Jacob

The concept behind L-Systems is really straight-forward. You start with a string, then you successively apply a string replacement rule. So, let’s say we have a string:

A

And we apply this rule: Every time you see an ‘A’, change it to ‘AB’. Every time you see a ‘B’, change it to ‘A’. The first time through, we get:

AB

Then:

ABA

Then:

ABAAB

Then:

ABAABABA

That’s the root of it (pun intended). Once you have a long enough string, you can then run it through an engine to translate it into some result. In our easy example, maybe A draws a line forward, and B turns 90 degrees to the left. Or maybe A plays the next note up on a piano scale, and B plays the next note down.

In my system the symbol set is different. My strings look something like this:

FF-[-F+F+F-]+[+F-F-F+]

In which F moves one unit forward, – rotates to the left, + rotates to the right, and the brackets start and return to ‘branch points’.

If you send me an e-mail, I’ll send you the source. My system is very portable – the Lsystem objects, rulesets, and engines are separated so that the structure can be easily adapted to different purposes.

I spent a long time with this stuff a few years ago – I’m sure it is something that I will return to in the future.

Cheers,

-Jer

I really like the work you have done here, the abstract tree forms you have created are stunning. I am new to the concept of generating L Systems based visuals and was wondering if you could give me some pointers? A peek at the source code for this project would be of a huge help!

Jon Davis

Best Regards,

- Tom Gonzalez