Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Optical Toys

http://courses.ncssm.edu/gallery/collections/toys/opticaltoys.htm is a site that shows some of the most extraordinary optical toys that were created a long time ago, the site itself doesn't look too pleasing, but the information it gives is good. On the site it shows 12 pictures of optical toys, if you click on the pictures you will be transferred to another page explaining about the toy (how it works/history of the toy.) 


We are now learning about optical toys and I found one quite interesting for me, it's called Thaumatrope.  I've seen this before and created one actually. John Ayrton Paris created this in 1825. What it basically is, a disk not much bigger then 15 cm in diameter with 2 drawings on each sides, its then tied 2 strings on opposite sides of the circle so you can spin it. After that is complete, you need to make sure you can line the two drawings up properly so you will be able to see 1 drawing out of the two. 


You can check an animation of the Thaumatrope here.

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