From providing that "happy accident" that spurs organic creativity, to filling in the background with intricate detail, to expressing a whole piece at the intersection of art and math, generative art techniques have been used for centuries by visual and musical creators. In this talk, we'll explore a few techniques and tools that anyone can use on even modest computer hardware to inspire or guide their own work. This talk was presented at Convox 2015.

1. Generative Art:
a Systemic Approach to
Manufacturing Inspirado
Nathan Moser
nate@rezonate.org

2. “Where do songs come from? Inspirado.
I mean, I could 23-skidoo you a song, but that would be false. It would
be wrong. You can't… manufacture inspirado. It arises from a stillness,
a quietude. When your heart mingles with your soul, and… oh man
they do the dance! The ancient…
[gasp] I swallowed a bug! I swallowed a bug!”
- Jack Black, Tenacious D, ‘The Search for Inspirado’
Where does art come from?

3. “Sometimes you've gotta leave your zone of
safety. You have to manufacture inspirado.”

4. Generative art refers to art that in whole or in part has been
created with the use of an autonomous system.
An autonomous system in this context is generally one that
is non-human and can independently determine features of
an artwork that would otherwise require decisions made
directly by the artist.
In some cases the human creator may claim that the
generative system represents their own artistic idea, and in
others that the system takes on the role of the creator.
-- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Generative_art

5. The System can be...
● Random
● Algorithmic
● Some of both

6. Early Examples

7. Rug Weaving
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Rug-weaving,_Hamadan.jpg

8. Girih Tiles
A set of five tiles used to build up complex
patterns in Arabic/Islamic decorative
architecture since the
13th century.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Girih_tiles.svg

9. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Green_mosque_archway.JPG

10. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Roof_hafez_tomb.jpg

11. Musikalisches Würfelspiel
‘Musical Dice Game’
Popular in 18th century Europe
Mozart’s(?) version:
Anleitung zum Componieren von Walzern so viele man
will vermittelst zweier Würfel, ohne etwas von der Musik
oder Composition zu verstehen
"Instructions for the composition of as many waltzes as one
desires with two dice, without understanding anything
about music or composition"
https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/1516316/

12. Hasser werden hassen
“The 'galant' middle class in Europe was playing with
mathematics.
In this atmosphere of investigation and cataloguing, a
systematic device that would seem to make it possible
for anyone to write music was practically guaranteed
popularity.”
- Stephen A. Hedges, Dice Music in the Eighteenth
Century, Music and Letters (1978) 59 (2): 180-187

13. Modern Visual Examples

14. John Green, http://fleen.org

17. Jonathan McCabe
http://www.jonathanmccabe.com/

19. Holger Lippmann
http://www.holgerlippmann.de/
See also wowgreat.tumblr.com

23. Michael Hansmeyer, Computational Architecture
http://www.michael-hansmeyer.com/

30. “An art form is defined by its tools. The tools give an art
form its grammar.”
-- Matt Pearson, Generative Art: A practical guide
using Processing
How to Generate Art

31. Visual Tools
● Context Free
● Structure Synth
● Processing

32. Context Free
http://www.contextfreeart.org/
“Context Free is a program that generates images from written
instructions called a grammar. The program follows the
instructions in a few seconds to create images that can contain
millions of shapes.”
http://www.contextfreeart.org/gallery/view
.php?id=945
http://www.contextfreeart.org/gallery/view
.php?id=561
http://www.contextfreeart.org/gallery/view
.php?id=3215

33. Structure Synth
http://structuresynth.sourceforge.net/
“Structure Synth is a cross-platform application for generating 3D
structures by specifying a design grammar. Even simple systems
may generate surprising and complex structures. The design
grammar approach was originally devised by Chris Coyne (for a 2D
implementation see the popular Context Free Art).”

34. https://www.flickr.com/photos/syntopia/3407648446/in/pool-structuresynth

35. https://www.flickr.com/photos/martinlatter/4967265480/in/pool-structuresynth

36. https://www.flickr.com/photos/martinlatter/12547657093/in/pool-/

37. Processing
https://processing.org/
http://openprocessing.org/
“Processing is a programming language, development
environment, and online community. Since 2001, Processing has
promoted software literacy within the visual arts and visual
literacy within technology. “
http://openprocessing.org/sketch/6707

38. Processing (not just for drawing)
http://www.niklasroy.com/project/88/my-little-piece-of-privacy

39. Audio(/Visual) Tools
● Earslap apps
● Max/MSP
● SuperCollider

40. Earslap Apps
http://www.earslap.com/page/otomata.html http://www.earslap.com/page/circuli.html

41. Max/MSP
● https://cycling74.com/products/max/
○ low, low price of $399
○ bundled with Abelton Live for $749
○ Can create apps, e.g.: http://www.essl.at/works/
■ Flow
■ Amazing

42. Supercollider
http://supercollider.github.io/
“SuperCollider is a programming language for real time audio
synthesis and algorithmic composition.”

43. Save your Seed!

44. The THX ‘Deep Note’
Written by Dr. James Andy Moorer in 1982 in 325 lines of C
code, and 298 more lines for the sound generator “patch” file.
The sound itself is trademarked, but the program has generative
characteristics, so each time you run the program, the sound is
somewhat different.
After the release of the piece with “Return of the Jedi,” the
original recording of Deep Note was lost. Dr. Moorer ran the
code again to recreate the sound, but there were complaints that
it didn't sound the same as the original. Eventually, the original
recording was found and kept in a safer place.
http://www.earslap.com/article/recreating-the-thx-deep-note.html

45. Is Generative Art...
a. the output
b. the process
c. the code
d. all of the above
?

46. Nate Moser - nate@rezonate.org
Thanks! Questions?

47. Perlin noise
https://flafla2.github.io/2014/08/09/perlinnoise.h
tml
Used in Minecraft to draw terrian:
http://notch.tumblr.com/post/3746989361/terrai
n-generation-part-1

48. Cellular automata
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellular_automaton