Miscellaneous Animations

GitHub Repo: animations

The goal of this endeavor was to play with animating certain motions. I used Python and gizeh, a Python library for vector graphics. Executing these scripts creates a .gif and an .mp4 of the animation.

1. Bouncing Ball

Not much to say here. A ball accelerates to the bottom of the frame and rebounds up with a fraction of its velocity, simulating energy loss on each bounce. Eventually, the ball comes to rest.

2. Infinite Squares

This one is a lot more fun. The looping of the .gif makes it seem like the objects in the frame are shrinking forever. It is reminiscent of “Powers of Ten”, a 1977 short film shown in almost any introductory physics class starting off with a 1 meter squared picture of a picnic in a park that gradually zoomed out to the scale of clusters of galaxies.

3+4. Bunny Hopping

This was supposed to be a simulation of a bunny hopping around, but the motion reminds me more of a flea than a bunny.

Animation is a recurring theme in my hobby-code because it invites you to model motion with clever math. Every frame is another step in an algorithm designed to simulate motion, real or imaginary. Trying to model that with math and in code is always an engaging challenge.