The Hybrid Invention Generator

Abstract

The Hybrid Invention Generator (HIG) is a generative artwork that enables the creation of new inventions through a computer-based hybridforming mechanism. Some 70 inventions generated by me in 3D are presented to a participant. Any device can be “mated” with any of the other inventions in the system (Fig. 1). Ten “genetic hybrids” for each “mating” inventions, including drawings, plans, photographs and movies, and we developed a series of media tests and experimental visualizations exploring the potential aesthetics of the system. The model for the functioning system was highly ambitious. It functioned as a metaphor for an even more ambitious concept, the creation of an actual Hybrid Invention Generator. A threeyear research gift from Intel was central in facilitating this process. There are few systems that enable people to brainstorm about the visualization and creation of new inventions. The HIG system produces differing kinds of results: serious, humorous, surreal—yet by interacting with a series of visualizations/conceptualizations in real time, the participant is potentially able to imagine the actual solution. Even the broad expertise of the researchers involved could not solve some of the more intrinsic research problems. Gideon May, a computer programmer and artist, was then solicited to bring the work to fruition. One of the most difficult problems to solve was developing the mechanism to form the “genetic” offspring of the initial invention models in real time. This problem proved to be non-trivial. Yet May rose to the task. Thus the Hybrid Invention Generator could only come into being through processoriented research—a collaborative interaction among artists, designers, programmers and engineers as facilitated by industry support. The Hybrid Invention Generator premiered at the Museum of New Zealand—Te Papa Tongarewa, in Wellington, 2002. It has been discussed in a variety of essays, including “OULIPO | vs | Recombinant Poetics” [1].