CCI Diploma 2020/2021: Unit 1: Lecture 0: Introduction.
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Hi!
I'm Joel.
Welcome to the Creative Computing Institute!
Welcome to the Diploma in Creative Computing!
You are all Diplomats now - in a year I want you to go back to your courses and be Diplomats for the land of Creative Coding.
By the end of this lecture, you'll know more about:
- Me and my background
- The Creative Computing Institute (CCI)
- The Diploma in Creative Computing and why I'm proud to be teaching it
- How I'm going to teach and test you in Unit 1: "Creative Coding and Creative Computing Frameworks"
- What I'm going to teach you in Unit 1
- Important methods for succeeding on this course (and in general)
- Other coding resources and teachers of Creative Coding
- Some brain exploding resources
Me and my background:
- Born in London, grew up in Wales on a mountain.
- BSc in Maths and Computer Science at Imperial, MA in Interaction Design at Royal College of Art.
- One year at Fabrica.
- Three years at UnitedVisualArtists.
- Eight years at Hellicar&Lewis.
- Three years of visiting lecturing at CSM MA Narrative Environments and RCA Visual Communication and working on my own projects.
- One year as head lecturer on the Diploma in Creative Computing at the Creative Computing Institute. One year as the Interactive Creative Director of Universal Everything.
- Currently researching Solar-powered mesh based computing and global-scale open source Augmented Reality sculpture.
What is the CCI?
What is the Diploma in Creative Coding?
Why am I proud to be teaching it? I think the Diploma in Creative Computing is the most interesting course that the CCI offers. You are all two years into your undergraduate degrees, you know what you are doing. I'm here to give you knowledge and skills to take back to your final years in whichever department you are in.
How I'm going to teach and test you in Unit 1: "Creative Coding and Creative Computing Frameworks": let's take a look at the Unit 1 GitHub for more information on how I'm going to teach AND test you (aka the Unit 1 Brief, you'll be getting briefs for each unit you take): https://github.com/JGL/CCIDiploma-AutumnWinter2020 - BTW, this should be the first place you look if you have any questions about unit 1, or the course in general.
What I'm going to teach you in Unit 1: let's take a look at the list of lectures I'm going to be giving up to Christmas.
Up to Christmas, I'm going to teach you JavaScript, which is the most commonly used programming language in the world. After Christmas I'm going to teach you C++, but that's a language for another day.
I'm going to teach you JavaScript using a library called p5.js. p5.js was specifically designed as a great way for designers, artists and others to learn to code. It was originally created by Lauren McCarthy but now has many contributors. p5.js emerged out of another project: Processing.
After Christmas I'm going to teach you C++ using another library, openFrameworks, but that's also for another day.
TLDR: I'm going to teach you creative coding, but also explode some brains along the way with references and concepts outside of creative coding that I think you will find interesting and useful.
BTW, I'm going to reference Wikipedia a lot in this course, because I think it's one of the best things that humanity has ever made, and I wish I'd had it when I was young. Also, it's free - I hated it when teachers would reference books that I couldn't afford when I was at university.
I'd really encourage you to take the time to look at the references I put up throughout these lectures. Think of them as cheat codes to get you to the next level quicker than I did. A reminder: you are expected to undertake independent study of about 25 hours per week - spread across all the courses you are taking in the Diploma.
I'm going to introduce lots of interesting concepts from many areas so that you know the magic word to search for if you want to know more. Obfuscation is a BIG problem. What is Obfuscation?
What is creative coding? I believe all coding is creative, as all life is creative. Specifically, creative coding is about blending creative techniques with software engineering. I want to teach you how to write code but also how you could use computing to change your practice. You can make lots of earth credits writing software, but I much more interested in giving you the tools to change yourself, your practice and the world.
Through teaching you creative coding, I want to teach you Computational Thinking. But what is Computational Thinking?
- To teach you see problems at many levels (abstraction), break down problems (decomposition), find the order in them (pattern recognition), make solutions using a series of steps (algorithms) and realise that you might be able to use that solution in lots of areas (generalisation).
- Most of all, to teach you to be autodidacts, and, as previously mentioned, to blow your mind at least once per lecture.
- First task: what is an autodidact?
Look it up!
Jim Campbell's formula for Computer Art. Realise that you can use things without understanding every aspect of them. All that computers do is process inputs into outputs. That's it.
