSX users...

[Anonymous]

stefan

My bad, I should have noted windows only upfront. The model was generated in ArchiCAD 11 and exported in 3DS. Not quite sure what Eon used. I don't believe the stereographic 3D model is available on the street but rather something they are developing. Rex probably knows a great deal more about it that me. I played around briefly with the Color Code 3d site and their models had gravity and wall blocked your movement. those feedbacks would be a nice toggle feature for sure. Also i'm not sure about lighting....I do not have light sources inside my model...and as the house is basically daylight driven and archicad allows for no real photometry artificial illumination is a waste of time in my IMHO. Daylight and shadows would be nice. Also textures seemed to have some export import problems.

Cary
ArchiCAD 11 build 1210 usa full
windows XPsp3