Gallery

Everything here is plain PostScript, drawn by pscat. The art comes first: 33 finished pieces, each with its own page showing how it is made and the source. Below it are specimens and examples, the demo sheets for each library. Every picture is deterministic: run the same file and you get the same pixels. Many run live in the playground.

Art

Geometry and fractals

Pictures that fall out of a formula: roses, spirals, tilings and fractals.

Golden Bloom, a disc of 1,300 glowing dots spiralling out from a small gold centre through orange and red to pink and magenta at the rim, on a dark ground

Golden BloomPhyllotaxis: 1,300 florets at the golden angle, spaced like a sunflower.

Cathedral Rose, a lace-like rosette woven from straight red and gold chords inside a gold ring on a dark purple ground

Cathedral RoseA Maurer rose: straight chords walking a six-petal curve in 71 and 97 degree strides.

A green fern frond made of tens of thousands of tiny dots, shown on a dark background

Fern, After BarnsleyThe chaos game: 48,000 points over four affine maps, with no outline drawn.

Frost Mandala, a six-fold pattern of fine overlapping circle outlines in pale blue and teal on a near-black ground, with faint rays

Frost MandalaSix-fold circle recursion with an 11 degree twist per generation, over 1,555 circles.

Woven Labyrinth, a square grid of tiles, each split corner to corner into one orange and one navy triangle, under a title and a double frame

Woven LabyrinthTruchet's 1704 two-triangle tile, randomly quarter-turned 256 times, chains into a flowing quilt.

Infinite Descent, a disc tiled with heptagons that shrink toward the rim, coloured in rings from dark navy at the centre through purple to orange-red at the edge

Infinite DescentA hyperbolic tessellation: one heptagon reflected across its own edges, four generations deep.

$Recursive Peaks, three mountains made of nested triangles shaded from white tips to grey, under a night sky of cyan and pink stars and three fractal snowflake outlines$

Recursive PeaksA night mountain range built entirely from artkit's fractals: nested-triangle peaks, a carpet-pattern starfield and snowflake curves.

Generative and L-systems

Rules and random numbers that grow into plants, fabrics and fields.

Ember Tree, a tree with a spreading crown of golden leaf clusters in front of a large glowing sun setting on a dusk sky that fades from deep blue to red

Ember TreeRecursive branching from a seeded random generator, a banded dusk sky and layered sun glow.

Silk Waves, sixty-six thin threads rippling across a dark page, shading from violet at the top to teal at the bottom, with a few white threads

Silk WavesSixty-six threads displaced by two interfering sine waves.

Hortus Machinalis, a herbarium plate with three branching plants labelled in Latin-style captions on cream paper

Hortus MachinalisA herbarium plate: three L-system plants grown by turtle, with blossoms stamped along each stem.

Lodestone, hundreds of short dark strokes (iron filings) curling in loops around a dark rock on a pale tan ground, like the field lines of a magnet

Lodestone1,400 iron filings tracing a flow field around a rock, like the field lines of a magnet.

Firefly Census, a summer meadow after dark with a starry sky, a stippled hill, tall grass and glowing fireflies

Firefly CensusA meadow after dark in which every mark is placed by artkit's scatter, and none by hand.

Painting

Brush strokes with bristle, loaded paint, wet edges and paper underneath.

Plum Branch in Ink, a sumi-e ink painting of a plum branch with blossoms, grass and a soft wash behind

Plum Branch in InkA sumi-e plum branch in which width is everything: each stroke narrows to a brush-lifted point.

Flying White, a dusk wetland with reeds in dry-brush strokes, a broken reflection in the water and thin mist in the sky

Flying White: Reeds at DuskA wetland at dusk in dry brush: reeds that run dry toward their tips, a broken reflection, thin mist.

Fugitive Pigments, a poetry broadside with a spray-stencilled title, a starry night sky above reeds and a moon with a halo

Fugitive PigmentsA poetry broadside: an original poem under a spray-stencilled title, illustrated entirely with paintkit brushes.

Mochi in Denim Blue, an oil-painting style portrait of a golden Pomeranian with upright ears against a denim-blue canvas

Mochi in Denim BlueA portrait study of a Pomeranian in broad oil strokes against a scraped denim-blue canvas.

First Rain, a river valley in layered watercolour washes with five receding ridges and a veil of rain

First RainA river valley in layered watercolour, palest and wettest first, each ridge darker and drier.

