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To design and develop an interactive globe

stripe.com

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Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#31

Post by mxfh »

Great basic and easy to follow tutorial for visualization display only (virtual globes), which are totally fine to be spherical, just be aware of the limitations.

So as a trained Cartographer I have two supplemental remarks on this:

1. For anything involving simulations or else, that require an ellipsoidal earth or beyond, go for Patrick Cozzi's (of CesiumJS) still very relevant book 3D Engine Design for Virtual Globes

http://www.virtualglobebook.com/

2. There is no fixed ratio of screen space for map vs globe display, it all depends on the choice of projection used for the map version, the ratio mentioned is apparently for a specific equirectangular plot.

Maps don't need to be rectangular, projections like Robinson or Equal Earth are also considerable options, which don't make the map appear so huge and have a way better screen space ratio vs. a globe than rectangular ones.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equal_Earth_projection

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#32

Post by billfruit »

tomgp wrote: post #25
billfruit wrote: post #3

On a tangent, I do feel most GIS systems and applications still use 2d maps instead of a 3d globe, which I think could do with some rethinking. Working with globes could eliminate the whole apparatus of projections, and I guess would simplify a lot of calculations.. but there seems to be much resistance to this idea.

It’s still being projected onto a screen though so you’re still using a projection. There are some pretty extreme trade offs you accept when using a orthographic ‘globe’ projection, not least of which is that you can’t see half the planet for any given moment.

I don't exactly get this argument. It is not only about what you see on screen, I was talking about geographic operations like spatial queries being executed on the globe rather than on a projected 2d surface.

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#33

Post by billfruit »

growlist wrote: post #11
billfruit wrote: post #3

On a tangent, I do feel most GIS systems and applications still use 2d maps instead of a 3d globe, which I think could do with some rethinking. Working with globes could eliminate the whole apparatus of projections, and I guess would simplify a lot of calculations.. but there seems to be much resistance to this idea.

It would certainly be interesting as an exam question, for example, to compare 2D and 3D for what it would reveal about each, but in the end it's all about choosing an appropriate model for the task at hand. I'd therefore suggest that pitting 2D against 3D is actively choosing to set up some kind of battle that doesn't actually exist in reality - most of the time there is nothing to be added to an analysis by choosin…

Perhaps it is not only the resistance of practitioners/ legacy of experience and data in 2d, but also the unavailability of a decent tech stack for 3D GIS.

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#34

Post by graphene »

ponker wrote: post #19
graphene wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

on that note, are you aware that the globe on stripe.com is rotating in the wrong direction?

This is a tricky one. The majority of worldwide software revenue comes from companies in the North Hemisphere who read left-to-right, so most globes are oriented this way.

Can't tell if sarcasm...? What I mean is that the globe should rotate towards the East, not towards the West. This is of course assuming a stationary camera!

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#35

Post by ArtWomb »

Cool writeup! I agree with this sentiment 100%: "the web is poised to embrace 3D en masse". And with the heady webgl adoption that threejs brings, we see sites with decorative elements that hog resources, inhibit user interactions, and make finding the actual information you are looking for a nightmare. It's a power tool, use it judiciously ;)

Post fails to mention how they are actually rendering the "dots". But I feel perhaps they are executing excessive draw calls. 100K is not egregious. ThreeJS docs include many instanced geometry samples. As well as library level particle systems and materials. All anim logic handled via shaders. Raw webgl points without textures are also very performant for things like starfields, etc.

Wanted to link up the original "webgl-globe". Visualization originally used at Google to see where in the world search requests were arriving from:

https://github.com/dataarts/webgl-globe

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#36

Post by atonse »

iNerdier wrote: post #21

‘None of us on the team considered ourselves 3D artists, so we leaned on each other, the internet, and friends to help solve technical problems.’ You have money to burn on a vanity exercise using experienced programmers but don’t even bother to hire anyone in the visual arts when designing it?

Err what? Stripe's design team for a decade has been so solid, so good, that they literally drive some design trends across the web (at least with tech companies).

I'd say they're probably one of the biggest champions of people in the "visual arts" among tech companies.

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#37

Post by atonse »

graphene wrote: post #34
ponker wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a tricky one. The majority of worldwide software revenue comes from companies in the North Hemisphere who read left-to-right, so most globes are oriented this way.

Can't tell if sarcasm...? What I mean is that the globe should rotate towards the East, not towards the West. This is of course assuming a stationary camera!

Yes and the reply was saying that to the majority of readers (who read left to right), the globe spinning as it does, probably feels more subconsciously comfortable to our minds.

It's an artistic interpretation of a globe. It's not meant to be a scientifically accurate representation (one could say that the oceans aren't grey either, or that countries aren't sets of dots, or that the Earth isn't a sphere but an oblong spheroid, slightly squished at the poles). Again, scientific accuracy isn't paramount here.

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#39

Post by growlist »

billfruit wrote: post #33
growlist wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would certainly be interesting as an exam question, for example, to compare 2D and 3D for what it would reveal about each, but in the end it's all about choosing an appropriate model for the task at hand. I'd therefore suggest that pitting 2D against 3D is actively choosing to set up some kind of battle that doesn't actually exist in reality - most of the time there is nothing to be added to an analysis by choosin…

Perhaps it is not only the resistance of practitioners/ legacy of experience and data in 2d, but also the unavailability of a decent tech stack for 3D GIS.

But why, if completely 3D GIS would be so super awesome, do you think that that decent tech stack doesn't exist? The answer is that for the vast majority of applications of GIS, 3D is just an unhelpful distraction.

I don't want to upset you, but I really think you are not speaking from a position of knowledge if you think otherwise (I have a couple of degrees in Geography including one in GIS specifically, plus 15+ years' experience in the field).

Re: To design and develop an interactive globe

#40

Post by growlist »

billfruit wrote: post #32
tomgp wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s still being projected onto a screen though so you’re still using a projection. There are some pretty extreme trade offs you accept when using a orthographic ‘globe’ projection, not least of which is that you can’t see half the planet for any given moment.

I don't exactly get this argument. It is not only about what you see on screen, I was talking about geographic operations like spatial queries being executed on the globe rather than on a projected 2d surface.

> spatial queries being executed on the globe

But it's perfectly possible to create geodesically-correct buffers, for example - such as you might see when calculating ballistic missile range over thousands of kilometres - in a 2D projection, and indeed this has been available for decades. And we have plenty of global models, such as WGS 84: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Geodetic_System

So what exactly are you talking about?

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