Important methods for succeeding on this course (and in general)
So, I'm going to teach you how to code! But much more than that - as mentioned previously, I'm going to teach you different ways of thinking about the universe. I want you to explore thinking in multiple dimensions, how mathematics can help you do that and what dimensions you might want to think in.
What about the dimension of time?
What about the dimension of play with the dimension of time?
- Playful history - sampling/remixing?
- Playful now - glitching?
- Playful future - speculative design?
What about the dimension of care with the dimension of time?
- Caring past - history, telling stories truthfully?
- Caring now - repair, upkeep?
- Caring future - sustainability?
BTW, this idea of play and care as sustainable activities came from a brilliant talk by anthropologist, provocative critic of economic and social inequality and self-proclaimed anarchist David Graeber at amazing annual conference in Germany at the end of 2019: "From Managerial Feudalism to the Revolt of the Caring Classes". Sadly, David Graeber passed away in Venice on September 2nd, 2020. David coined the term "We are the 99 Percent" and the idea of Bullshit Jobs.
Some things to keep in mind for the whole course:
- Dory
- Henrick Kniberg on making skateboards
- A rubber duck
- Cassie Robinson's thoughts
- Chuck Wendig on being a magic skeleton
- David Bowie on being out of your depth
- Dhiru Thandani on rotating things that are already there
- Jim Jarmusch on stealing
- Sister Corita Kent's Rules for Art College
- Yohji Yamamoto on copying
- Stewart Brand on the responsibility of the artist
- On going slow
- Susan Wendell on hearing disabled people
What does Dory do? This is the most important thing in coding.
Henrick Kniberg on how to make a car. In other words, if you want to make a car, make a skateboard, then a scooter, then a bicycle, then a motorbike and THEN a car. I want you to make lots of skateboards this term.
Rubber duck debugging is a very powerful technique. Please ask me for your duck when you finish watching this lecture!
Cassie Robinson's thoughts on what to think about when you design something.
Chuck Wendig on what to remember.
Just a little out of your depth is the right place to be.
Dhiru Thadani on thinking about what would happen if we designed for humans - but also that you don't have to make new things, sometimes you just have to rotate what is already there.
Jim Jarmusch on stealing.
Sister Corita Kent's rules for art school. It's always obvious when people have put the work in. It's not about one great idea, it's about steady practice, failure and determination.
Yohji Yamamoto is right. Copy what you love!
Steward Brand's pace layering. It's our job to experiment wildly! We have to test the future. Then slower things can filter those tests.
Just try. As soon as you try you are way ahead of most other people.
Susan Wendell wrote powerfully about disability and feminism. What explosion of knowledge could you make with your life?
There is a chicken and egg problem with teaching coding, which is that so many parts rely on each other. I've picked an order to teach you over the rest of this term, but I'd really recommend making use of the resources on the next few slides - you won't understand everything right away, but it will help with familiarisation.
Throughout this course I'm going to use something that I call "Examples orientated teaching". I'm going to spend a lot of time in lectures going through examples, and then re-enforcing that in workshops. Please Slack me with any praise, problems, questions or queries.
Other coding resources and teachers of Creative Coding:
Some useful general JavaScript coding resources:
- JavaScript basics from the p5.js wiki - a good place to refer back to while we are doing this course, with a bit of the history of JavaScript at the start.
- JavaScript for Cats - great intro tutorial to JavaScript that you can do right in your browser.
- The Modern JavaScript Tutorial - a crowd sourced tutorial that is contantly being updated. Comprehensive series of tutorials and exercises on every aspect of modern JavaScript.
- Mozilla Developer Network JavaScript reference - series of tutorials and references from Mozilla, the maker of Firefox.
- Stack Overflow is an online forum for developers using many different languages. It's possible to search by JavaScript only, or even p5.js only.
Some useful p5.js coding resources:
- A good place to start your p5.js learning journey is the Get Started tutorial. The learn section has a series of tutorials. The examples section is full of real examples to copy from - that's how I usually start a new project - by duplicating an existing project. When I'm writing p5.js, I always have the reference open so that I can refer to it constantly. Finally, p5.js forum is a great place to ask questions and find other learners. I use it all the time.
