From Geoscience Australia
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3D Web Mapping - 3D Geoscience Information Online

Created 17/10/2025

Updated 17/10/2025

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Scientists within Geoscience Australia create complex models of 3D geological structures. These models are built using specialised 3D modelling software to which very few people outside of Geoscience Australia have access. To overcome this access problem, Geoscience Australia has developed 3D VRML (Virtual Reality Modelling Language) models, to display interactive 3D data using a web browser plug-in - hence 3D web mapping. VRML is an open source standard for 3D graphics on the web. Geoscience Australia's 3D web mapping development is unique and has proved to be a very effective method for communicating large amounts of complex 3D geoscientific and geospatial information to a wide audience. Geoscience Australia has produced nearly 40 unique 3D VRML models during the last five years, some of which are available for online interaction on the Geoscience Australia website. The next challenge for Geoscience Australia's visualisers is to move from VRML to X3D - the XML successor to VRML. This paper outlines the motivations for developing 3D VRML models, explains the technologies used, and takes a brief look at possible future developments.

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Additional Info

Field Value
Title 3D Web Mapping - 3D Geoscience Information Online
Language eng
Licence Not Specified
Landing Page https://data.gov.au/data/dataset/5fcc0f8c-a01b-4456-84a7-b5a74287c947
Contact Point
Geoscience Australia Data
clientservices@ga.gov.au
Reference Period 20/04/2018
Geospatial Coverage Australia
Data Portal Geoscience Australia

Data Source

This dataset was originally found on Geoscience Australia "3D Web Mapping - 3D Geoscience Information Online". Please visit the source to access the original metadata of the dataset:
https://ecat.ga.gov.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/csw/dataset/3d-web-mapping-3d-geoscience-information-online