Looks cool, so I feel churlish complaining, but I'd prefer it if the speed was varied by changing the distance/rotation moved, rather than the time delay between frames. i.e. like true slow-motion from a high fps camera.
EDIT unfortunately, the approach he used precludes this: http://www.animatedengines.com/howto.shtml I guess it illustrates how rare it is to combine domain expertise (like that guy has), with an unrelated expertise in animation. If you have both (or access to them), you can make difficult things much easier, and so create value.
Cool, thanks. The main motion works for me (FF 2, linux, on a eeePC 900MHz), except for black circles that appear and disappear near the center, in 3 locations (only one is visible at a time, and sometimes none are).
(I let it update a few times to settle down before pasting the figures, so they represent an average of the "average overrun").
Maybe it doesn't matter so much if the fps is slow for more complex engines? If the change between updates is small enough, it will look pretty smooth. Is it important to be able to make the machine rotate fast? I mean, it looks cool, but does the viewer gain greater understanding from this? (I'm not being rhetorical - I really don't know. Maybe it gives an overall feel for the engine's operation).
Sorry, I don't have any experience with JS animation to address the issues you mention. Some people here probably do though - or why not ask on http://stackoverflow.com ? It's often excellent for clear technical questions.
