Created by Dave Young aka henderson, Radius Music combines ideas of cartography and graphic scores as a means to produce sound. The device is an autonomous revolving machine that reads a distance value in real-time between itself and another object. As the machine slowly rotates and scans the room, it takes this radial distance and outputs it as a relative sonic frequency and a corresponding visual score.
The synthesis techniques used to generate the audio include Frequency Modulation and Additive Synthesis, with phasing effects providing a procedural rhythmic element. The circular rotation of the piece evokes an idea of early sample culture – each device plays a loop of sound approximately 3 seconds long, sampling the position of people and objects in the space. Two devices are situated in the room, documenting sonically and visually the dynamic real-time readings taken from the rotation ultrasonic distance sensors. As people walk in and out of the room that these devices will be placed in, they will alter the readings of distance, and therefore, the sounds too.
Built using Arduino, PureData, and Processing.
Henderson is a new media artist currently based between Dublin, IRL and Den Haag, NL. He works with electronics, sound and architectural ideas in order to create generative and interactive situations. He has finished his final year of study at The National College of Art and Design, Dublin, and has completed writing a thesis titled Generative Systems: Authorship, Obsolescence and Production in Brian Eno’s 77 Million Paintings.
