GIF animation of mode shapes and other data on the internet

摘要

The World Wide Web abounds with animated cartoons and advertisements competing for our attention. Most of these illustrations are animated Graphics Interchange Format (GIF) files. These files contain a series of ordinary GIF images plus controlinformation and they provide an exceptionally simple, effective way to animate on the Internet. To date, however, this format has rarely been used for technical data, although there is no inherent reason not to do so. This article describes a procedurefor creating high-resolution animated GIFs of mode shapes and other types of structural dynamics data with readily available software. The article shows three example applications using recent modal test data and video footage of a high-speed sled run. Afairly detailed summary of the GIF file format is provided in the appendix. All of the animations discussed in the paper are posted on the Internet at the following address: http://sdb-www.larc.nasa.gov/SDB/Research/ data/pappa_data/imaci 17_figs.