splatlas: a navigable 3D Gaussian splat solar system

splatlas is an interactive solar system that runs in your browser, where every world (the Sun and the eight planets) is a real 3D Gaussian splat trained on a GPU from open NASA and USGS imagery and elevation data, not a texture wrapped on a sphere. Fly through the system, warp to any planet, and read it up close.

What is splatlas?

A WebGL experience built with Next.js and three.js. The nine bodies (Sun, Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) are placed at their real positions for any date and relit in real time by the Sun, with a true day and night terminator. Live overlays add NOAA space weather, the International Space Station position, NASA DSCOVR EPIC Earth imagery, and the Astronomy Picture of the Day.

How is splatlas made?

1. Source a satellite colour map and an elevation model for each body from open NASA and USGS data.
2. Render a displaced sphere of each body from 150 to 300 synthetic viewpoints, up to 4096px.
3. Train a 3D Gaussian splatting model on a single NVIDIA RTX 4090 until the body reconstructs as a cloud of oriented splats.
4. Light the splats live from the Sun in the browser for a real day and night terminator as the planets move.

Key facts

• 9 worlds: the Sun and the 8 planets, each a separately trained Gaussian splat.
• Roughly 676,000 oriented Gaussian splats in total.
• Data from NASA (GIBS Blue Marble, SDO, DSCOVR EPIC, APOD) and USGS.
• Trained on a single NVIDIA RTX 4090; Saturn has real ring splats; terrestrial planets carry elevation relief.

Researched, built, and orchestrated by Pavlo Puzikov.