AS3 version done

I will be posting very soon. I just need to document it a little but I have been too busy. 

AS3 3D Engine On Its Way!

I have successfully converted the classes over to AS3! Will post soon.

More Examples

3D Topographical Terrain
http://www.mattmaxwelldesign.com/mm3dengine/sample3.swf

3D Buildings
http://www.mattmaxwelldesign.com/mm3dengine/sample4.swf

Use A, S key to zoom in and out. Use arrows to move around.

Site that Uses Matt Maxwell 3D Engine Gets National Recognition

NitroCircus.com just scored a national Silver Addy! This groundbreaking site was the first site to fully employ the MM3D engine.

National Campaign Uses 3d Engine

The latest site to use my 3d engine is Dial60th.com. Keep the examples coming!

Source Code

Well I never got around to converting this to AS3, but here is the code. On my next project I will develop it further.

http://www.mattmaxwelldesign.com/transfer/mattmaxwell3dengine.zip

Drop me a line if you use it and I will post it on this site.

More sites that use the Matt Maxwell 3D Engine

Here are a couple more implementations of my 3D engine. The first one is Dreaded Grove. This was created by Shauna Ehninger who is a Jr Designer at Richter7. It is a pro-bono project for a Halloween venue that is raising funds for childrens Cancer. The second example Thrillbillies was designed and programmed by myself. Both leverage the 3D engine to create an immersive experience.

More Samples

In a few weeks I will be releasing my 3D code. In the meantime, here are a few more samples:

http://www.mattmaxwelldesign.com/mm3dengine/sample1.swf
http://www.mattmaxwelldesign.com/mm3dengine/sample2.swf
http://www.richter7.com/xdelete/crocsrx/main.html

On all of these examples, use A, S, and the arrow keys to navigate the 3D universe.

BTW, I don't care if you decompile these samples and use the code. Its just basic 3D math and a few other tricks. Just drop me a line and give me lots of praise - and offer to help improve it with me. I am actually interested in getting some help making this really AS3, open source great. I am pretty inventive (this technique is somewhat clever once you understand my approach), but I am a designer and not such a great coder. It would be awesome if I could get some real technical help.

If anyone reading this will be at Flashforward Boston and would like to see how this works, I could show you. Just email me at matt@mattmaxwelldesign.com and we can meet up.

Welcome

I realize that there are others working on bringing 3D to Flash, but I have done some work of my own on this and have created a pretty decent engine that gives some pretty amazing results- and it is fairly intuitive. The purpose of this blog is to show how the approach works, add functionality, show off examples, and gather suggestions to make it better.

What is it?
See this example below. A picture is worth a thousand words. This is the first site I have designed that uses the engine. It was actually nominated in the FlashForward Film Festival (along with PaperVision3D - Ug. they will surely win)

http://www.nitrocircus.com/

How does it work?
Basically, you place MovieClips on the stage. The engine uses the actual _x, _y, and _alpha properties of each MovieClip to determine their position in the 3D universe. The _alpha value of each MovieClip is used to create the Z coordinate when the engine runs (100 is really close, 0 is very far away). This allows regular Flash designers to intuitively position each MovieClip on the X, Y, and Z axes. My mother thinks it is an ingenious approach.

How is it different from PaperVision3D?
Not sure yet. I have never been able to figure out how to get their demo files - just a shark swims around on their site. I am sure PaperVision3D is far more powerful - and a lot more complex to use. Kind of Flash 3D for nerds. I'm not that smart. I have also notices that the graphics in PaperVision are Nintendo64 quality - pretty pixellated.

What does the Matt Maxwell 3D Engine do exactly?
You can move forward, backward, left and right, but you are always looking forward. That's all. But that's a lot. The engine has headlights that illuminate the objects based on their distance from the camera.

What are your plans for the engine?

• I want to add audio speakers that get louder when you are close by and soft when you are far away.
• I want to improve performance using AS3 Sprites
• I need to convert it to AS3. I am struggling a little with the nerdier approach of AS3. I realize why Adobe has made it more complex, but it is far less intuitive to me.
• I want to use it as much as possible so people get used to a more immersive, realistic web experience. I want HTML to go away. My hope is that everyone will say, "hey, how come our site is flat and boring? We need a next-generation site like that one."
• I want to give it away for free so I can get a lot of good karma (and hopefully a few PayPal donations - mattmaxwelldesign@gmail.com if you are feeling generous)

What's my background?

I have been designing in Flash since it was FutureSplash in the 1990's. I have a degree in Graphi Design at the University of Utah. I live in Utah in the USA.

Why did you name it Matt Maxwell 3D Engine?

I'm busy and I thought it was pretty clever, don't you?

Where can I get the files?

Patient, my son. I just need time to zip them and post a few more examples.