SME Coversations

Scott Snibbe Email #1

On Jan 18, 2011, at 1:48 PM, erin_lee@mail.com wrote:

Hello, my name is Erin Lee, I am a senior at the University of Colorado at Denver and am graduating in May with a Bachelors Degree in Fine Arts with a Digital Design Emphasis. I was completely inspired by your Concentration installation! I am hoping to produce a very large projected version of a pixel piano that deals primarily with personal space. My critical question is about how can personal sounds allow people to experience personal space through a computer-based installation in real time? The pixels represent very large simulations of personal space, when movement is detected through processing, a personal sound is produced every pixel that is disturbed. Any feedback or advice, or books that I should read, would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks

Erin Lee

Received email back Jan 18, 2011 3:15pm:

Erin, that's great. The key piece of advice for you is to make something that people understand their effect on the work. If not, there's no point in it being interactive. That's the main problem with 99% of all interactive work.

I wrote a couple papers on interactivity that could be helpful:

Social Research
http://www.snibbe.com/research/dynamic

And this is a good interview:

Simanowski

David Rokeby is the pioneer in the type of installation you mention:

David Rokeby

Are you a good designer/illustrator? We are seeking interns or contract staff:

Careers

Timing may not be right for you..

Scott


On Feb 10, 2011, at 1:28 PM, erin_lee@mail.com wrote:

Hey Scott,

My Thesis statement has now evolved into: Through projected spatial boundaries how can participants learn about personal space? I took you advice and emailed David Rokeby, and he emailed me back! The articles you suggested were very helpful. The research that proves "that personal space exists and that invasions of personal space triggers emotional reactions." That is exactly what I seek to experiment with. David brought up a valid point of "wearing a sound" instead of just triggering, which is something I also need to consider.

Thanks again for all your help,

Erin Lee


David Rokeby Email #1

On 2011-01-18, at 4:40 PM, erin_lee@mail.com wrote:


Hello, my name is Erin Lee, I am a senior at the University of Colorado at Denver and am graduating in May with a Bachelors Degree in Fine Arts with a Digital Design Emphasis. I was completely inspired by your Very Nervous System installation! I am hoping to produce a very large projected version of a pixel piano that deals primarily with personal space. My critical question is about how can personal sounds allow people to experience personal space through a computer based installation in real time? The pixels represent very large simulations of personal space, when movement is detected through processing, a personal sound is produced every pixel that is disturbed. Any feedback or advice, or books that I should read, would be greatly appreciated.


Received email back from David Jan 25, 2011 5:53pm:

Hi Erin,

I am glad you found Very Nervous System inspiring. It is a little hard to get a full sense of your project by your description. I am interested in the notion of personal space. It is a challenge to make the sound really evocative of personal space. The simple triggering of sound might not be as effective as the triggering and continuous modulation of the sound so that the person really "wears" the sound by affecting it in some way by every small gesture that they make. I also tried to make my pieces more continuously effected than simply triggered. Depending on the kind of sound source you are using, there are a variety of ways to continuously modulate the sound... pitch bend, vibrato, filtering, volume, etc for MIDI devices, and related things or parameters of sound for other sound sources.

Hope this helps.

David

On 2011-02-17, at 1:48 PM, erin_lee@mail.com wrote:

Hello David,

I enjoy this concept of, "pieces that are more continuously effected than simply triggered." The sound that is triggered from the broken boundary line in my piece, is glass breaking, or a bubble popping. My attempt at teaching participants that when they walk into someones space and hear the noise they have broken the boundary. I am curious on how to continuously effect sound through the participant, an MIDI device is interesting but out of my price range. Can we discuss more about "wearing a sound"?

Thanks
Erin Lee

Received email back Feb 23, 2011 10:43am:

You can create a quasi-continuous effect by carefully looping the a range of sounds, starting each new one just before the previous one ends, and keeping the order unpredictable so that it does not sound like just a looping repeat. Then you continuously modulate the volume, pan position, possibly filtering, to vary it continuously.


What do you mean "wearing" a sound?


If a sound is modulated by your body in a way that is really physically convincing, then it feels like you are wearing the sound.


David