This weekend marks the release of another #Sharknado film, and The School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook University remains at the forefront of the Sharknado phenomenon with a Minor in Sharknado Studies and faculty conducting research that addresses “Sharknado Studies.”
The Instrument Laboratory at SoMAS maintains a network of observation cameras, weather stations and tide gauges across Long Island that monitor current conditions. The photos from the cameras capture the current weather conditions very well. News12 Long Island nows regularly uses the images in their weather forecasts and a daily time-lapse video from the cameras is available on the SoMAS YouTube Channel.
As a fun demonstration of the webcam coverage of Long Island along with a fun mix of web programming, the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences is proud to present the Sharknado Generator! Using our webcam images as a background and based on code by Jaume Sanchez, the Sharknado Generator experiments with 3D-like clouds created with CSS 3D Transforms and Javascript. The clouds can be controlled using a mouse and regenerated by pressing the spacebar. The Texture Controls menu allows for customization of the cloud formation, including the types of clouds and the amount. The CSS 3D Transforms can be affected when a significant amount of clouds are added to the scene and this might affect computer performance.
Create a fun #sharknado and take a screenshot and share it with us on Facebook or Twitter! Please tag @somas.sbu and @stonybrooku along with #sharknado!
