1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:21,619 *36C3 preroll music* 2 00:00:21,619 --> 00:00:24,119 Herald: But thanks that you all are here. Actually, since it's all teardown moment, 3 00:00:24,119 --> 00:00:30,090 still, we have enough, we have lots of people here. Interesting. This is as well 4 00:00:30,090 --> 00:00:34,530 an interesting talk because it's Helen Leigh who's going to present this. 5 00:00:34,530 --> 00:00:42,370 Actually, give us an overview actually about what hackers, you know, in music 6 00:00:42,370 --> 00:00:47,420 meant actually in the history. So to give an overview, if I understood this well, 7 00:00:47,420 --> 00:00:52,260 she gives certain examples. And I think she's gonna kick this a little bit further 8 00:00:52,260 --> 00:00:57,579 because she's going to talk a little bit about her current work and future 9 00:00:57,579 --> 00:01:05,420 objectives. So I would fasten seat belts, I would say. Yes. Helen Leigh. Give her a 10 00:01:05,420 --> 00:01:08,800 warm applause. 11 00:01:08,800 --> 00:01:13,270 *applause* 12 00:01:13,270 --> 00:01:19,960 Helen: Hello? Yep. So I'm Helen. This is if you want to follow my stuff or download 13 00:01:19,960 --> 00:01:25,869 any of my things that I mentioned in the talk about GitHub and various plots of my 14 00:01:25,869 --> 00:01:30,869 work on Twitter. So here we go. OK. Right. I am going to talk to you today about 15 00:01:30,869 --> 00:01:35,160 we're gonna give you a story. I'm gonna give you a story about how a group of 16 00:01:35,160 --> 00:01:40,929 music hackers in the 1940s changed the face of music technology forever and how 17 00:01:40,929 --> 00:01:43,610 they didn't know anything by what they were doing. But they still manage to do 18 00:01:43,610 --> 00:01:47,629 some incredibly cool things by just disregarding and being really awesome 19 00:01:47,629 --> 00:01:52,500 hardware hackers. I'm also gonna give you an overview of some of the coolest 20 00:01:52,500 --> 00:01:57,770 projects coming out of London and Berlin at the moment. So I've been... I'm living 21 00:01:57,770 --> 00:02:01,490 in Berlin at the moment, but I was active in the music hacking scene in London for a 22 00:02:01,490 --> 00:02:05,910 long time as well. So I'm going to show you some cool projects. And before I start 23 00:02:05,910 --> 00:02:12,711 off on my story and cool projects I'm going to just introduce myself. I am a 24 00:02:12,711 --> 00:02:17,209 creative technologist, which is a ridiculous buzzword. But people like to 25 00:02:17,209 --> 00:02:22,540 put you in a box. But I'm basically a massive nerd who really likes arty stuff, 26 00:02:22,540 --> 00:02:27,239 so I'd like to smash them together. My favorite things to smash together are 27 00:02:27,239 --> 00:02:33,489 electronics and hardware and with music technologies. And so with that in mind, I 28 00:02:33,489 --> 00:02:39,489 make a lot of strange musical instrument creations, usually very experimental in 29 00:02:39,489 --> 00:02:43,760 form. I'll show you some of that as well. This is one of my experimental 30 00:02:43,760 --> 00:02:49,400 instruments. I make sonic psycho sculpture creatures and I've taken them on 31 00:02:49,400 --> 00:02:58,140 residencies in London, Shenzen and Copenhagen. And I just really like 32 00:02:58,140 --> 00:03:02,680 experimenting with what a musical instrument looks like. And not so much 33 00:03:02,680 --> 00:03:06,499 what it sounds like. I mean, I am into other people's noise art. But for me, I 34 00:03:06,499 --> 00:03:11,940 like my instruments to sound melodic. But yeah, form, I'm very interested in 35 00:03:11,940 --> 00:03:16,939 experimenting with. I also really like at the moment - this is made out of brass. 36 00:03:16,939 --> 00:03:19,650 And I've made a lot of stuff with different metals. But at the moment, I'm 37 00:03:19,650 --> 00:03:24,930 on a big soft circuit kick. And so I'm experimenting with electronic embroidery 38 00:03:24,930 --> 00:03:33,900 and soft robotics to make kind of kinetic, sculptural, squishy creature things. And 39 00:03:33,900 --> 00:03:38,749 I'll show you some of that later, too. And obviously, this doesn't pay my rent, 40 00:03:38,749 --> 00:03:45,879 shockingly. So I also do some product design and a lot of curriculum based 41 00:03:45,879 --> 00:03:50,159 things, remember, I'm a writer as well. So this is a product that I designed. That's 42 00:03:50,159 --> 00:03:54,659 actually my hand on the box. Very exciting. And it's a wearable instrument 43 00:03:54,659 --> 00:04:03,989 for children sold by PIMORONI and Adafruit and et cetera. And it's a DIY wearable 44 00:04:03,989 --> 00:04:08,170 gesture based instrument for children to learn how to code with. And I designed 45 00:04:08,170 --> 00:04:13,430 that with Imogen Heap. And I'll tell you about that cool project later. But that's 46 00:04:13,430 --> 00:04:17,889 something I do. And I also do a lot of writing. This is a still from one of my 47 00:04:17,889 --> 00:04:24,290 books I wrote recently. Last year it came out, one called The Crafty Kid's Guide to 48 00:04:24,290 --> 00:04:29,670 DIY Electronics, where I teach basic electronics through the medium of paper 49 00:04:29,670 --> 00:04:36,060 craft, origami, sewing and kind of like DIY robotics as well. I also write for 50 00:04:36,060 --> 00:04:41,449 Hackaday. I've written for blah blah blah, doesn't matter. I write words for money 51 00:04:41,449 --> 00:04:46,800 sometimes. Anyway, that's me. I am going to tell you as one of my favorite stories 52 00:04:46,800 --> 00:04:51,759 of music, tech history. I'm going to start off here with this rather pretentious 53 00:04:51,759 --> 00:04:56,220 quote from a rather pretentious man who I still kind of love is a guy called John 54 00:04:56,220 --> 00:05:01,500 Cage, who most people know him for his experimental compositions and his many 55 00:05:01,500 --> 00:05:06,470 and varied writings on on the subject of what is sound and what a sound artist. 56 00:05:06,470 --> 00:05:11,310 But he was also pretty early on a hardware hacker. He made experimental instruments. 57 00:05:11,310 --> 00:05:15,550 Actually, one of his first famous pieces was him like smashing up a piano and 58 00:05:15,550 --> 00:05:21,729 changing that. So he was a composer, but he was also an experimental hardware 59 00:05:21,729 --> 00:05:26,830 artist. I mean, he said this. There is no noise. There is only sound. And the reason 60 00:05:26,830 --> 00:05:31,530 I put this quote up there is to kind of make you... remind you that all music is 61 00:05:31,530 --> 00:05:37,129 made up. Okay. All instruments are inventions. The violin wasn't a violin 62 00:05:37,129 --> 00:05:42,409 until probably the 13th century when various instruments that came before it 63 00:05:42,409 --> 00:05:47,319 converged and someone using new techniques, new tools. And it starts and 64 00:05:47,319 --> 00:05:51,789 it keeps revolving through the ages. Right. And I think you could think of an 65 00:05:51,789 --> 00:05:57,490 instrument as a - as a specific thing, but it's really not. We've been messing around 66 00:05:57,490 --> 00:06:03,340 with science since we've been humans, basically, and deter with compositions. 