First Look: Space Engine

Just discovered a program called Space Engine written by Russian astronomer and programmer Vladimir Romanyuk.  It's pretty amazing.  It's basically a universe simulator.  Like the entire visible universe (what isn't based on observed data is procedurally generated). SpaceEngine allows you to fly literally anywhere in the universe at any speed and it shows it to you in real time.  This is the most impressive part for me, because unlike 3D animation programs, there's no rendering, it's like a game engine.  There's downsides to this, like sometimes you can see some gradient banding and texture popping, and the framerate fluctuates, but for the most part, it is visually stunning and rivals some of the best visual effects shots from movies in the 90's.

I've strung together a few of my preliminary flights in a video.  I'll probably be making more of these.

Music from Hans Zimmer's excellent Interstellar score.