After spending several hours playing with iSpace, I discovered that Web designers have not taken advantage of a whole category of design software. Namely 3D software. I gather it's because many Web designers migrated from the print world and never used programs like Lightwave, 3D Studio and Caligari Truespace. For those unfamiliar with Caligari, they go way back to the days (mid-80s) of the Amiga. Specializing in 3D modeling and animation with their Truespace product they have recently entered the Web design market with iSpace.

First of a Kind
iSpace is really the first of a kind, bringing 3D to the web building process. iSpace combines traditional web design tools with a full range of 3D capabilities in a drag and drop environment. Of course any HTML program will allow you to import 3D images into an HTML page. But iSpace goes several steps further. It can give a 3D look to the whole page using lighting, transparency, reflections, textures, anti-aliasing and photo realistic rendering. The HTML code generated by iSpace can be read and edited by HTML editors like Frontpage, Dreamweaver and Fusion. You can even import a page created in one of these editors and spruce it up using iSpace's 3D technology. Here is one example:

3D Building Blocks
The first thing you notice about iSpace is its interface. In my opinion it's a little icon happy but I soon got the hang of it. The top bar has your 'Toolset.' Here you can select objects for editing, edit and erase table cells, control lighting effects, play animations, render your design and more. The 'Library Panel' on the left is your warehouse for all the elements that will make up your Web page. They are divided into various categories like styles, buttons, objects, animated banners, borders, 3D fonts, lights, materials and backgrounds. iSpace comes with a large library of elements. But you can create your own elements using 3D programs like Truespace, Lightwave and others. iSpace will import Truespace, 3D Studio, Autocad, Imagine, Lightwave and Alias/Wavefront 3D files.

Creating a Web page in 3d is fairly straightforward. You start with a single table. You edit the table by adding, deleting or moving cells using one of the various tools in the tool bar. By right clicking in a cell you can edit it more precisely. Once you have your table structure designed you can begin importing elements onto the page. You normally begin adding a background. This can be a 2d or 3d image. Then you can add buttons, 3d text, borders, and so forth.

All buttons in the library are rollover ready. You right click a button and a small sub-window opens. Each button has three states; normal, highlighted and pressed. Select a state and open the materials category. Now you can drag a material or color onto the button. You can also add text to the button. It's that simple. There is no JavaScript code to write, iSpace does it for you. Applying procedural animated effects to an object is equally simple. Open the 'animeffects' category and just drag an effect on to an object. These preprogrammed effects include, bounce, spiral, fading, spinning and many more.

Putting on a Light Show
Once you have completed building your page you add the final touch -3d lighting. You have a number of light schemes available, spotlight, multiple spotlights, colored lights, area lights and infinite lights. Spotlights can be pointed at specific objects. These lights create shadows giving your Web page a 3D appearance unlike any I have seen before. Rendering in iSpace is a beautiful thing to watch. At the push of a button every 3d object is rendered, assembling all elements into a seamless HTML page with highly compressed image files, and the necessary Javascript coding. The major downside of the program it needs to create images for the whole page and this can result in longer download times. But the results can be spectacular.

Here is a sample page designed in iSpace. iSpace will not replace your HTML editor. You cannot edit the HTML code inside iSpace. Nor can you import or enter text. iSpace is strictly a program for designing cool, visually stunning HTML templates. Once you've created your page you can open the template in Dreamweaver, or any other HTML editing program, and further refine the page by adding text, 2D images and multimedia elements.

Summary
iSpace is a niche design tool that is in a league by itself. Its ability to create visually stunning web templates is truly unique. The code it generates is remarkably clean and concise. But to truly take advantage of this program you should have a good 3D program to create new objects like buttons, animations, borders and others. Obviously Caligari would like you to purchase their robust but relatively inexpensive Truespace 3D program. But other 3D programs can also do the job. In the cutthroat world of Web site design iSpace can give you an edge over your competition. By the way it's also a fun program.

Price: $299

System requirements: Windows 95/98/2000/NT4 Windows 95 and NT4 require IE 4.01SP2 or higher Pentium 166mhz or higher 64 megs ram 30 megs Disk space 3D graphics accelerator recommended

Imports to these page/scene files: .html, .htm and truespace .scn file

Imports these object formats: .cob, .sob, .asc, .3ds, .prj, .x, .dxf, .ps, .eps, .ai, .iob, .lwb, .lwo, .geo and .obj

Exports these object formats: .cob, .can, .asc, .3ds, .x, and .dxf

Imports these image formats: .dib, .bmp, .tga, .jpg, .gif, .avi, .png, .dds, and .tif

Exports these image formats: .bmp, .tga, .jpg, .gif, .avi, and .png