Creative Programming for Audiovisual Art (kadenze)

Creative Programming for Audiovisual Art (kadenze)
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Creative Programming for Audiovisual Art (kadenze)
Creative Programming for Audiovisual Art aims to enhance student skills and experience in the development of software for the creation and manipulation of sounds and images, both in real and non-real time. The course explores the intersection and similarities between sound and image signal processing through the exploration of combined audiovisual approaches. As such it is suitable for those with a strong interest in creative technologies from either an engineering or creative arts background.

This course extends the principles of creative engineering for use in arts, games, and more general interaction scenarios so that students can develop their own projects through the use of computational approaches to audiovisual processing. The lessons will be taught using Javascript. It is recommended that students have some experience with using Processing and some background in digital audio and/or digital image manipulation before taking this course.




Materials on how to use Javascript will be made available, and we will be using bespoke tools and libraries to make this a lot easier. At first we will use ready made code to apply creative techniques. Following this, you’ll be expected to develop your own code based on what you’ve learned. Throughout this process, you should pick up some great skills.

We will spend the first few sessions exploring Digital Audio Signal Processing. This will cover synthesis, sequencing, filtering, sample loading and playback, panning and rudimentary analysis. Following this we’ll be looking at audiovisual interaction using video and 3D graphics.


Schedule :


This course is in adaptive mode and is open for enrollment.

- Session 1: Introduction to the course: What is Creative Programming?

Introduction to Digital Audio in Javascript. In this session we will get started using the CodeCircle IDE, and then download the current version of Maximilian. We’ll be going through some of the examples, and building some really basic music software to get us started. Some of the most important things you will learn in this session include how simple waveforms can be used to create more complex ones, and how signals can be used to make sound, or to control sound, depending on how those signals are scaled.

- Session 2: Sound Synthesis and Control

Building on the previous session's introduction, we will be learning more about waveforms and their construction, and looking at additive synthesis. After this we’ll be exploring how we can use simple statements to make an efficient metronome object that can be used to make things happen. At the end of the session, you will have all built synthesizers in Javascript and made them play things that sound like music.

- Session 3: Real-time recursive filters, LFOs, and Sample playback

In this session we will learn how to use Maximilian’s built-in filters to create a subtractive synthesizer and an LFO, and get some insight into how these work. We will also learn how to load in a sample and play it back.

- Session 4: Building a Drum Machine/Sample Playback Device, Manipulating Samples, and Using Envelopes

During the first half of the lesson we will be working to create a drum machine using sample players and sequencer skills from the previous session. Following this we will be looking at various ways of manipulating sample playback to create interesting effects, and learn how to use basic envelope generators to control parameters. We will also look at an advanced example demonstrating how to create a polyphonic music device.

- Session 5: Audio Visual Composition: Contemporary Work by Audiovisual Creatives

In this session we will look at the work of contemporary AV artists and talk about what inspires them, showing examples of their work and discussing what approaches they take to audiovisual composition. We will also begin to explore the fundamentals of algorithmic computer graphics design in Javascript.

- Session 6: Using The Javascript Canvas With Maximilian

This session will be a basic introduction on how to use the Javascript canvas in more detail, and how to augment it with Maximilian. We will look at drawing methods, and demonstrate how to integrate your existing audio DSP code and projects with the Javascript canvas to make interactive music applications that use graphics, mouse and keyboard interaction.

- Session 7: Audiovisual Synthesis Using Javascript

This session will look at how to get basic information from our sound algorithms and use it to map graphical parameters to make basic audiovisual synthesizers. We will explore a range of generative drawing techniques including the geometric systems, non-linear systems and noise. We will also look at controlling generative drawing through audio, and using graphics parameters to control sound.

- Session 8: Memo Akten Guest lecture

Memo will take you through a bunch of simple systems for the creation of audiovisual art.

- Session 9: Pixel Pushing – 2D and 3D systems using algorithmic and generative graphics

In this session we will look at a range of approaches for creating images using pure pixel pushing. We’ll make classic fractals, Chladni patterns, and look at how to create our own DIY 3D environments without any openGL, including an introduction to generative 3D geometry and superformulae.

- Session 10: Audio Features And Their Uses

In this session we’ll be visualizing audio features using various forms of analysis. Here we can do great effects with not much coding, but getting started is a headache, and we can make this part easier. We will also introduce frag shaders as a mechanism for manipulating images.