Infinite Regeneration

200,000 particles float silently through a Perlin noise field. Each particle is rendered as an ellipse of variable size. Half the particles are white, half are black. The black particles are mirrored along the vertical axis opposite of their white counterparts. A space camera allows interactive flight into and through the composition. Particles that have…

Journey Iconography

Journey is a contemplative video game set in distant land riddled with mystery. It was created by my favorite game developer Jenova Chen. A beautiful symbolic language haunts your imagination as the story develops. After exploring the realms by foot and flight, the symbols’ meaning becomes clear. Largely indecipherable, the characters can be generated quite…

Truchet Tile Multiscale

Truchet Tiles are square design elements. Generally they are arranged in a grid tiling with random rotations. This sketch adds additional complexity by allowing tiles at various scales. I have used a “winged” tile set as described by Christopher Carlson. The entire graphic is drawn using only black and white ellipses. Arcs are composed of…

Asemic Illustration I

Uninterpretable technical diagrams in the asemic writing tradition. This is a place and test algorithm using four geometric objects. The point source object, a randomly placed position from which everything manifests. The arc, a curved line with a centroid around some point source object. The radiant, a straight line that originates on an arc and…

Penrose Substitution

This sketch uses a tile substitution method for constructing highly ordered aperiodic tilings. Each construction is made entirely from just two basic shapes. The shapes are triangles. Commonly called the ‘half-kite’ and ‘half-dart’ , they are derived from the pentagon and described in depth by Roger Penrose. There are two substitution rules for each triangle.…

Shipibo Pattern

The Shipibo are an indigenous tribe that live in the Amazon Jungle in Peru. During ceremony, a particular pattern is seen and heard by these people as a description of the reality of nature. I have seen it too. The visual pattern is not what is actually witnessed, but an attempt to represent it in…

Buddhabrot

The Buddhabrot Set is a re-visualization of the familiar Mandelbrot Set using a technique invented by Melinda Green. Instead of selecting points on the real-complex plane, initial points are selected at random from the image region. The point is iterated through the function, z = zˆ2 + c, where z has components in both the…

Concentric Paths

Concentric maze walking lines emanate from a central location alternating between ages of light and dark. Each path has a limited number of cycles through the machine. The path explodes into a tiny brilliant dot on its last cycle. A variation in which paths begin on a ring and emanate inward. Download Source Code Programmed…

Vesica Piscis: You, Me, We

A meditative geometric construction of our relationship. This algorithm begins with two congruent circles labeled ‘you’ and ‘me’. The circle can be considered an individual’s entire perceptual awareness. As we become close, the intersection of our awareness is highlighted. This geometric construction is sometimes called the vesica piscis. Then complexity arises, as new ideas and…

Node Garden 2020

A darker, more contemplative return to the Node.Garden from 2004. 10,000 nodes are organized along snaking spine objects. The spines emanate from a computationally defined path. The path is a ring in some cases and a straight horizontal line. in others. The rendering process for this algorithm uses a multi-step approach. One by one, layers…

Infinite Disintegration

We are like waves, rushing towards the shore, moment to moment made up of new matter. This particle generating system attempts to explore this idea. A familiar ring form exists in a cycle of emergence and dissipation. New particles emit on an ellipse in three dimensional space. A noise field guides the direction and speed…

Ship Hull

A combinatoric spaceship generator. This system takes the classic Asteroids delta shape and randomly adds primitive geometries to create unique spaceship designs. Each added shape is a circle, triangle, square, or line. Shapes are randomly translated, rotated, and scaled. Each shape reflects about the lateral axis for a symmetric appearance. This project was created in…

Blended Tris

Another algorithm in the Blended Arcs and Blended Ends modality. Recursive regions are filled this time with triangles, eventually becoming tiny villages of computational gnomes. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 11:36am November 20, 2019

Blended Arcs

Subdivided regions draw partially completed circles as pie sliced arcs. When stacks of arcs overlap each other, the machine inverts both layers, multiplies them, and then inverts that result. The color then tends to always get brighter, towards white. Blend mode is built into Processing. This is an derivation of Blended Ends. Programmed in Processing…

Blended Ends

A randomly subdivided quad tree fills the voids with blended lines. Each line is drawn from top left to bottom right, with an offset midpoint and thick colorful halo. The subdivision process builds complexity until resulting regions reach a minimum area. Images are displayed in reverse order of creation. Programmed in Processing By Jared S…

