ICMC 2006

Interesting things from ICMC 2006 day 5: Max Matthews (CCRMA) spoke about phase filters The algorithm is a difference equation based on a rotating complex number. A complex number, viewed as a two-dimensional vector, is sometimes called a Phaser, hence the name of the filter. The resulting filter is a high Q two pole resonant filter that is well behaved in terms of stability and is easy to re-tune dynamically during a performance. The filter is about twice as expensive in terms of computer multiplies and additions per sound-wave sample than most other filter algorithms but laptop computers now are so fast that they can run a bank of several hundred Phaser filters in real-time. ...

Interesting things from ICMC 2006 day 4: Dan Overholt (CREATE, UCSB) talked about the CUI interface based around a PIC microcontroller and gave lots of nice examples of how the interface has been used by students. In the education section, it was interesting to see the different strategies and programs at various institutions: ...

Interesting things from ICMC 2006 day 2: Tim Place presented Jamoma. Golan Levin presented a very interesting project on spectrographic performance, where a large table with a projected image is “scanned” sequentially and synthesized as a frequency spectrum. So the table would serve as a performance space where physical objects could be moved around to create various rhythmic patterns and timbres. ...

Day 1 of ICMC 2006 was hot and humid before the rain… Woon Seung Yeo (CCRMA) presented raster scanning, a technique for sound synthesis and analysis based on a traditional scanning technique as is used in TVs and other image devices (see some example pictures). Mikael Laurson presented recent features in PWGL (Patch Work Graphics Language). This system, based on Lisp, is everything that Max/MSP is not. It is built around traditional notation, but with lots of novel methods for drawing dynamic and rhythmic curves. It works in realtime and the musical output is very impressive. ...

{width=“195” height=“260”} This last week has been quite busy here at ICMC in New Orleans. I have been writing notes along the way, and the idea is to publish them in the blog when I get things cleaned up a little. I arrived last Sunday, day 0 of the conference with pre-conference workshops and concerts. Unfortunately, I came in to late to go to the Electrotap workshop, but at least I managed to see Ge Wang present Chuck, Audicle and the miniAudicle. Besides the stylish implementation and GUI of this software collection, they have some very nice and novel features. I particularly like the potential for creating scalable systems, and the networking capabilities. ...