High–fidelity adjective: the reproduction of an effect that is very faithful to the original.

Simulations, plural of simulation [simu•la•tion (sim′yo̵̅o̅ lā′s̸hən, -yə-)] noun (1) the act of simulating; pretense; feigning. (2) a simulated resemblance or imitation. (3) the use of a computer to calculate, by means of extrapolation, the effect of a given physical process. (4) the duplicating or reproducing of certain characteristics or conditions, as of a system or physical process, by the use of a model or representation, for study, training, etc. First use in 1340. From Middle English simulacion/simulacioun < Old French simulation/simulacion < Latin simulātiōnem from simulō (“imitate”).

Designing the leading interactive simulations on the market today requires an uncommon approach.

News

3DI Gains Industry Recognition

At 3DI we’ve always felt we were on the cutting edge of the simulation technology market. This past Friday that feeling was confirmed as we were awarded Best Game (Commercial/Casual/Serious) at the 2010 MediaFRESH awards in Calgary for our Caterpillar 924H Small Wheel Loader simulator. The 924H simulator is deployed in a training facility at Fort Leonard Wood for the US Army Engineering Corps. Commercial success is fantastic, but peer acknowledgment is always an honour. The entire team at 3DI is extremely proud of our work. Being recognized by the tech community for that work is icing on a cake built with passion, creativity, intelligence and hard work. Thank you to Digital Albert and all who voted. We are on track to outdo our past efforts with products we have in the pipe. Stay tuned for further exciting announcements by 3DI as 2010 will be our most exciting year to date.


Game Developer Magazine Profiles 3DI's Success Story

Epic Games, the makers of the Unreal Engine, have chosen to profile 3DI in their latest success stories series. The profile is featured in the January 2010 issue of Game Developer magazine. The article discusses our past projects and looks to our future work using the cutting edge features that Unreal Engine 3 provides. Technical Director Andrew Czarnietzki looks at how using Unreal Engine 3 makes 3DI innovative, agile and creative all within budget and on tight timelines. You can view the article here.

Phase 1 of Snubco's S9 Rig Assist Snubbing Simulator Launches

3DI is also pleased to announce that they have completed the first phase of a project with a world leader in the field of snubbing. The world’s first snubbing simulation is being developed at 3DI in conjunction with Snubco Group. 3DI has developed a simulation that accurately models the entire hydraulic systems and intense pressures involved in dealing with a live natural gas well and the equipment used to move pipe in and out of those wells.

Snubbing Simulator Photos:
“Working with 3DI has been an incredible experience. They provided so much more than promised. This snubbing simulation is ground breaking on many levels. It looks and acts like we expect a snubbing rig to. This is an industry changing training and marketing solution. We look forward to continuing our work with 3DI and developing a training curriculum that will save lives and money.”
- Sean McKinnon, Chief Engineer, Snubco Group Inc.

Markets Served

3DI develops advanced interactive simulations for clients that expect the best.

When Caterpillar™ needed to quickly revamp the Cat® Simulator line they came to 3DI. Now Cat Simulators have been praised by the U.S. Army Engineer School and recognized by the U.S. Army PEO STRI (Program Executive Office for Simulation, Training & Instrumentation) as among the best values in the COTS (commercial off-the-shelf) simulation market today.

Our clients span the mining, industrial and oil and gas industries, including:

  • BP Energy
  • Caterpillar
  • Genie, a Terex Company
  • Hertz Equipment Rental
  • JLG, an Oshkosh Company
  • Snubco Pressure Control
  • Suncor Energy

In other industries, 3DI has won a range of other competitive interactive 3d projects including:

  • Art Gallery of Alberta
  • Canadian Military Museum
  • City of Edmonton Fire Rescue
  • Starwood Hotels
  • TELUS World of Science
"...incredible realism and digital quality, ideal way to present curriculum with confirmation of course retention,"
Paul Dorion, VP, Hertz Equipment Rental

About 3DI

3D Interactive Inc. (3DI) is a leading developer of advanced interactive simulation software for design visualization and training systems. Founded in 2005, the founders set out to create a new generation of highly interactive simulations.

3DI’s team of engineers, industrial designers, programmers, 3D graphic artists, and AI and gaming specialists have proven themselves through a wide range of challenging projects for global clients in the oil and gas, construction, mining, and heavy equipment industries.

Working closely with expert trainers and subject matter experts, 3DI is able to rapidly deploy an extraordinary level of realism into critical training systems. In terms of look and feel, 3DI simulations are distinctive and memorable – a must for all branded assets.

Located in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, 3DI looks forward to reviewing your most challenging projects.

Positions

3DI is always looking for great people to join our team. If you like to work in an environment where you are not a square peg stuffed into a square hole, 3DI could be the place for you. And if you can find a creative way to fit a square peg into a round hole, we definitely want to talk to you.

Current Opportunities

Please send your resume and cover letter to . If available, please include a link to samples of your work. Only applicants being considered will be contacted.

