Description

Cubicles is a particle-based generative art system that produces isometric line drawings. The results sometimes appear as an elevated view of a modern office full of cubicles, or perhaps the skyline of a futuristic city. The algorithm is entirely two-dimensional but gives an illusion of depth, though the perspective is not always accurate, leading to some Escher-esque constructs at times. The painterly style is intended to mimic pencil-shaded renderings.

Influenced by Jared Tarbell's Substrate.

Applets

Cubicles 300 x 300

Algorithm

The particle system consists of two distinct classes of particles: those that walk the edges and draw the outlines, and those that fill in the gaps with color.

The edge line "walkers" follow paths that mimic isometric perspective by contraining their motion within a fixed set of angles. At each stage of motion, the walkers may create additional "painters" that drag color downward, or erase upward, from the current location of the walker.

There are three subclasses of painters that help produce the depth illusion by painting in slightly different ways. A light painter is applied to southwest-northeast trending "walls", while a dark painter is applied to northwest-southeast trending "walls". The "top" surface is painted white, potentially washing out others colors already applied.

Color is chosen at random from a small image loaded as a palette source. It is then faded exponentially along the path of the painters. This fading, along with the random frequency of painting, leads to the sort of brushed metal appearance.

Gallery

600x600 193k 600x600 192k 600x600 129k

600x600 165k 600x600 179k 600x600 139k

600x600 132k 600x600 172k 600x600 160k

Variations

15-degree perspective 45-degree perspective

60-degree perspective 30-degree perspective rotated 30 degrees

30-degree perspective small polar spiral 45-degree perspective large polar spiral

45-degree perspective polar spin 45-degree perspective polar bulge

5-directional 8-directional

Related Works

The Maze Blur project uses a similar strategy of walkers spawning children in order to create paths that blur an image by dragging color.