Spiritual Noise Machine

Long exposures within a Perlin Noise field machine. This sketch began as a BlendMode test within the Processing development environment. How fast could I render particles using the built in feature? Very fast, it turns out. Through interactive commands I allow the size and speed of the particles to change. I also allow them to…

Nine Dot Thing

Combinatoric system connecting nine dots arranged in a 3×3 grid. There are 362,880 possible combinations with rotations and reversals allowed. Artistic renditions eliminate crossings for select dots. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 1:37pm August 13, 2019

Head Explode

Head explode, get new head. These images are created from a long exposure particle scattering machine. New particles are randomly positioned inside the perfect circle. There is a break, whereas a definable arc of the perimeter is allowed to loose fidelity into the void. The resulting pixel plot shows a brilliant object experiencing rapture and…

Black Snakes

Geometric, highly angular black snakes vomited from my spiritual psyche. Snake components occupy virtual grid, slight variations in relative angular placement perturbs the final form. Goodbye black snakes. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around November 2, 2019

Imaginary Machines

I was contracted by an imaginary client to build an interface for their imaginary machines. This project connects nodes in a ribbon lattice similar to the sacred Tree of Life. A multi-mode blending technique screens colors together while also multiplying darkness. Labels are added post-construction, randomly assembled from two word lists (adjectives and nouns). Early…

Venation

The veins below are composed of thousands of self-similar cells linked together. Randomly distributed hormone sources alert nearby cells of their location. The cell grows toward the source by instantiating new cells in that direction. In this fashion the vein system is generated. Final composition can be finely crafted through the careful selection of hormone…

Differential Growth

Thirty years of programming and all I can do is watch in amazement as this specially connected force-repulsion network grows. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 10:01am December December 11, 2019 Derived from prior work by Symmetries In Chaos

Space Flight

Endless generative flight through a field of stars inspired by my partnership in Deep Space Coffee. Flying through a field of stars was one of the first great computer programs I remember as a child.  Breaking through the third dimension felt great.  It was often implemented in the form of screensavers or animation demonstrations.  You…

Far Away Pixel Galaxy

Somewhere in a pixel galaxy, far far away… Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico Date unknown

Invader Super Ring

The Invader is a special grid construction of black and white squares.  I have generated millions of them.  They are familiar friends. Previously arranged in order or in a fractal, here they are arranged in concentric rings.  Rings vary in width.  Invader scale and distribution is set to fit accordingly. One variation identifies and highlights heart shaped…

Noise Field

Particles follow paths derived from a two dimensional Perlin noise function.  Paths are rendered with translucent pixels, making common areas bright.  Where are you in this picture? The evolution of this algorithm, presented in reverse order. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 1:10pm February 2, 2015

Circles Inside Circles

Packing circles into a finite space is fun.  Especially when you use lazy algorithms that place and test, rather than do any hard math.  One such classic algorithm is this, place a very small circle into a field and grow that circle until it hits another circle or the edge.  Repeat until no room is left for…

Abandoned Etsy Mandala

My last project for Etsy.  It was to be a mandala, a custom generated visualization of friendships, favorites, and shop activity with you at the center.  My most ambitious project, abandoned in early 2011 when I chose to leave the company. Programmed in Flash AS3 By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around…

Yarn Stretcher

Exploration of a childhood craft stretching yarn between two adjacent lines of pins, many many many times. I often use red in debugging situations. Red helps isolate changes to the algorithm. Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 9:54pm May 1, 2015

Binary Ages

A system of path tracing particles evolves continually from an initial creation event.  Ages of darkness play arbitrarily with ages of light.  This is an adaptation of Binary.Ring (2003). Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 9:16am August 3, 2015 Based on earlier work titled Binary.Ring (2003)

Orbit Clock

Nodes orbit a central location in groups of variable intervals.  Lines connect nearby nodes.  Syncopated cycles move groups of nodes around a central location. The elements of the clock construction are exposed over time. Movement reveals a tapestry of relationships. Download Source Code Programmed in Processing By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico Around…

Metatron’s Cube

During times of creative drought, I sometimes turn to classic geometric forms.  Today I recreated well known constructions from the Metatron Cube.  I was surprised to find the dodecahedron in there.   Illustrated in CorelDRAW By Jared S Tarbell In Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Around 5:15pm August 1, 2015

Noise Circle

A rotating line of white noise reveals something looking back at me. In this post, the images show my development process. It begins with a rough sketch of a line drawing process and advances towards the final result, seen at the bottom of this page. I often begin sketches without a goal in mind. I…

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