Computational Ocean (2016)


Computational Ocean is a visualisation derived from my work on Antarctica and the Southern Ocean.

It includes global ocean data visualisations deriving from the GEBCO dataset, global Sea Surface Height Anomaly (SSHA) and Sea Surface Temperature (SST) datasets, as well as synthetic FFT-based ocean simulations. These are works-in-progress to create new and (hopefully) insightful ways of examining scientific datasets, rendered at ultra-high resolution for display and interaction upon 4k Fulldome planetarium systems as well as immersive devices such as VR systems.

The Global Ocean is a Ding an sich: a data-based noumenon – or fiction – translated for the human sensorium via instrumentation and software conformation of information. In the GEBCO-WGS’84 (negative) visualisations we catch a glimpse of the inhuman geography of the world; imaginal noesis of ocean-agent perceptrons that inhere this space (umwelt).

This transforms into an isometric view of a notional 3D-laser-print crystal structure, as if we can see it from ‘outside.’ A glass sculpture of what we can observe, not of what we can know.

Emerging from this via SSHA and SST visualisations are the mountains and valleys of the sea, the deep circumpolar Antarctic convergence: observed data/derived statistics from remote-sensing spectral information.

Finally, synthetic FFT ocean simulations portray a romantic view of the mathematical infinite – the Oceanic.

A partial observation of a high-dimensional space.

There is one ocean. The phenomenon of it.

‘Computational Ocean’ was exhibited in ‘Dark Ocean’, curated by Kit Wise, for the 2016 Dark Mofo Festival:

darkmofo.net.au/lineup/dark-ocean/

Acknowledgements to Paul Bourke and Ben Raymond.
720P online version. 1080P Prorez available on request.

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2 Responses

  1. Jasmine Wales says:

    Hello Peter, I have been looking at your film and they are incredible. Could you please kindly advise where I can purchase full copies from to play in my Home planetarium?

  2. Peter Morse says:

    Hi Jasmine – I’ll be releasing purchasable full copies via download sometime soonish (probably 1k, 2k versions) – what resolution are you after?

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