Swarm Intelligence: Craig Reynold's Boids
THE FLOCKING BEHAVIOR OF BIRDS, FISH, INSECTS AND EVEN HUMANS. CGA (computer graphics animation) of how flocks of birds, fish, or humans in a crowd move are very realistic. But they follow simple rules discovered by Craig Reynolds in 1986 i n a simulation of digital creatures he called Boids. In the 1992 film Batman Returns the swarms of computer- modeled bats and penguins used this algorithm. Crowds of people behave in the same way if you observe them going leaving the MRT, or shoving to get ahead towards some object. The simple rules of 'flocking' from which emerge the the fascinating patterns of swarms are (1) keep a certain average distance between your nearest flockmates (avoid collision) (2) Move towards the average position (center) of the flock/school/crowd (3) Move in the average direction of the flock/school/crowd. The next time you are in a crowd see if you have unconsciously followed these rules. Flocking is a stable phenomenon but if just one of the flock br...