Paramecium In Three Parts from Stephen Surlin on Vimeo.
This was a work I did in my BioArt class at the University of Windsor (http://www.incubatorartlab.com) that involved interactivity and performance. The basis for my interaction with the biological (living or at one time was living) element is through the program Max/MSP/Jitter, especially the OpenCV.jit computer vision libraries, in order to track movement and other data through a camera. During the performance I am changing play speed, creating loops that play forward and reverse and adjusting thresholds that determine what aspects are being detected.
From there I sourced found footage of paramecium filmed through a microscope. Paramecium are a very good organism to track because I used the jit.centroids function in order to detect centers of mass within circles, and the cellular shape of these paramecium work well.
The audio is produced by observing the movement of certain centroids. This movement sends MIDI note information to a VST synth in the program Logic on my computer. The sound is sent through my DJ mixer where I am adding effects and changing levels of two tracks.
The programming I did in order to translate the notes creates a chromatic scale that creates compositions similar to the works of the Second Viennese School of composers like Schoenberg, Berg and Weburn. I am very interested in the works of these composers, especially Alban Berg.
Check out the program here:
uwindsor.ca/takingaction/bioart-lab-a-space-to-blend-love-of-science-and-creativity
The equipment I used. Laptop running Max/MSP/Jitter and VST synths & plug-ins, Dj Mixer and recorder.
The circles and crosses indicate the areas of mass that the Open.CV patch is detecting in Max. That data is being turned into note data and is being played by the synths through MIDI.
The view from the audience.
Me performing the second part of the performance.
The third part of the performance.
Now I am describing the Max/MSP/Jitter patch to the class after the performance.
Paramecium In Three Parts
Stephen Surlin 2011
Here is the recording of the performance.
Special thanks to Marcy for taking the pictures.
