1. Home
2. Modules
3. Module 3 - Tangible Media
4. Module 3 - Warmup Exercise

Module 3 - Warmup Exercise

Tangible Translation

tl;dr: Choose a sound (song, sampled audio, loop) and give it a beautiful physical 3D embodiment/representation (in just 2 hours).

Due Date: Monday, Oct 17, 9pm (see full timeline)

Submit to Gallery Pool: Tangible Translation

• Brief and goals
• Learning Objectives
• Process
• Deliverables
• Considerations and Constraints
• Approaches, Inspiration and Context
• Documentation

Brief and Goals

This module explores giving media physicality, tangiblity and presence in the real world. This exercise is designed to help you consider the relationship between the digital and physical by bridging that divide.

Brief: Translate a sound (song, sampled audio, loop) from the digital to a beautiful physical form in 2 hours.

Sound as an intangible media adds another layer to this exercise. First, you need to think about the qualities and structures of the media (the texture, structure, composition, patterns, repetitions, notes, and/or frequences). So, first spend some time unpacking the sound that you’ve chosen and consider how you would code or describe it’s elements. Second, you need to figure out how you’re going to render this structure in a physical format? What is the mapping you can use to make this happen? What are the aesthetic choices you need to make it make the sound recognizable from the physical form? Then, you’ll need to encode it or embody it in that form. Finally, spend some time reflecting on the outcome - can you recognize the sound? is it a successful translation?

Learning Objectives

As part of this exercise you will be asked to:

• Develop your skills in analysing and decoding media (recognizing and coding patterns and structures within media);
• Develop an awareness of the relationships between digital and physical structures, and how these might be used in media installations;
• Build an applied understanding of embodiment and how it relates to tangibility and materiality of media; and
• Develop your skills in media representation.

Process

As mentioned above:

• Selection: Choose a sound to work with. A strong suggestion would be to use a familiar and personally significant sound (a favourite song, the voice of an important person to you).
• Analysis: Listen to the audio track multiple times. To help plan, it would be helpful to annotate it for patterns or things of interest, develop a quick notation for the audio, or diagram it’s flow.
• Mapping: Plan how you will map features of the audio into a tangible format. Sketch it out.
• Embody: In not more than two hours, create a physical representation of the sound.
• Reflect on the process of recreating this composition and the relationships between digital and physical media.

Deliverables

You are asked to deliver three things for this warm up exercise:

1. Composition: The final physical composition. Deliver photos and/or video of the final form.
2. Narrative: A description of the manner in which you approached the project, the process you followed and the strategies you used to translate the work.
3. Reflection: A reflection on outcome and comparision to the original work.

Considerations and Constraints

Constraints:

• The outcome must be created in under 2 hour (not including research).
• The outcome must be physical and 3-dimensional;
• The size is limited to no more than 1 foot by 1 foot square;
• The translation must be from digital audio into something physical (i.e. no visual accompaniment - a movie, TV show does not count even if you only use the audio).

Considerations:

• You are free to use any materials you wish to construct the representation. But it’s recommended you use everyday materials that are suited to rapid prototyping: cardboard, hot glue, paper, pipe cleaners, wire, etc. are all accessible materials that don’t cost much.
• You’re welcome to use technologies and tools to assist you in your analysis and translation of the sound e.g. you might import the sound file into Audacity to look at the waveform; might run it through a FFT (Fast Fourier Transform);
• Consider how you want to make the translation. One way is to examine the content itself. For example if it’s a song the word choices might be a good starting point, or the relationships, durations and tonal qualities of sections of the song (intro, outro, verse, chorus, etc.), the instruments used, etc. Try to find patterns you can exploit. Alternatively use your personal experience of and response to the sound. What does it evoke for you? Draw on expressionism and abstraction as a way to compose your representation. What does the sound look like - round, square, big, small? What does it feel like - rough, smooth, jagged, sharp?
• You don’t have to deal with the entire sound/song. You can focus on a section of the sound.

• Materials matter. What material choices pair well with your sound? Should you use textiles (felts, twine, fabrics, thread), cardboard, wood, metal (wires, aluminum), plastic? And why? Think about the materials that relate to the aesthetic of your chosen content.

• Remember: you have creative license! And these considerations are just a guide.

Approaches, Inspiration and Context

There’s lots of ways you could approach this assigment. To help provide a little guidance, and some starting points, below are some links and resources to take a look at. These are by no means exhaustive and finding. Some of the kinds of things you might create could include, but are not limited to:

• The work of artist Nathalie Miebach translates weather and climate change data from cities into musical scores, which she then translates into vibrant, whimsical sculptures and uses them as the basis for collaboration with musicians across a wide spectrum of styles and genres.

Musical notation allows me a more nuanced way of translating information without compromising it.” She uses these scores to collaborate with musicians across a wide spectrum of styles and genres.” ~ Nathalie Miebach via Brainpickings

• Notations 21 - Drawing inspiration from John Cage’s Notations, this 320-page volume by Theresa Sauer examines how 165 composers and musicians around the world are experiencing, communicating and reconceiving music visually by reinventing notation. See this example score by Julie Dassaud. More images here

• Not directly related but DataPhys explores the mapping of data into physical form and volume. They maintain an extensive and chronological list of physical visualizations and related artifacts that is a great inspirational resource for this project. Definitely check this out; here’s a call out to a few that focus on sound

  • 2007 – Explosion of Sound Sculptures
  • 2004 – Cylinder: Early Sound Sculpture
  • 2011 – Stephen Barrass’ Physical Data Sonifications
  • 2014 – Sound Bites

• Soundform “is the result of an enquiry into the transformation of sound to three-dimensional form. The work came about through a number of discussions between the artists as to whether it was possible to translate “the invisible” or more specifically invisible information into visible and tangible three-dimensional form.”

  • Similarly, REIFY have turned Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries” and other music into 3d printed sculptures.
  • Inmi Lee’s and Kyle McDonald’s Mother is collaborated to translates sounds into objects. This piece “explores synesthetic connections between language and shapes through generative sculptures based on gestures that represent the participants’ interpretation of particular sounds. The gestures were captured using Microsoft’s Xbox Kinect, interpreted with openFrameworks and printed with rapid prototyping machine.”

• Reflection II is an augmented sound data sculpture, which was inspired by and derived from the musical piece of the same title by Frans de Waard. In a similar aesthetic, Soundscape: The Physical Sounds of Manhattan consists of a 3D map that lays out Manhattan’s musical history over its neighbourhoods.

Documentation:

A suggested format for documentation is as follows. You should include a write up of the following:

• Audio - Describe the audio you selected and why. Include (if possible) the sound file or embed it from an online source.
• Product - What was the final representation. What did you create? What is it composed with (materials, shapes, forms)? Describe the textures, colors, etc.
• Approach - How did you approach the assignment and re-creation of the work in a physical medium? Cite examples that informed your approach
• Reflection - Do you think you captured the content and aesthetics of the audio accurately? Is it recognizable as the original sound? What did you learn? What would you do differently?

Each of these sections should be no more than 150-200 words max. and well illustrated (images, videos, etc.)

For the Project Info’s goal description: it must be tweetable - summarise your outcome in no more than 140 characters