Algodoo

The short story: I used some code from FRA32's Koch Pattern generator, and I also used a few lines of code from one of s_noonan's scenes. After placing those scripts in a large baking dish, and adding a few lines of magic ingredients of my own, I came up with a delicious meal that I think you will like. If you don't like it, there is a Burger King just down the street.


The LONG story: For a very long time, I have been amazed by how some mathematics equations can create interesting geometric patterns. I also discovered that by tweaking certain values in variables and/or constants that the generated patterns can morph into something totally different, which are even more amazing! That's basically how I made this scene. I used a previous scene of mine: Koch Pattern which is a hacked up version of FRA32's Koch Pattern generator scene, and I hacked it up even more. Here is how I did that: I took the scene and ran it through a meat grinder, then a paper shredder, then I ran over it with my truck, shot it 30 times with my AR15 rifle and my 12-Gauge shotgun, and then I gave it to my dog to chew on it for a couple of weeks. After all that, the scene was making some really interesting patterns, none of which I planned, engineered, invented, or otherwise caused it to generate anything that I had imagined. The scene simply created whatever it wanted to, just from my screwing around with a few numbers! How amazing is THAT!?

After you start Algodoo, you will notice that the scene has a secondary "Run/Pause" button, which starts and stops the actual pattern generator. While the generator is stopped, you have the oportunity to change the pattern (select number 1 to 10 with the Up and Down arrow keys) and you can also change the pattern color by clicking on the desired color circle. When ready, click the Run button to start generating the pattern. You can Pause the generator any time by clicking the Pause button (I'd bet that you already figured that one out! LOL). While the pattern is being generated, the display will automatically attempt to keep the newly generated pattern near the center of the screen. It does that by shifting the camera pan value each time the generator moves beyond a certain distance from the center of the screen. When the pattern starts to get very large, you may want to zoom out so that you can view a larger area. I made the buttons and the text in such a way that they will remain in a displayed area of the screen regardless of how you pan or zoom the camera. It's not perfect, but it works fairly well.

FYI - My favorite pattern is number 4. The pattern it produces is really interesting! I would not be able to intentionally create a pattern like that by using math equations if my life depended on it! But some how, the math gods made it happen, and I get speechless every time I see that pattern being generated. By the way, some patterns will suddenly switch to another version of the pattern after it has been generating for a few minutes. So, if you see a pattern which is not especially appealing to you, just wait a few minutes to see if it changes into something more interesting! Again, you will probably want to zoom out a ways to view it.

Okay, enough rambling. You can leave comments if you want to, but please be nice about it. I made this scene just for fun, and I realize that it's probably full of many bugs (also known as, "unintended enhancements"). If you don't happen to like my scene, you can return it for a refund. Just pack it up in a large titanium box shielded with 34Kg lead plates on each side, and send it prepaid via FedEx overnight to: Mr. Ecks Ray, Sqrt(2) Pi Highway, Algotown, Siberia, postal code 314159. Your money will be cheerfully refunded as soon as I receive the package.

Thanks!