7 ms·

Marble Marcher: ray-traced real time game on the surface of evolving fractals

345 points by tiborsaas 8y ago

kaffeemitsahne 8y ago
Reminiscent of the exploration scenes in Lem's Solaris, where the fractal-like surface eruptions are explored by spaceship/plane. Unfortunately neither of the movies had those.
divs1210 8y ago
This looks beautiful! Is the engine available as a library?
ariehkovler 8y ago
This captures two of my childhood computing obsessions. I spent so long messing around with Polyray and generating raytraced pictures for convering into Magic Eye stereograms. I also had some Windows 3.1 fractal generator program, where you could mess around with the formulas and zoom in (slowly) and make them cycle colours. Looking forward to playing this a lot. I particuarly like the clever use of fractal mathematics to make accurate collision detection physics. Though it helps that he's using a sphere as the user-controlled object.
- philsnow 8y ago
  I thought you were talking about the raytracer I was obsessed with as a kid, POVRay, but indeed there is also a project called polyray. I spent many a weekend rendering hundreds of .tga files and throwing them into .flc files since that was the only way I knew how to make "videos". I mostly did renderings of planets turning with texture maps, trying to get something similar to what I saw in Star Control 2, and I told myself I was making them for my own video game, but I never got past fiddling around with povray. Anyway it looks like polyray has a lot of the same facilities. I wonder how I was unaware of it for the couple years I played with povray?
  - russh 8y ago
    I remember staying up all night waiting for my first renders to complete on my brand new amazingly fast 80286 with 80287 math coprocessor. It was amazing.
- phkahler 8y ago
  For some time now I've wanted to modify my ray tracer to do realtime RDS (random dot stereograms). Just another item on my bucket list that I might never get around to. I suspect doing high frame rates and animation may keep your eyes adjusted very well, but that intuition might be wrong.
- rzzzt 8y ago
  I played with Bryce 3D (from the MetaCreations era) as a child. Sooo many generic landscapes.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - rpmonteiro 8y ago
    you should checkout Tom Beddard, a master in the area, that has partnered with the founder of MetaCreations. A little googling will show you some cool stuff.
vbuwivbiu 8y ago
anyone compiled this for Linux/OSX ?
- delinka 8y ago
  Or wasm?
  - anderspitman 8y ago
    Looks like it's using GLSL 400 shaders so I don't think it would work for wasm unfortunately. Not sure how many non-WebGL features it's using though. Might be straight-forward to port. EDIT: bigger issue is probably that SFML apparently doesn't support wasm: https://github.com/SFML/SFML/issues/1494 https://github.com/SFML/SFML/issues/1494
- ah- 8y ago
  Not precompiled, but there's a PR with Linux support: https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/pull/1 https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/pull/1 Works well.
Liquix 8y ago
This program utilizes a powerful technique called raymarching, raytracing's big brother. Instead of tracing along each ray in tiny fragments and returning intersections, the ray is 'marched' in larger steps, vastly increasing render speed (the downfall of classical raytracers). How do we 'march' rays without missing geometry? With the aid of signed distance functions, geometric equations which take an arbitrary point in 3space and evaluate to 0 if that point is on the 'shell' of the geometry. For example, the signed distance function for a sphere: float sdfSphere(vec3 p, float r) { return length(p) - r; } This lets us do interesting things such as transform the point p to transform our object, take the minimum value of two spheres to produce a venn-diagram intersection shape, take the maximum of two spheres to 'cutout' a hole from one, etc. The logic is a bit backwards at first, but it clicks quite quickly and one can rapidly construct complex geometry without much optimization/shader magic. For example, this is a realtime capture of a 64k self-contained executable. No 3d models, no textures, no assets - just raymarching and math: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie4u2i_5OdE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie4u2i_5OdE] Approachable overview of raymarching & SDFs: [https://jamie-wong.com/2016/07/15/ray-marching-signed-distance-functions https://jamie-wong.com/2016/07/15/ray-marching-signed-distan...] Learn more: [https://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchingdf.htm https://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchin...]
- dylan604 8y ago
  >Marble Marcher is entirely ray-traced in real time and is played on the surface of evolving fractals. That’s the very first line of the source page. So why do you say it uses raymarching? Are these terms used interchangeably as in marching is a method to do tracing?
  - petetnt 8y ago
    The source code is available on GitHub and it indeed does seem to use ray-marching https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/blob/d436b6f80068cfee6b00b515cb4c0b2704d49afe/assets/frag.glsl#L199 https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/blob/d436b6f8006...
    - 8y ago
roadkillon101 8y ago
Reminds me of Marble Madness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_Madness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_Madness except with cool real time fractal generation. Definitely has potential.
dmos62 8y ago
I ran this on my 2008 high-endish business laptop on lowest settings and it ran at about 2 frames per second (though the indicator was showing 11) and wasn't responsive. I love the idea, though.
- airstrike 8y ago
  You'll need a dedicated GPU as the post says
llao 8y ago
What a super well done video! Really benefits the game itself. Clear, concise, intriguing and so positive. Can't wait to try this when I have time.
- jonshariat 8y ago
  I'm constantly shocked at how well experts in their field can also teach, explain, edit, and share their knowledge these days.
  - codeparade 8y ago
    Thank you!
tehsauce 8y ago
A couple years ago I made very minimal game engine that allowed simple objects to be intersected with SDFs for physics, a bit similar to this. It also had some other cool ideas in it like 3d portals and gravity-bent rays of light. This is the old version with pictures in the readme https://github.com/PWhiddy/Raymarch-Engine https://github.com/PWhiddy/Raymarch-Engine And here is a version with no pictures in the readme but an actual build system (if you want to try it out) https://github.com/PWhiddy/time https://github.com/PWhiddy/time
Damogran6 8y ago
My Pascal class in Highschool had a raytracing project for our amiga A500's. I seem to recall a 320x200 view was split between 4-6 machines and it took 3-4 days to render.
czei002 8y ago
Very cool. Think this game also used fractals: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus!
lbj 8y ago
This ran at a very fluxating FPS but never below 120 in 1600x900 - So I think you've done a very good job. Love the fractals!

