What you're looking at above isn't abstract 2D animation, but more dazzling still, animated prims.
"The script is for ever changing scenes or reactive environments," Somatika Xiao tells me. "This is an example of it switched over to Random. The object is 200 or so prims, consists of several link sets, not to mention each link is spinning slowly." They also change in size, color, and rotation, and are set against the background of a mega prim made solid black, to create the backdrop.
They're part of Xiao's still-in-development Unreal Project (no known relation to the FPS), an effort to bring interactivity to SL builds. "To give Second Life environments," as he explains, grinning, "Life.
"As I go to so many of these awesome looking environments I see little to no movement," he continues, "like walking into a picture. So this part of the Unreal Project is that first step into creating a quick deployable setup into environments that will give them life!"
Currently the demo is resting dormant on a private island, "[But] if I can find someone to put it up to showcase it I would gladly do so." And though he didn't mention it specifically, I believe it's a project with Wishfarmers, a new metaverse development that Xiao co-directs, along with veteran Residents like Max Case, Gary Bukowski, and Adenoraque Qin. (In which case, I should make a disclosure, as the company recently ran ads on this blog. But that aside, I've admired their work for years, as mentioned here, here, and here.)
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