MICROINTERACTIONS
§ Cat. no. SMTK–MI–2026 — Helsinki field station

cursor proximity, ~90px radius

Sixty specimens of interface motion, designed, pinned, and labelled. Hover, drag, click, press, scroll — each behaves exactly as its badge says.

0 specimens catalogued
VANILLA CSS + JS, zero deps
Helsinki collected 2026

Specimen catalogue

Sixty interactions,
each pinned and labelled.

Every card below is live. The badge in the top-left corner of each specimen tells you exactly what wakes it up.

Trigger key — filter the catalogue
SPEC. 01
hoverprop · transform

Magnetism, cursor var.

The button leans toward the cursor within reach, then springs back the moment you look away.

SPEC. 02
hoverprop · rotateX/Y

Parallax tilt, glare-bearing

Perspective transform tied to pointer position, with a glare that hunts the light source — your cursor.

SPEC. 03
moveprop · svg path

Fluid organism, cursor-fed

An SVG path stretches toward the pointer with spring easing — soft body, no bones.

SPEC. 04
hoverprop · char decode
DECODE ME

Scramble & decode

Characters dissolve into noise, then resolve back to the source word, letter by letter.

SPEC. 05
hoverprop · clip-path
hover to flood

Ink bleed, radial

Colour spreads outward from the point of contact like ink hitting wet paper.

SPEC. 06
dragprop · spring return
DRAG

Elastic tether

Pull it anywhere inside the pen — release, and it snaps home on an overshooting spring.

SPEC. 07
clickprop · radial scale
click anywhere

Impact ripple

Every click seeds a ring at the exact point of contact — no two overlap the same way.

SPEC. 08
hoverprop · direction flip
SOMETEK · HELSINKI · SOMETEK · HELSINKI · SOMETEK · HELSINKI ·

Marquee, reluctant

Drifts one way at rest. Hover, and it reverses course at speed — like it changed its mind.

SPEC. 09
hoverprop · flap cycle
0
0
0

Departures board

Digits cycle like an airport split-flap sign before settling on the real number.

SPEC. 10
moveprop · mask-image
sweep to reveal
hidden in plain sight

Spotlight mask

A hidden layer only shows through a small circle carved out around the cursor.

SPEC. 11
clickprop · particle burst
click to celebrate

Confetti burst

Every click seeds a small explosion of colour at the exact point of contact.

SPEC. 12
hoverprop · rgb offset
SIGNAL LOST

Glitch, RGB split

Red and blue channels shear apart under hover, like a dropped broadcast signal.

SPEC. 13
moveprop · position jump

Repel, evasive var.

The opposite of magnetic — get close and it darts to a new corner of the pen.

SPEC. 14
clickprop · rotateY 180°
click to flip
the other side

Two-sided specimen

A single click turns the card over in 3D — the back only exists once you've looked.

SPEC. 15
press & holdprop · conic fill
hold

Hold to confirm

Nothing happens on a tap — commitment is measured in time, not clicks.

SPEC. 16
dragprop · rotate(deg)

Rotary knob

Drag in a circle around the centre — the indicator tracks your angle exactly.

SPEC. 17
hoverprop · conic-gradient
aurora edge

Aurora border

A conic gradient ring spins around the card the instant your cursor lands on it.

SPEC. 18
clickprop · scale squash

Jelly squash

Cartoon squash-and-stretch on click — overreacts on purpose, settles fast.

SPEC. 19
hoverprop · rotate + translate

Card fan

Three stacked cards spread into a hand of cards the moment you hover the deck.

SPEC. 20
hoverprop · char reveal
hover to type

Typewriter

Text is keyed in character by character, caret blinking, on every fresh hover.

SPEC. 21
moveprop · canvas particles
move inside the glass

Particle trail

A comet's tail of fading dots follows the cursor across the specimen glass.

SPEC. 22
clickprop · line morph

Morphing icon

Three lines rearrange themselves into an X and back — no swapped icon, same lines.

SPEC. 23
hoverprop · bar height
SPEC. 24
moveprop · canvas lines

Constellation network

Nearby nodes draw a line to your cursor and to each other — a sky-map that redraws itself as you move.

SPEC. 25
moveprop · lerp + glow

Bioluminescent orb

A glowing body trails behind the cursor, always a half-beat late, like something alive under dark water.

SPEC. 26
hoverprop · clip-path band
surface reading
skeleton beneath

X-ray scan

A scanning band sweeps down on hover, showing what's structurally underneath before it passes.

SPEC. 27
hoverprop · height fill

Liquid fill

Colour rises from the base like a glass being poured, fully full by the time you've noticed.

SPEC. 28
moveprop · bg-position scale

Magnifying lens

A circular loupe follows the cursor, showing the same field of dots at nearly twice the scale.

SPEC. 29
dragprop · destination-out
you found it

Scratch card

Drag across the foil to wear it away — what's underneath was there before you started.

SPEC. 30
clickprop · rotateY 90°
01
02
03
04

Rotating cube

Four faces, one click each — the cube turns a quarter and waits for the next tap.

