garry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Garry Beirne) (11/14/90)
Most of the discussions about VR have assumed a visual world, or some representation of a visual world. This is natural, given that we are probalby 'visual animals'. However, there is no reason why we need to base our notion of virtuality on things we can visualize. There has been a great deal of progress on the development of interactive music systems in the past 10 years. There are a number of composers and performers who are also excellent programmers (e.g. George Lewis, Daniel Scheidt, Robert Rowe) who have given spent a long time thinking about interactivity, and have developed successful 'virtual musical worlds'. In these worlds there is a musical framework that is defined by the compser. There may or may not be entities in these worlds that exhibit their own (musical) behaviours, and may or may not respond to stimulus from the other occupant of the musical space, the performer. I will call these Musical Virtual Worlds (MVW) The are several features of these MVWs that we in the 'visual' worlds might learn from. First, it is assumed that the occupant/participant/user/performer in a MVW is a 'virtuoso'; they are experts in communicating via very specific musical gestures (bowing the violin, playing the piano, etc.) and there is a well established vocabulary within the range of gestures they use. In VR we almost always assume a naive user. Why not follow the model of the instrument builder, and develop a set of gestures that are 'appropriate' to the task of communicating to and from the visual virtual world? Second, there is a large degree of interaction between the performer and the MVW. The performer plays something, the MVW listens and responds or accompanies, the performers next gestures are influence by what they hear from the MVW, which is in turn affected by what the performer plays, and so on. There is a rich degree of dependance/reliance/cooperation between the two entities. (Note that the MVW is not 'intelligent'. Rather, it is the embodiment of the composers' musical thought. So, it is the composer that is intelligent, not the MVW). In short, I think that the music world has a mature notion of 'virtual worlds' and is at the forefront of 'interactivity'. Yes, I have left a lot unsaid ... but I don't want to give it all away on the first posting :-) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Garry Beirne Box 1020 Phone: (403) 762-6641 Head, Computer Media Banff, Alberta FAX: (403) 762-6659 Media Arts Canada UUCP: garry@cpsc.UCalgary.CA The Banff Centre T0L 0C0 PAN: BANFF -- Garry Beirne Box 1020 Phone: (403) 762-6641 Head, Computer Media Banff, Alberta FAX: (403) 762-6659 Media Arts Canada UUCP: garry@cpsc.UCalgary.CA The Banff Centre T0L 0C0 PAN: BANFF
garry@cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Garry Beirne) (11/14/90)
Most of the discussions about VR have assumed a visual world, or some representation of a visual world. This is natural, given that we are probably 'visual animals'. However, there is no reason why we need to base our notion of virtuality on things we can visualize. There has been a great deal of progress on the development of interactive music systems in the past 10 years. There are a number of composers and performers who are also excellent programmers (e.g. George Lewis, Daniel Scheidt, Robert Rowe) who have given spent a long time thinking about interactivity, and have developed successful 'virtual musical worlds'. In these worlds there is a musical framework that is defined by the compser. There may or may not be entities in these worlds that exhibit their own (musical) behaviours, and may or may not respond to stimulus from the other occupant of the musical space, the performer. I will call these Musical Virtual Worlds (MVW) The are several features of these MVWs that we in the 'visual' worlds might learn from. First, it is assumed that the occupant/participant/user/performer in a MVW is a 'virtuoso'; they are experts in communicating via very specific musical gestures (bowing the violin, playing the piano, etc.) and there is a well established vocabulary within the range of gestures they use. In VR we almost always assume a naive user. Why not follow the model of the instrument builder, and develop a set of gestures that are 'appropriate' to the task of communicating to and from the visual virtual world? Second, there is a large degree of interaction between the performer and the MVW. The performer plays something, the MVW listens and responds or accompanies, the performers next gestures are influence by what they hear from the MVW, which is in turn affected by what the performer plays, and so on. There is a rich degree of dependance/reliance/cooperation between the two entities. (Note that the MVW is not 'intelligent'. Rather, it is the embodiment of the composers' musical thought. So, it is the composer that is intelligent, not the MVW). In short, I think that the music world has a mature notion of 'virtual worlds' and is at the forefront of 'interactivity'. Yes, I have left a lot unsaid ... but I don't want to give it all away on the first posting :-)
brucec%phoebus.labs.tek.com@RELAY.CS.NET (Bruce Cohen;;50-662;LP=A;) (11/15/90)
