Author: kcb403

Our group which consists of Gabe, Celine and myself created our graphic score on an iPad using the program ProCreate. Our visual score is meant to represent the essence of water as well as capture the overall aesthetic impact of our performance.

 

Our score is meant to be followed from left to right, allowing the eyes to travel up and down to see the different elements.

 

There are many visual components to our visual score. The main musical bars represent the audio synthesizers that will play in the background during the entire performance. The notes along these musical bars are meant to represent the input of sounds that we control in real-time during the performance.

 

Another main element of our graphic score is the flowing trails of purple and blue. This is meant to represent the evolution of our sound as well as its flowing essence that envelopes the entire performance. The usage of the colors blue and purple are meant to evoke the feelings that one experiences when relaxing near bodies of water.

 

Some more elements in our graphic score include the black and white circles which show large bursts in sound, which we intend to incorporate through different midi keyboards. The change of color that occurs across the graphic score is intended to represent the evolution of the music’s mood over time.

The final element is the swirly purple line at the end, which is meant to show a divide between the busy and simple elements of our score. This shows the divide between our main background sound and the additional sounds we plan to add later on.

Belson and the Whitneys both created visual music that led to the popularization of hallucinogenic imagery in popular media. They both created abstract films that took inspiration from eastern metaphysics. They broke free from the common painting medium of the time and eliminated representational imagery to pursue the theme of the cosmos and set art in motion. Their works aimed to act upon the body and mind, and allow the viewers to understand truths about the structure of the universe. By using visual music to express self-realizations, both artists wanted to use their light shows as a medium of spiritual knowledge. Belson and the Whitneys were able to weave images and music together more precisely than any other audiovisual artist before them.

John and James Whitney specialized in eight-millimeter films. Their sound was generated from the motion of a pendulum. They wished to use mandalic imagery to combine art, science, and spirituality. Eventually, the works became so popular that they were recruited to create geometric spirals for Alfred Hitchcock’s Vertigo. Their works also inspired the artwork in other Hollywood productions such as Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

Belson worked on images that were less technologic, but rather seemed to be based on natural phenomena. His work gained popularity when he was asked to develop a planetarium performance, Vortex, in which the imagery in a planetarium would dance to a wide variety of music. These planetarium performances challenged the typical separation between the artist and the art by blurring the lines of perception. Vortex successfully combined the likes of entertainment and art.

The Vortex concert series set the stage for a contemporary interaction between music and visuals. It inspired a collection of electric composers in San Francisco who ended up forming a group called the Sonics. They had teamed up with multimedia artists in order to have visual equivalents for their music produced. These light shows became art for events and concerts and served as a bridge between musicians and artists to connect. I believe this combination of music and art into interdisciplinary performances is highly prominent in contemporary nightclub and concert culture. These spaces of celebration and entertainment are defined by both the sound and light that fills them. This shows how the combination of music and art popularized by Belson and the Whitneys has had lasting effects.

Sonic Drift

My project is an experimental soundscape and visual design meant to provide its viewers with psychedelic and calming effects. It is created to allow its aesthetic effects to wash over its viewer’s minds, allowing them to release any worries they may have. Its design is a constantly shifting kaleidoscope image that changes color and expands and contract with the beat. My intention behind creating this design was to create an enticing soundscape that draws the user in and pair it with an aesthetic visual system that is intricate but not overly complex.

My project fits into the context of visual music because the soundscape that I created directly correlates with the visuals that it is linked to. The visuals resemble a colorful kaleidoscope forever shifting in size and color. I believe my project can also be related to synesthesia because the 3patternmappr that sends the textures to my projectr has audio values sent to it from the soundscape. Therefore,  I believe that I am portraying the effects of synesthesia by linking the audio to the visuals the same way somebody with synesthesia’s mind would link sound to the colors that they perceive. By using programming to mimic the connections that would occur in a synesthete’s mind, I believe that I am providing that experience to a wider audience.

MY GIST 

I developed my creation first by establishing my main audio sources. I first started with the piano roll sequencer and the gate sequencer, adding a keyboard later on. I converted all of the audio that was produced through audio2vizzie and the beapconvertr. I also separately sent all of the different audios to a stereo to hear my sound as I calculate the visuals that I want to associate them with. My next step was to send all of my output values through smoothrs to have values that were not too finicky. I noticed the trick to using smoothrs is to smooth out the outputs enough that your visuals aren’t laggy, but not smoothing it out too much to where your data is unresponsive.

Once having smoothed out the different audio data, I  sent them into the 3patternmappr. I used the audio from the main twinkly background to control some of the coloring values and I used the values from the drumbeat to control the pattern variation. I then sent the output texture from this 3patternmappr into a kaleidr. This kaleidr’s horizontal and vertical values were controlled by an attractr. Meanwhile, I have its mode controlled by the audio values being output from the keyboard that I had added later on. This causes my visuals to practically melt off of the screen every time the keyboard is pressed by the performer. I then mix the output of the kaleidr with a primr, whose inputs are all being controlled by twiddlrs, into a mixfadr. Then I send the mixfadr to the projectr.

