Make
Generative Art
Algorithms as a medium: flow fields, particle systems, tilings and fractals you can steer. Output tends to be wallpaper-grade within a minute.
11 sites
Botanical infinite zoom drifting through flowers, insects and quiet ruins. Best left running on a second screen.
- <1 min
Sculpt a glossy blob with sliders for noise, light and iridescence, then leave it rotating and admire your handiwork.
- 2 min
- Desktop
JavaScript demos in 140 characters. The gap between how little code there is and what appears is the whole appeal.
- 10 min
- Desktop
Walks you through rebuilding classic algorithmic pieces — tiled lines, Joy Division, cubic disarray — one step at a time.
- 10 min
- Desktop
Zoom into the Mandelbrot set as far as the arithmetic allows, with palette controls and no plugin to install.
- 1 hr+
- Desktop
Physically modelled sea you can retune — wind speed, swell, choppiness — rendering waves that behave properly.
- <1 min
- Desktop
Gallery of Processing and p5.js sketches where every piece runs in the page and the source is right there to fork.
- 1 hr+
- Desktop
Write creative code in one pane and watch it run in the next, with no install, no build step and no configuration.
- 10 min
- Desktop
The gentle way into fragment shaders, with every example editable in the page and redrawing itself as you type.
- 1 hr+
- Desktop
Plotter art drawn by a virtual turtle in a hundred-odd lines of JavaScript, with everybody's source code on display.
- 1 hr+
- Desktop
Real-time fractal zoomer ported to the browser, smooth enough that the boundary keeps unfolding as fast as you dive.
- 10 min
- Desktop
How we picked these
Every entry in Detour is hand-sorted rather than scraped: filed under one category, given one to three moods, and placed in a time band for how quickly it pays off. The practical facts — cost, sign-up, sound, device and whether it is safe at a desk — are recorded per site and shown on every card, so you can rule things out before you click.
Generative Art: questions
How many sites are in Generative Art?
11 sites, each hand-sorted by category, mood and how long it takes to pay off.
Which of these sites are free with no sign-up?
11 of the 11 are free and need no account. None of them are paid.
Do these sites work on a phone, and are they safe for work?
1 of 11 work on a phone; the rest are desktop only. 11 are safe for work and 11 work with the sound off.