More Glitch Tests

I wanted to play around with a larger, more complex image to apply the various glitch processing upon. I chose a Jewel Tree image as the base with the following results:

This is the original unmodified image:

NOISEDIVE - more Deep Dreaming!

Noisedive from Johan Nordberg on Vimeo.

This is what emerges when you recursively feed noise to a artificial neural network trained to recognise places (e.g. you give it an image and the response is something like 90% beach , 20% desert, 2% swimming pool).

The familiar shapes you see floating past is abstractions the network has made for the different categories. Some categories feature more prominently because the amount of images used to train them differ. For example the "fountain" category contains 111,496 images compared to only 883 in the "nuclear_power_plant" one. So that's why you see a lot more fountain like shapes than big chimneys.

There's a lot more to it than that of course, and this visualisation only shows you one of the many abstraction layers the network uses.

Based on the work by Google researches Alexander Mordvintsev, Christopher Olah and Mike Tyka

Read more at Google Research Labs blog:

• http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2015/06/inceptionism-going-deeper-into-neural.html
• http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2015/07/deepdream-code-example-for-visualizing.html

Forest Goddess Dreamtime

Here are some more images processed via the Dreamscope web interface (see previous posting for details). In this posting, I've selected some samples based upon images from the Forest Goddess / Pachamama series. The samples show a progression from heightened edge details to full blown crazy tripping.

Deep Dreaming Tara Mandalas

The Dreamscope site is another Deep Dreaming web interface for processing images. There's a selection of 15 filters (various pre-configured neural net levels and feedback settings)... This site is kind of fu and addictive in that it responds quickly and there are hardly any queuing / processing delays. (I wish the output wasn't limited to 800x600 however.)

I've been playing around with a number of images and filters. Interesting and often crazy stuff. Several results really stood out as being interesting without totally overwhelming the original image. Here is a set from the Tara Mandala series:

And here is one more from this Tara series that I thought was striking:

Deep Dreaming on the Fractal Ocean of Being

There is a web interface to the DeepDreamBot processing engine which is currently being run "gratis" by a research group in Japan. (Note, however, there is an extensive queue of images waiting to be processed. Not surprising.) One can also surf back thru previously processed images - 300 per page. It's interesting to see so many examples of what works and what does not work with the neural net.

I decided to try out the Deep Dreaming neural net processor with a couple of my own images. I selected some from the Fractal Ocean of Being series which make use of a fractal dimensional space (what else?) encompassing an emergent Green Tara, around whom various enlightened beings and Protectors emerge and disappear in the quantum foam of spacetime.

Below are the BEFORE and AFTER results of being processed by Deep Dreaming software. (Click to enlarge for better detail.)

Original

Dreamed

Original

Dreamed

Original

Dreamed

#deepdream #inceptionism

Since sample images were released last month, Google's DEEP DREAM neural network software has spread like wildfire across the meme-scape of the Internet. By now most everyone has seen at least a few of these remarkable, strange and disquieting images created by a sort of feedback processing within the layers of neural net's visual recognition algorithms. Self manifesting eidetic visions of a silicon brain.

Here is a 5 minute deep zoom into random noise - what emerges eventually, magically, is a panoply of animals, insects, faces, eyes - an every changing Rorschach of imaginal species. Wonderful! (Watch it full screen!)

Inside an artificial brain from Johan Nordberg on Vimeo.

Fractal Ocean of Being

OK, so I renamed this series from when I worked on the first image... As originally posted last January (1/30/14), I had been playing around with a new fractal generator (for iPad from Kai of Kai Power Tools fame) and got very intrigued by the idea that the infinite froth of space / edges within a fractal map might be a great visual metaphor for the for the unseen particle froth of the quantum realm. From that, it was a short step to thinking about the infinite expression of Tara throughout space & time as being like the quantum foam.

Below is the original image from this series and a follow-on images using essentially the same elements ('deity particles') but a different space/time foam.

Green Tara Emerging From Ocean of Being #1

Green Tara Emerging From Ocean of Being #2

This image (below) from the fractal series is a "close up" of Tara's energetic self-manifestation and blessings for all beings.

Green Tara Self-Manifestation

Fractal Foam of Being

I started playing with a fractal app for the iPad. Shades of 1980s! As I fooled around, I happened across a few interesting rendering settings that made me think of quantum energy fields. That got me wanting to create an image of emergent space filled with manifestations of Tara, Medicine Buddha, Mahakala, Dakinis and other protectors.

So this is the first image I came up with. At low rez (screen rez) it's hard to see the fine detail in the various "atoms" of Medicine Buddha who follow the sweeping curves of the fractal spaces. But there is a sense of pattern and energy exchange / flow in any case.

Can't wait to get this printed out LARGE (30"x36") to reveal the full details!

Green Tara in Field of Self-Manifestation