Import GLB in krpano using threejs helper

It's weekend again, so time to play around with krpano
And even though I just made a video on how to convert GLB to OBJ for use in krpano, here is a GLB importer for krpano using threejs (0.147).

Using this helper, you can import GLB and lights into the krpano scene using standard krpano xml and even manipulate the objects location using standard krpano actions.

Demo: https://krpano.kri-soft.be/threejshelper/

To use the helper, include the plugin and then you can use these tags in your tour.xml:

<threejsmodel name="ram" url="ram.glb"   tx="0" ty="0" tz="0" rx="0" ry="0" rz="0" scale="10"></threejsmodel>
<threejsmodel name="cube" url="cube.glb" tx="0" ty="10" tz="0" rx="0" ry="0" rz="0" scale="10"></threejsmodel>




<threejslight name="hemi"   type="HemisphereLight" 		color="0xffffff" strength="0.1" helper="true" tx="0" 	ty="-10" 	tz="0"></threejslight>
<threejslight name="sun" 	type="DirectionalLight"  	color="0xffffff" strength="0.5" helper="true" tx="10" 	ty="-17.5" 	tz="-10" 	castshadow="true"></threejslight>
<threejslight name="light" 	type="PointLight"  			color="0x00ffff" strength="1" 	helper="true" tx="-10" 	ty="-2" 	tz="10"		castshadow="true"></threejslight>
<threejslight name="light2" type="PointLight"			color="0xaaaa00" strength="1"	helper="true" tx="-5" 	ty="-2" 	tz="5" 		castshadow="true"></threejslight>

Features
- support for glb (only glb, no obj
- 3 light types: HemisphereLight, DirectionalLight, PointLight
- control the objects through standard krpano actions

Limitations:
- code is not public (sorry, not ready for release)
- scale, helper true/false and castshadow cannot be animated (only location, rotation and (light) strenght and color)
- no mouse events for the objects
- no dynamic adding/removing of objects (only possible to define them in xml)
- no scene support
- no animations
- many many more limitations :)

As you can see, it's still early development. Depending on the interest, I might develop this further, so ... let me know what you think about this!

Project can be downloaded here if you want to play around yourself...
https://krpano.kri-soft.be/threejshelper/…20230401_01.zip

gr,
Kristof

Thanks for the feedback.
I understand that this is not be the ideal approach for now, but for those who really want threejs or glb and lights in their project, this might be a way to do it.

I do still see some advantages using krpano xml rather than threejs directly: for some users it might be easier to understand the xml rather than javascript, and you can use krpano acions and the many other things krpano provides, rather than building it from scratch again in javascript. I guess it is a preference. I see advantages in a javascript-only approach too.

Quote from Tuur

I hope for something like hotspot type="object" and perhaps type="light" etc.. or so.. (??).

And if not, we can make a plugin that does

The plugin can be downloaded from the link at the bottom of the first post.

Yes, that should be possible.

Quote from klaus.krpano

Hi,

A quick update on this - combining krpano and threeJS works nicely

In the next release there are new APIs for including and integrated other WebGL renderer.
And almost all works - depthbuffer, hittesting, postprocessing, VR/stereo/anaglyph.

I think the only things that can't be used together are the fisheye-projections from krpano and the EffectComposer postprocessing from ThreeJS...

Best regards,
Klaus

Hello Klaus,

The message above is now almost a year old. When you wrote the post, I was very excited to see where krpano would go and I was looking forward to a release that we could further explore. Since then, there have been numerious posts where you talk about the next version, for features and for bug fixes. There was even some mention of a release around the time where the hype around the Apple Vision was released (Februari). But unfortunately, nothing has been released yet.

I'm still looking forward to a release, as the features that we require for some of our current projects should allow us to continue to use krpano. But in the meantime, we have explored various alternatives to krpano and while they not provide us with the low level flexibility that krpano is offering, the support from those alternatives has been very satisfactory, the release schedule and feature development is far more frequent and the community for some of them is a lot more active.

So I'm asking - what is on the radar for krpano and can you give us some insight in the plans for a release so we can also plan our developments on the short to mid term?

Many thanks,

Kristof