67 00:06:03,340 --> 00:06:07,840 You might think of classical music mainstays like Stravinsky, Strauss or 68 00:06:07,840 --> 00:06:13,979 Debussy as, as these kind of like boring establishment figures, but actually in the 69 00:06:13,979 --> 00:06:18,509 day they were seen as avant garde. People walked out of their performances. There 70 00:06:18,509 --> 00:06:23,560 were hit pieces about them in the mails. You know, the Daily Mail of the time. So 71 00:06:23,560 --> 00:06:27,180 basically, anything that sounds strange to you now or something that's experimental 72 00:06:27,180 --> 00:06:32,569 to us could well have an influence in a long reaching way. So, yes, here we are. 73 00:06:32,569 --> 00:06:39,840 Oh, I'm going to tell you. But my favorite conspiracy theory as well. So even down to 74 00:06:39,840 --> 00:06:47,370 the note A, 440 Hertz, middle A. And it's - It was not even - it was not the letter. 75 00:06:47,370 --> 00:06:52,760 Sorry. It was not 440 Hertz until the 1950s when a group of dudes met up in one 76 00:06:52,760 --> 00:06:58,300 room in London. And then everybody signed this agreement saying, OK, now an A is 440 77 00:06:58,300 --> 00:07:02,409 Hertz. Before that, a flute in Italy might sound different to a flute in France. 78 00:07:02,409 --> 00:07:07,830 You'd have like this small tonal variations. So it wasn't until yeah the 79 00:07:07,830 --> 00:07:11,199 1950s that it became actually the letter A. There's a wonderful series of 80 00:07:11,199 --> 00:07:16,460 conspiracy theories around this that actually that they chose 440 Hertz because 81 00:07:16,460 --> 00:07:21,090 it's a method of population mind control and there are alternative websites out 82 00:07:21,090 --> 00:07:24,699 there, now you can literally go and if you search for like uhm 440 Hertz 83 00:07:24,699 --> 00:07:27,791 conspiracies, there are websites that are campaigning like groups that are 84 00:07:27,791 --> 00:07:33,219 campaigning for it to be changed for the whole of modern music to be a to be 85 00:07:33,219 --> 00:07:41,050 changed. There's one at 432. There's one at 438. And if you're in the 438 camp, 86 00:07:41,050 --> 00:07:44,719 because there are opposing camps as well. So if you're in the 438 camp, you're in 87 00:07:44,719 --> 00:07:49,349 luck because someone's made a music adjustor. OK, so you can take your track 88 00:07:49,349 --> 00:07:52,680 that you've done and you can put it into a converter and it will convert all of your 89 00:07:52,680 --> 00:07:57,990 music into 438. So you can do that if you like. And there's even a radical fringe 90 00:07:57,990 --> 00:08:03,840 group calling for the middle A to be 538, which is absolutely insane. But there we 91 00:08:03,840 --> 00:08:10,620 are, I love it. And so if you ever want to go down a conspiracy theory YouTube black 92 00:08:10,620 --> 00:08:16,780 hole, which you probably will do, we're all at camp, uh congress, not camp. You 93 00:08:16,780 --> 00:08:21,990 can look at that. But basically my point here is that music is all made up. 94 00:08:21,990 --> 00:08:27,050 Instruments are all inventions. So, you know, there are no rules. I'm gonna take 95 00:08:27,050 --> 00:08:33,090 you through em - one of the paths, one of the many paths of music history and music 96 00:08:33,090 --> 00:08:39,219 hacking. And we're going to look at one piece of hacked technology and how people 97 00:08:39,219 --> 00:08:42,340 who played with that and did things with it that they weren't supposed to do 98 00:08:42,340 --> 00:08:48,010 changed modern history, modern music production. This is the magnetic tape 99 00:08:48,010 --> 00:08:53,241 recorder. It's a lovely device. And it was used popularized in World War 2 by the 100 00:08:53,241 --> 00:08:59,141 Nazis who used it to chop up propaganda and so on. And after the World War, after 101 00:08:59,141 --> 00:09:06,010 the World War and the BBC took on it, took it on themselves to try and develop a 102 00:09:06,010 --> 00:09:12,190 version of this. So this is a relatively modern technology. In the 40s and 50s, 103 00:09:12,190 --> 00:09:17,120 it started becoming becoming popular and it was used for real to real broadcasting, 104 00:09:17,120 --> 00:09:22,160 right. Before this, it was grammophones. But a bunch of - so they were used in 105 00:09:22,160 --> 00:09:26,209 music studios and they were relatively expensive. As it became cheaper, a bunch 106 00:09:26,209 --> 00:09:34,680 of music hackers saw its potential to do something more than just line it up. So 107 00:09:34,680 --> 00:09:38,820 these hackers got their hands on a bunch of these and a bunch of these magnetic 108 00:09:38,820 --> 00:09:44,730 tape recorders. And as people want to do with technology that they get their hands 109 00:09:44,730 --> 00:09:50,150 on it. They started to fuck with it in a new and very exciting ways. And what they 110 00:09:50,150 --> 00:09:55,040 did is they they as a movement in Paris and then early 1940s called musique 111 00:09:55,040 --> 00:09:58,769 concrète, which was the first group of people who were doing this. Aside from one 112 00:09:58,769 --> 00:10:02,721 lonely guy in Egypt as well. But there was like the epicenter of this was - is in 113 00:10:02,721 --> 00:10:08,510 Paris. And what you do is you see the the actual tape there. You use a razor blade 114 00:10:08,510 --> 00:10:13,960 to cut it. And then you can, for example, flip it over, tape it back together, and 115 00:10:13,960 --> 00:10:18,520 then you've got one piece that's backwards. Right. OK. And using that 116 00:10:18,520 --> 00:10:22,190 technique, I'll show you how actually you this is it. 117 00:10:22,190 --> 00:10:28,320 *sounds playing* OK, so not only can you chop things up and 118 00:10:28,320 --> 00:10:32,540 turn them around, you can speed them up and slow them down. This gives you - this 119 00:10:32,540 --> 00:10:37,610 seems - so, basically, if you do it faster, it will give you a higher tone. 120 00:10:37,610 --> 00:10:42,250 And if you do it slower, if you slow it down, it will be lower. OK. We all know 121 00:10:42,250 --> 00:10:46,079 this kind of instinctually now. But back then, this was fellow. This was completely 122 00:10:46,079 --> 00:10:50,779 revolutionary. You could make sounds that were not existing in nature. Take, for 123 00:10:50,779 --> 00:10:55,700 example, the plucking of a violin string, okay, you pluck a violin string. And it 124 00:10:55,700 --> 00:10:59,910 comes on quick. It's like boom. And then if you let it die off, there's a "laaa". 