The Sound Database

I have almost finished a project which I have been working on for the last few months so i thought it was about time I posted it up here. The website is written for Peter Cusack of CRiSAP (Creative Research in Sound Art & Performance). He approached me looking for an online database to show case sounds around major cities in the UK (which eventually turned into the world) and here is the result:  The Sound Database

There are a few bugs and usability features that I am working on but the base of the site pretty much finished.

The site uses a number of different languages and API to achieve the end result.

Languages-

• HTML
• CSS
• Javascript
• PHP
• MySQL
• AJAX
• Regular Expression

API:

• Google Maps API
• SoundManager2
• Prototype
• Scriptaculous

This is the first time i have coded something this complicated and i am fairly pleased with the results. Next i hope to add some extra functionality to the site.

1. A randomizer which pans around the world randomly playing sounds as it goes.
2. A walk though feature whereby the user can draw a line though the sounds. An icon will drive the path of the line playing sounds in close proximity. Sounds will pan to the left if they are on the left and right if they are on the right.

Rhythm bug improvements

Its been a really long tome since i wrote anything on here. This is partly because i am slacking and the mainly because i have 7 weeks left of my degree and have endless amounts of work to do. Just thought I’d take some time to document version two of the rhythm bug idea I posted a while ago.  Its a bit slow at the mo but works well. Gonna try different wheels maybe a different motor to see if i can improve its performance. I have also changed the switch to be more linear instead of rotating. This seemed to fit better into such a small space. One other detail that is worth mentioning is the humble Drawing pin. The contacts that slide across the circuit board are made from upside down drawing pins. They slide really well, conduct electricity really well and allow the contact to rotate with the movement putting less strain on the solder join – Useful little things!

Sound weave

This is a really interesting project. A sewing machine has been modified using 24 Servos to knit sound levels recorded from a microphone. Not only does it look epic but the end result has been used to create some quite interesting garments.  check out the main website here though i found the project on the Make site

HAPPY NEW YEAR

Apologies to my millions and billions of readers for my recent lack of motivation when it comes to blogage. Just before Christmas i was in fact abducted by aliens whereby they proceeded to carry out a number of experiments on me. One of which was a curious experiment where the Extraterrestrials tried splicing my phalanges with the tentacles from several octopodes. Obviously this is gonna slowly me down when it comes to typing but undeterred and dedicated to the cause i have mastered my new phalanges and am able to type again!!!

GOOD NEWS

Now that the excuses are over lets start the new year as we mean to go on. Recently i have been asked to build a website sound map of london which i am very excited about. in my research i came across this amazing piece of sound art/interactive design on the make blog. The model must have taken forever.

Yokohama Soundscape 2007 from pelican on Vimeo.

webcam processing

I am starting to get quite obsessed with procesing at the moment its a very addictive framework. I have been experimenting with the video class library. Processing allows for individual pixel comparison of each capture from a webcam. The code from the video in this post compares the current webcam capture to the previous capture from the webcam. The code scans from left to right top to bottom when it finds the first pixel that is different from the previous capture it draws a circle on the screen at that point. One of the interesting problems solved from this code was converting the linear array of pixels from the webcam capture to the 2d space on the form.

xPos = The modulous or remainder of pixelnumber / width.

yPos = the result of pixelnumber / width ignoring the remainder.

ps. ignore the quality of my very very old webcam its just impressive it still works

Fireworks

I ran through the tutorial i posted a while ago on projectile motion, This post is just to show a quick example of how to apply this theory in code. I wrote the code for this animation in processing which is a java frame work for graphic designers. I have touched on processing in previous posts. Animation was created by allowing the code to run and saving every frame as a .jpg.  Here is the final animation :-

I am no moving image expert by a long shot. The animation was compiled in final cut pro. I am very pleased with the out put from my code it look very natural and the particles all fall taking into account gravity. I now am working on a fire work class so i might post that up soon.

Rhythm bug

After my post on subconscious tapping a while ago i have been pondering over my own version. I have been developing a very simple robot that bounces back and forth between two objects; the further apart the objects the slower the beat. I plan to make quite a few of these little bots so that different beats can be made by having each robot bounce between different distances.  Here’s a quick mock up of how the robots will be made -

I have nick named him Gaz the destroyer i made a mock up out of cardboard before this one who was not quite so successful. He was called Baz the racing slug! i do in fact need to get out more.

I am quite happy with the over all performance of the mock up. There are a few things to take into consideration. The robot produces a slight wheel spin on the return journey. This is because of bad weight distribution. I have decided to counteract this by making the robot 4 wheel drive. I also want to consider what material to construct the mechanism with so that when the robot bashes against an object it makes a good noise.

Projectile motion

Recently i have been working alot with processing which if you have not tried i really guarantee it for image manipulation, real time web cam tracking and general interaction experiments. Part of an applet i recently wanted to produce involved shapes flaying out of the bottom of the screen. These objects must obey gravity and act like real objects when you throw them in the air. These sort of behavior is know as projectile motion. I am no mathematician by any standards but i found this brilliant tutorial on the subject of projectile motion. I worked through from the very beginning and was easily able to produce this effect. Its a very very good tutorial and i went through a lot of complicated mind boggling sites to find it. So if your interested in this subject the try this:

Projectile Tutorial

Don’t rush through it because the beginning parts are vital to understanding the last parts.

image from the Kitty throw game; bored try it!

Beautiful eyes transcend to music

This is a very poetic project and a very beautiful idea. The author and creator of the program decided it would be nice to have a way to convert the beauty of the retina in an eye in to music. He’s Using Processing as the backbone and creating OSC which are then picked up by SuperCollider.

I have not looked at SuperCollider yet but it does look like an excellent piece of software for producing real-time audio synthesis and algorithmic composition. So watch out in the future for experiments on my blog using this software.

heres the video showing the EyeSequencer:

this project was found on Makezine.com

Makezine found this project on: http://blog.califaudio.com

Tape loop

Pretty self explanatory really. Its a really nice idea that originated from the punk era. If anybody knows of this technique being used in professional recordings i would love to hear about it.

I found this image on good old instructables.com here >> instructable