p5.js is a friendly tool for learning to code and make art. It is a free and open-source JavaScript library built by an inclusive, nurturing community. p5.js welcomes artists, designers, beginners, educators, and anyone else!
p5.js prioritizes accessibility, inclusivity, community, and joy. It makes sketching with code as intuitive as sketching in a notebook. p5.js supports audio-visual, interactive, and experimental works for the web. ...
Getting Ready
Sign up for an account on the p5js web editor
Watch this interactive video from Lauren McCarthy and Daniel Shiffman
Optionally check some of the p5.js examples to get familiar with the possibilities
Stay calm! This will be hard, frustration sometimes and take time. You don’t need to be a coding master right away. Coding is a form of writing with strict rules. Unlike casual writing, even one wrong character can break a program. It's fine to start by copying, modifying, and merging code from others. Creating "Frankencode" — stitching bits of code together — can work but is prone to errors. However, for this class, type the examples yourself. Building muscle memory and learning syntax is key.
Contents
- First Steps
- Movement, expressions & variables
- Conditionals & loops
- Interaction
- Transformations & functions
- Arrays & Objects
- Media: Images and sounds
- Advanced
- Bits&Bobs
- bonus: Generative Art • a collection of historical examples of Generative Art
Additional Learning resources:
- Check out the tutorials page & the reference on the p5.js website for full documentation.
- a p5.js cheatsheet
- Watch The Coding Train video tutorials.
- Creative Coding Notes from Allison Parrish, a poet, programmer and educator at NYU ITP.
For these notes, I have taken major and minor parts from other sources. These are: Creative Coding by Allison Parrish, Getting Started with p5.js book, by Lauren McCarthy, Casey Reas & Ben Fry, Programming For Artists, An introduction to programming for artists by Brannon Dorsey, Introduction to p5.js by Johannes Preis & the p5.js website
