Google Web Designer Reaches 3.0 Beta

Google Web Designer just released its 3.0 beta version for public consumption and testing. Despite the product’s name, you still can’t design websites with it. For those of you who figured that out when it first released—and have ignored it ever since—here’s a refresher:

Google Web Designer is an app that makes it easier to create interactive content with HTML5, Canvas, and the like. Specifically, it’s designed for creating HTML5-based ads, and is probably worth a look if you want to serve up that kind of content with Google’s own ad platforms, because Google makes both. It’s also good for slowly but surely replacing the hole left in your heart by the stick-man Flash animations of yore.

[pullquote]…it’s not there yet, but it could be one day.[/pullquote]

I mean, it’s not there yet, but it could be one day. Mark my words, I’m maybe very possibly going to look like a genius in five years.

In the meantime, most of the improvements over previous versions of Google Web Designer seem to be quality of life changes (along with a healthy serving of bug fixes). Smaller new features include:

1. The ability to change “ad environments” on the fly.
2. Double clicking on components in the Components panel will now put them on the canvas.
3. A help panel integrated into the main app window.
4. Easier file browsing for assets.
5. A couple of performance improvements.

The big deal for this release is the inclusion of a 3D component. That’s right, 3D objects are coming to a browser ad near, you. And if those 3D objects don’t crush my phone’s processor or play music, I’ll be okay with that. This feature is most definitely still in beta, however. And even if you do use it, only a small selection of people in a pilot program can currently serve up ads with 3D content. Don’t expect to get much use out of the feature yet.

If you want to try all of that out, just click here to get it straight from Google. If you want to see the full release notes, with every bug fix laid bare, you can check out the release notes.

Ezequiel Bruni

Ezequiel Bruni is a web/UX designer, blogger, and aspiring photographer living in Mexico. When he’s not up to his finely-chiselled ears in wire-frames and front-end code, or ranting about the same, he indulges in beer, pizza, fantasy novels, and stand-up comedy.