I think a lot about ecosystems, big and small. I remember realizing that all ecosystems are deeply connected...and that the largest ecosystem of all wraps around an entire sphere...it's called Earth.

This realization maps to my fascination with spherical geometry, inspired by the work of Buckminster Fuller.

So, around the turn of the millennium, I started writing algorithms that animate geometry over a sphere, as a way to celebrate Earth Day.

My only goal is to out-do myself each year - artistically and mathematically. I have found this to be a good way to balance my left and right brains, and to express my reverence for the planet.

The music for this video was composed by Robby Elfman.

Previous Earth Day animations are available here:
ventrella.com/EarthDay/

Technical notes:
This animation was made in pure JavaScript/canvas on a web browser. The animation was sped up 4x using Adobe Premiere. No other additions were made other than the titles and Robby's music, which was composed specifically for this piece.

The animation uses a geodesic grid. A hexagonal cellular automaton is run over the grid, using a technique described here:

ventrella.com/SphereCA/

The colors at the end of the animation are created by interpolating a dynamic colormap through the list of cells, which are hierarchically-ordered according to the geodesic algorithm.

Enjoy!
-j

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