125 00:10:59,910 --> 00:11:04,730 So what we call that in music is a sharp attack on a long delay. And that's how a 126 00:11:04,730 --> 00:11:09,120 lot of musical instruments or natural science will work. OK. They will fade off, 127 00:11:09,120 --> 00:11:14,790 OK. But using this technology, you could switch it around. So it had the 128 00:11:14,790 --> 00:11:20,990 opposite effect. So like "uooom" the long attack and a short delay. So you could 129 00:11:20,990 --> 00:11:25,610 create sounds that are not found in nature now, which is extraordinary. And at the 130 00:11:25,610 --> 00:11:27,731 same time, there was the advent of something called field recording, which 131 00:11:27,731 --> 00:11:32,380 was you could go outside instead of having to record in a studio. You could have a 132 00:11:32,380 --> 00:11:37,010 physical piece of equipment that you could carry around with you and a microphone, so 133 00:11:37,010 --> 00:11:42,260 you could go and record sounds outside. Found sound is what we call that. Then you 134 00:11:42,260 --> 00:11:45,389 could take it back to the studio, chop it up with a scalpel, sellotape it back 135 00:11:45,389 --> 00:11:50,019 together, rerecord it, and you could create... This is just you know, it's just 136 00:11:50,019 --> 00:11:56,100 a huge, vast new set of tools that you can work with as somebody who's making music. 137 00:11:56,100 --> 00:12:01,250 Now the first people doing this were, as I say, these French guys in Paris 138 00:12:03,271 --> 00:12:07,709 and in musique concrète. And they were doing it. And due to modern music, 139 00:12:07,709 --> 00:12:11,350 digital preservation techniques, you can hear these, the sounds they were making on 140 00:12:11,350 --> 00:12:15,320 YouTube. You can spend some time and listen to that. And I won't lie, they 141 00:12:15,320 --> 00:12:21,279 sound pretty awful. Nobody wants to listen to that. I mean, unless you're a true 142 00:12:21,279 --> 00:12:24,920 enthusiast. But it's not it's not about the music they were making, is about the 143 00:12:24,920 --> 00:12:28,490 techniques that they were creating, their experimentation sounded terrible but 144 00:12:28,490 --> 00:12:35,269 actually was incredibly influential. We use sampling now as just an ordinary 145 00:12:35,269 --> 00:12:41,290 thing, but this was the technology behind it. It really came to a head in the 1960s 146 00:12:41,290 --> 00:12:47,339 when Beatle - the Beatles were the first people to use this technique on "Tomorrow 147 00:12:47,339 --> 00:12:52,009 Never Knows". Now, normally, well, I would play this, but when I did, at a talk 148 00:12:52,009 --> 00:12:55,350 similar to this at the Hackaday Super Conference, they uhm they pulled my 149 00:12:55,350 --> 00:12:58,949 livestream because there was a 10 second snippet of the Beatles. So I've decided 150 00:12:58,949 --> 00:13:04,050 not to risk it today. But you can look up "Tomorrow Never Knows" and you can hear 151 00:13:04,050 --> 00:13:09,220 these "woauum, woauum, woauum" kind of sounds. And that's actually flipped. 152 00:13:09,220 --> 00:13:12,639 That's just flipped sounds that the - all of the Beatles brought in sounds from 153 00:13:12,639 --> 00:13:17,019 their home. They flipped it around, speeded up and slowed it down. There's a 154 00:13:17,019 --> 00:13:21,220 famous like very high pitched "hiehiehiehiehie" sound in that song and 155 00:13:21,220 --> 00:13:24,730 it's just Paul McCartney laughing and they've manipulated it using sticky tape 156 00:13:24,730 --> 00:13:29,040 and scalpels. Anyway, so that was the beginning of these new production 157 00:13:29,040 --> 00:13:32,850 techniques, right? You can use these in modern music, you know, when you're in 158 00:13:32,850 --> 00:13:36,699 your Ableton or your Logic or whatever. You know, those are just standard 159 00:13:36,699 --> 00:13:42,540 features. But this was the beginning of it. And it's incredibly influential. I could 160 00:13:42,540 --> 00:13:48,320 follow it down this path. But I'm actually going to take this and 161 00:13:48,320 --> 00:13:52,500 leave them to go on with modern mainstream production. And I'm going to talk about 162 00:13:52,500 --> 00:13:57,269 this woman instead. Who was one of my favorite things about hacker culture is 163 00:13:57,269 --> 00:14:01,780 the way that we learn from each other and the way that we rev off of each other's 164 00:14:01,780 --> 00:14:06,450 work. And so I'm gonna go slightly sideways and talk about this artist and 165 00:14:06,450 --> 00:14:12,170 engineer. Her name is Daphne Oram, and who's heard of Daphne Oram? All right. 166 00:14:12,170 --> 00:14:19,540 Like ten of you. Which is more than usual, actually, to be honest. So Daphne Oram is 167 00:14:19,540 --> 00:14:24,860 - everyone should know her name and that's why I never shut up about her. She was a 168 00:14:24,860 --> 00:14:30,980 musician and physicist, an electronics engineer who was unfortunate enough to be 169 00:14:30,980 --> 00:14:39,779 a woman. And was - has a pretty tragic work history. But she... she's one of the 170 00:14:39,779 --> 00:14:44,389 iconic figures of early electronic music. She should be as well-known as any of the 171 00:14:44,389 --> 00:14:50,170 - as Moog or whatever. But anyway, so she's a trained musician and she got a job 172 00:14:50,170 --> 00:14:54,050 at the BBC queuing up these reel to reel magnetic tape recorders, which is actually 173 00:14:54,050 --> 00:15:00,720 a pretty big deal at the time for women as well. So she would. She went on a training 174 00:15:00,720 --> 00:15:05,720 course to Paris and - just studio recording techniques. You know, standard 175 00:15:05,720 --> 00:15:11,529 corporate training. Right. And while she was there I believe she met some of the 176 00:15:11,529 --> 00:15:16,040 people behind the musique concrète. And she was basically and they showed her what 177 00:15:16,040 --> 00:15:19,610 they were doing. And it totally blew her mind. She was like, oh, my God, I will 178 00:15:19,610 --> 00:15:23,030 take this back to the BBC. It's gonna be so cool. I'm going to revolutionize 179 00:15:23,030 --> 00:15:28,500 everything. It's gonna be awesome. She took it like that. And predictably enough, 180 00:15:28,500 --> 00:15:34,600 everyone was like, no, go back to pressing buttons. So she did. But she also would 181 00:15:34,600 --> 00:15:38,870 run around at the BBC late at night after hours stealing bits of equipment from 182 00:15:38,870 --> 00:15:43,790 other people's studios and wheeling them into her own studio. And she would 183 00:15:43,790 --> 00:15:48,779 experiment with all these musique concrète methods. And she was an electronics 184 00:15:48,779 --> 00:15:54,000 person, as well, and she was one of the first people in the world to make purely 185 00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:57,450 electronic music, because she was one of the first instances of someone who 186 00:15:57,450 --> 00:16:02,910 recorded her oscilloscope and then started using that for compositional purposes as 187 00:16:02,910 --> 00:16:08,339 well. And she was doing this for maybe five, six, seven years. And at the end of 188 00:16:08,339 --> 00:16:11,890 that, she started to get some interest. She managed finally to convince somebody 189 00:16:11,890 --> 00:16:16,970 to give her a commission to create some incidental music for a piece of - for a 190 00:16:16,970 --> 00:16:24,500 show. And erm and it was a success. Also people hated it. Of course. But enough 191 00:16:24,500 --> 00:16:29,149 people wanted her to repeat it that eventually the BBC gave her her own studio 192 00:16:29,149 --> 00:16:34,889 which is like absolutely, you know, out of the question for someone in the fifties, 193 00:16:34,889 --> 00:16:41,900 for a woman in the 50s. And so she she was starting to make this but she erm 194 00:16:41,900 --> 00:16:44,720 unfortunately at this point she got the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, which is one of 195 00:16:44,720 --> 00:16:50,740 the most iconic sound design workshops and studios in the whole history of music 196 00:16:50,740 --> 00:16:56,320 technology. So she starts this workshop, the BBC Radiophonic Workshop, but a year 197 00:16:56,320 --> 00:17:04,730 later she leaves to start her own artists practice because they - they said she said 198 00:17:04,730 --> 00:17:09,560 they wanted my ideas and they wanted my work but they didn't want me. So she had 199 00:17:09,560 --> 00:17:13,290 to leave her life's work. And she was largely erased, actually, from everything 200 00:17:13,290 --> 00:17:18,699 that she did, even though she founded this iconic this absolutely iconic workshop. 