Robert Heel is a visual musician who’s been creating some lovely instructional films on topics dear to the heart of a visualist.
Of special interest, A Kick A Snare A Hat. Documenting a little AV performance in Resolume Avenue.
A Kick A Snare A Hat from Robert Heel on Vimeo.
Philia 01 Support Video from Lia on Vimeo.
Artist Lia has created her first piece of art for the iPhone and iPod touch, something called PhiLia 01. It’s a quirky, gorgeous generative sound and visual app activated by movement, one that encourages users to save their own artwork.
http://www.iphoneart.org/philia01
Composer Morton Subotnik used to talk really eloquently back in the days of multimedia CD-ROMs and The Voyager Company about computers as “chamber music” environments. Instead of seeing the personal scale of technology as an impediment, he viewed it as something intimate and wonderful. So it’s fantastic to see artists engage mobile platforms as a way to have that relationship with a participant.
There’s now also a page up that is beginning to collect some of these particular artworks, focusing on generative-style interactive creations, and featuring work by our friend Memo Akten. Joshua Davis’ kaleidoscopic artmaking tool Reflect, which he showed for the first time at OFFF earlier this month in Lisbon, is enroute.
The way in which these tools are being created is interesting, too. PhiLia is built in OpenFrameworks, the open source C++-based development tool made friendlier for artists with integrated toolsets, a community of friendly creative folk, and simplified, speedy syntax similar to Processing. OpenFrameworks, thanks to its open source nature, has made its way onto the iPhone.
Part of what this demonstrates is that, while the iPhone itself is proprietary, some of the power of open source can still triumph. And, indeed, by basing work on this open source foundation, these same artists aren’t imprisoned by a single platform. PhiLia could be a desktop app, or on other mobile platforms once they support OpenFrameworks.
And, yes, it means I’m aching that much harder to get OpenFrameworks and/or Processing onto Android – it should be possible. (Java on Android is not identical to Java on desktop, so it can’t be a direct port – you can’t just install Processing on Android – but it is possible.) There are also still some wrinkles in the App Store approval process; it really is refreshing on Android (and presumably things like Palm WebOS) not to have those restrictions.
Then again, that’s the whole point: OS and specific platform shouldn’t have to matter, and open source software – and artwork – can be just as brilliant on a proprietary platform as an open one.
Ready to try this yourself?
Developing for iPhone using openFrameworks and ofxiPhone [memo.tv]
Using openFrameworks for iPhone dev [Rober Carlsen]
You can thank Lee Byron, Memo Akten, Damian Stewart, Zach Gage, and the core OF team (Zach, Theo, and Arturo). The “power of open source” is not some sort of magical whirlwind that surrounds code and makes things appear spontaneously – it’s blood, sweat, and tears (unpaid!) by real people. Although, if you get those real people together in a room and do some sort of battle shout or Care Bear Stare (sorry, I’m an 80s kid), it might help psych you up.
As visualists, the sad truth is we have a poorer sense of the history of our medium than musicians. Part of this is simply a lack of access. YouTube is a weak substitute, but it’s a start. In that spirit, Karl (Format K) sends us the minimal geometric machinations of pioneering electronic graphics artist and animator John Whitney. We’ve previous mentioned the role of Whitney and Larry Cuba in helping the modern computer graphics industry to be born – with a little help from a movie called Star Wars. Here, you get a real sense of an artist working within the restrictions of the technology to produce something beautiful. It’s a chance to recognize how we’re indebted to this kind of work. While the temptation may be to replicate effects like this with more modern tools, they also illustrate how you can focus on a technique within a tool – and perhaps there’s a digital equivalent of focusing on artistic limitations.
The musical score turns this into a dream collaboration, with the work of Terry Riley.
It’s nice to have access to this, but boy, would I love to have an HD-quality rendition of many of these films available for download or on a high-quality medium like Blu-Ray. Any chance a modern-day Voyager would re-release seminal visualist work from decades past?
Part of what makes Resolume Avenue so compelling as a live visual solution is that it can mix, mash, and loop audio alongside video, in ways often resembling Ableton Live. But that, of course, doesn’t make Resolume nearly as deep a live sonic tool as Ableton. So, to combine two great tastes – live video in Resolume Avenue, plus live audio and elaborate sequencing control in Ableton Live – the folks at Resolume have assembled a recipe that allows Resolume to be controlled via Live using MIDI.
The basic process:
1. Route MIDI from Resolume to Ableton, using the IAC Driver on Mac and MIDI-Yoke on Windows.
2. Make a MIDI sequence in Ableton that controls clips in Resolume.
3. Add some audio clips and scenes in Live for some live audio goodness.
4. Link parameters and sync for effects and icing.
Controlling Resolume Avenue with Ableton Live
This does nothing to stop a fantasy I’ve heard other folks discussing of late: imagine if we had an OSC (OpenSoundControl) sequencer? OSC is by nature time-based as a protocol, and you could even still sequence MIDI events (using MIDI over OSC) – or arbitrary events that wouldn’t be restricted by overly rigid event types like the MIDI Note? Does anyone know if such a thing has been tried? (Maybe it’s time to write one.)
That’s not to take away from the beauties of Ableton Live in this sort of setup. Combining Live and visuals, whether to add audio or sequence visuals or both, has been an ongoing theme on this site.
Live + Resolume (like the above tutorial, but + Ethernet) Tutorial: Ableton Live + Resolume with MIDI Over Ethernet, Free on PC (Linux, Mac Soon)
Live + Isadora + Max + The Karate Kid: Karate Kid AV Remix – and a how-to using the awesome Lucifer plug-in (which could also be nice with Resolume): AV Cutup Secrets: Using Lucifer & Live
Live + Isadora: Ableton Live + Isadora: Slicing, Syncing Audiovisual Tutorials
Live + VDMX: Toby *spark and Live Cinema: Ableton and VDMX, Soundtrack and Narrative
Live + robotic mirrors on projectors: DMX For Dummies: Controlling iCue Robotic Mirrors with uDMX and Ableton Live
Live + Jitter: Christopher Willits on XLR8R with Live Jitter, Ableton Live Visual Setup
Live + robotic cameras: Interview: Josh Cardenas’ Robotic, Midi Controlled Cameras and tour with DJ Shadow and Cut Chemist
And one instance of Live failing to be the tool for the job, only to be replaced by Max: Progress Report: 8 Cameras Plus Vixid Plus Patching Gives Craziness (Pd would work, too, which would be nice for a Linux netbook)
Now that Bart has gotten the ball rolling for Resolume, though, I suspect we’ll see a lot more ideas for combining Resolume Avenue with Ableton Live, or using Avenue as an audiovisual tool in itself; it just makes sense. If you work up your own setup or add your own twist after following this tutorial, let us know!
"MGFest (Motion Graphics Festival) continues its tour of the US, opening tonight in Austin, Texas. The conference is still $7 total for all the live events and the conference itself. For the workshops, you add $240 a day (bulk discounts available) – but that means that, if you’re low on change, you Texans can absolutely go hit this.
A number of highlights:
Some interesting-looking live audiovisual stuff, via our friend Troy:
Create Digital Motion by Create Digital Media, Ltd. is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.
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