Short: Draw organic cyclic blobs Author: Claude Heiland-Allen Uploader: Claude Heiland-Allen Requires: AmigaOS 2.04+ Architecture: m68k-amigaos Website: http://users.ox.ac.uk/~linc0882/graphics/cyclepix/ This program draws organic cyclic blobs. There are examples on the website - looks pretty cool huh? Currently the program is restricted to a PAL overscan screen with 32 colours, if anyone out there wants a better version then email me. The website explains how it works and has some linux C source code too. To save the pictures use something like ScreenX. Usage: > cha_cyclepix ; show random pictures until CtrlC > cha_cyclepix 4 0 0 4 .25 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ; show example until CtrlC, change numbers! ; experiment with changing the first 6 numbers first, and ; each gradually, until you see how it works ; then set the 7th and 10th numbers to 3 (say) and change ; the last six numbers - see how this makes it freaky ;) How it works: - cha_cyclepix draws a cosine amplitude grid (think eggbox) position modulated (distorted) by two other waves - the grid is made up of waves X and Y - the distortion is made up of waves U and V - the template is XN,XA,XP,YN,YA,YP,UN,UA,UP,VN,VA,VP I guess you want to know what that means well, the first letter is the wave and the second letter N = number, number of peaks onscreen (X and U are assumed to be horizontal, Y and V vertical, for some internal calculations - other angles may be slightly different) A = angle, angle of the waves (0 is horizontal, 1 is full circle, so .25 is vertical - increasing numbers mean more clockwise) P = phase, where the wave starts in its cycle (best to adjust these by hand to fit the picture on the screen nicely Bugs: - typing cha_cyclepix ? will show the template after it opens its screen - specifying no arguments is safe specifying all 12 arguments is safe specifying other arguments may not be safe Limitations: - cha_cyclepix is limited to a 32 colour overscan screen with a fixed palette - there is no built-in save option, use ScreenX or similar - the rendering code is not very optimised, and the drawing code is very slow indeed - command line is a bit obscure, maybe a nice GUI sometime - the random-number seed is fixed, so you always get the same set of random pictures... Source: - inspiration came from a PD program called Cyclops, but that was non-OS and had awkward parameters - cha_cyclepix is much more elegant (if lacking the really obscure options) - written in E and a bit of assembler, source code included