201 00:17:18,699 --> 00:17:24,150 And she went off and created. She didn't have a sad life after that. She - she went 202 00:17:24,150 --> 00:17:29,620 off and created em, this wild synthesiser, which is in the London Science Museum. And 203 00:17:29,620 --> 00:17:34,910 I was like instead of she she loved looking at wave forms of music. So she 204 00:17:34,910 --> 00:17:37,980 thought she would use watercolor to draw the wave forms and then have a synthesizer 205 00:17:37,980 --> 00:17:41,400 interpret those wave forms. And that's called the Oramics Machine is like 206 00:17:41,400 --> 00:17:45,550 absolutely wild. You can look that up on the Internet as well. It's cool to look 207 00:17:45,550 --> 00:17:51,700 at. So, yeah, she's becoming a bit more popular now because of the work of some of 208 00:17:51,700 --> 00:17:55,760 the guys at the Radiophonic Workshop who still exist. Some of the old guys who go 209 00:17:55,760 --> 00:18:00,380 around telling cool stories about them. And but also because of the woman she 210 00:18:00,380 --> 00:18:05,900 helped bring in who stayed after she left. And she's quite famous now because of 211 00:18:05,900 --> 00:18:10,039 something I'll show you. It's this lady. And this is Delia Derbyshire, who's head 212 00:18:10,039 --> 00:18:14,980 of Delia Derbyshire. A lot more of you. I thought so. Now, Delia Derbyshire again 213 00:18:14,980 --> 00:18:18,230 the same? She's got a maths and music degree. She couldn't get a job, but she 214 00:18:18,230 --> 00:18:21,970 ended up basically pestering them into letting her do some interning at the 215 00:18:21,970 --> 00:18:27,539 Radiophonic Workshop and eventually got a job there. And then she was the arranger 216 00:18:27,539 --> 00:18:34,270 and made the instrumentation for this. Now I'm going to play this for you. Before I 217 00:18:34,270 --> 00:18:39,600 do, I want you to think about the fact that at the time every sound had to be 218 00:18:39,600 --> 00:18:46,140 physically cut and sticky taped together, every sing-. And there's no multi-track 219 00:18:46,140 --> 00:18:50,659 recorders back then either. OK. So you have to. It's an absolutely enormous 220 00:18:50,659 --> 00:18:54,630 process of recording the sounds, stretching the sound, cutting the sounds, 221 00:18:54,630 --> 00:18:58,640 sticking it back together, making on a reel, recording that onto a separate reel. 222 00:18:58,640 --> 00:19:01,750 Then you've got this and then you add more sounds and then you have like several 223 00:19:01,750 --> 00:19:08,090 tapes that you have to condense into each other without multi-track technology. OK. 224 00:19:08,090 --> 00:19:13,880 They're literally on different machines shouting "Go" at each other. And that's 225 00:19:13,880 --> 00:19:17,400 how they recharged multi-track. But she was very blasé about it. It was kind of amusing 226 00:19:17,400 --> 00:19:20,809 because it seems ridiculous to me now to be able to compose a piece of music 227 00:19:20,809 --> 00:19:26,940 like that, like a jigsaw puzzle. But she just shrugged and said, well, 228 00:19:26,940 --> 00:19:34,550 seemed to work. I find that kind of charming but yes. So that's. Oh, no. Why didn't it play? 229 00:19:34,550 --> 00:19:37,170 *low volume static noise* 230 00:19:37,170 --> 00:19:44,530 Oh, no. Huh, goddamned. Well I'm gonna play it for you anyway. 231 00:19:44,530 --> 00:19:48,620 Oh, it's playing! Oh good, it just took a minute. 232 00:19:48,620 --> 00:19:59,760 *Doctor Who Theme playing* 233 00:19:59,760 --> 00:20:03,710 [over the music] No theremin. No synthesizers existed. This was literally 234 00:20:03,710 --> 00:20:13,429 just tapes. And she also made her own instruments so she [inaudible], including 235 00:20:13,429 --> 00:20:17,240 my favourite which is called the wopulator(?). And that just a good name 236 00:20:17,240 --> 00:20:24,078 Yeah, so uhm, they actually used a lot of electronic engineering gear in their work. 237 00:20:24,078 --> 00:20:27,910 Anyway, we know how this goes. And I don't want to get another copyright violation. 238 00:20:27,910 --> 00:20:31,567 *Doctor Who Theme stops* So let's move on. I did actually want to 239 00:20:31,567 --> 00:20:37,100 play one of her own songs, so that's her commercial work. But she was also an 240 00:20:37,100 --> 00:20:42,809 electronic experimental musician of her own and on her own accord. And she I think 241 00:20:42,809 --> 00:20:49,250 you kind of forget that music in the 50s and 60s actually kind of was wild as well. 242 00:20:49,250 --> 00:20:51,829 Let's see if we... *Music playing* 243 00:20:51,829 --> 00:20:55,340 [talking over music] This is one of her tracks from the 60s. 244 00:20:55,340 --> 00:21:13,369 Kind of a banger. [making sounds] 245 00:21:13,369 --> 00:21:19,609 You might even recognize this track, because someone did sample it. 246 00:21:19,609 --> 00:21:23,659 Die Antwoord literally just rapped over the top of that and then released it as a 247 00:21:23,659 --> 00:21:32,659 track. She made this for a science fiction show that was based on an Asimov story and 248 00:21:32,659 --> 00:21:36,049 this remains, but the Asimov story that it was made for has been deleted from the BBC 249 00:21:36,049 --> 00:21:42,510 archives, which I find to be an absolute tragedy. I would love to watch that. If 250 00:21:42,510 --> 00:21:47,140 you uhm if you flip it back, the robotic sound is singing "praise be to the 251 00:21:47,140 --> 00:21:50,590 master". *Music stops* 252 00:21:50,590 --> 00:21:54,690 Thank you, Daphne. And so that's the that's my story of the BBC Radiophonic 253 00:21:54,690 --> 00:21:58,620 Workshop. But I wanted to leave you with a quote from one of the BBC Radiophonic 254 00:21:58,620 --> 00:22:03,350 Workshop engineers. Unfortunately unnamed in the documentary that I watched and I 255 00:22:03,350 --> 00:22:06,720 just thought this was kind of a cute sentiment because they were making things 256 00:22:06,720 --> 00:22:09,960 up. They weren't - they weren't the experts in the room. They didn't know what 257 00:22:09,960 --> 00:22:15,330 they couldn't do. So they just basically managed to mess around with stuff and 258 00:22:15,330 --> 00:22:19,179 ended up with something really special and really cool and something that was just 259 00:22:19,179 --> 00:22:24,260 iconic. You know, some