A WRL viewer that works with export> 3D

[PaulHuffman]

I happened to notice that in ArcScene there is export to 3D.  So I tried it. Docs say I can export Scene> 3D and my scene gets saved to a VRML model. It seems to produce a wrl file and a bunch of jpgs.  I thought the VRML format might be useful to send scenes to collaborators that don't have ArcGIS.http://webhelp.esri.com/arcgisdesktop/9.3/index.cfm?id=3458&pid=3453&topicname=Exporting_a_3D_docume... Something I could put up on my webserver. But so far I haven't found a VRML viewer that works with files created by ArcScene. I've tried FreeWRL and Cosmo. Cosmo could view its own demo files but my export from ArcScene was blank white. There are lots more out there, so it doesn't seem very efficient for me to keep randomly trying different viewers. Do you know of any that are known to work with files created by ArcScene?

[JakubSisak]

This one worked for me. Although, to be honest, I doubt any of the viewers are going to 'really' useful. I though i could do the same but... Well, you will see what i mean; http://www.vias.org/pngguide/chapter06_08.html

It would be MUCH more usefull if 3D Analyst could export to say SketchUp.  I've gone through a lot of trouble to convert a 3D model build in ArcGIS to SketchUp so that the end user can have an interactive, scaled product.

There are some browser plugins that I've tested and they do display the model but it's only good for zooming, rotating and such...

[PaulHuffman]

Couldn't find VRMLView 2.0 through that link. Perhaps Kongsberg has reorganized the page and products offered.

Octanga works for their on line demo files http://cic.nist.gov/vrml/vbdetect.html with my Firefox, but my ArcScene generated files only get 8% loaded.

[PaulHuffman]

Instant Player http://www.instantreality.org/downloads/ works on Instant Player demo files as a stand alone program.  Octaga Player http://www.octaga.com/ works as a Firefox plugin on the Instant Player demo data.  But nothing yet works on my 3D exports from ArcScene http://ykfp.org/views/

ESRI tech support told me "Thank you for your email.  Unfortunately your question is outside the scope of Esri support.  We cannot make any reccomendations on any 3rd party software.  We really appreciate your use of our software, but we are not allow to make any suggestions that may conflict with our software. " 

Leaves me to wonder if Export 3d actually works.

[JakubSisak]

Even if you found a viewer that works, I think you would not be pleased with the results.
It took me a while to find something that works until i found the VRML Viewer 3 (mentioned above). I don't think it's available anymore but if you are interested I can e-mail you the installer.

I am attaching a screen capture of a 3D model created in 3D Analyst and exported to VRML and loaded into the viewer. The other screen capture is of the model itself in ArcScene.

Unless you are doing something VERY simple, then the 3D exporter is completaly useless.  If you intend to share models, you are probably better off designing 3D models in SketchUp. Even the Collada export does a really bad job; you need to explode the models and re-paint the faces to even make sense of what it is you are looking at BUT. It is georefenced and it does provide grounds for sharing models between SketchUp and 3D Analyst.

[Karl-JohanSellberg]

I have tried using Deep Exploration CAD, Babel3d.com, 3d Object Converter, Crossroads, Vue, Polytrans, Catia, Maya, Rhino and 3ds to edit the Vrl-files produced by ArcScene 10 sp2. None of the above works. If the software even does have the ability to open vrl-files, it still won´t open.

The funny thing is that earlier i had a older version of Rhino that actually could open these files, so it isn´t impossible. But that software stopped working some time ago. So I am all out of luck and Ideas here.

I am back to square one here... Keep getting the feeling of beta-testing this software for ESRI.

[JeffreySwain]

In house with exports from ArcScene, Cortona 3d is one that has worked for me.  It is available as a browser plug in and a stand alone viewer.  There is no official viewer application from Esri.  Also for the conversion to sketchup, I recommend the Export to Collada tool. Those should work in Sketchup, but if not, then please log a Support Incident to report the bad behavior.

[GregorRadlmair]

For non US-Clients:
Be aware to use the point as decimal delimitor before exporting a .wrl: Go to START >> System settings >> Regional Settings.

Additionally, under some circumstances it is..
- .. better to use a Raster or Multipatches instead of a TIN
- .. not possible to have more than one grafic in a grafic layer

I used Instant Player with Win 7 to review my .wrl output. (http://www.instantreality.org/)