Launched in November 2003 for Mac OS X, Interiors provides a 3D grid onto which users drag and drop the various elements that make up a virtual room — walls, windows, doors, furniture, wallpaper, lighting and so on. At the heart of the application is its library of elements, which contains over 500 customisable objects and textures. Users can also create or import their own elements. The library is expanded monthly — registered users can download free updates from the Microspot Web site — and Microspot actively encourages requests for particular objects, colours or textures.

Spaces can be as large, complex, intimate or simple as the user dictates. In addition, different lighting tools, including sunlight, can be selected to provide ambience. Scales, ceiling heights, the number of squares on the grid and the snapping distance are also simple to control.

Claudia and Robert Briggs, the husband and wife team behind BBC award-winning design consultancy Graphic Idea, learnt to use Interiors in just four days. The Briggs originally set up Graphic Idea in South Africa but moved to the UK in 2001 and quickly established a fine reputation in the fields of graphic and Web design. However, when the Briggs decided to seek more interior design commissions, they soon discovered that most 3D modelling packages are designed for the architectural market and are highly specialised, complex to learn and prohibitively expensive. “We finally found Interiors and we couldn’t believe it”, says Claudia Briggs.

If you're fairly computer literate and you know your way around a Mac, it won't take you much more than a week. For what it can do, and the time it takes to learn how to do it, this is really very good.

The Briggs are lifelong Mac users and an eMac G4 is currently their studio workhorse. As well as being habitual users of Apple software, including iPhoto and AppleWorks, they are also well-versed in Photoshop, QuarkXPress and Flash. This familiarity with the platform obviously gave them an advantage when learning a new program; however, until they started using Interiors, the Briggs had never even opened a 3D modelling package before. Claudia asserts that even amateur designers will pick up Microspot Interiors relatively quickly: “If you’re fairly computer literate and you know your way around a Mac, it won’t take you more than a week”, she says. “For what it can do, and the time it takes to learn how to do it, this is really very good”.

As well as providing users with a set of tools which from which a suite of rooms can be designed from scratch, the viewing function allows you to look around it — you can virtually ‘stand’ in the centre of the room and spin it slowly around you. This three dimensional quality provides users, or potential clients, with a far greater appreciation of a space than a set of flat, 2D images.

Moreover, Interiors allows users to show either restraint or to completely indulge themselves. The Briggs have shown the versatility of the program by using it to design an opulent living space complete with circular water features cut into the walls. “You can design whatever you want. We put together something on a grand scale — the sort of space we might design for our ideal client”, explains Claudia.