“Levels” by Sheltron at 3D Web Fest
Now in it’s 3rd year, 3D Web Fest is a celebration of creativity at the boundary of what’s possible in today’s web browsers. On June 30th, 2017 over 15 artists will show their WebGL, CSS, and Javascript creations in a film festival setting at the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco. Levels by Nick Shelton (aka Sheltron) is one of those projects!
Levels
This fractal visualization explores the relationship between chaos and rules. Given simple objects and processes, iteration yields an unprecedented network of connections and complexity. All parameters controls can be changed on the fly, with 3D controls.
This is a fundamental property of all organisms around us. Simple cells follow iterative processes, generating the richness in forms of the natural world. This work illustrates these connections with a powerful 3D fractal renderer capable of visualizing complex networks from tree structures to immersive surreal landscapes.
Most fractal art cheats the viewer out of this powerful knowledge that the blueprint is very simple, and the complexity comes from iteration. The complex images are simply presented without context. In this educational piece, Nick Shelton demonstrates the construction of these forms from primitives, showing iterative processes of translation, rotation and scaling. By viewing the process step by step, the viewer gains insight into the connections being presented, and hopefully, structures in the natural world around them.
Sheltron
Sheltron is a graphics programmer from Austin currently located in San Francisco. His work uses real time graphics as an education and communication medium, believing that vast amounts of information can be transmitted through computer-generated imagery. Data, audio and natural phenomena can be visualized using 3D graphics in ways not possible until recent history. A graphics programmer by trade, he pushes the envelope using custom GPU programming and rendering systems, pushing maximum bandwidth data straight into your eyeballs. Sheltron can be found experimenting with mixed reality rendering at Occipital, VJing warehouses (and VR) with audio reactive shaders, or creating interactive data visuals for museums.