Making interactive evolutionary graphic design practical

Abstract

This chapter describes interactive evolutionary design, a powerful technique where one marries the exploratory capabilities of evolutionary computation with the esthetic skills and sensibility of the human as selective agent. Interactive evolutionary design has the potential to be an enormously useful tool to graphic designers. However, in order for it to become commonly used, a number of barriers to use must be overcome, including making it both simpler to understand (e.g., more intuitive genotype-phenotype mappings) and with greater user-control (e.g., allow the user to lock "perfect" elements of a design). In this study we explore these ideas - how can one make interactive evolutionary design more appealing, useful and practical? - by developing a design tool "evoDesign" that employs a genetic algorithm to evolve designs. As an illustrative test case, evoDesign is used to evolve tiles used for walls or floors or as a repeating unit for fabrics and wallpapers. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.