Google Draco

A .drc file is a compression format for 3D data created with the open source library Google Draco. The format is designed to store polygon structures (meshes) and point cloud data in a file with a small file size and can lead to good results in that respect. However, decompression can take a long time. Google Draco supports .ply and .obj for import and output.

Aspects of 3D data such as textures, animations, materials are not stored in a .drc.

When generating a .drc file, it can be specified whether the storage is ‘lossless’ or ‘lossy’; whether the original quality is fully preserved or not. Lossless compression is preferred for digital preservation.

Google Draco .drc is a non-preferred format for file type 3D, but can be a very acceptable solution for reducing the size of large polygon/point cloud data files. The depositor will have to check carefully whether lossless compression gives desirable results in size reduction, or whether some degree of lossy compression is acceptable. Also, close attention must be paid to whether the original data contains metadata and whether this metadata is included in the .drc file.

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