From: Friedman Doron <doronf@math.tau.ac.il>
Subject: Re: MISC: VR software (info needed for article)
Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 16:58:41 +0200 (GMT+0200)


> 
> I am writing an article for a national publication on virtual worlds
> software development, and am interested in learning what software
> packages people are using to create VRML and other applications.

In Zapa Digital Arts (where i am a consultant) we use traditional 3D
animation tools, mainly Litewave (previously 3D Studio also), and
convert to vrml.  this is what many people do, and missing some of the
point.  vrml 2.0 has two main features over 1.0: animation, and
interactivity.  in this kind of work there is no taking advantage of
interactivity.

> Also, do you feel VRML will continue to be a dominant technology for
> VR on the Internet, or are there other technologies in the offing?

vrml is important for being synthetic (versus, e.g., video). this
makes it better in two main points:

1. smaller in size - which is going to be crucial for several years
yet on the net.

2. extendable in real time - which will be crucial for environments
for many years, until it will be possible to extend photorealistic
material or video.

i have many more opinions, and usually am willing to share and spread them.

Doron Friedman
Tel Aviv University - http://www.math.tau.ac.il/~doronf
Zapa Digital Arts - http://www.zapadigital.com

<doronf@math.tau.ac.il>