Author: Izza Tirmizi

One of my favorite parts of Casey Reas’ Eyeo Talk was his emphasis on how randomness should be embraced and has been embraced when creating art. He gives examples like John Cage’s experimental music compositions, where random elements influenced the outcome, and Jackson Pollock’s drip paintings, which embraced chance as a key element in the artistic process. But, he also provides examples from his own work in graphic art using generative systems and computer algorithms. I feel as if many people stray away from randomness out of fear that the chance exists of a random element ruining what they hope to achieve, but Reas welcomes that chance in his art, showcasing to others that randomness can create unexpected but fascinating art that is worth appreciating. He even states that with computer generative systems, you can create bounds or limits such as how big or small to make something in order to control some of the randomness in your art, creating endless possibilities for future computer generated art that have a guide on what to do but still have unexpected elements to them.

I was inspired personally by this talk and really tried to incorporate randomness into the assignment for this week, but with some bounds to get the desired effect I wanted for my project. I created lists with a set of elements that would be acceptable to use such as a set of colors or a set of numbers and then used the random function to have the program pick a random element from that list. This way, all my lines looked different due to the random line sizes and they were varied in color due to the random colors picked. I doubt I’ll ever be able to fully give in to total randomness as I do want some sense of control over what is created, but I am open to trying it to see what could be created since the possibilities are endless.

For this assignment, I was inspired by an artwork in the Computer Graphics and Art May 1976 magazine titled “The Cubic Limit Series” by Manfred Mohr shown below:

I wanted to create a grid like it along with similar looking shapes, but instead have the shapes/doodles be randomized and made from sharp lines that rotate in different colors within each square. The result of that looked like this:

Overall, I think the assignment did end up aligning with the vision I had in my head. When I initially made the grid, I was having trouble getting the background to be black as it seemed like the background was somehow being overwritten. It took me a bit, but I eventually I figured out that the squares in the grid had an automatically applied color fill which was displaying over the background. I also had trouble with getting each doodle to be in the center of each square before I realized I had to use translate to change its origin. I did have to create a separate function to create the doodle in each square, and while it seems complicated, it just involved picking a random number from a list I had defined in an earlier variable. I am proud of getting the result to be similar to the inspiration from the image I had in mind, and the snippet of that code can be seen below:

// Function to draw a random doodle in each square
function drawSquiggle() {
  strokeWeight(1.25)
  stroke(random(colors))
  line(random(neg_numbers), random(neg_numbers), random(numbers), random(neg_numbers)); 
  line(random(numbers), random(neg_numbers), random(numbers), random(numbers));  
  line(random(numbers), random(numbers), random(neg_numbers), random(numbers));
}

In the future, I want to see if I can make the rotation be smooth as well. Even though this kind of choppy look was intentional to seem more robotic, I feel a different shape rotating smoothly inside of the grid would also look cool. I also want to get better at navigating transformations of shapes for the best placement.

 

For this assignment, we had to create a self-portrait in p5js. I began by deciding which elements of myself were important to incorporate. Of course, this includes basic features like eyes, nose, mouth but also things like my wavy hair or silver earrings. Once I figured out what to incorporate, I began making shapes in p5js, making sure the layers were right to get the results I wanted. The final result of my self-portrait is as follows:

As I worked, I realized making shapes in this program is quiteee annoying, especially because you need to play guess and check when figuring out coordinates. This led to it taking more time than expected, especially when it came to places where there are many shapes combined. For example, the eyes are something I am proud of because I went a step further to make them a tad bit more realistic by adding a flash spot. You can see the code for this below:

//eyes
  push()
  stroke('black')
  fill('white');
  ellipse(220,190,30,19)
  fill('black');
  circle(220,190,12)
  fill('white')
  circle(224,186,4)
  pop()
  push()
  stroke('black')
  fill('white');
  ellipse(280,190,30,19)
  fill('black')
  circle(280,190,12)
  fill('white')
  circle(284,186,4)
  pop()

Overall though, I think this assignment was a great introduction to creating objects in Javascript and required a lot of self-teaching from the references on the p5js website when it came to things like arcs, rounding out rectangles, push and pop, ellipses, etc. Breaking down myself into simple shapes really pushed my creativity when it came to combining shapes like ellipses and rectangles and circles for my hair and bangs. I was able to think outside the box on how to create what I wanted because I wasn’t even sure what the best way to get what I wanted to create was. My hope for the future is the be able to understand curves better to be able to make more custom shapes from scratch. Perhaps one day I can revisit this self-portrait and make it more realistic.