Demo Lab

Black Hole Playground

Explore how mass, spin, and viewing angle change a visual toy model of gravitational time dilation, lensing distortion, and redshift near a compact object.

Time dilation 2.18x

Lensing strength 1.42

Redshift 0.31 z

Mass 32 solar masses Spin 0.42 a Observer angle 48 degrees

hot accretion side redshifted side photon ring curved light path

Time Dilation

Higher mass and closer visual orbiting regions increase the displayed time dilation readout.

Lensing

The photon ring and background star distortion strengthen as the compact-object model becomes more extreme.

Redshift

Spin and viewing angle change the contrast between the hotter approaching side and dimmer redshifted side.