DIY animation

Animated fidget spinner

Give new life to your fid­get spin­ner!

Safe­ty pre­cau­tions

Warn­ing! Only un­der adult su­per­vi­sion.

Equip­ment

  • fid­get spin­ner;
  • an­i­ma­tion sto­ry­board on thick pa­per (12 frames);
  • dou­ble-sid­ed tape.

Step-by-step in­struc­tions

Re­move the mid­dle sec­tion of a fid­get spin­ner and se­cure a sto­ry­board disk on it with dou­ble-sid­ed tape. Spin the spin­ner and take a video with your phone cam­era at a rate of 30 frames per sec­ond. Af­ter some time, the pic­tures will oc­cu­py a set po­si­tion and each will move sep­a­rate­ly!

Process de­scrip­tion

An­i­ma­tion is based on a se­quence of frames with chang­ing de­tails re­plac­ing one an­oth­er at a cer­tain fre­quen­cy. 12 frames per sec­ond is enough for the hu­man brain to per­ceive the frame change as con­tin­u­ous move­ment. In­creas­ing the frame rate fur­ther, up to 60 frames per sec­ond, im­proves the smooth­ness of mo­tion. Your phone cam­era records a cer­tain num­ber of frames per sec­ond, and the an­i­ma­tion be­comes vis­i­ble when the spin­ner's speed be­comes a mul­ti­ple of the frame fre­quen­cy. The pic­tures re­place each oth­er in each new frame, cre­at­ing the il­lu­sion of con­tin­u­ous move­ment!

You can make many more cool toys with a MEL STEM sub­scrip­tion!

Try it