of the biggest electronic music acts in the world today, 260 00:22:24,260 --> 00:22:29,101 still say that the work at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop was one of the big 261 00:22:29,101 --> 00:22:37,040 influences in life as well. So. So, yeah, that's the BBC Radiophonic Workshop. And I 262 00:22:37,040 --> 00:22:41,571 think it's very important that we allow for ridiculousness in technology and we 263 00:22:41,571 --> 00:22:48,240 allow for ugly noises and we allow for stupid things that don't fully - you don't 264 00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:54,620 really see what they're for. Like the power of them allowing for experimentation 265 00:22:54,620 --> 00:22:59,210 that isn't very successful at first or doesn't sound successful. The idea is 266 00:22:59,210 --> 00:23:07,100 really important. Yeah. So outsiders, hooray. That was a golden age. We've got 267 00:23:07,100 --> 00:23:12,419 the invention of a new technology and what resulted in democratization. You know, the 268 00:23:12,419 --> 00:23:18,309 availability of a new technology to a reasonable number of people led to this 269 00:23:18,309 --> 00:23:23,429 uhm to this amazing sea change in the way that people made music, made digital music 270 00:23:23,429 --> 00:23:27,960 and analog back then. But, you know, the way that we make music was changed by 271 00:23:27,960 --> 00:23:34,050 these experimenters. It was definitely a golden age for - for new techniques. But I 272 00:23:34,050 --> 00:23:37,840 think that we're currently in a golden age for people who are working with 273 00:23:37,840 --> 00:23:45,990 experimental instruments and experimental sound in general. And I think that we. So 274 00:23:45,990 --> 00:23:49,200 we've got loads and loads of really exciting new technologies that are 275 00:23:49,200 --> 00:23:53,640 available. We've got cheap microcontrollers. We've we can make our 276 00:23:53,640 --> 00:23:58,260 own PCBs. We can make our own synthesizers. We can access people, which 277 00:23:58,260 --> 00:24:02,160 is which is really crucial. I mean, think about Daphne. She didn't learn about 278 00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:06,270 musique concrète and she didn't find the BBC Radiophonic Workshop until she had a 279 00:24:06,270 --> 00:24:10,950 spark of an idea from somebody else. So really, it is learning tools, learning 280 00:24:10,950 --> 00:24:15,970 type, you know, gaining access to tools, learning new techniques and learning and 281 00:24:15,970 --> 00:24:20,410 being inspired by other people is really, really critical for anything to to really 282 00:24:20,410 --> 00:24:24,360 change and to really and to happen. But I think that at the moment we've been 283 00:24:24,360 --> 00:24:27,950 really, really cool, accessible new technologies that more and more people are 284 00:24:27,950 --> 00:24:34,020 learning how to use and more and more are becoming much simpler as well. And and 285 00:24:34,020 --> 00:24:37,970 crucially, people are more accessible. So people share, particularly in our 286 00:24:37,970 --> 00:24:42,659 community, people share their knowledge and very freely. And you don't have to be 287 00:24:42,659 --> 00:24:44,659 in the same room to do this. I know a bunch of people are listening on the 288 00:24:44,659 --> 00:24:49,750 livestream right now. So you don't have to be here to learn about things. 289 00:24:49,750 --> 00:24:54,840 And you don't have to be in the room to lend it - to attend a workshop with 290 00:24:54,840 --> 00:24:58,909 somebody. Right. There's these wonderful YouTube tutorials now for sharing 291 00:24:58,909 --> 00:25:03,700 information. Niche communities are just way more accessible through online places. 292 00:25:03,700 --> 00:25:11,120 And we've got an incredible community and abundance as well. So this is I mean, I 293 00:25:11,120 --> 00:25:14,409 shouldn't have put this slide in here but it doesn't matter. Uhm so this is this is 294 00:25:14,409 --> 00:25:19,679 one of my old hacker spaces. It's Machines Room. In uhm in London. And it was where - 295 00:25:19,679 --> 00:25:23,669 where the music, technology, one of the places where the music tech community in 296 00:25:23,669 --> 00:25:29,470 London was centered. And they did some, it was there on the London hackerspace, but 297 00:25:29,470 --> 00:25:34,530 we did a lot of things. But there's a community called the hackoustic that I was 298 00:25:34,530 --> 00:25:38,900 involved with. And we used to do a lot of events there. I'm saying that the reason I 299 00:25:38,900 --> 00:25:43,230 put this slide down was just just to show that hacker spaces and maker spaces often 300 00:25:43,230 --> 00:25:47,549 have some kind of music technology partnerships and those kind of central 301 00:25:47,549 --> 00:25:51,450 spaces where you can share things and share knowledge and get inspired by each 302 00:25:51,450 --> 00:25:55,080 other's work and also hold events is really, really crucial. Actually, I do 303 00:25:55,080 --> 00:26:01,070 know why I put this slide in. So, so this slide the - this this was a wonderful 304 00:26:01,070 --> 00:26:07,120 space for uhm for three years. And then the landlord raised the rent four times 305 00:26:07,120 --> 00:26:15,010 and this amazing community of artists and designers and music hackers was removed, 306 00:26:15,010 --> 00:26:19,169 and at the same time, the London hackspace moved from central London to west London 307 00:26:19,169 --> 00:26:23,070 and a bunch of other hacker spaces and fab labs closed as well just because of how 308 00:26:23,070 --> 00:26:29,309 expensive the center of London had had become. And there's just as a direct 309 00:26:29,309 --> 00:26:33,679 result of that, I moved to Berlin. So like this is there by, by, uhm by allowing this 310 00:26:33,679 --> 00:26:37,830 kind of gentrification of our hackerspaces we actually do destroy community as much 311 00:26:37,830 --> 00:26:44,980 as we can create community online as well. Like this. So this is uhm this is an 312 00:26:44,980 --> 00:26:49,370 example of awesome online community. This is, um, YouTube uhm video from someone 313 00:26:49,370 --> 00:26:53,179 from the London music tech hacker scene and probably the most famous person from 314 00:26:53,179 --> 00:26:57,640 it. And it's a guy called Sam who goes by "Look Mum No Computer" on the Internet. 