How to make an Interactive 3D PDF

How to make an Interactive 3D PDF

by ihazdesign, July 27, 2015

To create an interactive 3D PDF, you need to have Photoshop CC (2015) and Adobe Acrobat. Also, you will need to create your 3D model in a professional 3D program like 3ds Max or Maya then import it to Photoshop.

So, how it works? well first you need to create your 3D model with all its textures and UV layout. Then export that model as OBJ (with the default setting, just make sure you have the texture coordinates checked).

The second step now is to import that OBJ file to Photoshop as 3D layer, import the texture(s) files to the Photoshop material(s). If you have the UV layout set right, you should have the texture mapped correctly with no problem. You might need to flip the texture horizontally or vertically to make it fit (this depends on the 3D software you used in creating the 3D model).

When you have all that set in Photoshop, you can add some animation and export the 3D layer as U3D file format. Then all you need to do is to open Acrobat and “Add 3D” element from the Rich Media tool set, and import the U3D file you just export from Photoshop.

That’s it, you will have the imported U3D file viewed inside PDF file. I did a quick example using this technique.