computer human interaction

The Who’s Pete Townshend, with the help of mathematician and composer Lawrence Ball and software engineer David Snowdon, has created a computer system called The Method which allows users to make unique pieces of music created by inputting personal information, sounds and a rhythm. Users will ’sit’ for the software in the same way a person would pose for a portrait painting, and the compositions created will be posted on the site.

Townshend plans to use the music created on the web on the next Who album as long as his bandmate Roger Daltrey gives the project the go-ahead.

Speaking at the launch of The Method yesterday (25.05.07), Townshend said “When I first had this idea John Entwistle and Keith Moon were still alive and in the band. They were very dismissive of it.”

“But today, The Who is just me and Roger Daltrey. If I was going to work with this idea, I would want to do it full on and if Roger was into it then I don’t see why we couldn’t make an album.” Read more…

reacTIVision is an open source, cross-platform computer vision framework for fast and robust tracking of fiducial markers attached onto physical objects, as well as for multi-touch finger tracking. The Reactable applies reacTIVision to create an electro-acoustic computer music instrument with a tangible user interface.

Robert Moog played an early prototype of the Reactable at the NIME conference 2004 in Hamamatsu, Japan.
It was mainly designed as a toolkit for the rapid development of table-based tangible user interfaces (TUI) and multi-touch interactive surfaces. This framework has been developed by Martin Kaltenbrunner and Ross Bencina  at the Music Technology Group at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, Spain as part of the the reactable project, a novel electro-acoustic music instrument with a tangible user interface.

 

 Bob Moog Checks Out Reactable [2:02m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Winter NAMM Show: Alesis introduced their MasterControl Audio Interface and Control Surface.

The MasterControl is a professional audio interface and recording control surface, providing up to 44.1 – 192 kHz recording capability directly to your computer via ultra-fast, low latency FireWire connectivity. The audio interface features 2 mic (XLR) inputs with Phantom Power and channel inserts, 6 line (TRS) inputs, and boasts plenty of expansion capability; a total potential of 26 simultaneous inputs with the additional S/PDIF and dual S/MUX ADAT Lightpipe inputs (18 total digital inputs at 44.1/48 kHz or 10 at 88.2/96 kHz).

The outputs on the MasterControl feature six analog outputs, configurable as 5.1 Surround or three separate stereo outputs. With dedicated speaker switching, the MasterControl allows you to dynamically select between different monitor combinations to check your mixing references on different speakers.

In addition to being an audio interface, the MasterControl functions as a fully featured control surface for hands-on, dedicated control over your HUI-compatible DAWs and external MIDI devices. Each of the 8 channels strips is equipped with dedicated Solo, Record-Enable, Mute, and Select buttons for quick access to the most essential channel strip functions.

Read more…

Tai-Chi (Tangible Acoustic Interfaces for Computer-Human Interaction), is a system developed by researchers from Switzerland, Italy, Germany, France and the UK that can turn just about anything into a control surface.

“We have made a system that can give any object, even a 3D one, a sense of touch,” says Ming Yang, an engineer at Cardiff University, UK, who is coordinating the project.

Two or more acoustic sensors are attached around the edges of the surface. These pinpoint the position of a finger, or another touching object, by tracking minute vibrations. This allows them to create a virtual touchpad, or keyboard, on any table or wall.

This video (WMV) shows the technology being used as a musical instrument control surface.

Tai-Chi uses tiny piezoelectric sensors to sense surface vibrations. The sensors are connected to a desktop computer loaded with software developed by the team and the system can track up to two objects at once, in one of two ways.

One method involves measuring differences in the amount of time vibrations take to arrive at two or three different sensors – a similar approach to sonar. Using this method any surface can be made touch sensitive simply by attaching the sensors.

The other method requires just one sensor and can actually be more accurate – to within just a few millimetres. But this method requires the calibration of the system beforehand, so that it recognises the vibrations caused by contact at different points on the surface. It then uses a database of vibration “fingerprints” to identify the point of contact.

“For little cost you can have a much larger touch-sensitive area,” says Yang. “The whole surface of your desk could become your keyboard and mouse-pad.”

Diana Young, right, a Ph.D. candidate in the Hyperinstruments Group of the MIT Media Lab has developed the Hyperbow, a new electronic sensing system to measure minute changes in the position, acceleration and strain of a violin bow.

The system can be used to evaluate different bowing techniques and may expand the expressive possibilities of the violin by electronic means, according to Young, who built the gesture sensing system for the Hyperbow.

The Hyperbow is an enhanced bow, used in conjunction with a Hyperviolin. The latter, another product of the MIT Media Lab, is an instrument that makes no sound but creates an electronic output when played. The Hyperviolin can readily be played by anyone used to an acoustic violin.

“Electronic music is a way of combining my interests in music and engineering,” Young said.

Young, who has a B.A. in music from Johns Hopkins University and a certificate in violin performance from the Peabody Conservatory, built the gesture-sensing system for her master’s degree, which she received from MIT in 2001. Designed as a performance interface for professional violinists, the Hyperbow includes a set of accelerometers, gyroscopes and force sensors all installed on a carbon fiber bow.

Because the system is wireless, it interferes only minimally with the violinist’s bowing.

Both the Hyperbow and the Hyperviolin have been played in concert, by the renowned violinist Joshua Bell among others; several composers, including MIT’s Tod Machover, have created new compositions for them.

The Hyperbow premiered at the 2002 Conference on New Instruments for Musical Expression in Dublin. (You can hear samples of Hyperviolin music on the Toy Symphony web site, www.toysymphony.net, then follow links for Sound and Images/Dublin – National Symphony Orchestra/AUDIO Samples.)

The Hyperbow is just the latest in a series of Media Lab inventions on the vanguard of musical expression. Hypercello and Hyperinstruments were developed at the Media Lab by Joe Paradiso, Neil Gershenfeld and composer Tod Machover in the 1990s.

via MIT