If you're interested in creating cutting-edge code-based art and animations, you've come to the right place! Processing (available at www.processing.org) is a revolutionary open source programming language and environment designed to bridge the gap between programming and art, allowing non-programmers to learn programming fundamentals as easily as possible, and empowering anyone to produce beautiful creations using math patterns. With the software freely available, Processing provides an accessible alternative to using Flash for creative coding and computational art—both on and off the Web.

This book is written especially for artists, designers, and other creative professionals and students exploring code art, graphics programming, and computational aesthetics. The book provides a solid and comprehensive foundation in programming, including object-oriented principles, and introduces you to the easy-to-grasp Processing language, so no previous coding experience is necessary. The book then goes through using Processing to code lines, curves, shapes, and motion, continuing to the point where you'll have mastered Processing and can really start to unleash your creativity with realistic physics, interactivity, and 3D! In the final chapter, you'll even learn how to extend your Processing skills by working directly with the powerful Java programming language—the language Processing itself is built with.

Amazon.com® Reader Reviews (Ranked by Helpfulness)

Average Amazon.com® Rating:  Based on 8 Ratings

Inspiring and thorough. - 2008-08-20
Reviewer Rating:
I picked this book up on impulse while about halfway thru the other book "Processing: A Handbook for Visual Designers and Artists". They seemed like books that were too similar, but they are not. This book is aimed more at the individual, whereas the other seems to be aimed more at a classroom (yet is also an excellent book). The amount of exercises and experiments is massive. The book opens up assuming you have never touched a computer language before, however it's easy to jump ahead if you have experience. The book is also hardcover, making it a nice object to hold and read. As the book progresses, it becomes more of an encyclopedia than a tutorial, therefore should stay useful for years to come. As a former artist-tuned-web developer, Processing has saved my life from mundane coding, and this book provided much of the inspiration. I have also recommended this book to non-artistic coders looking to expand their graphic and artistic skills.

Engineering Students Should Not Bother With This Book - 2008-12-19
Reviewer Rating:
Generally speaking this book moved way too slow for me and did not work well as a reference manual, so I would suggest that people who are already familiar with programming do not bother. The author spends way too much time running his mouth about stupid garbage that nobody cares about like how he got interested in processing or the profoundness of algorithmic art.
I know this book was written for artists and it probably works very well for that purpose but I strongly recommend that engineers or anybody already familiar with programming stay away from this book.

Great book for advanced programmers as well - 2008-09-15
Reviewer Rating:
I have purchased literally hundreds of books from Amazon, this is the first one I felt compelled enough to write a quick review on.

I have been developing software for over 25 years, I am also formally trained as an artist. I discovered Processing a few months back, and it has been an incredible find. I wanted to learn as much as I could, so I started buying some books.

I was concerned that since I already understood all of the fundamental and advanced programming concepts that I would find the book trivial and just a re-hash of what I already knew. I was mistaken, and I am so glad I took a chance and purchased this. The author does a great job of weaving in personal anecdotes, historical context (in both programming and art) and an fresh look at many of the abstracts used in modern day programming that I found it at once refreshing, insightful, and informative. I actually thought about some of the paradigms I am familiar with from a new perpsective.

I highly recommend this book to both novices and experts alike - it provides a great context for learning programming and Processing specifically. It is also very well written in a conversational format that makes it immensely more approachable (and entertaining) than many of the other more engineering focused texts.

just ok - 2009-01-22
Reviewer Rating:
i started my learning of processing with this book.. and then i got hold of the manual by Reas and Fry. It was the comparision that made me realize how little synthetic Greenberg is in his writing. It hardly works as a manual or reference book for processing. The code gets too long many times unnecesarily, and to my taste, i would prefer to get a view on creative issues, rather than in Greenberg own personal experience.

but still you can get quite a lot of information out of it

Thank you for writing it Ira.

Great book about Processing and a lot of concepts of programming - 2008-05-31
Reviewer Rating:
I received this book a few days ago and i have not finish yet, but everything i have read is very clear, easy to follow and with a lot of examples that works.

Is my first book about Processing, Im a actionscripter and here i found many interesting concepts, formulas, procedures that can help, not only in processing, just in a lot of languages that we could make artistic things.

If this book is an alternative for novices? i guess it is. Maybe in the firts reading people who have not any knowledge about programming it could be hard to follow, but i guess in the second or third lecture will became in a very good programmer. For people who have a knowledge it will be a very interesting travel to be a better programmer.

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