What this explores
Verlet integration for rope physics, elastic constraints, and responsive drag handling.
Principles demonstrated
- Physics simulation with Verlet integration
- Canvas rendering with gradients
- Touch and mouse interaction handling
- Performance optimization with requestAnimationFrame
Build It Yourself
Step-by-step guide to recreate this experiment
Intermediate45-60 min
Prerequisites
- Basic JavaScript/TypeScript
- HTML Canvas fundamentals
- Understanding of 2D vectors
Verlet integration is a way of calculating motion that skips storing velocity. Instead, it works out movement from the difference between the current and previous positions. That makes it naturally stable, and it's a great fit for ropes and cloth.
javascript
// Traditional physics: velocity-based
position += velocity;
velocity += acceleration;
// Verlet integration: position-based
const velocity = position - previousPosition;
previousPosition = position;
position += velocity + acceleration;Verlet integration is self-correcting. Small errors don't accumulate over time the way they do with Euler integration.