imedu Design Workflow
imedu offers many possibilities to create your own spaces. From working with templates to uploading your own designs. To clarify all the options and how they relate, this article zooms out and describes the complete design-workflow that is available.
This article is intended for designers.
The imedu Design Workflow
The image above shows the complete imedu design workflow from 'creators' (the 3D designers, on the left side) to educators (the people using templates and organizing the classes, on the right side).
Most educators will probably start in step 4 and 5, where they set up learning spaces using one of the existing 'templates'. Once you get more experienced or design your own models, you can also import custom models and build your own scenes in step 1 and 2.
imedu is built on top of the open source software 'Mozilla Hubs', which we adapted and extended for (private) learning and education. This means that you can use the same design tools that come with Mozilla Hubs in the same way with imedu, plus the option to add more interactive modules, configure your spaces from the CMS, run your own cloudservers, and integrate with other systems.
If you want customized training or help for your staff, we can provide that.
We will shortly go over each step to describe what it involves.
1. Making 3D models in Blender (or another 3D design tool)
If you want to have complete freedom you can design your 3D location in a design tool like Blender. This is a free open-source 3D software that is used for making 3D models and animations. Although we recommend Blender, you can also use different software as long as you can export or convert to the .glb file format.
There are two ways to use Blender in the workflow:
1) Using the Blender exporter to create complete scenes in Blender, using 3D models and multiple core elements (like spawnpoints, nav-meshes, etc.). This also allows you to use more advanced lighting techniques. After you built your scene, the resulting GLB's will be uploaded in Spoke to publish them, but require no further post-processing.
2) Use Blender to build 3D world elements, which can then be loaded and extended in Spoke into a scene. Here you use the Spoke editor to set up your scene using 3D models and standard elements. While Spoke is easier to learn then Blender, and also allows you to use external models, this is usually an easier solution. However, you will miss out on some more advanced features that you can use through the Blender exporter.
Modelling limits
While imedu is a web-based platform (and possibly used on low-end laptops), it is important to optimize for your intended target devices, by keeping the polygon count low and reducing texture size. While devices and technology (including the Blender exporter) is improving fast, a general guideline is hard to give.
The basic guideline is to keep everything as optimized as possible to ensure fast loading speeds and good performance on every laptop. You can always add more complexity or detail later. To give some you some starting points:
- Keep the total file size as low as possible, but definitely below 128MB
- Optimize the total polygon count to a maximum of 100-150K. Faster laptop can handle more, mobile devices less
- Limit video RAM to 256MB in case you are using mobile devices, this can be higher when using laptops.
- Prevent using to many dynamic lights, instead opt for 'light-bakes' to simulate shadows and lighting effects.
2. Finish your space in Spoke
Spoke is an online 3D scene editor that you can use to combine your 3D model(s) into a scene. A scene is a single virtual world or 'location' that you can visit with avatars.
In Spoke you can import different 3D model(s) into your scene, and add things like audio settings, entry points, media frames, portals, and special effects. Furthermore, you can add extra (static!) assets such as posters, documents, links, images and video*.
If you are new in the world of 3D models and design, you could see Spoke as a tool to build a complete scene from all kinds of individual lego pieces like scenery, furniture, other objects and configurations. More information about Spoke can be found here.
3. Create a space from your custom design
Once we saved our scene in Spoke, we can use our scene to create a spacein the imedu Class Manager. Just follow the process under Spaces > Add a space, and choose your scene from the list of Spoke projects.
4. Schedule a class in your space
The last step in the entire process is scheduling a class with the space you created. (Scheduling classes is discussed in this article)
Note: importing 3D scenes is (currently) only available for users with creator rights. For now, you can manually request these rights by sending a message to our support staff.
* While scenes are more static by nature, anything that is added becomes 'part of the scenere' and can not be (re)moved or replaced by visitors. Therefor, for most content it is better to add it while setting up your space in Step 4.