Rod constraints for simplified ragdolls

Programmers sometimes love rag dolls. This study is the fruit of one such love: “Rod constraints for simplified ragdolls,” Chris Lewin, Matt Thorman, Tom Waterson, Chris Williams, and Phil Willis, Proceedings of the 12th ACM SIGGRAPH/Eurographics Symposium on Computer Animation, pp. 79-84. ACM, 2013. The authors, at the University of Bath, UK, and Electronic Arts, […]

The broken-spaghetti physics behind Illustrator

Research on how spaghetti breaks (research that was honored with the 2006 Ig Nobel Prize in physics) had an influence on modern computer-aided drawing tools. Melanie Kaplan in SmartPlanet reports: During a recent conversation with Eitan Grinspun [pictured, spaghetti-less, here], I found myself wondering whether he is more obsessed with food or with movement. But then […]

Improbable Research