Web3D
When I started my MA in Communication Design at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design in 2001, my focus was on interactive film making. This rapidly went down the rabbit hole of three dimensional online information environments and got me thinking about issues such as how information can be navigated more intuitively. [[My thesis on this subject, Liquid Space, can be found here.]]
I designed and built a three dimensional interface for computer desktops that stretches into a virtual sphere all the way around the user and incorporates hand tracking as part of the navigation process [[(more on that can be found here)]]. Both the dissertation and the project were awarded with distinction.
Later, in 2007, working at Sky News, I secured a budget to build a three dimensional online version of the Sky News studio using the Second Life platform. Second Life (SL) is an online 3D environment created by Linden Labs that allows people from all over the world to share a common, persistent space in real time. The content of the space is built by the users.
Here are the details of that project: