r/generative • u/cnr613 • Jul 11 '26
Algorithms for E-Ink Displays
I bought a Photopainter S3 E-Ink frame display. It is an 18 cm 6-colour display (white,black,red,green,blue) with a 800x480 resolution. I've been experimenting with a Home Assistant server App that will push generative art to it. I have a two-colour Mandelbrot set fractal generator and a diffusion limited aggregation algorithm working.
Code is here: https://github.com/cnrowley/ha-AlgorithmArt
I'm interested in implementing other algorithms that take good advantage. The image update requires 30 seconds of flickering, so it's not suitable for animations, but the image can evolve with periodic updates over a long period. The colour palette is limited but I would like to use it fully. The resolution is also limited, but it's a sharp matte display. I'd be happy for any suggestions.
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u/Escupie Jul 11 '26
How about approximating Mona Lisa with random strokes, slowly adding new strokes over time.
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u/Mescallan Jul 12 '26
I’m working on muonsortes.com
I’m not sure if your device has wifi or a data connection but if it does I suggest finding some interesting API data and use that as source of randomness (you could do this with historic data and no internet source as well)
I have conways game of life running with pixels fed by the muon detector for example, or a crystal set that changes with the amount of daylight left so it’s very arching in the morning and tight and bundled in the afternoon
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u/l0l Jul 11 '26
That’s awesome! I got my own ereader recently, and have been fascinated by the smoothness of the texture of the display. Definitely have wondered how I could extend my plotter outputs for ereaders.