GRECIAN GEARS.

An animator cranks up an ancient machine

One hundred years ago, Greek sponge divers discovered an ancient shipwreck off the coast of Antikythera, an island in the Mediterranean Sea. The contents of the first-century BC vessel--fine bronze and marble statues, gold jewelry, and other works of art--were so impressive that some unwieldy hunks of wood and metal found among them were initially overlooked. As museum technicians began cleaning the fragments, however, gears, dials, and a set of complex instructions revealed themselves from beneath a wooden framework that fell apart as it dried in the air.

From reading the inscriptions, researchers determined that the so-called Antikythera mechanism was a complex astronomical calendar--actually a primitive computer for calculating the positions of celestial bodies--that may have been used for navigation. But not until recent years has the true complexity of the device become clear. With its 20 or more toothed gears, including what appears to be a differential gear assembly, the 2000-year-old mechanism represents technology that had not been thought to exist until the thirteenth or fourteenth century. "It's like opening a pyramid and finding a jet engine inside," says one researcher.

The ramifications of such a device, and how it is reshaping our understanding of ancient Greek technology, inspired modern-day Athenian Adonis Kotzias to create a film about it. "Scientists from around the world are discovering that ancient Greek culture was not just based on philosophy and art--it was very technologically advanced" says Kotzias.

Last year, while working at The Foundation of the Hellenic World, a nonprofit cultural institute in Athens, Kotzias began discussing an animation of the device with architect Ioannis Arvanitis. Based on these discussions, Kotzias was able to create a proposal for a postgraduate project with the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland, where he had received a master's degree in 2D/3D motion graphics and virtual prototyping.

The plan for the three-and-a-half minute film was simple in terms of plot. "The Antikythera Mechanism" depicts a merchant vessel as it would have appeared about 80 BC, when it is supposed to have sunk. The ship sails through calm, then stormy, seas, eventually sinking. A new day then dawns on wreckage floating in the water. At the end of the film, the Antikythera mechanism appears in the heavens, whirling past the sun, moon, and stars, in what is, in Kotzias's words, "a symbolic expression of what this mechanism can do."

Ancient Animation