Microsoft challenged Big Spaceship to take on the beta release of IE9—to explore the new features and functionality of the browser and push the limits of what’s possible. We responded with “Always Beautiful”, an interactive experience that uses the history of the web as a personal paintbrush.

IE9’s new support for web standards and SVG are impressive, but hard to comprehend in the abstract. We wanted to show how these new capabilities translate into unparalleled opportunities for users and developers.

Drawing inspiration from the ever-evolving trends of the Web and setting them against a soundtrack from recording artist Ming, users generate a completely unique piece of artwork from a library of Web-inspired graphic assets we created. IE9’s unique use of the user’s graphics processor allowed for hundreds of assets on the screen at once with no drop in performance. And with native browser support of HTML5 standards and SVG, the creation could be be generated based on real-time user input and output at any size.

The result? A beautiful piece of artwork rich in detail, representing the beauty of the Web in a way only IE9 can deliver.