Blog
2012-04-03
For the last few days I’ve had lots of fun playing around with Absynth at my studio.
Apart from being a rich implementation of common synthesis techniques with a simple GUI, it’s the surround capabilities that interest me. I’m currently working on different strategies towards creating B-format audio content for further processing and spatialisation, as a way of doing sound design and content development for an upcoming project. The screenshot above is a Bidule patch.
It starts out with a 6 channel version of Absynth, controlled by a MIDI keyboard. The 6 channels are spatially distributed in a hexagon pattern. The six channels connect to a custom AudioUnit plugin I made today based on the eminent wdl-ol, Oli Larkin’s take on the WDL / IPlug C++ framework for cross-platform audio plugin development. The 4-channel B-format signal is then passed to Harpex for ambisonic decoding.
At the moment I’m playing with a similar setup in Reaper, decoding to 7 channels according to the rather idiosyncratic speaker setup at my studio. Thanks to Harpex, this actually leads to much more articulated spatialisation than a similar setup using a 7-channel version of Absynth with speakers at the same position as at my studio.
The next step now is to see if and how I can control surround panning using LFOs .And the ultimate goal of it all is to be able to use B-format signals as sources in DBAP decoding for a larger loudspeaker rig.
Lots’s of fun….
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2012-03-25
BBC Nature reports on recent research that indicates that noise not only alters birdsong and can make it difficult for some predators to hunt, but also seem to affects plants. A US team found that industrial noise disrupted the behaviour of animals that pollinate plants and disperse seeds. This, they suggest, could be slowly transforming our landscape, especially by changing the dispersal of slow-growing trees.
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2012-03-23
24-29 March, 2012, Cultural center Can Gelabert
Binissalem, Mallorca, Spain
AIM (Artists’ Initiatives’ Meeting) Europe is a network consisting of different artists’ initiatives and organisations from across Europe. The network is for exchange of experience and knowledge and for mobility and cooperation between artists and curators in Europe. AIM Europe was founded in Berlin in October 2010. The first meeting was coordinated by Supermarket Art Fair (Stockholm) and organised at The Swedish Embassy in Berlin.
NEXT STOP MALLORCA – as part of the conference international artists from Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Germany, Spain and France will show their works at the Casal can Gelabert art cultural center of Binissalem, Mallorca, Spain. There will also be a show with artists from Mallorca from the magazin HIPERBOLIC.
Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/events/288536797879698/
Organisations taking part in NEXT STOP MALLORCA are Espai sant Marc, Supermarket Art Fair, Microwesten, MUU gallery, Inquietart, la revista Hiperbolic, Nordic Art Association NKF of Sweden.
Participants of the AIM Europe meeting: Matthias Roth, Kim Dotty Hachmann (Berlin), Andreas Ribbung, Alvaro Campo, Pontus Raud (Stockholm), Signe Vad (Copenhagen), Philip Tonda Heide (Paris), Timo Soppela, Rita Leppiniemi, Hanne Ivars (Helsinki), Carles Gispert, Irene Peukes, Marcos Vidal, David Martín, Mar Aguera, Julio Fuentes, Bartomeu Sastre, Sandra Vadell Christiansen, Antoni Fluxa Munar, Antoni “Garreta” and David Campaner (Mallorca and Barcelona).
Espai sant marc is a dynamic initiative, which began operating in Sineu over ten years ago. Event is coordinated by Espai sant Marc. http://www.santmarc.tumblr.com
Culture center Casal can Gelabert is one of the most active cultural centers in Mallorca, with three exhibition spaces. It is run by Tres Serveis Culturals for the City hall of Binissalem. There are also a Library and a Music school in this popular and well known Culture Center.
