Comment by brudgers
I feel like a combination of both human input + algo could work.
For some definitions of “work” I agree.
But, a premise of the OP’s question seems to be a how-hard-could-it-be.
The color of the birds matters. That’s how hard aesthetics is. The shape matters too, for anyone who missed my larger point…and their names because the text is a graphic element.
And all the negative space.
If you want an analogy, there aren’t general purpose algorithms that solve 3-sat in the way we want it solved. Good solutions to specific problems require hand crafting a procedure tailored to the data.
I feel like we are, overall, in agreement, although this may be a case of [1] :-).
--
1: https://youtu.be/XHO4Aby6fT8?t=11