Mark Tensen's Blog: Exploring Software Engineering, Artificial Life, Electronic Music, and generative AI

Mark Tensen

On finding synergies in programming, music, AI, artificial life, and design. Researcher at the Artificial Life Institute & Motorica.

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Topics

2026

Microcosmos: evolving swimmers in a differentiable fluid

artificial-life, gpgpu

We released Microcosmos, a GPU artificial life platform where creatures are elastic filaments swimming in a viscous fluid. It's work ... continue reading

New album - MythStream

music

MythStream got released yesterday, May 29'th 2026. For all IDM nerds out there, May 29 shares the release day with ... continue reading

Locomotion by Actin Polymerization

webgpu, programming, generative-art

Preface This project was done together by Grisha Szep and me in 2025, from spring to autumn. Our goal was ... continue reading

Future of digital art is diffusion models or code?

reflections, generative-art

From generative design to generative models When starting my carreer from around 2019, I really believed in creative coding and ... continue reading

2025

My biggest pytorch workflow gripe

programming, ML

When I'm developing/debugging in pytorch, for years, I encounter the following annoyance all the time: A debug session is open, ... continue reading

Reflections on ALife 2025 conference

reflections, artificial-life

Because of my collaboration with the ALife institute, I had the honor to get a ticket to ALife 2025 sponsored. ... continue reading

Blogs I like

reflections, programming, ML

I like personal blogs specifically because they're less 'designed by commitee'. Less tailored, more opinionated. Higher chance also to stumble ... continue reading

On Minimizing WGSL / WebGPU texture plumbing

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

Here's a quick and powerful thing I learned during the development of our aritificial life project/paper on cell locomotion through ... continue reading

Emergence vs 'unexpected' emergence in artificial life

artificial-life, complex-systems, reflections

I liked Michael Levin's definition of emergence in a podcast with Kurt Jaimungal. According to him, central to emergence is ... continue reading

My favorite WebGPU random function

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

I thought it was worth sharing this for its value, but also understanding the implementation gave me a more intimate ... continue reading

Detecting NaNs in WebGPU

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

NaNs can sometimes arise in WebGPU / WGSL when doing normalizations or divisions. Most important is setting up guardrails to ... continue reading

My iOS app Walk Walk Walk, and a more authentic internet

generative-art, reflections

It's early 2025 and Code-assistants are getting crazy good. Nowadays most technically-inclined people (even without experience) are enabled to create ... continue reading

2024

Neural Cellular Automata Swarming

generative-art, artificial-life, complex-systems, gpugpu

Here's some documentation on my endeavors with putting Neural Cellular Automata (NCA) into a flock of BOIDS. Why? - Artistic ... continue reading

Reality-questioning Ideas before bed

reflections

My day-to-day grind means singular focus, lots of screen-time, programming, and discussions around the ideas I'm working on. I love ... continue reading

Two collective-intelligence models for the internet: the Rhizome and the Borg

reflections

This post was originally deployed on escherthink.com, a startup I'm co-founding. Escher Think reduces entropy in teams with ideas from ... continue reading

Hierarchical BOIDS, Game of Life, recursion and a model for consciousness

complex-systems, reflections, generative-art, artificial-life, gpugpu

This post explores a research idea that's been on my mind. It continues on my earlier research on how to ... continue reading

Interview on music and technology with Griff Fulton on Delayed.com

music, reflections, generative-art

This interview was originally posted on delayed on occasion of my new EP Jurassimo link We are so pleased to ... continue reading

Order of magnitude more boids while keeping global dynamics

graphics, complex-systems, generative-art, artificial-life, gpugpu

Here's some new results simulating an order of magnitude more boids, while keeping global interactivity accross the canvas. I'll share ... continue reading

15 Questions music interview on my EP Jurassimo

reflections, music, generative-art

This interview was originally posted on 15 questions https://15questions.net/interview/tensen-park-production-technology-and-creativity/ with music and images Name: Mark Tensen aka Tensen Park Nationality: ... continue reading

More raw websites please

reflections

I loved the 00's internet as a kid. The sites were often ugly, the styling inconsistent, yet they were very ... continue reading

Estimating a 3D scene with primitives using raymarching and differentiable rendering in JAX

graphics, ML, generative-art, gpugpu

At hypothetic we had a series of R&D projects focussing on providing tools for the 3D asset creation pipeline. One ... continue reading

MaxMSP learnings

music, generative-art, reflections

Reflections on preventing a mess in MaxMSP/Max for Live TLDR. It's hella hard to avoid Spaghetti. But I alleviated some ... continue reading

MIDI Evolution - a generative music device

music, generative-art, reflections

Excited to have released a new MaxMSP Ableton device called Midi Evolution that's been quite central in the way I ... continue reading

2022

Tensen Park - Reflections on my music

music, reflections

In this post I'll reflect on the unreleased 'Molasses' music album I've been trying to finish as Tensen Park. I'll ... continue reading

Reinforcement Learning applied to sculpting - A technical story of AI craftsmanship

ML, Reinforcement-Learning, generative-art

This is a technical overview of our reinforcement learning sculpting project. We will go into the reinforcement learning part, but ... continue reading

Firefly Synchronizer, a chaotic system Max4Live device

MaxMSP, music, complex-systems, generative-art

Introduction Earlier on I shared about my work with firefly synchronization, or pulse-coupled oscillators. The mechanism is basically that we ... continue reading

