Processing for Visual Artists

Computers offer us the opportunity to create powerful, meaningful 2D visuals, animations, and interactive experiences. But to control this power one has to learn its ways: to get a computer to do what you want, you have to be able to communicate with it.

Learning how to communicate in a new way can be one of life’s great pleasures. Learning a new human language opens up a new world of literature and ideas. Learning to communicate with a dog is an intensely rewarding experience where both sides work together to form a common language. So it is with computers: to share our ideas with them and get them to do what we want, we have to learn to communicate in their language.

That’s called programming. A lot of people have worked hard to find the most flexible, sensible ways for people to program computers so that they can focus on their ideas, rather than on the mechanics. Some people have even focused on developing programming tools specifically for artists, designers, and animators. One of the best of these tools today is Processing.

You can buy a copy of my book on Processing here.

Learning Processing

Processing is a free, open-source project. It’s a computer language, a programming environment, and a bunch of libraries. You download the system onto your computer, and using the built-in text editor, you write programs to create images, animations, and interactive experiences. You can run those on your computer, or embed them in web pages.

Of course, you have to learn how write these programs, and that’s where this book comes in. My starting point is that you don’t about programming for its own sake; it’s just the tool you need to learn to get the computer to behave the way you want. So we don’t get into theory or math or any of that stuff, and instead we focus on the nuts and bolts of writing great programs that produce great visuals. We start at the very beginning, with an empty slate, and work our way up to expressing rich and complicated ideas.

The book takes a conversational, friendly tone. It’s loaded with tons of example programs, all of which can be downloaded and run on your computer. The book is full-color throughout, with hundreds of color figures.

Friendly Writing
The book uses the same friendly and lucid tone that thousands of readers have enjoyed in my other books, papers, and my computer graphics column.

No Prerequisites
I don’t presume you have any experience with programming in any language. We start at the beginning and work our way through the basic ideas, and then lots of complete, running programs.

Table of Contents

  • 1 Overview
  • 2 Setting Up and Getting Started
  • 3 Basic Ideas: Variables
  • 4 Functions and Tests
  • 5 Color
  • 6 Graphics Primitives
  • 7 Human Input
  • 8 Loops and Transparency
  • 9 Transformations
  • 10 Recursion
  • 11 Randomness and Arrays
  • 12 Catmull-Rom Curves
  • 13 Bezier Curves
  • 14 Objects
  • 15 Fall Leaves
  • 16 Images
  • 17 Working With Files
  • 18 Creating Patterns
  • 19 An Action Lamp
  • 20 Typography
  • 21 3D
  • 22 Useful Odds and Ends
  • 23 Projects
  • 24 Big Projects
  • Appendix: Keywords
  • Index

You can buy the book here.