315 00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:01,980 And he he's an electronic engineer and general purpose weirdo. Which is why I 316 00:27:01,980 --> 00:27:07,549 like him. And this is one of his creations. He made a Furby synth, which is 317 00:27:07,549 --> 00:27:13,570 as horrific as you imagine, if not more so. So don't look that up. I mean, do look 318 00:27:13,570 --> 00:27:18,200 that up. But it is genuinely be prepared to not have a nice time. But he doesn't 319 00:27:18,200 --> 00:27:22,080 just show his instruments. He doesn't just perform with them. He he does really 320 00:27:22,080 --> 00:27:25,640 awesome electronics teardowns as well. So I've learned a bunch of stuff from 321 00:27:25,640 --> 00:27:30,500 watching his videos and looking at actually how he's done them. And that's 322 00:27:30,500 --> 00:27:34,409 something that's really exciting. I mean, like maybe 20 years ago, I wouldn't have 323 00:27:34,409 --> 00:27:36,960 had access to this kind of knowledge. I just would have I probably wouldn't have 324 00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:40,630 even known that I like this kind of stuff, you know, wouldn't have been exposed to 325 00:27:40,630 --> 00:27:43,820 it. And then I certainly wouldn't... You know, I've been going down my my local pub 326 00:27:43,820 --> 00:27:49,011 saying, hey, he wants to work on, uh, on a weird Furby instrument with me. And they'd 327 00:27:49,011 --> 00:27:54,010 be like, well, no. So it's kind of nice to be able to show your weird passions with 328 00:27:54,010 --> 00:27:58,240 the people on the Internet. And then, of course, we have, we're at one of these. 329 00:27:58,240 --> 00:28:02,809 This is me and my friend Phoenix. We've done a fair bit of music tech hacking 330 00:28:02,809 --> 00:28:08,830 together. And this is actually the British version of Congress, EMF camp. I guess 331 00:28:08,830 --> 00:28:12,440 it's the version of Chaos camp, actually. But so yeah, EMF camp, which is actually 332 00:28:12,440 --> 00:28:17,360 in 2020 this year. It's a yes. It's really cool small hacker festival or but these 333 00:28:17,360 --> 00:28:22,419 kind of spaces and these kind of events really allow. I mean, I've learned so much 334 00:28:22,419 --> 00:28:27,559 just by being here the last couple of days. And every time we do this, we should 335 00:28:27,559 --> 00:28:32,400 cherish and we should cherish the hacker spaces and the events. And we should also 336 00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:35,991 support people like Sam, who makes his living through Patreon and on YouTube, you 337 00:28:35,991 --> 00:28:41,130 know, so by supporting maker spaces and events and also by supporting individual 338 00:28:41,130 --> 00:28:45,560 people who are putting the effort in to create and share work, I think and we can 339 00:28:45,560 --> 00:28:52,419 cherish this community. OK. Onto the final bit. I'm going to show you some - some of 340 00:28:52,419 --> 00:28:58,270 the cool projects that I've been working on with other people. But the reason I've 341 00:28:58,270 --> 00:29:03,190 chosen the ones that I'm showing you is because they are also using some of my 342 00:29:03,190 --> 00:29:08,220 favorite ways that you can hack on instruments. So I figured I'd show you a 343 00:29:08,220 --> 00:29:13,010 project, but also show you how to make, you know, how you can have a go at it. So 344 00:29:13,010 --> 00:29:18,500 recently I've lived in London and Berlin, and one of my favorite things to do is 345 00:29:18,500 --> 00:29:24,460 when I'm in a space is to make an instrument in the context of two people's 346 00:29:24,460 --> 00:29:29,169 work, two or more people's work. I always find like my work is always way better if 347 00:29:29,169 --> 00:29:34,730 I'm collaborating with somebody else. So you know what they do and what I do 348 00:29:34,730 --> 00:29:38,340 smushed together to create something that's better than either of us could have 349 00:29:38,340 --> 00:29:43,620 done on our own. And I think this is a good example if it will play and this is 350 00:29:43,620 --> 00:29:46,320 one of my first sonic soul circuits sculpture creatures. 351 00:29:46,320 --> 00:29:51,950 *plucking sounds* This started off as a hack just overnight 352 00:29:51,950 --> 00:30:00,789 hack with my composer friend Andrew Hockey and Drew Fustini from Oshpark and myself, 353 00:30:00,789 --> 00:30:05,000 obviously, and we worked together overnight to create this. This is a 354 00:30:05,000 --> 00:30:09,240 circuit sculpture. If you don't know what a circuit sculpture is, it's basically uhm 355 00:30:09,240 --> 00:30:14,039 instead of putting your circuit inside of a box, all of the parts or the key parts 356 00:30:14,039 --> 00:30:20,300 of it are shown and are actually celebrated as art in their own light. And 357 00:30:20,300 --> 00:30:23,299 so that's what a circuit sculpture is. And there's a couple of wonderful people and 358 00:30:23,299 --> 00:30:29,240 there is this guy called Mohit(?) who makes really beautiful things. He's living 359 00:30:29,240 --> 00:30:34,940 in San Francisco. And then this guy called Giri(?), who is in Prague, I want to say. 360 00:30:34,940 --> 00:30:41,610 And they make really, really awesome, tiny, neat things. But I I'm not tiny and 361 00:30:41,610 --> 00:30:46,529 neat, so I make big, massive and messy things. So this is the first one I made. 362 00:30:46,529 --> 00:30:50,140 It was really interesting to me. I really like capacitive touch as a technology and 363 00:30:50,140 --> 00:30:55,880 it's can be unreliable, but I find it kind of really fun to work with. And it's very 364 00:30:55,880 --> 00:31:01,809 intuitive for a musician. And then that led to me developing a second creature. 365 00:31:01,809 --> 00:31:07,750 And I'm really inspired by kind of utopian science fiction. And I wanted to make a 366 00:31:07,750 --> 00:31:12,470 series of creatures that inhabited the same world and sung when you touch them. 367 00:31:12,470 --> 00:31:17,169 So this was the second in the series. This is a more traditional instrument. I mean, 368 00:31:17,169 --> 00:31:20,710 obviously, it's still weird. It's more traditional in the - past one, the second 369 00:31:20,710 --> 00:31:27,130 one, the first one was generative in some way, like semi generative. And this one is 370 00:31:27,130 --> 00:31:31,450 more like one note per limb with two modes of modulation. This is a bass. 371 00:31:31,450 --> 00:31:45,740 *synth bass sound playing* "wobb wobb wobb". 372 00:31:45,740 --> 00:31:58,780 *Helen chuckles* So that's my base creature, which I'm 373 00:31:58,780 --> 00:32:03,549 actually developing for a real musician now and a woman, amazing bassist called 374 00:32:03,549 --> 00:32:07,220 Ayse Hassan who is the basis for the Savages and just was on tour with the 375 00:32:07,220 --> 00:32:13,169 Pixies and I'm going to - I'm making her a stage presence one. And so she's going to 376 00:32:13,169 --> 00:32:16,770 be able to play it, but that's gonna be more generation based as well. But it's 377 00:32:16,770 --> 00:32:21,590 kind of interesting to to try and create something that in its functionality is 378 00:32:21,590 --> 00:32:27,899 very traditional, but in its form is really weird. And that's kind of fun to 379 00:32:27,899 --> 00:32:34,840 play with. But now my latest one is another creature. But this is kind of like 380 00:32:34,840 --> 00:32:41,039 an abstract sensicle pod. It's gonna be human sized. And each of the limbs will 381 00:32:41,039 --> 00:32:45,460 pay a different part of the choral arrangement. And then there's like some 382 00:32:45,460 --> 00:32:48,640 kind of like sunlight feature at the top where you can modulate it by touching the 383 00:32:48,640 --> 00:32:54,269 copper rods. I've actually made a prototype, which you can listen to. So 384 00:32:54,269 --> 00:32:58,390 this is this is the latest version of one of the limbs of the tentacle, which