The system I used to process my signal through was an algorithm to Pixel Sort images for the application Processing. Pixel sorting is the process of isolating a horizontal or vertical line of pixels in an image and sorting their positions based on any number of criteria, in my case I sorted the pixels of the images through the brightness. In more detail, the script will begin sorting when it finds a pixel which is bright in the column or row, and will stop sorting when it finds a dark pixel. The script identifies black pixels by comparing the pixel’s brightness value to a threshold, if it’s lower than the brightness threshold the pixel is deemed to be dark, if it’s higher it’s deemed to be bright.

I started with a simple image of a bird-eye view picture of an island. I ran my image through the system 630 times to be exact. The effect or changes can be quite noticeable at the beginning, but they slowly become harder to notice as the signal gets twisted even more. I also noticed that the algorithm itself has a few bugs, leaving some blocks of pixels unsorted at all. Especially in the middle (middle of islands) where brightness levels are even and high, the effect won’t be present no matter how many times the process is ran.

For more info about pixel sorting, please see: http://datamoshing.com/2016/06/16/how-to-glitch-images-using-pixel-sorting/