A Pattern Measure

Allen Klinger and Nikos A Salingaros
Additional contact information
Allen Klinger: School of Engineering and Applied Science, University of California at Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California 90095, USA
Nikos A Salingaros: Division of Mathematics, University of Texas at San Antonio, San Antonio, Texas 78249, USA

Environment and Planning B, 2000, vol. 27, issue 4, 537-547

Abstract: In this paper we propose numerical measures for evaluating the aesthetic interest of simple patterns. The patterns consist of elements (symbols, pixels, etc) in regular square arrays. The measures depend on two characteristics of the patterns: the number of different types of element, and the number of symmetries in their arrangement. We define two complementary composite measures L and C for the degree of pattern in a design, and compute them here for 2 × 2 and 6 × 6 arrays. The results distinguish simple from high-variation cases. We suspect that the measure L corresponds to the degree that human beings intuitively feel a design to be “interesting†, so this model would aid in quantifying the visual connection of two-dimensional designs with viewers. The other composite measure C based on these numerical properties characterizes the extent of randomness of an array. Combining symbol variety with symmetry calculations allows us to employ hierarchical scaling to count the relative impact of different levels of scale. By identifying substructures we can distinguish between organized patterns and disorganized complexity. The measures described here are related to verbal descriptors derived from work by psychologists on responses to visual environments.

Date: 2000
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1068/b2676 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:envirb:v:27:y:2000:i:4:p:537-547

DOI: 10.1068/b2676

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in Environment and Planning B
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().