DorkbotBRU#9

Wednesday, 18 January 2012 | 19:00 - 22:00

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Sculpting sound and spaces

With the help of digital fabrication, programming and electronics, the guests of this Dorkbot meeting have designed objects that can transform their environment. Sometimes influencing sound perception, sometimes interacting with the space around them. But always having impact on the person who is there to experience the world that they intended to shape.

For a start, Elise Elsacker and Yannick Bontinckx will present their Kinetic Pavillon, a structure that can react to wheater conditions, human movements, social media and certainly much more. Made of 46 mdf sheets 60x30cm, 28 servomotors, 160 metal sticks, 28 bolts and screws, 1 Arduino Duemilanove, 1 Arduino Mega, 1 recycled computer power supply, 75g wood glue and many cables, their final small scale model interacts with Ecotect (environmental software), Processing, iPad/iPhone, webcams and Kinect,... During its exhibition at iMAL, you will have the opportunity to test and play with the Kinetic Pavillon, exploring its potential for the future.

Following the thread of smart tools for architecture, sound artist Duncan Speakman will demo his portable audio tools. The intended application is to be able to change the acoustic space around a listener in realtime. So for example you could walk down a street and hear what it would sound like if it were an enclosed space, or walk into a small room and hear what it would sound like if it were much larger.

Besides, Duncan will introduce his latest project "Vicinity Songs", a guided walk using location sensitive speakers carried by the audience to create spatial sound compositions determined by the movement of the group. The sound is a mixture of processed location recordings and musical score that correspond to architectural, geographic and social aspects of the location. Each speaker unit is self contained and plays back its audio content based on its own GPS position.

To close the evening, Aernoudt Jacobs will present his latest work "Miniatuur", a kinetic sound installation that plays with the physical laws of sound. For this project, he made twenty-five miniature sound objects with the help of digital fabrication. Some of the object holds a tiny speaker and a rotatating reflector. The speaker amplifies field recordings of natural noises like wind, crickets, water... The reflector modulates these sounds in a purely acoustic way by acting on physical aspects: air, reflection and movement. Its circular motion distorts, disrupts, bounces the physical properties of sound waves. The sound changes dynamically, depending on the movement of the flywheel.

This Dorkbot session will be streamed live on iMAL.tv