The Arduino isn’t quite an deal choice for a live generative visual computer – but it can do some gorgeous things with signals. Sebastian Tomczak has a gorgeous hack (as seen via Limor Fried) that manipulates RGB data lines with the Arduino. You connect horizontal and vertical sync signals, then go to town. The Arduino in this case just converts the signal to digital and uses the lower 8 bits of the 10-bit data – a real Swiss Army Knife-style job for the microcontroller.
I’m curious looking at this, though – what other sorts of microcontroller projects might be possible? (Not limiting to the Arduino, either.)
How to: Use Arduino to Generate Glitchy Audio VGA Visuals [Little-Scale]
If you’re unimpressed and want to just stick to software, Anton keeps pumping out updates to his v002 Glitch plug-in pack, which emulates all manner of visual glitches – including, soon, his new optical flow implementation, adapted from Andrew Benson.
Updated: Downloads now available: