I have a project in Toronto Nuit Blanche 2010 this Saturday! Here’s the blurb:

The Wall
Dustin Freeman
Rorik Henrikson

A wall of coloured blocks that move randomly when there is empty space. There is one rule:

1) When a moving block bumps a still block, it transfers its colour.

At the beginning, every block starts as a random colour. Over time, the number of colours will decrease as blocks run into each other. Check back several times over the night to see it progress. In the end, will there be only one type of block?

This project was completed with the support of the Dynamic Graphics Project, Department of Computer Science, University of Toronto.

Location: The University of Toronto Arts Centre (UTAC).

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Finding the entrance is a little confusing. So, if at first you are lost, persist!

For those that recognize it, this project was heavily inspired by John Conway’s Game of Life. Simple rules can lead to complex behaviour.

I actually don’t know yet whether, at the end of the night, there will be one, or many colours left. I ran it for 3 hours earlier today and there were at least 12 colours. Come check it out at 7 am Sunday morning!

After Nuit Blanche, I will probably post a version of The Wall on my site.

Here is the latest version. (performance-intensive)