My final result works as the main 3patternmappr animation is constantly pulsing and changing color following the drumbeat and main background audio. I also have the kaleidr change its mode every time the extra background sounds are triggered by the keyboard. In addition to that, the kaleidr and primr’s values are constantly generating in different ways due to the attractr and twiddlrs that I have added. A lot of my experimentation involved finding different visuals that were complicated enough to grab the viewers’ attention, but not too complicated to the point where it would be difficult to see how they relate to the audio samples. This led to a lot of tweaking until I found the perfect mix of intriguing yet not confusing visuals to match my soundscape.

I believe that my in-class presentation went very well. Even though I didn’t have the most intricate project, I was happy with the outcome of my patch and I think it definitely represents the efforts that I have put into this project. My patch didn’t lag too much and everything involving technology functioned how it should have. My audio sounded great on the speakers and I don’t know if there’s much to improve on in my presentation skills. The confidence I had for this presentation definitely has taught me that there’s no need to get nervous about small things like class presentations.

In conclusion, I believe that I learned a lot during this project involving my own skills, the extent to which the Max program can be utilized, and my love for music and art. I think that using creative technologies such as Max can bring out many creativities that have simply had no medium to be expressed through before. So through my understanding of this program,  I believe I was able to use my creative side, as well as my love for technology to produce a satisfying audiovisual performance.

Due to my affinity for visual learning, I have always struggled with traditional coding programs. Lines and lines of text are simply hard for my brain to process. However, I have gained a big appreciation for the way that Max is set up as I can see where all the information is connected to without needing to consult lines of logic and code. I think this is ideal because it allows me to focus more on the creative process than figuring out the meaning of specific characters of code. Overall, I’m glad this project turned out the way it did because it expanded my confidence in my creative ability while also letting me learn more about the workings of Max.

Thomas Wilfred is a pioneer in the world of light art. His work as a scientist, inventor, and artist, led to his creation of the Clavilux, a mechanical device that reflects light in order to create audiovisual performances he named Lumia. This invention of an entirely new medium of artistic production challenged the views of art as a discipline only defined to painting held at the time. His beautiful obsession with his passion to use light as a medium for the exploration of space and time led to his isolation from the world, but also led to his perseverance in the discovery of something revolutionary, light art.

His inspiration for his different Clavilux machines stems from his interest in the new ideas of interstellar space introduced by Einstein’s scientific theories. His beliefs supported the idea that an artistic experience with a scientific background is necessary in order to make these abstract ideas reachable to the general audience. Through different simulations of how the universe would look like through a telescope, as well as simulations of how essential the movement of light is to the movement of the universe, he created a new musical and visual form. He is the pioneer of this entire discipline.

His Clavilux machine not only functioned as a decoration for the home but could also produce the Lumia art which he is so famous for. His device contained a switch and motor, which would control a lightbulb, which would then pass its light through various color wheels and bounce off reflectors. These reflectors were polished stainless steel cans with different dents that created an ephemeral atmosphere of light. This machine had various knobs that controlled movement, color, and brightness which allowed Wilfred to work with them in a live performance setting. During his early years of creation, he had many live performances in very intimate settings, but as he progressed, he aimed to create a more lasting performance.

Overall, Thomas Wilfred is a pioneer in his field for being the father of light art in America. His contributions are very much overseen in the contemporary perspective, but that doesn’t mean his efforts were not essential to the development of light as an artistic medium.

A film I was particularly intrigued by is Free Radicals by Len Lye. It is a B&W artistic film that includes abstract art drawings that generate and transform in accordance with music created by The Bagirmi Tribe of Africa.  Len Lye was inspired to create this film due to his time spent living within an indigenous community. He wished to integrate the art forms experienced within this community into a revolutionary film that celebrates the livelihood of Aboriginal indigenous culture. In order to create the visuals that he set to the tribal music, Lye directly etched into the film base. He had envisioned certain designs that reflect the energy of the tribe’s movement and dance and used different needles and tools to etch his vision into the film base (Pinchetti). This technique did not use any actual camerawork but instead resulted in a direct application of the film stock in order to create his desired artistic output. In order to truly reflect the indigenous culture that he celebrates, his etching aimed to reflect the line-work in the people’s own artistic endeavors.

During my viewing of this film, I noticed that the visuals have a direct connection with the beat of the drums. The etchings are constantly set in motion and seem to change movement with every single drum beat  (Pinchetti). When there is the audio of a man singing, Lye introduces a series of vertical lines that wobble and dance across the screen in unison with the tremble of a man’s voice. While many of the shapes created are fairly abstract, there is a common theme of etchings that resemble sound waves, asterisks and dancing people. The visuals seem to expand, rotate, separate and combine. Even though they are purely 2D, the way that they flow across my line of vision produces the illusion that they are almost 3D objects. Overall, I believe this audiovisual experience shows a beautiful relationship between an indigenous people’s musical talent and the exploration of abstract film work.

Source: http://www.thethird-eye.co.uk/free-radicals-by-len-lye/