I made 385 00:32:58,390 --> 00:33:02,529 and it just made it for the form. But then everybody seems to really like cuddling 386 00:33:02,529 --> 00:33:07,580 it. It's very comforting. So I decided to make it purr after I'd finished 387 00:33:07,580 --> 00:33:12,529 prototyping. If you want to listen to my purring tentacle afterwards, you can. It 388 00:33:12,529 --> 00:33:17,850 does sometimes work, but I should say actually. Hello. So this is it. This is, 389 00:33:17,850 --> 00:33:21,769 um. This is machine embroidered conductive thread so that - that is able then to 390 00:33:21,769 --> 00:33:27,200 detect capacity. That's a capacitive touch sensor essentially - It's a sensicle. And 391 00:33:27,200 --> 00:33:30,620 so yeah you can see that afterwards if you want. It mostly works. I made it yesterday 392 00:33:30,620 --> 00:33:38,269 so that's quite fine. But again, you know, I would not have been able to create the 393 00:33:38,269 --> 00:33:43,160 intricate sounds without the help of my composer friend, and I would not have been 394 00:33:43,160 --> 00:33:46,470 able you know this and I would not been able to get the implementation that I 395 00:33:46,470 --> 00:33:51,299 wanted onto the beagleboard whithout erm, Drew. And so it's, it's, it's, it's really 396 00:33:51,299 --> 00:33:55,260 nice to kind of like sit together and mash up your mash up your skills. 397 00:33:55,260 --> 00:34:00,260 *bottles falling over* Now, these all use one of these and this 398 00:34:00,260 --> 00:34:07,389 is another one of my instruments. This is a wearable, flexible PCB, it's gonna be a 399 00:34:07,389 --> 00:34:12,090 vocoder, but it's not finished yet. But. But the reason I'm showing you that is 400 00:34:12,090 --> 00:34:17,040 because that's the sensor that I use. This is a they call it the trill. It's 401 00:34:17,040 --> 00:34:20,550 essentially like if anybody viewed any of you who used capacitive touch before, you 402 00:34:20,550 --> 00:34:27,760 probably used an MPR121 sensor. This is like an MPR121 sensor ++. It's much more.. 403 00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:34,170 they've got... a) it's got like 20 something pins, which is wild and it's way 404 00:34:34,170 --> 00:34:38,260 more sensitive as well. So I find it really really great. So if anybody's doing 405 00:34:38,260 --> 00:34:41,030 stuff with cap touch and they're having some problems with it: a) make sure you 406 00:34:41,030 --> 00:34:45,500 ground it and b) have a go on that trail. It's like 10 euros. I think that, that 407 00:34:45,500 --> 00:34:49,980 sensor. And it is done by bela. You can see one of their boards there. Now I'm 408 00:34:49,980 --> 00:34:53,490 gonna do a whole slide about bela and Fan Girl about them because they're my 409 00:34:53,490 --> 00:34:59,170 favorite technology at the moment to use for embedded systems, for embedded 410 00:34:59,170 --> 00:35:02,760 instruments. And this is like the size, this is this big. It is based on the 411 00:35:02,760 --> 00:35:07,020 pocket beagle, which is the size of a small Altoids tin. So it's very, very 412 00:35:07,020 --> 00:35:13,331 small. But it runs, it runs, it's a full Linux computer and is really, really 413 00:35:13,331 --> 00:35:16,950 awesome. Super, super responsive, super low latency, which is really important 414 00:35:16,950 --> 00:35:22,010 when you're creating instruments. But also the cool thing is it runs this. This is 415 00:35:22,010 --> 00:35:26,350 PureData. It's a visual programing language for sound creation. A lot of 416 00:35:26,350 --> 00:35:32,590 artists and sound designers and music creators, they use this already. You 417 00:35:32,590 --> 00:35:35,450 might. This is very similar to something called Max, actually made by the same guy. 418 00:35:35,450 --> 00:35:42,140 But this one's open source. Yeah. So and so that's bela and PureData. Definitely 419 00:35:42,140 --> 00:35:46,641 worth checking out if you're interested in instrument design. The reason the bela is 420 00:35:46,641 --> 00:35:51,830 special is because, because of the latency, but also because no other... So 421 00:35:51,830 --> 00:35:56,120 you can't get a microcontroller that will run PureData except for the Raspberry Pi 422 00:35:56,120 --> 00:36:01,190 does. But the latency on the Raspberry Pi is like meeh. So I would always suggest if 423 00:36:01,190 --> 00:36:08,850 you're doing something. The bela and PureData is a nice combo. OK. That's that 424 00:36:08,850 --> 00:36:13,870 one. Then the other project I wanted to talk to you briefly about is, is this is 425 00:36:13,870 --> 00:36:16,850 Ariana Grande, who you probably don't know who she is, but anyone under the age of 13 426 00:36:16,850 --> 00:36:19,790 certainly will. And here she is demoing and is called MI MU glove. 427 00:36:19,790 --> 00:36:21,160 *music playing* [talking over music] 428 00:36:21,160 --> 00:36:29,550 It's a gesture control. I say yes, gesture control. And she's controlling, she's 429 00:36:29,550 --> 00:36:36,750 doing looping. She's doing effects using gestures. Obviously, gestures, various 430 00:36:36,750 --> 00:36:39,750 gestures. Thank you, Ariana. *music stops* 431 00:36:39,750 --> 00:36:43,581 So that's that's the that's the. This is what she's using here. And this is coming 432 00:36:43,581 --> 00:36:49,420 out of London. About of the music tech company called MI MU, that was originated 433 00:36:49,420 --> 00:36:54,770 by Imogen Heap, if you know her. And I saw the Ariana video and something I didn't 434 00:36:54,770 --> 00:36:58,340 mention is I actually do quite a lot of teaching as well. And when I saw that 435 00:36:58,340 --> 00:37:01,731 Ariana video, I just thought I was like, oh, my God, if I showed this to a 12 year 436 00:37:01,731 --> 00:37:06,580 old girl and told them we could make one, they were going to lose their mind. So 437 00:37:06,580 --> 00:37:10,160 these cost like five grand, though. So I don't think I could get one of these in 438 00:37:10,160 --> 00:37:15,490 the classroom. So I just messaged Imogen and asked her if I could make a children's 439 00:37:15,490 --> 00:37:26,110 version. And so I did. She said yes. And she - we, this is this is a wonderful 440 00:37:26,110 --> 00:37:31,940 piece of technology called the micro:bit. And it's a DIY, it's like my first 441 00:37:31,940 --> 00:37:36,310 microcontroller that is made by the BBC. It's like 10 pounds. It's very, very 442 00:37:36,310 --> 00:37:41,620 cheap. It doesn't do a lot. But what it does, it does very well and very simply. 