dissolve (2021)
Netpbm (P2)
source code
This series contains two groups of images: those that were hand-crafted and those that were created by a script. dissolve.pgm, dissolve2.pgm, and dissolve3.pgm were hand-crafted (2021-02-26). The beebe_trail subseries is generated via a script (2021-03-02). Both are based on the same principle: dissolving a vector of pixels. A plan was chosen to iteratively update a vector of pixels converging to a vector of black pixels. This plan was inspired by the rule for toppling sandpiles.
The three hand-crafted images begin with different lengths of a random vector. The columns from the left to the right of the image show how the vector is updated until it dissolves completely.
For the beebe_trail subseries, this same plan was implemented programmatically. A vector (some row in the case of ‘h’ and column in the case of ‘w’) at location i is chosen from the image to dissolve. In some images, consecutive dissolves are applied. For example, beebe_trail_h60v47 is achieved by first dissolving down from row 60 and then dissolving to the left from column 47.