Alpine Lake, snow-capped peaks reflected in a still lake under a criss-cross brushed sky, with evergreens in the foreground

Alpine LakeA snow-capped range over a still lake, painted wet-on-wet from paintkit's brushes alone.

Evening Stream, an autumn evening with a glowing sky, a stream tumbling over a small fall between dark banks, autumn trees and a cabin with a lit window

Evening StreamAn autumn evening: a stream comes out of the sunset glow, over a little fall, past a cabin with its lamp lit.

Printmaking and etching

Halftone dots, hatching and relief cuts: pictures made of marks.

Out of Register, a three-colour risograph-style sunset made of halftone dots in teal and orange with dark line ridges, printed slightly misaligned

Out of RegisterA three-plate risograph sunset, misregistered on purpose: every tone is a halftone dot.

Nightfall, Three Cuts, a moonlit ridge over water in three print styles: engraved sky and water, woodcut mountains and linocut reeds

Nightfall, Three CutsA moonlit ridge over water in three print styles at once: engraving, woodcut and linocut.

Lettering and type

Text set glyph by glyph, flowed into shapes, or written by hand.

Ring of Type, a sentence repeated around eleven concentric rings that shrink toward a large ampersand at the centre

Ring of TypeOne sentence set glyph by glyph around eleven shrinking rings.

Hundred Lines, a chalkboard covered in the same sentence written by hand nine times, each line a little more ragged

Hundred LinesA chalkboard on which the same sentence is handwritten nine times, and no two letters match.

The Compositor's Proof, a printer's proof sheet with a motto set in a circle, a justified paragraph and a two-column colophon

The Compositor's ProofA printer's proof sheet showing artkit's paragraph flow: a round medallion, a justified block, two columns.

Released in Part, a typed 1962 office memorandum on a twice-photocopied page: an office-use-only marking at the head and foot ruled through by a reviewer's pen, a memo header, six numbered paragraphs with a strikeover, an x-out and underlined words, two names covered by marker bars with an exemption code beside each, a received date stamp, a records-review box stamp with handwritten initials and date, a released-in-part stamp, a document number, a paper clip, punch holes, and handwritten initials and a note

Released in PartA typed 1962 memo about two lost cans of aerial film, its marking ruled through, its names blacked out, stamped and photocopied twice for release decades later.

The Man from 2026, a typed 1962 TOP SECRET memorandum for the record on aged legal paper: red typed classification lines at the head and foot, a control number and copy line, a registry stamp, a paper clip and punch holes, numbered paragraphs with x-outs and a strikeover, a signature block and distribution list, a regrading box and handwritten initials and a margin note

The Man from 2026A TOP SECRET memorandum of 1962 that was never released: an interviewing officer's flat account of a man who says he came from 2026 and built his time machine by talking to another machine.

Data visualization

Charts and surfaces drawn as clean vector figures.

Ripple Range, a three-dimensional surface drawn as stacked ridges that shade from orange at the back to blue at the front, with a pale dip where the ripples meet

Ripple RangeTwo decaying ripples summed into a height field and drawn as a 3D surface.

Field Notes, a naturalist's journal page with a bar chart and line chart sharing one axis, and a donut chart with a hand-lettered legend

Field NotesA marsh census set as a field journal: bar and line charts on one axis, a donut chart, handwritten labels.

Apparel and design

Print artwork for shirts and jerseys.

Keepin' it Real, a shirt front lettered twice in fat groovy faces with green, blue and red plasma fills, above a typewriter punchline for the back

Keepin' it RealA recreated shirt front in two groovy faces, filled with GIMP-style plasma, over a typewriter punchline.

Varsity Backs, two team jerseys seen from behind, cardinal-and-gold and navy-and-white, with arched names over large numbers

Varsity BacksTwo team jerseys seen from behind, with arched names over large layered-outline numbers.

Drawing (dry media)

Chalk, crayon and charcoal on slate and toothed paper.

Lecture 14, a slate chalkboard after a lecture deriving Euler's formula from the Taylor series, with braces naming the terms, a boxed result, a unit-circle sketch and erased ghost writing

Lecture 14A chalkboard as the professor left it: Euler's formula derived step by step from the Taylor series, braced, starred and boxed in yellow.

My Family and Our House, a young child's crayon drawing: a red house, four stick figures, a smiling sun and blue sky band, and the name Josie

My Family and Our HouseA six-year-old's crayon drawing on printer paper: a house, a family of stick figures and an oversized sun.