In article <1990Nov13.213038.27046@cpsc.ucalgary.ca> garry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalg ary.ca (Garry Beirne) writes: > First, it is assumed that the occupant/participant/user/performer in a > MVW is a 'virtuoso'; they are experts in communicating via very > specific musical gestures (bowing the violin, playing the piano, etc.) > and there is a well established vocabulary within the range of gestures > they use. In VR we almost always assume a naive user. Very good point. In corrobaration, I'd like to mention the banquet speech at OOPSLA/ECOOP in Ottawa a few weeks ago, given by Bill Buxton. He argued passionately for user interfaces which allow experts to make use of their expertise, and designers who respect the time and energy experts have invested in their expertise. He's a musician, and as one example of what he meant, he played a few bars on a Yamaha electronic saxophone, pointing out that the design of its interface allowed him to make use of the years he'd spent developing his embrouchure (sp?). -- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Speaker-to-managers, aka Bruce Cohen, Computer Research Lab email: brucec@tekchips.labs.tek.com Tektronix Laboratories, Tektronix, Inc. phone: (503)627-5241 M/S 50-662, P.O. Box 500, Beaverton, OR 97077
eliot@phoenix.princeton.edu (Eliot Handelman) (11/15/90)
In article <1990Nov13.213038.27046@cpsc.ucalgary.ca> garry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalg ary.ca (Garry Beirne) writes: ;In short, I think that the music world has a mature notion of 'virtual ;worlds' and is at the forefront of 'interactivity'. My current line of work involves what I'm calling an "auditory cyberspace." It's based around some notions of consciousness, especially of temporal integration & the possibilities of transmitting cognitive structure, as outlined in my PhD thesis "music as secondary consciousness: an implementation," which ought to be on the shelf within a few months. The medium is a high intensity broth and involves something comparable to echolocation, insuinuating objects of arbitrary complexity with no "real- world" correlate. The listener/participant has no "observational" status. While I'm here, some quick positions: The concept that we're "visually oriented" is shallow and, I think, probably incorrect: consult any textbook of auditory disorders (Sacks has come out with one called "Hearing voices.") Visual orientations are, to me, essentially distance-preserving modalites of selfhood which express an unwillingness to jeopardize one's detachment from the world -- a detachment which usenet, a visual medium, promotes, hence its peculiar psychology. Not to undermine seeing, of course: but the blind do have it easier than the deaf. The deaf, unless regimented into an appropriate educational proghram early on, may have a highly underdeveloped sense of time and of selfhood. The "musical" perspective espoused by most recent musical cognitivism is based on some unfortunate misunderstandings of musical history: especially problematic is the notion of musical generative grammars. There is no such thing, in my view; worse, I think it is detrimental any sort of thinking that goes on around music to insist on the ideas od a "semantics," be they emotive, significative, or pseudo linguistic. Habituation entails perceptual automatization, as already James pointed out. The reliance of cognitivism on previous experience is at most a pedagogical blunder, not an insight into how music "works." I am looking at things that force involvement and map out experience, not things that are, from an intercationist stance, already dead. eliot handelman princeton u., music
hlr@uunet.UU.NET (Howard Rheingold) (11/16/90)
garry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Garry Beirne) writes: <lines deleted> >First, it is assumed that the occupant/participant/user/performer in a >MVW is a 'virtuoso'; they are experts in communicating via very >specific musical gestures (bowing the violin, playing the piano, etc.) >and there is a well established vocabulary within the range of gestures >they use. In VR we almost always assume a naive user. Why not follow >the model of the instrument builder, and develop a set of gestures that >are 'appropriate' to the task of communicating to and from the visual >virtual world? <lines deleted> Claude Cadoz, Annie Luciani, and Jean-loup Florens have been working with "the musical gesture," "gestual transducers," and "virtual instruments" since 1976. They founded ACROE (translated: Association for Research about Artistic Creation Tools) in Grenoble and have been working there ever since. They have developed a visual animation language (ANIMA) and a musical synthesis language (CORDIS) and a 16 degree of freedom keyboard. I tested the keyboard myself, and it is quite an astounding experience. They use peripheral devices to convert the keyboard into different virtual instruments. For example, I put my fingers into a couple of loops, moved my wrist, and voila -- the sound and *feel* of running a violin bow over a taut violin string. They can be reached at acroe@lifia.imag.fr Most of their reprints are in French. They didn't know a great deal about the ferment in the rest of the VR world until I showed up, although they are in touch with Margaret Minsky, who was the person who turned me onto them in the first place.
rnm@uunet.UU.NET (Robert Marsanyi) (11/17/90)
> MVW's: expert vs. naive interaction, and user<->world interdependence
Two good points. The notion of environment as instrument is especially
powerful, in my view, and I have pointed out that much can be learned from
the millenia-old art of instrument building in the capture of acquired or
intuitive gesture.
