Quantum Zentanglement: Combining Picbreeder and Wave Function Collapse to Create Zentangles

Anna Krolikowski, Sarah Friday, Alice Quintanilla, Jacob Schrum

Abstract: This paper demonstrates a computational approach to generating art reminiscent of Zentangles by combining Picbreeder with Wave Function Collapse (WFC). Picbreeder interactively evolves images based on user preferences, and selected image tiles are sent to WFC. WFC generates patterns by filling a grid with various rotations of the tile images, placed according to simple constraints. Then other images from Picbreeder act as templates for combining patterns into a final Zentangle image. Although traditional Zentangles are black and white, the system also produces color Zentangles. Automatic evolution experiments using fitness functions instead of user selection were also conducted. Although certain fitness functions occasionally produce degenerate images, many automatically generated Zentangles are aesthetically pleasing and consist of naturalistic patterns. Interactively generated Zentangles are pleasing because they are tailored to the preferences of the user creating them.