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I have always loved electronics. I enjoy creating electronic circuits, looking at components, and analyzing their designs. I could spend hours just observing them. What fascinated me the most was how their design is purely functional, rather than aesthetic. Over time, I began to appreciate the industrial beauty that emerges from this functionality.

Take capacitors, for example. Their design is entirely practical—a metal canister (i guess aluminum) filled with liquid, with two leads extending from it. It’s a strange yet fascinating object, and it made me think about how other things could resemble it. A medicine bottle with pills inside, or any other kind of container. Even the polarity marking on a capacitor could be seen as a form of branding.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve imagined a world built from electronic components—a city where capacitors serve as energy or water tanks, tall LEDs function as streetlights, and large screens display advertisements. A dystopian world with no trees or organic life, just raw functionality.

Discovering X3DOM

Recently, I discovered a tool called X3DOM through Web legend Melonking. As soon as I started using it, I knew I wanted to build my own miniature electronics city.

I have some basic knowledge of PCB design, which I picked up during my recent experiments with electronics. So, I created a circuit board—not for any real function, just as a design experiment. I wasn’t aiming for a perfect result, but rather testing the idea itself—whether X3DOM could handle it.

The Process

  • Designed the board with 96 items in KiCad, Exported the board as a STEP file.
  • Imported into Fusion 360 to fix and refine the model then export as an OBJ file.
  • Used Blender to organize and rename parts and separate components as needed and adjust materials, then exported as a X3D file.
  • Integrated it into web page using X3DOM and added some functionality with JavaScript.

After a lot of refinement, it finally worked the way I wanted, and I loved it. the project with all the files, models, and everything is on my GitHub as an open-source thing.

What excites me most is how this project added a new dimension to my imagination of the city—it feels as if I’ve actually visited this place, as if it exists outside my mind now. That’s a beautiful thing.

I’d be really happy if someone tried exploring my city sacrificing 100MB of internet. I’ll be updating the design soon with an improved version, and I’m excited to experiment with it again.

This project has sparked a lot of ideas in my mind, educational, commercial, even industrial possibilities. I think I might create a tutorial or two about this process and share them, as long as I don’t get distracted by something else.