Wednesday, September 8, 2010


3D Animated Screen Savers

Date Added: May 30, 2007 05:27:16 PM

3D Animated Screen Savers

While slide show screen savers are obviously becoming obsolete and disappearing from the net (except for those made by users themselves of the photos of their dogs, cats and flowers - those are eternal), 3D animated screen savers still enjoy popularity even though they no longer save any screens. So what are screen savers today, and, in particular, what are 3D animated screen savers?

The initial purpose of the first screen savers was to change the static image on a desktop replacing it with a sequence of dynamically moving images after a certain period of computer inactivity. The replacement images are supposed to be dynamic, which means that they should contain some kind of animation or change the entire image at once, which happens when one background is replaced with another.

Animated screen savers usually have a static background and an object (or several objects) that move against this background; for example, it can be fish swimming in the ocean or deer walking in the woods, or parrots flying in jungles, etc.

While slide show screen savers are merely sets of images and they are easily customized (there are many software programs that help users create these sequences using their own photographs and preset special visual effects), animated screen savers are a lot more complicated. Most of animated screen savers are actually 3D animated, because the moving objects are 3D models and require 3D animation. Producing the screen savers of this type requires a lot of time, skills and knowledge, and the result is usually more visually interesting and appealing.

People like animated 3D screen savers that feature holidays, animals, underwater worlds and marine animals, aquariums, nature, seasons, miracles of the Universe and many others. These screen savers are usually customizable, and they allow users to easily change the settings and select the number of moving objects, backgrounds and scenes, sound tracks, sounds or nature or holiday tunes, etc.

There are many web sites which offer a lot of animated screen savers you can choose from. Due to their complexity, screen savers have certain hardware requirements and may not work on some old computers and outdated video cards. Sometimes the file sizes are quite large, and the download takes time. Some web resources offer a free version that you can try. After you download and install the trial screen saver, you can test it, check out the settings it has, take a look at scenery and animation, and if you really like it, you can get the full version and enjoy it for lifetime.