At least 4 sources of creative potential are involved when creating art on the computer. When the user is able to subordinate the computer resources to his dominating expressive visual style and ideas, then there is good art. A user's formal art education in traditional art media and art history is important to produce art with a computer. With such a prior education most attempted computer artwork emulate the established standardized look of graphics, a historical precedent based upon commercial, military adn scientific tasks rather than aesthetic application. Without a baseline knowledge of art history, the user-artist's results are more the results of the preconceived imaging of the programmers rather than a personalized digital style.
Most computer programs are finite as to the aesthetic output capability.
The goal of the user-artist should be to outgrow the program's limits and advance to the next generation of programs. Successful art exists when the viewer responds primarily to the artistic idea and visual experience instead of the computer graphic embodiment of the artist's vision or message. In working with the particulate, the computer artist develops a keen sense of visual order, possibly more so than most traditional painters. The final goal of a successful picture is a satisfactory effect from the distribution of aggregate pixels' colors, value and distribution. Subgroups of sequences of graphic commands run automatically and mix randomly with other subgroups in a machine intelligent way to initiate limitless complex visual patterns.