The art of motion control

June 3, 2015 3:21 PM

Marbles, magnets, and sand - the hypnotic art of Bruce Shapiro [via]
posted by a lungful of dragon (7 comments total)

Fuckin' magnets.
posted by Drinky Die at 3:26 PM on June 3, 2015

And that’s how the universe began?
posted by metaBugs at 4:19 PM on June 3, 2015

Awesome. Awesome, awesome, awesome.
posted by cleroy at 7:10 PM on June 3, 2015

Nice post. That was fun to watch.
posted by double block and bleed at 8:20 PM on June 3, 2015

Ball bearings, not marbles.

I would love to learn more about the mechanisms propelling the guiding magnets, and the programs that guide them.
posted by kinnakeet at 8:36 PM on June 3, 2015

He's actually pretty forthcoming about how he does it.
posted by the Real Dan at 12:12 AM on June 4, 2015 [1 favorite]

I've seen his art in a science museum. It was fun--you could watch it for a while, trying to guess what pattern it was going for, then go explore the museum, then come back to see how far it gotten to, only to realize that it would overwrite itself with non-stop pattern transformations.
posted by eye of newt at 12:21 AM on June 4, 2015