CloudExpo 3D

3D mode lets you build tours inside real-world Gaussian-Splat captures instead of 360-degree photos.

CloudExpo started as a tour builder for 360-degree panoramas. 3D mode adds a second authoring path for Gaussian-Splat scenes — photoreal 3D captures of buildings, sites, products, or rooms. You walk through them just like a 3D viewer, and place the same kinds of interactive markers (images, videos, audio, text, links) that you'd use in a 360 tour.

From an empty dashboard to a sharable 3D tour in seven steps.

1. From the dashboard, click + Create a new Project and pick 3D Scene Project.
2. Click Add Scenes in the bottom-left panel and pick a Gaussian-Splat file (.sog, .splat, or .ply) from your media library.
3. Fly through the scene using the mouse (orbit, pan, zoom) or the W A S D Q E keys.
4. Draw walkable boundaries so viewers stay inside the captured area.
5. Drop markers — images, videos, audio, text, or viewpoints — anywhere in the scene.
6. Click Set as starting screen to capture the camera angle every viewer will land on.
7. Click Preview to test, then Publish to ship a sharable link.

Everything in 3D mode is reachable from the UI, but these shortcuts save clicks while you're authoring.

Each scene holds one 3D environment (the Gaussian-Splat capture) plus all the markers, boundaries, and viewpoints inside it. Projects can have many scenes.

Add a scene

Click Add Scenes in the bottom-left scene panel. Pick a Gaussian-Splat file from the media library — supported extensions are .sog, .splat, and .ply. The file becomes the scene's background and shows up as a thumbnail tile in the scene list.

Switch scenes

While editing, click any scene tile in the bottom-left panel to switch to it. In preview mode, switch via the scene-switcher dropdown at the top of the canvas.

Rename, duplicate, or delete a scene

Each scene tile has small action buttons on hover — pencil to rename, copy to duplicate, trash to delete.

Move the camera with your mouse, with the keyboard, or both — they're always live at the same time.

Mouse / trackpad

• Left-click and drag — orbit around the focus point.
• Right-click and drag — pan the focus point (slide the view sideways).
• Scroll wheel — zoom in and out.

Keyboard (first-person fly)

Use W A S D Q E to fly through the scene like a first-person game. The camera moves along its current viewing direction, so you can combine WSAD with mouse orbit to navigate naturally.

Set the camera angle every viewer lands on when they open the scene.

Fly to the camera pose you want viewers to see first, then click Set as starting screen (the house icon in the top toolbar). The current angle is saved with the scene. Every time someone loads the project — or switches to this scene from another — the camera lands here.

Wrap the void around your splat with a 360-degree backdrop image — sky, indoor lighting, gradient, anything.

A Gaussian-Splat captures a finite volume of space. Anything outside that volume is empty (rendered as black). The skybox fills that void with a 360-degree image so the scene feels complete.

How to set

1. Click the Skybox button in the sidebar (only visible in 3D mode).
2. Pick any equirectangular 360 image from the media library.
3. The image wraps around the camera as the scene's background. Your splat renders in front of it.

The skybox is saved per scene — different scenes can use different backdrops.

Define the area where viewers are allowed to walk. Outside the boundary the camera glides along the wall instead of escaping.

Draw a boundary

1. Click the Boundary button in the sidebar. A translucent cyan box drops at the camera's current position.
2. Click the box to select it, then drag the gizmo handles to move, rotate, and resize it. You can make it any shape — narrow corridor, square room, sprawling outdoor area.
3. Add more boundaries if your space has multiple walkable areas. The combined union of all boxes is the walkable region.
4. Press Delete with a boundary selected to remove it.

What the viewer sees

• Boundaries are invisible in the viewer — they only show up in the editor.
• When viewers try to fly out of the boundary, the camera slides along the wall instead of stopping cold — much smoother than a hard wall.
• Orbiting and zooming are also clamped to the boundary.

Markers are interactive points placed inside the 3D space. Viewers click them to see images, play videos, jump to viewpoints, or open links.

