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A Natural Pattern
I'm new to beading, but not patterns, so what I'm hoping to share here may already be common knowledge, but I won't know unless I say!
I've always liked some of the patterns in nature like fern leaves and Romanesque Broccoli:
and sunflower seeds:
So I've thrown together a web page that will draw some patterns like this:
Which I hope can be reproduced in bead-work, from looking at the pattern, or a printout if I add a print facility.
I already have some ideas for improving it, but ought to wait until I know there is any interest before investing more time!
To see the patterns, go to http://homepage.ntlworld.com/underst...iral/index.htm and wave your mouse around the top left of the white page. Once the program is ready, you should see a selection of patterns which are coarse when your mouse is away from the centre and get finer as you approach the centre.
I have issues with the strings at the centre at the moment - I think I should be able to get a better shape with the beads all touching and the strings coming together. At the moment it looks like you'll have to have a disc of material to support the centre, but I don't know bead-work tricks: there may be obvious ways to reproduce this already.
The pattern only looks good once you have over 200 beads on my page, but I made a light using 55 LEDs in this pattern and in real life it still looks interesting (I'd attach a photo, but have lent it to someone - I'll edit when I get it back)!
I've also made software to do this in three dimensions (like dimples on a golf-ball) but don't know how to draw it in a way that is easy to copy to real-life (the back beads and wires show between the front beads and wires and make it very difficult to see what is what). Again, I won't put more work in unless there's a need: It's quite possible that the flat version I've made can bend into a dome anyway, and two could be put together to make a ball:
If any geeky folk with more time than me would like the source code to make more of the project, I have no problem sharing it (the algorithm is complex but small, the development would be user interface things).
I've always liked some of the patterns in nature like fern leaves and Romanesque Broccoli:
and sunflower seeds:
So I've thrown together a web page that will draw some patterns like this:
Which I hope can be reproduced in bead-work, from looking at the pattern, or a printout if I add a print facility.
I already have some ideas for improving it, but ought to wait until I know there is any interest before investing more time!
To see the patterns, go to http://homepage.ntlworld.com/underst...iral/index.htm and wave your mouse around the top left of the white page. Once the program is ready, you should see a selection of patterns which are coarse when your mouse is away from the centre and get finer as you approach the centre.
I have issues with the strings at the centre at the moment - I think I should be able to get a better shape with the beads all touching and the strings coming together. At the moment it looks like you'll have to have a disc of material to support the centre, but I don't know bead-work tricks: there may be obvious ways to reproduce this already.
The pattern only looks good once you have over 200 beads on my page, but I made a light using 55 LEDs in this pattern and in real life it still looks interesting (I'd attach a photo, but have lent it to someone - I'll edit when I get it back)!
I've also made software to do this in three dimensions (like dimples on a golf-ball) but don't know how to draw it in a way that is easy to copy to real-life (the back beads and wires show between the front beads and wires and make it very difficult to see what is what). Again, I won't put more work in unless there's a need: It's quite possible that the flat version I've made can bend into a dome anyway, and two could be put together to make a ball:
If any geeky folk with more time than me would like the source code to make more of the project, I have no problem sharing it (the algorithm is complex but small, the development would be user interface things).
'ere there be monsters", would do it...
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