Audio Graffiti is a multi-user music installation that explores new modes of sonic interaction, afforded by the latest in locative technologies. Several mobile users may create and explore a gradually evolving collage of audio recordings, “stuck” to real walls in urban environments.
The piece can be deployed in an outdoor environment (using GPS tracking), or in an indoor space as seen in the video below. Equipped with a wireless headset and tracking device, participants can “tag” or “spray” sound onto the wall. We provide several small musical instruments, which can be used along with one’s voice, to add sounds to the collaborative musical mix. The installation is seeded with some pre-existing sonic material, which allows participants to synchronize rhythmically, and maintains cohesion over time. All user-contributed sounds slowly fade away, resulting in an ever-evolving musical piece.
As users moves about, they also experience a changing sonic perspective of the localized sounds, based on their particular location. So users not only create audio content, but they also participate actively in the encounter (remixing) of sonic material. Participants who are waiting their turn in the staging area may watch a real-time 3D visualization of the installation, which shows avatars of each player walking amongst virtual sound sources.
This installation was filmed at the 12th Biennial Arts and Technology Symposium in the lobby of the Ammerman Center for Arts and Technology (Connecticut College, March 4-6, 2010).
This Monday, May 11th, I will be presenting a course on “Art, GPS and mobility” as part of the SAT[Transform] educational series. Although the topics may vary according to audience feedback, below is a overview of the topics that may be presented:
> Inspiration for interactive mobile applications:
intro to mixed & augmented reality
examples of locative media projects (past & present)
> Geospatial data:
Existing viewers, rendering engines, and geotagged data
Location-based content delivery and interaction
intro to OpenStreetMap, Google Earth, etc.
> Mapping & GIS:
projections and representations (lat/long - UTM)
geocaching: waypoints/tracks/routes and exchange formats
open source software solutions
> User tracking:
about GPS receivers, technologies, and conversion between formats
robustness with other inputs: accelerometers, compasses, cameras, fiduciary markers, etc
On March 6th 2009, we held a networked event where DJs and VJs in Montreal and Vancouver performed simultaneously. Moreover, audience members in each location were able to contribute material in real time with their cell phones using Raw Materials, a software developed by Mike Wozniewski and Alexandre Quessy at the SAT. Below is a documentary video created by Mo Simpson that describes the event:
As a collaboration between the SAT and Mobile Muse, we have created a component that allows visual artists to collect media content from their audiences during live events. The project is called RawMaterials, and is targetted at VJs using Modul8 for mixing, yet any software capable of receiving OSC messages can be used. Audience members can use their cell phones or other mobile devices to send SMS, MMS, microblob feeds such as Twitter, and even live video using Livecast software. The public can also upload content to social media sites such as Flickr, YouTube, Picasa, etc., and the system can be configured to aggregate content from those sources as well. This can even happen far before the event starts, so that the public can choose the raw materials that will be used during the performance.
In the summer of 2008, we developed a prototype of a multi-player mobile audio game, called SoundPark. The objective of the game was to collect audio clips that were physically scattered throught the real world, and deposit them in a staging area for playback. Central to the design are the themes of highly coupled interaction and communication between players with different roles and an engaging blend of interaction with both the physical and virtual worlds. To this end, numerous technologies including locative sensing, miniature computing, and portable displays had to be integrated with a game middleware and audio scene rendering engine.
I’ve written a much more detailed description on audioscape.org if you are interested, but here is a little documentation video that we put together to illustrate the concepts:
From May 13-15, I was at the Mobile Music Workshop in Vienna, which turned out to be a great forum for the exchange of ideas related to sonic design in mobile settings. There is a nice book published, which includes all the proceedings from this workshop since 2004. So rather than telling you about all of the projects, I’ll urge you to go to mobilemusicworkshop.org and buy one of these books
As for the poster that I presented, click the thumbnail below to see the larger version:
My main activity is the development and programming for the Audioscape Project, which involves anything to do with spatial organization of audio content and sound processing. Generally speaking, we provide the ability to create virtual worlds that function as musical interfaces or installation.
Most recently, however, we have started to add the ability to include mobile and location-based environments, in the outdoors. By using tiny mobile computing devices, GPS, and ad-hoc wireless audio streaming, we have managed to create shared mixed-reality audio environments that multiple users can experience while roaming around outdoors.
On March 11th, 2008, I presented our mobile audio work at Interface[s] Montreal, which is a conference series held each year at the SAT. The theme for this night’s presentations was “Mobility”, and so I talked about the future use of audio in augmented- and mixed-reality applications.