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001790073789
MUU gallery presents at NEXT STOP MALLORCA sound art and a video collection:
MUU VIDEO 2011 is a collection of seven video works on the theme of ’landscape’ – from a summery forest road to a skyscraper city to spacescapes. The collection is also published on DVD and sold for home use. MUU Video 2011 includes works by following artists: Gun Holmström, Juha van Ingen, Rita Jokiranta, Mikko Kuorinki, Sari Palosaari, Minna Parkkinen and Thomas Westphal.
MUU FOR EARS 9 is a new CD Collection of Finnish and Norwegian Sound Art and Experimental Music, published February 2012. The compilation contains a wide range of material, including field recordings, sound installations, experimental musical improvisations, remix and sample compositions and live recordings. The artists on MUU FOR EARS 9 are Child Of Klang, Hemmelig Tempo, Trond Lossius and Marieke Verbiesen from Norway, with Mikko Maasalo, Aleksi Myllykoski / Urban Dark Ensemble, Antti Nykyri and Joonas Siren / Younghusband from Finland.
MUU SOUND BOX is a new tool made for performing works of sound art to public. The CD will be presented for audience with these Sound Boxes, made by Matti Niinimäki and Pasi Rauhala.
OPEN CALL for MUU FOR EARS – MUU is looking for Spanish and Southern European sound art for coming Autumn CD publication.
THREE WALKERS is a sound installation of three mobile speakers with amplifiers by Petri Kuljuntausta. Icy walking sounds removed from Helsinki and localized to a gallery environment.
http://www.muu.fi
http://www.facebook.com/pages/MUU-galleria-Helsinki-Finland/204644579563
NEXT STOP MALLORCA
Place: Cultural center Can Gelabert (City hall of Binissalem)
Adress: Calle de la Portella s/n, Casal de Cultura, 07350 Binissalem
Opening: 24th march at 20 hours
Open for audience: 24-29 March, 2012, 5-9 pm.
AIM Europe has been supported by Nordic Culture Point.
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2012-03-22
A stereo version of the sound for the 2011 installation Lines Converging at a Distance at Håkonshallen is featured at the CD MUU FOR EARS 9, published by MUU Artists Association in Finland.
MUU FOR EARS 9 explores the sound art and experimental music scenes in Finland and Norway. The compilation contains a wide range of material, including field recordings, sound installations, experimental musical improvisations, remix and sample compositions and live recordings. The CD features eight artists and 17 tracks with a total duration of 68 minutes.
The artists on MUU FOR EARS 9 are Child Of Klang, Hemmelig Tempo, Trond Lossius and Marieke Verbiesen from Norway, with Mikko Maasalo, Aleksi Myllykoski/Urban Dark Ensemble, Antti Nykyri and Joonas Siren/Younghusband from Finland.
The CD was released at the Supermarket Art Fair at Kulturhuset in Stockholm, 17-19 February 2012. The second release event will be organised in Lydgalleriet in Bergen, Norway, 13 April 2012. http://www.lydgalleriet.no
The mission of MUU is to promote the collaboration and interchange between artists working within different fields of art, such as sound and music, video, media art and performance. The publication of MUU FOR EARS is part of MUU’s Audio Autographs project featuring international sound art events, workshops, publications, artist talks and lectures, and also an online radio at http://www.muu.fi/sound
http://www.muu.fi
FACEBOOK:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/MUU-for-EARS/249914898434575
MUU FOR EARS 9 – a limited edition of 600. Price: 15 euro (postage included).