Artificial life, fireflies and music production

graphics, complex-systems, generative-art, artificial-life

Complexity of nature, and simulations I'm interested in the emergence of intelligence, and replicating the beautiful complexity of nature. Often, ... continue reading

2021

Quantifying interestingness in images using information theory

generative-art, complex-systems

Making art with generative systems often involves a lot of parameter settings, randomness, and fine-tuning to get to a nice ... continue reading

A primer on Reinforcement Learning, and its application to art

ML, Reinforcement-Learning, generative-art

In recent years, Reinforcement Learning (RL), once a small branch within the field of AI, has gotten quite some attention. ... continue reading

Music - Tensen Park

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. - Aldous Huxley

Topics

artificial-life, gpgpu

We released Microcosmos, a GPU artificial life platform where creatures are elastic filaments swimming in a viscous fluid. It's work ... continue reading

music

MythStream got released yesterday, May 29'th 2026. For all IDM nerds out there, May 29 shares the release day with ... continue reading

webgpu, programming, generative-art

Preface This project was done together by Grisha Szep and me in 2025, from spring to autumn. Our goal was ... continue reading

reflections, generative-art

From generative design to generative models When starting my carreer from around 2019, I really believed in creative coding and ... continue reading

programming, ML

When I'm developing/debugging in pytorch, for years, I encounter the following annoyance all the time: A debug session is open, ... continue reading

reflections, artificial-life

Because of my collaboration with the ALife institute, I had the honor to get a ticket to ALife 2025 sponsored. ... continue reading

reflections, programming, ML

I like personal blogs specifically because they're less 'designed by commitee'. Less tailored, more opinionated. Higher chance also to stumble ... continue reading

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

Here's a quick and powerful thing I learned during the development of our aritificial life project/paper on cell locomotion through ... continue reading

artificial-life, complex-systems, reflections

I liked Michael Levin's definition of emergence in a podcast with Kurt Jaimungal. According to him, central to emergence is ... continue reading

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

I thought it was worth sharing this for its value, but also understanding the implementation gave me a more intimate ... continue reading

webgpu, programming, gpugpu

NaNs can sometimes arise in WebGPU / WGSL when doing normalizations or divisions. Most important is setting up guardrails to ... continue reading

generative-art, reflections

It's early 2025 and Code-assistants are getting crazy good. Nowadays most technically-inclined people (even without experience) are enabled to create ... continue reading

generative-art, artificial-life, complex-systems, gpugpu

Here's some documentation on my endeavors with putting Neural Cellular Automata (NCA) into a flock of BOIDS. Why? - Artistic ... continue reading

reflections

My day-to-day grind means singular focus, lots of screen-time, programming, and discussions around the ideas I'm working on. I love ... continue reading

reflections

This post was originally deployed on escherthink.com, a startup I'm co-founding. Escher Think reduces entropy in teams with ideas from ... continue reading

complex-systems, reflections, generative-art, artificial-life, gpugpu

This post explores a research idea that's been on my mind. It continues on my earlier research on how to ... continue reading

music, reflections, generative-art

This interview was originally posted on delayed on occasion of my new EP Jurassimo link We are so pleased to ... continue reading

graphics, complex-systems, generative-art, artificial-life, gpugpu

Here's some new results simulating an order of magnitude more boids, while keeping global interactivity accross the canvas. I'll share ... continue reading

reflections, music, generative-art

This interview was originally posted on 15 questions https://15questions.net/interview/tensen-park-production-technology-and-creativity/ with music and images Name: Mark Tensen aka Tensen Park Nationality: ... continue reading

reflections

I loved the 00's internet as a kid. The sites were often ugly, the styling inconsistent, yet they were very ... continue reading

graphics, ML, generative-art, gpugpu

At hypothetic we had a series of R&D projects focussing on providing tools for the 3D asset creation pipeline. One ... continue reading

music, generative-art, reflections

Reflections on preventing a mess in MaxMSP/Max for Live TLDR. It's hella hard to avoid Spaghetti. But I alleviated some ... continue reading

music, generative-art, reflections

Excited to have released a new MaxMSP Ableton device called Midi Evolution that's been quite central in the way I ... continue reading

music, reflections

In this post I'll reflect on the unreleased 'Molasses' music album I've been trying to finish as Tensen Park. I'll ... continue reading

ML, Reinforcement-Learning, generative-art

This is a technical overview of our reinforcement learning sculpting project. We will go into the reinforcement learning part, but ... continue reading

MaxMSP, music, complex-systems, generative-art

**Introduction** Earlier on I shared about my work with firefly synchronization, or pulse-coupled oscillators. The mechanism is basically that we ... continue reading

graphics, complex-systems, generative-art, artificial-life

Complexity of nature, and simulations I'm interested in the emergence of intelligence, and replicating the beautiful complexity of nature. Often, ... continue reading

generative-art, complex-systems

Making art with generative systems often involves a lot of parameter settings, randomness, and fine-tuning to get to a nice ... continue reading

ML, Reinforcement-Learning, generative-art

In recent years, Reinforcement Learning (RL), once a small branch within the field of AI, has gotten quite some attention. ... continue reading

Introduction Earlier on I shared about my work with firefly synchronization, or pulse-coupled oscillators. The mechanism is basically that we ... continue reading