Software Developer

3DI is seeking a full-time software developer to join its industrial simulation development team. We are a young and growing company applying state-of-the-art graphics and physics technology to the field of industrial training simulations. As a member of our team, you will be using the Unreal Engine 3.0 in combination with several in-house tools and libraries to build cutting edge training software for an eager client base! You will work closely with our talented artists, animators, sound designers, and senior developers in a fast-paced startup environment. Developers have the opportunity to take ownership of projects, and are given a vocal role in the direction of the company.

Requirements:
  • A post-secondary education in computer science or equivalent job experience
  • Excellent understanding of C++ and object-oriented programming
  • Experience applying best practices for software development in a professional environment
  • Able to work as part of a team
  • Problem solving skills and a willingness to push the state-of-the-art forward
  • Able to meet deadlines while producing quality work
Assets:
  • Experience using Microsoft Visual Studio
  • Experience programming with the latest graphics technology (DirectX, shader languages such as Cg and GLSL)
  • Demonstrated ability to work effectively in a wide variety of programming languages. C#, Javascript, Python, Ruby, Lisp, COBOL… an eclectic range of interests is a plus!
  • Experience working with physical simulation libraries (PhysX/Ageia, Havok, ODE, etc)
  • Willing to interact directly with clients to gather requirements and demonstrate projects
  • Interest in working on serious games
Salary: Negotiable based on experience

Please send your resume and cover letter to

Archived News

October 16, 2009 - 3DI Simulator Software Deployed for the U.S. Army

3DI’s software was recently tested and deployed on 31 units for the U.S. Army at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri. The heavy equipment simulators were unveiled on September 4, 2009 to a clearly impressed audience. See news story here.

"It (the simulator) operates as the form, fit, feel and function as the actual piece of equipment."
- Brig. Gen. Bryan Watson, USAES Commandant
(referring to 924H Wheel loader simulation software developed by 3DI for Caterpillar).

September 1, 2009 - Oil and Gas Sim

In the oil and gas industry, snubbing is a notoriously dangerous process and operator error can produce a catastrophic failure that propels heavy equipment a mile or more from the epicenter of the blast. Traditional training methods cannot fully develop all the skills needed to operate the rapid-fire control consol—with zero tolerance for errors—to safely complete the snubbing job.

As the leader in this rarefied industry, Snubco Group Inc. is astutely aware that virtual training not only saves money, but also lives. After a thorough review of other simulation companies, Snubco turned to 3DI. For this project, 3DI is developing the software, designing and fabricating the electronic interface components, and working with Snubco to design the replica controls so that operators can quickly and safely learn the complex operations before they must operate the rig in the real, very hazardous, world. Snubbing simulators will be used to training operators in the U.S., Canada and overseas markets including China.

February 1, 2009 - WTS-627G Wheel Scraper Launch

When you are the world’s largest earthmoving company, reducing the cost of moving a cubic yard of dirt is big business. Caterpillar needed advanced training simulators in order to train operators on the intricacies of effectively and economically moving dirt, so they turned to 3DI to design the simulation software for Caterpillar’s flagship WTS-627G Wheel Scraper.

Completed in February 2009, it was the first deployment of 3DI’s proprietary dirt physics system, now considered the most sophisticated of such systems available. It was one of 3DI’s more challenging projects: the vehicle itself has a two engine system with a complex hydraulic system and Caterpillar wanted complete and accurate dirt metrics (volume, weight, etc.), dynamic force feedback from the dirt being moved, and real-time computation of fuel consumption. Caterpillar reports the story of one of their senior executives, who had never driven such a machine before, jumping into a giant Wheel Scraper and driving it with confidence after only being trained on 3DI’s simulator earlier that same day.

3DI is fervent in its belief that valuable brands should be honored faithfully in any reproduction process. Our client’s quality standards and reproduction policies that are compulsory for engineering drawings, photography and videography are adopted as the foundation for 3DI’s creation of virtual digital properties.

If a picture tells a thousand words, then the story told through an interactive simulation is an epic tale. 3d assets can have long-term value for marketing, branding and training and are particularly important for competing for today’s consumers and employees. Creating top quality 3d assets requires a diverse mix of creative talents, professional skills, superb technology and an uncommon attention to detail.

Comprised of an eclectic mix of engineers, industrial designers, programmers, 3d graphic artists, and AI and gaming specialists, 3DI’s technical team understands the importance of physics-based realism and superb lighting treatments required to design and develop top quality interactive simulations for training or design visualization purposes.

For example, when 3DI found existing lighting solutions inadequate, our technical team created a unique and proprietary lighting system called pureLIGHT, a technology now licensed to third-party game developers. Such out-of-the-box thinking gives 3DI the edge in representing its client’s interests in the virtual world.

