Dominoes have been entertaining, educating and amusing children and adults for generations. And while the popular game’s simple rules may seem straightforward enough, creating a domino setup that falls according to the laws of physics is surprisingly complicated. Lily Hevesh, a 20-year-old professional domino artist with over 2 million YouTube subscribers, creates stunning arrangements of hundreds of thousands of dominoes. She says one physical phenomenon is essential to her domino projects: gravity.
When Hevesh sets up a large domino display, she starts by making test versions of each section. She films the tests in slow motion so that she can make precise corrections if something isn’t working properly. Once she has the test pieces in place, she begins placing the larger dominoes in a flat arrangement. Then she builds the lines of dominoes that connect each section together. Hevesh says that she always tests her final domino layout in slow motion as well to ensure that everything works the way she wants it to.
She adds that the most important thing is to plan carefully before beginning construction. She has to keep in mind how the dominoes will fall and how much space she will need to move them around, as well as how long it will take for the entire project to complete. Then, when she is satisfied with the results of her work, she will film it in real time to share on her channel.
In addition to their use in a variety of games, dominoes have been used in other ways, including as educational tools and aids in learning mathematics. They are often used to teach multiplication and division, and the numbers on each individual domino can be counted by students in order to help them learn these concepts.
Dominoes are also a popular choice for a number of different party games. In these games, players compete to win by playing all of their dominoes first. The player who wins the most dominoes is declared the winner. While domino games are most commonly played with a traditional wood or plastic set, they can also be made from other materials, such as marble, clay and metal.
There are many games that can be played with dominoes, including a variation of Concentration called “Centrum.” Other popular games include domino strategy, in which players try to build chains of dominoes that add up to a certain total; or blocking and scoring games, which involve forming lines of dominoes in various shapes. Some domino games also have an artistic element, such as a form of solitaire known as domino tiling, which involves placing matching dominoes side-by-side so that they touch at their centers.
The term domino, from the Latin dominio (“heard”), comes from the fact that dominoes have an echoing sound when they are knocked over. The word’s other meaning, denoting a hooded robe worn with a mask at carnival season or a masquerade, is derived from an earlier sense of the word, which may have referred to a cape worn by a priest over his surplice.