Your Paper is Dead! Bringing Life to Research Articles with Animated Figures

AbstractThe dissemination of scientific knowledge has evolved over the centuries from handwritten manuscripts transcribed and published as physical black and white prints-on-paper, to digital documents in full color available for consultation online. Even if it now primarily relies on digital media, academic publishing still generally adheres to its historical rigid paper-based style—where static content is presented at the ready-to-print letter format. In this paper, we reflect on our experience of authoring a published academic article that embeds an animated figure and discuss the opportunities and caveats of transitioning to such practice at the wider academic literature scale.