Why the Aurora Never Repeats Twice

The northern lights across the top of the site aren't a single image on a loop — they're generated a little differently each time the page loads, which is either a nice touch or a mildly excessive amount of effort for a background, depending on your view. I lean towards the first, or I wouldn't have built it that way.

It started as a much simpler gradient, three bands of teal and pink that repeated every few seconds. It looked fine in isolation but went stale within about a minute of actually sitting with it, which is the opposite of what I wanted from something meant to sit quietly behind a card table.

Getting the movement slow enough was harder than getting it varied enough. Anything with real motion felt like it was competing with the games in front of it, pulling attention sideways instead of keeping the room feeling alive. The version that finally worked barely moves at all — you notice it more in the corner of your eye than head-on.

I tested it running behind Polar Roulette Ring for longer than I'd like to admit, mostly because that table has the most empty space around it and the lights show through clearest there. It's a small thing, but it's the sort of detail that made the whole lounge feel like one place rather than a folder of separate pages.

If you ever notice the sky looking slightly different between visits, that's not a bug — that's rather the point of building it this way.