Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
There are of course, many reasons why we might seek some form of “automated
creativity” or aesthetic judgement,
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apart from replacing human labour. For exam-
ple, automated creativity could lead to creative discovery that exceeds any human
capability, or provides greater insights on the mechanisms of human creativity by
attempting to model it. But these are “blue sky” speculations, and current techno-
logical advances in this area can just as easily homogenise and suffocate the creative
decision-making process for human users, as they can expand or enhance it. A good
example can be seen in recent digital camera technologies. Over the last ten years,
as computational power has escalated, digital cameras have increasingly shifted cre-
ative decision making to the camera instead of the person taking the picture. We see
modes with labels like “Intelligent Auto” or scene selection for particular scenarios
(“Fireworks”,“Landscape”,“Sunset”, “Beach”). These modes supposedly optimise
many different parameters to achieve the “best” shot—all the photographer has to
do is frame the image and press the button.
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Recent advances even take over these
decisions, choosing framing by high-level scene analysis and deciding when the
picture should be taken based on smile detection, for example. Such functionality
trends towards the removal of much human creative decision-making, subjugating
the human photographer to an increasingly passive role.
As anyone who has used a entirely manual camera knows, hand-operated “slow
technology” forces the user to think about all aspects of the photographic process
and their implications for the final image. The user's role is highly active: experi-
mentation, mistakes, and serendipitous events are all possible, even encouraged—
well known stimuli for creativity. If the
design
of components and their interaction
is good, then using such a device isn't marred by complexity or limited by inade-
quate functionality, which is often the rationalisation given in automation of creative
functionality.
Shifting the thinking about the design of technology from one of “complexity
automation” (where complexity is masked through “intelligent” simplicity) to one of
“emergent complexity” (where interaction of well designed components generates
new, higher-level functionality) allows the human user to potentially expand their
creativity rather than have it subsumed and homogenised.
2.5 Conclusions
Ecosystemics represents an alternative, biologically-inspired approach to creative
discovery over more traditional methods such as genetic algorithms or genetic pro-
gramming. It offers an interesting conceptual basis for developing new creative sys-
tems and processes, even in non-computational settings. Incorporating an “environ-
ment”, and allowing interactions between dynamic components and that environ-
ment, permits a rich complexity of creative possibilities for the artist wishing to
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Chapter 4 discusses this issue in more detail.
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Reminiscent of Kodak founder George Eastman's famous tag line of 1888 for the Kodak No. 1
camera: “You press the button, we do the rest”.
