Over the summer i have been experimenting with the design of different world structures for an interactive game based on generative/emergent systems. I’ve basically implemented three different spacial formats, exploring different aspects of scale/dimension and extendability. Unfortunately, at present none of the systems seems to fulfil the requirements I have for a base structural format. […]
As part of my current research I have been examining different techniques for world generation. The traditional approach to heightmap creation consists of using procedural texture functions to build a greyscale map that is then used to make the vertex mesh. Common functions are octaved perlin noise, midpoint displacement, voronoi maps, fault displacements and circle […]
In a continuation of my Butterflies workshop I teamed up with Lovebytes to produce a region-wide butterfly design project. I updated the software to keep track of over 1400 butterflies that were created in 13 school workshops across South Yorkshire. Laura Mundy and Janet Jennings ran the workshops, producing a vast database of butterflies that […]
To accompany the installation of avseq at phoenix square I was invited to do a performance in the cinema lounge. I took this as an opportunity to try out a new peice of work I had been trinkering with for a while. My generative audio sets have traditionally been written and run as PD patches, […]
Avseq is now showing at Phoenix Square in Leicester. This is an installation version of a game I have been working on for a while now. The short description reads as follows.
“Avseq is an interactive installation that takes the form of an abstract computer game. The player must capture and link sound objects together into […]
I recently asked a question on the shmups forum, how many games have a ‘perfect score’. I was referring of course to shmups, but the question could apply to many games. Snooker has a perfect score, 147 achieved by potting all 15 reds with 15 blacks for 120 points then all six colours for a […]
Well, I have finally managed to find the appropriate academic context for my continual research interest in gaming. Over the next three (yes I am going to try!) years I will be studying for a practice based phd in the area of digital games as a performative framework. Just to outline a little more of […]
Artists Daniel Waillis and Davina Drummond develop community art projects for cultural institutions like Tate and southbank centre. Not a Bad World, Is It? was a collaboration with 20 young people from north, south, east and west London to make a new piece of artwork to be projected on to the side of The […]
I’ve been playing with coding my own simple spring/chain type physics for a game idea. My application generates a series of ‘genetically grown’ insect-wormlike creatures that then swim around exhibiting nice elastic spring type animation. The structure of their ‘bones’ is similar to the 3d skeleton builder i wrote, using a bilateral spine model in […]
A year or so ago I wrote a game in C++/OpenGL as part of a little prototyping experiment we ran in the 8453 collective. My entry was a greyscale pixel-art platform puzzler. The gameplay was sort of a cross between chu chu rocket and lemmings. The general flow and interaction was really quite fun and […]
I have recently been working with Southbank Centre London, in collboration with Bernadette Roberts and Gaia Nova to produce large scale generative animations for their multiprojector screen setup in the festival hall. I wrote an interactive animation program using C++/openframeworks that would generate a large range of minimalist and hypnotic animations using simple geometric forms […]
I thought it would be useful to compile a short list of texts I wrote for my “Thinking games” blog. These peices were produced as part of the output of my independent research supported by the Huddersfield DRU ( a joint venture between the University and The media centre). Unfortunately, during the consolidation of several […]
Untitled Application is an interactive sound peice comissioned by MAAP and SAM for the Leeds Expo. Its an open air work hosted on one of the BBCs ‘big screens’, a range of large outdoor LCD displays in major cities of the UK. The peice itself was produced for the LEEDs Expo, a festival of sound […]
Another quick commercial break. In the last few months I’ve been working along with odessadesign on a microsite for the V&A museum for their current exhibition Telling Tales. We were really pleased to be chosen (up against some good competition) and we managed to incorporate some intriguing navigation ideas and a fun interactive exquisite corpse […]
This post contains some brief notes that I have nowhere else to keep for the time being. They will hopefully form part of a longer research idea.
What is entropy?
Noun
1. Formal lack of pattern or organization
“entropy increases as matter and energy in the universe degrade to an ultimate state of inert uniformity”
As referenced by the scientific […]
I am generaly not a huge fan of scripting languages. I tend to view everything except C/++ as window dressing that isn’t ‘hardcore’ enough. While I’m aware that this is a ridiculous stance I just can’t help myself scoffing when a new API emerges with some custom scripting language attached that allows us to send […]
I’ve always been interested in the relationship between gameplay and musical performance. Theres a remarkable structural similarity between certain game systems/mechanics and compositional ones. There is also a risk/reward/challenge aspect that is core to both practices. Anyway, for a short talk I took part in for the Leeds Evolution Festival I wrote a quick augmented […]
I recently listened to Jon Blow’s montreal lecture on how narrative and gameplay generally contradict each others operation in videogames. As usual its an insightful and thought provoking talk, however it did make me question how much the definition of these two aspects could be flexed in order to improve their collaboration. It seems inevitable […]
AudioPool is a project based around a selfsequencing pool of sounds and the representation of those sounds in 2d space. Although this is a fairly old project, Im slowly porting items over from my old website and i thought this deserved a copy. (dont ask if it fails to run, it was written on windowsME!)
The […]
Pure Data is a modular dsp system by Miller Puckette.
See www.pure-data.org for more details
You must have PD to run any of these patches.
PD Drum machine
An 808 style drum machine.
Up to 10 user sample instruments, up to 200 bars.
drum-machine.zip (280k) with samples
PD Pulse Grain Generator
A pulsar like grain generator (single grain train) with […]