345 points by tiborsaas 8y ago

Reminiscent of the exploration scenes in Lem's Solaris, where the fractal-like surface eruptions are explored by spaceship/plane. Unfortunately neither of the movies had those.

divs1210 8y ago

This looks beautiful! Is the engine available as a library?

ariehkovler 8y ago

This captures two of my childhood computing obsessions. I spent so long messing around with Polyray and generating raytraced pictures for convering into Magic Eye stereograms. I also had some Windows 3.1 fractal generator program, where you could mess around with the formulas and zoom in (slowly) and make them cycle colours. Looking forward to playing this a lot. I particuarly like the clever use of fractal mathematics to make accurate collision detection physics. Though it helps that he's using a sphere as the user-controlled object.

philsnow 8y ago
I thought you were talking about the raytracer I was obsessed with as a kid, POVRay, but indeed there is also a project called polyray. I spent many a weekend rendering hundreds of .tga files and throwing them into .flc files since that was the only way I knew how to make "videos". I mostly did renderings of planets turning with texture maps, trying to get something similar to what I saw in Star Control 2, and I told myself I was making them for my own video game, but I never got past fiddling around with povray. Anyway it looks like polyray has a lot of the same facilities. I wonder how I was unaware of it for the couple years I played with povray?
- russh 8y ago
  I remember staying up all night waiting for my first renders to complete on my brand new amazingly fast 80286 with 80287 math coprocessor. It was amazing.
phkahler 8y ago
For some time now I've wanted to modify my ray tracer to do realtime RDS (random dot stereograms). Just another item on my bucket list that I might never get around to. I suspect doing high frame rates and animation may keep your eyes adjusted very well, but that intuition might be wrong.
rzzzt 8y ago
I played with Bryce 3D (from the MetaCreations era) as a child. Sooo many generic landscapes.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- rpmonteiro 8y ago
  you should checkout Tom Beddard, a master in the area, that has partnered with the founder of MetaCreations. A little googling will show you some cool stuff.

vbuwivbiu 8y ago

anyone compiled this for Linux/OSX ?

delinka 8y ago
Or wasm?
- anderspitman 8y ago
  Looks like it's using GLSL 400 shaders so I don't think it would work for wasm unfortunately. Not sure how many non-WebGL features it's using though. Might be straight-forward to port. EDIT: bigger issue is probably that SFML apparently doesn't support wasm: https://github.com/SFML/SFML/issues/1494 https://github.com/SFML/SFML/issues/1494
ah- 8y ago
Not precompiled, but there's a PR with Linux support: https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/pull/1 https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/pull/1 Works well.

