M. Di Benedetto, M. Corsini, R. Scopigno. IN: Volume XXXVIII-5/W16, 2011 ISPRS Workshop 3D-ARCH 2011 "3D Virtual Reconstruction and Visualization of Complex Architectures" 2-4 March 2011, Trento, Italy (Editor(s): Fabio Remondino, Sabry El-Hakim)

The recent introduction of the WebGL API for leveraging the power of 3D graphics accelerators within Web browsers opens the possibility to develop advanced graphics applications without the need for an ad-hoc plug-in. There are several contexts in which
this new technology can be exploited to enhance user experience and data fruition, like e-commerce applications, games and, in particular, Cultural Heritage. In fact, it is now possible to use the Web platform to present a virtual reconstruction hypothesis of ancient pasts, to show detailed 3D models of artifacts of interests to a wide public, and to create virtual museums.

We introduce SpiderGL, a JavaScript library for developing 3D graphics Web applications. SpiderGL provides data structures and algorithms to ease the use of WebGL, to define and manipulate shapes, to import 3D models in various formats, and to handle asynchronous data loading. We show the potential of this novel library with a number of demo applications and give details about its future uses in the context of Cultural Heritage applications.