SELF PRESENTING GENERATIVE PROGRAM
performance
The idea to develop a generative program that can present itself was born approximately one year ago (October 2002) after several presentations of generative concept in public. Usually I used PowerPoint with static text and images to present the basic theoretical starting-points and later I ran some programs creating real time images. “If the presented material speaks about generative method why couldn’t be generative itself” I posed a question often. Using this approach the whole presentation could be entirely generative. I was conscious of existing a certain level of risk that the program could generate not good enough images to be representative. But this is the main characteristic of generative method and I decided to develop this program believing in good results.
I reconstructed one of my recent programs introducing the concept of underlying text on movies. On the main part of the screen the image is real time generated and in the bottom there are two lines if explaining text. In the beginning of the program is possible to set English or Slovene language version. Text lines are string constants according to typical image created on the screen. Repeating the program means to present new images of the defined type with the same description in the bottom text. The program is time controlled and depending of defined duration of the whole presentation the duration of elementary presentations is shared. The program allows placing time regulation depending on processor speed to obtain approximate time of presentation.
The program is divided in four parts. The first part is dedicated to symbolic imagination of the generative art birth. From the technical point of view generative approach as the useful method last to some ten years ago. From the philosophical view the generative process is old as the cosmos is. Starting form this fact it seems to be logic to place its birth in the period of “big bang”. The nature is primary and the method is only to be the copy of natural processes.
In the second part the program generate some examples of images from geometry to virtual landscapes explaining in brief what the main characteristic of generative art are: unpredictability, coincidence, creativity, time depending process, not repeatable results, etc.
The third part is dedicated to generated images based on geometrical concept. Those were my first experiments on the area of generative approach about twenty years ago. There are points, lines and plains as the basic elements to create a graphic composition. It is the typical pragmatic algorithm where the final result as the motif is predictable, only the version is always different.
In the last and the largest part of the program are presented different algorithms based on mathematical formulas. The images appear in the sequence of the development of my concept in the recent time: from the 16-colcors shapes to shot-colored landscapes and virtual spaces. There are presented different screen elaborations too.
The program is modular designed with the possibility to add new algorithms and new image types in the future. To be executable in different PC platforms I used Visual Basic programming language with as less as possible library call routines. Till now I have no problems to run it on different MS Windows versions or platforms.