How to add a marker

1. Fly to where you want the marker to appear.
2. Click one of the marker buttons in the right sidebar (Viewpoint, Image, Video, Audio, Text, Embedded, 3D Model).
3. For media markers (Image, Video, Audio, 3D Model), the media library opens — pick a file.
4. The marker appears a short distance in front of the camera. Drag the gizmo to fine-tune its position.

Marker types at a glance

Save specific camera spots so viewers can jump to them instantly. Perfect for guided tours and bookmarked angles.

Create a viewpoint

1. Fly to the position and angle you want to save.
2. Click the Viewpoint button in the sidebar. A marker appears in front of the camera with an orange arrow showing the direction it'll face when activated.
3. Each viewpoint is auto-named Viewpoint A, then B, C… Rename it in the marker panel if you like.

What viewers see

In preview, clicking the viewpoint marker teleports the camera to the marker's exact position and facing direction. The orange arrow only shows in the editor — viewers see only the icon, not the arrow.

A clickable spot that opens a full-screen image when the viewer clicks it.

Image markers are perfect for product photos, diagrams, signage callouts, or before/after images. The marker's icon defaults to the image itself, so viewers see a thumbnail in 3D space — they get a visual hint of what they'll see when they click. (You can override the icon — see Customizing.)

Add via the Image sidebar button → pick an image from the media library.

A clickable spot that opens an overlay video player.

The video starts playing automatically when the viewer clicks the marker. Standard controls (play / pause / seek / fullscreen) are available. Close the overlay to return to the 3D scene.

Add via the Video sidebar button → pick a video file from the media library.

Place audio cues anywhere in the scene. Play on click, or have them autoplay when the viewer arrives.

Add an audio marker

Click the Audio sidebar button and pick an audio file. The marker appears as a small speaker icon — no overlay or player UI, the audio just plays in the background when clicked.

Audio options

• Volume — slider from 0 % to 100 % in the marker panel.
• Autoplay on tour launch — when ticked, the audio starts the moment the viewer enters the scene. Great for ambient soundtracks or narrated guides.

A label that appears directly in 3D space — like a sign hanging in the world. No click required, the text is always visible.

Add a text marker

1. Click the Text sidebar button.
2. A small text panel appears in front of the camera, facing you.
3. Open the marker panel (click the text) and type your content in the Text field. Multiple lines are supported.

Styling

• Font — pick from 20 system fonts (Arial, Helvetica, Georgia, Comic Sans, Impact, monospace, and more).
• Bold — checkbox to toggle bold weight.
• Color — colour picker; supports an eyedropper on Chromium-based browsers to sample any colour on screen.

Text markers are spatial — they stay flat in the world wherever you place them, viewed from any angle. Rotate them with the gizmo to stick text on a wall or floor.

Open any external web content — a Google Doc, a map, a dashboard, a form — in an overlay when the viewer clicks.

Embedded markers carry a URL instead of a media file. Add via the Embedded sidebar button, then type the URL into the Embed URL field in the marker panel. When a viewer clicks the marker, the URL loads in a full-screen iframe overlay.

Place a glTF model or a smaller Gaussian-Splat as actual 3D geometry in the scene — it becomes part of the world.

Unlike other marker types (which place a small icon you click), a 3D Model marker places the actual model in 3D space — it's permanent décor. Use it to drop product mockups, furniture, signage, or pre-rendered objects into your captured environment.

Add a 3D Model

1. Click the 3D Model button in the sidebar.
2. A small dialog asks: glTF / glb or Gaussian Splat? Pick the file type you have.
3. The media library opens filtered to that file type. Pick your file.
4. The model appears in front of the camera at default scale. Drag the gizmo to position, rotate, and resize.

Supported formats

• .glb / .gltf — standard glTF 3D models.
• .sog / .splat / .ply — Gaussian Splatting captures.

3D Models don't show a clickable icon — they're decorative. They don't open an overlay when clicked.

The right-side marker panel lets you change every aspect of a selected marker — content, icon, size, visibility, description.

