Open Source Physics

So, I just got done reading the Physics Teacher (journal from the AAPT). In the back of each issue is a list of cool websites. I just got done looking at one of them titled Open Source Physics. Now, given my bent on opensource and physics I had to check this out. Combine it with the fact that it is hosted at comPADRE and I knew it had to be good.

Open Source Physics has a collection of tools for computational physics. I've only scratched the surface, but I think it will be a center point of the honors physics course I'm designing for next year. The one piece to catch my attention first was the Tracker program. This is a java based video analysis tool. It also includes the ability to mathematically model motion. You can overlay the model right on the video. So you could model a perfect projectile path and show how an NBA player seems to float when they dunk a ball. The center of mass fill follow a parabolic path even though his head follows a nearly horizontal path.

So far I've done some basic motion analysis and it's pretty easy to do. Not quite as slick as LoggerPro, but it's free and very functional. I will be playing more with this and will be creating some tutorials for the FlosScience site.