Accelab 2.0 is now available on the App Store. It's the biggest change to the app since I first built it, and it started with a problem in the very first version.

Where it started

Last year in Grade 11 physics, we did a lab with a cart on an air track. We filmed the cart, then went through the video and recorded, by hand, how far it had travelled every 0.2 seconds.

The part where the real learning happened, calculating the acceleration due to gravity, didn't take long at all. Collecting the data was what drained all my energy.

Then the iPhone in my hand caught my eye. If I used its sensors, could I skip the tedious part and focus on the acceleration calculation, where the actual physics is?

That night I went home, stayed up, and built an app. That was Accelab.

The problem I didn't think about

I showed it to my teacher, who said it was a really good idea. But there was one thing I hadn't considered while building it: the weight of the iPhone. Because of it, the iPhone barely moved along the track.

A new teacher, a new approach

This year, in Grade 12, I have a new physics teacher. Reviewing last year's concepts reminded me of Accelab and the problem it never solved, so I asked my new teacher for advice.

Their suggestion: what if the app analysed a video instead? Then the iPhone wouldn't need to ride on the cart at all.

I took that advice and worked hard on a new version. That version is Accelab 2.0.

AI transparency

Accelab 2.0 has been developed with substantial help from Claude Fable 5.1 on Claude Code. I used it to explore some mathematical concepts I haven't learned yet required to achieve the feature.

Mathematics behind the camera method

I have also published a document containing the mathematical concepts used to achieve this feature. You can read it here.

Availability

Accelab 2.0 is available now on the App Store, for iOS 26.0 or later.