The ability to create, view, and retrieve stunning Virtual Photos of your products requires only a few clicks, outlined in the steps below.
Create a Stage
Optimal presentation of products is achieved by way of creating the ideal environment. Control all presentation elements - cameras, lighting, background, props - within Stages.
Similar to traditional photography, presentation of products can have a marked effect on impression. The two main elements involved in staging a product are the camera and lighting. Within Threekit, these elements are created and refined within Scene Assets. While the artist will take great care in ensuring camera and lighting are to the liking of the merchandising team, prior to doing so, a few additional steps are necessary.
The steps below allow a given scene to be used as the stage on which to render any number of Catalog Items. Said stage may also be used within an interactive 3D presentation of the product, where desired, by way of the stageId
parameter when embedding the Threekit Player.
Create a placeholder for the Product
Navigating to any scene asset, drag and drop any model asset from the asset panel into the Objects folder of scene hierarchy.
Note: If making use of a single stage for several different products, it may be agreeable to rename the node to something more generic.
Include a Camera (optional)
Include a camera for more granular control over framing the shot. Add the camera via the Creation Panel.
Click the top of the scene hierarchy, then set the camera as the default from within the Player section of the properties panel. This ensures it will be the camera used when the Threekit Player loads.
Manipulate position as desired. If a camera is not included, the default used for the Virtual Photo will be the Perspective Camera.
Create necessary Logic
Navigate to Logic Mode and create an Asset Attribute of Type: Model. This Attribute must be named 'Asset'.
Create a Rule with a set model action, driven from the previously created Asset Attribute.
Once the placeholder for the product is present within the scene, and the corresponding Attribute and Rule have been created, the artist can move forward with adjusting cameras and lighting.
It is possible to create renders of Catalog Items without including a stage. The Virtual Photos will show the Item with the default lighting and camera.
Additional information on stages may be found in the how-to guide here.
Create Virtual Photos
Within the Threekit Platform, creating Virtual Photographs requires just a few simple clicks.
Creating Virtual Photos of your products is quick and easy:
Start by navigating to the Item you wish to render, create a New render job
On the Create Render Job interface, the Item from which you hit the button should appear by default in the Select Item field. Select a Stage, then provide a meaningful name. Feel free to limit the renders by hitting the Limit Configurations button. Select the desired Render Type and Resolution, then hit Render.
Upon hitting render, the user is re-directed to a page specific to the render job. The user may filter based on Status as well as access information on each of the individual renders.
The Renders will take a few minutes to process. Once the job has completed, View your Virtual Photos
View Virtual Photos
Virtual Photos are readily available via the Item or Stage from the respective Item or Stage record, or by way of the Renders tab.
Virtual Photos can be accessed via the Renders tab, or the Item record for which the renders were created.
The Renders tab will provide a listing of all render jobs. To preview the renders, click any render job record, then click on any individual render to present a preview panel.
The preview panel allows for previewing all renders for the respective render job.
Similarly, all Render Jobs associated with a given Item are accessible via the View Renderings button above the Preview Panel of an Item.
Virtual Photos of the rendered product can also be viewed within the 2D player, accessible via the toggle in the upper right of the Threekit Player. Selecting Attribute Value combinations will present the corresponding render.
Once the Virtual Photos are ready to share with the world, Retrieve Virtual Photos for use anywhere!
Retrieve Virtual Photos
Virtual Photos can be downloaded within the UI from the individual render record or the preview screen. Images may also be retrieved programmatically via the Layers API
The embedded 2D Player makes the request to the Layer Service once attributes satisfying a viable configuration have been selected. For cases in which there is only one layer, the request for the layer ID is the same as the asset ID itself. Commonly, this returned layer is then used as the thumbnail for the cart.