Inception-style curved map for turn-by-turn directions

ThouYS

ok this is nice

Orbify_Karsten

Thanks for sharing! Building this in public, check my X for more updates! https://x.com/karshuit

vessenes

This is cool. May I suggest that you make the standard deformation much less spherical? I do not get nauseous that easily and it made me a little nauseous, feeling like I was falling. I would not want to watch that while driving in a car. But 1/3 of the way from ‘flat’ to that would be super useful.

Conscat

I don't remember a map from the movie so I didn't know what to expect. Instantly I love this. I actually wish I could have this rather than street view in Google Maps.

angiolillo

Neat! It might be useful to be able to configure the map viewing angle at the top and bottom of the frame, perhaps even the degree of curvature between them. I say this because I wonder if a shallower gradient (slightly more top-down at the bottom and slightly more angled at the top) would be more understandable and familiar while providing almost as much information. Not as cool-looking, but potentially more useful as a real navigation aid.

Zebfross

Mine gets stuck at loading 90%.

SkepticalWhale

Very cool. This would actually save me from those terrible times when the navigation tells me to turn, but not which lane is best for the next turn after that. Now I could visualize it clearly. That being said, it is a little dizzying to watch.

maqp

looks cool. But estimating distances is hard, as is estimating road size. You can only plan one straight line ahead, and there's no "glance how many blocks before I make a left turn". Now it's "scan and process the entire straight terrain section with eyes recognizing crossings to get the count" Alternatively, I'll have to task switch all the time to it to not miss on the turn. Some hybrid map visual overlay that makes reading it at a glance easier would go a long way here.

NDlurker

At first I thought this was a cool gimmick, but this seems like it would be really helpful. You get to see the angle of the curve from the driver's perspective and the overhead view at the same time!

tomgp

First time I saw this idea was Berg's "Here and There" poster from 2009 (a year before Inception) though they acknowledge a bunch of earlier inspirations... https://berglondon.com/blog/2009/05/04/here-there-influences...

prometheus1992

Nice work! This sort of reminds me of a game I saw demo'd on HN about a year ago, where you could walk and talk to the people and do some tasks- the difference being - in that game the world felt like a convex sphere and here it is concave.

sd9

This is a really good proof of concept. I would use this. Something about the moment of the turn itself isn’t working for me though. Just before the turn you have essentially no information about the route ahead, until after the turn is completed. This would make a sequence of consecutive turns difficult to navigate.

Dansvidania

Absolutely honest question: what is the advantage of this over a top view navigation with the orientation following the orientation of movement? Am I missing something?

hexator

A variant of this but taking place on an O'Neill Cylinder would be amazing. I've always been captivated by the idea of the horizon curving up in front of you.

B1FF_PSUVM

Does it come with barf bags, or at least a discount coupon?

tantalor

I see a whole new business category being born: Nausea as a Service!

Coeur

Beautiful perspective if you need to take a left in 500 meters. Not so great if you have to take a left in 3 kilometers because that would just not be visible. Now of course you could change the parameters so that the upper screen border is 3 kilometers. But normal standard perspective is even better, because it can show you up to infinity . The inherent concept here is that there is a cut-off at the top, and that there is always a lot of unnecessary stuff near you whizzing by to look at / dopamine kicks. So you would have to constantly look at the screen - instead of at the road. Navigon (among others) back in 2009 showed a perspective that balanced between showing the next junction and the next few kilometers. And leaving out anything unnecessary. I like that better. Example: https://www.notebookcheck.com/fileadmin/_processed_/csm_Garm...

nicwolff

What the hell is "right drag"?

HighGodLoki

That's almost perfect. Proposal: The use case is to inform the user of landmarks on the route before they need them, giving visual cues about the scenery. It's missing an early distortion along the direction of the turn though, each turn feels jarring and drops the useful spatial awareness aspect.

mpalmer

Very cool idea. I was on board until the first turn, then I just felt seasick.