Some Approaches to Abstract Digital Visuals
Hi. Here are some abstract experiments in visual art. I think these are some nice ways to get fun images and unique ideas. These approaches could be applied to art in general but I present examples in visual art specifically.
Digital & Human Artifacting
Algorithmic chaos bound by digital quantization. Human randomness constrained by animal physicality.
On the left is the original painted canvas. On the right is an extracted filtered image.
In fact all images in this section were obtained from that Krita canvas, on which I rendomly scribbled. The interface here is my mouse, the limitations of which become quite apparent if you draw with it by jerking it quickly about the screen. The parallel lines on these picture capture the discretization of the cursor position. They also capture the rough patterns of my hand movements, of course. The combination of which gives these images both an organic and a rigidly mechanical feel.
I also used some funny Krita brushes. And lots and lots of different filters, to bring out the color and sharpness. It's was good fun to explore the results and capture some of these snapshots!
The general approach here is as such: find sources of interesting chaos, preferrably some that can be generated quite quickly and on a big scale. And then explore the resulting canvas and process the heck out of it. A huge benefit of digital media is that you can zoom in and crop the resulting canvas however you like.
Of course, these could be processed further and formed into a more directed piece.
Partial Blindness
By partially limiting your perception of the piece you're working on, you can achieve some images you wouldn't otherwise get. For example, you can apply a desaturation filter while painting with color, only revealing the colors after you're done. Or, drawing with the canvas zoomed out: I do this often, it results in some fun linework.
This one... Is quite strange. Here's the process.
I opened a photograph of the scene you see here, added a paint layer on top,
and made that paint layer transparent. I chose a fancy brush and
started painting over-top the photo. Of course, I didn't see anything of
what I drew, and would have to guess what parts of the image still lacked work.
I picked colors with the dropper and painted brush-strokes
roughly tracing the picture.
Finally, after some minutes, I revealed the image.
It's quite strange. At certain zoom levels, the white-space seems really off. Certainly, I wouldn't paint this image as such if I could actually see what I did.
Happy Accidents & Salvaging
Does true abstraction have quality or meaning or intent? Can you create intentless art? The answer is that you can't. If I tried showing you intentless art, it would instantly obtain both an intent and an implied meanings. Either way, there are a few canvases which I used purely for the purpose of testing out different Krita brushes. After such a testing session there remains a cavas full of color and void of artistic intent.
Again, this results in a unique kind of image. It's akin to photography, you have to have an eye for curious visuals so you can capture and preserve them.