At the core of our development platform, 3DI utilizes the best available gaming technology. And yet, if required to meet our client’s expectations, 3DI is able to enhance and extended those systems with low-level modifications to the toolsets, physics engine, or related systems as needed. Millions of lines of custom coding, combined with in-house capabilities in advanced physics, engineering and artificial intelligence provide our clients with 3d vehicles such features as real-time compressible “soft” tires (an essential element for an accurate driving experience with heavy equipment), engineered articulated bodies, virtual hydraulic joints and hundreds of complex details needed for effective training. Likewise, 3DI’s proprietary dirt technology has advanced the state-of-the-art in the moving, loading, and blasting of all types of aggregate and dirt in interactive simulations.

3DI continues to advance these technologies with ongoing research and development in fire physics, dirt/aggregate systems, particle systems, and oil and gas reservoir dynamics. Developing such intricate and interlocking systems is the fun part for 3DI and we look forward to discussing interesting and challenging projects and ideas.

The Epic® Unreal™ Engine provides 3DI with a robust and highly advanced development platform – in fact, it is the ideal solution for today’s demanding simulation projects. 3DI has augmented Epic’s core system with its own proprietary systems and processes.

First released in 1998, the award-winning Unreal Engine is known for cutting-edge graphics and a best-of-breed toolset. The Unreal Engine has recently added massive world support, multi-processor support, next-generation console optimizations, and clearly has one of the most mature tool pipelines in the industry. Most importantly, the Unreal Engine toolset is designed specifically to accelerate developers' productivity for ultra-complex, next-generation content.

Epic's Unreal Engine 3 is the three-time consecutive winner of Game Developer magazine’s Best Engine Front Line Award and is this year's Hall of Fame inductee. Unreal Engine 3 has also been recognized as the number one game engine by Develop magazine.

Competitors using less mature engines or in-house solutions are not likely to match 3DI’s feature-rich interactive simulators or our accelerated development cycles.

There is hardly a more important visual element in 3d simulations than proper light effects. Yet proper lighting historically has proven to be one of the more difficult features to implement in interactive simulations. Around the gaming and visualization world, countless hours of developer’s time is expended on getting light effects the way they want. It is a tedious, repetitious, and very expensive process which greatly affects the project’s time line.

pureLIGHT was born of necessity. When existing lighting solutions failed to deliver the realism of natural light or the myriad of effects of artificial lighting, 3DI’s resourceful crew went to the drawing boards and starting from scratch, designed and built an innovative lighting engine which became pureLIGHT. In 2009, 3DI’s lighting technology took on a life of its own and pureLIGHT is now being licensed to third-party game developers around the world.

The feel of a simulator is intangible, but as the saying goes, “You know it when you see it.”

From project concept stage to final delivery, 3DI works closely with expert trainers and subject matter experts (the “trainers of trainers”) to insure that 3DI’s simulations are “tweaked” until they have surpassed that vaguely defined threshold where the simulator just feels right. One test as to whether a simulator has the right feel is if expert operators quickly fall back into their practiced operating routines while performing advanced maneuvers on the simulator.

Interestingly, we have seen expert operators on a 3DI simulator perform front-end wheelies and similar tricks with a 10-ton piece of equipment (packing a bucket load of dirt) and everything about their smile acknowledges that that 3DI nailed the essential elements of that machine. (It has been said that such maneuvers can indeed be done by skilled operators on real machines, but clearly, it is not a recommended practice.)

“The 3DI team is also amazing in how quickly and easily they can develop a visual image such as this, and they're a pleasure to work with too!”
George Smith, President & CEO TELUS World of Science

Contact Us

10425 79 Avenue
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
T6E 1R7

Local: 780 440 1128

If you are looking for a career at 3DI please visit the careers page.

December 3, 2009 - 3DI Xmas Soiree

September 17, 2009 - 3DI Paintball

Serious games aren’t always serious business. This month some of the staff at 3DI took time off to decompress. It was decided that the best way to take a well deserved break would be to go out and get some compressed air guns and fire paint pellets at each other. Fortunately there weren’t any casualties, but there were many bruises, laughs and a few screams (no names mentioned). Here are a few pictures of the festivities.

3DI Advantages

Time to market

3DI’s advanced development platform and related tool sets can create advanced interactive simulations in time frames that often surprise even savvy simulation professionals.

Quality

From concept creation to ongoing after-sales support, 3DI is dedicated to all facets of quality and excellence for our customers. Our goal is to deliver simulations that look, feel, and sound like the real thing at a surprising price point. Combined with a commitment to high standards of customer support, we believe that 3DI can accomplish great things for great companies.

Long Term Value

3DI can deliver products at a price that makes high-end simulation accessible to a wide range of organizations concerned with employee safety, training costs, wear and tear on equipment and positive training outcomes. Simulation training combined with traditional methods increases knowledge retention and effectiveness of any training curriculum. 3DI systems leverage cutting-edge technology and readily available COTS PC hardware to keep our client’s total deployment costs low.