Processing is a programming language built for visual artists and designers, developed by Casey Reas & Ben Fry. I’ve been working with the language for a little over a year now… And it’s a slow process. For someone like me with very little background with programming, jumping back into bed with numbers and math is a bit grinding after not having touched it since ten years ago in high school…
I was inspired to start using code by video games. To be truthful, I never really knew that programming was how you made video games. It was only a few years ago after attending a conference on game design, and a talk by Jon Blow that it all started to sink in. I was also inspired by the album art visualizations online at thinner.cc, something I hope to do for my future audio releases.
Initially a friend and I started messing around with Python and Pygame, but it really hurt my brain. It wasn’t till later the next year that Stu Campbell introduced me to Processing, and I was sold. I wish I’d found out about this language earlier!
From my experience, canvassing many languages, Processing clearly comes in as the one most suited to artists and designers. For me the impetus in learning code was initially to make a video game, and still is, but for now I’m happy for that to sit on the back burner while I familiarize myself with a first language, understanding basic programming concepts, and getting my head around math again.
In the interim I’m excited about using processing as a painting tool, a generator for abstract visuals and a tool for interactive websites. Ultimately I’d love to do some some stuff for the iPhone, or other such multi-touch devices. I’m even considering a move up to Sydney for a while to do a 1 year course in Interaction Design (the first of it’s kind in AU).
For now, I’m posting my experiments on openprocessing.org , and will drop updates here as new work goes online. I’m currently polishing up a version of pong I’ve put together, as well as a new version of the ‘dragDraw’ painting app. You can check out my stuff via the Processing link up on the main menu.
For now here is a little experiment in basic loop functions, trying to get my head around getting stuff to move in different directions!