This Google Doodle lets you create calming musical animations

Today would have been Oskar Fischinger’s 117th birthday, and Google is using its latest doodle to celebrate his abstract animations.

The German-American was notable for his abstract musical animations long before computer graphics and the concept of music videos came into play.

In 1936, Fischinger and his wife fled Germany when it became clear he could not pursue his art under Hitler’s regime. When he arrived in the US, Paramount Pictures offered him a job. He went on to animate sequences for Disney’s Fantasia and Pinocchio.

The artist’s work was largely created between the 1920s and 1940s — and the lack of digital technology meant he often spent months painstakingly creating his paper stop-motions.

Luckily, Google isn’t asking you to do the same. In fact, they’ve made it incredibly easy to create your own composition to which it adds Fischinger-like animations.

The Google Doodle offers four instruments and a variety of modifications so that your piece will sound beautiful no matter your musical background — and it even offers the option to share to Twitter, Facebook or via email.

Composing music with a #GoogleDoodle thingy, lol! 😂 Oh Oskar Fischinger… You never cease to amuse me! 💖 pic.twitter.com/GzEMQpgxgM

— Utho Riley (@UthoRiley) June 21, 2017

Create visual music for Oskar Fischinger’s 117th birthday in this #GoogleDoodle👀🎶https://t.co/BZUSZ3xsGp

— N¡R!😅 (@niriksha435) June 22, 2017

Leon Hong, the doodle’s creator, says that Fischinger’s work left him in “awe” when he first discovered him in college.

“I hope [the doodle] inspires you to seek out the magic of Fischinger for yourself,” he writes.

Yesterday’s Google Doodle celebrated the summer and winter solstices — the middle of winter and summer for Earth’s two hemispheres.