Putting simple rules, evolutionary loops, and generative models inside constrained digital and physical substrates—from multimodal AI curators at Google DeepMind and 635,040-LED living sculptures to 1990s artificial life (*Creatures*, *BAMZOOKi*), Raspberry Pi e-paper frames, and DIY Eurorack synths in wooden wine crates. That's right.
Pairing foundation models, vision-language encoders, and homeostatic RL agents with procedural 3D art, collage grammars, and architectural light installations.
Combining 35 years of procedural 3D evolutionary computer art (William Latham & Stephen Todd's Mutator / FormGrow) with multimodal foundation models (Gemini) acting as an aesthetic critic across 200+ generations. Exhibited at London's OXO Gallery (27,000+ visitors), CVPR/ECCV/ALife 2026, and featured in The New York Times.
A suspended 3D media sculpture of 2,940 black-PCB cubes (635,040 LEDs) in the lobby of Google DeepMind's King's Cross headquarters, created with Jason Bruges Studio. Powered by 3D cellular automata, Developmental GRNs, RL agents, and an embodied AI curator ("Agatha") with internal homeostatic drives that plays with passers-by.
Open-source generative art frameworks combining hierarchical neural L-systems (Arnheim 1) and differentiable Dadaist photomontage (CLIP-CLOP / Arnheim 3) with CLIP dual encoders—giving artists transparent, object-level control over evolutionary image creation.
Site-specific installations, multi-authored compositions, and mobile augmented reality collaborations with artist Bettina Furnée—including Lines of Defence (Bawdsey coastal flags), POWERHOUSE (Cambridge University Library), and Reality Rules (Parker's Piece AR)—alongside gallery exhibitions in London.
Running generative art and artificial life on £15 single-board computers, e-ink displays, and hand-soldered Veroboard Eurorack modules in a wooden wine crate.
A zero-glare, bistable e-paper picture frame powered by a Raspberry Pi Zero that dreams up and renders fresh generative artworks—drawing 0.0W between refreshes.
Experimental generative synth tracks, hand-drawn iPad patch notebooks (1 Fish per Second, Leaving the Heliopause), DIY Veroboard modules (100 DSP Reverb, Electrosmith VCOs, NiftyNoise), and a playable browser simulator for the KORG Phase 8 acoustic synth.
A dedicated low-power hardware board continuously running Arnheim 3 (CLIP-CLOP) evolutionary collage in the background—slowly mutating and publishing new visual compositions around the clock.
Lo-fi artificial-life simulations, cellular automata, and evolving pixel ecologies running standalone on Raspberry Pi boards—connecting pocket hardware to 30 years of ALife research.
Three decades of evolving virtual creatures, neural pathways, self-referential prompts, and cognitive scaffolding.
Creatures Series (1997–2003): Senior Researcher & Head of Artificial Life designing neural network brains, artificial biochemistries, and digital genetics for the BAFTA-nominated ALife classic.
BAMZOOKi (BBC, 2003–2009): Technical & Creative Product Lead for four series of the BAFTA-nominated mixed-reality TV show where kids engineered physics-based 3D virtual "Zooks" at home to compete on broadcast television.
The modern spiritual successor to Creatures and BAMZOOKi: co-evolving both the physical 3D bodies (directed acyclic graph genotypes in MuJoCo physics simulations) and neural controllers of virtual creatures using asynchronous distributed genetic algorithms as they wrestle in competitive sumo arenas.
Why do biological and artificial agents externalize internal states into persistent drawings, symbols, and artworks? Investigating cognitive scaffolding (Adaptive Behavior, 2024) and intrinsic communicative motivation—where agents actively model whether their partner has understood them and repair misunderstandings interactively (arXiv 2025).
Promptbreeder (ICML 2024): Self-referential evolution where LLMs evolve both task-prompts and the mutation-prompts that govern how prompts mutate.
PathNet (2017): Evolutionary algorithms selecting modular pathways through giant neural networks for continual transfer learning.
Perception Test (NeurIPS 2023): Diagnostic multimodal video benchmark.
Every classic 2008–2012 camera mod, circuit hack, and deadpan side quest—cleaned of Wayback Machine rot and preserved in one place.
Taking a hacksaw and epoxy to £5 25mm CCTV lenses for Micro Four Thirds swirly bokeh, drilling £2 body-cap digital pinholes, reversing 58mm lenses for ant/fly super-macro, and mounting CMOS webcams onto microscopes and telescopes.
Playing vinyl records without electricity on a broken 3.5" hard drive platter with a paper cone and pin; duct-taping a CHDK-hacked Canon camera to a kite; soldering a Drawdio musical pencil on Veroboard; and toothbrush BristleBots.
"Instant reviews on instant noodles, the instant they are consumed." Plus Decoupled Labs—a deadpan speculative biotech startup simulator ("Fat storage is uncompiled legacy code running on outdated hardware").
Gemini as aesthetic curator over 3D Mutator forms across 200 generations.
Generative e-paper art frames and acoustic web synthesizers.
Self-referential evolutionary prompts, cognitive scaffolding, and "Wanting to be Understood".
635,040 LEDs in a 42×10×7 voxel matrix driven by 3D CAs and homeostatic agent "Agatha".
Neural L-systems and evolutionary collage running in Colab and 24/7 on low-power hardware.
DIY stripboard synth modules alongside 3D morphology evolution and evolutionary neural pathways.
Hacksawing C-mount lenses, spinning vinyl on dead hard drives, and flying cameras on kites.
Lines of Defence, POWERHOUSE, and Reality Rules mobile AR.
Head of Artificial Life: neural network brains, artificial biochemistry, and digital genetics.
Technical & Creative Lead for four series of mixed-reality 3D physics "Zook" competitions on BBC TV.