Plus Equals #4, December 2021
In which Rob takes a deep dive into isometric projection and then gets generative with it.
Tags: generative
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Tuesday, January 4th, 2022
Wednesday, December 1st, 2021
Aliendscapes - Alien Planet Generator
Generative landscapes made with 2K of vanilla JavaScript.
Click (or refresh) for a new one.
Thursday, September 30th, 2021
Plus Equals #3, September 2021
Want to take a deep dive into tiling images? Like, a really deep dive. Rob has you covered.
Wednesday, September 22nd, 2021
Design research on the Clearleft podcast
We’re halfway through the third season of the Clearleft podcast already!
Episode three is all about design research. I like the narrative structure of this. It’s a bit like a whodunnit, but it’s more like a whydunnit. The “why” question is “why aren’t companies hiring more researchers?”
The scene of the crime is this year’s UX Fest, where talks by both Teresa Torres and Gregg Bernstein uncovered the shocking lack of researchers. From there, I take up the investigation with Maite Otondo and Stephanie Troeth.
I won’t spoil it but by the end there’s an answer to the mystery.
I learned a lot along the way too. I realised how many axes of research there are. There’s qualitative research (stories, emotion, and context) and then there’s quantitative research (volume and data). But there’s also evualative research (testing a hyphothesis) and generative research (exploring a problem space before creating a solution). By my count that gives four possible combos: qualitative evaluative research, quantitative evaluative research, qualitative generative research, and quantitative generative research. Phew!
Steph was a terrific guest. Only a fraction of our conversation made it into the episode, but we chatted for ages.
And Maite kind of blew my mind too, especially when she was talking about the relationship between research and design and she said:
Research is about the present and design is about the future.
🤯
I’m going to use that quote again in a future episode. In fact, this episode on design research leads directly into the next two episodes. You won’t want to miss them. So if you’re not already subscribed to the Clearleft podcast, you should get on that, whether it’s via the RSS feed, Apple, Google, Spotify, Overcast, or wherever you get your podcasts from.
Have a listen to this episode on design research and if you’re a researcher yourself, remember that unlike most companies we value research at Clearleft and that’s why we’re hiring another researcher right now. Come and work with us!
Saturday, April 24th, 2021
things are a little crazy rn
Adversarial chatbots engaged in an endless back-and-forth:
This piece simulates scheduling hell by generating infinite & unique combinations of meeting conflicts between two friends.
Tuesday, September 25th, 2018
Incomplete Open Cubes Revisited
Art, geometry, and code. Sol LeWitt started it. Rob saw it through.
Thursday, June 21st, 2018
Generative Artistry
Tutorials for recreating classics of generative art with JavaScript and canvas.
Wednesday, June 13th, 2018
designhumandesign
Refresh for a new design challenge.
Sunday, February 11th, 2018
Brendan Dawes - Using a Git Repo to create a physical document of the work
There’s something quite Bridlesque about these lovely books that Brendan is generating from git commits.
Tuesday, October 3rd, 2017
JavaScript Systems Music
A massively in-depth study of boundary-breaking music, recreated through the web audio API.
- Steve Reich - It’s Gonna Rain (1965)
- Brian Eno - Ambient 1: Music for Airports, 2/1 (1978)
- Brian Eno - Discreet Music (1975)
You don’t have to be a musician or an expert in music theory to follow this guide. I’m neither of those things. I’m figuring things out as I go and it’s perfectly fine if you do too. I believe that this kind of stuff is well within reach for anyone who knows a bit of programming, and you can have a lot of fun with it even if you aren’t a musician.
One thing that definitely won’t hurt though is an interest in experimental music! This will get weird at times.
Monday, September 25th, 2017
Constellation charts
Refresh to get a new randomly generated constellation.
A lovely bit of creative JS from Emily
Friday, August 18th, 2017
Poco Apollo
Here’s a beautiful use of the web audio API: Enoesque generative music composed right in your browser. Each piece is generated from one of the 14,226 photos in NASA’s Apollo archive. The darker and murkier the picture, the moodier the music.
Wednesday, August 2nd, 2017
InspiroBot
I am an artificial intelligence dedicated to generating unlimited amounts of unique inspirational quotes for endless enrichment of pointless human existence.
Sunday, October 16th, 2016
Hatnote Listen to Wikipedia
Listen to the sound of Wikipedia’s recent changes feed. Bells indicate additions and string plucks indicate subtractions. Pitch changes according to the size of the edit; the larger the edit, the deeper the note.
Thursday, August 13th, 2015
The Infinite Trad Session
Okay, this is kind of nuts: some researchers have seeded a neural network with all the tunes from The Session. Some of the results are surprisingly okay. It’s certainly a fascinating project.
Sunday, March 17th, 2013
Notes on remixing Noon, generative text and Markov chains
Jeff Noon and Markov chains—a heavenly match by Dan.
Thursday, July 28th, 2011
Lava Lamp Installation on Vimeo
Brighton hacker Jason Hotchkiss demos his music-generating lava lamps in this promo video for the Brighton Maker Faire taking place the day after dConstruct.
Sunday, April 24th, 2011
Otomata
A truly beautiful piece of work: generative music based on Conway’s game of life. Go ahead: create something gorgeously unique.
Wednesday, November 17th, 2010
in Bb 2.0 - a collaborative music/spoken word project
Generative music with YouTube.