OscilloScribe draws by moving a virtual pen under the control of a pair of waves.
The technique is described in some detail in a tutorial:
Drawing with a Wave-Guided Pen.
It produces a rich variety of figures ranging from simple figure 8's to Spirograph®
patterns and beyond. You can color regions of these figures, adding your own
interpretation and artistry. You can also specify the waves that guide the pen,
thereby creating new figures. The waves are constructed from simple building
blocks and wave parameters can be specified numerically or adjusted graphically.
OscilloScribe is designed to encourage experimentation and exploration.
Basic operating instructions appear below.
See The OscilloScribe User's Guide
for a complete description of the program and its operation.
Things You Can Do
How To Do Them
Choose a color
Click any sector of the color wheel. For black, click the wheel's hub.
For white, click its outer rim.
Draw a pattern
Click any of the wave pairs in the upper left to draw the corresponding
pattern using the currently selected color.
Adjust the drawing speed
Drag the thumb of the speed control slider
to the right to increase the drawing speed or to the left to decrease it.
Drag it all that way to the right for "instantaneous" pattern drawing.
Fill an area
Click any area of the drawing to fill it with the current color.
Click outside any enclosed area to change the background color.
Erase the last change
Click the pink half of the eraser ()
to undo the last draw or fill operation (the gray half operates on the color mixers).
Start a new drawing
Click
to clear the drawing area. The current drawing will be lost if it hasn't been saved.
Replay activity
Click
to replay the steps that produced to the current drawing.
Save a drawing (Not available on Mac)
Click
to open the gallery. Within the gallery, drag the current drawing's thumbnail from
the upper left to any empty grid location. Click "OK"
to leave the gallery an retain the newly saved drawing.
The gallery is saved locally on your computer and will appear anytime you return
to the OscilloScribe page.
Export a drawing to another program (Not available on Mac)
While in the gallery (see above) drag any drawing's thumbnail to the clipboard
().
The drawing will be placed on the system clipboard from which it may be
pasted into other programs.
Export a drawing to a file (Not available on Mac)
While in the gallery (see above) drag any drawing's thumbnail to the file folder
().
Choose a location and file name in the dialog that appears. The drawing will
be saved in PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format.
Mix colors
Select the first color. Click within an empty mixing tray
()
to deposit the first color. Select the second color. Click within
the empty portion of the same mixing tray to deposit the second color.
Click on the mixed color to select it for use.
Spelunk
to the right to increase the drawing speed or to the left to decrease it.
Drag it all that way to the right for "instantaneous" pattern drawing.
)
to undo the last draw or fill operation (the gray half operates on the color mixers).
to clear the drawing area. The current drawing will be lost if it hasn't been saved.
to replay the steps that produced to the current drawing.
to open the gallery. Within the gallery, drag the current drawing's thumbnail from
the upper left to any empty grid location. Click "OK"
to leave the gallery an retain the newly saved drawing.
The gallery is saved locally on your computer and will appear anytime you return
to the OscilloScribe page.
).
The drawing will be placed on the system clipboard from which it may be
pasted into other programs.
).
Choose a location and file name in the dialog that appears. The drawing will
be saved in PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format.
)
to deposit the first color. Select the second color. Click within
the empty portion of the same mixing tray to deposit the second color.
Click on the mixed color to select it for use.
to open the wave editor. See 
to activate the 
pointer. While this pointer is active, click on any display item to learn about its use.