3D tour of the plant: how the company presents production to partners
A 3D tour of a plant is an interactive copy of production, which a partner or potential client walks through himself by clicking on the arrows between workshops. We at 360° Space film such tours for mechanical engineering, food industry, metalworking and chemistry. Over the past two years, about forty industrial projects have passed through us - from a small furniture workshop near Vladimir to a metallurgical complex with an area of 18,000 m². And this is what became clear during this time about the genre itself.
Factories rarely allow guests. Access control, safety precautions, trade secrets - all this makes an ordinary excursion an expensive story. The tour removes half of these barriers.
Why does production need a 3D tour?
I have collected five scenarios that are most often mentioned by the customers themselves - with numbers from our projects.
- Reduce audits by 30–50%. A client from Kazan, a packaging manufacturer, sent a tour to the buyers of Magnit and Pyaterochka before signing the contract. Out of six planned visits, three actually arrived - the rest had enough access to the workshops online plus half an hour of calling.
- Acceleration of negotiations with foreign partners. When working with Chinese and Turkish suppliers, the business trip takes 2-3 weeks of approvals. A tour with a floor plan and equipment marks eliminates most of the questions even before the first meeting.
- Training new employees. At one food production facility in the Moscow region, the HR department built a tour into a welcome course: in 20 minutes a newcomer understands where the sanitary inspection station is, where the bottling line is, where the finished product warehouse is. Previously, this took a full day of work with a supervisor.
- Sales of equipment and franchises. If you are selling not a product, but the technical process itself, the tour shows the future franchisee a real workshop, not a rendering. This is how our network of mini-breweries works: the investor sees what he will invest in even before signing the NDA.
- PR and participation in tenders. A link to the tour is attached to the application for government procurement - the commission checks production facilities without visiting. In our experience, this adds 1-2 points in the qualifying selection (where such a column exists).
How it works: shooting, assembly, launch
Technically, everything is simpler than it seems. The operator arrives with a Matterport Pro3 or Insta360 camera (the choice depends on the area and detail requirements) and takes panoramas every 2-3 meters. On an average workshop of 2000 m², this is 350–500 points and one full working day.
What is important to understand about industrial photography: factories are almost always working. Stopping the line for filming is expensive, so we adapt to shifts, bypass moving conveyors and coordinate high-risk areas with the chief engineer. At the metallurgical plant, we were assigned an escort with a gas analyzer; without it, we were not allowed into certain passages.
Next is assembly. The panoramas are “stitched” into a single space, tags are added: description of the machine, equipment passport, PDF instructions, link to a video of the line in operation. If desired, we can integrate a floor plan with navigation, distance measurements and a VR headset mode for exhibitions.
Readiness time is from 5 to 14 days after shooting, depending on the number of interactive elements. The tour can be placed in three ways: (1) in the 360° Space cloud with our technical support and high-speed delivery; (2) deploy on the customer's server if the security service requires keeping the data inside the loop; (3) issue an offline build - a standalone version for PC or a separate version for VR glasses, works without the Internet. The latter option is often requested for exhibitions and private presentations.
How much does a 3D factory tour cost?
The price depends on three factors: area, number of interactive markers and requirements for the shooting mode (during a work shift or with a line stop). Basic - from 25,000 rubles for a small workshop to 350,000 rubles and above for a full-fledged complex with several buildings, a floor plan and a VR version.
In production, additional inputs usually come up: shooting in PPE, night shift, working in an ISO 8 class clean room, separate processing of panoramas under NDA. We calculate each such item separately - we collect an exact estimate after a short brief on the object.
The easiest way to estimate the order of numbers is through calculator on the website: specify the area and options, get the range in a minute. If the object is non-standard (several buildings, a protected area, work with special permission) - write to the form, we will respond with a calculation within a day.
Frequently asked questions
Is it possible to film a tour without stopping production?
Yes, in 90% of cases we work like this. The operator moves around the workshop between operations without disturbing the staff. The moving elements of the conveyor in the frame look slightly blurry - this is normal and does not interfere with the perception of space.
What to do if the plant is a sensitive facility and the data cannot be removed?
We deploy the tour on the customer’s server inside its protected circuit. Our team delivers the assembly and installation instructions, no outside access required. We can also make an offline version for display from one laptop.
How long does such a tour last? Does it need to be re-filmed every year?
If the layout and equipment have not changed, the tour has been running for years. We are updating locally: we replaced the line - we re-shot one section, added a new workshop - we completed the shooting and hemmed it. A complete reshoot is usually needed every 3-5 years, after a major modernization.
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