

Three.js Interview: Online 3D Modeling and Rendering With Clara.io - bhouston
http://learningthreejs.com/blog/2014/05/07/threejs-interview-online-3d-modeling-and-rendering-with-claraio/

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fulafel
tl;dw - "Google Docs for 3D models", Web-based 3D modeling app/service with
concurrent editing and lots of nice features. Uses Three.js internally but
also good for producing assets for Three.js apps.

I hope this also advances Three.js for content production, and helps tilt the
scale in the open web apps/libs direction (vs insulated Unity+emscripten and
Unreal+emscripten blobs).

~~~
bhouston
Nice summary. Thanks!

It does both 3D modeling and rendering.

Feature summary on landing page: [http://Clara.io](http://Clara.io)

Example scenes: [http://Clara.io/library](http://Clara.io/library)

User base: +50,000

Status: Pre-release, open beta started in November 2013

Funding: Self-funded with one angel (former Autodesk SVP in charge of Maya,
3DS Max, Softimage -- desktop equivalents.)

~~~
fieldforceapp
Really solid work, I was surprised to see how complete this is, especially
compared to Blender. I need to render some scenes soon, importing existing
OBJ's and adding new materials. I was going to be using Blender, I'll first
give clara.io a try!

One question, sent a ticket already but wouldn't mind an HN bump... I couldn't
get 'Render > Render Current Pass' menu option to show? Kinda miss that big
green "render now" button.

~~~
bhouston
Thanks for the positive feedback. We are pushing really hard on the features
and also performance right now.

Sorry about the missing menu. We will have that menu back in the next week. :)
Rendering options are still in flux as we technically haven't officially
released that feature -- we've just soft launched it in a tentative state.

Right now you render via "Live Render > Fast Preview" in the viewport menu.
Full information here:

[http://clara.io/learn/user-
guide/rendering/rendering_basics](http://clara.io/learn/user-
guide/rendering/rendering_basics)

------
jianshen
Impressive work!

I'd love to see Google Doc's revision history applied here so I don't have to
worry so much about losing my work.

As a coder who does 3d modeling, I've always been irked by the lack of version
control in the modeling world (Airplane_013a.mel - what was in this file?).
Git worked ok and github is doing some interesting stuff with STL file
previews but it's still very disruptive to the creative flow. Again I'm super
impressed and this is just a suggestion that might bring us 3d modelers out of
the dark ages of file management.

~~~
bhouston
> I'd love to see Google Doc's revision history applied here so I don't have
> to worry so much about losing my work.

We store all changes as diffs. :)

[http://clara.io/learn/user-
guide/basics/interface_overview/h...](http://clara.io/learn/user-
guide/basics/interface_overview/history)

Technically we can restore any version of the file that you want or tag
revisions (like you can tag code revisions in Git.) We have not yet exposed
this in the UI though.

~~~
jianshen
Fantastic! I did a quick one over of the docs but didn't think to look there.

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msane
If there's anyone from Exocortex here -- I'm extremely interested in the diff
based versioning system you guys have incorporated. Was it done entirely in-
house or is it based on any existing tools?

 _Amazing_ work.

~~~
bhouston
I'm here. :) It is a fully custom system. Ping me at ben@exocortex.com if you
want to chat more.

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doczoidberg
I can't find any details about prices? All I could find was that it is
freemium.

~~~
bhouston
We do not yet have prices. We have designed this to be a low cost service
though.

~~~
doczoidberg
are modeling features like boolean operations calculated on server or client?

~~~
bhouston
Most operations are client side so you can model very quickly and the server
catches up even if you are on slow connections.

Right now Boolean operations are also client side, this allows for things like
this animated Boolean scene (press play):

[http://clara.io/view/86e0579a-4dc8-4145-81a8-6ad9f765b30b](http://clara.io/view/86e0579a-4dc8-4145-81a8-6ad9f765b30b)

We may be introduce server side Boolean operations that are more robust, but
less flexible. There is a limit to the complexity of the code we can run
client side and the best Boolean algorithms are actually really complex/costly
and thus hard to easily execute in the client.

~~~
doczoidberg
I know that boolean operations are cpu-intensive. I dealt with CAD modeling
and especially with NURBS surfaces in the past. Therefore I asked.

I think of building an Html interface for opencascade.

