I am uncertain where in the computer forums to put my questions.

To reference what I am talking about, please see this site: http://www.izpitera.ru/lj/tetka.swf

By no means do I mean to say I approve the weirdness of this, however it did raise some technical questions.

I know it is in Macromedia Flash, and it loops - however at the same time it is interactive (limited) you can click on the lady and make her move: "throw" her, slip her between the spheres, etc. When I hit play for a flash of an instant there is a stick figure (I guess the frame for this). So I assume one can change the 'skin' on this.

The Gravity of the site is interesting, and the spheres appear to be slippery. In my opinion the spheres should have a time limit for existence, becoming bubbles that pop so the "lady" (on the site) will continue on her downward fall instead of getting stuck.

Is there a way to reproduce this - not just copy it - put reproduce it and apply different things, say a cow, or a robot, or something not quite as unnerving?

Can it be made into a screen saver?

Basically I like the concept, falling figure (not so dead-like) the slipping over spheres, the movement - I think it would make a killer (pun intended) screen saver with the right adjustments – I’m thinking of a multi-limbed articulated geometric thing – not a life form – least ways not one that looks so creepy. Is there anyway I can do something similar?

Thanks

"How does this work?" I can't answer all your questions. But I can help with some very rudimentary knowledge of graphics programming.

Here's the "skeleton" of the falling woman, which I captured using a well-timed press of the PrintScreen key during the instant it appeared when I clicked on Play in the right-click context menu:



It consists of rigid segments connected to pivot points in a hierarchical structure. For example, the pelvis is the parent of the thigh, which is the parent of the lower leg, etc. Movements must be iterated down the hierarchy. Rotations of the segments about the pivots are accomplished using matrix mathematics to transform points from one configuration to another.

The laws of physics are applied using forward kinematics and inverse kinematics (Google these terms to learn more), usually with the help of powerful, professional graphical modeling software. For example, take a look at this article and this one. It's not trivial. The way the body parts swing in this applicaton is extremely realistic and hardly the work of an amateur.

I agree that it should be possible to map other images onto the linkages to change the finished appearance from a woman to a Raggedy Ann doll, or a gorilla, or whatever. I don't know exactly how you'd do this. I suspect you've got to know a lot about graphical rendering to make even simple adaptations.

Wish I knew more. Hope that helps.

Edited to correct image size.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Karrow,

Ouch, this old dog isn't up to learning that many new tricks.

I thought is might me a simple thing.

Thanks for all the info, I will read it more.

Professor
Thank you for your answer. I did not have a clue how this was done and I appreciate your insights into this process.

Dwight

I was asking my son about this and he explained a bit of the mathematics and a bit about Macromedia Flash Player, Pro Edition. This is the program that you can use to write a flash presentation.

Anyway, he showed me the http://www.flashplayer.com site where you can see *examples. One I found interesting is "Gravity Tester". You can locate and run it at the site. Use the Search to find it.

*Click the "Animation" link at the top of the page.

Dwight

A similar site: http://www.chezmaya.com/applet/valentin.htm