Operating on the Animation Scene Graph in XML (X3D)

The motivation for this article lies in 3D computer graphics animation systems that were developed twenty to thirty years ago. The author particularly sees the connection between Mathematica and the animation system that ran in Genera Lisp on the Symbolics platform. This article presents a method for programmatically operating on an animation scene graph in Mathematica represented in the X3D extension of the Extensible Markup Language (XML). Below is presented historical and conceptual background on the animation scene graph and a contemporary example. Further motivation came from comparing the user interface design of a current, advanced animation system to an animation scene graph implemented in X3D and uploaded to Wolfram|Alpha Pro. Finally, this article presents an instance where an X3D scene graph was used in the “Fingerspelling Sign Language” Demonstration [1].