The gridded geometry of VSLI diagramming celebrates the cargo cult of optimum electron flow as ornamental tribal heraldry. Part modernist weaving pattern (Gunter Stolz, Annie Albers), part tribal ornamentation – its geometric constraint aesthetic is squeezed into place by the forces of functional logic and space-filling optimisation. Introduction to VLSI Systems [1978] (PDF) contains finely coloured logic gate designs, NAND & NOR op-art and hieroglyphic transistor abstractions; and offers an early description of the circuit/microchip layout problem.

The creation of a geometric script to encode a symbolic layout language might be a modern day equivalent of Islamic Girih tilings or Kilim weave patterns. But rather than floral embellishments and pointed stars of the Girih tradition, VLSI constrains the symbols for input registers, logic blocks and phase clocks to best-fit space constrained by function that is devoid of any explicit aesthetic consideration. The microchip layout problems is part of a large group of much studied topological problems – and so the design of these circuits will hold clues to the solution of their more famous sibling – The Traveling Salesman Problem – and its lesser known one – The Seven Bridges of Königsberg.

‘The task of the integrated system designer is to devise geometric shapes and their location in each of the various layers. By arranging predetermined geometric shapes on each of these layers, a system of the required function may be constructed..[ ]..A simple and common method of producing system layouts is to draw them by hand. This is typically done on a one lambda grid using the familiar colour codes to identify various system layers. One the layout has been hand drawn it can be translated into machine readable form, by encoding it into a symbolic layout language.’

Related Posts:

Microchic: Cara McCarthy’s Diagramming Microchips & Theo Kamacke’s PCB Hieroglyphics
Ulla Wiggen – Conductive Abstractions

“The dream of visual dynamism is the same; to leave behind earthbound stasis and to fly into that liquid space of numerical architecture without gravity” – John Whitney

John Whitney’s Digital Harmony – On the Complementarity of Music and Visual Art [1980] can now be read or downloaded at the ever brilliant Archive.org. Good news since second-hand copies of this out-of-print classic often fetch up to a few hundred pounds each on Amazon. A classic textbook for those working in audiovisual composition, the book explores technical, philosophical and conceptual aspect of software-based visual music. The computer code contained in the book is obviously well outdated but there is much to learn from Whitney’s insights into his methods for composition.

The main tenet of the book is the idea of ‘harmonic resonance’ – that the harmony of music corresponds to the harmony of visual design. Whitney explores how graphic harmony can be generated using periodic relationships, modulation, tension vs equilibrium, interference, resonance and counterpoint in audio-visual systems. He demonstrates how interesting results from ‘the nature of patterns in time in the human perceptual experience’ can be attained without relying on the obvious mechanical synchronization of sound and image. Technologies able to translate sound into video or vice-versa (in anywhere near real-time) were scarce outside scientific laboratories in 1980 so Whitney made metaphorical and perceptual bindings using mathematical relationships in his modal systems. The book contains many full colour stills from Whitney’s films and also revealing step-by-step diagrammatic annotations to his process. He cites precursors in the field such as Len Lyre, Viking Eggeling, and Hans Richter, but he also mentions less obvious sources of inspiration such Schoenberg, Pythagoras and even Chomsky.

“Computers will do no such thing – art is a matter of judgement not calculation / No one expects a piano to write really good music” [p124]

“Symmetries generated by kaleidoscopes and snowflakes are not unwelcome – but like medication, overuse quickly becomes overdose” [p109]

“Using chromatic scale to concatenate tonal reflection upon tonal statement, at exactly the right time, that is how Debussy gave elegance to the shape of time” [p85]

Related Posts:

Permutations & Arabesque – John Whitney
Emma Kunz – Cardinal Points

Illustrations from Opus mago-cabalisticum et theologicum – Georg von Welling [1719]

Selected tweets from my Twitter stream @MrPrudence

Group of Sun Spots and Veiled Spots – E. L. Trouvelot [1873].

Chromatic Drawings – Ivan Wyschnegradsky.

Polyomino II – Jose Sanchez and students. Combinatorial patterns generated in Unity3D.

Illustrations from Opus mago-cabalisticum et theologicum – Georg von Welling [1719].

Hacker Slang and Hacker Culture – AI Koans, Hacker Folklore in The Jargon File, circa 2000.

A Cognitive Computation Fallacy? Cognition, Computations and Panpsychism – John Mark Bishop.

The Analog Art – Joost Rekveld traces the history of analogue computing leading to his current film work #59.

No Code: Null Programs – Nick Montfort [PDF]. The null program or lack of code as a functioning program.

Marginal, Local and Time-Bound – Sydney Lévy [PDF]. Edgar Allan Poe, Charles Babbage & the machinations of the mind.

Hadopelagic – Hideki Inaba. Fischingeresque time and motion study in candy coloured pop.

Illustration from Carpentry : Being A Comprehensive Guide Book for Carpentry and Joinery – Nicholson, Peter, [1848]

EKO ComputeRhythm – a drum machine that used punched paper cards from 1972.

Art of the Airport Tower – Carolyn Russo. The airport tower as monumental abstraction.

Illustrations from Elektricität und Licht – Otto Lehmann [1895].

Incomprehensible Brainfuck talks formal L-Sys.

Commodore 8580 chip. Hi-res [133MB]. Plus many more at http://www.visual6502.org/ 

Ilya Prigogine on The Arrow of Time – Is time a fluid reversible cosmic commodity? – Omni Mag, 1983.

“The arrow of time is an arrow of increasing correlations.” Natalie Wolchover on entanglement as entropy.

Frolicsome Engines: The Long Prehistory of Artificial Intelligence – Jessica Riskin.

‘Others seek and achieve notoriety, Hinton has achieved almost total obscurity’ – Borges on Howard C Hinton and his Fourth Dimension.

Imaginary city landscapes by Georg Bohle.

Group of Sun Spots and Veiled Spots – E. L. Trouvelot [1873]

Theosophical images from Europe from the 1930’s at Lexicon magazine.

‘Some fractals were rejected by mathematicians and labelled pathological and monstrous.’ Infinite Space and Self-Similar Form – Laura Strudwick

Enlivening The Grid. On Channa Horwitz’s grid-system Sonakinatography.

Joe Banks, author of ‘Rorschach Audio’ on the visual construction of ‘reality’.

Chance and Order Group VII, Drawing 6 – Kenneth Martin. Lines between randomly defined points.

The strangely relaxing abstractions of Aeroese poetry – “Establish localiser two-seven-right”.

Geometric stimulation arrives from unlikely sources: 17C carpentry & joinery manuals.

Illustration from Man Visible & Invisible – Charles Leadbeater [1903].

Geodesic Model – William Donovan [1980] Made from ‘nit sticks’ used to check for head lice.

Théâtre Mobile – Pascal Häusermann.