Wikipedia
Trenticular is a painting/printing technique where three different images can be painted/printed on a single complex surface which when viewed from a perspective will display only one image at a time. The surface generally used in trenticular technique is an array of triangular pyramids. These pyramids are specially designed and positioned to match with the angle of view of the human Eye (from 120 degree to 200 degree) and the focal length of 22 mm. The perspective points or lines will be 120 degrees apart.
If the surface is rotated around the center or the viewer moves around the painting, a visual image transition can be seen which is similar to the transition in a lenticular hologram.
In a lenticular hologram the transition is achieved through microscopic prisms and is Only possible with specialized equipments or printers whereas in Trenticular it uses macroscopic pyramids which enables it to be painted or printed without the help of any specialized equipments.
Trenticular concept was introduced by the Guinness World Record winning Artist Limnesh Augustine and team in the year 2012 in Bahrain. He used Gypsum and Fiberglass to create the pyramid surfaces on specialized tiles.
Tile Arrangement Strategies
There are basically two types of tile arrangement strategies.
1. Side Perspective Strategy
2. Corner Perspective Strategy
The tile array is classified and Latitudes and Longitudes. Latitudes represent the ring addressing and Longitudes represent the linear addressing (Star Topology)
The effective possible measurements of a classic Trenticular Corner Perspective Artwork is displayed in the chart below:
Side Tiles
Outer Ring Tiles
Total Tiles
Side Width (meter)
Diameter (meter)
Area (sq meter)
1
1
1
0.125
0.2165
0.0403828125
2
6
7
0.25
0.433
0.2826796875
3
12
19
0.375
0.6495
0.7672734375
4
18
37
0.5
0.866
1.4941640625
5
24
61
0.625
1.0825
2.4633515625
6
30
91
0.75
1.299
3.6748359375
7
36
127
0.875
1.5155
5.1286171875
8
42
169
1
1.732
6.8246953125
9
48
217
1.125
1.9485
8.7630703125
10
54
271
1.25
2.165
10.9437421875
11
60
331
1.375
2.3815
13.3667109375
12
66
397
1.5
2.598
16.0319765625
There is a practical limitation in Trenticular painting arrangement beyond 12 due to human visibility angle
Trenticular Printing beyond 12 array is possible. But <1 cm pyramids need to be used
Example of a Trenticular painting
For the painting titled "Ill effects of Smoking", the following three images were used as the design.
The painting was done on trenticular hexagonal surface
The way trenticular painting is done. The hexagonal shape will provide three equal perspective observation sides separated by 120 degrees
Observer Views
This is the way an observer will see the painting from 1st Perspective side
This is the way an observer will see the painting from 2nd Perspective side
This is the way an observer will see the painting from 3rd Perspective side