Desmos Panda Project

This panda was made in Desmos using a few images of black, white, and pink circles that I made in Keynote. I made lists to set their centers, dimensions, and angles. I also graphed an ellipse for the head and two parametric circles for the mouth. I thought about symmetry a lot while working on this graph.

My elementary aged kids and nephew asked me if I was doing work when I made this (I work at Desmos). I told them I was doing it for fun, and that I thought maybe it would be cool if they worked on a similar project in their math class one day. They all seemed to like the idea and sat around me engaging in a discussion about the math I was using.

Question: What mathematics would students need to know before working on the panda project? 

Note: I am interested in exploring what a Desmos art/animation course would look like for personal reasons, but also I am interested in exploring what it would look like because I'd love to see a course like this offered at the high school or college level as a math elective.