Kaleider Funnels

The Funneling feature of Kaleider explores another curious mirroring phenomenon.  When two mirrors face each other, objects between the mirrors are reflected recursively, with ever diminishing size, off into 'infinity'.  Items appear alternately as mirror-images and true-images as their reflections 'bounce' back and forth between the mirrors.

The photo at right is an example of this effect.  (click to enlarge) ->

Funnels created by Kaleider do not exactly reproduce this mirroring effect, but rather were inspired by the actual phenomenon.


Infinite Restroom

Several varieties of Funnels can be created:

  • Ring
  • Oval
  • Square
  • Rectangle
  • Triangle
  • Diamond

Each Funnel type can also be 'split' to reflect half of the rendered Funnel onto the other half, creating a more symmetrical effect.  The side to mirror can be selected by clicking with the mouse.

The Kaleider screen images to the right illustrate the creation and rendered result of a Triangle (Split) Funnel.  The Masking feature has been enabled, in this case with the Mask Shape set to Mandala, using a gray color as the Mask Background.  (click to enlarge) ->

After a Funnel type has been selected, an outline of the Funnel shape will appear on the screen.  The two outer rings define the 'shell' of the Funnel, which contains the portion of the image that will be reflected.  (The width of the Funnel Shell is somewhat analogous to the distance between the two hypothetical mirrors.)  Funnel Options can be set to control whether the rendered Funnel should be tiled kaleidoscopically.  The Funnel shape can be clicked and dragged with the mouse to the desired position on the screen.  The mouse can also be used to adjust the overall Funnel dimensions and the shell thickness.


Triangle (Split) Funnel Selected Triangle (Split) Funnel Rendered

The Shifting Effects feature makes it easy to reposition the 'tile' and underlying source image by clicking and dragging with the mouse.  The button on Kaleid Tools can be pressed to re-render a Funnel with Improved Quality, often producing a smoother, less-pixelated result.

Several more examples of rendered Funnels can be viewed among the Kaleider Sample Images.