More Research

This image is of a press clip from the research of Bells Labs in 1926, an early and extremely technical investigation into the visualisation of sound and voice patterns. Part of progressing with this brief will be understanding the history of the topic and what tests we could do to progress the subject, rather than simply a regurgitation of existing projects.

Here demonstrating how an acoustic lens focuses sound from a horn, a wave was made visible with an aluminium rod with a microphone and a neon lamp at the end. A complete 'sound photo' took 10 minutes exposure.

Thomas James

Brief on phono-aesthetics by Thomas James for his FMP. The project explores the relationship between perceived sound, type and image within the traditional form of publication design. The book is however interactive as the video below illustrates.
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The second spread relates to sound source, and initial positions that sound comes from. Using a left to right,  composition, the interactive elements and sounds also pan from left to right, allowing the user to observe the relationship between source and location.
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This image to the left technical aspects and complications of the project. Although between us we don't have the technical ability to achieve anything like this we are considering getting in touch with people from more musically orientated backgrounds.

Phonaesthetics

Leading on from dissertation research and the last post I have started looking into Phonaesthetics, which explores the relationship between the representation of words and noises. This might be a really interesting and slightly more graphic orientated way of creating responses for the cymatics brief.

This is a longer definition of the term taken from wikipedia _-_-_-_-_-_

Phonaesthetics (from the Greek: φωνή, phōnē, "voice-sound"; and αἰσθητική, aisthētikē, "aesthetics") is the study of inherent pleasantness or beauty (euphony) or unpleasantness (cacophony) of the sound of certain words and sentences. Poetry is considered euphonic, as is well-crafted literary prose. Important phonaesthetic devices of poetry are rhyme, assonance and alliteration. Closely related to euphony and cacophony is the concept of consonance and dissonance. From this meaning should be distinguished the closely related but different concept of phonaesthesia, which does not refer directly to aesthetic attributes of sound, but to phonetic elements that are inherently associated with a semantic meaning. The term was introduced by J. R. Firth in 1930 "The phonæsthetic habits [...] are of general importance in speech." Firth defined a phonaestheme as "a phoneme or cluster of phonemes shared by a group of words which also have in common some element of meaning or function, though the words may be etymologically unrelated."

I will try to get hold of some publications of the subject to obtain some more reliable sourcing and development for the brief.

Shavian Letterforms

Shavian letterforms were another interesting topic that I have come across while researching the visual sound brief.
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The alphabet is conceived as a way to provide simple, phonetic orthography for the English language to replace the difficulties of the conventional and non phonetic spelling of the English language. Creating typographic pieces of work based on this translation of the alphabet might be another route to take for representing the link between sound and image.
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I will look into purchasing the book ready for FMP and see what typographic routes I can explore to create imagery for the brief.

Morse Code Typeface

Morse Code essentially has a direct link between sound and visuals. This typeface designed by Konst & Tecknik illustrates that link in the form of typography. There are plenty of other beautiful examples of their work on their website.
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I am considering working on a typeface for the brief simply for headers but feel my typographic skills may not be an appropriate quality for the project, or that they may even cheapen the final result.
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Using musical notes to create or edit a typeface might also be a nice idea, I will have to do some research into different bits of software to work out what processes I will have to undertake to progress with this idea.

Beatles Info-graphics

This info-graphic by New York based designer illustrates different pictograms derived from mapping each albums relative key distribution over a key of fifths. This might be another angle to take working on digital tests, we need to build up a library of existing tests and add our own to make the project unique.

This sort of design is far more representative of the digital experiments we have been working on. We will keep experimenting with techniques over Christmas to define what other research we will need to undertake for FMP.
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Info-graphics are another obvious choice possibly hi-lighting the highest and lowest parts of songs. Again this is something that will be developed through practical research & experimentation.

Visualising Sound

Lovely exhibition exploring the relationship between sound and visuals. Because of the live element to the testing and the resources that have been used it will be extremely hard to top this. But its a valuable piece of research none the less.
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I am going to get in touch with them over the Christmas break to see if they want to get involved or even for some advise on setting up the event.

People could shout into the speaker, and see the direct relation between the sound and movement of the paint.
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As an extension of this brief next year we will be hosting a small exhibition as part of a night in Leeds called Loco. We have decided to keep this aspect of the brief a bit more simple and aimed more towards creating an initial hype for the event.

See more images and info from the event here
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There are also a few technical specifications from the event that may be really helpful when doing the experiments again.

Johnston Research

I have been browsing the London Underground website to look at the branding and look at interesting use of the type, one of the main points I want to make about the typeface is its ability to communicate different messages. Going back to a quote I picked up on during Typo London from Freda Sack from foundry types.

"A typeface should be something you can trust but it should also convey authority'

I feel this is appropriate to Jhonston Sans as it has to portray so many different pieces of information such as warnings about not smoking as well as telling people when their next train is both examples of authority and trust. This can be applied to most of the instructional signage around the underground, portraying so many messages and still avoiding the temptation of overpowering the information with ornamental value.

A typeface should support information rather than become the centre of attention

Considerations for colour schemes, mustn't forget about the four colour limitation to the brief.

 I have been looking at how the typeface has been used in the London underground idenity gaining inspiration for the visual hierachy of information and how I could link it back to the identity of the London Underground.
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Also need to remember this is a project in its own right and I still need to communicate the messages that are within the brief! The devil truly is in the details.

Different messages that the typeface has to communicate and how I could use these as quotes in the booklet.
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Authoritative without being being

Again portraying different messages the type maintains the visual language of the underground and separates it from its over complicated environment.

Transmutations

Lovely book on transmutations by Johan Rosenmunthe designed by Lodret Vandret  in 2011. The case for the book is particularly interesting, given the chosen substrate, of Chipboard which you could say has been through a process of mutation from the original bits of wood. We were considering creating a book / case for the cymatics brief but it has changed into more of a booklet with a series of posters.

Visualising Sound

This video was made for the exhibition 'Invisible Fields' in Barcelona, it  has an eerie vibe, but amazing static abstract qualities draw me into it.

20 Hz observes a geo-magnetic storm occurring in the Earth's upper atmosphere. Working with data collected from the CARISMA radio array and interpreted as audio, we hear tweeting and rumbles caused by incoming solar wind, captured at the frequency of 20 Hertz. Generated directly by the sound, tangible and sculptural forms emerge suggestive of scientific visualisations. As different frequencies interact both visually and aurally, complex patterns emerge to create interference phenomena that probe the limits of our perception.

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This video in particular has opened my eyes to less literal representations of visualising sound, using interpretation and even simply through enlarging or reworking aesthetics you can end up with some really abstract visuals.

This strange looking, mechanical / origami type structure creates a dialogue between one another each producing sounds at regular intervals, while the other listens, records and analyses the sounds. It also moves according to the frequencies of the sounds. Immediately after that, the second sculpture plays back the recorded sound, but it adds to it any disruption caused by the reverberating space and the voices and sounds made by visitors entering the space.

A particularly interesting approach to visualising sound, considering the exhibition feature of our brief would have been good, but we plan on running this project on after Christmas and involving it in the LOCO project. There is a pre planned studio space to use during a music event, that we have been given free reign over.
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"The L.E.V. Festival is a physical and ephemeral space, particularly focused on the natural synergy between image and sound, on live action, on the influence of avantgarde movements on contemporary creation, on the relationship forged between the spectator and the public space, and on the new art movements emerging around the world in connection with audiovisual culture."

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