**4. The company**

This research was initially triggered by a company which specialises in large-scale metrology, quality engineering, and aerospace. Company 3D specialise in alignment services and CAD drawings for its customers. Since then it has grown and now provides a wide range of services in all engineering disciplines including:


One of the important areas of expertise is the creation of 3D models and 3D photographic databases of numerous artefacts which can be navigated in a PC environment using a variety of 3D viewing packages. These environments create authentic and detailed virtual models that are easily navigable and contain comprehensive and detailed information that can be easily queried by users or employees.

Central to the authoring tool is the photographic database created by using special surveying and photographic equipment. The environments produced are implemented using VRML, which the company use to produce realistic, accurate and visually matter-offact environments which are easily navigable by simple walk-through. Individual entities within the environment can also be linked to external sources using a number of interfaces such as Hypertext Mark-up Language (HTML). These environments are also easily and efficiently upgraded and revised to reflect innovations, changes, new data, explore other technologies, and archive reference information. One major reason for the popularity of these 3D model databases is based on the fact that traditionally database information is composed of text and figures. This makes such databases very complex and time consuming to use, as traditional searching facilities are less intuitive than browsing through natural representations of reality. Thus, these 3D models provide a more intuitive interface for a non-expert user to explore more readily (Annansingh & Nunes, 2005). The intuitive user interface allows a broad cross-section of company personnel, from low-level maintenance, to senior engineers to have access to whatever information is needed to populate the database. These environments are also easily accessible and can be navigated by even those with very limited training (Annansingh & Nunes, 2005). This is a dynamic environment which encourages creativity and risks taking.