- The Nature of Code and The Coding Train both by Daniel Shiffman. The Nature of Code is completely free if you put the price to $0. The Coding Train is a brilliant YouTube channel that has amazing creative coding content. I'd really, really, really recommend Daniel's Code! Programming with p5.js playlist.
- Programming Design Systems - "a free digital book that teaches a practical introduction to the new foundations of graphic design", by Rune Madsen - all examples are written in p5.js. A great p5.js and general graphic design resource.
Stop press! I found a great p5.js cheat sheet for beginners! I really recommend downloading this in your favourite human language and saving it to your desktop.
Other creative coding teachers and courses:
- For a more Computational Thinking approach (wider cultural thinking too), go through the slides from my Computational Thinking Intensive for UAL students from Summer 2020.
- Matt DesLauriers is a 30 year old generative artist and creative coder from Toronto, Canada, and now based in London, UK. He's taught a great course on "Generative Design & Media Art with JavaScript" at the UCL Bartlett School of Architecture, within the Design for Performance and Interaction programme. He's also taught an Intro to Creative Coding course that uses p5.js.
- Allison Parrish has published her notes on Creative Coding. Allison teaches at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program, where Daniel Shiffman also teaches. You can also find the 2019 ITP Introduction to Computational Media: Code syllabus and notes on the ITP GitHub.
- Golan Levin is the person that I wrote to in 1999 asking what I should do next. He's the reason I'm here. He runs the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University. He's also posted all his teaching, which I highly recommend looking through. He's also posted individual lectures on a variety of subjects on his GitHub.
- UCLA Design Media Arts is where the creator of p5.js, Lauren McCarthy teaches. You can look through all their courses and resources here. They've also published a free course "Introduction to Programming for the Visual Arts with p5.js".
- "Introduction to Computational Media with p5.js" by Luisa Pereira on behalf of New York City Department of Education Computer Science for All initiative.
Other coding resources:
- Awesome Creative Coding - a "carefully curated list of awesome creative coding resources primarily for beginners/intermediates" - tons of brilliant creative coding resources here.
- CS50, Harvard University's introduction to the intellectual enterprises of computer science and the art of programming - not strictly creative coding, but a good introduction to programming and computer science.
- Super old school (1986) introduction to Computer Science from Hal Abelson at MIT - lots of wisdom here, but not a good source for how to learn p5.js!
- Computerphile is a YouTube channel with "videos all about computers and computer stuff". It's also the sister channel of the brilliant Numberphile.
Some brain exploding resources:
We are in a stressful time at the moment. Here are some resources for situating yourself in the world, and how to keep going, set up a studio (if you want) and what you (maybe) should be doing:
- Win Without Pitching - how to run a design studio in a sustainable way.
- You're my Favourite Client - how to be a great client. I give this book to all my clients.
- Hell Yeah - how to decide to do a project or not.
- Austin Kleon on how to keep going.
- Tim Pychyl on procrastination and the importance of being conscientious.
- Ira Glass on the gap between your taste and the quality of your work - you must watch this one!
- Virgil Abloh’s Lecture at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design - interesting to see how one of the most high profile designers in the world talks about their work.
- Bret Victor’s Lecture at Closing keynote at the UIST and SPLASH conferences, October 2014 on "The Humane Representation of Thought" - inspirational stuff from Bret Victor - who also wrote a great essay on what a technologist can do about climate change.
- Alan Kay - "Normal Considered Harmful" - one of the creators of modern computing on how to make change in the world.
- Anab Jain of Superflux 's essay on Calling for a More-Than-Human Politics.
Finally, some brain exploding resources:
- Digital morphogenesis is the exploration of how shapes, forms, and patterns emerge in nature through the use of computational modeling and generative systems based on biological, chemical, and physical processes. It draws upon research from practically every area of the natural sciences and has applications in architecture, digital fabrication, art, engineering, biomedicine, and more.
- Wait but Why - lots of great essays on interesting things - I started with this one - Your Life in Weeks.
- Better Explained - the best site for getting explanations of Maths ideas graphically - I started with this article - Surprising Uses of the Pythagorean Theorem.
- Joscha Bach's lectures are always brilliant - lots of amazing thinking about love, the universe and what it means to be concious.
- Stanford professor Robert Sapolsky's opening lecture of the course entitled Human Behavioral Biology on how he aims to avoid categorical thinking.
- Jane Elliott's anti racist teaching.
Thanks!
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