tecznotes

I’ve been looking at the Gray-Scott Model of reaction-diffusion, and thinking about how to use it to create natural-looking, repeating patterns.

From Rob Munafo’s page on R-D:

All of the images and animations were created by a computer calculation using the formula (two equations) shown below. …the essence of it is that it simulates the interaction of two chemicals that diffuse, react, and are replenished at specific rates given by some numerical quantities. By varying these numerical quantities we obtain many different patterns and types of behavior.

My quick pattern explorations were the result of some unsharp mask tweaking, but they’re all results of the output of a simple python script using a range of input F and k parameter values. The raw outputs look a little like this:

The variation in output is pretty astonishing, from the worms-and-blobs above to a tanned-leather dimple, earthworm maze, or Mayan-looking interlock:

Over about a week of computer time, I’ve generated 300+ renderings of a particular interesting portion of Munafo’s high level view as 1024x1024 tileable patterns: