GPlates for visualizing Earth's history

Misc
1

Hey folks! I just learned about GPlates after finding this cool video that shows how the appearance of Earth’s surface evolved from its formation to the present: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1OreyX0-fw

I wanted to create a simple visualization tool (probably javascript-based) similar to this video that I can host on an educational website. It would allow the user to advance forward or backward through time and watch the Earth’s surface evolve. I’d have both a 2D projection and a 3D globe that the user can rotate. My simplest idea is simply creating a ton of frames (maybe every 10 million years) to advance through.

Would GPlates be a good way to obtain these frames? Or am I barking up the wrong tree? Has someone already done this?

2

Hi lesh,

Yes, once you’ve got things looking how you want in GPlates you can export individual time frames to image files (eg, PNG format).

Have a look at the GPlates Tutorials: 6.2: Exporting Plate Reconstructions as Image Files. And note that you can export to any image size (ie, you’re not constrained to the viewport size in GPlates).