Study after Berger, 1864, a charcoal portrait of Abraham Lincoln drawn as an art student would, with the coat and background left unfinished

Study after Berger, 1864An art student's charcoal portrait of Lincoln, drawn to the tones of an 1864 photograph.

Specimens and examples

These are the library demo sheets and sample programs. Each group links to the guide that explains the library behind it.

Groups

Style packs

Four motif libraries in lib/styles/, layered on the generative-art toolkit artkit. Each pack adds three palettes and a drawer of motifs. These specimen posters are examples/style_*.ps, 620 by 800 and deterministic. Read the guide.

Aether & Brass, a steampunk specimen poster

steampunk.psGears, rivets, flanged pipework, pressure gauges and riveted plate frames, in the /brass /verdigris /boiler palettes.

Turn On The Sun, a psychedelic specimen poster

psychedelic.psSunburst rays, wobble-ring blobs, spirals, kaleidoscope repeats and hue-wheel colour, in the /acid /blacklight /sherbet palettes.

Outer Reaches, a sci-fi specimen poster

scifi.psStarfields, a ringed planet, HUD chrome, hex shields and the synthwave grid floor, in the /void /hologram /synthwave palettes.

Splat!, a toon specimen poster

toon.psCel-shaded flats under fat ink, speech bubbles, action bursts and dripping title slabs, in the /saturday /latenight /pastelpop palettes.

Page templates

lib/pagekit.ps builds whole pages from a content dictionary: a title, a body, a signoff. A sparse or even empty dictionary still renders a complete page, and long copy shrinks or flows to fit instead of overrunning. Each specimen is examples/template_*.ps at 612 by 792. Read the guide.

A greeting card rendered by pgcard

pgcardA tinted rounded panel with a centred title, a flowed message and a signoff tucked into the corner.

A letter rendered by pgletter

pgletterA plain page: header rule, date, salutation, flowed body and reserved signature space.

A certificate rendered by pgcertificate

pgcertificateA double-ruled cream certificate with a shrink-to-fit awardee name and a two-column presenter and date line.

An invitation rendered by pginvitation

pginvitationA tinted bordered panel with a large event title, a when, where and host block, and RSVP-style body copy.

A poster rendered by pgposter

pgposterA full-bleed headline sized to the page width, an italic tagline, a large flowed body and a footer line.

Lettering and apparel

Display lettering from glyph outlines, GIMP-style fills, headline composition, jersey numbers and apparel print templates. Read the guide.

Keepin' It Real, a display lettering specimen

lettering.psGroovy display lettering from outline text: charpath clipped to a multicolour interior (solid, transition, patches, mottled, worn) with a dark contour, seeded and deterministic.

A specimen of GIMP-style fills: plasma, solid noise, difference clouds and gradient shapes

fillkit.psGIMP's plasma, solid noise, difference clouds, conical, spiral and square gradients and grain as seeded, clip-friendly fills, also usable as lettering treatments.

Keepin' It Real, a headline composition specimen

headline.psHeadline composition from measured glyph ink: one dominant word, supporting phrases tucked against individual letters, and clearance checks that fail loudly instead of clipping.

A jersey specimen with arched team names over player numbers, in light and dark garment colours

jersey.psAn arched team name over a dominant player number, ink-centred, outlined and fitted to a print rectangle, rejecting impossible geometry by name.

An apparel template proof sheet with front, back and two sleeve print areas

apparel.psA two-sided apparel graphic template: front, back and optional sleeve artwork from one configuration, each its own print area, exported transparent with a manifest (proof sheet shown).

Dry media

Chalk, crayon and charcoal on toothed surfaces, plus the stroke-skeleton letters and TeX-style mathematics that go on a board. Read the guide.

A drykit specimen: chalk, charcoal and crayon strokes at three pressures and three tilts on five surfaces

drykit.psA dry stick across a toothed surface: chalk on slate and green board, charcoal on newsprint and drawing paper, crayon on construction paper, at three pressures and three tilts, with the gaps streaking along the direction of travel.

A drychalk specimen: handwriting in chalk on a dressed green board and a slate

drychalk.psChalk on a board: strokes that land heavy, tire and lift thin, dust beside them, side-of-chalk underlines, soft coloured chalk, and boards dressed with erased writing and eraser swipes.

A drycrayon specimen: sixteen crayon colours at three pressures, repeated passes, tip wear, layering and scribble fills

drycrayon.psWax crayon on paper: the 16-crayon box at three pressures, coverage building with each pass, a new point against a worn flat, one colour laid over another, and scribble fills that go past the lines.

