Reproducing works of Calder

Many fine art pieces have been reproduced in digital form. The digital reproductions have been used to store and transmit the original work. In contrast, mobiles, or moving sculptures, such as those designed by Alexander Calder cannot be reproduced realistically by photographs and/or static images. The real characteristics of mobiles come from the motions generated by interactive external forces applied to their structures. Hence people could not fully enjoy them through static images or even static three-dimensional models. We present a virtual mobile system where users can easily control the mobile and can feel the impressions that the artist originally intended to provide. Virtual winds are generated by blowing on a microphone which then exert external forces to the mobile. This microphone interface lets users control the mobile while they are watching it through a monitor. We introduce a linear time solution for the constraint dynamics and an improved impulse dynamics to speed up the simulation. Using these techniques, we achieve a realtime simulation of the mobile on personal computers. The techniques presented can easily be extended to simulate other interactive dynamics systems. Copyright # 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.