  Physics-based animation of soft or rigid bodies for real-time applications
often suffers from numerical instabilities. We analyse one of the most common
sources of unwanted behaviour: the numerical integration strategy. To assess
the impact of popular integration methods, we consider a scenario where soft
and hard constraints are added to a custom designed deformable linear object.
Since the goal for this class of simulation methods is to attain interactive
frame-rates, we present the drawbacks of using explicit integration methods
over inherently stable, implicit integrators. To help numerical solver
designers better understand the impact of an integrator on a certain simulated
world, we have conceived a method of benchmarking the efficiency of an
integrator with respect to its speed, stability and symplecticity.
