It was the mid 19th century, when a relatively young physicist from Versailles tried to impress the ladies of his entourage by attaching two tiny mirrors to tuning forks and drawing knotlike shapes with light against the wall. The dames of his time were hardly impressed.
Little did the physicist know that in the 21st century he would be regarded as a vector synthesis nerd.
His name was Jules Antoine Lissajousandto this day he ceases to impress and influence audiovisual artists with his findings, the Lissajous figures.
At this years PIFcamp Bernhard Rasinger and Václav Peloušek will worship Monsieur Lissajous and rebuild the principle of his original contraption. They will treasure his legacy by developing a laser projector based on deflection mirrors attached to any speaker cones. Join them on the quest of revealing the beauty of two signals in harmony and participate in this community projects on developing a DIY kit, set of instructions (tutorial) and a workshop.
At PIFcamp, beepblip (Ida Hiršenfelder) is going on an expedition to the vast universe of retrofuturist sound with the extensive construction of a do-it-yourself analogue synthesizer —The Music from Outer Space Sound Lab ULTIMATE. The synth contains all the basic and some extended building blocks for modular synthesis. The project is a tribute to the legacy of the late Ray Wilson, who generously shared his circuits and knowledge with the DIY and DIWO community, while maintaining the ethics of non-commercial and attributed work. He published a detailed description of the Music from Outer Space Sound Lab ULTIMATE construction from soldering to calibration. During PIFcamp, we will follow in his footsteps and try to venture into a retro analogue sound nebulae.
With surgical precision, calibration and selection of rare and accurate electronic elements the synth contains threemusically punctual voltage controlled oscillators (VCO), white noise generator, active mixer, voltage controlled low voltage filter (LP VCF), voltage controlled amplifier (VCA), attack release envelope generator (AR Env Gen), two low frequency oscillators (LFO), repeat gate generator, sample & hold and attenuator bank.
In times when projections for the future are becoming increasingly dystopian, when time has shrunk to the immediate reality, which is doubtful in itself, I wonder what kind of projections a retrofuturist sound will produce combined with an idyllic natural environment along the emerald green Soča river. Retrofuturism is not nostalgic, but requires a reassessment of technological development.
“By assembling modules, source elements, and elements for treating sound (oscillators, generators, and transformers), by arranging micro intervals, the synthesizer makes audible the sound process itself, the production of that process, and puts us in contact with still other elements beyond sound matter. … The synthesizer, with its operation of consistency, has taken the place of the ground in a priori synthetic judgment: its synthesis is of the molecular and the cosmic, material and force, not form and matter, Grund and territory. … to make thought travel, make it mobile, make it a force of the Cosmos (in the same way as one makes sound travel).” — Deleuze, Gilles and Félix Guattari. A Thousand Plateaus. Capitalism and Schizophrenia
This is an ongoing project by Julian Chollet fuelled from a deep fascination with microbes and a hacker style approach to technology. The integration of multiple scientific disciplines (microbiology, chemistry, electronics, etc.) is a great starting point for the PIFcamp style of open collaboration and it is not clear at all what will come out of it.
What is a microbial fuel cell? Microbial fuel cells convert the chemical energy derived from bacterial metabolism into electrical energy that can be measured and used to power low-voltage devices. Electrogenic (electricity generating) bacteria can be found in almost all terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, where they perform key functions in organic matter degradation, nutrient cycling and biofilm formation.
We will convert hand-crank powered flashlights to off-grid sound machines. What could be the hurdy-gurdy of a post-apocalyptic world, will be built from used electric torches and scrapped electronics. The outcome of this endeavour will be situated anywhere between musical instrument and ritualistic artefact of cacophony.
When playing the sound tool, the movement of the hand directly translates to the voltage the synthesizer receives, enabling the musician to explore soundscapes at the fringe of a working circuit.
The project imagines a world without batteries, where hand-held devices only receive power generated in situ.
An exercise in muscle powered sound synthesis is a project by Thomas Preindl.
Tucked away under the shade of a tree, a pop-up tattoo studio by day, at night transforms into a stage for telling tales from the making. The Headless Pin Tattoo Studio is open to all, and is always hiring. Come by and let them temporarily tattoo you with a design that captures your current project. While they work on you, lay back, relax, tell them about your practice. What are you making? Why are you making? Open up to them, tell them more, what ideas are you chasing? What ideas are chasing you?
Want more than a tattoo? Enticed by the idea of becoming a temporary tattoo artist yourself? Apply to work with them! They will introduce you to their tools and techniques, you’ll become part of their family, tattooing by day, storytelling at night. Helping them collect, write and perform the other stories they care to tell.
And what are the other stories they care to tell? To them makers/hackers the world is a malleable place, full of materials and tools that they can use to realise their ideas and shape their surroundings. But what about how they are equally remade in their collaborations with other materials? If their tools and materials could talk, what stories would they tell of “their” making?
As the sun sets, the tattoo studio transforms into a stage for telling tales from the making. They make sound, they make light, they make up, they jump down… they make all kinds of spectacular technological things to help them get at our inner workings.
The DIY ambisonic dome 2 is a continuation of last years project by Blaž Pavlica, who experimented with spatial sound synthesis and processing. This time Blaž will experiment with synthesis of the 3D sound fields and new sound effects possible in ambisonics format with the SuperCollider programming and livecoding environment.
