OBSERVATION 036

往来

Ōrai — Coming and Going

Play with it

Press the picture or the button to reduce the points.40,000 → 625 → 40 → 1, then back to 40,000.
At fewer points, dots grow and trails linger to help you follow their paths.
“Listen” maps the displayed points to sound.Changing the count rebuilds the sound.

Chapter
Likeness
Year
2026
Medium
Equation, run live in the browser
Points
40,000
Cycle
20s per turn
Fingerprint
sha256 78abcd23…ef21

Points circle a ring. There is a flow going, and a flow returning.

Two stretches of stillness travel the ring at different speeds.

When the flow enters one, the points are not drawn.
Even the vanished points keep circling inside the equation.
Past the stretch, they appear again.

To be, or not to be there —
what decides it is not any property of the point.
It is the interval the equation places it in.

Reduce the points and the same thing happens.
At one point, the line becomes a broken arc.
While that point is inside a stillness, its old trail gradually fades.

This coming and going brings money to mind.
A thing received, and handed on.
What becomes visible only while it is passing between us?

Read and verify the equation
(i, t,
        st = i % 40, p = (i / 40 | 0) / 999, dr = st % 2 * 2 - 1,
        u1 = st * .618034 % 1, v = i * .754878 % 1,
        a = p * TAU + dr * t * .5,
        r = 96 + 34 * (u1 - .5) + 12 * sin(a * 3 + st * .7 - dr * t * .25) + 5 * sin(a * 7 + u1 * TAU),
        S1 = max(0, sin(a - t * .75 + 1.2)) ** 6, S2 = max(0, sin(a + t * .25 + 4.4)) ** 6,
        S = max(S1, S2)
       ) => v < S ? [-9, -9]
         : [200 + r * cos(a), 200 + r * sin(a) * .78 + 8 * sin(a * 2 - dr * t * .25)]

Fingerprint of this equation

sha256:78abcd2373728975ae69eea120c723ef8eb8962ab0b33f6cf4e8bb165d6bef21

The same point number and time give the same coordinates.
Trails and the appearance of points depend on rendering settings and the device.

The button above takes the equation out as it is. To count it again yourself:

pbpaste > f.txt && printf %s "$(cat f.txt)" | shasum -a 256

Take it and run it.What appears when you change the equation? Run and rewrite this equation →