This project hopes to utilize augmented reality as tool for understanding the ephemeral and computational nature of our surroundings; whether it be the emergent behaviors of flocking birds, the wind vectors that guide the movement of leaves, or the cyclical re-growth of terra’s surface, nature as innumerable agents and forces that interact with our living and non-living world. It’s interesting to note how information processing in nature is self-organized, distributed and optimizes without central control (1); although we have used the intelligence inherent within natural systems to inform the our own human advancement, it is less common to use the “language” of nature to better understand non-human agency and environmental concerns.

We hope to develop a new immersion situation through three motion case studies that not only visualize natural computational systems in imaginary ways, but also provide a hypothetical representation of how these systems will behave if the speed of time was manipulated. By creating a composition of augmented reality and computational drawings, we hope to provide a new framework for discovering the natural world and visualizing environmental futures through a digital lens.