Light Box (Initial Project Proposal)

Abstract: Light Box is to be a fixed media piece with some narrative aspects centered around a personified small black box containing an RGB LED. 8-channel electronic tape music and projected colors will sync up with the opening and closing and RGB LED colors of the box using Max/MSP and an arduino interface.

Philosophy behind the piece: The environment a sound object is placed in can greatly alter our experience of the sonic event. Hearing an instrument in an anechoic chamber can then make hearing the same instrument in an especially reverberant stairwell nearly make-believe or dreamlike. Partly due to the advancement of computer graphics, we can better imagine make-believe environments that are able to manipulate and transform sound and sight (movies like “The Matrix” make us dwell upon environments that are impervious to the laws of nature). It is my intention to make the audience feel as though they are in an environment they have never before experienced, an environment that amplifies and manipulates the sights and sounds of the small black box in magical ways. While creating the piece, it will be very important to stick with the rule that all sound and sight has to somehow be explained as coming out of the small black box (explanations may include arguments that break the laws of nature). Special attention should be paid to keeping technology awareness down in order to allow for audience members to enter a sort of “dream state” during the performance of the piece.

Narrative: To begin with, the little black box is brought in from outside of the performance space, plugged into the ethernet cable, and set down (the person carrying the box walks away and himself sits down). The computer program controlling the entire piece now begins and the following sequence of events take place:

• the box opens and closes once
• the box opens a bit longer than before then closes
• the box opens and the LED turns on . . . then the box closes
• the box opens, the LED changes color, and the box closes with some added specialization of the closing sound through the 8-channel tape track
• this continues = as the sounds evolve, so does the entrance and growth of colors projected on the wall (syncopated with the RGB LED in the box)
• after a fair amount of development (added intensity = volume and texture growth), the piece begins to die down as if everything is going back into the box
• all becomes dark and still and the computer program stops

Someone comes to the front, unplugs the box, and takes it out of the hall.

Materials/Technology:

• Light Box (click here) = wooden box controlled by Max/MSP through an arduino interface
  • a solenoid is used to open and close the box powered by an internal optoisolated DC transistor switch
  • an RGB LED inside changes color and brightness with the use of PWM
• Max/MSP patch to control the piece (click here for patch)
  • plays 8 tracks of audio for octophonic effect
  • plays MIDI track synched with audio to trigger box solenoid and RGB LED with the arduino object
  • display projected colors one a screen (the same colors as the swatch that controls the boxes RGB LED colors) [not yet realized in the current patch]
  • (click here for a screen shot of the patch)