Order your copy from: muugalleria@muu.fi
On sale at: MUU gallery, Lönnrotinkatu 33, 00180 Helsinki, Finland, +358-9-625 972
MUU FOR EARS 9:
01 Marieke Verbiesen: Rjukan 2:34
02 Antti Nykyri: In Between 2:20
03 Antti Nykyri: A Song for Nurses 3:30
04 Joonas Siren: Exploring Amen (part 2) 3:28
05 Younghusband: Cosmic Rays from the Planet Altar 4:50
06 Hemmelig Tempo: Double Tape Station 6:16
07 Hemmelig Tempo: Do Not Experiment in the Sauna 2:39
08 Mikko Maasalo: Breen_01 3:05
09 Mikko Maasalo: Breen_02 4:35
10 Child Of Klang: Marmelen – The Magical Bridge Hymn #1 1:01
11 Child Of Klang: Marmelen – The Magical Bridge soundtrack (featuring Kristine Tjøgersen, clarinet) 6:05
12 Aleksi Myllykoski: Non-Place Walk (abandoned theme park version) 5:01
13 Urban Dark Ensemble: No Fallin’ (Ad-Free Remix) 3:58
14 Trond Lossius: Lines Converging at a Distance 7:20
BONUS TRACKS:
15 Mikko Maasalo: Breen_03 3:44
16 Marieke Verbiesen: eyeyeyuh 2:28
17 Marieke Verbiesen & Håvard Pedersen: No Laptop Liveset 4:30
SUPPORTED BY:
Frame
Finnish-Norwegian Foundation
Nordic Culture Point
Arts Council of Finland
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2012-03-21
For the past few months I have been pretty busy assisting the director Torkil Sandsund with sound design and programming for the theater production Urmakarens hjarte. Urmakarens hjarte (The Heart of the Watchmaker) is an adventurous thriller for youngsters inspired by Norwegian folk mythology and modern fantasy literature, based on a script by Miriam Prestøy Lie, and directed by Torkil Sandsund.
It is produced by Sandsund/Lie in the valley of Dale in Sogn & Fjordane, further north on the west coast of Norway. I have spent five weeks or so commuting between Bergen and Dale by boat and buss, a beautiful travel through the west coast fjords, where the bleak and barren winter landscapes leaves me with an impression of being a Tolkien-like hinterland.
Sound is reproduced using a 16 channel loudspeaker system, and a custom live sound spatialisation system has been developed for the production, using Max and Jamoma.
Urmakarens Hjarte premiered last summer, but unfortunately experienced some problems with the sound system. Last fall I got involved in the production as they prepared for tour in the spring of 2012. Gradually we have been redesigning patches and modules, developed new features for Jamoma as required (notably module highlighting and aliases), developed an “OSC/Jamoma” bundle for TextMate, and totally reworked all of the cues for the play.
The audio files used for the production were already prepared by the time I got involved, and my role in the production has been to do the reprogramming, and what could be considered the spatial mixing of the sound design. Apart from the differences in audio system used (16 channels and Max/Jamoma and cue execution rather than stereo recordings within a DAW environment), I feel that my role has resembled that of a mixer in a record production: All sound files were already recorded and prepared by the time I got involved. My role has been to mix the audio to make it sound good and make use of the rich spatialisation possibilities of the system, while also ensuring that the system would perform reliable in rehearsals and performances.
This is by far the largest patch/system that I have been using Jamoma for ever. The patch is to heavy to run on my own 4 year old dual-core laptop, but runs fine at the laptop used for the production. We have more than 200 cues that are executed over the 1 h 15 min duration of the play, an average of close to 3 cues a minute.
Sound plays an important role as auditory scenography, creating the sonic ambiances and emotional backdrops of the scenes where the play unfolds. As such each scene can be thought of as a sound installation in itself.
In addition sound plays an important narrative role, functioning as auditory props and folley, assisting and at times driving the story and actions of the play.
Parts of the workflow in Max/Jamoma still feels cumbersome when needing to work fast in a setting involving lots of other artists and technicians that can’t afford to wait for you, but at the same time it has been inspiring to see how well the modular structure works, in particular the spatialisation based on the Jamoma Modular and AudioGraph frameworks, ViMiC and ambsionics techniques for spatialisation, SpatDIF, and Jamoma modules embedding ICST externals for spatialisation (the ambipanning, ambimonitor and ambicontrol externals).
Urmakarens Hjarte will be touring Western Norway and Oslo in the spring of 2012.
Me and Torkil Sandsund working on
sound design and spatialisation in Dale.
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