Form + Image

A Kaleidoscope is one of the best examples of interactive form and image that I have enjoyed so far. The whole visual experience is created by simple colours and shapes contained within its scope and they create stunning patterns and forms. They can be quite abstract and their abstraction catches people’s eye and makes them wonder what it is they are actually looking at. The audience just needs to simply rotate the scope and the beautiful patterns will start dancing in front of their eyes.

I really enjoy the continual transition from pattern to pattern, it is just gorgeous. And now technology is more advanced, I am constantly shocked by how amazing the generative animations are getting these days. It is amazing seeing the structures generated by autonomous systems such as 3d fractal patterns creating something so beautiful and complex that it puts one almost in a trance. Just the simple idea of all of the little patterns and details which would take someone forever to reproduce can be created on the spot is amazing. This generative art style has lots of potential in the future of visual interactions.

 

 I know there are a lot of people who have already experimented or based work on these ideas but I still can’t imagine how amazing the results could be if we grew virtual trees which were not only an animated 3d mesh, but by generative fractals and each time you grow the tree, it will look different. I believe this “autonomous systems” will be a golden opportunity for the future sandbox games, because it can give more randomness to the environment. And I believe that this is something that sandbox could really improve on – to make environmental changes in more of a situational sense rather than a spacial sense, e.g. seasons or weather (Like moss growing in the city when it has rained too much).  

Nevertheless, after seeing all this cool autonomous system visuals, I started to feel excited but also a bit scared of its potential. It is like when artist first see the Photoshop. What if autonomous systems can also generate high quality rigged characters and creature blueprints with random gender, skin textures, hairstyle and fashion? Does it mean we won’t have a need for any more 3D artists? Or I am just worrying too much, and autonomous systems can never take the place of an artist and they are merely a tool to save time.