Liquix 8y ago

This program utilizes a powerful technique called raymarching, raytracing's big brother. Instead of tracing along each ray in tiny fragments and returning intersections, the ray is 'marched' in larger steps, vastly increasing render speed (the downfall of classical raytracers). How do we 'march' rays without missing geometry? With the aid of signed distance functions, geometric equations which take an arbitrary point in 3space and evaluate to 0 if that point is on the 'shell' of the geometry. For example, the signed distance function for a sphere: float sdfSphere(vec3 p, float r) { return length(p) - r; } This lets us do interesting things such as transform the point p to transform our object, take the minimum value of two spheres to produce a venn-diagram intersection shape, take the maximum of two spheres to 'cutout' a hole from one, etc. The logic is a bit backwards at first, but it clicks quite quickly and one can rapidly construct complex geometry without much optimization/shader magic. For example, this is a realtime capture of a 64k self-contained executable. No 3d models, no textures, no assets - just raymarching and math: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie4u2i_5OdE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ie4u2i_5OdE] Approachable overview of raymarching & SDFs: [https://jamie-wong.com/2016/07/15/ray-marching-signed-distance-functions https://jamie-wong.com/2016/07/15/ray-marching-signed-distan...] Learn more: [https://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchingdf.htm https://iquilezles.org/www/articles/raymarchingdf/raymarchin...]

dylan604 8y ago
>Marble Marcher is entirely ray-traced in real time and is played on the surface of evolving fractals. That’s the very first line of the source page. So why do you say it uses raymarching? Are these terms used interchangeably as in marching is a method to do tracing?
- petetnt 8y ago
  The source code is available on GitHub and it indeed does seem to use ray-marching https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/blob/d436b6f80068cfee6b00b515cb4c0b2704d49afe/assets/frag.glsl#L199 https://github.com/HackerPoet/MarbleMarcher/blob/d436b6f8006...
  - 8y ago

roadkillon101 8y ago

Reminds me of Marble Madness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_Madness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marble_Madness except with cool real time fractal generation. Definitely has potential.

dmos62 8y ago

I ran this on my 2008 high-endish business laptop on lowest settings and it ran at about 2 frames per second (though the indicator was showing 11) and wasn't responsive. I love the idea, though.

airstrike 8y ago
You'll need a dedicated GPU as the post says

llao 8y ago

What a super well done video! Really benefits the game itself. Clear, concise, intriguing and so positive. Can't wait to try this when I have time.

jonshariat 8y ago
I'm constantly shocked at how well experts in their field can also teach, explain, edit, and share their knowledge these days.
- codeparade 8y ago
  Thank you!

tehsauce 8y ago

A couple years ago I made very minimal game engine that allowed simple objects to be intersected with SDFs for physics, a bit similar to this. It also had some other cool ideas in it like 3d portals and gravity-bent rays of light. This is the old version with pictures in the readme https://github.com/PWhiddy/Raymarch-Engine https://github.com/PWhiddy/Raymarch-Engine And here is a version with no pictures in the readme but an actual build system (if you want to try it out) https://github.com/PWhiddy/time https://github.com/PWhiddy/time

Damogran6 8y ago

My Pascal class in Highschool had a raytracing project for our amiga A500's. I seem to recall a 320x200 view was split between 4-6 machines and it took 3-4 days to render.

czei002 8y ago

Very cool. Think this game also used fractals: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rescue_on_Fractalus!

lbj 8y ago

This ran at a very fluxating FPS but never below 120 in 1600x900 - So I think you've done a very good job. Love the fractals!