Interactive music video shows off amazing power of HTML5 and WebGL

[youtube=http://http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReH7zzj5GPc&w=670&h=411]

Google has been at the forefront of the HTML5 revolution which has been unfolding on the web. Look no further than the Chrome Experiments page which contains dozens of advanced HTML5 examples that will give you a pause. I blogged about some of the must-see examples which knocked my socks off. Nothing could prepare me for the latest demo. This stuff has just considerably raised the bar of what’s possible on the web.

The combination of HTML5/WebGL code and a GPU-enhanced browser with hardware-accelerated graphics like Google Chrome is what makes possible “Rome: 3 Dreams of Black”, a collaborative music video from Jack White, Norah Jones, Daniele Luppi and Danger Mouse. It’s the best WebGL showcase I’ve seen so far. Check it out in its entirety below the fold.

You can pan across the panoramic video by moving the mouse in any direction, but nothing could prepare you for an immersive experience when 3D objects like birds and buildings begin flying around, all rendered in real-time according to your current viewpoint. Go ahead and check it out in Chrome right now. Google recommends the Chrome Canary build (now available on Mac OS X as well) that comes with the latest experimental features planned for stable releases. Note that stable and Canary builds of Chrome can co-exist on your machine without interfering with each other.