Adam Guzman: Thesis Blog

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These images are from the show Notation.

I met with Norman this past week to discuss my final 10 weeks of school.  We talked about the background of my research- influences from John Cage, Oskar Fischinger, Andy Warhol, DJ Spooky and David Byrne. It is important to contextualize my work when I present my final projects. My project has become investigative research. I want my practice to be expressive, creating instruments for designers and musicians to be expressive in this medium.

When I worked on the synced visual show, I was starting directly with an instrument ( the computer) and creating at the same time the music was going on. Now I am investigating a different approach, perhaps a shared instrument. The goal is to harvest enough experimental data so I can refine it and bring it back into a concert setting.

When using visuals to create sound, it is not about how free the user is to create the sound, but how expressive the sound becomes. Therefore, the user should not be in reactive mode when generating content. They should be the author. The topic becomes authored chance, not pure chance. So the prompts must appeal to one’s expressiveness. As designers, we deal with the uncertainties inside the drive of the human condition.  So we must develop new tools, new possibilities for discovery.

Oskar Fischinger

Karin Dreijer Andersson’s theatrical persona is a great inspiration. She is known to wear masks on stage to downplay the relevance of appearance. In an interview with Pitchfork, she stated:

“We think it’s important to let the music stand for itself more than focusing on the artist or the person who is behind it. Music has the potential and the capability to create something much bigger… it has the capability to be completely free, to do anything. And I think you limit that idea when you put yourself in front of it, in a way.”

I missed a chance to see her at Pop Montreal, but I get another chance tomorrow night at the Henry Fonda. I heard the stage production is amazing. I can’t wait.

Nosaj Thing Visual Show Debut at Pop Montreal

We arrived in Montreal Wednesday evening, picked up by a Towncar with Fourtet playing through the stereo. I was thrilled to be in a different country. I was even more excited to be performing the visual show. Up until then, we had only performed it live twice, once in Los Angeles, and once in San Francisco. Red Bull did it right. Their setup had two Hummer sized projectors and a custom built screen that reached from behind the performer and over the audience.

The day of the performance was Thursday. By sound check, Julia and I still had a handful of revisions and new clips to generate. We returned to the hotel after Jason tested his sound, and proceeded to work up until we had to perform. As with any project, there is always room for improvement. The more experience we get, the more we learn. We learn about our process, our practice, and our methodologies.  I don’t want to ever stop learning.

Photos By David Lang

Lucky Dragons live show combines atmospheric meditative songs with live audience interaction. The performance looks and sounds a bit like a pow wow, but once you participate it becomes a whole new experience. The live show has a different feel to their recordings. The live show feels more like a family is contributing to the energy of the songs, whereas the records focus on the music and the atmospheric experience of listening. Sarah Rara said that the band’s live performances are created with the idea that they should “generate equal power-sharing situations between members of the audience and ourselves.” This technique was described as “radical” as it was said to “encourage connections between show-goers over the standard-issue connection between a band and their creation and the audience’s emotions”If you ever get a chance to see them live, go!

I have uploaded some experiments in translating sound and image. I used a program to read my sound file and generate a bitmap image based on the sound data. Iterations will be posted manana.

I had a meeting with one of my core advisors, Elise Koh. We discussed my two projects, Insistence of Vision and the untitled recursion project. The point of interest for my recursion project is addressing two questions: How can my music create visuals and how can my graphics create music? Answering these questions should be a process, without a finite answer. The goal is to have a myriad of experiments to address the questions, rather than trying to answer them. We discussed what form the visuals would take, and possibilites for interaction. She suggested looking into gaming as a possible motif. I’m not entirely sure how I feel about that, I don’t intend for this to be similar to guitar hero by any means. Iterations will be posted soon.

The other project is inspired by synesthesia, but not limited to it. Insistence of Vision- referring to the persistence of vision and sound, and the interaction which takes place. The work is insistent with its point. You must be immersed to participate. It should be built and done by this coming week. Photos and project writing to come.

After completing the Nosaj Thing live show, I wanted to further investigate the possibilities of a live performance. As it stands, the musical content is created first, and graphics are created to accompany the music. During my meeting with Ben Hooker, I briefly talked about the idea of the recursive musical/visual performance. My question was how can I use visuals to create music and how can my music create visuals? The answer was to use a recursive algorithm to generating sound and graphics exponentially. If I just hit one note, the computer should take over and generate content until I choose to stop or play a different note. A chordal progression should yield a corresponding visual sequence. One method could be to use the Fibonacci Sequence or the Sierpinski Triangle (pictured above). I will have experiments done in the next couple weeks using this method.

I have uploaded the clips used in the live show for Nosaj Thing. These are the formatted for mixing in Modul8. Each clip belongs to a certain part of a song. We triggered and manipulated each clip live with 2 midi controllers. Our performance is focused around disorientation and using the projector as a light source. The first half of the show is dedicated to slowly building a visual style. The images are black and white lines and squares. The positive/negative space is used to create rhythm that is synced with the audio. As the set progresses, the imagery becomes less abstract and focused less on light. Patterns begin to form and space begins to open as if the two dimenions exploded into a third. The relationship the graphics create with the performer is interesting. As the graphics become more spatial, the performer flattens, becoming a 2-D cutout version of himself. This effect is unexpected, but pleasantly welcome.