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Vibe Lab·CHLADNI

Sand finds the quiet zones

A square plate hums one of its natural notes. Pixel sand on top of it gets shaken everywhere the plate moves — and slowly piles up along the lines where the plate stays still. Tap to change the note. Same plate, same grains, totally different picture every time. Drag to nudge a grain free if it gets stuck somewhere you don't want it.

What it does

500 grains do a random walk where the step size is proportional to |sin(m·π·x) · sin(n·π·y)|² — the squared amplitude of a (m, n) plate mode. Loud regions kick grains hard; quiet regions barely move them. Over hundreds of frames the grains drain out of antinodes and pile up on the nodal lines.

In the real world

Ernst Chladni discovered this in 1787 by bowing the edge of a metal plate covered in sand. The same physics governs guitar tops, drum heads, smartphone speakers and even the way chocolate dust settles on a vibrating cake pan.

Painted with these colors

Every VibeBoy lab paints with these 16 colors — the same palette PICO-8 made famous. Constraints are what make pixel art feel like pixel art.

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