Graduation date: 2007
This thesis presents a domain specific visual language designed to allow coaches to create content that exhibits the complex 2D interactions observed in the game of American football. Coaches can visually program the content by using symbols and drawing primitives similar to those that they currently use to design static playbooks. However, the result is not a static play, but animated primitives that move according to the programmed rules. The symbols and primitives represent rules that can be applied to the 2D synthetic players. The user can specify rules and run the simulation. At run-time, the rules are unified as a set of vector constraints. The resultant vector is used to animate the motion of the 2D player. The combination of football primitives and parameterization of those primitives allows the user to program the simulation to achieve the desired performance. We present the language and user-centered design process. We discuss the language and visual components and conclude with a description of the feedback from interviews with football coaches.