018 - RANDOM SEEDS
This experiment looks at the effect of multiple-cell seeds on the generation of a pattern. To do so, I ran 24 patterns based on a "growing" seed of random bits and captured snapshots of the pattens genrated.
Seed Bits
The sequence of bits was pulled from a file download from Random.org. The breakdown of the seeds is shown below, with each row being the initial seed for a pattern.
Generating Patterns
I captured a 65 x 130 cell area of the pattern generated by each seed. At the 14th step, the length of the seed is 65 cells wide. After the 14th step, it appears there is no change in the seed where in fact the seed is changing beyond the frame of the captured image until it reaches the final width of 129 cells.
To get a better sense of how the multiple-cell seeds affect the display pattern, I used the Wolf-018 ruleset and made four color treatments for the pattern generated by each seed:
- Full Color: each rule with its own color (see here for more about colors).
- Partial Color: the active rules display as black with the rest its own color. For Wolf-018, the two active rules are 100 and 001.
- W&B with Color: the active rules are black, passive (101, 010, 000) rules are white, and the remaining unused rules are their own color (see here for the distinction).
- Unused: only the unused, along with the seed condition, display (again, see here for the distinction).
I put the first three together on one page and the fourth (unusued) pattern three times on a second page. Click through to see the progression of the generate pattern as the seed changes:
- Colors: Full Color, W&B with Color, Partial Color
- Unused: the same pattern three times
- Next -> click on the right side
- Previous -> click on the left side
I also animated the patterns a multi-screen page set. Click Menu to see the options. The legend for the menu is:
: Colors patterns
: Unused pattern, three times- Single: animation of the static pages, above
- Flipped: flipped along the horizontal access, seed in the middle
- Rotated: rotated 180 degrees, seed in the middle
- Combo: Flipped and Rotated overlayed on each other
