Code'vember is open: our first monthly competition, with a Vault to win

Starting this month, VYBE.ART runs a competition every month. We set a theme, you make a piece for it with Perlin, and the one we love most wins a Vault of 13,000 Vybe Tokens.

The first one is running right now. It's Code'vember, and entries close on 30 November at 11:59 pm Sydney time.

Read the brief and enter

Why a competition

I built VYBE.ART so anyone can make the kind of thing that used to take an engine, a team and a few months. The making is the easy part now. Starting is the hard part. A theme gives you somewhere to start, a deadline gives you a reason to finish, and a Vault of tokens makes it worth showing off.

It's also the best way I know to see what people do with the studio when they're not just poking at it. The first entries are in already, and I can't wait to see the rest.

The theme: creative code

November is for creative code. Make a piece where the code is the art: a pattern that grows from a few simple rules, a shader that never repeats, a swarm that follows your hand, a tiny game, an instrument, a world that plays out differently every time.

You bring the idea, Perlin writes the code. Then scrub it, play it and bend it until it's yours. We're after pieces that surprise us, reward a second look and make people wonder how they work.

Creative code is what VYBE.ART was made for. Every piece here is a small program, so a few simple rules can grow into something nobody could have drawn by hand. Four from the gallery, to show what I mean:

Open any of them in the gallery: Coral Bloom, Gyroid Cathedral, Curl Flow and Silk Flow. Just remember the prize is for original work, so your entry has to be your own.

Ideas to start from

The competition page has ten sparks to get you going. These are a few of my favourites. Each one opens the studio with the idea in Perlin's prompt box, ready to make your own:

How to enter

1. Make it. Open the studio and describe your idea to Perlin. Tune it with the sliders, ask for changes, bend it until it's yours.
2. Publish it. Press Publish in the studio. Your piece gets its own page and joins the community, where anyone can play it.
3. Enter it. On the competition page, press Enter a piece and pick it from your published pieces. You can enter up to three, and swap them until entries close.
4. Win the Vault. The VYBE team plays every entry and picks the most creative, original and inspiring one. The winner gets 13,000 Vybe Tokens, $99.99 worth of making.

Entering is free, and you don't need to buy anything to enter or to win. Every new account starts with 150 Vybe Tokens to make with. A piece that started from someone else's published piece can't go in, but building on one of your own is fine. The full rules are on the competition page and in the competitions guide.

A new theme every month

Code'vember is the first. When it closes we'll announce the winner, and a new theme and a new Vault will follow. The easiest way to hear about them is the newsletter: sign up in the site footer.

So open the studio, pick an idea, and make something that makes people wonder how it works.

Enter Code'vember

Your turn / Free to start

Describe it. Perlin builds it.

Art, games and worlds you can step inside, from one sentence. Play it, bend it, put it on a timeline, share it.

Create