FIVARS speaks with fulldome filmmaker Marek Slipek about his beautiful film Colored Cubes

What lead to the creation of this piece?

A collaboration with the Planetarium Mannheim in Germany led me to create Colored Cubes. The goal was to produce fulldome films with the theme of Mannheim as a city. I teach Creative Coding at the Technical University of Applied Sciences in Mannheim. I gave my design students the task of using Google Maps to create a 360-degree still of a location of their choice in Mannheim. They then animated the still image using Creative Coding with particle systems and post-processing techniques.

I took a different approach myself: I visited several well-known locations in Mannheim and recorded an audio sequence for each place. For the visual component, I used coloured cubes in a 3D space as a metaphor for the “city of squares.” Mannheim was planned and built during the Baroque era, which perhaps explains its obsession with structured architecture.

What was the production process like for you and your team? What did you learn?

Using Google Maps to create 360-degree images proved quite challenging for our students. 
We had to create six different camera angles and ensure they were aligned correctly to produce a convincing immersive image. This part of the production was very experimental. The fun part came with working on the particle systems and experimenting with them.

My own piece followed a more direct approach, starting with the audio. In hindsight, I wish I had used a 360-degree audio recorder instead of a stereo one. The visual aspect of my work was based on a production method I devised for myself using OpenFrameworks, including some workarounds I’ve grown accustomed to. Overall, the project went well, and we had a fantastic show at the planetarium, created by our students.

How did you become an immersive content creator and why?

We’ve already had several collaborations with the Planetarium Mannheim. The first one was what brought me into immersive media creation. At the time, I had already been using Creative Coding for a long time for various purposes—posters, illustrations, infographics, and visuals for events—when I got the opportunity to work with Creative Coding in a dome environment. It was amazing to experience that powerful and overwhelming projection space. The same applies to VR, which I have also managed to explore successfully.

What is the VR/AR industry like in your region?

There are quite a few opportunities to produce dome and VR content for the XR industry in this region. These range from planetarium shows and digital art festivals to digital art centres and virtual escape rooms in many cities, including ours in Germany. Beyond the entertainment industry, there are also scientific projects that explore the social and psychological aspects of VR. Our university operates its own VR cave, which can be used by the local mechanical engineering industry during the prototyping phase of their products. All in all, there’s a lot happening in this space.

What do you have planned for the future?

I’ve used Creative Coding for several years to produce fulldome and VR content—starting with Processing and later transitioning to OpenFrameworks. Both are excellent tools for experimenting and understanding the principles behind 3D graphics and VR technology on a technical level.

By now, I can say I truly understand these technologies—from CPU to GPU—including the use of powerful shaders and technical concepts like textures and VBOs, which can be intimidating for those diving deep into the field. I feel it’s time to come up for air and start using tools that are specifically designed for multimedia creation. That’s why I’m excited to begin working with tools like TouchDesigner in the near future to create fulldome content. These tools are a kind of technological shortcut and, hopefully, a more time-efficient approach. We’ll see—I’m looking forward to the next production.

What would like to share with fellow content creators and/or the industry?

As mentioned earlier, I plan to start using tools that are more commonly adopted in the dome and VR industries. My technical experiments with Creative Coding have given me a deep understanding of how the underlying technology works. I believe this knowledge helps me understand commercial tools at a more conceptual level.

Despite all the technical aspects involved in producing a dome or VR experience—and there are many—we should never lose sight of the artistic concept and the story itself.

Do you think VR festivals like FIVARS are important?

VR festivals like FIVARS are very important, as they expand the boundaries of imagination and offer a platform for exciting experimentation. I believe strongly in FIVARS as an innovative platform for ambitious projects!

Colored Cubes will screen for attendees in the FIVARS online dome theater