- published: 16 Sep 2015
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X3D is the ISO standard XML-based file format for representing 3D computer graphics, the successor to the Virtual Reality Modeling Language (VRML). X3D features extensions to VRML (e.g. Humanoid animation, NURBS, GeoVRML etc.), the ability to encode the scene using an XML syntax as well as the Open Inventor-like syntax of VRML97, or binary formatting, and enhanced application programming interfaces (APIs).
X3D extension supports multi-stage and multi-texture render, it also supports shader with lightmap and normalmap. In 2010 X3D supports deferred rendering architecture. Now X3D can import SSAO, CSM and Realtime Environment Reflection/Lighting, but doesn’t need care much about polygon counts. The user can also use optimizations like BSP/QuadTree/OctTree or culling in the X3D scene.
X3D also benefits from other open source standards like XML, DOM and XPath. The user can easily develop content tools like an exporter and editor which make content creation and optimization tasks easy.
X3D defines several profiles (sets of components) for various levels of capability including X3D Core, X3D Interchange, X3D Interactive, X3D CADInterchange, X3D Immersive, and X3D Full. Browser makers can define their own component extensions prior to submitting them for standardisation by the Web3D Consortium. Formal review and approval is then performed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).