Genesis Effects: Growing Planets in 1980s Computer Graphics

ABSTRACT:This article examines a discourse about computer-generated planets that emerged in the 1980s, just as computer graphics practitioners became interested in what they called the "simulation of natural phenomena." These graphics engineers helped to develop standards of realism and methods for modeling and simulation that were supported by a science-fictional version of mimesis, with realism as an extension of, rather than a reproduction of, reality. Through the computer-generated imagery of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan and 2010: The Year We Make Contact, and illustrations by mathematician Benoit Mandelbrot, I show how representations of planets were prethematized by science fiction stories about planets being "grown." This influenced scholarly conversations about particle systems, fractal landscapes, and other procedurally generated graphical simulation methods, and helped to authorize an epistemology combining physical and "visual"—that is, non-physics-based—simulation as a means of getting closer to the realistic rendering of natural phenomena.