Steve’s Stuff

First the music -

As I previously posted, I’ve switched from Pd to Reaktor for the majority of my sound design. This is because it offered a lot of power and flexibility in a short amount of time. Had I had maybe an extra three weeks, I would have probably been able to use Pd instead. See my previous post on Reaktor for more info and for some screen shots of the Reaktor code.

I’ve spent hours composing frameworks for improvised electronic music. The frameworks have a number of components: first comes the musical idea (what I want it to sound like and communicate), second is the tools to produce these sounds, and third is practicing using the tools so that I can adequately realize my ideas.

Reaktor has on average 30-50 controls per instrument. I don’t need to use all of them all the time, but it’s nice to control functions like filter cutoff and resonance, amplitude envelope, formant center, and usually two or three other parameters specific to the instrument. This is the classic electronic music conundrum - the interface presents many options, but they require virtuosic manipulation if real-time sound synthesis is desired.

I’ve mapped a number of important controls to midi instruments to solve some of these problems. I’m controlling Reaktor with an M-Audio Radium 61 keyboard that comes with 8 knobs and 8 sliders. I’m also using an M-Audio Oxygen 8 v2 to control a different synth module (more on that later).

Regardless, control over five+ software instruments plus mixing both within Reaktor and externally for live sound is no small task. Reaktor sounds are fed through a virtual mixer with the resulting submix sent to an external FireWire mixer. At this stage, I’m adding some hardware including an old Kawai R-50 drum machine, an Alesis MIDIVERB II effects unit, and a Roland synth module. I’ve connected the Alesis FX unit through the mixer as an auxiliary send, which enables me to apply it to any track (e.g. the Reaktor feed, the drum machine, the synth module).

I’ve posted a number of experiments on the wiki. I have one week to practice, so hopefully it will keep getting easier with more interesting results. I may hit up a few musical friends if they’re in attendance just to keep things interesting.

Now onto the other parts of the project -

Keith has six light sensors working with his logochip. He’s planning to install a black light in the middle of our area with his light sensors all around. The audience will walk between the light and the sensors and this will trigger his lighting effects. I’m not sure how they’re programmed, but he will probably have more to say on his blog.

Tyler is taking care of the construction of the walls. Our presentation needs to be dark so that our light sensing works and it needs to be closed off so that our lighting effects don’t interfere with other installations. Tyler is also still working on his infinity table.

We’ve already scaled back a couple things. I was hoping to use ultrasonic sensors instead of light sensors so that we wouldn’t have to place a light in the middle of the floor. Keith made some attempts at using an ultrasonic sensor, but opted to go with light because it was much easier. I’ve made a few adjustments as well such as the switch from Pd to Reaktor. I would also have liked to have Keith and Tyler do more with artistic lighting design. As it looks right now, the lights are simply triggered on and off by the sensors. This is a partial victory, but it’s a very simplistic type of interaction (one that almost isn’t work doing). But, it’s what they had time for. I feel like with an extra week, Keith, Tyler, and I could get together on the creative elements of the show. With the time available though, we’ve had to make sacrifices.

Overall our show won’t be a total failure, although it will be more difficult for the audience to see what we’re trying to say (hi/low art). Worst case, people think I’m the DJ for the event - a horrible, experimental DJ playing his own music that nobody wants to hear. Heck - they my not even realize that I’m making the sounds on the spot. I’ll do my best to explain that or have my team mates explain it.

Sorry that there aren’t any pictures. There’s really not much to see. It is, afterall, music . . .