Category: Weaving

  • Learning about thinking and weaving in Leeds and Sheffield

    The second week of intense work on weavingcodes/codingweaves took place in the north of England, and began with a talk at the New Mechanics Institute show and tell meeting in Leeds. This was a good place to pick up from the previous week in Denmark as it included a talk on pixel art from the…

  • Flotsam: A prototype screenless livecoding language

    Two languages are working with Flotsam, the new name for the prototype screenless tangible programming language I’ve been building (which comes from the fact it’s largely made from driftwood). It’s somehow already been featured on the Adafruit blog! The circuit seems to be fully debugged now, with short circuits fixed – which took a little…

  • Learning to read, notate and compute textiles in Aarhus

    Setting off from Copenhagen, the weaving codes tour continued as Emma Cocker, Alex McLean, Ellen Harlizius-Klück and I sped across the Danish countryside on the train. We were heading for Aarhus to spend some time working with people at the other end of the technology spectrum – The Center for Participatory IT in Aarhus University.…

  • Unravelling technology in Copenhagen

    Last week the weavingcodes/codingweaves project started with a trip to Denmark, our first stop was the Centre for Textiles Research in Copenhagen where we presented the project and gathered as much feedback as possible right at the beginning. The CTR was introduced to us by Eva Andersson Strand, and is an interdisciplinary centre which focuses…

  • Thinking outside of the screen (#1)

    I’m starting a new exploratory project to build a screen-less programming language based on two needs: A difficulty with teaching kids programming in my CodeClub where they become lost ‘in the screen’. It’s a challenge (for any of us really but for children particularly) to disengage and think differently – e.g. to draw a diagram…

  • Neural Network livecoding and retrofitting ZX Spectrum hardware

    An experimental, and quite angry neural network livecoding synth (with an audio ‘weave’ visualisation) for the ZX Spectrum: source code and TZX file (for emulators). It’s a bit hard to make out in the video, but you can move around the 48 neurons and modify their synapses and trigger levels. There are two clock inputs…

  • New Hardware

    A Harris, 4 shaft table loom:

  • Computation is weaving

    With my mind on our upcoming AHRC weave/code project (and seeing as Alex has already started writing code) I thought I’d have a go at visualising how computers work in relation to pattern manipulation. These screenshots are from a ZX Spectrum where I’ve modified some library assembler code for higher level arithmetic to display the…

  • Splinterfields: Mathematickal Arts #3

    A third and final update on the Mathematickal Arts Workshop – following the previous outline, some more detail on the process of going from software to textile using plain weave. First create a program and choose the colours: Axiom: O Rule: O => : O O : Repeat 5 generations : = Green 0 =…

  • Splinterfields: Mathematickal Arts #2

    For my contribution to the Mathematickal Arts workshop, I wanted to explore weaving, specifically plain weave. This is the simplest form of weaving, but when combined with sequences of colour it can produce many different types of pattern. Some of these patterns when combined with muted colours, have in the past been used as a…