The Amoeba is a study of repetition, patterns, and harmony. The code repeats simple shapes in different positions and sizes until they build up to form a colorful and lively Amoeba. View in live mode to watch it dance. Press [1] - [4] to adjust rendering quality. Press [s] to take a snapshot of the Amoeba. Charity: 25% of sales for the first 24 hours will be donated to Meals For Unity, a nonprofit grassroots organization dedicated to reducing food insecurity among marginalized communities in the New York City area.

Amoeba

Mecha suits are one-of-a-kind, armored, robotic vehicles designed to explore the metaverse.
Built using blueprints left behind by an ancient alien civilization.
Jump in, activate the controls, and get ready to pilot.
Drag and drop to rotate, scroll to zoom in and out.

mecha suits

From the Insecta Class and Apidae Family, we find the Species Apis Mellifera: the western honey bee.  One of the more iconic aspects of honey bees is their hive, the hexagonal grid we call honeycomb; an efficient use of resources and space, and a beautiful representation of a geometric shape found in nature.

The humble grid has also been a mainstay of generative art from its earliest days.  Code up a loop or two and see what you can do.  What I've done with grids has been seen in many of my projects over the past year; in *Polka*, *Over the Air*, *Ode to Untitled*, and now *Mellifera*.  Breaking from the rectangular and square grid, and embracing the complexities of the hexagonal grid, *Mellifera* creates patterns working within the points and sides of a hexagon while laying out those patterns across a honeycomb like structure.

While working through this series of grid based projects, one main area of study has been finding ways to move off the grid, at least in appearance.  A recent move to a rural home has left me much more off the grid, and there's been a parallel through my projects.  Increasingly, I've explored ways to make the overall aesthetic not appear grid-like, to have a more organic feel, all the while though still centering elements perfectly in their place across the grid.  *Mellifera*, with its use of hexagons, imperfections, unique symbols, rotation, and negative space, is another step in this evolution, and the largest one yet.

While most of my work has embraced the digital and machine-like feel that computers and code are so easily capable of (again influenced from my appreciation of Roy), *Mellifera* moves in a new direction, introducing a more imperfect and human feel to the lines, shapes, and symbols.  These imperfections change the overall aesthetic drastically and are a main component in helping break away from the grid, visually.  While honey bees are incredible in their ability to create beautiful hexagonal geometric patterns, there's still a natural, lived-in feel to their creations, and *Mellifera* uses this organic quality as inspiration.

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**High-Resolution Downloads**
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* Press 3 for 9000 x 13500

See download limitations under Display Notes.

Mellifera

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  ___ _  _____ _   _  ___  __  __  ___  ___ ___ _  _ ___ 
 / __| |/ / __| | | |/ _ \|  \/  |/ _ \| _ \ _ \ || / __|
 \__ \ ' <| _|| |_| | (_) | |\/| | (_) |   /  _/ __ \__ \
 |___/_|\_\___|\___/ \___/|_|  |_|\___/|_|_\_| |_||_|___/

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A skeuomorph is a derivative object that retains ornamental design cues from structures that were necessary in the original. They are used widely in architecture, product design, and perhaps most familiarly in user interfaces. Think: desktop icons like trash cans or notepads. SKEUOMORPHS is a meditation on this digital tradition. 

SKEUOMORPHS picks up where RASTER left off as an another exploration of the materiality of pixels and rasterized imagery. Here the study of pixels narrows in on the shallow depth of on-screen interfaces and the play of low-res figure-ground effects. Moments of skeuomorphism where the 2-dimensional plane of the screen becomes slightly 3-dimensional through beveling or drop-shadows are extracted and used as abstract painterly details. These elements that are typically used to make computation and interfaces more familiar become unfamiliar on the canvas, suggesting the possibility of an aesthetic between abstraction and realism.

SKEUOMORPHS employs recurring themes and techniques from my art practice: limited color palettes, low-res chunky pixels, dithering, and physics simulation. It uses a specific kind of dithering called R-sequence dither developed by Martin Roberts. Like traditional Bayer matrix-based dithering, this technique produces a patterned image akin to retro video games and early computer screens. In this project, the R-dither pattern results in a woven textile-like texture, which recalls the long relationship between computing and weaving. The canvas negotiates two scales simultaneously: that of the dithered pixel (rendered at 1/1024th of the canvas height) and the simulated particle that acts as a brush stroke (rendered at 1/256th of the canvas height). The two resolutions work together to produce a cohesive texture that is neither pretending to be a retrograde screen nor an analog material but something in between. Similar to RASTER, the goal is to investigate new avenues for digital aesthetics that rely on a combination of historical techniques and innovative practices.

Use mouse or touch controls to interact.
Press 's' to grab a still frame.

Collectors will be eligible to receive a signed archival giclée print of their mint.

SKEUOMORPHS

What would a transaction hash look like in space? This project explores the spatial properties of 32-byte hashes by intertwining bezier curves based on them. Floating on deformed blobs, both the curves and their companions are constructed by mapping parts of the hash to the screen. Forever yours to untie, slowly drifting in aether space - the metaverse is surely tangled. ——— Best enjoyed in live view - touch/click anywhere to stop the animation, press ’s’ to save an image.

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