Title Diffusion Limited Aggregation in G-Speak
Interaction, code, code poemA particle drifts. It wanders randomly, tracing no particular path, until it encounters a structure and adheres to it. Another particle drifts, adheres, and then another, and the tree grows outward from its seed in forms that look uncannily like frost on glass, or the branching of a river delta, or the dendritic spread of a neuron firing. This is diffusion limited aggregation: a mathematical growth process that generates, from the simplest of rules, forms of extraordinary complexity and beauty.
This interactive Processing applet, developed during my RISD thesis as an exploration of structural pattern in nature, allows the user to manipulate the conditions of that growth in real time, controlling particle density, stickiness, and the initial point of seeding, and watching the resultant form emerge. The project was originally built to run on G-Speak, a spatial gestural interface that let users shape the simulation through intuitive three-dimensional movement. It serves two purposes simultaneously: as a pedagogical tool for making a mathematical phenomenon viscerally legible, and as a generative design instrument, producing vector forms that can migrate into more conventional graphic work.
+ Special thanks to Clement Valla for his generous programming help during the project
+ Photography/Videography: Micah Barrett
+ Concept, programming, video-editing: Olivia Verdugo
+ Song: Legions (Reverie) by Zoë Keating
Title Diffusion Limited Aggregation in G-Speak
Interaction, code, code poemA particle drifts. It wanders randomly, tracing no particular path, until it encounters a structure and adheres to it. Another particle drifts, adheres, and then another, and the tree grows outward from its seed in forms that look uncannily like frost on glass, or the branching of a river delta, or the dendritic spread of a neuron firing. This is diffusion limited aggregation: a mathematical growth process that generates, from the simplest of rules, forms of extraordinary complexity and beauty.
This interactive Processing applet, developed during my RISD thesis as an exploration of structural pattern in nature, allows the user to manipulate the conditions of that growth in real time, controlling particle density, stickiness, and the initial point of seeding, and watching the resultant form emerge. The project was originally built to run on G-Speak, a spatial gestural interface that let users shape the simulation through intuitive three-dimensional movement. It serves two purposes simultaneously: as a pedagogical tool for making a mathematical phenomenon viscerally legible, and as a generative design instrument, producing vector forms that can migrate into more conventional graphic work.
+ Special thanks to Clement Valla for his generous programming help during the project
+ Photography/Videography: Micah Barrett
+ Concept, programming, video-editing: Olivia Verdugo
+ Song: Legions (Reverie) by Zoë Keating
© 2026 Olivia S Verdugo