About * This station will remain on-air until the collapse of humanity,
or we stop paying our web-hosting bill. Whichever comes first.
Created by Russell Samora and Kevin Litman-Navarro for The Pudding .
This is a companion piece to our main story The Afterlife of Pi . Read more to learn about the history of its calculation and the
unexpected paths it took across a century.
How the sound works: Every note of the melody you hear is the next digit of
pi, in order. Each digit is a note in the Fmaj scale. 0 and 9 are rests
(silence). Digits are not skipped or changed, but we've created a set of
simple rules (and some fiddly ones that aren't worth explaining) that decide
when each note plays and how long it lasts to best match the underlying
progression.
How walking pi works: The colored squares are a picture of the same digits.
Each digit from 1 to 8 points in one of eight directions, like the points on
a compass. 0 and 9 mimic the rests and don't move. Older steps slowly fade
away. Why create a random walk? Well, read the essay !
Sound engineer and background track artisan: Kevin Litman-Navarro
Video credit: Moving Image Archive. "Just Pies" should be self-explanatory. "Making Pi" is an homage to William Shanks.
Why? Well, read the essay !
Close
Walking pi: a trail of colored squares drawn from the digits of pi as they
play. Each digit from 1 to 8 moves one square in a compass direction, from 1
for up, clockwise to 8 for up-left. 0 and 9 are rests and don't move. Older
squares slowly fade.