Recursion For Beginners

• What we'll do
Recursion is a very powerful idea used extensively in algorithmic art - used to create, for example, impressively intricate geometric patterns or realistic natural forms. Recursion is powerful because it can describe very complex, sometimes beautiful, forms with apparently very simple rules.

However recursion can be a little tricky when learning about it for the first time. This relaxed session will introduce the idea gently, and illustrate it with some simple but convincing examples.

The tutorial is aimed firmly at beginners, including artists who have never coded before.

Some of the things we'll cover:

• basic idea, without using a computer
• simple recursive circles example
• reminder - stop and continue conditions
• realistic trees, geometric patterns
• lindenmayer-systems (which made the pattern above)

After this session you will have at the very least an intuition for recursion and why it is so powerful. If you're a little more confident with coding, you'll be able to experiment with recursion yourself.

• What to bring
You don't have to bring a laptop. If you want, you can experiment with a few of the examples which will be using www.openprocessing.org and p5js so you only need a modern browser and working wifi - no additional software needs to be installed.

Slides, video and examples will be linked from the group blog afterwards.

• Important to know
The session will start at 7.00pm. You can arrive from 6.30pm, there is free tea/coffee available at the bar.

Please sign up also at SkillsMatter here: https://skillsmatter.com/meetups/10744-recursion-for-beginners