Create an impressionist self-portrait from your Twitter followers

Here's something fun you can do with R and its interface to Twitter, the TwitteR package. An R script by CMU student Mark Patterson downloads your Twitter profile picture, counts the number of Twitter followers you have, and then creates a pointillist version of your profile picture with as many dots as you have followers. Here's mine:

Note that to use Mark's script you will need to install the BioConductor package EBImage (follow the instructions in yellow on that page) and create a Twitter app and authenticate it. Once you've got those set up, call general.func("yourTwitterHandle") to create your own!

Decisions and R: Visualizing Twitter Followers Using Pointillism