SPEC. 31
dragprop · angular physics

Pendulum

Drag the bob aside and let go — it swings on its own, losing a little arc every pass.

SPEC. 32
moveprop · translateY falloff

Ripple surface

A grid of pins dips beneath the cursor like water — the wave rolls outward and settles behind it.

SPEC. 33
dragprop · rgb interpolate

Colour mixer

Drag between two pinned hues — the swatch blends live, pixel by pixel, at every point between.

SPEC. 34
hoverprop · translateY loop

Levitation

Floats gently at rest. Hover, and it rises higher and faster, shadow shrinking as it lifts off.

SPEC. 35
clickprop · rotateY spins
H
T

Coin flip

Click it, and it spins several full turns before settling — heads or tails, decided mid-air.

SPEC. 36
dragprop · bubble follow
00%

Scrubber preview

Drag the handle and a preview bubble rides just above it, always naming exactly where you are.

SPEC. 37
clickprop · scale + opacity loop

Breathing halo

One tap starts a slow four-second breathing loop; another tap and it settles back to still.

SPEC. 38
moveprop · word-level push
keep your distance please

Gravity well

Whole words lean away from the cursor as it nears — repulsion at the word level, not the letter.

SPEC. 39
dragprop · damped oscillation

Yo-yo spring

Pull the weight down and release — it bounces on its string, each pass a little shorter than the last.

SPEC. 40
clickprop · staggered rotate

Domino cascade

Tip the first tile and the rest fall in sequence. Click again once they're down to stand them back up.

SPEC. 41
clickprop · staggered fade

Pixel dissolve

Click, and the whole tile scatters into a grid of fading squares — then quietly reassembles itself.

SPEC. 42
moveprop · position threshold

Waveform scrub

Move across the track and the bars light up exactly as far as your cursor has travelled.

SPEC. 43
press & holdprop · width fill + flicker
hold to charge

Charge meter

Holding crackles the bar upward. Let go early and it drains back down instead of firing.

SPEC. 44
hoverprop · rotate + sequential light

Radar sweep

A beam turns continuously while you hover, lighting each blip on the grid the instant it passes over.

SPEC. 45
clickprop · square wavefront

Echo ping

Click, and a square ring expands outward from that point instead of a circle — corners arrive last.

SPEC. 46
moveprop · sequential translateY
THE WAVE ROLLS THROUGH

Letter wave

Move across the row and each letter bobs up in turn, like a crowd wave passing along a stadium row.

SPEC. 47
press & holdprop · interval ring spawn

Signal beacon

Hold it down and rings pulse outward on a steady beat, like a lighthouse marking its position.

SPEC. 48
dragprop · rotateY meridians

Free-drag globe

A wireframe sphere that spins on its own axis wherever you drag it — no momentum, just direct control.

SPEC. 49
clickprop · graph-distance delay

Network pulse

Click any node and the signal travels the connections outward, each hop lighting a beat later than the last.

SPEC. 50
moveprop · sine bands + hue

Aurora curtain

Bands of colour hang still until you move — then they ripple sideways like light bending in the sky.

SPEC. 51
hoverprop · flocking + glow

Firefly swarm

They drift on their own at rest. Hover, and the whole swarm loosely gathers toward your hand.

SPEC. 52
press & holdprop · contrast + sepia fade
hold to develop

Photo development

Hold, and the image slowly emerges from white like a print in the chemical bath — let go too soon and it fades back.

SPEC. 53
hoverprop · mirrored clip

Kaleidoscope

Six mirrored segments lie flat at rest and spin into symmetry the moment you hover the glass.

SPEC. 54
moveprop · scale falloff

Fisheye bulge

A grid of tiles swells up under the cursor like glass pressed against a lens, and flattens as you leave.

SPEC. 55
dragprop · rotateX/Y free

Free-drag pyramid

No fixed quarter-turns here — drag in any direction and the tetrahedron follows both axes at once.

SPEC. 56
clickprop · multi-axis tumble

Dice roll

Click, and it tumbles through all six faces before settling — genuinely random, every time.

SPEC. 57
clickprop · surface + gravity

Trampoline bounce

Drop it and the surface dips on impact, launching it back up a little lower every time.

SPEC. 58
clickprop · sequential wavefront

Sonar ping

Click, and a wavefront radiates outward across the grid — each dot lighting up exactly as it passes.

SPEC. 59
moveprop · svg path bow

Plucked string

Move along it and the string bows toward your cursor, snapping straight the instant you pull away.

SPEC. 60
clickprop · canvas rings

Pond rings

Every click drops a stone — concentric rings expand and fade, and they stack if you click again before they're gone.


Field notes

Every specimen above runs on plain CSS transitions or vanilla JS — no animation library, no build step. Copy the block you need straight out of the page source and it works standalone.

Collector's remark

Restraint is the actual trick. One good micro-moment at the right point of contact beats sixty competing for attention at once — use these as a palette, not a checklist.