Known Space Explorer - Cinematic Space Exploration Experience

Known Space Explorer is a cinematic space exploration experience built with pure HTML, CSS, and JavaScript that visualizes the Solar System and the Observable Universe directly in your browser. No installation or build step required.

🌐 Try now at kunaldasx.github.io/space-simulator

Demo

Key Features

Journey Flow

Launch - Watch your shuttle lift off from Earth
Orbit - Float in space with Earth behind you
Solar System - All 8 planets orbiting the Sun; tap any planet for details
Observable Universe - Zoom out to the full 93-billion-light-year cosmos

Showcase Features

Observatory-style HUD - Scene status with a live discovery count
Universal Search - Search across planets, the Sun, galaxies, clusters, voids, and cosmic structures
Direct Target Focusing - Focus directly on selected objects
Random Discovery - Discover random objects throughout the experience
Earth Shortcut - Quickly return focus to Earth
Pan & Zoom - Mouse/touch pan with pinch or button zoom
Responsive Detail Views - Explore object information with keyboard-friendly controls
Escape-to-Close - Close detail views using the Escape key

Project Structure

The project is organized as a lightweight browser application with no build step:

Known Space Explorer
├── index.html      # Page structure and scene controls
├── styles.css      # Layout, visual, and animation styles
├── constants.js    # Astronomy data for planets and universe objects
└── app.js          # Scene navigation, rendering, gestures, and interaction logic

How To Use

No installation or dependency setup is required. Simply open index.html in any modern browser.

Clone the repository

git clone https://github.com/kunaldasx/space-simulator.git
cd space-simulator

Open the application
```
open index.html
```
You can also open index.html directly in any modern browser.

Technologies

This software uses the following technologies:

HTML5
CSS3 animations
Vanilla JavaScript

License

About the Author

Kunal Das