Friday, February 7, 2014

Non-procedural Generation

What is the opposite of procedural generation? I would say an image where every pixel was put there by hand.

Whenever I get tired of looking at source code I found good old fashion drawing helps to put things back into perspective.

Since I have shared so many synthetic images here, I thought it would not hurt to post something I had created by hand. These images are rather rough sketches for scenes, characters and environments. I was kind of free-styling in every case and did not pay much attention to detail. I do these to entertain my kids, which often decide what is going on in the scene and what colors I should use (that actually explains a lot).





11 comments:

  1. They're nice =D. Are these made using physical or digital methods? (I'm not good with art etc. so I can't tell the difference =P). I especially like the creature in the first picture. It looks like it can jump over canyons and uses that to allow it to hunt/forage over a larger area =P.

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    1. It's digital, you can say that from the typical layering of the semitrasparent colors. Also some brushes are used, and that's noticeable from the homogeneous pattern the color is applied in a stroke.

      Quite well made, Miguel, but if you think about it, everything is procedurally generated, to an extent. The difference is where you decide to put the stop to the automated processing (like brush generation or color overimposing) and give place to your own creativity.

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    2. I see what you mean. I do not think we can say everything is procedural to some extent just because some set of rules apply.

      This was done using a digital canvas and a digital brush. Like a real canvas and a real brush, they have some specific rules and behavior. If it had been oil painting, I would have to be aware of how colors blend, how fast they dry, etc.

      In this case I did not use Photoshop, this was done in an android tablet using a crappy little app. I used a stylus but it was not pressure sensitive. It was done with a rather uncomfortable medium.

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    3. In the same way, you could say that even the most proceduralest of contents had some programmer creating its generator too.

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  2. How about some procedural creature generation? :)

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    1. don't know about procedural but you can experience natural selection based evolution right here http://www.speciesgame.com/

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    2. I do believe natural selection is a nice example of procedural generation =P.

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    3. Well we know natural selection works for creatures, it just takes all the time in the world (literally)

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    4. Not for virussus it doesn't =P. Biggest problem is the refresh cycle =P. It takes a lot of macro-life at least a year to start a new cycle, so yea... And the changes per cycle are minimal, if any at all =P. Furthermore, the elimination is often quite... slow as well.

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  3. Stick to code, you suck at drawing.

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  4. I'll take the first and add it to my wallpaper list.

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