Your question RE: the 3-D graphic, is actually both more understandable and more successful to answer when I use the STUDIO in my head to think about the way you have phrased this...... and I think.... please read that with a show of bluster, ego, self-confidence, and pride before the fall.... I THINK I currently am forcing things to move in multi- dimensional spaces...IF you remember that EVERYTHING in a 2-D drawing is an illusion in the first place. Thusly, I am currently using both FLAT (i.e. Cezannesque space) RENDERED (i.e. Renaissance space) and pure ILLUSION of TRANSPARENCY (i.e. NO SPACE, but pure EXPRESSION OF MOVEMENT on a PARTICLE level..... in other words, like seeing a comet's TAIL, but not the comet).
I can say with confidence, that I am currently UTILIZING all three of these categories of space, but only as PARALLEL to each other.... by which I mean, if each TYPE of space was drawn on a flat sheet of glass, and then all 3 sheets were put together, the spaces would exist in parallel-ness to each other, BUT would not (yet) intertwine. Thusly the MOTION of an image existing in these parallel spaces is expressed INTELLECTUALLY at this stage... more in the wish-fulfillment genre, than existing as an inter-penetrating object which is capable of multi- shapes-forms-mutations, etc.
There-in lies the difference between sculpture and painting. The MOST SUCCESSFUL I ever was with this concept, was back in the 70's, when I worked with poly-chrome- sculpture (basically a concept from the Baroque...look at old churches, where-in architectural elements are PAINTED IN ILLUSION on top of REAL buildings, and then PAINTINGS, using illusionary space, are painted between the illusionary architecture (which acts like a frame for the painting). These THINGS, that people like Michelangelo, Correggio, et al where doing, up through Tiepolo in the 18th. cent. , PLUS some basically unknown INSANE Spanish varieties, are perhaps the furthest possible push illusion and reality have intertwined that I know of.
There IS, now, the MTV concept (like in BLADERUNNER), where buildings act as canvases, only adding the MOTION-EFFECT of film-video, etc.... but it all happens so fast, I have a lack of CONTEMPLATION, which I feel is very necessary to digest this sort of information.
I think the reason I bought the 3-D program was because I felt it would offer a short-cut to these areas, which I could then take to the studio. I still think this will turn out to be true, but it's not as FACILE as I thought it was going to be...obviously requiring learning NOT JUST another concept, but another MEDIUM.... oh well......
However, the secret to all art may lie in motion. Not REAL motion, but the illusion of it. I have succeeded many times in convincing myself that parts of a drawing were in movement, flight, about to crash into another part, jamming up an orifice, cumming...et al...... and not just because I wished it to be so. I think IT REALLY APPEARS SO. And, if I got THIS FAR, then its just a matter of seeing around corners, to get the next step.
It will, if it occurs, require an act of magic (magic in the alchemical sense), and I have no doubt that it will require seeing cross-eyed, or some other physical illusionary STUNT to make it happen. Now, I have seen it once..... I have known about this painting since the mid 1970's, but finally saw it in October in the Tate. Its by Richard Dadd, called THE FAIRY-FELLERS MASTERSTROKE. Its about 14" X 21" ... tiny, only its painted in miniature to sub-miniature... some areas are so small, they DO require a magnifying glass to see. What I never paid much attention to, in reproductions, was this figure who sits in the fore-ground, looking exactly frontal... at YOU... and its cross-eyed!!!!! I just said something like, "fuck-it!", but once I was in front of the picture, I realized Dadd was telling us exactly how to look at it....CROSS-EYED! The ONLY WAY to make the immense amount of STUFF come into focus.
So, does this answer your question? Yes, I believe it does, but it should also give you a SENSE of what your up against, if you decide to join in this particular game.... because, Barrett, like everything REALLY DESIRABLE, inter-penetration of muti-layered-multi-leveled space occurs only in the realm of the MARVELOUS.
Wm.