All posts by admin

Twister

Twister

Contracting work for twosuns, a Berlin multi-media company. Twister is part of the sound subsystem of enclued, an interactive multi-media development environment. Initially a multi-channel soundcard with embedded spatialization functionality, which was later moved to the host PC.

Bali

Bali

Computer aided score generation of Balinesian Gender Wayang music, based on multi-channel envelope recordings. The recording system required a custom acquisition system as multi-channel audio interfaces were not available in the early 1990s. It was implemented by Thomas Ruoff and Pierre Dutilleux at FH and ZKM, Karlsruhe. I was involved in the later stages that dealt with the analysis of the accumulated data. Most of this was done in Matlab and its signal processing toolbox. Finally, a custom notation system was devised to take the specific playing styles into account.

Traguisma

Traguisma

Traguisma – the TRAnsient GUItar State MAchine. Or, if you prefer the official title: ‘Algorithms for Combined Sound Analysis and Synthesis and their Implementation in a Multi-Processor Environment’.

This was to become a ‘Diplom-Informatiker’, my graduation project. In short it was about improving guitar synthesizer, with a focus on the attack phases of a pluck, in particular re-plucking a string that’s already vibrating.

The intended target platform was GWIZ’ Infinity Box, but as this project was cancelled, I implemented it on CNMAT’s multi-DSP box Reson8.

Here’s the PDF

Chipsaw

Chipsaw

A typical hardware hacking project while working at STEIM: Jane Henry approached us with a ‘Jingle Bells’ melody-greeting-card whose almost drained battery caused it to sound like Jimi Hendrix thru Granular Synthesis. In order to make the process a little more controllable we fed it with a fresh battery combined with a pressure sensor that would reduce the supply voltage. In addition a set of mercury switches combined with a resistor ladder would create even further disturbances and interruptions. The latter was moulded into a sort of anklet, while the pressure pad would go between Jane’s toes.

Chromasone

Chromasone

A simplified way to approach the Chromasone is to call it a virtual piano, although that doesn’t tell the story by far. It is played with a pair of data gloves fitted with bending sensors that are connected to a SensorLab, which also takes care of the 3-D spatial tracking of the hands’ positions, and outputs MIDI data that feeds synthesizers and samplers. Rather than replacing the piano’s keyboard for thin air, the Chromasone provides a sort of ruler that acts as a playing reference and can be rotated & tilted to change parameter mappings. Most of the initial development was done by Bert Bongers.

COEXIS

COEXIS

COEXIS = COmpiler & Emulator for maX Incorporated SPIDER (SPIDER = SensorLab Programming Integrated Development Environment). A project from my early days at STEIM as an intern, COEXIS was the bold attempt to write a cross compiler between Max and the SensorLab’s programming language SPIDER. While the project never made it past the proof-of-concept phase, it resulted in a set of externals for dynamic object creation, i.e. self-modifying code (since Max 4.5 this has become easier with the new scripting options).