Project Description
Scenegraph Studios have worked for various clients to create interactive and immersive 3D websites, including experiences to showcase the art of students and upcoming artists. We had an amazing opportunity to help local businesses that were forced to close during the 2020 Covid-19 lockdown. Our 3D galleries have helped to give their artist’s a new, interactive and socially distanced platform and allowed their customers a chance to be immersed in an interesting space, from the comfort and safety of their own homes.
Dot Art
Throughout 2020 we completed multiple projects for Dot Art, a Liverpool based Art Gallery who specialise in promoting and selling artworks by local artists.
Scenegraph Studios were excited to take Dot Art and their online 2D portfolio of artworks, and place them into an immersive 3D experience, viewable globally on desktops and mobiles, building their online presence and helping them stand out by using the latest in 3D technologies.
Our first project for Dot Art was to set up a virtual gallery for their Art Bytes school exhibition. Art Bytes is a national programme for primary, secondary and SEN schools, allowing young, budding artists to enter their artwork into a national competition, concluding with the opportunity for this work to be displayed in a public gallery. However, due to the Covid-19 lockdown, all physical exhibitions in 2020 were unable to take place.
For this project we created an interactive navigation system in the form of a map. This map allows the user to select specific regions of England and the school year, taking you to different galleries filled with competitions pieces. We also implemented augmented reality features, which allowed users to scan markers that show additional videos of the winners on a smartphone or tablet.
Throughout 2020, as more and more lockdown restrictions were brought in, there was a greater need to bring more exhibitions online. As a result of this, we created another 3D gallery, this time for the Dot Art Schools branch of Dot Art, based on the competition winners from the previous year:
Following this, we created a Virtual Curator tool which allowed full WordPress integration, allowing users to pick pieces of art from the Dot Art School’s catalogue of past competition entries and curate their own virtual gallery at the click of a button:
Finally, to finish the year, we added a epic gallery to their Dot Art site, which allowed Dot Art to enable a virtual gallery for any artist featured in their shop. This allowed them to pick up to 16 artworks to fill the virtual gallery, in an order of their choosing.
An example of an artist’s gallery can be seen below:
Just like our work above we created another for Art Bytes but with further interactivity. For this project we created an interactive navigation system in the form of a map. This map allows the user to select specific regions of England and the school year, taking you to different galleries of art competitions from across the country. We also implemented augmented reality features, which allows users to scan markers that show additional videos of the winners when scanned on a smartphone or tablet. Check out the Art Bytes 3D gallery below.
The Daniel Adamson Steam Ship
In early 2021 we had the exciting opportunity to step aboard the oldest, functional, Mersey-built steamship in the World, followed by the privilege of recreating it in 3D. We recreated custom 3D models of the ship and placed a 3D gallery inside. 3D Web allows the creation of art galleries with a twist, augmenting the basic white walls of a gallery. Doing this enables the user to explore the famous ship while appreciating the exhibited art, previously featured in the AND festival.
Come and check out The Danny virtual gallery below.
Scenegraph Studios have created multiple apps for The Daniel Adamson focusing on interaction, VR and immersion, allowing users to learn about the history of the ship and how it works. Follow the link below to see our visit to The Daniel Adamson and learn more about these projects.
https://www.scenegraphstudios.com/the-daniel-adamson-visit-and-vr-learning/
Gallery of Rainbows
During the 2020 Covid-19 lockdown we wished to say a thank you to the hard-working public servants (nurses, doctors, shop workers etc), and we wanted to do this in a way that was not going to be an issue with lockdown and restrictions. Using 3D Web, we created a rainbow road 3D gallery. Members of the public were able to upload photos of rainbows they would walk past on the streets, or from home, and our web scripts would place them into the gallery. A special feature about this gallery is the road gets longer the more photos are uploaded. Explore the Gallery of Rainbows with the link below.
Scenegraph Studio’s Gallery to showcase artist’s work
Scenegraph Studios has had the opportunity to work with local artists to host their art in our 3D gallery, optimised for desktop and mobile for the best 3D web experience.
Each month, Scenegraph Studios chooses an artist, then curates a gallery of their work.
August 2021 was Hellen Songa, a Visual Journalist and photographer whose work primarily focuses on human stories, law and equality. During this digital exhibition, Hellen’s work was specifically centred around peacekeepers and the balance between civilians and people of power. To find out more about Hellen and her work, check out her website and Instagram below.
https://www.instagram.com/hellensonga/
September’s artist was Jon Edgley, a Liverpool based artist whose work comprises the creation of drawings and objects. Jon’s work explores many situations revolving around his life, existence, and role. Jon’s 3D gallery in September 2021 focuses on a selection of digital drawings capturing laughter, suffering and confusion. To find out more about Jon and his work check out his website and Instagram below.
https://www.instagram.com/jon_a_edgley/
Upcoming artists in our 3D gallery has been a great experience, as it has allowed us to explore further artistic themes and bring more exposure to these creative individuals.
Come and check out the artist who is currently featured in our 3D art gallery, or sign up to be featured:
Technical Information
Now that you know about the various 3D galleries and features we have developed, it’s time to go to the technical side and talk about what tools we used to get these working efficiently.
To begin the development of these 3D galleries we started with the creation of the scenes and the assets within them. To do this we used Blender, a 3D modelling software package. For each gallery, the models we made were different depending on what the client needed, such as a traditional art gallery or The Daniel Adamson steamship. A challenge with creating the 3D models for these galleries was making sure that they were as optimised as possible. To do this we carefully adjusted the quality of the materials, textures and polygons which make up the overall asset. This was a key element for our development as the 3D galleries have to run from a website on mobile and desktops, making it accessible to everyone.
Another key element to our development was programming using Javascript and the 3D web library, Three.js. With this programming language, we were able to create custom code to add interaction, player navigation and interface. Interaction within these 3D galleries was a predominant feature that we had to include, to accomplish the client’s aspirations.
