Matplotlib, Python’s primary scientific plotting library, provides tools to make many elaborate plots, graphs, and diagrams. Many of these can be animated, but the process isn’t always intuitive. The hardest part is learning how to animate a simple line plot (here’s my easy way). Beyond that, the steps to creating most animations tend to be similar.
The examples below demonstrate the particular methods needed to animate common types of plot. Here I focus on the key components needed for updating each frame of the animation. The full code for the examples is here. It includes liberal and arbitrary use of sines and cosines so as to produce looping gifs.
Scatter with variable colour, position, and size
Brushing Up Science 