01 / Experience
Hearing information gathered from the surroundings.
Synphon maps its environment through sensors and translates visual data into a three-dimensional soundscape. It approaches the apparatus as a tool for algorithmic composition, connecting what is sensed to what can be heard.
The work draws on sensory substitution: information normally associated with one sense is presented through another. Rather than illustrating a scene with a fixed soundtrack, Synphon uses information from its surroundings as material for sound.
- Year
- 2015
- My contribution
- Concept, hardware, software and sound
- Artistic authorship
- Verena Bachl & Karsten Schuhl
- Context
- independent artistic research collaboration
The finished apparatus and its physical controls. Photograph: Verena Bachl.
02 / My contribution
Concept, hardware, software and sound.
I developed Synphon with Verena Bachl, working across its concept, hardware, software and sound. These parts form a single chain from sensing through computation to an auditory result.
The physical object gives that chain a tangible form. Painted wood, aluminium and electronics house an apparatus approximately 45 centimetres long, 39 centimetres high and 26 centimetres wide.
Sense
Collect information from the surrounding environment.
Translate
Map visual and 3D information into parameters for sound.
Compose
Use those changing parameters as material for sound synthesis.
03 / Development
Thinking through the translation.
The process documentation includes discussions of depth information and a sensor test with the hardware connected to a computer. These studies sit between the conceptual question and the built object.
The central design task was the translation itself: deciding how information about the environment could become an audible structure. The apparatus brings algorithmic composition and psychoacoustic interests into that practical question.
Discussion of depth information during development.
A sensor test connected to the development computer.
Film & documentation
See the work in motion.
Project film — edit: Verena Bachl. Sound: Karsten Schuhl. Watch on Vimeo ↗
04 / Fabrication
Building the instrument around its system.
The workshop material shows component layouts, machined panels, housings and electronics before final assembly. It records the development of an object in which sensing, processing and physical controls need to coexist.
The separate pieces make the scope of the build visible. Synphon was developed as both an interactive system and a physical apparatus, with software and sound working alongside the fabrication of its enclosure.
Electronics and interface components on the workbench.
Machining a panel for the apparatus.
Prepared housings and structural parts.
A panel assembly during fabrication.
05 / In use
An environment becomes compositional material.
Completed in 2015, Synphon explores how a scene can be experienced through a different sensory channel. The work’s title joins the idea of togetherness with sound.
The project film offers a way to encounter the apparatus in time, alongside the photographs of its finished form and development.