26 - Religion Explorer

Our group was brainstorming ideas, and we couldn't find anything quite perfect. Some topics were too complicated, others were too simple, but most importantly, most of our concepts had no underlying motive or useful cause. Then, we came upon the idea of this program, and we immediately had the drive to make a brilliant piece of code.

This program utilizes 8th wall and other 3d techniques to implement "planets" into the area around you (via AR). These "planets" each connect to one of five religions: Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, and Judaism. If clicked on, "planets" provide more information about the religion, and they have "moons" around them that have objects relating to the religion, with each of these "moons" also having interactive text regarding the objects on them.

Building this project was a multi-step process.

First of all, we needed to find a way to make the planets have religious symbols inscribed in them. Initially, we tried having a 2D symbol inside of a 3D sphere. However, this wasn't working properly, since we were having errors making the sphere transparent permanently (it was fine in the editor, but it wouldn't be transparent after export).

Instead, we tried wrapping a rectangular image around a sphere, and this method proved much easier to implement, at least in our scenario. Although it took a while, we were able to wrap an image around the sphere well. After some testing, we were able to size the rectangular image so that the religious symbol wouldn't be oddly stretched across our spheres.

After this, making the remaining "planets" and "moons" was relatively easy, since we had the basic model and concept, and all we were doing was altering the images we were using. However, even this took some time, since we had to research the symbols more deeply, especially for the next part of our project.

During this next phase in our project, we had to learn much about each of the individual objects that were being represented on the "moons", alongside obtaining basic knowledge regarding each religion. This step was an important one because, without it, there was no point in us making the program.

After all these steps, all of the 3D models were uploaded, and the coding really started. Many problems were encountered along these steps as well, such as all scenes appearing one on top of another instead of one scene appearing and the user choosing what scene appears next.

Finally, we had to implement a special feature to be able to move back to the larger solar system from one of the planet systems. This was essential so that the user wouldn't have to reload the page every time they wanted to go back to the original view. A merge problem occurred with this, and through some ingenuity, we were able to bring the back button into the program.

From writing this program, we learned how to implement 3D models into a simple mobile app, which can be useful for many practical purposes. We learned how to use AR, and we understood how 3D models could be implemented via 8th Wall.

Some things that our team might consider adding to "Religion Explorer" in the future include adding more religions, such as adding religions that aren't as well-known. Additionally, we might make the AR experience more interactive, with smoother transitions and a more sophisticated look. Finally, we might want to make the planets orbit the user slowly, a feature that would increase user engagement.