443 00:37:41,620 --> 00:37:49,070 And I was able to make an approximation of a five thousand dollar glove with a ten 444 00:37:49,070 --> 00:37:54,560 dollar microcontroller, which is nice. That's what the core of the product that I 445 00:37:54,560 --> 00:38:01,080 made is actually in. But. I haven't got the time to talk to you about that. That's 446 00:38:01,080 --> 00:38:04,090 my leather robot unicorn. I gesture control, but I can't tell you about that. 447 00:38:04,090 --> 00:38:07,350 This is another artist, got no time for that. So we're getting onto this last one. 448 00:38:07,350 --> 00:38:15,380 So basically I was able to - with one bridge, one micro:bit and a little bit of 449 00:38:15,380 --> 00:38:18,890 code to get it to work on professional music software. And this is a musician 450 00:38:18,890 --> 00:38:24,830 called Bishi who's really awesome and this is her using my ten dollar hack. 451 00:38:24,830 --> 00:38:28,560 *music playing* [talking over music] 452 00:38:28,560 --> 00:38:35,130 To do very similar things. To the 5000 dollar. And of course, that's not stadium 453 00:38:35,130 --> 00:38:40,810 level. Ariana claimed they couldn't use that on tour. But it's it was a fun 454 00:38:40,810 --> 00:38:45,620 project that we hacked together. *music stops* 455 00:38:45,620 --> 00:38:51,840 And that is that's my time. I have done all of it, by the way. All of this, how I 456 00:38:51,840 --> 00:38:57,390 did that. And that's all on my GitHub. All of the code. If you've already got a 457 00:38:57,390 --> 00:39:02,000 micro:bit, you can do, you can do it yourself or you can get the kits for like 458 00:39:02,000 --> 00:39:05,830 30 bucks. It's not very expensive. So all that's on my GitHub along with some weird 459 00:39:05,830 --> 00:39:10,720 factory signs of things. And you can follow along on on my weird electronic 460 00:39:10,720 --> 00:39:17,390 adventures on my Twitter. I'm pretty reactive. So say hi to me and I'll be 461 00:39:17,390 --> 00:39:21,150 hanging around here if you want to listen to my tentacle. So the end, okay. 462 00:39:21,150 --> 00:39:24,330 *applause* 463 00:39:24,330 --> 00:39:37,870 Herald: Helen Leigh, woo. Thank you, Helen, for his fantastic presentation. I'm 464 00:39:37,870 --> 00:39:43,370 wondering actually, how are we gonna play that thing there? What it's like. I had a 465 00:39:43,370 --> 00:39:49,460 questions here. No. Yes. Yes. Online, of course. They are far more, more speedy 466 00:39:49,460 --> 00:39:52,990 than we are. Shoot! Signal Angel: So the question from the 467 00:39:52,990 --> 00:39:59,290 Internet is: Have you ever considered creating music without human interaction? 468 00:39:59,290 --> 00:40:01,350 Helen: Yes. *laughs* 469 00:40:01,350 --> 00:40:08,110 Her: Okay then, next one. Hel: Thank you. Good night. No, I mean, 470 00:40:08,110 --> 00:40:13,810 I'm personally I'm a very tactile person and so I like creating instruments that 471 00:40:13,810 --> 00:40:22,470 you... that you stroke that are affectionate almost and kind. I like 472 00:40:22,470 --> 00:40:26,180 giving the things that I create some kind of persona and that you interact with 473 00:40:26,180 --> 00:40:29,520 them. However, a lot of people use... there's a lot people doing really 474 00:40:29,520 --> 00:40:35,320 interesting things with generative, non- human interactive art. In fact, the 475 00:40:35,320 --> 00:40:38,790 composer friend that I was talking about, Andrew Hockey, who's done a lovely... He's 476 00:40:38,790 --> 00:40:44,020 haked a musical marble run and that is just automated. I mean, when the marbles 477 00:40:44,020 --> 00:40:48,180 go down, the marble run. It will trigger generative signs, which is really, really 478 00:40:48,180 --> 00:40:53,570 cool. There's lots of people doing it. But for me personally, I just I know. I like. 479 00:40:53,570 --> 00:40:57,320 I like touching the objects that I make. You know, I'm the kind of strange person 480 00:40:57,320 --> 00:41:00,520 who walks around a craft store with a multimeter kind of like touching things 481 00:41:00,520 --> 00:41:04,040 and figuring out if they're conductive, like adequately conductive. 482 00:41:04,040 --> 00:41:08,230 Her: You're measuring out... Hel: Yeah. So for example, in fabric 483 00:41:08,230 --> 00:41:10,760 stores, there might be something that's conductive. That's not actually built as 484 00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:15,480 conductive. Or I'll often go to art stores and craft stores or architectural supply 485 00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:21,040 stores. And you can find you know, you don't have to go to Conrad. You can go to 486 00:41:21,040 --> 00:41:26,290 Modulor with your multimeter. If I just like you can, you know see if it's 487 00:41:26,290 --> 00:41:28,600 conductive or it's not. *laughs* 488 00:41:28,600 --> 00:41:34,000 Herold: We believe you. I'm just imagining you there. 489 00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:37,760 Helen: Oh, yeah. No, it's... Herold: At a flea market. 490 00:41:37,760 --> 00:41:40,650 Helen: I've had some strange looks. *laughing* 491 00:41:40,650 --> 00:41:44,780 Herold: That question here from number two please here in the front. 492 00:41:44,780 --> 00:41:50,180 Mic 2: Have you also created instruments that actually work with the physicality of 493 00:41:50,180 --> 00:41:58,010 the object that you have built instead of triggering some processing? 494 00:41:58,010 --> 00:42:06,740 Helen: So actually, you mean... Mic 2: Like what if the tentacle itself, 495 00:42:06,740 --> 00:42:11,400 the sound it produces would be amplified and somehow that, the base of the 496 00:42:11,400 --> 00:42:17,030 processing of the actual... Helen: Oh, you mean more acoustic. Yeah. 497 00:42:17,030 --> 00:42:20,970 Actually when the tentacle is done it will have some kind of physical feedback loop 498 00:42:20,970 --> 00:42:27,970 in it that will be reactive to its uhm, to its space, to its personal space even as 499 00:42:27,970 --> 00:42:30,870 well. So actually the cool thing about capacitive touch technology is if you get 500 00:42:30,870 --> 00:42:37,330 the thresholding right, you can not just sense touch. You can sense proximity and 501 00:42:37,330 --> 00:42:40,710 that kind of also very cool how many people are in the room as well. So you can 502 00:42:40,710 --> 00:42:45,210 get it to react quite... not uniformly, but you can get it to react quite nicely 503 00:42:45,210 --> 00:42:51,410 to its environment and also the way that people are manipulating it as 504 00:42:51,410 --> 00:42:54,650 well. And you can also code some cool things into that as well. So basically 505 00:42:54,650 --> 00:42:59,510 based on, you know, like the number of touches. How often people have played with 506 00:42:59,510 --> 00:43:03,500 it and, you know, and then and how people have played with it. And get that type of 507 00:43:03,500 --> 00:43:08,140 feedback in to the music that it's making in a generative fashion. There's lots of 508 00:43:08,140 --> 00:43:10,880 cool things that I want to do with this next sculpture. But yeah 509 00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:12,430 *laughs* Mic 2: Thanks. 510 00:43:12,430 --> 00:43:19,570 Herold: I'm so sad. I really have to spoil it here. Really... we have to shut this now. 511 00:43:19,570 --> 00:43:26,760 And I would like you to ask do to talk to her personally. Here next to the stage. 512 00:43:26,760 --> 00:43:31,490 Thank you all for being here. Thank you. Thank you. And leave for this fantastic 513 00:43:31,490 --> 00:43:33,490 presentation on. 514 00:43:33,490 --> 00:43:34,490 *applause* 515 00:43:34,490 --> 00:43:35,490 *36c3 postroll music* 516 00:43:35,490 --> 00:44:00,000 Subtitles created by c3subtitles.de in the year 2021. Join, and help us!