The marker panel

Click any marker in the editor to open the marker panel. Different marker types show different controls, but most include:

• Content — the file or URL the marker references. The Pick from library or Replace from library button opens the media library to change it.
• Description — text shown when the viewer hovers the marker. For Viewpoint markers this is the viewpoint's label (used in the minimap viewpoint list too).
• Marker icon — the small picture viewers see in the scene. By default, image markers show the image as the icon; other markers show a type-specific icon. Use Customize icon to pick a different image, or Reset to default to clear an override.
• Hide icon in preview — when ticked, the marker icon is invisible to viewers. Useful for invisible click zones (an entire wall that opens a link, for example). Hidden markers show at 30 % opacity in the editor so you can still find them.
• Size — number input that scales the marker uniformly. Type 0.5 for half-size, 2 for double-size, 0.1 for tiny.

Every selected object — marker, boundary, or the Gaussian-Splat itself — gets a gizmo with handles for translate, rotate, and scale.

The gizmo

Click any marker (or the splat, or a boundary) to select it. A coloured arrow / ring / box appears at its origin:

• Translate mode (press T) — coloured arrows along each axis. Drag to move.
• Rotate mode (press R) — coloured rings around each axis. Drag to rotate.
• Scale mode (press S) — coloured boxes. Drag to resize. Scale snaps to small increments so it doesn't jump.

What you can select

• Markers — opens the marker panel for editing.
• Boundaries — drag the gizmo to reshape the walkable area.
• The Gaussian-Splat — click empty space inside the scene; the gizmo lets you reposition / rotate / rescale the entire capture.

A list of every marker in the current scene. Click to select, double-click to fly to, trash to delete.

• Single-click a row — selects that marker in the 3D view and opens the marker panel.
• Double-click a row — flies the camera to that marker so you don't have to hunt for it.
• Trash icon — deletes the marker.

Switch the editor into viewer mode to test exactly what your audience will see.

Click Preview in the top toolbar to enter preview mode. The editor chrome (sidebars, scene list, gizmos) hides. The 3D canvas takes over the screen, and markers become clickable triggers instead of editable items:

• Image markers open their lightbox.
• Video markers play in the overlay.
• Audio markers play in the background.
• Viewpoint markers teleport the camera.
• Embedded markers open their iframe.
• Boundaries silently constrain the camera (you can't fly out of them).

Click Return to Edit Mode to come back to the editor.

A dropdown at the top of the viewer that lists every scene in your project. Click to jump.

The dropdown shows the active scene name with a small chevron. Click to open the full list; click any scene to switch. Long scene names are truncated in the pill but shown in full in the menu. Click anywhere outside the dropdown to close it without switching.

A 2D floor-plan overlay with clickable dots for each viewpoint. Click a dot to teleport.

Set up the minimap (editor)

1. Click the Minimap button in the top toolbar (the building / floor-plan icon).
2. Click Change Background and pick any image from the library as the floor plan.
3. Click Add Point to drop a blue dot. Drag the dot to position it on the floor plan.
4. Click the dot to open the popover, then pick which viewpoint it links to from the dropdown.
5. Click Save.

What viewers see

In preview, a small minimap panel appears at the top-right. Each dot you authored is clickable — the viewer clicks it and the camera teleports to the linked viewpoint. The panel can be folded with the small icon in the header — clicking it collapses the panel to a compact pill so it doesn't crowd the view; clicking again expands it.

Every time a Gaussian-Splat scene loads, a glowing wave sweeps across the capture as it materializes — like the scene is being conjured in front of you.

It happens automatically whenever a 3D scene loads or you switch between scenes. The effect lasts about 4.5 seconds:

• The splat starts invisible.
• A glowing ring of light sweeps outward from the centre.
• As the ring passes, the splat materializes — the captured world fades into view behind it.
• Markers fade in at the same time so the whole scene assembles together.

It's purely visual — no setup required. It just runs.

Save while you work; publish to give your tour a public URL.

Save

Click Save in the top toolbar to save a draft. Drafts are visible only to you. The button shows a toast confirmation when the save completes; you can close the tab and come back to the project from the dashboard at any time.

Publish

Click Publish when you're ready to share. A unique shareable URL is generated — anyone with the link can open your tour without needing a CloudExpo account. Re-publishing updates the same URL, so you can share it once and keep iterating.