Ambisonics is a spherical surround sound format, which in addition to the horizontal placement also contains sounds above and below the perceiver. Unlike other formats, its channels do not carry signals for individual speakers, but a representation of a spherical sound field, which is independent from the number of speakers. Because of this, it allows more freedom in the speaker placement, as signals representing the sound field can be decoded into any applicable sound system. In addition, it allows the sound producer to think about the spherical origin of sounds instead of having to deal with the final sound reproduction and opens new possibilities for sound synthesis and audio effects, because it broadens the ubiquitous stereo field which represents one dimension to three. The format was developed as early as the 1970s, yet it has only recently been gaining a bigger popularity, mainly because of patent expiration and use in gaming audio and virtual reality.
Live coding is the process of creating music or visuals with code. The code is written in programming languages that can generate audio or video and support changing or replacing it while it runs without stopping.
Have you ever wanted to build a circuit from ethical hardware?
Join Stefanie Wuschitz and build a device to sonify your most active acupuncture spots on the surface of your skin (no needles involved). You can later connect the input from your acupuncture points to Pure Data. For more sophisticated sounds and more detailed findings on how the environment changes your body we will build several prototypes of instruments.
This workshop is trying to use only hardware that was created under fair labour conditions. Without harming the environment and avoiding commodity chains connected to mining. This can work if we use fair trade certified electronic components, self made and recycled electronic parts and explore the capacitive quality and resistance of our own body.
Friday’s rage claimed several lives: the morning began slowly and drop by drop, but without rain! Katja’s workshop (second part) bore the first fruits. After spending the night in the darkroom, the first cyanotype images appeared: the river in Gambia, a pet dog, river Soča, a mask.
In a full workshop with the locals in Soča town Dario and Darja shared their findings and knowledge. Meanwhile, we were kept under a tent by the last in a series of workshops by Andrew Quitmeyer, where we saw ants in a hitherto unknown role. The colonization of colonies on the body and interfaces as fashion accessories has succeeded. Wearable ants are a hit of the summer season. Dolce & Gabbana is out of fashion, here are Simon & Andrew.
Just after sunset, Vaclav from BASTL showed us how subtle music from DIY instruments can be. For a moment, we wished we could have listened to the mildly dosed rhythms and lyrics in melodious Czech for hours. How do you say ‘more’ in Czech?
The concert was followed by an AV performance by Bernhard and Rob, which included samples from the river’s surroundings and projections on the treetops. It seemed to us that the trees were moving in synth rhythms and rocking us in the hips. The audience went home hyped and ready for the last night in PIFcamp. Julian will take part of the atmosphere from the camp to Bohinjska Bistrica, where he will conduct a microscopy workshop.
The end is near. We are reassured by the thought of Luka’s rotator for potted plants. Until the next PIFcamp-!
It’s Friday?! A sultry morning started with the traditional and mandatory PIFcamp hike. Jumping into the pools of the (almost) icy cold Soča was reserved for the bravest and most heated heads. We keep their esteemed names in the editorial office!
In the afternoon, the PIF members continued with their work. Rob Canning is developing a tool for musical performance related to geological processes in the Soča Valley.
Over the past few days, he has been collecting field recordings and sounds of the surrounding landscape. Using the SuperCollider platform for audio synthesis and algorithmic sound composition, he is developing a system that will also be able to process music by other creators. Initially, the research was supposed to lead to the release of a short EP, but PIFcamp opened the opportunity to connect with the research and projects of other participants – Rob will also test the system in Blaž’s DIY ambisonic dome. In line with his previous creative ethics, Rob will make all media available to the public, under a creative commons license (click).
Darja prepared a workshop on hydrolates, tinctures and ointments from medicinal plants (among others Arnika, Rman, Thyme), which were collected by PIFcampers in the past days in the surrounding meadows.
Katja introduced us to cyanotype, one of the earliest photographic processes, and a once popular image transfer process, characterized by the blue color of the final image. That is why it is also called blue printing, and this time it was done on paper. The main compounds are ammonium iron citrate and potassium iron cyanide. Under Katja’s guidance the participants developed their own photos. After the introduction to the chemical process, we set to work. Some have developed images from meadow flowers and – suited to 2020 – from a protective mask! After the chemical process the images have to sunbathe, thus Katja’s workshop will be on the schedule on Saturday as well.
Robertina and Miha tested the protocol of the aquaforensic_2.0 workshop, which they developed together during PIFcamp. As the name of the project suggests, water forensics focuses on often overlooked contents from sea depths. At a lively and informative workshop, the mentors presented the development of the project from the very beginning, when Robertina and Gjino (Šutić – unfortunately absent this year) conducted preliminary field research (Ars Electronica Linz, etc.) and tested the content of pharmacological and toxic contents in rivers and seas. “The pharmaceutical industry is not interested in flushed parts of their medicines,” says Robertina, adding, “this project opens up a view of this silenced part and perhaps this can be a step in a direction of industries thinking more sustainably and less harmful to the environment”. In addition to microscopy of microorganisms, Miha also presented his invention from this year’s camp: sonified TSD sensor that reacts to conductivity and can be used to test liquids. The principle is this: more salt, more music! The maestro added salt by feeling.
Stella and Črt enlivened the evening via a live-stream from Ljubljana, where they performed an audio-video set they were working on at PIFcamp.
Last but not least, the card battles continued this evening as well and were accompanied by an audio-visual impro dessert offered ad-hoc by Rob, Klemens, Bernhard and Anja.