Crayon motions: wobbly lines, scribble fill, unclosed loops, stick and tadpole figures, a sun with rays and grass

drycrayon motionsA child's ways of moving a crayon, as path builders: shaky overshooting lines, back-and-forth scribble fill, circles that do not close, stick figures, sun rays and grass.

A drycharcoal specimen: vine, compressed and pencil strokes, value scales, a hatched sphere, a lifted mass and a construction sketch

drycharcoal.psCharcoal on drykit: vine, compressed and pencil grades, value scales by hatching and by smudging, a hatched sphere, stump smudge, kneaded and hard-eraser lifts, and construction lines under a drawing.

A specimen of stroke-skeleton letters, Greek, operators and growing delimiters

Stroke glyphsSkeleton letters, Greek, operators and growing delimiters for board mathematics, as paths for any pen to follow (lib/strokeglyphs.ps).

A mathkit specimen: well-known formulas written as stroke skeletons, and a derivation in chalk on a green board

mathkit.psTeX-subset mathematics laid out with TeX's box model as stroke skeletons: fractions, roots, sums and integrals, matrices and accents, written with a lecturer's irregularity, and an aligned derivation in chalk.

A mathkit specimen of TeX structures: braces with labels, stacked limits, negation and modular arithmetic, style switches mid-formula, and aligned columns in pen and in chalk on a board

mathkit structuresMore TeX structures as stroke skeletons: over- and underbraces with labels, stacked limits, negation, style switches mid-formula, and aligned columns, in pen and in chalk.

A mathkit specimen: congruences with mod and pod, brace labels beside the brace, aligned columns that drift down the lines like a hand, alignat coefficients, and hand-drawn braces marking spans of formulas on a chalk board

mathkit columns and bracesCongruences with \mod and \pod, brace labels set beside, align columns that wander down the lines as a hand does, alignat, and mkbrace, a hand-drawn brace between two points for marking a span on a board.

Charts and figures

Paper-ready figures from graph.ps and dataviz.ps: function plots, bar, line and pie charts as plain vector pages. Read the guide.

A paper figure: a framed function plot with axes and labels

graph.psA single framed plotfn figure with axes and labels, the way a paper wants it.

A paper figure with a bar chart, a line chart and a pie chart

dataviz.psBar, line and pie charts on one plain, paper-ready page.

Fonts and handwriting

The Type 3 display faces in lib/fonts/ draw every glyph with a program, so the letterforms can do things outlines cannot. fonts/catalog/ adds 60 open outline faces loaded at findfont time. The Fonts page shows every face individually. Read the guide.

The Type 3 font library specimen poster

The specimen poster/Neon (glow by overdraw), /Marquee (bulbs, glints, burnouts), /Constellation (star charts) and /Lapidary (chiselled stone).

The Type 3 font library specimen, second folio

The second folio/Circuitry (copper traces, pads and vias), /Stitchwork (cross-stitch on the 45 degree grid) and /Confetti (a thrown handful, still falling).

A handwritten letter set in the HandScript font

/HandScriptDynamic handwriting: jittered strokes, a wandering baseline and varying pen pressure, so no two letters ever match.

View source · open in playground

The standard 35 fonts specimen

The Standard Thirty-FiveEvery classic name (Palatino, Bookman, Avant Garde, Zapf Chancery, Symbol, Dingbats) resolved to an open font.

The font catalog specimen

The CatalogA face for every occasion: 35 families across serif, sans, slab, script, blackletter, western, horror, pixel, sci-fi and more.

Classic examples

The demo files that grew up with the interpreter: fractals that draw themselves, and test pages written the way real-world files are. Read the guide.

The Sierpinski triangle

Sierpinski triangleThe original watch-it-draw demo: recursive subdivision.

View source · open in playground

The Koch snowflake

Koch snowflakeRecursive edge replacement.

View source · open in playground

A golden spiral

Golden spiralFibonacci arcs and a radial burst.

View source · open in playground

A test card

Test cardWritten like a found file, shortcut prolog and all; renders identically in Ghostscript.

View source · open in playground

A type specimen

Type specimenThe base fonts through the full operator set.

View source · open in playground

A postcard

PostcardFiles, filters and sampled images, inline in one page.

Type 3 fonts

Fonts where every glyph is a PostScript program. Read the guide.

A ransom note in mismatched cut-out letters

Ransom noteType 3 fonts where every glyph is invented fresh at show time.