"I wanted to represent the influence of cities on their environment as a kind of invisible fluid that overflows from the city to its surrounding," Istvan explains in a project description. He achieves this effect by rendering actual city maps in a program called World Machine, then fusing them with procedurally-generated terrain. Once he has created the ideal amount of "erosion flow," he uses Photoshop to give each fluid map its own unique visual identity; Cairo is yellow, Rio de Janeiro is a fiery orange, Tokyo is bluish purple, and New York City is aquamarine. The final product looks like a series of post-apocalyptic wastelands, torn apart by flooded rivers until only a few of the most robust neighborhoods remain—all rendered in high-chroma color.View some images from Flowing City Map below, and click here to see the full series.
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