In this animated movie, created with the Autodesk Maya software, the well-known helicoid minimal surface is presented. The geometry is rendered as a glass surface on which several rolling marbles illustrate the curvature of the surface. Amongst the set of known minimal surfaces, the helicoid is one of the oldest, since it has been first described by Leonhard Euler back in 1774. Furthermore, the helicoid has a dual minimal surface, also mentioned in the video: the catenoid. The video shown is the result of a student project by Ulrike Bath, Kevin Guo, and Fabian Löbel in a seminar of the workgroup of Professor Polthier at Freie University Berlin. Post processing was done by Ulrike Bath and Kevin Guo.

Music is due to www. bensound.com