Added to the above: many of these performance environments are designed for
more than one performer, and sophisticated notions of the interaction of
performers in this circumstance are also a part of the ground that's already
been broken. In addition, many of the most successful of these environments
entail a severe limitation on the universe over which they operate, rather
than trying to be a catch-all.
--rbtgarry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalgary.ca (Garry Beirne) (11/18/90)
> My current line of work involves what I'm calling an "auditory cyberspace." > It's based around some notions of consciousness, especially of temporal > integration & the possibilities of transmitting cognitive structure, as > outlined in my PhD thesis "music as secondary consciousness: an > implementation," which ought to be on the shelf within a few months..... Your work sounds *very* interesting, and I would like to get some references from you. Where and when could we read about your work? Can you give us an example of a cognitive structure that might be useful to transmit in a cyberspace? Do you imagine that concrete messages can be 'encoded' in these structures? > The concept that we're "visually oriented" is shallow and, I think, probably > incorrect: consult any textbook of auditory disorders ... BRAVO. It seems my 'quoted' suggestion that we were 'visual animals' didn't imply my disbelief in this notion (though my source of disbelief comes more from an intuitive and experiential rather than from any scientific position). The aural component of our virtual worlds should not be treated as second class citizens to the visual components; as nice little special effects to enhance the so-called experience. It will be interesting to see Eliot Handelman's work, or others, can illuminate the power and necessity of sound in cyberspace. Eliot, do you think that sound could have greater importance than visuals in certain cyberspaces? In all cyberspaces? > The "musical" perspective espoused by most recent musical cognitivism is > based on some unfortunate misunderstandings of musical history: especially > problematic is the notion of musical generative grammars. There is no > such thing, in my view; worse, I think it is detrimental any sort of thinking > that goes on around music to insist on the ideas od a "semantics," be they > emotive, significative, or pseudo linguistic. Habituation entails > perceptual automatization, as already James pointed out. The reliance of > cognitivism on previous experience is at most a pedagogical blunder, not > an insight into how music "works." I am looking at things that force > involvement > and map out experience, not things that are, from an intercationist > stance, already dead. There's a lot of stuff in this paragraph. I would be grateful for further illumination of your ideas about musical grammars. What do you mean by things that "map out experience?". -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Garry Beirne Box 1020 Phone: (403) 762-6641 Head, Computer Media Banff, Alberta FAX: (403) 762-6659 Media Arts Canada UUCP: garry@cpsc.UCalgary.CA The Banff Centre T0L 0C0 PAN: BANFF -- Garry Beirne Box 1020 Phone: (403) 762-6641 Head, Computer Media Banff, Alberta FAX: (403) 762-6659 Media Arts Canada UUCP: garry@cpsc.UCalgary.CA The Banff Centre T0L 0C0 PAN: BANFF
yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu (Brian Yamauchi) (11/19/90)
In article <1990Nov13.213038.27046@cpsc.ucalgary.ca> garry@cs-sun-fsc.cpsc.ucalg ary.ca (Garry Beirne) writes: The are several features of these MVWs that we in the 'visual' worlds might learn from. First, it is assumed that the occupant/participant/user/performer in a MVW is a 'virtuoso'; they are experts in communicating via very specific musical gestures (bowing the violin, playing the piano, etc.) and there is a well established vocabulary within the range of gestures they use. In VR we almost always assume a naive user. Why not follow the model of the instrument builder, and develop a set of gestures that are 'appropriate' to the task of communicating to and from the visual virtual world? There is a place for both types of systems. Consider the difference in user interface between a CD player, a digital FM synthesizer, and a MIDI sequencer. All three are examples digital music technology, but the first is designed to be used by a listener, and the second by a performer, and the third by a composer. In VR likewise, different systems are suitable for the world user and the world builder. Your suggestions are interesting, since they suggest a third class of VR person -- the real-time VR artist. Just as the world user is analogous to the music listener, and the world builder is analogous to the music composer, the real-time artist could be analogous to the music performer. -- _______________________________________________________________________________ Brian Yamauchi University of Rochester yamauchi@cs.rochester.edu Computer Science Department _______________________________________________________________________________
hlab@milton.u.washington.edu (Human Int. Technology Lab) (11/21/90)
I am very interested in the discussion of musical virtual world but I missed the beginning of it. Could somebody who started the discussion send me some information/references about the topics? S.F. Wu wu@canon.co.uk Canon Research Centre Europe Ltd 17/20 Frederick Sanger Road Surrey Research Park, Guildford Surrey GU2 5YD, United Kingdom