Drawing Machine

The method

Russell's procedure for finding a drawing, as it was used here. The machine supplies tools; the method decides when to use them.

The loop

a referencegenerator · museum · stageauthored plan · a drawing the critic readsmeasured packet + passesmay say: abandon, go back the artist actsHands · eraser · intentionsanswers the handoff Holdargued, with itsstrongest objection not yet: back out (to a generator, or the next sitting) every move is a ledger line: tool, platform, hashed in/out, prompt verbatim, who

The loop (Russell, 2026-10-08)

  1. A reference arrives from anywhere: a generator (ChatGPT, MJ, FLUX), a museum API, an authored plan, a drawing.
  2. The critic reads it (critic/read.py packet + the engine passes) and checks the previous handoff's predictions.
  3. If it is not what the critic asked for, or not at Hold, the artist makes the next visual reference with the native tools (compose, Hands, eraser, intentions), not by tracing: every change answers a line of the handoff.
  4. The critique and the reference go back out (to a generator, or to the next sitting), and the loop repeats.
  5. Hold is a recorded step (hand/step.py --tool hold) with the reason.

Every move is a ledger line (hand/step.py): tool, platform, hashed inputs/outputs, prompt verbatim, who.

The workshop (from the still life)

  1. Establish an inquiry, not just an appearance. Keep the prompt intact, but separate its subject and treatment from what is being discovered.
  2. Explore materially different propositions before choosing. Sets of thumbnails in which the relationships change, not the finish. Read the set together, captions second.
  3. Try to disprove the promising direction. Make its strongest counterexample before polishing.
  4. Give the artist a passage of work. Several attempts at one consequential question, with the tool that fits it: native drawing, a generator, source research, or looking.
  5. Critique the return and the original intention. The critic may recommend abandoning the composition, changing the inquiry, or returning to an earlier branch.
  6. Make Hold an argued decision: what became specific, which alternatives revealed it, what remains unresolved and why that matters, and the strongest remaining objection. Words like tension or melancholy without visible relations do not earn it.

Three ways the machine stayed honest

Captions second

Contact sheets are made without captions; ideas that only work because a caption explains them are named and dropped (still life set 1: "bound by a shadow", "an event").

Predictions checked

A handoff says what should change and how it will be measured; the next image is checked against it. On sheet 5 the visual goals were met while the measured predictions failed, and both were recorded.

Not a tracing tool

Redrawing a generator image is a trace. The critic reads the image first, and the artist answers the handoff with changes (sheet 5 artist stages; still life loop 1).