Letting the art flow: how EMBERs art work.

LONDON Embers is an all new NFT project by @LondonDAO celebrating EIP-1559 and burning. Embers are attainable via the burning of LONDON Gifts or Embers itself. Learn more here.


A sample run of the EMBERs artwork
A sample run of the EMBERs artwork

EMBERs algorithm was largely inspired by the works of @hyper_glu’s GENOME work on OpenPallete (shoutout to @dvnabbott, a LondonDAO grantee)

Genome is cool
Genome is cool

To that, we wanted to add our own spin to this visual style of strong colors and simple line primitives. Instead of the more posterly qualities of Genome, we decided to approach EMBERs with a style similar to LONDON Gifts, a piece that works well standalone but also as a PFP background.

The early versions of EMBER artwork were primitive, lines were drawing at random and the visual style draws many similarities to GENOME. We wanted EMBERs to stand out on its own and started to play around and experiment with the visual style via varying noise functions.

SUPER DENSE
SUPER DENSE

At this point, I was still trying to figure out the visual style of the work; while inspired by GENOME, I wanted the work to have its own voice; should it skew more towards the fine details or celebrate the simple geometry of lines building these patterns?

Eventually, it became clear to me that the algorithm was capable of BOTH wants; it can deliver simple pieces and complex pieces just as well.

THICC BOI
THICC BOI
DENSE BOI
DENSE BOI

With quite a bit of fine tuning the artworks were largely coming out how I wanted them, but they did lack some life… so I decided to animate them.

Quite a bit of math to figure this out in SVGs
Quite a bit of math to figure this out in SVGs

With the animations, I really think the pieces LEVELED up. By controlling the perceived ‘speed’ of the animation, some artworks will look like smooth waves, while others look like rain from a monsoon. (I’ll let you think of all the layers of visual metaphors here) The added dimensionality drastically increased the diversity of artworks coming out of EMBERs.


On that note, some commentary on the overarching art design around EMBERs. For every generative art we produce at POB studio, we design them for the expected token behavior and supply. In the case of LONDON GIFT, we knew from the beginning that there would be 6000-10000 NFTs, and the algorithm needed to be capable of producing enough diverse art to fill that quota. For LONDON EMBERs, the quote was about 4000-6000, lending itself a different level of needs. Because of the smaller supply and burning behavior, I designed EMBERs to be more ‘loose’ with the expected output of artworks. Some may come out less than desired and should be burnt.

Hope this piece captures some of the inside work to build the gen art we ship at POB studios. It is quite the labor of love and takes quite a bit of thinking well beyond just ‘oh, the supply is 500’. We build interactive NFT experiences and work to ship art systems that work best in those systems.

PS Hope you all enjoy the names; they are inspired by ikea product names

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