Thread Art

Generate some beautiful images out of black threads spun between nails on a circular or rectangular perimeter

This work is heavily inspired by the SoME3-winner "The Mathematics of String Art" by channel Virtually Passed: https://youtu.be/WGccIFf6MF8

Examples

Input Image:

Output Image:

Video:

Click

Command:

cd ./src

Generate data (needs a lot of RAM!):
python thread-art.py ../demo/pexels-engin-akyurt.jpg --visualize-progress

Generate video from data:
python thread-art.py ../demo/pexels-engin-akyurt.jpg --load-nails ../demo/pexels-engin-akyurt-nails.txt --to-video ../demo/pexels-engin-akyurt-result.mp4 --video-length 10 --video-blend-target 5 --video-end 2.5

How does it work?

• Main idea is from the video "The Mathematics of String Art" (see above).
• First, all possible nail-to-nail connections are generated and stored in memory (that's why you need a lot of it; 64GB or more recommended).
• Then a random starting point (randomly chosen nail) is selected.
• Next, a greedy algorithm tries to connect this nail with all other nails and selects the best connection.
• To determine how good a connection is, the resulting image will be compared to the target image. In each iteration, the algorithm selects the connection that results in the best improvement.
• The algorithm stops when there is no connection that improves the current result, i.e. all additional connections would result in a "worse" image.