Sonicity by Stanza

Sonicity is a responsive installation, a sonification of the real space and environment. The sounds you hear are the sounds of the changing environment, ie the changes of noise, light, temperature of the space is turned into a real time sound stream using dozens of wireless sensors presented as an installation on 170 speakers.

This artwork focuses on the real time space and the experience of the gallery visitor as they interact with the space, using data gathered from these new technologies. My system monitors the space (the building) and the environment (the city) and captures live real time data (light , temperature, noise, humidity, position) to create an ambient sonification, an acoustic responsive environment, literally the sound of the micro incidents of change that occur over time.

This artwork explores new ways of thinking about interaction within public space and how this affects the socialization of space. The project uses environmental monitoring technologies and security based technologies, to question audiences experiences of the event and space and gather data inside the space. The project also focuses on the micro-incidents of change, the vibrations and sounds of the gallery using wireless sensor based technologies.

Sensor motes are used to collect the data. The wireless sensors gather data and communicate to the central server. The real world is monitored and the data stored in my archive retrieval system.They sense the micro incidents of change in the light, the noise, temperature, sounds of the flows inside the space.

 

Exhibition mode. The Experience.Data as sound. Data is Sound.

The patterns, movement, and exchanges of data in the real space, are measured and interpreted as an emergent social space and used to make this artwork; in this case a sonification of the space. This data is processed and turned into sound. There are 170 speakers laid out across the floor like city which you can walk around.

This is essentially what is seen in the gallery. A city of wires and speakers across the floor or on the wall. Soncity plays live data....ie, live data from wireless networks used to make sonification of real time spaces. The interactions of all this data are re-formed and re-contextualised in real time as a audio experience. Hundreds of small speakers are wired together and the artwork is made across the available space. The image above shows sketch for installation version of Sonicity by Stanza.

 

Bookings

If you want to book the installation version please email. stanza at sublime.net

There are 170 speakers in the installation version and it requires a large floor for it to go on.

You will need to pay all transport, set up costs, insurance, and artists fees.

Once the data is captured and turned into sounds via MAX MSP patches the audio experience is turned into a visual experience. The data is displayed visually on screen and projectors.

Technology.

I have already developed a 40 mote multi sensor network that will be scattered thought the the building. The nodes can be placed up to 10 -300 meters apart over the space. Once switched on they gather the data. I have made two versions of the interface software and custom built software for real time data over networks. Mote proxy is a java middle-ware environment for connecting up xbow motes to  get access to the data  outside moteview and directly off the motes. It is now in version two and sits on an online server. It allows access to the two networks of twenty motes in  real time from which PHP  and XML  pages are served up. Mote proxy version two, and allows real time polling of data online from any sensors network that is connected and switched on, the data is then formatting in PHP and XML to enable anyone to make a visualization or interpretation of the data with it.

The changing data is what affects what you see and experience. Live XML feeds are coming from the real time sensors.. The sensors monitor temperature, sounds, noise, light, vibration, humidity, and gps. The sensor network takes a constant stream of data which is published onto an online environment where each different interface makes representations of the XML.

Using the XML live feeds the data is turned in music. A custom made MAX/MSP motereader and sound synthesis engine in Max MSP allows one to hear the sounds of space, ie an aural experience of the surrounding space. Additional mixers in the software allows all the sensors to be mixed and cross mashed.

Thanks to Ian Steele for support with all the speakers and connection issues.

Set Up of Speaker.(PDF)

Performance mode.

The motes can be set up in any space or gallery and a live performance can take place. The technology has been tested for a small audience at The Lanternhouse in Ulverston using 30 sensors inside and outside the space in june 2009.. Basically this allows you to perform with space as you can use the software to mix the data streams.

 

A custom made mote reader from Mick Grieson in max msp and sound synthesis engine in Max MSP from Stanza

What the data stream looks like.

	Small test version.

Above shows XML live feed example

Light, Temperature, Sound, Noise, Pollution, GPS, Pressure, etc turned into sound

Research

For the past four years I have been researching wireless sensor networks, research was funded by AHRC fellowship. I have developed the software and I can place sensor hardware as in kind support to make the installation. Thanks to Ian Steele for electronics support.

More information and photos soon.

Funding And Support

The funding for all the speakers and installation was made possible by financial support of Lanterhouse International. A version of this will be on show over the summer 2010.

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ABOUT STANZA.

Stanza is a London based British artist, who specializes in net art, networked installations, and electronic sounds. His award winning online projects have been invited for exhibition in digital festivals around the world, and Stanza also travels extensively to present his net art, lecturing and giving performances of his audiovisual interactions.

Artistic Statement about current research and practice.

I am researching data within cities and the built environment and how this can be represented, visualized and interpreted. Data from security tracking, traffic, and environmental monitoring can all be interpreted as a medium to make artworks. I am investigating new ways of comparing, conceptualizing and then visualizing complex concepts related to the relationship of emergent data and real space in the built environment. Through practice based research, a series of modular experimental artworks are being created to express the possibilities for our data-mediated future.

There are three strands of my working process; these involve collecting the data, visualizing the data, and then displaying the data. The outputs from the online interfaces and online visualizations are now realized as real time dynamic artworks as diverse as installations, and real objects, made out of new display materials back in physical space.

In all my work I try to exploit the changing dynamics of city life as a source for creativity and create meaningful artistic metaphors. I utilize new technologies and integrate new media artworks into the public domain as part of this ongoing research into the visualization of city space. In essence I am researching data as a medium for creativity and how meaningful experiences of our cities may result.

I was a NESTA Dreamtime Fellow from February 2004/5. During that time, I focused on new technologies and their relationship to urban space. As a consequence, for this Fellowship in the Creative and Performing Arts with AHRC, I now aim to research new technologies, sensors, motes, display technologies and interactive architectures.

By investigating these data structures I aim to create new metaphors relevant to the experience of the environment. The patterns we make, the visual and imaginative interpretations we give to real world events, are already being networked into retrievable data structures that can be re-imagined and source for information. These patterns disclose new ways of seeing the world. The value of gathering and re-presenting this data in artistic form, and then analyzing its impact and influence, lies in making meaning accessible to a wider audience.

© Copyright stanza 2008 -2009 Stanza www.stanza.co.uk

email: stanza at sublime.net