Thread Visualisation

There are many ways you can turn one text into another, in a different medium. hippo's Chess to Music Translator is (a) a good example of cross-media text conversion and (b) better than the present idea by some considerable distance.

This is an animation featuring a group of heroes attempting to escape from an underground bunker. The bunker is a dark, cramped space. It is unpleasant to spend any time in the bunker. The bunker has a sophisticated security system which is activated by certain triggers. If you can avoid the triggers you can escape the bunker simply by walking out. The output text is an animated film showing people trying to escape the bunker.

The input text for this project is any internet forum thread. The initial post seeds the size and shape and appearance of the bunker. Each subsequent post in reply transports the new poster, with an avatar inspired by their webhandle, into the bunker. Through their period of captivity, the avatar begins to look more dishevelled and deranged. Each avatar remains trapped in the bunker, though moving gradually towards the exit stairs, until a set period has elapsed since their last post in the thread and they leave. Each post the individual makes the thread triggers increasingly Heath Robinson security measures to befall the avatar and they are dragged back to their starting position.

Each thread that the visualiser is given will generate a new animation based on the status and rhythm of the thread. The animation is dynamic, and so will update as the thread is added to. This does mean that the person who drops the link to the animation into the thread is a character in the animation, but this is fair as they are already a character in the thread.