Temples

Procedurally generated ancient ruins, in a single 360 panoramic tracking shot. Rendered entirely in a shader on a graphics card GPU.

I accidentally discovered a terrain generation algorithm (using ray marching) which seemed to closely resemble architectural structures in disrepair. They could easily pass for Greek, Roman, Hindu or Egyptian. You can see columns, pillars, archways and decorative carvings… generated purely from a few lines of code and math.

The animation was created using a single tracking shot, rendered in 4K equirectangular format. This allowed me to direct the camera in post production using stereographic projection – allowing fisheye and ‘little planet’ views, as well as conventional looking camera views.

Here’s one of the 4k equirectangular frames – you can load this into any 360 panoramic viewing software.

Software / resources:

Processing (proessing.org) & GLSL shaders (inspiration & hacked code from http://www.shadertoy.com, and Little Planets plugin for After Effects (by subblue).

Music – Philip Glass – String Quartet No. 3 “Mishima” , VI. Performed by the Carducci Quartet.